ship building

[Magiusalkyrnn]

I a relativly new player I have a lvl 20 pt, Im looking into building ships anyone give me a rundown as to what i need sturcture wise to start off ?

[AStrangeMonkey]

Originally Posted by Magiusalkyrnn I a relativly new player I have a lvl 20 pt, Im looking into building ships anyone give me a rundown as to what i need sturcture wise to start off ?

You'll need a shipyard. Small shipyards can be built anyplace without any special requirements but can only build tiny and small ships. Medium and Large shipyards require natural and deep natural harbours respectively.

You'll also need a large supply of oak, iron and hemp. Then a lumber mill, forge and textile mill to put the stuff together.

So the basics are:

Shipyard
Lumber Mill
Forge
Textile Mill

With the raw materials being:
Iron mine (for ship fittings)
Limestone quarry (to smelt the iron)
Granite quarry (for ballast)
Oak logging camp (for the oak)
Plantation (for the hemp to make sails)
Fir logging camp (to make mast sections)

This is of course excluding ship provisions and various other miscellanea you'll need like powder for cannons, wood tar and leather for rigging, etc.

Unless you're operating a careening camp, which has some of the basics but with slight variations.

So you'll either be buying a lot of stuff off the warehouse, cycling through your economy setup every few days or needing a business partner.

[SkttLes]

TBH it really isn't the kind of thing you should get into at lvl 20. To hard to get cash at that level, to many structures, not worth the time

[Remus]

Hmm, I was going to make a post on the Economy forums about how to set up for Shipbuilding but as SkttLes says, it is rather a daunting proposition. Also, although builders of low level ships are desperately needed on several servers (hey, even Antigua could do with another one or two suppplying Guyana and New Spain, and I haven't even looked at France yet), in order to build ships you will need a number of reliable sub-suppliers, most notably for ship provisioning, but also stuff like wood tar, leather, brass, sulphur, teak, lignum vitae and granite. My brief forays onto other servers suggest that where there is a shortage of ships on the Auction House, there is also a shortage of these other items you need to make them.

However, if you would like a detailed set-up posted on the forums, I will see what I can do.

In terms of starting off, may I recommend you take a look at making iron. As a new shipbuilder - particularly if you only have a small shipyard - you will probably be running one iron mine, one limestone quarry and two forges, but to start off I would recommend having 2 limestone quarries and just making iron ingots and selling them. This will give you some appreciation of the hauling involved and the money tied up in structures and inventory. But if you get it right, it will bring you an income which will nicely set you up for making ships. With your remaining lots, you could either make and stockpile some of the rarer materials - sulphur and granite perhaps, or wood tar (fir camp and up to four tar distillers, but probably one would be enough). You will shortly see the amount of warehouses, money and hauling capacity you require!

But whatever you do, I wish you luck and I will happily try to answer any questions you might have.

[BigHead]

I'd have to agree with Remus in terms of starting with something else first.

I started a long time ago with making Iron Ingots, went on to Round shot, then when I had some funds and made some friends I started building boats. It is also a good idea to get a nice bit of pocket change before you start trying to build ships.

Looking at your posts you lead me to believe that you are playing on Antigua. If you are looking to make ships because you need them for leveling, I'm sure Remus or I can cut you a decent deal for leveling ships. Remus I guess makes most of the ones on the auction house, I occasionally have a pile to give away to those new to the game.

[PaulG]

I am a solo ship builder and only make one raw material. I have a large shipyard, 2x forge, 2x lumbermill, 2x textile mill and a plantation to make hemp. All my structures are in Matthew Town.

I buy in all other raw materials but I find if I buy in bulk (requested in nation chat) I can usually get goods at cheaper than auction house prices at Matthew Town, but of course buying in bulk means plenty of coin to start with. I don't particularly enjoying hauling but will resort to this if I can't negotiate a deal, you will normally find that raw materials sell for reasonable prices in their port of manufacture as others can't be bothered to haul or don't have ships big enough to make this attractive/viable.

For me ship building is not a regular money spinner, I make ships because I like the challenge, I'm currently trying to build a Couronne. I usually make ships for myself or for friends and often swap them for raw materials.

The game is designed to allow only 10 structure slots, therefore you can only make a limited number of goods. You could of course buy another account or continually change economy, personally I don't see the merit in either action.

When I want to make decent money from the economy I make ship modifications which are very lucrative. At level 20 I also would not suggest that you make ships yet (unless you're rich), propably the easiest way to make money from the economy at your level is to make raw materials and be bothered to haul them to a ship building centre or learn to smuggle, there is nothing stopping you buying raw materials and selling them at a higher value, you just need to buy from the right port and sell at the right port. If you don't attack trade ships you should be able to see most auction houses and take advantage of others cheap prices. As a low level pirate I made lots of money shipping gold from Guyana to Matthew Town.

What ever you decide to do I wish you luck, the economy is by far my favourite part of the game.

[alericmckearn]

Originally Posted by Remus My brief forays onto other servers suggest that where there is a shortage of ships on the Auction House, there is also a shortage of these other items you need to make them.

yesterday there were 90 ship postings on the AH on rackham (around 185 ships). according to the posters here, that is more ships for sale than rackham has players.