Faction Treasury Rework

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but how does it work currently? Can you earn any Allegiance currently by activating the hourglass and putting loot on your ship? I thought it only increased Allegiance gained from Defending against other faction ships. If you have no battles, you gain no Allegiance. Am I wrong?

I do like the idea of there being some way to gain Allegiance in a PvE way.

@lordqulex Thank you very much for explaining. I did not know that!

It could be that alliances/alliance servers are also a factor in limiting the bonus applied by stash loot

@lordqulex there has def been organised alliances waiting in ambush, don't know if done by the server alliances etc but imagine they would be looking to cheese it for curses

@lordqulex They're doing it because they're bad at PvP, don't want to admit it, and instead of getting better as a single crew, use alliances to ambush other crews that will invade them, usually looking for a fair fight.

The passive play of the hourglass is in need of buffing, but it in no way needs to be improved to "shorten/ease the grind" of the PvP factions. You will need to fight to make your allegiance and gold while in a faction, and that's the intention of the passive alternative, so it isn't cheesed by alliances and "PvE-lords" in a mode that should otherwise promote PvP.

This idea genuinely spits in the face of the concept of promoting PvP, where you will be required to fight and win to receive rewards for your skills, efforts, and mettle. A PvE method of earning allegiance would have been implemented since Day 1, had the devs not realized how pointless it would be to get the masses of the playerbase to get into some genuine PvP, something the seas were lacking following the closure of Arena. I'm sure they're aware their larger playerbase doesn't like PvP, but they also wanted to promote PvP to bring this game's world back to the "healthier" PvPvE nature it's in, and have rewards of some kind for both isolated playstyles.

That idea is Great

@lordqulex said in Faction Treasury Rework:

I don't feel like you are taking the human element into account. Things like mental exhaustion, skill ceilings, and even just people liking or wanting to participate in PVP.

If you don't like or want to participate in PvP, then this Season's content is worth skipping to prevent those human elements from doing negative damage to your mental health.

In another thread the community has floated some ideas how how to get causal players engaged in hourglass to promote exposure:

• Daily first win bonus allegiance
• Daily deed of play 10 matches to gain allegiance
• Daily Bones Rush hour parallel to Gold Rush where increased allegiance is rewarded

Do you approve of these methods to encourage casual players to participate?

It's borderline QoL that would make the grind more approachable, yes. However, I don't see that ever happening since there have been no events in the past that have tied boosted XP as a consistent Daily reward. There have also been no ties to other trading company reputation gain in regards to the renown deeds, so again, this concept is shot in the water.

I also think that the wider problem with defending is that when the engine doesn't match me for hours, and I turn in grade 5 treasury bonus, I get the allegiance of a win. It feels like such a shrug because I put in potentially hours of work to get something invaders get in 10 minutes. It's not my fault you didn't match me! I put up the hourglass, I signed up for the increased risk, and you are giving me virtually zero increased reward for doing so. It feels like Rare is spitting in my face as a player when I sign up for your new game mode and don't appropriately reward my time for doing so.

You queued up to fight in a war, doing whatever you please, your mission in the war you queued up for is to defeat the opposition, not bring riches to Ramsey's/The Servant's laps, they have their own trading companies that do exactly that. The time you spent gathering that treasure sounds like an inefficiency when 2-3 world events can get your faction stash to level 5 easily, not that it matters because unless it's for the Emissary you voted for, the items you have on board don't sell for increased value or anything, nor does it affect your hourglass value as you need to successfully win a fight with all of that on board (though, it is very weak currently).

Ironically, the faction stash is better "handled" via diving, as you're able to take supply crates and emissary flags with you between invasion battles, increasing your faction stash for nearly every ship you sink as you recover their sunken remains.

P.S. Now that I know how much an "unfair" fight irks the "hardcore" PVPers who like to sail casuals out of bound, I'm going to try to make them every chance I get. I think turn-about is fair play for when some phantom jumps on my boat, ferry locks me, and shouts discouraging/derogatory things at me as they sail me out of bounds just because they can.

Alright first, if that's how your attitude about PvP is, you should not be surprised you're getting push back for your ideas and opinions. They're revolving around a bad attitude about PvP encounters that ultimately result in a skill difference that you cannot come to terms with.

Second, if a player is saying obscene things to you while they're spawncamping you out of bounds, and without any provocation, it should be worth reporting to Support, as that's not very sportsman-like behavior (note that I said, "without any provocation", if you start talking smack to someone about the way they play, they will talk smack back, and can be justified in doing so, minus slurs and offensive language, obviously).

@lordqulex said in Faction Treasury Rework:

Not for the large intersect of players that dislike/have no interest in PVP that also want the curses, which is quite large.

If the large intersect of players want to endanger their mental health to look like a skeleton/ghost in a pirate game, that's all on them, more than enough people are able to piecemeal through the grind/setting up better goals than just the cosmetics they want, they're bonuses on top of improving/experiencing PvP, which is the bigger goal of the Season.

You mean like letters of recommendation that you can buy to get levels with the trading company? Things that help players earn levels with factions don't exist you say? I know I bought a few Sea Dog levels with letters of recommendation...

Letters of Recommendation were monthly, but only based on monthly updates, should the devs even remember to refresh them, which they haven't before several times. This is also not equivalent to the "daily" formula you lot have been suggesting, so I deem it irrelevant to the suggestion and its potential implementation.

It's not my attitude in skill difference that matters, it's Rare's. They're basically telling the below average pirates "we don't care about you or your journey, suck it up and grind losses to get the curses you want." That's just bad for player engagement and retention IMO.

Rare isn't telling you or below-average pirates anything. That's what you're telling yourself, and putting words in the mouths of other people is the fastest way to get disregarded for any opinions and statements you plan to make.

I know that's easy on XBox, there is a feature that makes this fast and easy, but I'm not sure that exists on Steam. Rare won't take action against players without video evidence and that is not trivial on a PC. I'm not going to record every moment of my game, that's simply ridiculous.

This is a bold faced lie. Especially when GeForce Experience (Shadowplay) exists and can record minutes of really good quality recent game footage for free with no major issues. Windows 10 PCs come installed with Xbox Game Bar which can also record 30+ seconds of recent game footage.

@lordqulex said in Faction Treasury Rework:

Rare has given the casual/mediocre player a mechanic to finally get a little fun revenge against the people trolling them for years, and to actually make measurable headway in the new factions. I for one find the tables turning remarkably ironic that now many of the people who are "good" at PVP and been rubbing pirates' faces in it for years are finally getting comeuppance. "I wanted to match with another solo sloop so I can ferry lock them and sail them out knowing they get no allegiance, but instead I find three sloops who beat me up 'unfairly'! Waaaaaaaaahhh!"

Your tears are delicious. Keep 'em coming.

It's not my attitude in skill difference that matters, it's Rare's.

Yep, very strong stance you've got there. A fine backbone, but the wrong kind of backbone when you're trying to argue on the forums for something you want to make "inclusive".

@lordqulex said in Faction Treasury Rework:

I mean, have you tried teaching and coaching instead of merely calling someone a liar? I literally had ZERO idea XBox game bar could do that and just learned it. Can you wrap your head around the fact that there are things people simply may not know before attacking them personally by calling them a liar?

"This statement is false = Ur a liar!"

Nope. Not even gonna bother with that one.