The Daily Update at the Com

[anweRU]

SOLs should have the heavier, long range guns. The smallest ships typically carried a single shot-weight (i.e. caliber) cannon, frigates might have had two types. SOLs had three (some even four) different shot-weight cannons, giving them a mix of range and hitting power.

I will not have kittens - instead I'll continue playing EU3:IN instead of ETW, and may even pick up Civ4.

[Slaists]

SOLs should have the heavier, long range guns. The smallest ships typically carried a single shot-weight (i.e. caliber) cannon, frigates might have had two types. SOLs had three (some even four) different shot-weight cannons, giving them a mix of range and hitting power.

I will not have kittens - instead I'll continue playing EU3:IN instead of ETW, and may even pick up Civ4.

I agree...

On a different note, I do not see that this patch is intending to address the BIGGEST naval flaw the game currently has. Ships are able to sail directly against the wind...

[Jack Lusted]

Sure looks like a artificial way to balance ships. And that's being kind.

I wish CA would learn that if you stay close to history you usually get far better balance because then you'll see the true reason why different unit types were used alongside each other.

And you'll still see that balance even after the patch. Ships of the line will still be the dominant ship type, with a few frigates in support. Frigates will be the best ships for dealing with small raiding ships such as sloops and brigs, and sloops and brigs will be fast and very manoeuvrable ships good for hit and run.

I'm happy to see the efforts being made to get away from the race to 1st rates (or heavy 1st rates) that currently drives the Naval aspect of my games.

Having to defend trade nodes was a good step made in v1.3, meaning you have to use lower tech ships to defend early/mid game trade. Greater emphasis on differentiating the ship types and abilities should further the depth of the naval game.

Maybe it's just my understanding of a (neccessarily) wordy description of something easier to describe (or understand -if you are a geek like me) mathematicaly. It looks like a swarm of small ships (inevitably) micro-d would perform best against all other categories, unless the weight of fire of Frigates is really that much of a differentiator.

The difference in firepower and therefore damage is huge between even a ship of a line and a frigate, let alone a ship of the line and a sloop.

I'm not convinced that ships of the line (SOTL) would have slower firing -or less accurate gun crews... Surely, as mentioned in CAs post, lacking speed and maneuverability, as well as being intended to fight other large capital ships, would only further emphasise the need for good gunnery eg accuracy and reload rate. If anything other than a comparable ship came into their field of fire, surely it would have been toast. The challenge for SOTLs was getting things into their field of fire. Is it too unforgiving/boring for a PC game that battles be won mostly by maneuvre?

Well as you've guessed this is being done for gameplay not for realism.

I, for one, welcome these changes from a gameplay perspective (though i bet the realism brigade will shortly be having kittens).

However, I am curious about how this rock-paper-scissors mechanism is supposed to work. Ships of the line are vulnerable to sloops because sloops are faster and have longer range guns, and can thus supposedly keep out of range of the ships of the line's short range guns while sniping away at them, and I can see that frigates beat sloops, because even though they are slower they have the same range guns, thus a sloop has to come within range of frigate's guns in order to engage it, but the frigate has more guns and a stronger hull.

But how are ships of the line supposed to be able to beat frigates, which are (like sloops) faster with longer range guns? If a sloop can beat a ship of the line then surely so can a frigate.

Because the difference between a ship of the line and a frigates turn speed and actual speed isn't as big as between a ship of the line and sloop. Plus frigates are bigger targets than sloops so more likely to be hit by ships of the line even at range.

SOLs should have the heavier, long range guns. The smallest ships typically carried a single shot-weight (i.e. caliber) cannon, frigates might have had two types. SOLs had three (some even four) different shot-weight cannons, giving them a mix of range and hitting power.

I will not have kittens - instead I'll continue playing EU3:IN instead of ETW, and may even pick up Civ4.

And they do have different shot weights for the different guns they carry, the only inaccuracy being introduced is the bigger guns having smaller range.

I agree...

On a different note, I do not see that this patch is intending to address the BIGGEST naval flaw the game currently has. Ships are able to sail directly against the wind...

We tried having naval battles with ships being unable to sail into the wind, it massively increased the amount of time they took and decreased the amount of fun most people had so that's why ships can sail into the wind.

[Zenicetus]

...And WHY would frigates have more accurate guns than ships of the line?

Right. They're taking what was already an arcade design (due to ability to sail directly upwind and circle), and now they're making it even more arcade-like and less historical/realistic. Smaller ships in real life are affected more by wave action, and should have less accuracy than a larger, more stable ship.

And a ship of the line has less range with its cannons than a frigate or sloop? What??!

The bit about sloops being faster is ridiculous too. Sail area is the "horsepower" of a vessel in this period. The larger ships were the fastest, especially going downwind (modern rigs that could point close to the wind hadn't been invented yet). Even more important, the top speed of a displacement (non-planing) hull is limited by length. Longer/larger hulls can be driven faster by their sails before they hit the "wall" and try to climb up over their own bow wave. With wind astern, a large square-rigger will run down any smaller vessel with less sail area and a shorter hull.

Okay, "it's just a game," I know.

I can always just auto-resolve the naval battles, otherwise I wouldn't play Empire at all. Sailing upwind killed it for me anyway. But what the "it's just a game" crowd doesn't realize, is how much fun it would have been with realistic sailing and historical differences in the ships. It could have been as interesting as the land battles, instead of this arcade mess.

[Zenicetus]

Because the difference between a ship of the line and a frigates turn speed and actual speed isn't as big as between a ship of the line and sloop.

You're right about that, but you've got the concept backwards. Smaller ships with short hull length and small sail area, are slower than larger ships with longer hulls and huge sail area. Read up on how displacement hulls work.

Look, if you want to justify these things on gameplay value alone, that's fine. But it doesn't work that way in the real world. Aside from real-world experience, you can just read about it in the Patrick O'Brien historical novels. In the very first of the Aubrey series, he's given command of the sloop "Sophie," and has to fight defensively and cautiously against a Spanish frigate because the frigate can outrun him.

We tried having naval battles with ships being unable to sail into the wind, it massively increased the amount of time they took and decreased the amount of fun most people had so that's why ships can sail into the wind.

I wonder if an open beta test would have resulted in a different "amount of fun" factor for more realistic sailing. I don't remember people complaining about having to tack in the "Sid Meier's Pirates!" game.

[Xipe Totec]

I don't like the idea that my highly trained Ship of the Line crews cannot aim their cannons as accurately as a dhow or sloop. Having seen the pride of my Spanish navy, a galleon, detonated by the first shot from a light galley I am not convinced that smaller ships need any more unrealistic gamey tweaks. They are already faster and more manoeuverable than larger ships. A large ship losing to a small ship should be due to a rare accident or very skilful use of its attributes not by making its crew better automatically because it is smaller. Better trained mariners and officers would have been the ones on the larger ships surely.

[Fisherking]

Duh! This is how I use ships now...

I guess we see how it goes but I expect someone needs to work on a naval realism mod.

Just remember while you are making all the changes that portraying things as they really were is also a good way to bring about realistic tactics.

[Slaists]

We tried having naval battles with ships being unable to sail into the wind, it massively increased the amount of time they took and decreased the amount of fun most people had so that's why ships can sail into the wind.

Hmm. I do not see anyone playing Darth's mod complaining about the inability of ships to sail against the wind... Sure, the battles are slower, but I find them to be more tactical (every turn matters...) and, as a result, way more fun...

If one wants to have the battle proceed faster there is the 'mid-speed' button...

By the way, Jack, is ANY speed modifier applied when ships go against the wind in ETW? From just observing the battle I sometimes feel, slow AI ships (SOL) can sail against the wind faster than my frigates can sail with the wind blowing in their tails...

[Quickening]

Hmm. I do not see anyone playing Darth's mod complaining about the inability of ships to sail against the wind... Sure, the battles are slower, but I find them to be more tactical (every turn matters...) and, as a result, way more fun...

If one wants to have the battle proceed faster there is the 'mid-speed' button always ;)

Remember the "arcade mode" from Rome Total War? I was never sure what difference there was exactly, the battles were arcadey without it, but maybe a simple option like that might be a nice compromise when it comes to the ship battles.

[Sheogorath]

I guess I'll just go back to spamming rocket ships, since they can apparently still beat anything.

[econ21]

I've always felt queasy about the quest for artificial "balance" but never been able to articulate it well. Now I just need to point to this update.

Frigates are more accurate and longer range than ships of the line? Right...

Time to look at ETW realism mods.

[Slaists]

I've always felt queasy about the quest for artificial "balance" but never been able to articulate it well. Now I just need to point to this update.

Frigates are more accurate and longer range than ships of the line? Right...

Time to look at ETW realism mods.

Well, I was always wondering why my SOLs overshoot sloops and brigs, not doing any damage. I guess, now I know why, LOL. It was modeled to be so by CA...

Sloops and brigs are supposed to be able to out-MANOUVER SOL, not out-SHOOT them... Really, CA should look at how it's done in Darth's mod. SOL are way slower (than in vanilla ETW) and less manouverable than sloops and brigs so, those nimble ships are able to stay out of SOL firing arch if they choose to. But, boy... if they miss that one turn and the SOL broadside gets them...

And that's the way it should be. From the description of this patch, I feel, CA has gone completely the wrong way with the naval combat changes about to be introduced.

[Jack Lusted]

You're right about that, but you've got the concept backwards. Smaller ships with short hull length and small sail area, are slower than larger ships with longer hulls and huge sail area. Read up on how displacement hulls work.

Look, if you want to justify these things on gameplay value alone, that's fine. But it doesn't work that way in the real world. Aside from real-world experience, you can just read about it in the Patrick O'Brien historical novels. In the very first of the Aubrey series, he's given command of the sloop "Sophie," and has to fight defensively and cautiously against a Spanish frigate because the frigate can outrun him.

I'm fully aware that having sloops be the fastest ships in the game is completely inaccurate, but we're not aiming for realism in the ship battles. It has been done for completely gameplay reasons.

Sloops and brigs are supposed to be able to out-MANOUVER SOL, not out-SHOOT them... Really, CA should look at how it's done in Darth's mod. SOL are way slower (than in vanilla ETW) and less manouverable than sloops and brigs so, those nimble ships are able to stay out of SOL firing arch if they choose to. But, boy... if they miss that one turn and the SOL broadside gets them...

And that's the way it should be. From the description of this patch, I feel, CA has gone completely the wrong way with the naval combat changes about to be introduced.

What you've just described is pretty much how things will work with the balance changes. Sloops do pitiful amounts of damage so have to stay at long range and out manoeuvre ships of the line in order to have a chance of beating them. They still have really weak hulls and getting a broadside from a ship of the line is still going to hurt them lots, probably even more as ship of the line guns do more damage now. The difference in range between a sloop and a ship of the line is 100, it will require a lot of work for a sloop to maintain that range.

[Sheogorath]

The problem, it seems to me, is that since sloops would mount lighter guns, they would have to get in close to have a hope of damaging a ship of the line, which would have a much thicker and tougher hull. At long range, a shot from a sloops measly little 12lber cannons is just as likely to bounce off the side as it is to get in a lucky shot through a gunport or across the deck.

[FactionHeir]

I think the better way would be to constrict the firing arc of SotL only, so they have a smaller field of fire (though remain at their current range). That would allow smaller ships to outmaneuver them while preserving balance. Frigates should also be noticeably weaker than Lines, maybe more able to sail against the wind, but definitely not able to outmaneuver them at all while both are sailing with the wind.

[Jack Lusted]

The problem, it seems to me, is that since sloops would mount lighter guns, they would have to get in close to have a hope of damaging a ship of the line, which would have a much thicker and tougher hull. At long range, a shot from a sloops measly little 12lber cannons is just as likely to bounce off the side as it is to get in a lucky shot through a gunport or across the deck.

6lbers actually, and the sloops main way of damaging a ship of the line from range will be by using chain shot against sails and masts, or by targeting it's stern.

[AggonyDuck]

From an MP perspective the naval battles were already rather close to perfection. Sloops and Frigates had their uses, which was mainly attacking the bow and stern of the enemy line. Especially when attacking the stern a mere sloop could do a lot of damage, especially in terms of morale damage. The main problem keeping naval battles from being highly enjoyable was the rather overpowered chain shot, that meant that the battle was decided by whose lead ship lost the first mast. You know something is bloody wrong when two lines are fighting each other and ships on both sides are firing chain shot. The end result is inevitably that one side loses all mobility and after that the ships just pound the stern of the sitting ducks. Tactically this makes for a rather boring battle, especially when the best part about naval battles is the emphasis on maneuver. What strikes me as odd is that you're actually making Chain Shot even more powerful, even though it was already ruining the naval battles.

As to the RPS; I do not think that RPS based gameplay is always for the best. RPS means that the most important part in winning a battle is unit match-ups and general maneuvers are unemphasized. I personally found the emphasis on maneuver to be refreshing and, before the chain shot spamming started, felt that naval battles were the most successful part of the game.

Anyway the age old wisdom is that don't fix something that isn't broken and the balance between unit types is currently pretty perfect. If you want to fix naval battles and make them more enjoyable for the MP crowd, nerf the Chain Shot.

[Sheogorath]

Ah, now that actually makes a bit of sense. I was thinking you meant that a sloop would SINK a ship of the line. Simply disabling is a bit more acceptable to my sensibilities :P

[Karash]

Hi Jack Lusted,

Thanks for stopping by in this thread. I was wondering if CA thinks that the AI sufficiently defends it's home ports. It seems to be this is the biggest campaign breaking bug in the game. All major powers in the game rely on trade, but place a pittence on defending their most important asset. I cannot tell you how many times I have starved France, Britan, UP, Spain, India, etc of all their economic wealth (and therefor military might) by keeping 4 or 5 ships blockading their port.

Often times (and especially Britan), they will have almost full stacks of navy nearby that NEVER tries to lift the blockade. Seems utterly broken to me, and honestly...boring. I know a lot of players depend on AI trade for their own income (a practice I forced myself to stop on purpose), and its so frustrating to them to see a full stack never clear their port.

Thanks again for stopping by, and I hope you continue to monitor this thread.

Karash

[Zenicetus]

I'm fully aware that having sloops be the fastest ships in the game is completely inaccurate, but we're not aiming for realism in the ship battles. It has been done for completely gameplay reasons.

Okay, I can understand a design philosophy tilted away from realism and towards gameplay. What I don't understand is why it's tilted so differently for land battles vs. sea battles. Land battles have their faults, but I don't think anyone in the TW player community would call them arcade-like. The closest it gets is with the occasional fantasy-type unit, but the core game is fairly realistic in the way the units move and fight. The cavalry horses don't have wings, and the infantry don't have jet packs. That's what it's like for some of us to be seeing square riggers sailing upwind, doing circular tail-chases, or setting anchor and stopping dead in the deep ocean.

Why the difference in approach? It's like the land and sea battles were designed by two different companies, for two different types of gamer audience. I know you can't please everyone, but you'll please more people by picking one approach or the other for the TW series. The current approach is schizophrenic.

[Jack Lusted]

Okay, I can understand a design philosophy tilted away from realism and towards gameplay. What I don't understand is why it's tilted so differently for land battles vs. sea battles. Land battles have their faults, but I don't think anyone in the TW player community would call them arcade-like. The closest it gets is with the occasional fantasy-type unit, but the core game is fairly realistic in the way the units move and fight. The cavalry horses don't have wings, and the infantry don't have jet packs. That's what it's like for some of us to be seeing square riggers sailing upwind, doing circular tail-chases, or setting anchor and stopping dead in the deep ocean.

Well land battles do miss out some key things realism wise just like naval battles. Units don't break the instant they are charged like they generally did historically, cavalry will quite willing charge into a square instead of refusing to do so. Some units pull big stakes out of thin air and place them on the battlefield. Ranges aren't accurate. There is a hell of a lot less difficulty manoeuvring troops in line than historically, no delays when giving orders etc. It's not a case of where we are applying one set of standards to land battles and another set of standards to sea. Both types of battle are tilted towards gameplay.

[Sheogorath]

Speaking of land battles, I'm a little curious...is there currently anything being done about unit cohesion while routing?

It is realistic, but within the context of the game it makes things quite annoying sometimes. When you tell your cavalry to run down some routers, only to have them take off to the other side of the map to ride down the single man who happens to have the flag above his head it gets a bit frustrating.

[TinCow]

In re: Ship Rebalancing

Wow... just... wow. Congratulations CA, you have, with one move, managed to both ruin the strongest and most entertaining aspect of ETW, while simultaneously exceeding Flaming Pigs in pure absurdity. I never expected CA to be removed from my 'instant buy' list of game developers, but this appears to have done it.

[Slaists]

In re: Ship Rebalancing

Wow... just... wow. Congratulations CA, you have, with one move, managed to both ruin the strongest and most entertaining aspect of ETW, while simultaneously exceeding Flaming Pigs in pure absurdity. I never expected CA to be removed from my 'instant buy' list of game developers, but this appears to have done it.

Well, we'll just need to have a naval realism mod... Darth has done it pretty well for my liking. I hope he will agree to separate the naval balancing into a separate mod.

[Lemur]

For real, the mods will take care of those who want mega-realism (like me). I just want CA to get the AI working and keep the game stable. The rest will come naturally.

[Elmar Bijlsma]

Jack,
my whole point is that navies the world over used sloops, brigs, frigates for a reason, and they never equipped them with magic cannons and outboard engines. It's my opinion that if you balance them towards realism, you are more likely to find why navies found the little ships useful in certain roles. I'd start with reintroducing the intercept rating that was talked about early on. That could be one way to make the small ships more useful.

Even then, sloops and such should probably just try and stay away from SOL. Hey, guess what? In M2TW, peasant had to stay away from knights. That's just the way it was and you didn't give the peasants kill-o-zap guns to compensate.
As if realism isn't compatible with gameplay and balance.


Everyone else,
I can heartily recommend Darthmods changes to the naval game. That already is quite good and likely to get ever better. Which by the look of it, can't be said of vanilla.

[Husar]

I must say I agree with the majority that these changes don't sound very good to me at all.
Reducing the firing arc of ships of the line as has been suggested sounds like a much better idea to me, forcing a rock, paper, scissors system onto everyone everywhere has never been a good idea IMO and many people buy total War games exactly because the old rock, paper, scissors can be found in every other RTS game and people are sick of it at times. If you guys start turning Total war into more of the same I guess it's relatively safe to say you're ruining the novelty/being different bonus that draws in a large part of the fanbase.

[TB666]

I must say I agree with the majority that these changes don't sound very good to me at all.
Reducing the firing arc of ships of the line as has been suggested sounds like a much better idea to me, forcing a rock, paper, scissors system onto everyone everywhere has never been a good idea IMO and many people buy total War games exactly because the old rock, paper, scissors can be found in every other RTS game and people are sick of it at times. If you guys start turning Total war into more of the same I guess it's relatively safe to say you're ruining the novelty/being different bonus that draws in a large part of the fanbase.

ehmm both STW and MTW had a paper, rock, scissor system and when CA tried to move away from it, people complained that the game was unbalanced and a PRS balance would be better.
Lusted's mods have also always tried to get a PRS balance going and people loved that.

Edit: Unfortunately I'm starting to side with the "CA can't please you" crowd.
Seems no matter what they do people will complain.
People want better balance so CA tries to give them that and then people complain that it's not accurate etc etc.
It's a circle that repeats everytime and it's a miracle that CA still bothers to listen to the community about what they want since the community quite clearly does not know what they want.
So CA, if you feel that these changes makes the game more balanced and fun, then do those changes.
It's your game afterall.

[Slaists]

And you'll still see that balance even after the patch. Ships of the line will still be the dominant ship type, with a few frigates in support. Frigates will be the best ships for dealing with small raiding ships such as sloops and brigs, and sloops and brigs will be fast and very manoeuvrable ships good for hit and run.

Well as you've guessed this is being done for gameplay not for realism.

We tried having naval battles with ships being unable to sail into the wind, it massively increased the amount of time they took and decreased the amount of fun most people had so that's why ships can sail into the wind.

Anyway, Jack, while I might disagree with the suggested gameplay related changes to the naval battle mechanism, I do realize that this can be easily modded/adjusted to our liking by the community. So, plz, go ahead an do whatever changes you guys find useful.

I just wanted to note that it seems you guys have hit the 'sweet spot' as it relates to navy costs (and whatever the AI can afford) in 1.03. I see balanced navies rather than line-only or sloops-only fleets. AI fleets tend to have a couple strong ships and a bunch of support ships. I, as a player, cannot affort much more... So, it's a fun balance all in all. I, as a player, like it and would like to compliment you on that result.

[Zorbane]

ehmm both STW and MTW had a paper, rock, scissor system and when CA tried to move away from it, people complained that the game was unbalanced and a PRS balance would be better.
Lusted's mods have also always tried to get a PRS balance going and people loved that.

Edit: Unfortunately I'm starting to side with the "CA can't please you" crowd.
Seems no matter what they do people will complain.
People want better balance so CA tries to give them that and then people complain that it's not accurate etc etc.
It's a circle that repeats everytime and it's a miracle that CA still bothers to listen to the community about what they want since the community quite clearly does not know what they want.
So CA, if you feel that these changes makes the game more balanced and fun, then do those changes.
It's your game afterall.

Unfortunately that's how game development usually is

You also have to remember that posters in this forum are only a small fraction of the total gamers. I'd guess that this forum would also be more "hard core" whereas CA is obviously going to want to make a game that wil lcater to a larger audience.

If 9 out of 10 players get confused/frustrated when their ships stop moving against the wind then maybe they should do something about it :)

If you don't like it thats why there's mod support