Abandoned Order Specific Ship to be Built

[Levis]

This is also something for B15
Shipyards will have some ships in stock cause they are captured by you or someone else. But most ships which are sold will take time to build. So when buying a ship you have to order it and depending on the size it will take up to several weeks to build the actual ship so you can come back later to pick it up.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Building a ship takes a LONG time, especially a large one. You can hardly wait for that.
So perhaps allow you to leave the island and come back to take control of your new ship later?
Sort-of working together with this one: http://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/allow-play-during-waiting-times.25476

Also, if a ship is to be built from scratch, realistically you as buyer should be able to provide specifications.
That means you should be able to choose from ALL ships in the game, but perhaps only of those size that the shipyard can actually handle.
Might be interesting, but also might end up quite complex.

 

[Levis]

Yeah thats what I mean. It just triggers a quest with a completion date. If the date is passed the ship is done. So you could just order one and come back later.

I like the idea of having only ships for buy which the shipyard could actually make. remind you again this is for build 15
I'm planning on having the town inventory also be more dynamic, so this would also take resources from the shop etc, so it's possible if you order a very large ship you will see a fetch quest pop up very soon because the town is risking to run out of a certain resource , now wouldn't that be nice.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I'm planning on having the town inventory also be more dynamic, so this would also take resources from the shop etc, so it's possible if you order a very large ship you will see a fetch quest pop up very soon because the town is risking to run out of a certain resource , now wouldn't that be nice.

Very much so! Then you could go and collect the wood that you need for your own new ship!

As long as we keep an eye of what is reasonable for now to ensure we don't bite off more than we can chew....

 

[Grey Roger]

Building a ship takes a LONG time, especially a large one. You can hardly wait for that.
So perhaps allow you to leave the island and come back to take control of your new ship later?

If you're ordering a 3rd rate Bellona, for example, don't expect to take delivery until much later in the game. The real one was ordered on 28th December 1757, laid down on 10th May 1758 and launched on 19th February 1760.

Also, if a ship is to be built from scratch, realistically you as buyer should be able to provide specifications.
That means you should be able to choose from ALL ships in the game, but perhaps only of those size that the shipyard can actually handle.
Might be interesting, but also might end up quite complex.

It would also be limited by your skill level. If you're a relative novice, you don't know enough about ships to give detailed enough specifications for anything complex.

I'm planning on having the town inventory also be more dynamic, so this would also take resources from the shop etc, so it's possible if you order a very large ship you will see a fetch quest pop up very soon because the town is risking to run out of a certain resource , now wouldn't that be nice.

I like this idea, especially if the resource in question is planks. I'm going to order a battleship from every shipyard I can find. This will create a Caribbean-wide shortage of planks. Then I will wander through the jungles, exploiting the cheap labour provided by all those highwaymen, and become King of Planks. Failing that, whatever the resource is, I'll create a global shortage of it, then go looking for a fat galleon carrying a hold full of it, and make a fortune.

Can you order a shipyard to scrap a ship to get the raw materials for the new one?

 

[Armada]

If you're ordering a 3rd rate Bellona, for example, don't expect to take delivery until much later in the game. The real one was ordered on 28th December 1757, laid down on 10th May 1758 and launched on 19th February 1760.

I think for this to be a viable gameplay feature, the real build times would have to be massively compressed, with the largest ships perhaps taking several months to complete, instead of years.

 

[Bathtub-pirate]

Hey guys, hello there. Signing in after quite a while. I had an idea, that I wanted to suggest. Wouldn't it be possible to introduce ship building into the Build mod? Not that I know jack shit about the ins and outs of programming. But all the required set pieces, that I could think of, are already in the game. Books/plans, the repair skill, the ship yard interface, carpenters as crew members and son and so forth.

The way you guys maybe could go about it, would look like this: In order to build a ship, the player needs to have a plan of the ship type. These plans could be found (though super rare) or bought (for a considerable price). Then the player would require a certain amount of skill points in the repair skill. The higher the tier of the ship built, the more points would be required. In addition to that any ship higher than – let's say – tier seven would also require at least one carpenter to be part of the officers staff. The high tier ships may even require to have two or even three carpenters. All of which need to have a certain skill level in repair, matching the requirements that the player himself has to fulfill. Maybe even the currently controlled crew (working as labor forces) should also be of sufficient size. And last but not least it would require huge amounts of planks and sailcloth to build a ship. The bigger the more. Maybe also some tools, that the player needs to have in his inventory. And it should take a considerable amount of time for the ship to be finished, meaning that the player also has to be mindful of enough food, rum and money being available for the time the crew is occupied with building the new vessel.

For every point of the carpenter skill, that the player and his carpenter/s have more than the requirements, the stats of the ship could mildly improve. Adding fundamental value to building a ship yourself rather than buying it and creating an incentive to do so. For balancing sakes – if felt necessary – there could be a tier cap in place. Making it impossible to build anything bigger than – let's say – tier 4. Either that or make the bigger ones monstrously demanding, as far as requirements and time committed go.

This would allow to build older ship types, even in new epochs. Though, the opposite shouldn't be possible (since there would be no plans for ships, that haven't been invented yet). And I feel that it would be properly balanced. Plans have to found first (be it in a shop or by sheer luck). So if you want to build a specific ship, finding and obtaining the plan would be the first challenge. Then you and your carpenter/s repair skills need to be up to par. And then you would have to have enough resources (payment and supplies for the crew and the raw materials for the ship) to finish it.

Either an alternative or addition to that could be to make it possible to order ships to be built in one of the ship yards. That would seem much more authentic than the current model anyway. Because right now you just buy already finished ships. And to wait for a certain type to show up is sometimes awkward and annoying. Why not ordering them to be built and pick them up some weeks/months later?

What do you guys think about that? Would that be possible at all?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Ahoy there @Bathtub-pirate!

So basically you don't like searching for the ships you want and want to be able to order a specific ship to be made?
Assuming that you mean purely choosing from the existing ships in the game, that does sound theoretically possible.

Apart from the usual "amount of work" and "need to have someone to make it happen",
I can think of another practical concern though: The huge amount of choice you might get.
Imagine having all plans for all ships: you'd have to scroll through them all until you find the one you want.

Also, would you require a unique "plan" item for each ship in the game?
Possibly with their own interface pictures? That'll be a lot of items!

In other words: It sounds to me like it should be possible, but I have some doubts on whether it could be made practical.

That being said, the Select Storyline interface can be used to find the ID of the ship you are looking for.
And then you can use console to instantly give the ship you want to yourself for free.
A cheat to be sure, but it does have the desired effect without any code changes.

 

[Grey Roger]

In reality, building a ship took a lot of time. You'd certainly be looking at a few weeks for a small ship, several months for a frigate, and several years for a big ship. HMS Victory took about 6 years. Also, the same restrictions which apply to buying a ship now would undoubtedly apply to building one - a small shipyard can't build a big ship, and no shipyard should build a warship for you unless you're properly authorised, i.e. a naval officer or perhaps privateer of sufficient rank. So the sorts of ships you'd be able to order relatively easily and relatively quickly are probably the sorts you'll find for sale all over the place anyway. You won't get a battleship except at the bigger shipyards, a couple of years after you've ordered it, and the order would only be accepted if you're an admiral, which means you probably got it for free along with your promotion to admiral anyway.

Either that, or you want to be able to order anything anywhere regardless of your rank and the shipyard's size, which may upset game balance and certainly negates some of the realism settings. And if you want to do that, all you need to do is edit "InternalSettings.h", scroll down to the sections "SHIP MANAGEMENT, REPAIRS, TRADING" and "REALISTIC SHIP PURCHASE", and play about with the values there to make more ships available for sale. Alternatively scroll right down to the bottom, change "ENABLE_CHEATMODE", then you can choose any ship you want when you start the game.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I added a poll to the opening post.
Hopefully we can determine if we should put this on our Build 15 wishlist or if we can mark it as "Abandoned".

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Everyone: Don't forget to vote!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Hylie Pistof: How do you imagine this feature should work? Or what would you want to use it for?

 

[Hylie Pistof]

How should it work? It should work in conjunction with the abandoned project to make all items have weight amd volume. It makes no sense at all otherwise as one can buy the desired ship and add or subtract items at will with no side effects.

I would use it to take a large naval hull and fit it out with less and smaller cannons and less crew so more cargo could be carried. Then I could have a fast but still well armed merchantman. Like the Heavy East Indiaman.

The only other use for a completely custom ordered ship would be to change it from a square sail vessel to a lateen rigged ship. Or to build a complete fantasy ship.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

It should work in conjunction with the abandoned project to make all items have weight amd volume.

Wait, WHAT? Items aren't ships???

Or do you mean this one: Planned Feature - Include Cannon Weight and Number in Cargo Capacity | PiratesAhoy!
That isn't abandoned, just pushed to "long term goal"; I still want to see that happen and it was very close to being basically functional.
But then all sorts of people started objecting to perceived realism and that is where I stopped caring for the foreseeable future.

The only other use for a completely custom ordered ship would be to change it from a square sail vessel to a lateen rigged ship. Or to build a complete fantasy ship.

That is never going to be possible within the game engine anyway. I think you may have misunderstood the original feature request here.
The idea was to choose from all ships available in the game in some way and make your chosen ship appear in the game.
Basically what the console can do (but apparently not for you!?!???) but as part of the gameplay itself.

 

[Hylie Pistof]

The original post and the first replies are all walls of texts that I can not read. So a misunderstanding is likely. If all that is wanted is to be able to get any existing ship at any time, then the console works just fine for those that can make it work at all.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If all that is wanted is to be able to get any existing ship at any time, then the console works just fine for those that can make it work at all.

Still doesn't work for you, does it? We should REALLY get you sorted out there because it is a massively useful tool.

Quick test for you:
1. Open PROGRAM\console.c with Notepad
2. Find switch(0) at the top of the file and change it to switch(1)
3. Find the line that starts with \\GiveShip2Character(pchar, "NL_Amsterdam"
4. Remove the "\\" in front of that line
5. Load your savegame and press F12; you should see the text "Executed Console" on your screen
6. If you check F2>Ship, you should see you got a new one
7. If you were in 3D Sailing Mode, you will first need to reload to worldmap/port/shore before you can actually sail your new ship

Could you please try that and see what happens?

 

[Hylie Pistof]

Yes that worked this time. What I have seen in the past is that it will work 1-3 times and then it stops working. I can no longer choose the ship. I have destroyed installs trying.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Yes that worked this time. What I have seen in the past is that it will work 1-3 times and then it stops working. I can no longer choose the ship. I have destroyed installs trying.

Very odd.
Could you do me a favour and start using it again? If you DO run into bizarre weirdness with it, let me know and I'll investigate.
I see no reason why that should happen, but you never do know; if there is something wrong with it, it is better if we find out!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Hylie Pistof: How do you imagine this feature should work? Or what would you want to use it for?

@Levis, @crispey and @Robert Nutter: Same question to you.

In what way would this feature improve on the "console cheat" functionality that we already have?
And how could it possibly work without having either a huge number of "building plan items" OR a huge list of ship to scroll through?

Note that you already CAN get a "complete list of all ships" in the Repaint interface using the DEBUG toggle at the bottom of PROGRAM\globals.c on a new game.
You can probably even convince it to do that on a savegame using DEBUG = 1; in console, then pressing F11 to reinitialize.
if you try that, you'll see how huge and (in my opinion) close to useless that list is.

 

[Robert Nutter]

I havn't tried the Debug toggle, so will have to. But I think for me it's more the realism function it'd serve, ie nothing above the level of a Brig can be built to order (as you said, there'd be very little point from a gameplay perspective) and you can set the parameters and pay more depending on that ie higher hull stats etc or add-ons ordered, along with a range of paint jobs...almost like one of these car games you get now that lets you choose decals etc. So almost a way of editing ships_init non-destructively (then somehow resetting once ordered, but laying the specifications on that specific savegame ship somehow), all from within the game's ui. For me it's great in theory but I know it's probably extremely unfeasible and difficult to implement, hence why I voted only if practical; I just thought it'd also be a good thing to add for players who don't want to go into the console to do it. Though I do see your point, Pieter, I doubt there are many who play this game unwilling to do that...