The item I am concerned about is of course the newly implemented (Black Powder Barrel)
Please read this warning carefully and take it into consideration. I got over 3,000 hours in this game and I have seen many ups and downs, but this could be one of the greatest decline if not handled in time.
Let's start from the beginning, from when the item was added. The new (Black Powder Barrel) have more or less replaced the normal (gunpowder Barrel) and that's really not good. The availability of this item is ridiculous!; They are by the shoreline, Skeletons can carry them, Shipwrecks got them, Skeleton ships have like a 100% chance of having one, And by the only way I agree upon to obtain one, is the Smugglers missions.
Almost all natural conflicts that happens now since this item could be found everywhere is now settled upon a BOOM. This of itself isn't new, it could be done with normal kegs, but the POWER this one have in the short amount of time it takes to find one, compared to collecting the amount needed for the same amount of damage from normal kegs, there's no reason not to go for the new (Black Powder Barrel).
My experiences
- Sneaking (ONE) onto a enemy ship is a guaranteed win.
- Getting snuck up on with (ONE) of these is a guaranteed lost.
- Emergent skeleton ship battles have lost all its challenge, they practically sink themselves by having those on board.
- Noobs could barely handle a normal Keg on board before, and now they always find and carry these around to dangerous situations, if they didn't already blow themselves up before then.
There is practically no Canon on Canon battles anymore (in a natural setting i mean) not in hourglass. And it's going to get worse, since you have announced that you will be fixing the player encounters issue so to make sure more players will meet naturally. I assure you rare, people will start to notice, and mayhem will endure.
And here's how to fix this, before your hot fix.
First, you might remember that there are another overpowered item in the game called (Wraith Balls) Very powerful, so you had to limit the ways one obtained them back then. But the power of those balls are nothing compared to "ONE" (Black Powder Barrel) which I must add again, is very easy to obtain compared to Wraith Balls. You neutered them down to only "ONE" world event, and that was the right call, now let's do it again.
Remove the (Black Powder Barrel) from everything and everywhere except from the Smuggler bottle missions. but don't make it part of the Smuggler run, make it a (REWARD) for players to (OBTAIN) from the Smugglers after you have (COMPLETED) the run, But to make the Commendation still work, you would still be able to sell it to the Smugglers, but not the one you obtain it from, like the merchant mission, you can't hand in cargo where they were obtained.
This solution will strike a needed balance, like the Wraith Balls, time spent = big boom reward. No more insta-kill barrels being on board every ship unless they spent the time to obtain one.
I don't see enough people talking about this, so I hope I'm being heard.
Please, whoever reads this, push this forward and have a good long discussion about this issue.
