The Witch hut - should be

[Stan Rogers]

I too agree with Vane. That's not to say the great job the voodoo team is doing to help categorize the legendary voodoo. This alone is a huge job if left to the devs to go through the list, they will be spending precious time that could be used elsewhere. It's a job that must be done if the witch hut is ever to see fruition.

There has to be easier things to develop in the meantime that will induce more conflict scenario's maybe ?

[Hawk]

Voodoo is the single most powerful tool in this game. Why are we even considering giving this area a boost before working on and improving the many other areas that would greatly improve immersion, teamwork, strategy, ect.

- Ship Specialization
- Wars and Blockades (or other port battle suggestions)
- Nation Diplomacy
- Letters of Marque (or other national tools for revenge)
- Contract Shipping

And many many more..


Voodoo is becoming far to essential for everything, buffing it further at this point in time is sheer madness if you ask me.

In a way this could tie voodoo more closely back to the rest of the game, it is already essential to everything, but with a way to craft it suddenly newbs and players alike can incorporate it into longterm strategies and gameplay, regardless of f2P or P2P status.

An example - Charity donation can be crafted for a hella ton of gold and turns after a few days. Making it a strategy for players once they pass the point where donating gold is pointless.

This means that having traders supporting a nation means something, as meaningful influence can be acquired if they are crafting charity donations and using them every few days. Also what I said about beginning pirates earlier.. This can really enrich the game for all various types of players

+1

[Meliva]

I think that perhaps the witch hut should be added after most of the other features are implemented, that way there can be voodoo suggested that affects the new features. for example perhaps a legendary voodoo that ties in with nation diplomacy, or with ports and blockades.

[William one eye]

Re Charles:

Ship specialization will also be a huge change to how this game is played. For some, this will be welcomed, for others confusing, and for some it may mean their fleets are obsolete. Some may even feel they have wasted many mastercraftsman that will now mean nothing. This also may result in even more ships that are unsaleable on the market. Additionally while this will be available to all, it will make it harder for new players to learn the game and mean older players will need to seriously rethink strategies and structure. As with witch hut there are many conflicting veiws on how or if this should be implemented. Do I want ship specialization. Same as with the hut. Until I see a clearer picture of what admin wants to do with this, I am reluctant to support it.

- Wars and Blockades (or other port battle suggestions)
Similar to hut and ships this is a major game alteration.
It could completely change the balance of nations, it will mean anything nations currently have done to build and protect themselves will be lessened. I personally find the way we fight as nations odd and would like to see this, however I see plenty of potential for concern and resitance to this also.


- Nation Diplomacy -I just had a look at this for the first time. It Seems like a very useful addition. Off the top of my head I see potential for people controlling side nations to skim money out of treasuries, or perhaps to attack other nations in the name of a port controlling nation they ally with only for that purpose. So basically player A leaves nation X. They rank up in nation Y. They are paid by nation A, they may act for nation A or they may just collect money as a scam by set up by council. They may attack nation Z and claim no ties to nation A. Another possible issue. I would like to get nation A and nation B to fight with each other. I rank up in nation C ally with nation A and then pick a fight with nation B in the name of nation A, if this works and things escalate between A and B I could leave nation C and move on. There may be checks and balances for this that I did not realize in a quick read. Probably can think of some more potential abuses if I thought about it. It in general looks like a very good and useful concept, probably something that should be getting a lot more discussion.

- Letters of Marque (or other national tools for revenge)
Seems like a fairly welcomed idea by many, although there are many variations on the idea, I have read few rejections of it. I see it adding interest and not having any game changing impact for existing or new players.
I think it would be fun, useful and not have any epic impact. In my opinion this would be one of the first areas I would work on getting developed and implemented

- Contract Shipping
A minor tweak to an existing system, if feel it will not have a profound change on the way the game is played, it provides some useful tools, however it will be similar to the bounty system, generally missunderstood and not fully utilized as many may not want to pay the nessescary price to generate contracts, and likewise as with bounties many will not see and use it to its full potenitial. I also see this as adding benefits and not having and game changing impact for existing or new players. Do I want this. Yes, as long as it does not create delays for other developments. When i put this together I put a lot of thought into making it fit the existing game structure. Hopefully it would not be a huge effort to implement, however without full undestanding how it would code in with the existing system, Its impossible to know if its a huge project or a small one.

I am going to toss in Port Buildings and Port traits, That is something I think we should be looking at more carefully, and trying to move forward with.
I see it as an infrastructure that will add value to ports. It will provide benefits to nations, and allow them to individualize and strengthen patriotism. It could make them more desirable to own and might result in stronger efforts for map shifts.

My feeling on legendary voodoo is that we are currently trying to make soup over an open fire with no pot, for lack of a better analogy.

[William one eye]

This could potentially be a way for pirates to start their pvp career

"Set witch hut to create one hostile natives per day, at the cost of turns and some gold"

Otherwise you gotta scrape some gold together, convert it to credits, then bid on the voodoo you need. (Also somehow know how to do all that as a newbie).

I would like a few calculated cards that can be crafted. Ones that are critical to play the game and that may get lost as more voodoo cards are introduced. The craft times for a single card could vary from a day to several days, with increasing costs for rarer cards. This would obviously need to not be apart of the hideout building in this case. For other players it could offer a way to acquire some needed cards (Serenity, Mastercraftsman, Charity Donation ect..) using their turns and resources for a valuable card every few days. A long craft time should keep it from being a replacement to the card market (or buying cards which I am sure is a concern). While still being a great boon to players everywhere.

Compare it to the free voodoo present feature, but more complex and useful.

As for legendary Voodoo, I think that should be a different discussion from the Witch Hut. It just makes the discussion more convoluted when you combine the two. Certainly you could have a witch hut with legendary voodoo as a later (possible) addition.

I actually thought Hut should be a separate area, like a Hideout but an independent area. I would like to see it be affordable to create,
and then have varied costs on different areas within, some to help newer players and some for the Legendary voodoo craft hopefuls. Some areas may be inexpensive and only minor buffs, while others like legendary crafting would be very expensive.
I see legendary crafting a bit like goldsmith or banking, some may excel, some may experiment, others will regret their investment, and some may not want to invest at all. Admin seems fairly set on the hut being inside our current hideout, I see that as a barrier that makes it even harder for new players.

I have been suggesting a witch hut that has multiple areas, designed like our current hideout.
A building that has fields, each field could be developed with a room of choice and players could focus on what would help them most.

One room could be crafting legendary

I have suggested the following rooms or areas

A voodoo doll collection - a place to organize cards for planned casting
A juju collection - gift bonus buff
Alter - to boost card luck

Other possibilities could be

A card vault - limited space to store a small number of cards you wish to protect from magpies.
similar to a marina - you would need a bunch of turns to get cards in or out, basically a fail safe backup of cards
you cannot use until they are removed from the vault with turns.

Per your suggestion

Essential minor card craft by some not very efficient way for new players to get cards they really need but cant afford by credits - this only makes sense if they can afford to build the hut in the first place. I was against the idea of crafting existing cards, however your suggestion seems it would be helpful for new players, if it was designed to prevent established players from flooding the market with cards they created.


For legendary crafting I suggested the following rooms or areas

Kitchen - the legendary crafting area

Pantry - required to store ingredients you need to craft legendary - would be a control to limit crafting - similar to how the size of your hideout warehouse limits building up you hideout. You would need space to hold all ingredients to start crafting a particular card.

[Maha]

Essential minor card craft by some not very efficient way for new players to get cards they really need but cant afford by credits - this only makes sense if they can afford to build the hut in the first place. I was against the idea of crafting existing cards, however your suggestion seems it would be helpful for new players, if it was designed to prevent established players from flooding the market with cards they created.

buying booster packs is, with buying turns, the way that credits are gone from circulation. that is good for several reasons. (credits keep their value, CJ can afford to drink coffee etc)
an in-game card producer will devalue the boosterpack and with that either the credit will devalue or CJ get's grumpy without his coffee.

this can be worked around of course. e.g. the witch hut let you set 5 preferences. these 5 cards get a higher chance in the daily presents or booster packs. (start with 5% and each level adds 0.2%)

flooding the market with cards will bring the prices down, but it would not hurt the game. like the credit devalued 30% since the credit auction came online. card flooding is like selling lmm for 1 credit while players are willing to pay 2 some wants to cash in quickly and flood the market with 1 credit lmm's. gone is the extra profit. when a market is flooded it will readjust. and those who started the flood me regret doing so
the buyers will rejoice just imagine TI's & BD's going for 5 to the credit because there are way too many of them. all who are ranking up are happy. (some others may not ...)

[William one eye]

Maha - that suggestion is for players that cannot yet afford credits in decent enough quantity to buy packs.

unlimited TI and BD creation would probably not be an option - I see it as Hawk suggests,
cards that would be extremely helpful to new players.
Hostile natives,pasifism, costal piracy, Iron golem, East, West, Favorable winds.
perhaps it could be limited by something similar to the turn rule
Beyond this if more useful regular cards were craftable I also agree, craft time would need to
be sufficient for this to be only good for personal use,and not really useful for any mass resale the voodoo market

[DezNutz]

This could potentially be a way for pirates to start their pvp career

"Set witch hut to create one hostile natives per day, at the cost of turns and some gold"

Otherwise you gotta scrape some gold together, convert it to credits, then bid on the voodoo you need. (Also somehow know how to do all that as a newbie).

I would like a few calculated cards that can be crafted. Ones that are critical to play the game and that may get lost as more voodoo cards are introduced. The craft times for a single card could vary from a day to several days, with increasing costs for rarer cards. This would obviously need to not be apart of the hideout building in this case. For other players it could offer a way to acquire some needed cards (Serenity, Mastercraftsman, Charity Donation ect..) using their turns and resources for a valuable card every few days. A long craft time should keep it from being a replacement to the card market (or buying cards which I am sure is a concern). While still being a great boon to players everywhere.

Compare it to the free voodoo present feature, but more complex and useful.

As for legendary Voodoo, I think that should be a different discussion from the Witch Hut. It just makes the discussion more convoluted when you combine the two. Certainly you could have a witch hut with legendary voodoo as a later (possible) addition.

Said almost the exact same thing in one of the many witch hut related discussions. Witch Hut should allow for crafting of existing voodoo with Legendary Voodoo being a Tech to the Witch Hut. The how and what voodoo that could be crafted would need to be determined.

[fullfathomfive]

Not difficult to see the direction of the wind blowing and also what is causing the wind to continue to blow in the same direction. Currently of the next 100 voodoo offerings there are 3 that have a active bid. Those that that have invested in voodoo as a game revenue source certainly need to create a much more positive market than this for their offerings. The voodoo market in previous years averaged around 13-16 pages consistently. There are currently 66 pages of voodoo offerings. How do more voodoo options/creations make sense in such a depressed market? In reality they don't! Make your own assessment of how many times voodoo casting is used each day compared to plunder/skirmish as a revenue source and then you decide where the emphasis should be placed in the future of PG.

I understand voodoo creates a revenue source for the game and I am supportive of in some way creating a valid tool that would allow that to happen. However the expansion of voodoo seems less than the desirable way as can already be seen from the depressed voodoo market.

A pirates home is his ship... His world is the sea... Pirates were never ship builders/sellers, they left that to the land based citizens as pirates captured the ships they needed from the sea or died trying. More discussion now IC on the board about building more buildings. If it won't float, you can't eat it, trade it, material things beyond this hold no interest to the pirate. That's for the citizens that work for a living to figure out. Every pirate dreamed of owning a bank, at least owning one for one day, so to have time to get all the bounty back to the ship. I'll let others posting below to list all pirates in history that ultimately found their demise as bankers.

Voodoo hut? More market voodoo? Entrepreneurship? Pirate academics? Bankers, Don't really see any of this being a positive step in a pirate game based upon ships and the sea, but I do see the motivation behind it's creation.

[Hawk]

Not difficult to see the direction of the wind blowing and also what is causing the wind to continue to blow in the same direction. Currently of the next 100 voodoo offerings there are 3 that have a active bid. Those that that have invested in voodoo as a game revenue source certainly need to create a much more positive market than this for their offerings. The voodoo market in previous years averaged around 13-16 pages consistently. There are currently 66 pages of voodoo offerings. How do more voodoo options/creations make sense in such a depressed market? In reality they don't! Make your own assessment of how many times voodoo casting is used each day compared to plunder/skirmish as a revenue source and then you decide where the emphasis should be placed in the future of PG.

I understand voodoo creates a revenue source for the game and I am supportive of in some way creating a valid tool that would allow that to happen. However the expansion of voodoo seems less than the desirable way as can already be seen from the depressed voodoo market.

A pirates home is his ship... His world is the sea... Pirates were never ship builders/sellers, they left that to the land based citizens as pirates captured the ships they needed from the sea or died trying. More discussion now IC on the board about building more buildings. If it won't float, you can't eat it, trade it, material things beyond this hold no interest to the pirate. That's for the citizens that work for a living to figure out. Every pirate dreamed of owning a bank, at least owning one for one day, so to have time to get all the bounty back to the ship. I'll let others posting below to list all pirates in history that ultimately found their demise as bankers.

Voodoo hut? More market voodoo? Entrepreneurship? Pirate academics? Bankers, Don't really see any of this being a positive step in a pirate game based upon ships and the sea, but I do see the motivation behind it's creation.

Simply put. Pirates can't pirate without voodoo. And the process to get the voodoo needed is complex, expensive, and detrimental to a new pirate's ability to play. Same goes for aspiring nobles. The voodoo market is a valid concern, but with proper crafting times and costs, the feature would be a considerable boon to the game. I would not like to see a level-able, Hideout style building though. As yes, that is rather unpirate-like and would serve more as another source of income for merchants, one which devalues all cards on the card market.

Side note, An additional voodoo present of some sort was discussed some time ago, and it would not break anything. Indeed some people have been clamoring for it for awhile. Excessive demand is cause by all the Packs which are bought, and the lack of wars / people using them. When things start happening it will pick up, which ironically could actually be a side effect of implementing a witch hut. Introducing beginning pirates and noblemen to the voodoo they will need, and giving them a more engaging path to their goals (and the voodoo market)