Add Captaincy to Safer Seas

@nsgav said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

Thank you for adding safer seas.
... let us be captains...

And so it begins, as was foretold in the ancient prophecies of yore...

This is a really small ask. I'd also want this changed. I also wouldn't act like you're asking for more than a cup of milk with your cookie.

Contrary to popular belief, it isn't a character flaw to want things and there's nothing wrong with asking for the things you want.

@crowedhunter said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

... there's nothing wrong with asking for the things you want.

There absolutely is when what you want would fundamentally ruin the game for others.

I'm taking a "wait and see" attitude with Safer Seas, as long as it stays as restricted as it is now, it might not be so bad.

The moment they start acquiescing to demands like yours and adding High Seas exclusives back into Safer Seas, is the moment that the High Seas experience that players love is going to die a sad death.

After that SoT will only be Safer Seas.

@gravesilence272 Could you explain to me why people having a name and trinkets on their ship would ruin the game for you, personally?

It would let them repair their ship and buy supplies like they already can from merchant. Seems like a small qol change to me. I'm probably going to have to play on Safer Seas to get my wife or my friend to play. So this would actually enrich my own experience. Personally.

@crowedhunter said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

@gravesilence272 Could you explain to me why people having a name and trinkets on their ship would ruin the game for you, personally?

It would let them repair their ship and buy supplies like they already can from merchant. Seems like a small qol change to me. I'm probably going to have to play on Safer Seas to get my wife or my friend to play. So this would actually enrich my own experience. Personally.

I don't understand it either. Owning a ship in the game will be expensive for new players. Paying for supplies will be expensive. And having a Captained ship to get access to the Sovereign (massive QOL) means people will actually be playing the game more to get the ship. And as this thread has already covered, nobody cares about the trinkets of others (only friends/family, or, really, your crew). There's also no power gain from any of this, so it can't 'ruin' the game for others.

If the pushback is caused by 'but I haven't done it', then it's also opening the door for those players to do it too. I'm really not seeing the problem. If the pushback is trying to gatekeep the community, then there's a real problem there.

@gravesilence272 said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

@crowedhunter said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:
The moment they start acquiescing to demands like yours and adding High Seas exclusives back into Safer Seas, is the moment that the High Seas experience that players love is going to die a sad death.

After that SoT will only be Safer Seas.

Extrapolating that out, how does it die? Those who want PvP can still play in the High Seas. Those who don't want PvP, and I mean really don't want it, won't go to the High Seas in the first place. Those of us who will follow mood and crew desires, will do whatever that leads us to. Even with restrictions, Safer Seas will be what I probably do during the sweaty times here; at the moment, I generally don't play during those times because I've got no interest in having my fresh-spawn sloop being chased by a Galleon. But I might join friends on a Brig or Galleon during those times becausee they're otherwise there. At the moment, when things are bad, we do PvE instanced Tall Tales if we want to play, but that doesn't shield us from general abuse before and/or after the tale.

It's also worth keeping in mind that the community in certain regions is sparse (largely do to due to toxicity, both verbal and action-based). The High Seas keeps cannibalising itself. And the bottom line is, and always has been, that Rare has opted not to attempt a fix for a social problem ('attack on sight' rather than 'talk'), and the outcome has been self-evident for years. Even with the upcoming anti-cheat actions, social issues will remain, and as they increase in how problematic they are, the best option for those seeking to avoid them is not playing (as it always has been). For all of the gripes people seem to raise about Safer Seas, it lets people who want to play get access to the game; and whether you're aware of it or not, the position you're advancing here is that you'd rather people not play to protect an empty ocean, than let those people play, with a greater potential gain for yourself (read: more ships in the High Seas due to Safer Seas). If your fear is that more people will move to Safer Seas and not come back out, then take a moment to realise that this is where things woul have been headed anyway, as without Safer Seas, the only 'safer seas' would be in another game.

@phantaxus Or maybe they left captaincy on the list as a social experiment to see if people would actually oppose it without a real reason so they could determine whether or not those people would value the experiences of others at zero cost or still try to deny them for zero reward.

@crowedhunter said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

@gravesilence272 Could you explain to me why people having a name and trinkets on their ship would ruin the game for you, personally?

1. that's not what would ruin the game for people and 2) I never said it would ruin the game for me, personally

What WOULD ruin the game (for a lot of people) is having most of the player base move to Safer Seas and abandon High Seas.

Anything that adds restricted High Seas features to Safer Seas, incentivizes people to play more Safer Seas and less High Seas, and contributes to ruining the game (High Seas) that most of the current players enjoy.

What I personally prefer is irrelevant.

@orloglausa said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

Extrapolating that out, how does it die? Those who want PvP can still play in the High Seas. Those who don't want PvP, and I mean really don't want it, won't go to the High Seas in the first place.

You've literally just answered your own question here. The people who just want straight up PvP action, have already left the High Seas, they just do HG dives. The ones left on High Seas are not the ones just looking for a random fight, because all those people just do HG. The people who remain in the High Seas want to be pirates, and need they enough "neutral" players sailing around as emissaries, doing voyages and such on the High Seas to make it actually worth while.

Right now the game has struck a delicate balance - the PvE portions of the game are just fun, rewarding and easy enough to make playing the game worthwhile for enough players, even if they are not interested in PvP and would rather not have to fight other players. These players are wary and careful and will do anything to stop you from taking their loot. They are FUN to hunt. Other hunters are not.

Hunting the above players IS the game for a LOT of people. The only thing that makes doing so viable (currently) is having a sufficient number of players to hunt - and THAT is only possible because the "neutral" PvE players don't have a choice - they HAVE to play in High Seas.

Give those players the choice, and they will ONLY play in Safer Seas, and the hunters will have no one to hunt.

It's like taking all the deer out of the forest: all the wolves will starve.

If your fear is that more people will move to Safer Seas and not come back out, then take a moment to realise that this is where things woul have been headed anyway, as without Safer Seas, the only 'safer seas' would be in another game.

I mean... good? People who don't actually like SoT shouldn't play it, instead of demanding it be ruined for those who do enjoy it.

Sea of Thieves was unique and amazing because it was the ONLY game out there with no safe zones - that's what attracted the initial player base. After that, a vocal minority of players came along, who didn't understand the "zeitgeist" of the game was about conflict with other players, and started getting mad when other players took their loot. Since literally the entire point of the game is to either steal people's loot or defend you loot from theft.

The players who don't like it, quite literally DON'T LIKE the game of Sea of Thieves.

Rather than simply realize this, quit and go play a game they DO like though, for some odd reason these players INSIST on demanding a game THEY DON'T LIKE PLAYING be fundamentally changed to the point that it will no longer be enjoyable to those who DO like playing it.

@silverwing-525 said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

@gravesilence272
Ruin the game? By giving people the ability to enjoy their ship on their terms? Please do explain in what universe this statement makes any sort of sense.

Don't ask me man, it's YOUR statement, it has nothing to do with what I said, but yes, I do find YOUR statement rather non-sensical.

@gravesilence272 Oh cool so then you also would agree that captaincy should be in Safer Seas.

@gravesilence272 said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

@orloglausa said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

Extrapolating that out, how does it die? Those who want PvP can still play in the High Seas. Those who don't want PvP, and I mean really don't want it, won't go to the High Seas in the first place.

You've literally just answered your own question here. The people who just want straight up PvP action, have already left the High Seas, they just do HG dives. The ones left on High Seas are not the ones just looking for a random fight, because all those people just do HG. The people who remain in the High Seas want to be pirates, and need they enough "neutral" players sailing around as emissaries, doing voyages and such on the High Seas to make it actually worth while.

Except I didn't. I explained the PvE players are already gone and won't return as part of your equation. You're arguing that PvP players went to HG, draining the other side. If anything, you're suggesting that Rare drained the pool of PvP players to balance the PvE exodus of the last few years. So you clearly understand that PvE ceased to be fun for a lot of people, or became a 'sometimes' thing, instead enjoyable. As you pointed out, multiple times, in multiple ways, the core loop is PvEvP (PvE being the core part), and without the PvE aspect, the vP players are left hunting themselves. If anything, you demonstrated that HG needs to go to fix equilibrium issues (because PvEvPvP with 'hunter of hunters' players back would stabilise your complaints).

But none of this matters, because you're engaging with 'why we need captaincy' and rejecting reality instead of looking at the topic. Why would Captaincy being enabled in the Safer Seas be a bad thing? Here are the reasons it's a good idea:

• Sovereign QOL removes the 'grind' feeling of the game, meaning that new players get to experience a bump in power once their ship gets a captain;
• Captaincy allows saving of cosmetics, which up-values the Emporium and Plunder Pass for players who in the PvE realm;
• Captaincy/ship milestones can be cheesed, or collected through guilds (without the owner being involved), so there's zero reason to gate them from PvE when it's at least got to be better for the owner to actually be involved in getting them. They're also entirely cosmetic;
• Captaincy provides just enough of the 'full experience' that it teases the notion of 'unique' ships. Since only your crew can see your ship, some players are going to want to take the thing out on the High Seas to show it off to others. While most people don't care, and won't care, onboarding other players to join you on your ships, and giving people a sense of more to be done, can drive uptake. It also doesn't rob the full experience of anything, but rather prepares people for it.

Having said all of that, having Captained ships in Safer Seas doesn't undo half a decade of chasing PvE players out of the game. It also doesn't fix the social aspect ('shoot first, ask questions never'). But it may get new players into the game, and expose them to 'fast unloading' (Sovereign), reducing future anxiety about 'unloads'/'selling' in the High Seas.

I look forward to hearing how you think Captained ships are detrimental.

@clammyhuevos said in Add Captaincy to Safer Seas:

Also, I think it's safe to say, if someone earns "Hunter of the Shrouded Ghost" on Safer Seas......the entire veteran player base is going to have a complete and utter come apart. lol

Wouldn't bother me and it would be real tough to find someone that has spent an even close to comparable amount of time meg hunting in the strictly organic play style as a solo.

If megs have the same spawn rate (adjusted for 1 ship safe servers) I don't have a problem with it.

Alliance servers have cheesed meg hunts for years at max gold/commendation farming and manipulating the server for max megs.

Safer seas is a heck of a lot closer to a fair hunt than alliance servers are.

I've supported SOT way b4 release, got to play every fri,sat with other supporters to test the game. On release I had a crew and we only played 2gether and we lived up to the pirate hype, we didn't bully solos or even sloops unless we just robbed them and let them go but a galley was game on and I think our crew retired undefeated. After MEG summoning we all kinda vanished, and I later came back and now there are megs everywhere and grapples and special cannon balls and I'm a solo. Back then I'd say he'll no to safer seas but now I can see where your comming from. I've been sunk, grieved, hunted ect... and now I just wanna enjoy the ambience and be casual too. So much new stuff to learn but can't in a "rust" environment. So safer seas is a great way to play and then get back into normal play

@johnny-vain

That’s a product of putting solo players on servers with full crews.

Most solos can’t handle a decent full crew it’s just to great of a numbers advantage.

Been requesting the option for solo players to choose to play adventure with all crew sizes or just other solos for a long time.

@unstoppabledork yeah before I quit , the game got kinda empty and everyone was sloops and we were the only gallys , but when I'm in a sloop and try to just dig up treasure and try to solo quests. Share enuff I'd see a galleon heading my way and I'd have to run or hide and let them rob and sink my ship

I agree, add Captain's Ships as the novelty of having your own ship to play with will take nothing away from the PvP experience of others. Also, maybe think about letting you invite friends onto the server (more than just the 4 of you on 1 ship). Imagine the fun you can have by having your own 2 teamed sandbox to enact your pirate fantasies on without worrying about some griefer spoiling the fun. Then when you've both practiced enough together, then you can both jump onto High Seas and take on everyone else. These are only two little changes but they would be massive for a lot of players. And no, before anyone starts going on about how this will "kill the PvP" servers...it won't. The FIFA games had a season mode but that never stopped people playing online matches. This way, everyone gets what they want. Make it happen, Rare. Pretty please lol