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Included in Build Adapt Escort Quests to be more Interesting

This might be a fun thing to change tomorrow. Few things to do:
1. Ensure you can NOT normally touch an escort ship
2. Make escort ships turn hostile to you when you hoist a pirate flag (using mutiny)
3. Add a chance of an enemy ship at the destination, which triggers a larger monetary reward
 
There was definitely an error in the ship transfer interface that accidentally allowed you to swap with the trader. No more!
And I don't think the IsTrader function even remotely did what it was supposed to, so I changed that code to do what I think it was intended to do.
This should make it a lot harder to mess around with quest traders.

Additionally, if you hoist a flag that is hostile to the trader original nation, he'll mutiny and the quest will fail.
This allows you to loot the trader at your leisure.
 
And one more update: There is now a 50% chance of there being an enemy generated at the destination island for you to fight.
I set this as a simple fixed chance because while this does add to the danger, it is not necessarily a bad thing either.
Therefore scaling it on luck may not make all that much sense.

When this happens, you will get a monetary bonus from the quest trader.
The first time this will be modest at 100-200 gold, but it has a cumulative effect.
For each time you "save" a quest trader, the bonus increases. But if you fail an escort quest, the counter is reset.

That should help in making these quests potentially more rewarding. Though hopefully not excessively so.

In any case, it gives you guys something a bit new to play with. :cheeky
 
Pieter Boelen said:
Additionally, if you hoist a flag that is hostile to the trader original nation, he'll mutiny and the quest will fail.
This allows you to loot the trader at your leisure.
Click to expand...
It also means you're stuffed if he wants to be taken to a hostile port. If you hoist a false flag to get into that port, the trader will mutiny; if you don't, the fort will attack you.

Perhaps make it that the trader only mutinies if you hoist a pirate flag? If you're planning to betray and loot him, you're turning pirate anyway...
 
Unless I am very much mistaken, the traders are coded to never ask to be brought to hostile ports.
Please correct me if I'm wrong on that.

Strange thing is that "locked" companion ships don't change flags when you do,
which could be the reason for some of the odd effects that have been reported recently, such as this one:
http://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/save-at-sea-friendly-fire-after-loading.24797/
 
Even if traders are set to only go to a port which is friendly at the time the quest starts, that port might not be friendly by the time you get there if changing relations are enabled. Unless traders only ask to be taken to ports of the same nation as the one where the quest starts? And will these revisions have any effect on the Vigilia Mendes quest? That's effectively a two-way escort quest which may get interesting in a time period in which Spain and France are at war...
 
Grey Roger said:
Even if traders are set to only go to a port which is friendly at the time the quest starts, that port might not be friendly by the time you get there if changing relations are enabled.
Click to expand...
That could potentially happen, I suppose. Though should be a pretty rare event.
Not sure how to completely prevent that. I could indeed link the "mutiny" to only hoisting the pirate flag, but that seems like a less all-inclusive "solution".

Grey Roger said:
And will these revisions have any effect on the Vigilia Mendes quest? That's effectively a two-way escort quest which may get interesting in a time period in which Spain and France are at war...
Click to expand...
Not by default, I think because he is a pre-defined quest character instead of a regular quest trader.
Might need to check his quest to ensure he is treated in a similar way to the regular ones.
 
I wait to do Vigila Mendez until France and Spain are friendly with each other because he takes whatever flag you are flying when you talk to him. My personal flag doesn't seem to work so well so I fly the French flag.
 
Wait, what's wrong with your personal flag? That's the one thing that should be pretty reliable. :confused:
 
Well, just because France and Spain are on good terms, it doesn't mean they are on good terms with ME.
 
Well yes; if they don't like you, your personal flag would be exactly no help at all. :facepalm
 
Extra enemies or escort quests plus added reward (increases for each escort quest) are now included in the Beta 3.5 WIP.
Does this make those types of quests more worthwhile and profitable?

Also, the feature of double-crossing your companion is included now. How does that work?
And anyone noticed any unintended side-effects from that yet?
 
I don't know if it counts as an unintended side effect or an intended way to foul things up for the player, but if you hoist a false flag in order to enter a hostile port for other business, even if you have no intention of double-crossing, the companion takes objection to that. (I wasn't even at sea at the time. I'd landed at Octopus Bay, intending to do some peaceful trading in St. Pierre, while taking a merchant to St. George. Once ashore, I switched flag to French so that I could talk to the store. The merchant promptly turned nasty.)

The bonus enemy ship at the destination port does make things a bit more interesting, and more profitable. Partly because of the extra reward from the escorted captain. And partly from capturing and selling the enemy ship. :rpirate
 
Grey Roger said:
I don't know if it counts as an unintended side effect or an intended way to foul things up for the player, but if you hoist a false flag in order to enter a hostile port for other business, even if you have no intention of double-crossing, the companion takes objection to that.
Click to expand...
Ah, yes; that would indeed happen. First question would be: Should you be going into that hostile port while escorting that merchant?
If you were that merchant, how much would you appreciate being led into dangerous waters? I don't think I'd like that and might very well take charge and leave on my own.

Grey Roger said:
I wasn't even at sea at the time. I'd landed at Octopus Bay, intending to do some peaceful trading in St. Pierre, while taking a merchant to St. George. Once ashore, I switched flag to French so that I could talk to the store. The merchant promptly turned nasty.
Click to expand...
Did he turn nasty ashore? Or did his ship turn hostile upon transferring to 3D sailing mode again?
I think the SetMutineer function that is used does work ashore and triggers a mutiny later, so I could imagine that would happen.
Did you return to a friendly flag before setting sail? If so, perhaps an extra check is needed to undo the mutiny if that is the case.
But that would require a fair bit of figuring out and I'd prefer to avoid that if I can. Does the current behaviour seem unrealistic or unreasonable?
And if so, what would you suggest changing?

I could limit the effect to ONLY hoisting a pirate flag; that would be easily done.
But that sounds to me like it technically doesn't make that much sense. From the merchant's point of view, hostile is hostile, right?

Grey Roger said:
The bonus enemy ship at the destination port does make things a bit more interesting, and more profitable. Partly because of the extra reward from the escorted captain. And partly from capturing and selling the enemy ship. :rpirate
Click to expand...
:rofl
That's the spirit!
 
In the 2 times I have had to fight that ship in an escort mission it was not worth it at all.
1. The crew on that ship is way bigger than mine, so boarding was out of the question. Plus it was always upwind so I couldn't get to it anyway.
2. It was nearly impossible to sink and one time I ran out of shot and powder and had to just sail away. The 2nd time I also just sailed away and went to port. When I left it was there but got blasted to splinters by the fort.
3. The damage taken by my ships cost more to repair than the money received for the escort mission.

Conclusion: I will only do this one time per game just to get a perk.
 
Hylie Pistof said:
In the 2 times I have had to fight that ship in an escort mission it was not worth it at all.
1. The crew on that ship is way bigger than mine, so boarding was out of the question. Plus it was always upwind so I couldn't get to it anyway.
2. It was nearly impossible to sink and one time I ran out of shot and powder and had to just sail away. The 2nd time I also just sailed away and went to port. When I left it was there but got blasted to splinters by the fort.
3. The damage taken by my ships cost more to repair than the money received for the escort mission.

Conclusion: I will only do this one time per game just to get a perk.
Click to expand...
Do you ever do Governor Ship Hunting, Treasure Quests or encounter Smuggling Coastguard Ships? Of course you do!
The code used for putting the ship is exactly the same between all of those cases, because I made it reuse the same function a while back.
If those ships aren't too big for you, the Escort Quest Enemy shouldn't be either. In fact, that function is deliberately coded to take your own ship size (or was it player level?) into account.
 
1. No.
2. Only after I acquire enough/large enough ships to take on a pirate ship. Currently I am at level 14 and have done no treasure quests.
3. There are ways to avoid the Coast Guard.

I had hoped that the first escort mission would be trouble free. Now I know better and will not try for that perk until very late in the game.
 
The size of the ship is difficulty-dependent. Perhaps they become too big on the higher difficulty levels like you use?
In that case the general function might need to be toned down for that a bit. It does need to remain playable, no?

The chance of an enemy ship being generated on an Escort Quest is always 50%.
I figured it can be considered both a good thing (because you get something to do/can capture an enemy ship/get a higher reward) but also a bad thing (get damage/too difficult).
So I didn't know if I should make Luck factor in to make the chance higher or lower, so I just kept it simple for now.... :wp
 
Pieter Boelen said:
Ah, yes; that would indeed happen. First question would be: Should you be going into that hostile port while escorting that merchant?
If you were that merchant, how much would you appreciate being led into dangerous waters? I don't think I'd like that and might very well take charge and leave on my own.
Click to expand...
Realistically, if you've started from Antigua and are heading for Grenada, you're going through those dangerous waters anyway, unless you're planning on a big detour, which as a merchant I would not like at all! So we're likely to pass French territory. Maybe that's why I'm hiring an escort. And if he wants to try to sneak past rather than fight it out with anything French that shows up, that's fine by me - getting through without a fight is good.
Did he turn nasty ashore? Or did his ship turn hostile upon transferring to 3D sailing mode again?
I think the SetMutineer function that is used does work ashore and triggers a mutiny later, so I could imagine that would happen.
Click to expand...
I've no idea what would have happened later. I landed at Oyster Beach, changed to French flag so I could talk to the store, the merchant got upset, and I lost 10 reputation, at which point I reloaded a savegame. That's also when I realised I didn't need to change flag anyway because storekeepers will trade with you regardless of nationality and relations, if you're Hero. :facepalm

Hylie Pistof said:
In the 2 times I have had to fight that ship in an escort mission it was not worth it at all.
1. The crew on that ship is way bigger than mine, so boarding was out of the question. Plus it was always upwind so I couldn't get to it anyway.
Click to expand...
Whereas this one was a pitiful little thing, a ketch I think, and I was in a brig.
2. It was nearly impossible to sink and one time I ran out of shot and powder and had to just sail away. The 2nd time I also just sailed away and went to port. When I left it was there but got blasted to splinters by the fort.
Click to expand...
Sinking it is not my intention! There's no money in that.
Conclusion: I will only do this one time per game just to get a perk.
Click to expand...
Same here. There are other ways to meet enemy ships, preferably a group of merchants with light escort or no escort at all. And I usually have somewhere else I need to go, so don't want to have to detour for someone else's benefit. This one just happened to be going in the right general direction, plus I wanted to go to Grenada anyway to get a gun polished up and let Artois Voysey get mugged.
 
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