Proposed Idea.

[Yoshiboy]

I've got an idea for pirates and I was wondering what you people would think about it.

The idea was, to get around a few problems, is to replace the player icon with that of an arrow or something similar and then have some parties that essentially follow your arrow when it moves. These parties would represent your fleet (or crew on land) and it would mean all kinds of cool things. You could click on a ship to view it and switch it to your fleet leader. You could trade crew between ships and stuff, trade cargo. You could use multipal ships from your fleet in battle and stuff like that but you would always have one as the flagship which you would command.

It would basically be like having your own set of custom parties that follow your arrow around.

It would also open up the option of having a horse and stuff like that.

Basically the main limitation would be the slight delay when moving and getting your ships to follow, it would be like having a trade ship follow you. I guess I could test for when your fleet was near enough and stuff like that so that it wouldn't be silly when engaging parties when your fleet was a long way dragging behind.

[messenger]

I like the sounds of it, should be quite handy to defeat the odd Spainish Galleon :p.

[Exasperation]

Sounds like a great idea to me.  Would make capturing ships more interesting, and would make for some interesting decisions, such as "do I move at the speed of my larger and slower ships, or take my faster ships ahead of the rest of my fleet to chase someone and risk getting caught by an enemy who outguns me".

A couple of questions:
Would there be npc ships with escorts/fleets too?
If one of your ships sinks, would there be a chance to rescue the crew?

[Yoshiboy]

Would there be npc ships with escorts/fleets too?

Uh huh.

If one of your ships sinks, would there be a chance to rescue the crew?

Um, i could implement that. How do you think it should work?

[Exasperation]

Would there be npc ships with escorts/fleets too?

Uh huh.

That's what I was hoping you would say.

If one of your ships sinks, would there be a chance to rescue the crew?

Um, i could implement that. How do you think it should work?

Well, my first thought would be a percentage chance similar to the way surgery works, but based on the number of ships that survive the battle instead of a skill (more ships in the area=better chance to get fished out of the water before you drown).  It would probably be a good idea to have a significant non-zero base chance, to a) represent people that survive by using ships' boats and b) keep it from getting too frustrating early on when you have a small fleet.

[Fisheye]

I think that would be bloody excellent.

Are you implementing multi-ship battles? Fleet vs fleet like the Battle of Trafalgar? Formations, Crossings of Ts and such craziness?

[Yoshiboy]

I think that would be bloody excellent.

Are you implementing multi-ship battles? Fleet vs fleet like the Battle of Trafalgar? Formations, Crossings of Ts and such craziness?

Yeah, but without a super computer you might struggle.

[Leprechaun]

Why would the icon have to change to an arrow, though? Surely they could still follow your ship icon?

[Lokki^^]

If you can make this work, then it's a briliant idea

[broodwarcd]

I'm all for it, if it can be done, but would this be only a player oriented option or would npcs do it to

[Leprechaun]

Would there be npc ships with escorts/fleets too?

Uh huh.

That's a yes, I think.

[Pellidon]

Why would the icon have to change to an arrow, though? Surely they could still follow your ship icon?

the arrow refers to horse use, it would be wird to have a boat map icon moving on land when you have a horse equipped, and vice versa, it'd be weird to have a horse that can walk on water. the ships following you is a seperate thing, at least, that's my undrstanding of what yoshiboy said.

[Leprechaun]

Ah, I think I follow.

[Hellequin]

I'll second Fisheye.  Sounds bloody cool; do it!

Honestly, I especially like the thought of it on land.  In the extreme it's very cool - one troop per party, all labels gone (possibly except for leaders or whatever), basically you're watching your crew trot about on land and actually seeing all of them, and seeing a group of French musketeers or whatever as an actual group.  Now you might shy away from that extreme, but the idea of being able to actually see your companions at least is very compelling.

[Pellidon]

i don't think he meant that there would be individual members, more like this: you have three ships other than your own in your fleet; when you land, the crews of each ship make up one party, so you'd have three groups following you.

[Brigadier Hussey]

Sounds a great idea Yoshi, damn I can't wait to play the next version of Pirates!

[Merentha]

If you can do it, that would be obscenely badass. 

[WhindGhost8]

would the npc parties land and take off too or would they be stuck on either land or water?

[Yoshiboy]

would the npc parties land and take off too or would they be stuck on either land or water?

Nah, they would move with you fine

[WhindGhost8]

i meant the npc's that move around not the ones that follow you

[Yoshiboy]

i meant the npc's that move around not the ones that follow you

Oh no, those are either stuck on land or sea. That would take alot to be able to change that.

[SlightFeelingOfRegret]

i meant the npc's that move around not the ones that follow you

Oh no, those are either stuck on land or sea. That would take alot to be able to change that.

 That doesn't stop you. It would be pretty realistic if they could send out parties to chase you onto land.

 I've just had a thought, can the Spanish play dirty tricks, like stealing your ships when you've gone ashore?

[Yoshiboy]

i meant the npc's that move around not the ones that follow you

Oh no, those are either stuck on land or sea. That would take alot to be able to change that.

 That doesn't stop you. It would be pretty realistic if they could send out parties to chase you onto land.

 I've just had a thought, can the Spanish play dirty tricks, like stealing your ships when you've gone ashore?

Well, its not so much the difficulty. Its more the time required. I'd really love to do it but I've already overloaded myself with work. This was only meant to be a very simple port at first. I wasn't even planning to update anything but some bugfixes.

[Nethoras]

that sounds cool as hell; that should be a common feaure of m&b. I dont know if this has been suggested but wouldnt it work if you made it so when your in "move mode" or whatever, your parity moves at insane speeds, like move across the map in a milisecond, then; it made it so all, or even if your uber skilled the selected partes, gained the person ality of a caravan when you're protecting it. then when you exit this you're partyy goes back to itss origianl spot, and as soon as you hit space (wich unpausesthe game), all your men start moving to the set point. just a suggestion.
I think I will reference with higlander to see if we can use this with the 40k mod.