Boarding Party - New Combat and Plunder System

[Shadowood]

Boarding Party:
My idea would change the way pirates and privateers plunder/commandeer ships. This new way would incorporate some form of Hand to Hand combat. This will require a new battle system, crew specialty, and ideally Shot Type from cannons.

Rules of Engagement:
The current plunder and sink chance values will still apply. However, once the ship(s) are ready to be plundered (10% of ships base build value is greater than purse on hand) this will trigger a “Boarding Party”.

Hand to Hand Combat:
Current thoughts on this is your “Boarding Party” would be total crew of attacking Lead Ship, minus minimum requirement to sail the ship (15 crew). Example – Frigate has 150 crew, you would board a boat with 135 crew. This 135 would fight against the crew of the ship you are trying to take. If it happens to be a LMM with a crew of 100, you out man them and have a higher success rate of capturing your prize. If you are trying to take a SOLT with a crew of 250, well then you are out matched and will have a lower success chance. This is where Crew Specialties, Experience come in. Also, type of Cannon Shot.

Cannon Shot:
Please see my other topic on this. (http://www.piratesglory.com/forums/view ... it=foundry) But essentially I think there should be a type of cannon shot that will kill a portion of the crew. So it will still be possible for a Frigate to take a SOLT or MoW. It will just be harder. This will make using bigger ships slightly safer and/or it will force Pirates/Privateers to use bigger ships to plunder others. Example – Bundle Shot is used. Kills 25% of crew. A SOLT now has 187 crew members. If you are still using a Frigate and boarding with 135, you still will be at a disadvantage. However if Grape Shot was used and 50% of crew was killed, then that SOLT would be fighting with 125 to your 135. You now have a slight advantage, but not a guaranteed win.

Specialized Crew Members:
http://www.piratesglory.com/forums/view ... f=4&t=1778
I see this as an area where special crew members would have added battle tactics or access to certain type of weapons. Looking for ideas here.
I like the idea of JessicaA’s idea for Flagships where a ship gains points for upgrades. Perhaps a point system here for crew experience. The more versed they are in hand to hand combat the more deadly they can be. So a lvl 10 “Boarding Party” of 135 potential could take out a non-experienced crew of 250 on a SOLT.

Battle Progression:
Most of the time you pirates/privateers are plundering whole fleets (at least 2 or 3 ships), so what happens during the first battle with crew, to the last battle? Need to work out some details here as there needs to be loss of life during battle for a more realistic battle.

The Example below is assuming you sank the tail ships and the defenders purse is below current tail ship value. I will also assume crew strength is even, but the Attackers Frigates are using Grape Shot to kill 50% of crew.

Tier of Crew loss
1-10% Advantage = 70% of Boarding Crew Loss of Life
11-15% Advantage = 60% Loss of Life
16-20% Advantage = 40% Loss of Life
21%-25% Advantage = 25% Loss of Life
26-35% Advantage = 15% Loss of Life
36-50% Advantage = 10% Loss of Life
51%-100% = No Loss of Life

Defender
1 SOLT 250 Crew (50% = 125)
1 LF 225 (50% = 112)
1 Frig 200 (50% = 100)

Attacker
Frig – 135 Boarding Crew
Frig - 135
Frig -135
Cutter - 10
Cutter - 10

Attacker boards Defender Frig. 135 vs 100. (I horrible at math, I need help here, please correct me if I'm wrong…) you have 35% Advantage. You win but lose 15% of your men based on the above Tier Advantage. You are down to 115 Boarding Crew, but the Frigate is yours and you spared 15 crew members to sail the ship.

Next up you Board with 115 Crew onto the LF with 112 crew. You are at a 2% advantage. You win but lost 70% of your 115 crew. The Large Frig is yours and you spared 15 crew to sail the ship. You have 34 Boarding party left.

You board the SOLT. 34 vs 125. You are at a 72% Disadvantage. Your boarding crew was killed with no loss of life from the SOLT. Your next Frig boards with a crew of 135. 135 vs 125. You have a 7% advantage. 70% of your boarding crew was lost but you won the battle the SOLT is yours. You spared 15 crew to sail the ship. 40 Crew were returned to your Frig.

As you can see if the type of Cannon Shot did not dmg the crew, the boarding party (at even strength) would probably have captured only the Frigate and possibly the Large Frigate of the defender, but not the SOLT. The attacker or attackers would need to then use another fleet(s) to finish off the job.

I think this would add a big element to PvP. It would entice players to sail and plunder with larger ships. If “Foundry” was implemented with this, it would add a huge new dimension into battle tactics. Not to mention Specialty Crew and Experience.

Thoughts? Feedback

+1 Archive

[Mugiwara]

Just for opinion instead of killing crew(which will make it more complicated i guess) use round shots to damage ship and when hp drop to below %30 than use chain shot to boarding(under below conditions)
Rules of Engagement:
The current plunder and sink chance values will still apply. However, once the ship(s) are ready to be plundered (10% of ships base build value is greater than purse on hand) this will trigger a “Boarding Party”.

+1 to gain experience for your crew which even you didnt kill his/her crew still you can win with smaller ships thanks to your experienced crew members.

Questions:
If you would kill the crew than how the experienced crew will affect?
How we can calculate which crew wiill remain? or if you still want to kill crew(they have family plss)
Than experienced crew should die hard. which will be beneficial for fighter type players who will get a lot of experience thanks to their playstyle.
And in my opinion there should be only 1 type of crew killer shot 1 type of boarding shot like chain shot. And round shot as normal damage type.

[Shadowood]

Questions:
If you would kill the crew than how the experienced crew will affect?

I thought about this after I posted... Maybe the experience comes from the Ship itself, Captain and First Mate. Obviously if this went into effect, one would have to continuely hire new crew members. But the Experience of the Captain and First Mate (who are part of the 15 that stay behind on the ship) gain experience who then transfer it down to their crew. "Training Points" so to speak.

[Mugiwara]

Questions:
If you would kill the crew than how the experienced crew will affect?

I thought about this after I posted... Maybe the experience comes from the Ship itself, Captain and First Mate. Obviously if this went into effect, one would have to continuely hire new crew members. But the Experience of the Captain and First Mate (who are part of the 15 that stay behind on the ship) gain experience who then transfer it down to their crew. "Training Points" so to speak.

nice point . each battle will give some amount of experience to first mate like increase crews boarding chance X% or your crew will survive X% more you should choose one of those points when he gain level. And if i remember correctly they can steal your first mate. which makes you unexperienced when you lose it.

Experience should change due to battle's difficulty. there is no point to get same amount of exp for both winning against howker fleet or winning against sotl fleet. Exp amount can be calculated based on total hp of losing fleet/ total hp of winning team. stronger opponent more valuable.

[Shadowood]

Experience should change due to battle's difficulty. there is no point to get same amount of exp for both winning against howker fleet or winning against sotl fleet.

Agreed on this point 100%. I would defer to a system like JessicaA has mentioned for Flag Ship. This idea should be posted under the Speciality Crew suggestion.

[Maha]

-1
merchant sailors lack the stamina to hold of a boarding party. 1 member of a boarding party outweighs 6 merchant sailors or 3 sailors on warships.

at least there should be alternatives for boarding: surrender and sinking.
When the gun battle is over the attacker asks for unconditional surrender. each fleet has 'preset' the reaction (in case of losing a battle we: "surrender" or "fight to the last men") .
If the fleet is in "surrender" mode the tail ship is handed over to the attacker.
If the fleet is set to "fight to the last men" and the attacker wins the boarding action, the ship goes to the attacker AND the captain is KIA. (the defending player loses a captain); now the next ship in line is to be boarded or sunk
If the fleet is set to "fight to the last men" and the attacker decides not to risk a boarding action, the ship will be sunk. the captain drowns with the ship and is lost to the defender.

This way a fleet either fights back (huge risk, high stakes) or gives up the tail ship to avoid the high stakes.

[Mugiwara]

how ship type will effect the dying crew amounts? i mean howker can easily lose crew. but sotl it shouldnt be that easy. Maybe also ship types should have some X% bonus for save crew amounts during attacks.

And there should be a new voodoo card like emergency call.
Name: Healing touch
Enhancement Player
After each plunder attacks x amount of crew will be recovered. (x is quadrable the number of brigs target player owns or sotls maybe:))


Maha: The boarding will occur only if you dont have the ransom gold at hand which you already will lose the ship via sink or plundered.

But the crew lose shouldnt be applied if you pay the ransom. or all traders will suffer a lot.
Maybe crew killing shots will be available if player cant pay ransom.

[Shadowood]

-1
merchant sailors lack the stamina to hold of a boarding party. 1 member of a boarding party outweighs 6 merchant sailors or 3 sailors on warships.

at least there should be alternatives for boarding: surrender and sinking.
When the gun battle is over the attacker asks for unconditional surrender. each fleet has 'preset' the reaction (in case of losing a battle we: "surrender" or "fight to the last men") .
If the fleet is in "surrender" mode the tail ship is handed over to the attacker.
If the fleet is set to "fight to the last men" and the attacker wins the boarding action, the ship goes to the attacker AND the captain is KIA. (the defending player loses a captain); now the next ship in line is to be boarded or sunk
If the fleet is set to "fight to the last men" and the attacker decides not to risk a boarding action, the ship will be sunk. the captain drowns with the ship and is lost to the defender.

This way a fleet either fights back (huge risk, high stakes) or gives up the tail ship to avoid the high stakes.

Sinking should not be the goal. The goal is to capture ships, that is ONE way how a pirate makes a living.

[Shadowood]

And there should be a new voodoo card like emergency call.
Name: Healing touch
Enhancement Player
After each plunder attacks x amount of crew will be recovered. (x is quadrable the number of brigs target player owns or sotls maybe:))

Agreed there should be some new voodoo with this idea. That we can discuss later if this was ever to be implemented.

[Maha]

Maha: The boarding will occur only if you dont have the ransom gold at hand which you already will lose the ship via sink or plundered.

But the crew lose shouldnt be applied if you pay the ransom. or all traders will suffer a lot.
Maybe crew killing shots will be available if player cant pay ransom.

at present when a ranson cannot be paid the ship is surrendered.

it is easy to sink a ship, just 10 levi's; to capture a top ship is the challenge.
to steal lmm's is often the way how new players start to do well in the game. the 200 captain rule stimullates shipstealing.
this proposal without my addition make sit near impossible to do so while making a profit. it forces a pirate to use large crew ships which he will lose quickly after an action. it is not for nothing that pirates don't use them!

boarding is far more then a numerical advantage in crew size. it's training, shock, and lots more. boarding should not be connected with crew size.
However to extra ATTRIBUTES could be possible: boarding and repel.

shadow: not all ships are always to be stolen. going for the prize means bypassing the lesser prizes.
if additional voodoo is going to be made for this, it should be introduced at the same time. not only to heal, but to 'destroy the will to fight' as well. (name: hoist the flag probably similar as kraken)

edit:
on the numbers: in what order are the ships of the defender? do you waste your boarding power on the lesser ships only to lose the main prize? or will the best ship always be first?

on forcing attackers to use larger ships: how will yoiu solve the present pirate problem? there is a reason why they don't use larger ships. they cannot protect them! the game will see less action when pirates are forced to use large ships without the means to protect them. see the pirate flagship threat; the pirayes don't ask for "big ships" they know for they will lose them!

on cannons: how can a frig fleet both be overpowering in the cannon phase of the battle and take out the defending crew at the same time?