Docking a boat to a boat in a port

[psymann]

I have one big boat. It's in a town.

I have one little boat. It's in the town's harbour.

Is there any way I can dock the little boat to the big boat using only myself?

I could sail the big boat to the harbour and then have both boats in the harbour, but would I then be able to dock the little boat to the big boat?

I could sail the little boat to the town and then have both boats in the town, but would I then be able to dock the little boat to the big boat?

I could sail them both out to sea, presumably, and dock them out there, but I believe then I'd need a second person to command one or other of the two boats.

So do I need to find a friend and sail out to sea, or is this something I can perform on my own in some way?

psymann

[SekoETC]

No, you can't do it. You'll have to cooperate with someone else. Back in the day it was possible to dock to boats in the harbour but there was no announcement of docking, and combine this with a bug that negated the lock when approaching the ship from a docked boat, you can guess that there were many thefts that weren't noticed until it was too late. That's most likely the reason why it was made impossible.

[joo]

Yeah, you reason that in real life, sailing a fairly large boat usually requires a full crew, so it would be pushing it a bit if someone were able to effectively sail two boats by themselves.

In future though, always leave the larger boat (or whatever boat can be docked to by the other) out at sea so you dock to it by yourself, when you need to separate them. Also, if you character is that way inclined you can hire a newspawn to undock one of the boats, then dock and just kill them to keep your payment. It should be quick since they'll have no armaments, and nobody's going to notice they're missing

(I've never actually done this before, but it might suit certain characters who like to make a point of having absolutely no morals)

[SekoETC]

Yeah, you just gotta make sure that you're able to follow straight away after the helper undocks, or they might sail away. The best tactic is to put the helper in the big boat, preferably without a key so they know that if they sail away, they might be stuck inside for a long time.

[Spider]

... Back in the day it was possible to dock to boats in the harbour but there was no announcement of docking, and combine this with a bug that negated the lock when approaching the ship from a docked boat, you can guess that there were many thefts that weren't noticed until it was too late. That's most likely the reason why it was made impossible.

I don't think that allowing ships to dock to ships already docked was a feature but an accident of some new implementation, but the stupid people that were around refused for a while to do anything about it because they didn't really understand what people were saying until people started to do it a lot.

[SekoETC]

Well I don't think there would be a problem anymore since the lock bug was fixed and probably the code that makes an announcement when a boat is docking to a harbour could be extended to boats inside the harbour as well. The only problem would be that I don't think people in a docked boat can be seen and hit from the harbour, so if pirates docked to a ship in the harbour and started breaking the ship only the keyholder(s) of the boat could do something to stop them. Or townspeople that could go out in small enough boats and dock to the ship that's getting broken into.