Changes or improvements for Sea of Thieves. Various ideas.

You’ll get what you want next year. I’m guessing youll be able to buy the game and pay a subscription for full safer seas with all your friends and up to 5 ships

Enable full progression in PvE-only mode

They already said "No" about Safer Seas being a PvE mode. Its a tutorial extension.

so players who prefer exploration or calm sessions can still progress like PvP players.

You mean...take a game built on PvPvE, and divide it because you dont like other players, which is one of the core features of an online game.

Add a risk/reward system inside PvE

High Seas.

Introduce PvP flagging or opt-in systems

Allow players to choose if they want to engage in PvP at the beginning of a session.

I never see how this would work or function without breaking the game itself.
Dont want, PvP, go play Safer Seas. High Seas is PvPvE not just PvP.

These features would give players more freedom to enjoy the game the way they like

Or divide up the game. Turning a once proud, great PvPvE adventure online game, into a shell of it former self.
You have the freedom to play "Fully" in Safer Seas. You get 100% gold...nothing else is needed.

Players aren't the problem, but cheaters are.

I don't want to change the game, it's great as it is.

That pretty much it. But oddly, players want to change the game, removing other players so they dont have to deal with cheaters.
Thus also...changing the core gameplay.

@lorygo97 you dont want to change the game, and yet the core fundamental design principle of this game is its a pvpve environment. Everything is balanced with that in mind, that's why pve is not that challenging as there is always the prospect of pvp being added in at same time. I hope they never do this, time will tell though.

1.) You want safer seas but also the whole game. You can't have your cake and eat it too.

2.) The highest risk PvE is a lower risk than most mid level PvP encounters. I as a solo sloop can do skeleton fleets with almost no worries, but if even a single half decent player rolls up, I have to consider where they are, and how I might combat them. Even if they made skeleton fleets 3x harder it wouldn't be comparable to a single decent player. The amount of risk or challenge they would have to add would not only make it basically a new game mode, but it would also have to be balanced to be equally as risky as high seas to be fair, and at that point you won't like it anymore.

3.) This is called Hourglass. If you want to sail without the risk of anyone attacking you, safer seas exists, and soon safer seas fleets and custom servers will exist too! Two more places you can hide from the game you're playing.

These changes would make the game boring for almost all players as they would grind the game, then lose interest and never touch it again. If you can just stack 50, or 100, or 1000 FotDs without needing to worry about someone sinking you to steal your treasure, why would you ever play high seas again? I think these changes would actually be more likely to kill the game as it would make a large number of players switch to single player mode, making the main feature of the game, high seas, very empty and even worse off for players, since the vast majority of people who will be left will be the more skilled players, making high seas even more unapproachable from a newb standpoint, which again, the hardest PvE encounters are nothing at all compared to even average PvP encounters. You will not be able to train yourself to be good enough on single player mode to ever be good enough online to want to stay there. It will keep pushing more and more people into single player mode, killing the game outright.

@lorygo97 I’m not being confrontational at all my dude or dudette just think that there will be a premium priced “full release” of safer seas next year, probably locked behind a subscription. That or you can get a private server and set it up how you like it.

Just my thoughts on what happens next

@jon-sea-nah they have confirmed that custom seas will not include any form of progression

@hiradc I’m not sure that many players care about progression.

I do, I’m going through almost all the commendations and I am on the HG grind.

I’d venture to guess that if players can have up to 16 friends on the same server and can just cash in treasure and smash world events. It’s just a safe experience for a lot of friends to jam out on.

I’m sure I’ll get a server to set up tdm, multi ship battles, and such.

I love this game and I’m 99.9999999% on high seas, but I do get that this game has a very toxic culture to it. Most players either dumpster you then call you dog Shhhh or you win and then they call you a hard R and spam report you. So having an empty server will def have its benefits to just get away from so of it.

Some players really need to let go of the gatekeeping of pixels and the “Git Gud” mentality. It’s a hyper competitive game with a very steep learning curve. Maybe being a little more inclusive will keep players around who knows

@jon-sea-nah time will tell, personally I think once people realise what they are for those custom seas will mostly be used by communities, streamers etc to host tournaments, think of fun new modes etc. Most people are pursuing some form of progression. Thats why they get so bothered at the concept of being sunk and stolen from.

@hiradc oh for sure the tourney/shenanigan event servers will be the more popular.

I do think there are a decent subset 20% or so players that don’t give much of a rip about progression and just wanna be a pirate with the homies. Time will tell though.

I do anticipate a fully unlocked safer sea with one ship per server being a thing upon a premium game purchase think $89 and up. I honestly don’t even blame Rare for it at this point.

@lorygo97

You've flagged your ship saying you're not interested in PvP. I come over to you, board, and take your treasure and use a storage crate to take all your supplies.

How do you stop me?