Very sporadic and drastic ration use

[acehawk]

In the same ship it seems that sometimes moving through shallow waters I use .2 rations per tile, but at other times it seems to cost between 1.0 and 3.0 rations per tile. I have no idea why it changes so drastically. My ship never has more than 1 or two points of sail damage and everything else is always full.

This is specific to shallow water.

[Cyrus]

I think that happens when you sail against (into?) the wind. The game doesn 't slow down the animation speed, but instead speeds up the passing of time and thus ration use.

[acehawk]

Ahhh, if that is the case that makes sense. Is there any way to tell which way the wind is blowing that you know of?

[grävling]

There is an symbol that looks like O--> beside the setting icon on the sea map. This tells where the wind is blowing, but I think it is wrong.
I.e. the thing I drew has a circle in the west and an arrow in the east, and I think this means this is a west wind, i.e. a wind blowing from the west to the east. This is exactly backwards from what sailors expect, i.e. that the arrow will point in the direction that the wind comes from, not the direction it blows to.

[acehawk]

That thing in the bottom right corner of the screen? I always thought that was supposed to be an anchor or something

I don't think I've ever seen it change direction... hmmm, I'll have to pay attention to it.

[acehawk]

Actually I just found the correct place! There is a thing that says "Wind:" in bottomr left below where it says your ration amount. Also has a ship heading. I don't know why I never saw it before :/

EDIT: I have finally witnessed it move! So now I know it shows it in both locations. Also, I am now assuming that most of the sporadic ration usage is due to changes in direction relative to the wind, though I have also noticed that sometimes it doesn't seem to update the amount of rations I see every tile I move, so it catching up may also have something to do with it.

[Cory Trese]

Here is what you have to think about.

The critical thing is the amount of TURNS you're using.

The number of turns drives the rations use.

You're seeing 0.2 which means "we sailed 1 sector in like 4 hours" or something.

One meal for the crew, essentially.

However, if you run into bad wind, collide with something or foul the rigging, time could be lost.

Combine all three (or bad navigation rolls) and you might take 2 full days to sail 1 sector.

What the time display ... you'll see sometimes your flying along (the hours are changing but not the day.)

Other times, you'll see the days flying by as you crawl up wind.

[Cory Trese]

Jul 17, 2013 13:54:56 GMT -5 grävling said:

There is an symbol that looks like O--> beside the setting icon on the sea map. This tells where the wind is blowing, but I think it is wrong.
I.e. the thing I drew has a circle in the west and an arrow in the east, and I think this means this is a west wind, i.e. a wind blowing from the west to the east. This is exactly backwards from what sailors expect, i.e. that the arrow will point in the direction that the wind comes from, not the direction it blows to.

I totally get what you are saying, we saw in the research as well.

We're working on solutions for the confusion, the symbol and the experienced folks.

We're probably going to end up with a totally different visual queue for the new player.

We'll include an option that allows you to instruct the game to use the nautically correct symbols and lexicon.

Fear not -- message received. We know how much time you spend at sea and we'll make sure we don't leave this hanging.

[acehawk]

Thanks for the clarification! I didn't understand all of the ways me could be effected. This makes much more sense now! I will note that the way time relates to turns, relates to distance, relates to ration use seems a little difficult to understand, though I'm sure I'll get it now that I know what to look for:)