Sea of Thieves: July ’25 Direct

I definitely think Hourglass needs some forefront love, 100%. New alternate game modes to shake things up, more rewards all across the board, gameplay/QOL changes to address various pain-points (emergent AI threats being a big one for me - looking at you ancient megs..)

Would also very much love to see a Guild revamp. For a feature that's meant to really bring players together, it feels very disconnected to be in a guild. Not only is the member cap quite low (24), we only get to play with a max of 3 other guild members at a time.

I absolutely understand people will feel negatively about more than one guild ship on a server, but I think being able to sail with maybe two ships in the same server would be cool. Perhaps some parameters where guild ships are placed in servers with other sailing guild ships, as to make the sandbox not so uneven.

Customizable guild hideouts would also be amazing - something to visually represent the guild's deeds, through a meeting spot where everyone can hang out, have a grog, and revel in their stories.

the team has acknowledged some of the issues

They do this a lot already. Does t change anything. One could drink a shot everytime they “are aware” of an issue and plan to fix it. Only for it to backfire.

Hourglass should be changed but not in its fundamentals in my opinion I believe one thing that deters a great number of my friends from hourglass is the unfairness of said battles. By this I mean supplies I personally think that supplies should be matched so neither crew can have the advantage by simply having curse balls or chain shots instead crews would have the exact same supplies as the opposing crew making the fight more fair. Also there should be points in the match for example if it went on longer than ten minutes all barrels on the players ship would refill supplies. This would get rid off long fights with pure tdms due to both crews running out of supplies which is a thing I think no one is a massive fan of

Seems like the majority so far is on Hourglass. And while I agree Hourglass needs to be updated, it's not the first on my list.

I really would like to see an update to Emissary play. Right now the only thing that sets the Emissaries apart is the type of loot they have a bonus selling and the type of quests available to them. They don't have any other unique gameplay features when it comes to interacting with other crews combat-wise and non-combat wise.

I'd like to see something like Order of Souls being able to sell or trade buffs / debuffs to other Emissaries, to adjust weapon speed or damage, etc.

I'd like to actually board another ship as a Merchant and survey their goods and tell them which ones should be sold to which smuggler vendor for an increased price (in which I would get a huge cut!)

Something along those lines. They're definitely half-baked ideas but I just want to do something with different crews other than consider sinking them :(

Hourglass needs more. There is like 60 total things to unlock between both of them, and that's across 700+ levels. I'm not even counting the gold PVP curses as part of that. There are like 15 total things to unlock for GoF and if you don't care about the magpie set or mysterious stranger clothes, then GoF ends at 105 for you. It did for me.

@valor-omega I like the idea but in practice it would just be too overpowered. There's a reason they make it so hard to get even 2 ships on the same server.

@potatosord But it's really NOT that hard to get two ships on the same server, it's more just slightly time consuming. Having two friends on the same stamp loading in, until they merge takes 15-20 minutes tops, and then they can stay in.

Conversely, we ask random non-captained ships to use their ships sometimes (no we don't harass them if they say no), and usually 9/10 times they say yes. So that's two very easy ways already to get more than 4 friends on the same server. If neither of those instances are overpowered, then I really can't agree that having the ability for two guild ships on the same server would be overpowered.

@valor-omega One of those relies on pure RNG and the ability to sit through wasting your own time, and the other requires RNG and players who are willing to quit their session for you. Neither of those are "easy", they are annoying and time consuming. Which is the point. Just because you can do something one way, doesn't mean it's an allowed thing. Especially with joining someone elses ship, you are literally bruteforcing past the walls, they can't make a way to stop you from doing that because it would mean that you would be punished for making friends in the game, since they have no way to tell the difference between two people becoming friends for real and two people doing it to get 2 people on the same server.

@potatosord All I mean to say is that even without the above mentioned methods, an alliance can be formed organically, and wreak just as much havoc, or more, than if two guild ships were allowed to be on the same server. Here's the thing too; making alliance (especially nowadays) is quite easy, as most players are eager to just have a chill session. I just don't think it's conducive to bar a potential avenue for players to have a fun time, especially this late into the game's life cycle. I really don't think two guild ships on the same server would be this horrible/broken concept, truthfully.

It just feels like Guilds in general feel so hollow and empty, and the whole point of Guilds in any other game is bringing people together. With SoT, yeah we can all technically be playing at the same time, but that feeling of closeness with your friends/members isn't there at all. MAYBE if we had a guild hideout or something, it wouldn't feel so bad, but that's also not something likely on the table.

@valor-omega That's not the point. Yes, natural alliances can form, but if you can inherently have a stronger force without having to convince a stranger to ally, without needing to find that stranger to ally in the first place, hoping that person isn't doing dive quests when you do find them. You are making it seem as if this is something trivial to do compared to bringing your mate onto the server but its not that simple and the "natural" methods take a lot more time, energy, and are NOT guaranteed.

@potatosord My point is that organic alliances can be just as destructive if not more so, yet that's fine. All I am saying is that at this late point in the game, why NOT take some liberties and just let players have fun together?

@valor-omega And my point is just because we can already do it, doesn't mean they should give us a tool that expedites the process and makes it 1 click possible. It takes time and RNG to do it right now, which even 10 minutes or the inability to see another player could be the difference between them wanting to try it or not.

@rare-jumbie I think hourglass should get the first revamp (it's really struggling, has been for a while). Then emissaries (as it's the base motivator for how people play). Then guilds (a lot of potential to expand on guilds, something that worked but not for long enough).

@potatosord Okay, but why not? If it brings more people to/back to the game, and it helps create more fun sessions, why shouldn't something like this be a thing? We're already seeing shifts in design philosophy, I really and personally don't see any harm in it. But I feel we'll agree to disagree.

@valor-omega "Why not just have them drop the intentional walls they have in place to stop players from teaming and make it easier"
Because they intentionally have those walls in place to make it at least slightly harder to coordinate unfair play.