There are literally no reason for the Raid Voyages to be there, when they don't even give the same amount of loot from normal raids. If you keep them, atleast give it the proper loot table as the World Events.
Remove Raid Voyages
Though I wouldn't argue about dived raids having just a bit more higher payout, the fact remains they're:
- used by people on SS, not just HS. For SS, that's just 0 risk involved to do any raid whenever you want, without 3rd party threats. For the same reason, it should be lower payout than an organic raid event, due to instant access on top of having 0 risk (remember, SS gold rewards are 100% now)
- even on HS, I'd still rather have less payout if I really want to do some specific raid, instead of endlessly server hopping until I find one. So I 100% really don't want dived raids removed.
@blade6180
They're there for people who like to do a certain World Event without having to wait or hop servers.
Also for people who are looking for emissary specific loot; while the total might be less than a normal World Event, there is more loot for their emissary.If you don't like them, just don't do them.
As far as I know this isn't intentional (maybe it is behind the scenes) but raids are increasingly becoming the way to find action in SoT.
I've had more fights from raids creating quick encounters than just about anything else. This isn't necessarily good for raids overall as it can lead to less events getting done but it's creating random scenarios between players. They are putting people pretty darn close to each other with dives these days.
Personally I like a raid here and there. For the time I feel the loot is typically worth it. Especially solo. I have no issue with less loot that pays alright rather than a bunch of stuff that just slows everything down.
I'm an old timer tho, I still remember the huge battles for bread crumbs lol. This all pays good now for the time compared to how the game used to be.
While the removal is a bit much, I would argue for the rebalance / reskin of the Raids.
The loot for the Raids was designed with quality over quantity in mind, with (I think) the hopes to reduce server strain. They could rebalance it, seeing as more Raid Voyages are being added as time goes on (i.e. Skeleton Camps in S13).
My only major gripe with Raids is that opposing crews can't tell if a World Event is a Raid or not. Sometimes completely unoccupied World Events are just Raids because some crew dove to it and disappeared off the face of the Earth. Just adding something (like GH skeletons to GH Raids, or MA Lost Shipment wrecks to the Raid Island) to show this would be nice.
@r3vanns The reason why I want it removed is because it takes up a world event on a server. When you put up a Gold Hoarder Raid on a Skeleton Fort.
You dive to that server that has a Fort Active. BUT here is the deal. The loot will only be the small amount that you get from that specific faction. And not the standard amount of loot.
So wheh people see that this is a Skeleton Fort Dive mission. No one is even interested in trying, because it's simply not worth it. And it also takes up the space of a world event on that server with bad loot and no PvP.
Make the Raids pay the same amount as a normal skeleton fort but with mostly Faction loot, and people will actually fight for forts again like we do when theres a FoF.
@blade6180 said in Remove Raid Voyages:
Make the Raids pay the same amount as a normal skeleton fort but with mostly Faction loot, and people will actually fight for forts again like we do when theres a FoF.
No they won't. They'll just dive to another one, which is why you're running into abandoned raids.
@d3adst1ck speaking more on that, abandoned raids have completely ruined the game IMO. The loot pools need to reset somehow. I understand it could be exploited, but as a player who (when I do PvE) enjoys WE stacking, running into WE's that have a quarter the loot for a faction I'm likely not even playing for just makes me want to log off.
IMO raids (specifically on WEs) are a great safe seas feature where you're not going to encounter anyone anyways, and the point is just practicing. But it diminishes the experience on the open seas. If raids were moved to be a safe seas exclusive, I would be happy. I don't think that's realistic though. Because raids will likely never be removed completely, adding variations to all the World Events that are unraidable, reasonably uncommon, and have a greater loot pool would help breathe some life back into servers.
@fysics3037 I don't know if there's any reasonable way to despawn them without creating a loophole that basically creates free world event level loot.
- Allowing them to revert to emergent loot if the crew cancels the voyage is just going to allow crews to dive for emergent WEs (dive, then cancel repeatedly).
- Despawning them if the crew leaves or dives to a different server could be a solution but if that crew never leaves then you still have to wait for the natural despawn.
- Changing the clouds to specifically tell you if it's a raid version is just a form of player detector/radar
I think maybe a very low distance indicator that it's a raid voyage might be ok though. Like banners hanging from structures (boat, ships) that you can only see from high LOD distance, coloration on the Ashen Lord if it's an Ashen Winds, etc..
@d3adst1ck Yeah I know. I think that's why we don't have that system now. They could just make it so raid WEs despawn with 10 minutes of inactivity, which might be the best solution. But then again, what if someone just raids the next WE? This is kinda why I like the idea of having 3-5 "modified" WEs of different rarities.
Like a FoF is basically an unraidable rarer Skeleton Fort already and sees a decent amount of activity. What if they brought back the red (ashen) forts, or made the Molten Sands Skeleton Fort more common and gave it an Ashen Lord as a boss with a different cloud and even better loot pool. They could bring back the red (ashen) fleets, bring back (and actually modify) the Fleef (fleet of fortune), and add something like a stormy fleet. Ashen Winds could have a super volcano version in the roar, maybe there's one with a fleet you have to destroy before tackling the boss, or one with the fog effect throughout the whole fight. You could even give every WE a "fortune" version that's harder and contains the FoF. Ghost fleets could spawn around a sea fort instead, like the recent event (but harder).
Making all of these unraidable and uncommon (like 20%) would mix up the PvE gameplay, provide solid incentives to not dive, and make it so you don't encounter the raid loot on accident all the time. The part about this that could be problematic is the fact that having unraidable versions of the WEs means you need to even more servers going all the time. Like currently there are 7(?) WEs so there always has to be enough servers to host at least one for raids. If you make 20% of servers have a "modified" WE, it makes it so you need like 20% more servers. I don't have the numbers, but it could be an issue.
@fysics3037 Reducing the timer for raid voyages left unattended could work, they'd have to make sure it's long enough for someone to get back to if they sink though. I guess if you can't despawn if the voyage is still up that might be negated. I guess I've never really sailed around a server with a raid voyage active - does it even despawn if left alone, like a regular WE, in that case?
I'd like to see the emergent ones get a loot boost to give them a bit more edge over raids. If not in the number of items, improve the rarity tier of the items. Throw a kingly item or two in there maybe.
I don't think that the number of servers is a problem. It seems like the matchmaking system just sends players to servers with the matching active WE and converts it, or it will pick a server with a WE and no players around it and just despawn and change it to what they are asking for.
@d3adst1ck raids stick around for the same length as normal world events I believe. So like forever... least until you or I start sailing towards it 🤣 It's also kind of a thing of, "what if someone raids it before I get to the new one?" That could drive interest away still.
I also agree with the sentiment that normal sailed-to world events need a general buff, something I talked about in a recent thread called "the long term effects of S11" or something.
I just think that just overhauling all the world events as a season update, and keeping that fully separate from the raid versions, would drum up interest and actually get people to try just sailing around again. Plus IMO it's way more immersive and engaging to have these rarer special "attacks on SoT" rather than a banner saying "this WE has mediocre at best loot" 😂 I mean something like that would just kinda leave the WE sitting there 9/10 times. Adding some randomness to the PvE so every WE feels different would vastly improve my interest in the subject. You could even include quests in the same season update, giving similar improvements. Just seems like a relatively simple direction SoT could go that would make it feel much more diverse, alive, and feature rich.
@d3adst1ck People will always find a way to "cheese" the system. But as @Fysics3037 said earlier, this ruins the feeling of a WE for me too. You go in and fight the same waves, boss and difficulty as a normal fort. But get's slapped in the face with 2 captains chest, 3 seafarers and 2 cups. I mean come one...
Maybe don't make it a WE, create a Faction Icon cloud over that Fort or just put it on the Map table.
It is a bad system that needs to be looked at.
@blade6180 said in Remove Raid Voyages:
Maybe don't make it a WE, create a Faction Icon cloud over that Fort or just put it on the Map table.
I think there are negatives associated with doing that though so I'd rather they don't do that. If the event needs to be marked so you can identify if it's an abandoned raid or not, that needs to be only discernable once you're at the location.
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