Ahoy!
With the closure of Arena, the Sea Dog's tavern isn't seeing much of a bright future, unless the Devs already have something in mind, I propose a transformation to the tavern to bring a newer, fresher look at some pre-existing aspects of the game.
- The (desperately needed) Reworking of Open crew
To start off; the Arena Tavern should be reused to make a local "hub" of finding crews. It could be used to advertise open crew sessions, while also creating a place where players meet, therefore creating an in-game "LFG/LFC" system, because not everyone has access to the Discord, and from my own experiences, the Xbox LFG hub isn't much of a place to find an enjoyable time...
A board similar to the new map board on the outpost docks could be added somewhere within the Arena Tavern, but instead of giving out and taking maps, it could be used to sort through active Open crew sessions.
Using session titles; tags; ping; crew fullness; or time spent in that session, players would be able to sort through all Open Crew sessions to find the perfect fit for what they need to get done.
If you desire a more organised beginning to the session than meeting up with members already on their voyage: one will also be able to create their own "Looking For Crew" post, selecting tags to display to other nearby players looking to join, such as "Mic required/optional, what emissary, what voyage, approximately how long", and other such related things.
Also mic and instrument range would have to be decreased, similar to the speaking trumpet whispering mechanic.
- Community News
One thing I've seen consistently throughout my time among the community of this game is lack of notice for things like SoTshot, update times, or other time limited things.
A large board similar to the Open Crew or Map board could be installed somewhere: being updated in time with announcements, update schedules, twitch drops, SoTshot events, time limited cosmetics, and other events to keep everyone updated. Time limited cosmetics could also be shown off next to clothier shopkeepers and emporium stalls to let pirates get a good idea of what they're buying. (I would say that for everything in the emporium, but time limited things are more important)
- Fresh way to start a session
When playing closed crew; all crew members must meet at the bottom of the tavern area where there are ships of all types docked (for cinematic affect of liveliness) to launch the session. The doors of the Arena tavern are opened and players can now explore outside, complete the parkour course, and swim around in the ocean around that area. Fog encapsulates the Arena tavern to create an "invisible wall" style of limited access so loading into the arena tavern doesn't take as long as loading into the actual game itself.
A short cinematic similar to the player sailing towards the Arena tavern, or out of the Devils Shroud on the Pirates Life Tall Tales, and Maiden Voyage, could play and take up some time of the loading screen, just to make it a bit more interesting than a Powerpoint Presentation style loading screen with the Xbox player's worst nightmare: the green spinning wheel of blackscreen doom.
If joining an open crew session it could play a short cinematic of a silhouette against the sunset/rise as your pirate walks down the dock towards 3 other crew members and a docked ship.
I'd absolutely love to see something more come of the Arena tavern, especially in adventure mode, to really reuse it instead of leaving it to gather dust as a little "trophy of participation" for an attempted gamemode.
