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Thanks for the link. It was much more interesting than the Trailer. I like the world view for managing you ships and routes. Seems like a very intuitive interface.

The comment Kim made with regard to way points was a littler disturbing. Most games, I have seen, that use way-points have the deficiency that once the object reaches the way-point they tend to stop and await further orders which seems a bit silly for a sailing game. Does the game also support a heading and speed interface for control? When a ship reaches its way-point does it continue same course and speed? What if you give it way point that is dead into the wind, do the ships tack back and forth to get there?

In the multi-command mode can you use formations?

Greg.
 
Thank you for sharing.

Though i like the graphics of the naval tactical scenes i am very dissapointed to hear that:

- it has a waypoint system. This will strongly reduce the sailing feel and it will probably give the same situation as in ETW. In other words it will become more arcadish.

- Kim, though I appreciate all his work, mentioned World of Warcraft. I really do not like to see these skills in a naval 16th/17th century game.

In the past on the former forums we had quite some talk about the naval mechanics. I fear that my hope to see a worthy and better follow up of AoS 2 type of game has gone.

Cheers,
 
I absolutely hate the idea of waypoints in a sailing game.
NOT a good sign.

If ships come to a stop at a waypint like in ETW it's a game-breaker for me.
And tacking will be difficult to implement to a satisfactory degree within a clumsy waypoint system.
Hopefully they've got something hidden up their sleeve...

I must admit I'm a bit worried, now, and my excitement for this game just fell a few degrees here.
But I was up around fever-level anyway, so maybe that's for the better... ;)
 
Did I hear him correctly , saying about attacking other ships you can if you want, but the other companies wouldn't like that and end up going to war with you.

I thought this game had a pirates in it ? yes you have the companies and go one if you want, but a year or so ago, I thought it was said that you could be a pirate and attack the companies too.

Shame if this is not in the game.
 
I think the intention was that you could occasionally pirate away other companies cargoes but not play strictly as a pirate nation or company.

It is a little disturbing to see way-points tactical game. Way-points are fine the world map and land based units which tire from continual motion. Continual maneuvering is half the fun of Sea based sailing battles. In this game the most you have to track is 10 vessels. It would be sad to see another game pandering to the ignorance of the masses.

It is kind like hearing from your friends about this absolutely perfect person, then after a little conversation realizing you could put a piece of glass in each ear and use them as a telescope.

I still hope the tactical game has more gray matter. As that is the part, in which, I will be most interested.

Greg.
 
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On waypoints

Ships do not stop and furl their sails upon reaching the last waypoint. They continue with their current sail mode to the direction they are heading. We did experiment on this quite a lot with different approaches and felt that this was the best.

In addition, waypoints enable the player to give her ships specific plotted courses. This is important not only for tacking/beating in the wind, but also for manuevering your ships to optimal positions in general. Naturally, taking direct command enables you to do this yourself manually.

We have recently added three modes dubbed arcade, normal and simulator. The mode affects certain aspects like ship turning arcs and how strongly wind affects the ship. In simulator mode it can become almost impossible for single ship to reach certain point on the world as side wind can push the ship so strongly.
 
on piracy

There is no pirate nation in the game, but nothing prevents player from committing piracy upon ships of other companies. You can actually make large profits from it and use it to get items you would perhaps not otherwise have access to (situation where all gold ports would be ruled by other companies for example).

Other companies naturally do not take this kind of action lightly. I mean, if you attack someones ships, kill their crew and steal their cargo, you should not be surprised if that makes your relationship with them to deteriorate and eventually they would declara war on you.
 
There is no pirate nation in the game, but nothing prevents player from committing piracy upon ships of other companies. You can actually make large profits from it and use it to get items you would perhaps not otherwise have access to (situation where all gold ports would be ruled by other companies for example).

Other companies naturally do not take this kind of action lightly. I mean, if you attack someones ships, kill their crew and steal their cargo, you should not be surprised if that makes your relationship with them to deteriorate and eventually they would declara war on you.

Will nations go to war with each other anyway? And if they do can the player join in with privateering?

The waypoints thing seems entirely reasonable to me, you don't want to have to order each ship when to tack while also fighting an action with the vanguard.
 
We have recently added three modes dubbed arcade, normal and simulator. The mode affects certain aspects like ship turning arcs and how strongly wind affects the ship. In simulator mode it can become almost impossible for single ship to reach certain point on the world as side wind can push the ship so strongly.

That is good to hear Kim. Gives me hope again :) Thx for the quick reply.

I assume you can use this as a rule for setting up multiplayer custom battles?
Is it also possible to set the available "warcraft" skills in a multiplayer game? Or be able to set them to not available?

Actually how much can a host set the parameters in a multiplayer game?
(For clanbased wars this is quite important. For instance we have a very large community of naval fans (over 400 members), divided over many national navies. In such an environment players would like to get the maximum freedom when setting up their games).
 
nice i like how its sounding... i like your replies to the questions..

i agree with polar on the waypoints... its a good idea, though i suppose those that don't like plotting way points can issue singular course headings at a time if they please...

Sounds interesting... the whole war and pirating thing sounds proper enough...

looking forward to the game... =D
 
Ships do not stop and furl their sails upon reaching the last waypoint. They continue with their current sail mode to the direction they are heading. We did experiment on this quite a lot with different approaches and felt that this was the best.

In addition, waypoints enable the player to give her ships specific plotted courses. This is important not only for tacking/beating in the wind, but also for manuevering your ships to optimal positions in general. Naturally, taking direct command enables you to do this yourself manually.

We have recently added three modes dubbed arcade, normal and simulator. The mode affects certain aspects like ship turning arcs and how strongly wind affects the ship. In simulator mode it can become almost impossible for single ship to reach certain point on the world as side wind can push the ship so strongly.

That's very good to hear, Kim!
I am completely at ease and the fever has set in again...!

And making three different realism modes is a sensible decision. A bit more work, but this way you satisfy everybody.
And you avoid all the nervous complaining from the grognards on the forum up to release... ;)
 
Will nations go to war with each other anyway? And if they do can the player join in with privateering?

Player can get missions from the Crown that can require either improving relationship with specific company or encourage player to attack fleets of that company.

How to improve relationship is a different matter and it can be done in numerous ways. One time I got comminuque from the Crown stating that I have to improve relationship with the french company. As they were weaker than my company, I proposed alliance and at the same time threatened them with war. They did agree to ally with me and the Crown was happy :)
 
LOL, sometimes I think things are taken so very seriously when it comes to sea based games - people mad a waypoints? Seriously? There has to be some abstraction in any game.

Anyway, very excited! Don't know what I think about the "WoW like skills" but it seems a nice compromise between the Patrician style gameplay and Pirates of the Burning Seas. The video looked great and the performance was wonderful (what were the specs on the PC used for the interview during the GDC?).

Just a quick question, do ports sell more than one cargo, or do ports basivally specialize on one type of good to sell back to the metropole? Also are the port battles ship battles or is their a land battle engine as well?

Hoping release is soon, my birthday is coming up...

SoM
 
to the above

Yes indeed, abstraction is needed in games, as long as they are not simulations trying to capture all aspects of the real thing, be it fighter plane or sailing ship or persons life itself. :)

We are doing our best to strike a good and entertaining balance between realism and abstraction necessary.

Yes, ports do sell more than one cargo, but Main Trade Items (MTI) is only available on specific ports. Those Generic Trade Items are usually not nearly as valuable as MTI, but they are good supplement as there is not necessarily enough MTI to fill up all the cargo space of every ship in the fleet all the time.
 
Sounds great Kim!

Another question for P-dox - we going to get a nice ship badge to add to my ever growing army of badges... :p