Nerf Everything.

[MrTheOx]

There has been a gradual power creep in the "high end" boats. As more ships are introduced they tend to be more powerful than the older ones and as time has passed we have since a dramatic rise in the number of high cost boats on the OS and in port battles. This can be either attributed to people finding the most effective combination of structures to build ships, or an expression of the wealth that long term players have been able to build up in the game over time this has created a need to sail in the most expensive boats to have a reliable chance at PVP success.

In the last patch, the Dev's attempted to pare back the amount of Doubloons entering the system, citing inflation as the reason. Most people familiar with the economy pointed out that because there was no rise in the price of goods there could be no inflation. Hence the dramatic drop in doubloons entering the system was adjusted to a less radical margin.

I think what the devs were trying to express by using the term "inflation" was the fact that PVP boats had shifted radically from "vanilla" (non refit/non bundle) boats to almost exclusively refit/bundle boats. Rather than nerf all the high end boats to near parity with the vanilla boats, or boost all the stats on vanilla boat. The Dev's attempted to price the refits/bundle boats out of reach, by trying to take money out of players hands over the long run. By reducing the cash input to the system while keeping the output of Dbs steady. The Doubloons nerf was intended to make the player base poorer and thus force them into using the vanilla boats. This type of backdoor nerf to price won't ever provide balance the dev's hope to achieve because it fails to take into account that players will act irrationally and grind like crazy for even a small margin of superiority. Even before dailies, people found a way to around the "money/time barrier" to bundle boats, JOMT, and people will do it again no matter how much the legitimate money supply is nerfed.

The main problem is that this game is so pvp based/competitive and that the more expensive a ship is, the more effective it tends to be. So people will go to extremes to give themselves any advantage. Fighting non refits in refit boats gives you a chance of victory over 50 percent, meaning it would be irrational not to fight in a bundle/refit boat. What has really happened is that the top 3 percent of ships are now more than 20 times more effective in combat than 97 percent of all the other boats, all things being equal. I know many of us have been in vanilla groups which have sunk a group of HMC's but these tend to be the exception, not the rule.

Currently it is possible to buy success in this game, and many times less skilled people will sail in their heaviest ships and will not fight a group of similar strength because they are risking so much and have no guaranteed margin of success. In the past, when refits were considered the high end ships of the open sea, A group of vanilla boats could force combat on a superior fleet and if well handled could be assured that they had a reasonable chance at success. The fact of the matter is that the current generation of refits and bundle boats enjoy such a huge margin of superiority over the vanilla ships that they have render vanilla boats moot and a creating all kinds of balancing issues

This game is really at it's most fun when both sides are relatively equal in strength and the vanilla boats tend to be the most balanced of all the ships. The upward pressure to sail in the most expensive ships and ever increasing grind times are pushing players to the limit of time they are willing to commit to the game before they give up entirely. Therefore the devs should nerf all the bundle/refit boats so that they are closer in stats to their nearest competitor. First Rates should only be 2-5% more effective than 3'rd rates, but the cost should remain the same. Herc MC's/P Hercs Should be much closer to the vanilla Herc. A pvp game has much more long term playability if there is relative balance amongst the equipment.

[Not Woody]

Originally Posted by MrTheOx There has been a gradual power creep in the "high end" boats. As more ships are introduced they tend to be more powerful than the older ones and as time has passed we have since a dramatic rise in the number of high cost boats on the OS and in port battles. This can be either attributed to people finding the most effective combination of structures to build ships, or an expression of the wealth that long term players have been able to build up in the game over time this has created a need to sail in the most expensive boats to have a reliable chance at PVP success. In the last patch, the Dev's attempted to pare back the amount of Doubloons entering the system, citing inflation as the reason. Most people familiar with the economy pointed out that because there was no rise in the price of goods there could be no inflation. Hence the dramatic drop in doubloons entering the system was adjusted to a less radical margin. I think what the devs were trying to express by using the term "inflation" was the fact that PVP boats had shifted radically from "vanilla" (non refit/non bundle) boats to almost exclusively refit/bundle boats. Rather than nerf all the high end boats to near parity with the vanilla boats, or boost all the stats on vanilla boat. The Dev's attempted to price the refits/bundle boats out of reach, by trying to take money out of players hands over the long run. By reducing the cash input to the system while keeping the output of Dbs steady. The Doubloons nerf was intended to make the player base poorer and thus force them into using the vanilla boats. This type of backdoor nerf to price won't ever provide balance the dev's hope to achieve because it fails to take into account that players will act irrationally and grind like crazy for even a small margin of superiority. Even before dailies, people found a way to around the "money/time barrier" to bundle boats, JOMT, and people will do it again no matter how much the legitimate money supply is nerfed. The main problem is that this game is so pvp based/competitive and that the more expensive a ship is, the more effective it tends to be. So people will go to extremes to give themselves any advantage. Fighting non refits in refit boats gives you a chance of victory over 50 percent, meaning it would be irrational not to fight in a bundle/refit boat. What has really happened is that the top 3 percent of ships are now more than 20 times more effective in combat than 97 percent of all the other boats, all things being equal. I know many of us have been in vanilla groups which have sunk a group of HMC's but these tend to be the exception, not the rule. Currently it is possible to buy success in this game, and many times less skilled people will sail in their heaviest ships and will not fight a group of similar strength because they are risking so much and have no guaranteed margin of success. In the past, when refits were considered the high end ships of the open sea, A group of vanilla boats could force combat on a superior fleet and if well handled could be assured that they had a reasonable chance at success. The fact of the matter is that the current generation of refits and bundle boats enjoy such a huge margin of superiority over the vanilla ships that they have render vanilla boats moot and a creating all kinds of balancing issues This game is really at it's most fun when both sides are relatively equal in strength and the vanilla boats tend to be the most balanced of all the ships. The upward pressure to sail in the most expensive ships and ever increasing grind times are pushing players to the limit of time they are willing to commit to the game before they give up entirely. Therefore the devs should nerf all the bundle/refit boats so that they are closer in stats to their nearest competitor. First Rates should only be 2-5% more effective than 3'rd rates, but the cost should remain the same. Herc MC's/P Hercs Should be much closer to the vanilla Herc. A pvp game has much more long term playability if there is relative balance amongst the equipment.

I agree. It's almost to the point that the average player has to exploit to even keep up with the multiple account dailies runners...

[MrSardonicus]

*blinks at double wall-o-text*

Originally Posted by Not Woody I agree. It's almost to the point that the average player has to exploit to even keep up with the multiple account dailies runners...

Multiple accounts have little if anything to do with nerfing everything...FLS cant and won't nerf accounts you know that silly man.

[Kevles]

I think you could accomplish a light version of this by "invalid" flagging every lsb or refit boat (probably not haulers, though). This wouldn't really stop people from using them, but it would alter the risk/reward ratio in favor of vanilla boats and make it a little more appropriate (higher risk when using a better boat). The return of invalid flagging has been a good thing, so I would be for expanding it to slow/reverse the OS bundlezerg.

[MrTheOx]

Originally Posted by MrSardonicus *blinks at double wall-o-text*

The short version is, there is a class of refits/bundle boats that are OP compared to vanilla boats, this has fostered a toxic pvp environment. FLS's solution to this is a back door attempt at raising the price, this will fail cause MMO people will tend to grind for the "best" gear. The real solution is to take the O out of the OP, Make the highest cost ships only marginally superior to their lower cost cousins. Boats like first rates, herc MC's P hercs need to be statistically closer to their vanilla cousins to promote more balanced pvp. Rewarding uber grinds with uber gear creates a world of have's and have not's. Where the have not's feel like they are mere fodder for the haves.

[GB.]

Originally Posted by MrTheOx The short version is, there is a class of refits/bundle boats that are OP compared to vanilla boats, this has fostered a toxic pvp environment. FLS's solution to this is a back door attempt at raising the price, this will fail cause MMO people will tend to grind for the "best" gear. The real solution is to take the O out of the OP, Make the highest cost ships only marginally superior to their lower cost cousins. Boats like first rates, herc MC's P hercs need to be statistically closer to their vanilla cousins to promote more balanced pvp. Rewarding uber grinds with uber gear creates a world of have's and have not's. Where the have not's feel like they are mere fodder for the haves.

I agree that the plan to make bundleships rare or gated did not work.
If something is hard to get players will do whatever is needed to get it so all it did was make players do more econ so that PVP time became less as top end ships became more time consuming to make.

You are right bundleships & lsb's should be easier to obtain & brought more in line with vanilla ships.
Time spent doing econ needs to be reduced to the point where top end ships are more readily available & used.
It could be done in one patch.

[NimitsTexan]

Originally Posted by MrTheOx In the last patch, the Dev's attempted to pare back the amount of Doubloons entering the system, citing inflation as the reason. Most people familiar with the economy pointed out that because there was no rise in the price of goods there could be no inflation.

Not sure I follow you. There was a noticable rise in the AH prices of ships and goods since the introduction of dailies.

Originally Posted by MrTheOx The real solution is to take the O out of the OP, Make the highest cost ships only marginally superior to their lower cost cousins. Boats like first rates, herc MC's P hercs need to be statistically closer to their vanilla cousins to promote more balanced pvp.

IMO, most upper end boats already are only marginally superior to their lower cost cousins. Much reduction in ability, and they would never be worth the effort to build them.

[DerHuhnTeufel]

Originally Posted by NimitsTexan IMO, most upper end boats already are only marginally superior to their lower cost cousins. Much reduction in ability, and they would never be worth the effort to build them.

Depends entirely on the boat. Cap MC to Intrepid isn't much, but Minerva MC to Vengeance is a huge increase. Same thing with the Mercy and Defiant MC or Sultan and Khan or the Macedon.

As far as bundle boats go, I don't think there's any question that the more expensive ones are dramatic improvements over their less expensive models.

[MrTheOx]

Originally Posted by NimitsTexan Not sure I follow you. There was a noticable rise in the AH prices of ships and goods since the introduction of dailies.

There was much debate about this fact in the original post dev-log post, but many of the econ gurus said there wasn't much inflation.

Originally Posted by Remus I am sorry to say I side myself with the econ skeptics. Whilst there might be many reasons for changing mission rewards including nerfing dailies, I don't think the threat of >25% inflation is a correct premise for your arguments. My experiemce is that since 1.12 was introduced almost exactly a year ago, there has been virtually no change in prices.

Originally Posted by NimitsTexan Much reduction in ability, and they would never be worth the effort to build them.

That's really the idea. I think what the last year taught us was bundle wars aren't that fun. To much grind, to much forum agony, to hard to create balance when the 10% most costly ships are used by over 90 percent of the players.

[Cookie]

I'd rather see a drastic buff to all vanillas instead of a nerf to expensive ships, but I agree with your reasoning behind it.