Quit Screwing Up the Copperhead

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Eric Sailcutter

Pirate Lord
All these changes to the Copperhead are fundamentally changing sailing and it’s really upsetting me even though I don’t generally sail Copperheads. If Copperheads aren’t like they were in potco then work to make them so and if this is because of SvS complaints then just ban them from SvS. Maybe it would be better if all SvS ships were identical, then there’d be no complaints of op SvS ships. Making Copperheads further and further from the way they were originally developed is not the answer.
 
Ahoy @Eric Sailcutter

I'm not quite understanding your epiphany with the re-design. The only complaints that have been put out regarding Copperhead is that it is no longer as potent as it once was in SvE (Standard Ship v. Ship combat), or to the pre-nerfed version that it was far too powerful in SvS. If you don't use Copperhead in general, that rules out the current complaint.

However, I do want to address one part of your statement.

Making Copperheads further and further from the way they were originally developed is not the answer.

I'm sorry, but TLOPO has far passed the point in which altering content would be unethical to the original development of the game. The crew is working hard around the clock to create a re-opened version of Pirates of the Caribbean Online, but you need to be aware of the fact that Disney were not masterminds, as it might seem. There are bugs that were never patched out during the entire lifespan of the game that we are working to fix, some of which have been addressed and fixed already. There are balancing issues among weapons and ships alike, which is why (as an example) Jack Sparrow's Blade was altered post release, to make the rest of the weapons competitive, and now Copperhead, to add variation among the picks of sailors while still keeping the upgrade tree as viable as possible.

I'd hate to break it in such a way, but this isn't the end of balancing and improving a game that ended as neglected and riddled with issues. I understand that you want the game as true to POTCO as possible, but POTCO was NOT the end-all-be-all game, and it was not perfect, I promise you.

Finally,
If Copperheads aren’t like they were in potco then work to make them so and if this is because of SvS complaints then just ban them from SvS.

This is simply not possible in the current state of the game. (As was originally developed by Disney Interactive, by the way.) We are working our hardest to keep a true-to-life experience, but please understand that game balance isn't as simple as "Remove this, tweak that". There are a million variables in play that we are trying to contend with, and modifying code willy-nilly is how you break a game without achieving an intended goal.

Fair Seas,
Misha
 
As far as JSB is concerned, I was not a fan of changing that after release either but at least it was new content that hadn’t been out long and so like or not I can accept that change. Here we are talking about the Copperhead, which was designed as a slow tank with a bursty attack that was the most powerful in the game but inconsistent. Now it’s being changed to be less slow and less powerful and more consistent; this is the wrong approach and I cannot accept it the way I did with JSB. Of all the things in the original potco the sailing upgrades were the best and most thoughtfully done change with the balance between upgrades being quite unbelievably well made. Now it’s been upset in the name of making all SvS ships equal. As I say, this is the wrong approach, quit it.
 
I sure don’t remember people complaining that Copperheads were too op for SvS in potco, were they? What is the difference here? It’s certainly not 15% explosive to 55% or 1 explosive max. or faster turning. None of the changes are matching the original game. It’s not that I’m against SvS it’s I’m against changing an original part of the game that was not originally broken and not really intended to be different than it was as in the broadsides of galleons where it seems evident that Disney had intended them to be the biggest but never made it so.
 
All these changes to the Copperhead are fundamentally changing sailing and it’s really upsetting me even though I don’t generally sail Copperheads. If Copperheads aren’t like they were in potco then work to make them so and if this is because of SvS complaints then just ban them from SvS. Maybe it would be better if all SvS ships were identical, then there’d be no complaints of op SvS ships. Making Copperheads further and further from the way they were originally developed is not the answer.
OK Eric, I have to agree that you're on to something significant here and meaningful.
Make all SVS ships equal, and let actual sailing skills, and luck, win the day!
Awesome!
Savor it!
 
...I’m against changing an original part of the game that was not originally broken and not really intended to be different than it was...
As someone watching the progression of this remake (aka a 'fan'), I agree with Eric's point. *A lot of the nostalgia of the original POTCO gets lost if too much is changed...unnecessarily.

Disney lagged their efforts towards POTCO but also, people were laid off and resources diverted. One could argue, therefore, that POTCO became what it is with it's fate sealed.
 
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As someone watching the progression of this remake (aka a 'fan'), I agree with Eric's point. *A lot of the nostalgia of the original POTCO gets lost if too much is changed...unnecessarily.

Disney lagged their efforts towards POTCO but also, people were laid off and resources diverted. One could argue, therefore, that POTCO became what it is with it's fate sealed.
The point that is being missed is that the Copperhead in TLOPO wasn't behaving like POTCO's prior to the
"nerf". While it's still not like POTCO's, it's a lot less overpowered.
 
The point that is being missed is that the Copperhead in TLOPO wasn't behaving like POTCO's prior to the
"nerf". While it's still not like POTCO's, it's a lot less overpowered.
Sorry but your assumption is incorrect. I realize that the Copperhead was performing differently than it did in potco, it’s the blatant abandonment of the basic stats of the potco Copperhead that I object to. I do think that the Copperhead in tlopo, and all ships really, need some changes to bring them more inline with their potco performance but starting with the basic 15% chance for a shot to be explosive has been abandoned and after that there are even further changes that have now been introduced that are even further from the original concept. Get it? Despite some people’s objections the Copperhead should have some small chance of 100% explosives and one shotting most ships and certainly all player ships. Of course that chance should be very small but not zero as it is now.
 
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a lot less? you made it the worst ship in the god darn game... really bad decisions and at the end of the day what kills the game

The phrase "kills the game" is being thrown around like candy in a San Francisco candy shop, so let me take a second to address your post in full.

Firstly, the changes to copperhead (beside the slight buff to turn rate) to all intensive purposes were done to mimic the functionality of POTCO's Copperhead.

How the ship had been before was NOT how it functioned in POTCO, and the team has put hours of data collection regarding the ship's functionality in POTCO to make an accurate assessment of how to tweak it.

Secondarily, not everyone will be satisfied with accepting that the previous Copperhead was blatantly overpowered and desperately needed tweaking. As proven by a number of more mathematically inclined folk than myself in the community, Copperhead is as (if not marginally more) consistent with broadside damage to the likes of Stormchaser, arguably the best upgrade in the game. So damage doesn't seem to be a problem, and from personal testing, the ship performs fine at what it's meant for.

Second to lastly, as a game that is in beta, being run by a volunteer team, not everything will be perfect all the time. Bugs will last extraordinarily long amounts of time compared to massive development teams, and the previous version of Copperhead was considered a bug. It was not balanced nor consistent with POTCO, which are the two goals that were achieved with this recent tweak.

Finally, let's get this straight. There are millions of tweaks, fixes, and additions the crew can and may add to The Legend of Pirates Online in the future to create a path toward creating a more purposeful MMORPG, and I can promise you this:

Regardless of if the sky is falling, or some major thing is being added, I can promise that the addition of a single feature has never, won't, and will continue not to be the sole driving force in killing a game like this.

Fair Seas,
Misha
 
The phrase "kills the game" is being thrown around like candy in a San Francisco candy shop, so let me take a second to address your post in full.

Firstly, the changes to copperhead (beside the slight buff to turn rate) to all intensive purposes were done to mimic the functionality of POTCO's Copperhead.

How the ship had been before was NOT how it functioned in POTCO, and the team has put hours of data collection regarding the ship's functionality in POTCO to make an accurate assessment of how to tweak it.

Secondarily, not everyone will be satisfied with accepting that the previous Copperhead was blatantly overpowered and desperately needed tweaking. As proven by a number of more mathematically inclined folk than myself in the community, Copperhead is as (if not marginally more) consistent with broadside damage to the likes of Stormchaser, arguably the best upgrade in the game. So damage doesn't seem to be a problem, and from personal testing, the ship performs fine at what it's meant for.

Second to lastly, as a game that is in beta, being run by a volunteer team, not everything will be perfect all the time. Bugs will last extraordinarily long amounts of time compared to massive development teams, and the previous version of Copperhead was considered a bug. It was not balanced nor consistent with POTCO, which are the two goals that were achieved with this recent tweak.

Finally, let's get this straight. There are millions of tweaks, fixes, and additions the crew can and may add to The Legend of Pirates Online in the future to create a path toward creating a more purposeful MMORPG, and I can promise you this:

Regardless of if the sky is falling, or some major thing is being added, I can promise that the addition of a single feature has never, won't, and will continue not to be the sole driving force in killing a game like this.

Fair Seas,
Misha
I realize that your post was directed more at the phrase "what kills the game" but I've got to say that, in light of many other things you say here, my thread is really about the abandonment of the original stats of the Copperhead and how that has fundamentally changed the niche that the Copperhead fills. I have no doubt that the Copperhead needed some tweaking but the % chance of explosives and the amount of explosives and the turning rate all have now been changed from the original, this is unacceptable to me. The Copperhead now turns faster relative to other ships than it should. The Copperhead now has a much higher chance of explosives than it should. The Copperhead now is limited to just one explosive round per broadside making it's maximum power far less that it would be when it got lucky and had 100% explosives in potco. I see all these changes as moving the Copperhead away from it's original mission. Relative to the other upgrades the Copperhead should be super slow and super inconsistent but with the potential to be far and away the most powerful ship upgrade in terms of offense. The Copperhead absolutely should have the potential on a lucky shot to one shot every player ship. These changes have eliminated all of that. Sure, it's still a fun ship and still more powerful than the Treasurehunter or Firestorm in offense but it's not the Copperhead. It's now too quick, too weak in terms of potential offense, and too consistent.
 
The Copperhead is supposed to be a safe, slow, meandering hulk of a ship that takes half the Caribbean to turn around in.
If the devs need a good randomizing RNG engine, there are plenty at GitHub and the like.
15% chance of explosives means that there's a random chance, at 15%, of explosives rounds.
That can vary from none to a full broadside of explosive rounds, as far as the math flies.
The main purpose of the different ship types in the game was that each and every ship type had its advantages and disadvantages, as in a trade-off.
The superfast ships have no armor, some have armor to varying degrees and reasonable firepower, as in the middle of the road variety, etc.
That's why the ships all have different features, such as varying speeds, type of ammos, cargo size, armor levels, etc.

But alas, I'm guessing the effort was to please a squeaky wheel somewhere, and this is where we wound up.

Reminds me of the Jack Sparrow blade becoming as pointless/useless as an El Patron because someone who felt they deserved it first didn't get it.

Anecdotally speaking;
Y'all ever have that driver, with 30 cars behind him/her, and they stop at a green light to let someone go from a
different lane, in an effort to be nice to that one driver, who would normally wait their turn to go (as in when the light changes), and then all those cars behind the "nice driver" now get stuck at the red light, because "everyone's dad" had to let the car go out of turn, to be "nice"?
In the end, 30 cars were punished, so the driver in question could do something no one really needed, trying to be "nice" to the one car who didn't even need it.
Anyway...
 
The Copperhead is supposed to be a safe, slow, meandering hulk of a ship that takes half the Caribbean to turn around in.
If the devs need a good randomizing RNG engine, there are plenty at GitHub and the like.
15% chance of explosives means that there's a random chance, at 15%, of explosives rounds.
That can vary from none to a full broadside of explosive rounds, as far as the math flies.
The main purpose of the different ship types in the game was that each and every ship type had its advantages and disadvantages, as in a trade-off.
The superfast ships have no armor, some have armor to varying degrees and reasonable firepower, as in the middle of the road variety, etc.
That's why the ships all have different features, such as varying speeds, type of ammos, cargo size, armor levels, etc.

But alas, I'm guessing the effort was to please a squeaky wheel somewhere, and this is where we wound up.

Reminds me of the Jack Sparrow blade becoming as pointless/useless as an El Patron because someone who felt they deserved it first didn't get it.

Anecdotally speaking;
Y'all ever have that driver, with 30 cars behind him/her, and they stop at a green light to let someone go from a
different lane, in an effort to be nice to that one driver, who would normally wait their turn to go (as in when the light changes), and then all those cars behind the "nice driver" now get stuck at the red light, because "everyone's dad" had to let the car go out of turn, to be "nice"?
In the end, 30 cars were punished, so the driver in question could do something no one really needed, trying to be "nice" to the one car who didn't even need it.
Anyway...
Much as I didn't like the JSB nerf I feel it was their baby and wasn't out long so I can accept their decision as their call but the Copperhead is different, it is an original part of the game that I admit wasn't quite right but neither are any of the other ships, so, yes it needed tweaking along with ships in general. What I really really don't like is the abandonment of the original specs and how that has fundamentally changed it relative to the other ships.
 
Give the ship the ability to fire one exp per broad for lvl 4 copperheads 2 exp per broad for lvl 5 copperheads and 3 exp per broad for lvl 6 copperheads
They also are the most expensive to lvl so they should be the most powerful

They already are the most powerful.

3 explosives per broadside would do a ridiculous amount of damage. On a war brig the damage output would be nearly four times higher than a stock broadside, and 42% higher than it was before the nerf. There'd be little incentive to use any other upgrade.

What exactly is the defining trait of the Copperhead these days?

Damage output and armor.
 
They already are the most powerful.

3 explosives per broadside would do a ridiculous amount of damage. On a war brig the damage output would be nearly four times higher than a stock broadside, and 42% higher than it was before the nerf. There'd be little incentive to use any other upgrade.



Damage output and armor.
I've been out of the loop for a while and last SVSed before ship upgrades were a big thing. That being said, it would be cool if there were at least a very slim chance of two or even three explosives. Only on very rare occasion, but it would be like a super fun bonus. I'm not necessarily opposed to reducing the damage output, just implementing some sort of predetermined artificial cap. I guess it just feels too specific or something. My memory of pre nerf Copperhead is quite foggy and I don't think I ever had it on POTCO.
 
I saw Truecrash’s post about Bladestorm and Vipers Nest where damage can now be controlled independently between PvP and PvE and that that’s also coming to SvS and SvE. So, can we please consider restoring the % chance and dropping the one limit on Copperhead explosives. I’m not saying that explosives damage should be the same as the pre-nerf, it’s fine with me if it’s taken down a little. I just want the same concept in explosives chance as it was in potco and since SvS damage can be controlled independently from SvE damage I see no more impediment to at least a partial restoration of the Copperhead.
 
I'm going to cite this as evidence that even though the nerf was indeed a downgrade for the copperhead, the result is that storm chaser and copperhead are now both top tier ships allowing two different playstyles with similar damage outputs. Overall I think the change benefited balance and was reasonable.

 
I'm going to cite this as evidence that even though the nerf was indeed a downgrade for the copperhead, the result is that storm chaser and copperhead are now both top tier ships allowing two different playstyles with similar damage outputs. Overall I think the change benefited balance and was reasonable.

No, you are completely wrong, Stormchaser is better in everyway, it's cheaper to make and to obtain, it does more damage, and it's faster lightning is more range and faster hitting
you WILL not see any copperheads anymore, infact i doubt anyone is making them and everyone already swapped them because they are dog tier tlopo just screwed it up
 
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