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| Ahoy, Yah skurvy cur! Pirates of the Burning Sea is finally here!The wait is over! Sony’s revolutionary new MMORPG Pirates of the Burning Sea is now available. Fame and fortune will be yours! Sail on the high seas, command a crew, and conduct epic battles with the next-generation ship-on-ship combat engine. See you in the game!!! |
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Gameplay
Careers
Players will choose a Career for their avatars when they begin the game. The Career will determine what abilities and features he will accrue as a captain. The player will receive one point for his avatar’s career on every other level gained. These points can be spent in various ways depending on which career the player has chosen. Once a career is chosen, it cannot be changed.
There are a total of 45 skills for each Career. The skill trees are composed of 9 skill chains, each 5 skills in depth. A player will be able to reach the end of a single skill chain by Rank 15, and is then considered somewhat equal to a Rank 50 in that skill chain.
The different careers are:
- Naval Officer - Focus on defense, escorting duties, and direct, face-to-face combat. Navy Officers gain access to the extremely powerful ships of the line.
- Privateer - Focus on utilizing small advantages for big gain, outmaneuvering and outwitting opponents. Privateers have an edge in boarding combat and can learn a skill that enables them to use Pirate PvP zones.
- Freetrader - Focus on trading, production and economics. They will have abilities to effectively evade opponents in combat. Freetraders may learn skills that increase their ability to gather resources and produce goods.
- Pirate - All-round capability including the special ability to take command of defeated opponent ships. These ships will only have one durability point. If a Pirate takes command of a Ship of the Line he will automatically be flagged for PvP. This is the only career available for the ‘Pirate’ nation, and is not available for any other nation.
Characters
Players in Pirates of the Burning Sea will create up to six avatars per server to represent themselves in the game. All avatars will be captain of their own ship, and will fight either for a nation of their choice or as a Pirate (see below). As the player moves along in the game the avatar will develop by gaining ranks (known in many other MMO’s as levels). Through development the player can unlock new features, fighting abilities, and most importantly will be able to captain bigger and better ships. The maximum rank a player can reach is 50, and it is said that this can be reached through around two months of casual gaming.
When the character is first created the player will have to choose a nation to join. This can be any one of either Britain, France, Spain or the Pirates, known as the Brethren of the Coast. Players are restricted to one nation per server, and this choice can only be undone by deleting all characters on that server. Each of the four nations will have different starting ports, and therefore access to different resources at the start of the game.
After a player has chosen a nation, he will be able to customize the looks of his avatar. These will be alterable in-game and do not affect gameplay directly. There are thousands of different combinations available to the player, who can freely specify each of the 14 different slots. Most items allow color customization to further personalize the avatar’s look. The avatar’s appearance is also based on level. The more impressive and intricate clothing is restricted to higher level avatars. Certain items, such as peg legs or hooks for hands, must be earned through completing higher-level missions.
Swashbuckling
Swashbuckling is the name given to avatar combat in Pirates of the Burning Sea. Players select one of three fighting styles to learn and use that style to duel each other or any of the various NPCs they might encounter.
Swashbuckling is based on a fighter’s ability to manage their opponent’s balance. Each participant will have a balance meter which is used to determine how capable a character is of parrying, blocking or dodging an attack. Players will use Preparatory Attacks to lower their opponents balance, and then use offensive attacks to deal damage. Players and NPCs alike will aim to reduce their opponents balance meter while keeping their own alive.
The player must choose one of three fighting styles and will, through leveling, gain points every other level to spend in the chosen style. There are a total of 45 skills for each fighting style. The skill tree is composed of 9 skill chains that are each 5 skills in depth. A player will be able to reach the end of a single skill chain by Rank 15, and is then considered somewhat equal to a Rank 50 in that skill chain.
The three styles are:
- Dirty fighting - Fight with a cutlass. Excels in disrupting the balance of the opponent and has many ’special’ attacks.
- Fencing - The art of fighting with a rapier. Excellent at dealing high amounts of damage.
- Florentine - Dagger and sword fighting. Has the greatest defensive capabilities.
Ships
As it stands there are approximately 54 ships in the game, with the aim to add more over time. What ship the player chooses to sail will affect both his combat capabilities and his economic capabilities. Most of these ships have been User Created (see Customization below).
As a general rule, the bigger the ship, the less maneuverable it is. This means that even though a ship is bigger and has more and heavier cannons, it will not necessarily be the better choice. Because of the way combat works, ship speed and maneuverability has a great effect on combat. Small ships, especially in large groups, will in many cases be able to beat larger ships solely because of this. However, the developers have stated that smaller ships are not designed to take out larger ships in a one-on-one stand off, but to play support roles to other ships such as harassing the enemy ships.
Ships of different sizes will also have different cargo hold sizes. This is especially important to free-traders. The more cargo you can bring from one port to another, the more you will be able to earn on a single trip. Merchant ships are generally less armed than warships, but have more cargo space.
A player will be able to own three ships at anytime. Though only one can be sailed, the others can be docked in port, fitted and ready for action. The player will also be able to transfer himself directly from one docked ship to another. This means that the player will have easy access to any of his three ships, no matter how far away it is. It will also mean that the player will be able to more easily cover the different playing styles.
The developers have stated that some ships will be available in up to five different types:
- Stripped – A merchant variant. A low-level requirement version of a large trade ship although not equipped with guns.
- Courier – An easy-access variant. Courier ships are slightly faster and easier to handle, but they have less firepower and armor.
- Heavy – An upgrade variant. Heavy ships have significantly more armor and structure, and often have other combat benefits.
- Sleek – An upgrade variant. Sleek ships are faster and handle better. They might also have slightly better armor.
- Mastercraft – The premier ship variant. Mastercraft ships are expensive custom made ships that have been restructured to have room for more (and potentially heavier) guns and stronger hulls.
Durability
Durability is a system devised to deal with ship losses. It accounts for the largest expenditure in the economy, it assures that players tread carefully in their expensive ships, and it is the only ‘death penalty’ beyond lost time.
In Pirates of the Burning Sea, each ship has a set amount of Durability Points. When a ship is sunk or defeated it loses a Durability Point. If it loses its last point, it is considered destroyed and lost. This way, players will want to keep as many Durability Points as possible, because Durability directly equals the value of the ship. Ships captured by pirates have only one durability point.
In order to keep the bigger ships in demand and in order to make them more expensive and precious the higher level ships will have much fewer Durability Points than the expendable, smaller ships. This assures that the high level ships will be risky to bring into combat, and players will think twice before sacrificing their ship.
Shot Types
The developers have stated that there will be 9 different types of cannon shot available to players in 3 different categories:
- Round Shot - Stone Shot, Heavy Round Shot, Bronze Round Shot
- Antipersonnel Shot - Langridge, Canister, Grape shot
- Dismantling Shot - Bar Shot, Chain Shot, Star Shot
Round shots are designed to do structural damage to the hull, anti personnel shot is designed to maim crew, making boarding actions easier, and dismantling shot is designed to damage the sails and masts, slowing the opposing ship.
User Created Ships and Flags
One of the unique features of Pirates of the Burning Sea is the system in place for players to create and submit ships and flags. If the ship or flag passes a rather rigorous approval system, it is implemented into the game for anyone to enjoy. Many user created ships and flags will be in the game at launch.
Societies
In Pirates of the Burning Sea, players will be able to form groups known as Societies. These will function much like Guilds in other MMO’s, and will feature several tools that can be used for communication amongst it’s members. Players will only be able to join a Society with members of their own Nation.
The advantages of a Society is purely in the form of community. Players in a Society will help out each other, and through that they will be able to achieve goals that might be harder, if not impossible, alone. A good example of this is the economy (see below). Here, working together with other players can save many dubloons in production as you will not be dependant on 3rd party production.
Economy
The economy in PotBS is a player-driven, production-based system. This means that everything is made by players, but not by the avatars themselves.
Players manage plots of anything from lumbermills to shipyards in order to produce goods that can either be sold to other players or be used by the producer themselves. The buildings will then save up hours, in real time, that can be used for production. They will be saved up even when the player is not playing, but only to a maximum of 72 hours. Each account is limited to 10 plots per server.
Many things that a player can produce requires several steps in its production. Ships, for example, are made of ship hulls, which are made of planks, which are cut from trees. Along with this, the ship hull needs nails, which are made from iron, which is refined from iron ore. The ship, along with the ship hull, also needs masts, cannons, several hundred yards of rope, and so on.
While there is no requirement to taking part in the economy system, the rewards of doing so will be great. Economy is also directly tied to the port contention system, as who controls a port might control access to resources only available at that port.
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