Something for sailors. It's a suggestion that needs another.

[MakeBeliever]

I've been thinking on the sailing issues and it has come to mind that most know there isn't much you can do in the way of work while sailing due to limited machine building, so this encourages sailors to dock ashore. But what if something was introduced to the game that could only be done at sea and only on large boats that had to use docking facilities, which means that towns would also have to be friendly to sailors or encourage their sailors to work with the town which would encourage land co-operation with sailors who have gone to the effort to build big boats. At the moment it's the sailors who have to be the ones on the begging end of machines, maybe this would balance out if the land people needed something that could only be produced at sea?
Maybe like sea salt gathering, or there was suggestions about soap and things?Maybe blubber fat making it only processable at sea to go towards land fuel making for transport. Something on those lines. Something that will be needed by land people and not just a novelty item, something that warrents the time co-operating with sea goers or those with lingering ships working to help them ashore whilst also going on the odd resourse run?
Or maybe deep sea gas collecting or crude oil finding when sailing that needed machinery to gather once you struck oil or gas at sea?I'm not sure if that possible at all in this kind of game and programming, but it's just an idea.

[Doug R.]

With the character population spread so thin, I personally don't think that encouraging even more people to go to sea is a good thing.

Sea travel should be used to bring distant peoples together, and right now half of all seafarers are out there because they want to get away from people. I don't think isolationism should be made profitable.

[sanchez]

How do you know that? Most of my chars are sailors and it's not to get away. I've never met anyone who sailed for that purpose, in fact. We made sails and telescopes and sextants to make the world smaller, as expansion was inevitable. We are already seeing the beginnings of cross-zone trade. I like this suggestion. There have been proposals for more fishing. Whaling would be great, I think.

[MakeBeliever]

Well maybe if they had something to do that would bring them ashore more with something they could do only at sea to trade it would make the land people more happy to see them, then they wouldn't want for the isolation so much of travelling far off. In real they are welcomed upon docking because of the huge fish and oyster and seafood hauls which is why they come back to shore, but in cantr they just can't do that it's not what boats are for in Cantr. I don't see that sailors only use their boats to keep distantances close with people, most get bored i reckon and sail off because sailors are quite ignored in some towns unless they have the valuable resourses that they are looking for, give them something the land people will need and this will surely give them a better standing to be welcomed ashore more?
Some towns are friendly to sea goers, most are just quite offy and don't encourage the interaction and tend to misjudge as being pirates if you carry anything above a composite bow. Which is understandable considering there are pirates, but not all are and i feel often get pushed into the isolation mentioned. To get resourses needed for trading means they have to travel insland for quite a few things, take oil for instance for sails, thats mostly found inland who wants to build a boat and then have to risk it being stolen by having to take travels inland for goods that they have trouble trading ashore?.

[Doug R.]

Most of my chars are sailors and it's not to get away.

I could not disagree with that statement more, and I have two of yours in particular in mind.

[UloDeTero]

Ideas for possible resources from the ocean:

Salt - from seawater, using some kind of machinery (distillation?)

Oil - by building oil platforms (like boats, but way slower, and can't drill for oil while moving)

Fish, whales, crabs, octopi, etc - can be gathered from boats using nets

Oysters - might need a diving suit, but can gather from a boat. Random chance of finding a pearl.

Coral - maybe only in coastal waters

Ink - from octopi

Sand, seaweed, shells - also maybe from coastal towns...?

[Robaczek]

Yes, yes, yes!
Really good ideas in my opinion.
Especially oil and pearls - nice way to become rich.
And pirates attacking platforms... *dreams*

[wichita]

I'll just pop in for a quick thought since I am busy at the moment, but I will say that I am weighing several things in mind with trying to make sailing more "interesting", though it is low priority since we have a lot of sailors right now as is. Seafaring has been a popular, dare I say one of the most popular, activities in the game, which lends me to say that there is already something of incredible interest there.


There is boat based fishing. The implementation has been progressing more slowly than I would like. I hoped to have it in place already. But one thing that concerns me is that if every sailor in the game starts plucking fish during their travels, we will supersaturate the already saturated food market with metric tonnes of fishes. And like sweet tea in Tennessee, it seems like a good idea, it tastes good at first, but it will eventually make you puke your guts out after you sit in the sun with it for too long.

I do like the idea of whaling, but I have questions about what to do with the resources. I listen to a very interesting report about whale oil and the American economy of the 1800s, but Cantr doesn't have needs like lamps and such, and I would hate to dilute the potential importance of oil locations any further.


Blah blah blah, lots of thoughts, but I need to get back to work now.

[w.w.g.d.w]

It's good idea.
I want too something what living on sea pirates.Maybe will facilitate the automatic direction change of the boat would be pointed on different or when somebody want docking and it has the bigger boat the one smaller will stop?

[Arlequin]

There isn't any point now on collecting raw food for trade at open sea, besides to make your ship slower. Unless you find a very isolated mountain or desert location without animals where they maybe will need it.

Picture it: there's no gathering slots at open sea, sleepy sailors could be fishing for ages, then someone recovers the ship and boom! two hundred kilos of fish that never rots thrown away somewhere. Bleh.

Personally, I would go for adding lots of one location only tiny islands, then sailors would be busy at least looking for them.

[T-shirt]

I think this is a very bad suggestion. Sailing takes time and you can't do much aboard a ship. You'll have to get used to that.
In real life the crews of seafaring ships are bored most of the time they are not busy sailing.

Collecting salt from seawater can't be done practically on board.
Drilling for oil from the ocean floor can be done from ships.
Fishing, whaling and hunting other sea food can be done from boats using nets, but not while travelling; you'll need to stay with the fish to be able to catch some in your nets. You'll need to be close to shore or have means to prepare the fish so that it won't rot.
Oysters can not be collected while sailing; you'll need to be (and stay) at the spot where the oysters are growing.
The same applies to coral.

Sailing in Cantr takes a long time (I think all travelling in Cantr takes too much time). Characters should learn to read books while travelling or learn to write them first...

[sanchez]

I read this Suggestion as providing increased incentive for sailors to find inhabited land and trade, if they're able to gather resources that have only land-based use or at least preparation.

[Nakranoth]

Honestly, getting standard trade goods from the sea does nothing to make sea life less boring. If you want to make it more interesting, get interactivity. And I do NOT mean make it more complicated. What I do mean, is add some sort of primitive crafting materials.
For instance, add kelp, let it be used to make a sort of "kelp twine" an object used to make things like primitive bracelets and necklaces. Which would mean needing a way to get decorative things, like seashells and pearls, probably by gathering oysters from near-shore (between 10-30 piexels from a shore? could that function be made easily?) locations while stopped, then cracking them open.
Now, I know someone's bound to wonder at only wanting to add useless jewelry, but hey, it can be added without upsetting any sort of balances while adding an activity to current monotinay of sailing.

*appended*
Did a bit of discussing and ambergris came up too... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambergris Usable as a perfume ingredient, probably mixing it with alcohol as a secondary use for it, and can be polished into beads for additional primitive jewelry.

[MakeBeliever]

My suggestion wasn't about entertaining the sailors while at sea, it was a suggestion about giving them something in the way of work or a process that could only be done at sea to provide them with a resourse that is needed by people onland hence- to encourage them to go ashore with the new resourse but a resourse that you couldn't get while onland as a gathered resourse?. I'm not talking foods because land people have foods already and for them to be able to mass get foods defeats the object of them already being encouraged to dock for their food needs. And this isn't real life, if it was programmed they could easily collect pearl oysters while sailing as a project the same with coral. But that would mean it would only be a novelty item that probably would be useful only for tailoring.
Kelp sounds interesting but Octupus ink was be a great idea. Maybe if you had to posses maybe ink or charcoal before you could even write a note that would be interesting and give notes a value. Can you imagine having to ask for ink or charcoal to even get to copy a map, i'm sure all the thousands of duplicated notes would soon be fished out of envelopes for the newspawns and then where would the note bombing prisoners be, writing in animal blood maybe if they didn't hold ink or charcoal?

[the_antisocial_hermit]

Ew... no, no requirements for ink or coal to write a note. Let's just have to worry about one more thing to keep on our chars regularly. I use the notes for personal notes about the character or its goals, too; ones that I can access anywhere when I'm not on my own comp.

I like the possibilities of this main idea though.