I'd appreciate it if ship battles would cost anything more then supplies. No real pirate would dare to fight, if there was no prospect of lucrative prey, because a ship needs restauration after a battle. But not in Sea Of Thieves. So far.
This game does not involve such a risk. If the losing crew has no loot, it doesn't do much. You collect cannonballs, planks and bananas, look for the next opponent, start over.
One idea would be that the repairs carried out on board should not be as good as those carried out in a harbour. Repairs in the port would be expensive. This would cause the ship to wear out through battle, making the naval battles more interesting and penalizing blind, unprofitable PVP over lucrative PVP.
- A perforated hull, repaired with a few planks, could still make some water. Just in such a way that it becomes a bit annoying. And in heavy seas the repairs could break again.
- I had repeatedly suggested damage models for sails, masts/rigging and cannons. A damaged sail could be repaired, but wouldn't be so strong anymore. Full set and close to the wind, it could tear again. A cannon under fire could fail and would have to be replaced. At a damaged mast the rigging could wear out, so that one would have to adjust more often.
Where could such repairs be carried out? Only at the outposts would be unfortunate. They are too few, there could be crowds. I propose to have three kinds of restauration: simple on the sea, medium or high quality at the sea- and outposts. This will include those weird seaposts into the game, too.
There could be new sails to be bought. But it would be a bit cheaper to let repair the sails, they would then be a bit worse than new, but better than mended on board. A sea post could overhaul the hull repairs, so that they would survive a storm and violent waves and be a little denser.
A general overhaul of the hull would be a bit more expensive, it would only be done at the outpost.
