Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Ship to ship combat is way more robust than I anticipated. I wonder if it will stay fun, or become tedious after a while. I wish there was a more detailed attack system (aim for different system of the ship to demage crew members, cripple manuvers, delay enemy attack.) Right now I am not sure what is the gameplay elements beyond - move from one side to another and shoot, or rush your enemy and board. Wind seems to be a thing, which gives bonuses if you use it well. After getting murdered, I am now off to figure the system out. 7
Lamppost in Winter Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 I will admit I didn't really have a proper go at it, but I had little idea of what was going on and it seemed tedious. I probably wouldn't mind it being more abstracted unless it's really easy to skip entirely.Is there a formal way of fleeing a battle? Because I must've spent 5 rounds just running away trying to do that. 1
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 Ok, there is no wind - -6 deflection comes full sail forward. What confuses me is movement. It seems like you can only do "full sail ahead" only once per turn? After that I need to either manuver or stop right in our track. There is a prompt to feel at the very start of the combat, rather than that you need to move away from enemy ship. 1
CottonWolf Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 (edited) Ship to ship combat is way more robust than I anticipated. I wonder if it will stay fun, or become tedious after a while. I wish there was a more detailed attack system (aim for different system of the ship to demage crew members, cripple manuvers, delay enemy attack.) Right now I am not sure what is the gameplay elements beyond - move from one side to another and shoot, or rush your enemy and board. Wind seems to be a thing, which gives bonuses if you use it well. After getting murdered, I am now off to figure the system out. Yeah, targetting different parts of the ship or switching ammo to chain balls for different effects or something would definitely make it more engaging. As it is, I didn't really feel in control of what was happening. It was just a lot of turning to get in a broadsides then dicerolls as I fired. I'm not sure if I should even have been attempting something else. Edited February 2, 2018 by CottonWolf 2
Sedrefilos Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Terminology is a thing though... What's a starboard? What's jibe??
Sedrefilos Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Regarding multiple types of ammo and dedicated targeting system.... I wouldn't like a Pirates game shoved in my Deadfire, tbh.
IndiraLightfoot Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 I will admit I didn't really have a proper go at it, but I had little idea of what was going on and it seemed tedious. I probably wouldn't mind it being more abstracted unless it's really easy to skip entirely. Is there a formal way of fleeing a battle? Because I must've spent 5 rounds just running away trying to do that. I do hope fleeing will be easier and faster. 1 *** "The words of someone who feels ever more the ent among saplings when playing CRPGs" ***
CottonWolf Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Terminology is a thing though... What's a starboard? What's jibe?? I think they're generally okay, because the icons are informative. Jibing being the exception. That needs a better icon to make it clear exactly what it means.
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 Terminology is a thing though... What's a starboard? What's jibe?? If you hover over the icon it expains exactly what it means. 2
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 As it is, I didn't really feel in control of what was happening. It was just a lot of turning to get in a broadsides then dicerolls as I fired. I'm not sure if I should even have been attempting something else. After couple failed attempts I turned to critical path and will return to sea combat once I am done dungeoning. Unfortunately, after couple attempts it is exactly my impression. Combat seems to consist of firing one side of the ship, doing a jibe and firing another. If ship has better stats than you it will win, if not - you will. Speed seems to be purely dependent on your crew and stats - if enemy ship is faster it will simply excape before you can do anything about (that was my experience once I stated to play aggresively.) Overall, result of combat seems more dependant on stats rather than tactics. Right now I am way to slow to attempt boarding. I am worried that without some spice added to it, it might turn out to be tedious, rather than fun. 1
CottonWolf Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Josh said on SA that their going to add a "board" option at combat start, so you can get straight into boarding in exchange for an indeterminate amount of ship damage if you find the ship combat boring. 4
IndiraLightfoot Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 And where's the creativity? I have a ship and presumably a skiff. I have lots of bombs and explosives in my stash. How come I can't stuff that skiff with some of them, and then when a ship approaches, it'll get blown to kingdom come? *** "The words of someone who feels ever more the ent among saplings when playing CRPGs" ***
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 Josh said on SA that their going to add a "board" option at combat start, so you can get straight into boarding in exchange for an indeterminate amount of ship damage if you find the ship combat boring. yhh. I would much prefer for combat to be decent and boarding to be one of the feature of combat, rather than "skip" button. 4
morhilane Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Terminology is a thing though... What's a starboard? What's jibe?? It's nautical terms. Ship sides (where are starboard, port and stern). A jibe is a maneuver that change the swing the windsail from one side to the other which lead to a course change for the boat. See real life example. 1 Azarhal, Chanter and Keeper of Truth of the Obsidian Order of Eternity.
CottonWolf Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Josh said on SA that their going to add a "board" option at combat start, so you can get straight into boarding in exchange for an indeterminate amount of ship damage if you find the ship combat boring. yhh. I would much prefer for combat to be decent and boarding to be one of the feature of combat, rather than "skip" button. It's hard to disagree with this! 1
Breckmoney Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Eh, having a "skip" button with downsides makes sense. No matter how good they make this system there will be people who just don't want to interact with it and would rather do the fight using their actual characters. Making that an option on top of making the ship combat puzzle fun should be the objective.
Insidous Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 I am actually really impressed by the ship fights Boarding seems pretty underwhelming though. The approaching ship always takes a few more shots and even if you decimate most of the enemy crew members they are somehow still in the boarding fight. Also crew members knocked out in a boarding fight seem to be killed instead of injured like they get from cannon balls. Maybe get way more loot from boarding? Or the option to keep/sell the prize?
daven Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 The ship was called 'EnDurance'! Ha, brilliant. I love it. 1 nowt
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 Eh, having a "skip" button with downsides makes sense. No matter how good they make this system there will be people who just don't want to interact with it and would rather do the fight using their actual characters. Making that an option on top of making the ship combat puzzle fun should be the objective. Nothing wrong with skip button - a way to fast forward fight (with semi randomized results based on powerdifferent between you & enemy), a way to automate fleeing (rough estimation of your & enemy speed, how many shot he wil take at you before you escape etc.) and automated boarding (with estimated how many shots enemy will take at you before you reach them based on your speed) would all be good. Finished Poka dungeon and will try the ship combat some more - my first impression is that there isn't much decisionmaking in it. I am disappointed by Insidious report that wounded by cannonballs crewmembers fight during boarding anyway. At first glance I though they really managed to put in a real ship to ship combat system into the game - with ability to outmaneuver enemy, defeat him in combat, board him or weaken him (lets say take down some of his crew) before boarding, or target sails, and force him to surrender. If it will stay like this, it looks like they dumped a lot of effort into a very weak system... which would be a shame. Unless there is some hidden depth in crew management and combat I haven't figure out yet. So far I haven't seen "ship upgrade" sheet anywhere. During campaign they mentioned they wanted ships to act like stronghold - with different rooms to fill it with. They might have abandoned the system in favour of fitting the ship with "items".
dukeisaac Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 I also found ship to ship combat confusing, especially with movement. How come I cant close more in one turn? It seemed useless for me to go full sail ahead at the beginning and then turn port or starboard until the round is over. A "maintain course" action seems necessary. I got destroyed just trying to close in over nine rounds... Also, maybe a wind indicator? The text descriptions are nice, but are just flavour so far. Seems like there is a lot of potential, but I was honestly expecting something more scripted than "tactical". A pleasant surprise though. I'm sure it will get better 2
CottonWolf Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 (edited) Yeah. It's a good start, it just seems like as a system it needs a lot work, which, two months out from release, I can't see it getting. I also found ship to ship combat confusing, especially with movement. How come I cant close more in one turn? It seemed useless for me to go full sail ahead at the beginning and then turn port or starboard until the round is over. A "maintain course" action seems necessary. Looks like this is getting changed. This is what Josh said on SA: A few things that will likely be changing:* In the initial contact, the ability to Close to Board, potentially suffering a hailstorm of cannonballs if you just want to go to deck-to-deck combat.* Removing the Full Sail x1 or Half Sail x2 style moves per round.* Jibing being an immediate flip with few consequences.E: There are not currently any wind/directional mechanics related to moving in the ship duels. Gaining advantage at the beginning of a round will allow you to move farther in that round. Edited February 2, 2018 by CottonWolf 3
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 Finished beta, defeated all three ships. There is a new scripted interaction in south-west corner of a map. Strongly recommend checking it out! Some really promising stuff in there.Here are my impression:It's not actually all that bad, and might be fun.While there are no different ammo types, there are different cannon. Most of the ships in BB are equipped round cannons, but one of them had chain shot - doing more damage to sails than hull. I imagine there will be anti-crew cannons as well. With enough cannon types, with varied damage, range and reload, it might be fairly fun minigame. However, an automated "flee" and "board" commands would be welcome. There are some aspects I am not sure about - movement seems buggy. There is half sail, which you can use twice per turn and full sale, which you can use once. Full sale is supposed to provide full combat speed and high defencive bonus, while half sale provide half of speed and small bonus. The gameplay seems to revolve around moving around cannon range, and tyring to outmonouver enemy (preferebly using forward movement before he shoots). I feel like moving full sail parallel to an enemy ship should allow you to move around him. I like ships item consumption. Might provide enough drain on resources. 2
Cheston Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 Boat management: -Everything seemed intuitive! Nice. Impressions from the encounter I did: -I couldn't go 'full sail ahead' more than once a round. I thought this was a bug- it kind of took forever to close for ship-to-ship combat. -I thought wind was an active factor and something I just couldn't find the UI element for. -I wasn't sure if there was a way to board other than the ramp between the ships. It seemed like enemies managed to get on my ship without using the ramp, but I didn't see where/when or if they'd started the encounter that way. 2
anfoglia Posted February 2, 2018 Posted February 2, 2018 -I thought wind was an active factor and something I just couldn't find the UI element for. I had the same impression. And I would actually like wind to be a factor.
Wormerine Posted February 2, 2018 Author Posted February 2, 2018 -I couldn't go 'full sail ahead' more than once a round. I thought this was a bug- it kind of took forever to close for ship-to-ship combat. -I thought wind was an active factor and something I just couldn't find the UI element for. -I wasn't sure if there was a way to board other than the ramp between the ships. It seemed like enemies managed to get on my ship without using the ramp, but I didn't see where/when or if they'd started the encounter that way. -You can go fullsail once, or half sail twice. Fullsail is supposed to be higher speed and better evasion, however, they seem to do have pretty much the same effect, making halfsail straight up better. It says something about your deckhands not being experience enough, so it is possible that you can't go "fullsail" in beta (I had to defeat all three ship to lvl up my crewmembers). -move results vary, so that may very much be the case, but no UI element suggests that. -people can jump between decks. I ordered someone to go on the other ship and they jumped over without special command.
Recommended Posts