(1) An open, exterior stone vault door will no longer reset to a closed position if all players leave the island and the waters surrounding it.
Instead, once a player opens an exterior stone vault door with a vault key the door remains open for 30 minutes thereafter even if all players leave the island and the waters surrounding it.
(2) The interior stone vault door (the door that closes just before the vault floods with water) timer is not solo friendly especially in gold key vaults which are filled with lots of loot and tons of piles of gold. Solo players can’t empty the entire vault before the timer runs out while all other crew sizes can.
Two ways to fix this. The obvious answer is just to increase the timer for solo sloop crews by 30 seconds let’s say.
But the other way I envisioned it could be done is by tweaking the functionality of vaults in a small way in that if you solve the puzzle before the interior stone vault door slams shut then the interior door never closes and the vault never floods giving crews of all sizes infinite time to ensure they get EVERYTHING in the vault.
If this route was taken I would also REDUCE the interior stone vault door timer to 45 seconds to solve the puzzle before the door slams shut and the vault floods. This way pirates feel this sense of rush to solve the puzzle as quickly as possible and if they succeed they can relax, breathe normally and take their time emptying the vault but if they fail there is certain death and a whole lot less treasure as a result.
(3) Place a merfolk treasure statue that we see in shrines and treasuries just outside of the interior stone vault door. Place a second one just outside of the exterior stone vault door to eliminate the need for players to carry each piece of treasure through the corridor between the exterior and interior stone vault doors. These merfolk treasure statues could be on the same 30 minute timer as the exterior door. They spawn when a vault key is used to unlock a vault and last for 30 minutes.
(4) Buff the range of the gold value of the Chest of Tributes to 8,000 - 12,000 gold. There’s only one per vault. It should feel valuable and special.
(5) Add a new, rare vault key type above a gold key. This vault would have two Chests of Tributes hidden away and all chests would be Captain’s Chests/Ashen Captain’s Chests and all trinkets would be Peculiar Relics/Magma Grails. Just an absolute S tier return but rare.
(6) Add a simple toast message that pops up when you open a vault with a vault key. “Find three medallions and use them to solve the puzzle before time runs out.”
Add a second toast message after solving the puzzle. “Store treasure in the statue and retrieve it from the second statue just outside of the vault.”
