Ship Specialization

[Edward_Teach]

if you ship is faster then the opponents you get an advantage on windward/leeward gage depending if you attacking or defending. If neither ship is faster then the person with leeward gage gets the advantage. If you have the advantage on the leeward gage doesnt mean that you will successfully flee the battle. You may have to disable the opponents ship or slow it down before you can successfully retreat. If you have advantage with the windward gage you gain a small advantage at how you attack the ship

In this case to help you escape you would use a cannon mounted on the deck of the ship at the stern, the back of the ship. These are called Stern Chasers and were fairly popular among traders, pirates and warships alike. It gave them an advantage in escape, and could cripple an enemy ship, and by the way most of the ships that had these usually used chainshot as the preferred ammunition for their Stern Chasers, as it was more affective in slowing the ship pursuing them.

[Edward_Teach]

And when pursuing you would use a Bow Chaser a cannon mounted on the deck at the bow, the front of the ship, this was mostly common with Warships, and pirates, obviously not merchant ships.

[Captain dungeness]

Holding the weather, or windward, gage conferred several important tactical advantages. The admiral holding the weather gage held the tactical initiative, able to accept battle by bearing down on his opponent or to refuse it, by remaining upwind. The fleet with the lee gage could avoid battle by withdrawing to leeward, but could not force action.

if you ship is faster then the opponents you get an advantage on windward/leeward gage depending if you attacking or defending. If neither ship is faster then the person with leeward gage gets the advantage. If you have the advantage on the leeward gage doesnt mean that you will successfully flee the battle. You may have to disable the opponents ship or slow it down before you can successfully retreat. If you have advantage with the windward gage you gain a small advantage at how you attack the ship

I really like your level of understanding here and what it means in game-terms. I think this quoted part of what you said needs a diagram or something to explain who is better at doing what in each scenario...

I think your ideas provide (in my opinion) the much-needed decision making for how to build your ships to do a certain task well. I want to have certain fleets that are built for chasing down and plundering by taking advantage of speed to win against much larger ships. I also want the chance to try out other tactics like frontal assault and broadside attack.

-Captain D

[Spastic]

I did some reading on ship types and decided to change what some of the ships specialise in

Brigs, Brigs of War and Frigates are better at raking fire

War Galleons, Flag Galleons and Ships of the Line are better at the dutch tactic

Large Frigate's specialisation are calculated the way a mentioned before.

This change was because brigs and frigates were designed to be fast a manoeuvrable. The slow Galleons would be more suited to the line of battle tactic and sols were purpose built for the line of battle tactic.
The term frigate was generally used for ships too small to stand in the line of battle. The large frigate to me is like the link between frigates and sols.

[Captain Jack]

Ship specialization is one thing, fleet tactics is another. Of course, how well a fleet performs a specific tactic can (and should) be dependable on ship abilities (characteristics too) that are in the fleet.

We should keep the fleet tactic ideas as reference but they should be implemented after ship abilities (which have to be implemented after ship specialization). In this way we will combo them well, creating a very strategic pack of options for everyone.

When we will start working on this feature (which should not be as long away as you might currently think) we will need to focus on three different aspects in the same time, in order to achieve a total upgrade of the ships role (which we want to be the most primary strength in game).

Ship Specialization -> How it will work (This is what this topic is about - I already update the first post with current leading design)
Ship Abilities -> Which abilities there will be and which ships get what (Topic here: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=254 )
Fleet tactics -> I created a new topic here -> viewtopic.php?f=5&t=777

[Dr Vegapunk]

Cutter should have 30% chance of fleeing causing the battle end up as tie..for other ships like frigate and brig maybe put a chance to do critical damage in battle

[Rolando]

Perhaps every player should have the ability to designate a Flagship which carries special benefits. Depending on the ship and level could determine the various benefits. This could be offensive or defensive bonuses based on what everyone thinks. I think this would allow newer players to have a ship benefit to make them aspire to further specialize their ships.Your thoughts?

[Captain Jack]

Cutter should have 30% chance of fleeing causing the battle end up as tie..for other ships like frigate and brig maybe put a chance to do critical damage in battle

Since we now have a specific design template (check first post here) we should also become more specific in suggestions.

This should be a fleet tactic which will rely on a specific ship ability that cutters should have. So your suggestion will become:

New Ship Ability: Maneuver
Among other possible uses, it will increase chance for a ship to flee from combat.

New Fleet tactic: Flee
If chosen, selected fleet will try to flee from combat
Success will be dependable on ship total ship speed, copper plating and Maneuver.

Ship list that should get Maneuver:
-Cutter
-More will be added


I will continue to aid all user posts in this way, so if you got a nice idea but you are unsure how to write it down, just share and me (or some other player perhaps?) could write it in this format.

[Captain Jack]

Perhaps every player should have the ability to designate a Flagship which carries special benefits. Depending on the ship and level could determine the various benefits. This could be offensive or defensive bonuses based on what everyone thinks. I think this would allow newer players to have a ship benefit to make them aspire to further specialize their ships.Your thoughts?

If I understand well, you propose that every player should be able to decide which abilities his flagship will have? If I understand well, you want something along these lines:

Let's suppose that in the final design, sloops have the following abilities:
-Maneuver (chance to flee from battle)
-Chain shot (harms sails of enemy ships battle)
-Grape shot (harms crew of enemy ships during battle)

With your proposal, you suggest that if a player chooses a sloop as his flagship, he should be able to re-define these options according to his needs. (Replace natural ship type abilities with ones of his personal choosing).

Let me know if I got this clear enough.

[Rolando]

Yeah, that's pretty much it. Just so each player can have one ship with a few special traits. Perhaps even a standardized one such as +1 to traits, or +40% speed, whatever you determine as the choices, with a boost for the flagship.