PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why

@p5r3v1l said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@zagwitz
I tried to summarize my feelings on sailing atm in this post:

https://www.seaofthieves.com/forum/topic/29513/thought-s-on-sailing-as-an-avid-sailer-and-how-it-might-be-improved

sadly it did not pick up pace well, so i guess not too many people are interested in deeper sail mechanics...

And i can only agree, that a ship like a corvette has to be faster than a sloop. But weren't galleons in the begining just slow freighters with huge storage room?

Larger ships had huge advantages over the smaller ships.

First off they were larger, which meant they had room for a lot more crew, a lot more guns and swords, a lot more cannons and a lot heavier / larger cannons, plus they were made of thicker and more durable wood.

A small ship going after a large ship would in most cases be rather foolhardy, at least if the larger ship is carrying any sort of weapons. The larger ship can simply overwhelm you with manpower and firepower in close quarters, they can outrun you down the wind as well as (on many ships anyways) maintain fire on you with "chaser" cannons at the bow of the ship.

There is a reason why ships, especially warships, kept growing and growing in size, number of cannons, amount of crew and thickness of wood. The very late ships like the L'Ocean and HMS Victory were absolutely gargantuan with multiple gun decks and several tonnes worth of cannons onboard.

The smaller ships had an advantage in maneuverability and capability to sail faster when close hauled, mostly because of the shape of their sails (commonly lateen / triangle sails for the smaller ships) and the shape of their hull / keel which enables them to 'cut through' the water more efficiently than the larger ships. However due to their size they carried lighter guns and less crew. A 4 pounder or 6 pounder cannon would do very little against the larger ships, and most cannonballs would more than likely simply bounce off the thick wood. Meanwhile the larger ships carried huge cannons on the lower decks (closest to the waterline where the heavy weight was more stable than on upper decks). Facing off against a large ship with 12, 18, 24 or 36 pounder cannons against your tiny 4 or 6 pounder peashooter would be a terrible idea. Especially since you'd have to be relatively close to have enough power behind the shot to do any significant damage to a larger ship.

Anyways... if you were out on the open ocean in the age of sails you would be much, much safer onboard a large ship than in a small one.

@quixoticfolly said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@p5r3v1l

I'd love to see more accurate wind mechanics. By necessity this would require the wind to shift directions less frequently. I never bother with tacking in the game because it's barely any faster and you can count on the wind shifting quickly. Generally the galleon is slower trying to tack because of it's slow turn speed when the wind shifts. Bothers me quite a bit that sailing directly into the wind is more effective.

I'd like to see proper tacking enabling faster turns with the galleon. E.g. you are sailing South with the wind directly behind you. Then you turn to port (left for you landlubbers). By tacking the mizzenmast to starboard, and the foremast to port you would catch wind in the mizzenmast (which then pushes the rear of the ship towards starboard) while the foremast would be "neutral" and not catch any wind.

This would (should) cause your ship to 'pivot' due to the wind pushing the aft of the ship, thus lining it up faster.

Likewise if you are heading South and the wind is coming from the East and you want to make a turn to West then you tack the mizzen and main mast to "neutral" so they catch no wind, and turn the foremast to starboard. This way the foremast sail will grab the wind from the east and push the bow of the ship towards West. Then turn the mizzen and main sails once the ship is in a good turn to catch wind on the aft as well and speed it up as you steady up on a westerly course.

This video has a nice visual and explanation of what I was trying to explain above :)

You can watch it from start or just start it from 1m25s where he explains it very well how the wind can be used to turn faster.

https://youtu.be/NPLUTzICBug?t=1m25s

@zagwitz said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@p5r3v1l The galleons huge hull actually speeds it up, and with a lateen sail it it could have quite a tight point of sail. I believe that the Galleon would still be faster, though if anyone has a more factual argument I am happy to be proved wrong.

Here is an example sailing profile from the game Naval Action.

Note the Lynx and Privateer are smaller ships with lateen sails. They have better close haul (upwind) speed. 0° = directly upwind, 180° directly downwind.

The Pickle however is square rigged like the larger ships. Thus it has larger sail area for catching wind, but it's sails are not as good at catching wind when going upwind.

Thus the sailing profile shows the Pickle being slower up against the wind, but faster going downwind.

Sailing Profile | NavalAction Wikia | Fandom

Note that this guide discusses the sailing capabilities of ships in terms of their speeds at different points relative their own maximum speed. For a guide on the actual default speed value for...

What you will often notice when looking at the sailing profile for sailships is how there is a reduction in speed when going directly downwind (180° with wind directly at your back). This might seem counter-intuitive at first glance. The reason why ships lose speed when going directly downwind is because the back of the ship as well as the rear sail is "stealing" wind from the main mast and foremast. Put differently, the rear sail is "blocking" the sails towards the front so they don't get any wind.

This is why the optimal speed is gained by sailing a few degrees to either side of the direction of the wind as you then allow the wind to fill all the sails and thus take advantage of a much greater force to push the ship forward.

@p5r3v1l said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@ghroznak

I guess what we all agree on, is that the current sailing physics are still lacking and need to be improved! :)

I agree with you on that. In this game where horizontal progression and players being good is based on the player him or herself becoming good at the game rather than relying on gear then having things such as slightly improved sail physics would absolutely be an area where good teamwork and good player skill and understanding of basic sailing would give you an advantage.

It would be quite hard to coordinate and make it work in the start, but with practice and a good crew you could gain that slight advantage in combat by using the wind to out-maneuver.

Sure beats the current binary sailing skill of "lets do an anchor spin!".

@p5r3v1l said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@ghroznak Or, as it is done today, when you have the freedom of a foresail and a mainsail that only extends to one side of the mast (I dont know the correct term), going downwind you do a butterfly (foresail and mainsail on different sides).

I do also understand the effect of the different sail shapes and how they are attached to the masts on the speed.

What I am wondering about and what I could not find Info on, is the actual real world speed of an old classic style galeon (traders, broad and not stretched body), compared to ships like a sloop. While I do understand the effect of the body above and under the waterline at least pushing the ship forward a bit when close hauled and the broad back pushing it forward when going downwind, I still think the huge body is a huge minus in terms of water resistance. They also have the hindmost sail stealing the wind when going downwind as you said.

Do you have any good sources for that?

You'll just have to google it up.

Several trading ships, like the Le Gros Ventre and the East Indiaman traders all sailed at decent speeds.

It's not really so much about how wide or large they are as it is about the shape of their hull/keel and their sails. Being heavy just means slower acceleration in order to get up to full speed. Also being heavier means your ship has more inertia and is thus harder to turn. That is just simple physics.

However, once you are up to speed you will keep that speed easier as the momentum of your ship will keep plowing straight through the water which doesn't offer much friction.

It's a bit like a freight train. It's slow to get going, but once it gets up to speed it will just keep going easily with little effort.

Another thing which puts it into perspective is how little force is needed to get something moving across water. One of the largest containerships in the world, the Madrid Maersk (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madrid_Maersk) can carry 206000 tonnes deadweight, while engines "only" provide 70,604 horsepower. That's 0,3 horsepower per tonne of deadweight.

Imagine a truck on the roads with 0,3 horsepower per tonne of cargo it carries. That would mean a truck dragging 50 tonnes of cargo would have an engine providing 17-18 horsepower.

Note: Those 0,3horsepower per tonne are also not taking into account the displacement of the ship itself, just the deadweight (cargo, water, fuel, crew, provisions etc).

The point is... it requires very little energy to get even extreme weights to move when on the water.

@bo05ter said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

if you can sail your smaller craft well a galleon will never be able to bring her broadsides upon you. Maneuverability is a huge advantage in naval warfare, so much the fact that pirates would often use smaller more maneuverable ships to avoid the bigger guns of the larger ships.

Perhaps this is true for two man sloops but no matter how much better you are at rounding a gallion you cannot sail and attack by yourself.

I don't really understand the issue.

If you want a fair match against a galleon with 4 crew... join a galleon with 4 crew.

Why is this even a hard thing to understand?

If you want to fight a galleon with a small ship and 2 people, feel free to do so, but don't expect it to be a fair match.

4 vs 2 has never been fair in any game I ever played, nor should it be.

The game gives you plenty of choice though. The ships are free, the matchmaking (at least in beta) was quite fast and all rewards are shared equally whether you are solo, duo or four people.

Which means it's exceedingly easy for you to swap from small ship to big ship if you want a less challenging and more fair experience on the seas.

And if you don't like playing with or crewing with other people then I honestly have to ask... why are you jumping into a game which explicitly states that it's about teamwork, open world, pvp and which originally didn't even have an option for solo players at all.

Give them a finger (small ship to play solo in) and they take the whole arm (demand entire game to be reworked to make things fair for their solo preference).

@seniorwaffle14 said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

@im-axis-rahl I was thinking the same thing. I mentioned it in another post about how the small ship should be redesigned with a triangular sail, and therefor be significantly faster going into the wind. This would also allow for tacking with the sloop. Now solo players can legitimately escape a galleon, and that's as far as balancing the two should go. Sloops are meant for getting out of there.

Just keep in mind that a triangular or lateen sail performs worse directly downwind as the shape of the sail does not capture wind very well when it comes from directly astern.

Meaning a ship with such a sail would perform well when close hauled (at an angle up towards wind) and at an angle downwind, but performs less well with wind directly from behind.

Even going at an angle downwind it would likely not outrun a larger square rigged ship though.

@zagwitz said in PSA: Sloops are meant to be slower than Galleons, and this is why:

Okay so i've been on the reddit, on the discord and lurking on here for some time. This is an issue that is brought up time and time again. Now I am no Naval History expert but I have done more than my fair share of reading and have sailed for just under 8 years.

'Galleons are faster than sloops' because of something called hull speed. Hull Speed is how fast a ship can travel before surfing and longer ships have a faster hull speed. There is a lot more to this than just ship length and the reasons longer ships are faster is much more scientific than described here but I have tried to make it easy to understand. Feel free to look this up and educate yourself more!

Now for some of you, this may create a balance issue but I can assure you that if you can sail your smaller craft well a galleon will never be able to bring her broadsides upon you. Maneuverability is a huge advantage in naval warfare, so much the fact that pirates would often use smaller more maneuverable ships to avoid the bigger guns of the larger ships.

I hope this answers some questions and confusion!

Great post. Thanks for sharing. I always thought it was because of the ration of hull to sail or something like that, but this makes sense.
As for in game, Rare can pretty much get away with changing the physics as they see fit. I mean the guns work underwater!!! Oh, and there are skeletons that detonate upon death.