Six seems a little crowded for my tastes. Watch the horizon is kind of redundant when there is almost always at least one ship visible.
And it doesn't seem to have really helped with the hourglass queue.
IMHO 5 was better.
Is Six "Too Crowded"?
5 is stronger performance and organically speaking healthier
6 was always a push from content creators and their communities and "what we intended" by the devs but it's never done well yet, performance issues are obvious every time
as far as crowding goes it depends on the server, an active server even 5 can be too much depending on the scenario, too much meaning it becomes counter productive and less gets produced on that server
and 6 has these merges and servers being weird in season 9, some of these servers are getting locked in with one or two ships, a lot of issues with 6 but it's what they want (6) so it's what we are gonna get. I regularly have the server to myself after a couple hours but it's messing with meg spawns terribly.
Hit reg issues with 6 just go from annoying to obnoxious for many people that fight a lot in competitive fights. Doesn't matter as much when people are just wrecking new players at fofs for chests but it impacts the more competitive encounters.
@foambreaker Nope. For those of us that remember 6 and there wasn't even the roar to spread out, it created a constant tension on what that ship on the horizon was doing. It isn't redundant at all.
"Watching" means keeping an eye on potential threats, not just spotting the occasional ship and mostly playing in a void. The former adds tension and anticipation to what is otherwise a set of easy fetch quests (same reason PvE servers would fail.)
The "crowded" feeling is a good thing and brings what was missing back to the game.
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
This is the intended experience.
Well, given it was in the patch notes, I would say yes, everything is intended, but that doesn't mean it is working out.
On west coat US it is hard to do anything but fight other players, the PvPvE balance is completely skewed. I PvP, so it should have some encounters, but not constantly.
Maybe you guys are not on full servers.
This is also BTW why we are suddenly seeing so many PvE server requests.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
This is the intended experience.
Well, given it was in the patch notes, I would say yes, everything is intended, but that doesn't mean it is working out.
On west coat US it is hard to do anything but fight other players, the PvPvE balance is completely skewed. I PvP, so it should have some encounters, but not constantly.
Maybe you guys are not on full servers.
This is also BTW why we are suddenly seeing so many PvE server requests.
I play on west servers which are just west in name only because of hopping and server sharing and hg merging, there are people from all over on west because of it.
So far 6 has just been weird imo, messes with servers but rarely results in a lot of ships involved other than a fof here or there or other random big fight
I fight hostile ships and use good boy cosmetics (attracts significantly more fights with pvpers) and there is still a lot of non-battling going on out there.
A lot of it in my experience has been what I long have posted about would happen which is outposts regularly have a fresh spawn at it, because of all of the hopping that happens. Many of them never leave the dock.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
This is the intended experience.
Well, given it was in the patch notes, I would say yes, everything is intended, but that doesn't mean it is working out.
I think you misunderstand what I meant.
Rare has specifically designed the entire game from the ground up to be balanced around having 6 crews. From its inception, it has always been designed around 6 crews; no more and no less.
Island distance, storm times, world events, etc. is all balanced around having 6 crews at once on the seas.
The only reason we ever seen 5 crews, was because the boats are LITERALLY the most demanding performance hog in the game that it bogged down the servers so bad, they had to remove a crew.
I played yesterday with @BansheeSquads and our performance was fine.
Before the original reduction of ships to 5, the 6 count felt perfect to me. Im not sure what it was but when it went from 6 to 5 the first time, it was the difference between the sea feeling lively and full, to seeing almost no one half the time you get on.
As well i love the 6 count since it keeps the servers active enough usually to keep you on your toes at all times, which to me is a viatal part of the games feel.
@goldsmen said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
Before the original reduction of ships to 5, the 6 count felt perfect to me. Im not sure what it was but when it went from 6 to 5 the first time, it was the difference between the sea feeling lively and full, to seeing almost no one half the time you get on.
As well i love the 6 count since it keeps the servers active enough usually to keep you on your toes at all times, which to me is a viatal part of the games feel.
Amount of ships is far less relevant to activity than varied interest is
A majority of the 5 ship time was also in the low organic activity time, low risk taking, low interest in world events.
If organic activity interest drops again (which it's going to, to some degree) 6 ships will feel just as dead. It's a participation problem not a ships on server problem. 6 ship servers where 2,3,4,5 of those slots are hopping for marked/identifiable targets and not leaving the dock aren't any more active.
They still haven't addressed substantive issues with that, they just bandaid it, which is fine but it won't make that extra ship as valuable to the activity as people think it is when that activity drops.
Varied interest and organic participation need to be high for that ship to matter in a positive way to servers.
I'll make a prediction right now, within the next year (maybe sooner than later) there will be partner/streamer pushes for a 7th ship
@wolfmanbush said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@goldsmen said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
Before the original reduction of ships to 5, the 6 count felt perfect to me. Im not sure what it was but when it went from 6 to 5 the first time, it was the difference between the sea feeling lively and full, to seeing almost no one half the time you get on.
As well i love the 6 count since it keeps the servers active enough usually to keep you on your toes at all times, which to me is a viatal part of the games feel.
Amount of ships is far less relevant to activity than varied interest is
A majority of the 5 ship time was also in the low organic activity time, low risk taking, low interest in world events.
If organic activity interest drops again (which it's going to, to some degree) 6 ships will feel just as dead. It's a participation problem not a ships on server problem. 6 ship servers where 2,3,4,5 of those slots are hopping for marked/identifiable targets and not leaving the dock aren't any more active.
They still haven't addressed substantive issues with that, they just bandaid it, which is fine but it won't make that extra ship as valuable to the activity as people think it is when that activity drops.
Varied interest and organic participation need to be high for that ship to matter in a positive way to servers.
Are you saying that with the high level of activity and interest that we are seeing currently, that we should downgrade back to 5 ships and see how it goes and that you're willing to give it a go?
@wolfmanbush said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@goldsmen said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
Before the original reduction of ships to 5, the 6 count felt perfect to me. Im not sure what it was but when it went from 6 to 5 the first time, it was the difference between the sea feeling lively and full, to seeing almost no one half the time you get on.
As well i love the 6 count since it keeps the servers active enough usually to keep you on your toes at all times, which to me is a viatal part of the games feel.
Amount of ships is far less relevant to activity than varied interest is
A majority of the 5 ship time was also in the low organic activity time, low risk taking, low interest in world events.
If organic activity interest drops again (which it's going to, to some degree) 6 ships will feel just as dead. It's a participation problem not a ships on server problem. 6 ship servers where 2,3,4,5 of those slots are hopping for marked/identifiable targets and not leaving the dock aren't any more active.
They still haven't addressed substantive issues with that, they just bandaid it, which is fine but it won't make that extra ship as valuable to the activity as people think it is when that activity drops.
Varied interest and organic participation need to be high for that ship to matter in a positive way to servers.
I'll make a prediction right now, within the next year (maybe sooner than later) there will be partner/streamer pushes for a 7th ship
The only problem with that idea is the fact that the interest at season start was world events, and i spend most of my time doing just voyages stacking up, and yet the increase seems to have boosted how frequently i run into other ships again quite a lot when voyages are seen as not exciting content to steal any more.
Before it dropped from 6 ships, there wasnt a whole lot of excitement or a lot to steal other than the fotd, but i got attacked most every session, and after the drop little changed, fotd was still the main target for all, but it seemed that there was almost no one around.
I think part of that issue came from the fact that assuming no one was in the roar and people were spread out evenly, 2 people would be in each region, and if you sent just 1 person to the roar, that would mean only 2 ships would be alone in 1 region, while 2 regions would still have 2 ships. But after the drop, that means 1 person will be alone in their region, then if some one is in the roar on a full 5 ship server, that means that 3 ships would on average be alone in 1 region, with only 2 ships in the same.
That doesnt include ships happening to gather to the same region randomly, or to the same point, but those numbers as seen as a potential average due to the number of regions, do say quite a bit about how much you will run into some one on average from just a 1 ship decrease.
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@wolfmanbush said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@goldsmen said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
Before the original reduction of ships to 5, the 6 count felt perfect to me. Im not sure what it was but when it went from 6 to 5 the first time, it was the difference between the sea feeling lively and full, to seeing almost no one half the time you get on.
As well i love the 6 count since it keeps the servers active enough usually to keep you on your toes at all times, which to me is a viatal part of the games feel.
Amount of ships is far less relevant to activity than varied interest is
A majority of the 5 ship time was also in the low organic activity time, low risk taking, low interest in world events.
If organic activity interest drops again (which it's going to, to some degree) 6 ships will feel just as dead. It's a participation problem not a ships on server problem. 6 ship servers where 2,3,4,5 of those slots are hopping for marked/identifiable targets and not leaving the dock aren't any more active.
They still haven't addressed substantive issues with that, they just bandaid it, which is fine but it won't make that extra ship as valuable to the activity as people think it is when that activity drops.
Varied interest and organic participation need to be high for that ship to matter in a positive way to servers.
Are you saying that with the high level of activity and interest that we are seeing currently, that we should downgrade back to 5 ships and see how it goes and that you're willing to give it a go?
If they are happy with 6 ships they are going to keep 6 ships
The social side of the community is very "more more more" rather than into addressing substantive issues with risk reward.
It's less of high level activity and more of where activity should be at, at a minimum. They still don't have middle players, they have new players and they have forever players. That doesn't last in a hopping scenario.
They won't rebuild a substantive middle by repeating history and having new players be content for pvpers.
Gotta get skilled interest back in hg with something new to chase, expand on hg in some way. They can't and won't do much about server hopping but if everyone wants to repeat history with running off new players through excessive hopping they will get the same result of low participation.
If they eventually put the chest in a more appealing location that isn't just players sitting at a fort then it can add some padding for pvers from hopping and get pvpers back into hunting more rather than just hopping/taking servers.
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
I mean they always wanted 6 crews so I don't see them willingly changing this again.
They regularly add something for one effect and then around the same update add something that conflicts with what they are trying to do.
Making things less unpleasant for pve has less of an effect when they add another ship in the mix with a game as heavily hopped and pvp cheesed as this one.
If that chest eventually makes its way to a non marked event that will help. Something where it's not just hopping for something obvious, and by eventually I mean no later than season 11, it would be nice to have it be in fleets for season 10.
Fleets have strong potential as a season 10 chest location for both pvers and pvpers, I'm hoping they don't just toss it in fotd for 10.
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
I mean they always wanted 6 crews so I don't see them willingly changing this again.
They did indicate in the patch notes a willingness to make adjustments:
Six Ships on the Horizon
-
Following performance improvements delivered in recent updates, all servers have now returned to supporting six crews. When starting a session or migrating, servers will now actively matchmake six crews of different sizes in order to meet both six-crew and 17-player limits.
-
The team will continue to monitor server performance following launch and adjust the player limit outside the update process to optimise the experience.
-
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
I mean they always wanted 6 crews so I don't see them willingly changing this again.
They did indicate in the patch notes a willingness to make adjustments:
Six Ships on the Horizon
-
Following performance improvements delivered in recent updates, all servers have now returned to supporting six crews. When starting a session or migrating, servers will now actively matchmake six crews of different sizes in order to meet both six-crew and 17-player limits.
-
The team will continue to monitor server performance following launch and adjust the player limit outside the update process to optimise the experience.
that's boat sizes mainly, 6 probably isn't going anywhere as it survived a patch.
-
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
This is the intended experience.
Well, given it was in the patch notes, I would say yes, everything is intended, but that doesn't mean it is working out.
It is. Newer played just don't know yet. This will help reduce the churn of new players that try the game, find the fetch quests boring, and quit.
On west coat US it is hard to do anything but fight other players, the PvPvE balance is completely skewed. I PvP, so it should have some encounters, but not constantly.
Maybe you guys are not on full servers.
I'm in Montana. West coast servers. Always busy. I get plenty of PvE done. Don't engage on high risk activities. Aka world events, especially fotd and fof, and don't raise an Emissary of you want to increase your chances of a chill session.
This is also BTW why we are suddenly seeing so many PvE server requests.
That's not sudden. They've been regularly requested since day 1, and there hasn't been a significant rise in those requests. Spoken as someone who has also been in the forums since day 1 to see it.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
Six seems a little crowded for my tastes. Watch the horizon is kind of redundant when there is almost always at least one ship visible.
And it doesn't seem to have really helped with the hourglass queue.
IMHO 5 was better.
It feels normal again. I missed having 6 ships and I am glad it's back to it. 5 always felt empty.
@personalc0ffee said in
I think you misunderstand what I meant.
Rare has specifically designed the entire game from the ground up to be balanced around having 6 crews. From its inception, it has always been designed around 6 crews; no more and no less.
Island distance, storm times, world events, etc. is all balanced around having 6 crews at once on the seas.
The only reason we ever seen 5 crews, was because the boats are LITERALLY the most demanding performance hog in the game that it bogged down the servers so bad, they had to remove a crew.
Just because the game was designed around 6 ships, doesn't mean it has to stick that way for ever, as we all know multiplayer games undergo a lot of changes where its fluid, in other words the game in year 1 is different then the game it is now.
That being said, it's not really my place to give an opinion as I spend 99% of my time in hourglass and not sailing in organic adventure. So I think others in the community have a better understanding of how 5 v 6 Ship feels in this current environment.Bottom line I think it comes down to the RNG players in a server, regardless of 5 or 6 ships, players can be more PvP or PvE Orientated making servers feel more empty or alive.
Ex: A 4 ship server can feel really alive when all the ships are fighting over a FoF, compared to a 6 ship where majority are doing PvE/TT/or whatever around the map feeling more empty.TL;DR
mine own personal experience as a pvp avoider.
Tbh it's about the same. Pressure is a little higher because new season, new month, new emissary opportunities, but that comes and goes.
+1 more mast to watch? Honestly? Not that much different than it was. Or is.
I don't like interaction but six is not a societal issue.
While I agree that the seas feel more populated now, I'm not sure restoring the sixth slot is the cause. One ship is not going to make the difference between feeling completely alone on the seas, and seeing masts around every rock. My guess is that it's a rapid dwindling of hourglass participation more than anything else. Since season 8 launched, you basically had 2 or 4 ships tied up in tiny circles all the time, and the remaining 1-3 doing their own thing in adventure. All through the first months of hourglass, I could play for hours without so much as a sail on the horizon. Now there are people around, which is probably a good thing even if I'd personally rather there weren't.
@wolfmanbush said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
I mean they always wanted 6 crews so I don't see them willingly changing this again.
They regularly add something for one effect and then around the same update add something that conflicts with what they are trying to do.
Making things less unpleasant for pve has less of an effect when they add another ship in the mix with a game as heavily hopped and pvp cheesed as this one.
If that chest eventually makes its way to a non marked event that will help. Something where it's not just hopping for something obvious, and by eventually I mean no later than season 11, it would be nice to have it be in fleets for season 10.
Fleets have strong potential as a season 10 chest location for both pvers and pvpers, I'm hoping they don't just toss it in fotd for 10.
My bet is on Ashen Wind.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
I mean they always wanted 6 crews so I don't see them willingly changing this again.
They did indicate in the patch notes a willingness to make adjustments:
Six Ships on the Horizon
-
Following performance improvements delivered in recent updates, all servers have now returned to supporting six crews. When starting a session or migrating, servers will now actively matchmake six crews of different sizes in order to meet both six-crew and 17-player limits.
-
The team will continue to monitor server performance following launch and adjust the player limit outside the update process to optimise the experience.
I said, WILLINGLY not that they wouldn't have to.
That's also referencing performance issues only, not players just not vibing with it.
@strangeness said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@personalc0ffee said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
This is the intended experience.
This is also BTW why we are suddenly seeing so many PvE server requests.
That's not sudden. They've been regularly requested since day 1, and there hasn't been a significant rise in those requests. Spoken as someone who has also been in the forums since day 1 to see it.
Gosh they never stop.
-
There should be significantly more if I had my way. 12 ships would be fine to me if the game could run it.
To me, you're missing out massively on what the game is supposed to be about if you're complaining about needing to watch the horizon for potential threats too much. You have an extra ship in the server, why don't you approach them and hire them to watch your back for you? More ships can only add to the kinds of stories that get created.
@natsu-v2 said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
There should be significantly more if I had my way. 12 ships would be fine to me if the game could run it.
To me, you're missing out massively on what the game is supposed to be about if you're complaining about needing to watch the horizon for potential threats too much. You have an extra ship in the server, why don't you approach them and hire them to watch your back for you? More ships can only add to the kinds of stories that get created.
The game is full of grinds which are used to incentivize participation
The game goes through long stretches of low participation/interest with just the boats it has, specifically because of unappealing pvp scenarios.
Treating adventure like a hybrid arena lead to most of the issues it has, quick action, mass supplies, unappealing risk/reward.
They could change the entire foundation but as it's designed it's never worked to crowd outside of when there was no content and everyone was just doing one thing, which would never work in the current environment, cheesing went through the roof and people have far more options now, not nearly enough people would participate.
High clashing pvp is the minority, it's never been the needle mover for participation, it's the needle mover for content creation.
@strangeness "For those of us that remember 6"
Seen this a few times, all it says to me is experienced players have no problems. Surprised, no.
For new players, it fails.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@strangeness "For those of us that remember 6"
Seen this a few times, all it says to me is experienced players have no problems. Surprised, no.
For new players, it fails.
You shouldn't be so quick to discount people with experience though. There is a reason that doctors go through residency. Why clerking for judges is often the path to becoming a judge (in the US), why electricians and plumbers and many other trades have a journeyman career path, etc.
Rare has made their stance on PvE servers pretty clear. If too few ships makes the server feel "effectively" like a PvE server then that undermines their argument. Those of us with experience (both in the game, and in these forums) have seen enough new players come in and beg for PvE servers, then see those same players back in here complaining about "lack of end-game content" within a few months of cheesing their way to everything they wanted via alliance servers.
Experience tells me that without the PvEvP aspects of this game, the fetch quests get boring VERY quickly and players burn out and leave, and that is unhealthy for the silent majority of players that enjoy PvEvP. PvP players had Arena, and that audience was so immeasurably small that Arena wasn't sustainable. With the "newness" of HG worn off, we see its participation is lower as well, but being integrated into adventure at least makes it more sustainable, and as people start defending more, integrates better as a PvEvP outlet than a pure PvP outlet, and removes some pressure from every ship in the horizon being hostile. Alliance servers, based on leaderboards, are also a tiny fraction of the population, so it is with some confidence that I can say that yes, PvEvP is the silent majority. This forum is not at all representative of the playerbase. It is the tiniest sliver of a subset of passionate players, but the downside to that is "passionate players" are often hyper-focused on their own issues and don't take a broader view.
The game was balanced for 6 ships. That's a claim Rare has made many times. From time between encounters to distance between islands to how long it takes to reach a world event, they spent a lot of time balancing that. For many players that complained about the seas feeling empty and boring (not just hardcore PvP players made this complaint, but older and newer players alike have said it thorugh these last couple years), 5 ships was demonstrably part of that problem.
So yes, 6 ships might bother a few new players. But for the long term health of the game, 6 shipps is better for most players (even new players, even though they may not realize it yet.) Whereas 5 ships was having a negative impact on player retention. As long as the servers are stable, and mostly they are, as I've been in 6-ship fights over a FoF since season 9, experienced players will tell you 6 is better.
@strangeness I'm not suggesting a PvE server, don't go to extremes.
Rare has said they want a mix, well right now the mix is way to heavy to the PvP side. It doesn't take a Doctor or someone who has played the same game for 5 years to know it.
The basic principles of open world PvP are common to all games, too crowded you have nothing but a big free for all, too empty and you have a farm.
@foambreaker said in Is Six "Too Crowded"?:
@strangeness I'm not suggesting a PvE server, don't go to extremes.
Rare has said they want a mix, well right now the mix is way to heavy to the PvP side. It doesn't take a Doctor or someone who has played the same game for 5 years to know it.
The basic principles of open world PvP are common to all games, too crowded you have nothing but a big free for all, too empty and you have a farm.
But this is an open-world PvEvP game, not just open-world PvP. And more specifically, this game gives you ways to control your risk.
Veil tornadoes invite PvP. There are ways to get athena chests without doing a veil.
Emissary flags are bait for PvP. There are reaper commendations attached to flags, and they are worth big money at higher grades. People with stalk ships waiting for them to hit grade V before sinking them just for the big rewards and trophies. Don't want PvP? Don't fly an emissary.
World events are PvP magnets. All world events. Especially after the rebalancing. Many were originally balanced for 4 players, full stop, so smaller PvE crews weren't doing them. Which meant PvP crews stopped checking them because the time to sail and find them empty became a time suck. Which is why hopping for FotD's became a thing. As a player-activated event, it was gauranteed activity.
Now, world events are a short time investment for any crew size if left alone, so PvErs are doing them again. And PvPers are noticing and attempting to steal them again. Don't want PvP? Don't do world events.
If you are just out there sailing, no emissary flag, not at the big menacing cloud in the sky, must PvPers tend to think you aren't worth the effort. Very few players stack, and most PvPers have gone to sink a ship and gotten nothing for their effort, and gotten fewer supplies than the spent sinking, plus dealing with chasing a running ship for 45 minutes. I'm not saying that the risk is ZERO....anybody may attack at any time, but I am saying that most PvP oriented players would rather find a more lucrative target. Or lower their risk of wasting time and supplies. So they will look at emissary tables for wooden ship models. They will sail to any event that is up. And they will dive on HG. I talk to dozens of crews and do LFG fairly often, and even find players that will alliance with one ship while trying to sink another (a 2 hour chase for a FoF key last night!!!) and MOST crews I talk to, across most timezones and most english-speaking countries (LFG tends to get you out of your region more often), and many operate with the same mindset. Again....experience....vs the much easier to fall into "confirmation bias" that I see many people fall into in this forum.
@strangeness "If you are just out there sailing, no emissary flag"
Keep telling yourself that. Flags don't make any difference at all, I get attacked fishing with no flag.
The gist of your post is, "if you don't do anything worthwhile you won't be attacked"
No offense to you, but that is frankly a sad state of the game.
Six is a nice number of ships to maintain certain activity on the server... Problem? The Servers xD
Six is too much for SoT servers, the performance decrease from 5 to 6 is incredible (Yeah man, I know you live at 5 metres from server and you have 10 ping but is not the average experience)
IMO they should back to 5 until they fix Servers or improve It, is pathetic playing with 100-150 ping in 2023. With 5 ping stills High but not like now.
Yeah, again, "Is your Connecttion bruh" sure mate, every single spanish player has the same issue with lots of different internet providers and different services, but is our problem xD
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