Solved Playing this mod again after some years and many questions

[Just a Seadog]

Hi there!

I've been playing POTC and early versions of the build mod many years ago. Great to see this project is still alive and kicking. Thanks for all the awesome work!

After playing New Horizons for a bit some more or less stupid questions popped up.

1. Follower jobs
From what I've gathered so far their skills add to your own.
1.1 What happens if I put my navigator on a captured ship though?
1.2 Or what happens if I have two Navigators (happened to me when Artois Voysey joined)?
1.3 Do the Followers gain experience when they are not passengers/party members?
1.4 Does the shared experience perk work on passengers/party members which are not in the party and has it been changed from the vanilla version (I remember the vanilla version as buggy and a bad choice)?

2. Special Followers
Special followers (like Lucas) don't have the nice dialog commands generic officers have now.
Is it possible to give them at least the one that prevents them from boarding or give generic officers one that prevents all followers from boarding? Previously I'd just remove them manually from the passengers before boarding actions, but that became tedious very quick.
I think I modded it myself years ago, but sadly I forgot everything.

3. Joining a Nation/Privateering
3.1 How do I join a Nation's Navy? I've seen Naval Academies and the like but they are locked.
3.2 How do I obtain a Letter of Marque? I've tried Governors in town halls, but either I'm missing something or there isn't an option. Or I'm just dumb.

Thanks in advance for any good answers and keep up the good work!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Which mod version are you playing? The answers may differ between versions.
I'll answer based on the most recent version that we're working on.

1.1 That navigator should contribute to the captain.
I rewrote that system a few weeks ago though and didn't test that yet.

1.2 The highest contributing skill will be counter.
You can use the F2>Passengers interface to see how the effective "ship skills" changes if you have different officers in different roles.

1.3 They should do. Can't remember how effectively; they may not gain XP at all until you get that "Shared Experience" skill.
@Levis would be able to confirm when he is around again.

1.4 It has indeed been changed since the original game and that is pretty much exactly what it should be for.


2. Officers contribute their skills regardless of whether they are in your "shore party" or not.
So keep only the ones you WANT in boardings in there and take out the rest.
It would be nice to add the generic officer dialogs to quest characters, but that would take time and effort that I don't think anyone can afford right now.


3.1 Naval Academies only serve quest purposes right now. If you want to be a NAVY officer, you can start the game with Naval Officer as player type.
As per the most recent updates, this is nearly fully functional and plays quite differently from before.
You cannot join during the game itself though; that is a feature to be added at a later time.

3.2 Talking to the governors is exactly how you should do that.
Only works for non-hostile nations though; otherwise you have to crave forgiveness first.

 

[Just a Seadog]

Wow fast answering. Nice.
I am indeed playing the most recent version (from moddb).

2. Isn't that important anyway.

3.x
I've selected the Brave Black Flag storyline. I guess that was the problem. Due to the storyline I have slightly negative relations with all nations except pirates.

If I wanted to play a NAVY officer, which are the best storylines to use? Master and Commander? And I just have to choose Naval Officer as background profession?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If I wanted to play a NAVY officer, which are the best storylines to use? Master and Commander? And I just have to choose Naval Officer as background profession?

Are you running Beta 3.3 or 3.4 right now? Naval Officer isn't really very well developed in there just yet.
If you would like to do that, you may want to delay a bit until we've got Beta 4 back to normal again (hopefully next week).
That one contains a Free Play storyline where you can choose any navy officer you like or make your own; should all work.

 

[Just a Seadog]

I'm running Beta 3.4. I guess I'll delay playing a Naval Officer until you guys are done.
What about the Pirate or Privateer playing styles? Are developed enough in that version?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

In the Beta 4 WIP, yes. Those are all brand new features.

 

[Grey Roger]

The naval officer play style is under development but should be usable in those versions of Beta 3.4 or Beta 3.5 which have it. You could also try the "Chronicles of Horatio Hornblower" storyline, which is where the whole concept of playing as a naval officer started.

Privateer has almost always been my choice of play style (except when I've been playing "Hornblower"). Again, while there is some development work being done, it's perfectly playable in all previous versions. I've never tried playing as an outright pirate but from what I read on this forum, that ought to be playable in earlier versions as well - in fact, if you're playing "Brave Black Flag", it's effectively the play style you've chosen.

And if you're going to wait until development work is finished then you're going to be waiting a long time. People have been working on new developments ever since the original game first came out and probably aren't about to stop any time soon.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

In earlier modpack versions, "playing as a pirate" was almost completely pointless as basically you make an enemy of all other nations and don't get any advantages for it (other than the pirates not being hostile).
Once Beta 4 is done, you will be able to gain points with the pirates AND sell captured ships for maximum profit when you have joined them.
Gaining points is already in place. I started preliminary work on the "profit from selling" last weekend, but that got postponed again.

Hornblower is a scripted navy officer storyline that, as per Beta 4, will conclude by switching to the new "generic Naval Officer free play" behaviour.
Beta 3.4 did have a very limited "Naval Officer Free Play" feature, but I don't recommend using that. Better to use the much improved Beta 4 version for that.

And if you're going to wait until development work is finished then you're going to be waiting a long time.

I meant "wait until the next public release", which is to be Beta 4.
We have found a rough spot last week causing some nasty delays, but I'm still hoping for that to be ready to go very, very soon.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I'm running Beta 3.4. I guess I'll delay playing a Naval Officer until you guys are done.

If you want to help us out with testing, you can try this version: Mod Release - Build 14 Beta 4 Internal WIP For Testing | Page 7 | PiratesAhoy!
Updated just now to at least fix the most troublesome error that was introduced quite recently.

You can see all the important new features that you have asked about in this one.
Just don't get too attached to your savegames....