Poll What Version Are You Playing And Why

[Kikirik007]

I also playing vanilla. For me enough that. I tried GoF 1.2 and 2.0 and I liked new uniforms, ships, more goods etc. I didn't like changed naval battles, trade and I had often game crashes. Yes, battle are longest and more realistic, but are boring. In GoF is lots of characters. I know it is good, but I still playing same game only character is different. That's my opinion.

Maybe I have this opinion, because I played Caribbean Tales without mods (previously I didn't know about mods on Age of Pirates) and I also played CoAS long time without mods. Maybe its just habit. But I'm vanilla player and I have fan web about this game and don't worry. About GoF I wrote lots of information too.

And I'm sorry for my English.

Jakub/Jake

 

[Pieter Boelen]

@Pirate BlackBeard, from what I know, the unmodded CoAS is indeed a perfectly decent game.
It is different with, for example, our dear PotC, where the mods truly make a world of different.

 

[Kikirik007]

What do you think exactly?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

What do you think exactly?

I think that PotC + mods = awesome and if you haven't tried it, you may want to consider it.

 

[Kikirik007]

I already tried. Its a long time ago. But thank you. I'm enjoy it with COAS vanilla game. You don't like it?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

You don't like it?

Never really bothered to try.

 

[Kikirik007]

Why not?

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Why not?

No time and don't want to.

 

[Kikirik007]

Oh ok. So tell me some reasons why I have play GoF mod.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Oh ok. So tell me some reasons why I have play GoF mod.

You're asking the wrong person.
I can only give you reasons to play PotC with the NH mod.

 

[Kikirik007]

It is long time ago when I tried New Horizons or if I remember well, previously it was Build 13... I don't know exactly. It was fine but it is very old - textures etc. Sorry mate.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

It is long time ago when I tried New Horizons or if I remember well, previously it was Build 13... I don't know exactly. It was fine but it is very old - textures etc. Sorry mate.

Technically the wrong forum, because this is about another game.
Still, I'm glad you liked the old Build 13.

If you're interested, Build 14 is not too far from being released.
See the link in my signature for the latest.

 

[LarryHookins]

Hi Jakub.

New Horizons is actually quite good. It has an incredible wealth of content that has had time to mature to the point that everything works well. It's well worth playing just for the content.

I prefer stock COAS myself, with a few script mods I made. The other mods add a lot of content, but it hasn't been through the same maturing process that NH has and much of the content isn't as good as I'd prefer. I like the interface changes for COAS over PotC.

I'm currently playing Sea Dogs: To Each His Own on Steam. This game has added some incredible polish to stock COAS and a lot of content, with much of the story line being very in-depth. The story quests are too hardcore for many people, and you'll be reloading from previous saves often. I only play the sandbox, which is *very* well done and adds a lot of content to what COAS has for sandbox play. Not everything is right but I've made a mod that fixes most of it.

I've got 200 to 250 hours each in COAS and the newest version of NH, and over 1600 hours in TEHO, half of that before I started modding it. That should tell you which one I prefer. But I do like NH.

Hook

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If we're comparing the games and mods, I reckon this is a fair overview of pros and cons:
Need Help - Landlubber's guide to games and mods?

 

[Flame]

There is no contest. Gentlemen of Fortune eras rules supreme. It is actively developed by a team who constantly release new updates and improvements. Since the time this ancient survey was taken Gentlemen of Fortune eras gaming is continuing to improve far from where it was. If you go on the buccaneers reef website you will see what they are doing in their screenshots. All other mods on this list are long dead. Gentlemen of Fortune eras is the only living one left.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

There is no contest. Gentlemen of Fortune eras rules supreme.

As English mods for CoAS go, that might actually be true.
I'm curious though: what new features did they add to that mod?
Last I knew, it was mostly "more of the same" (e.g. an overwhelming number of items, for example), but that was many years ago.
Maybe they stepped up their game now and started on adding new and improved gameplay too.
Are there, for example, new quests?

 

[LarryHookins]

Since the time this ancient survey was taken...

While the survey went up some time ago, it's been expanded since and people are still responding. We get new votes every so often.

Pieter: One thing I haven't seen elsewhere is that all those starting characters you can choose from (135 or so last time I counted and they were planning to add more) will be encountered in the game, each with their own agendas. You can interact with them in various ways. They're all off doing their own thing. You can team up with them or fight them at some point (I'm guessing on this last one) or just ignore them. The only down side is that updating all these characters periodically takes a while. I haven no idea how well this plays.

New Horizons is still being updated, and Sea Dogs: To Each His Own is still in development with new DLC being added occasionally. It hasn't been officially opened for modding, but people are finding ways to mod it anyway. I haven't kept up with the GOF mod here.

Every game and every mod has bad ideas that made it into the game, New Horizons included. The major difference between New Horizons and all the others is that Pieter has weeded out most of the bad stuff from New Horizons at one time or another.

Hook

 

[Pieter Boelen]

One thing I haven't seen elsewhere is that all those starting characters you can choose from (135 or so last time I counted and they were planning to add more) will be encountered in the game, each with their own agendas. You can interact with them in various ways. They're all off doing their own thing. You can team up with them or fight them at some point (I'm guessing on this last one) or just ignore them. The only down side is that updating all these characters periodically takes a while. I

That's a feature of CoAS itself and is not limited to any mod.
I myself am not convinced that is actually a good feature though.

If we'd try to do that with the PotC:NH character selection, it wouldn't make the slightest bit of sense.
This is because there the character selection isn't limited to a specific number of characters at all.
Instead there are several suggestions, but you're free to create your own instead.

New Horizons is still being updated, and Sea Dogs: To Each His Own is still in development with new DLC being added occasionally. It hasn't been officially opened for modding, but people are finding ways to mod it anyway. I haven't kept up with the GOF mod here.

CoAS modding here is dead, so that's why I can certainly believe that Eras is the best English CoAS mod that is still being worked on.
By process of elimination it HAS to be, because it is literally the ONLY one!

Of course that doesn't mean that CoAS+Eras is the best pirate game you can find.
SD:TEHO and PotC:NH are probably at least on the same level.
What people prefer between those three is mostly personal preference.
And that is perfectly fine.

Plus there's a German mod for CoAS too that is still being worked on.
I strongly suspect that one is easily as good as Eras, though I do not know that for certain and it is definitely not available in English.

Every game and every mod has bad ideas that made it into the game, New Horizons included. The major difference between New Horizons and all the others is that Pieter has weeded out most of the bad stuff from New Horizons at one time or another.

I can't take all the credit for PotC:NH.
That mod has always been very, very much a team effort.

Also, I'd be curious to hear what people consider to be "bad ideas" that are still currently in PotC:NH.
Removing content is easier than adding content, so if removing content can make things better, that is probably easily arranged.

 

[LarryHookins]

That's a feature of CoAS itself and is not limited to any mod.

Izzat a fact? Well well. I didn't notice it when I was playing stock COAS. It sounds like they might have made all those characters into starting characters, which would make some sense. Each one has a considerable bio and background which is probably new.

It's not necessary to make your starting characters into autonomous characters that you encounter in the game. They can be any characters. One interesting thing is that there would be 135 new quest lines if someone bothered to write them, and they'd be applicable to any of the general story lines and periods (although you might find an anachronism or two in there; "Didn't you die about 100 years ago?" "... I'm his grandson.").

SD:TEHO and PotC:NH are probably at least on the same level.

While TEHO is more polished, NH has a lot more content and options for play. TEHO is a bit hardcore for a lot of people. There are good reasons to play both.

I can't take all the credit for PotC:NH.

You can probably take all the credit for what went into the mod and what got removed. It was your sound judgement that made NH what it is today. The rest of us just made content for the game.

I doubt there are many bad ideas left in NH. I'd point a finger at Isla Mona though. I was able to make the map work fairly well by using the intermediate scale. Hopefully the changes I did recently with the direct sail code helped. It would be hard to make a good map without understanding how direct sail works, more than just the basic concept.

Hook

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Izzat a fact? Well well. I didn't notice it when I was playing stock COAS. It sounds like they might have made all those characters into starting characters, which would make some sense. Each one has a considerable bio and background which is probably new.

Pretty sure it is indeed a stock game feature and Eras added a whole lot more of them.
From what I understand, it is easy to add such characters because they're in an INI file in the RESOURCE folder.
Takes only a few lines of code there and a new character is added both in the New Game menu and also shows up in the game.

It's not necessary to make your starting characters into autonomous characters that you encounter in the game. They can be any characters. One interesting thing is that there would be 135 new quest lines if someone bothered to write them, and they'd be applicable to any of the general story lines and periods (although you might find an anachronism or two in there; "Didn't you die about 100 years ago?" "... I'm his grandson.").

Yep, those are exactly the reasons why it wouldn't make any sense in PotC:NH and why it's not a feature I'd care to have.
Of course in CoAS it does make sense because there is no Periods feature and it is pretty cool.

You can probably take all the credit for what went into the mod and what got removed. It was your sound judgement that made NH what it is today. The rest of us just made content for the game.

I can assure you that we have been making many decisions together as well.
Of course I had a role to play, but it is every bit a Community effort.
And that's what makes it so very very special to me! It is proof of what can be accomplished when people work together.

I doubt there are many bad ideas left in NH. I'd point a finger at Isla Mona though. I was able to make the map work fairly well by using the intermediate scale. Hopefully the changes I did recently with the direct sail code helped. It would be hard to make a good map without understanding how direct sail works, more than just the basic concept.

Ah yes, Isla Mona. That was added purely for the benefit of a single storyline.
And then it got kind of out of hand.
Of course we had no idea it would mess up DirectSail at the time and now that's difficult to sort out properly.
Well, I don't need to tell you that because you know it better than anyone else.

I wished somebody had adapted your most recent work on DirectSail to the latest version of the mod.
But I haven't had time for any of that for quite a while and that doesn't look to be changing any time soon.
And nobody else did it either. Massive missed opportunity there!!!