YPP Roadmap July 2024

[Sardonic]

This is taken from YPP's site in case anyone hasn't seen it, or maybe you haven't played in a while and are interested in what the game is up to.
https://yppedia.puzzlepirates.com/Official:The_Spyglass

YPP Roadmap

For the past several months we’ve been finishing up a pretty extensive upgrade of various systems. While this isn’t particularly exciting for players, it is critical in allowing us to continue to support the game now and well into the future.

This roadmap is intended to give players a general overview of what we’re working on for the rest of this year and into the early part of 2025. It is not all-inclusive by any means nor does it provide extensive details about each item. A few things to keep in mind:

It’s always possible that something happens that prevents us from being able to accomplish something. Nothing on this list is guaranteed.
The order is alphabetical, not a representation of the scope of the project or its importance.
If something you’re hoping to see isn’t listed, that doesn’t mean it won't be added. We’re not including smaller tweaks, QoL and item additions, security updates, and regular items/events that will enter the game.
Many of these items will require extensive testing and the detailed discussions. This will take place in an appropriate Ice discussion thread we create once the testing is underway.
Blockades:

We will be making general changes to blockades implemented individually over a period of time so we can review how each change has impacted player blockades. We will not be overhauling blockades. Instead, the overall goal is to limit the cost of blockading based on the island being attacked. An outpost should be far less expensive to take than the most active large in the ocean. Further, a smaller flag should be able to reasonably contest a smaller island. If we can accomplish that without making some of these changes, we will. It’s also likely that what works on one ocean doesn’t on another, so there will be a long period where we make multiple adjustments to determine what limits work for each specific ocean. There is no quick universal solution. Some of these potential changes are below:

Limit the influence a flag can have based on the island being attacked.
Potentially add caps to the total number of jobbers (including mercs) a flag can have based on the island being attacked.
Limit jobber pay based on the island being attacked.
Allow both attackers and defenders to enter from both island or ocean side.
Fix the jobbing order on the notice board to remove the “one up” game for jobber pay.
Flotillas:

Flotillas will see some changes to make them more accessible, allowing players to participate in them more easily.

Increase their frequency and make changes to their difficulty. This is a balancing act given this does change how they potentially attack an island.
Add flotilla spectating and flotilla chat.
Mercenaries: Balance adjustments for our automated mates. Our goal is to allow mercs to help players compete on the oceans, limit the usefulness of bots, and curb activities that allow people to gain funds while not actively participating in the game. Many of these changes will not be the same across all oceans. Some of these changes include:

Make adjustments to their cost and/or what booty they take as payment.
Continue to make adjustments to the skill of the mercenaries.
Decrease the number of mercenaries that can be on some ships depending on size.
Enable the blackship to engage ships with far too many pirates unwilling to defend it. You’re a ripe target for the blackship if your ship is full of people unable to pick up arms.
Swords: We plan on adding new swords to the game along with some balance changes for existing swords. Most of these will be worked on as we have time.

Trophies: Periodically we will be adding new trophies for exceedingly skilled pirates. We will both extend the current line of several trophies and add entirely new ones.

Werewolves: We will release a new expedition type, werewolves. Like the vampires before them, their release will take place in stages. Be warned, they’re feisty if you threaten their pack.

Bonus: While all of our projects above, along with our regularly scheduled items, will take up the vast majority of our time and resources, we hope to squeeze in a number of additional items. These will be worked on as we have time and will extend beyond the time frame of this roadmap.

Player designed limited edition ships.
New items for trade in the trading post.
A few new additional items to loot in different areas of the game. In general, these won't be announced ahead of time and will be intended as a fun surprise.
Some quality of life improvements pulled from Discord suggestions.
Above all we intend to sail the YPP ship well into the future! Full sails ahead!

[Feix]

My main's on Meridian (name is Feix) with its limited edition ships, furniture, pets etc. I would like them transferred to the busiest Ocean/Server. Btw, PP’s a nice game.

[Sardonic]

Originally posted by Feix:

My main's on Meridian (name is Feix) with its limited edition ships, furniture, pets etc. I would like them transferred to the busiest Ocean/Server. Btw, PP’s a nice game.

I believe someone else posted and they were unable to get characters/items etc transferred between oceans, but dubs do cross between those oceans. Emerald is the most active at the moment.

[Feix]

Originally posted by Sardonic:

Originally posted by Feix:

My main's on Meridian (name is Feix) with its limited edition ships, furniture, pets etc. I would like them transferred to the busiest Ocean/Server. Btw, PP’s a nice game.

I believe someone else posted and they were unable to get characters/items etc transferred between oceans, but dubs do cross between those oceans. Emerald is the most active at the moment.

To the previous replies, I hope this request can be reconsidered. I think this can be done on a case-by-case and per request basis. The items are a treasure trove for some players who consider this game a role-playing game, including custom named limited edition painted ships, furniture, etc. A lot of care was put into collecting these items. These items can be made non-tradeable if that allay some of the concerns. I think there are a few hundreds or a few thousands of these players and they are your loyal fans that you want to keep.

[Sardonic]

You could try emailing their support staff about this to see if they'd help. I'm not associated with the company running the game whatsoever, I'm just a player on Cerulean. I just copied and pasted what they posted on their site because I know a lot of people used to play and still use steam and might be interested.

[perlandria]

Originally posted by Feix:

Originally posted by Sardonic:

I believe someone else posted and they were unable to get characters/items etc transferred between oceans, but dubs do cross between those oceans. Emerald is the most active at the moment.

To the previous replies, I hope this request can be reconsidered. I think this can be done on a case-by-case and per request basis. The items are a treasure trove for some players who consider this game a role-playing game, including custom named limited edition painted ships, furniture, etc. A lot of care was put into collecting these items. These items can be made non-tradeable if that allay some of the concerns. I think there are a few hundreds or a few thousands of these players and they are your loyal fans that you want to keep.

The whole concept of cross ocean pirate activity comes up all the time on the wiki, in the discord, and used to come up in the forums. It is technically difficult. If you have ideas and opinions the Game Design area of the Discord is very active.
https://discord.com/channels/1166405982390337568/1166433956665774120
https://discord.gg/Sgr5XRA5Pt

[onder.erin]

Based on my 15+ years of interaction with this game, I would like to share this following suggestion with you. Finding jobbers for pillage is taking longer and longer time. Filling big ships for pillages are impossible even. To solve this problem, my recommendation is to bring a 'Matchmaking' based Queue structure. It works as the following: the pirates get involved in the pool of pirates. And each time a pillage post job offer, the people in the pool, wherever they are, receives an invite immediately. The pirates and captains can select some filters to choose ships as they desire, but the imporatnt thing is, the ships get filled in the order it is queued, ensuring quick 'load and go'.

[perlandria]

If you are on Discord at all, the official YHH!PP discord server has a Game Design area. It acts much like the Game Design area of the Forums and is currently the main area to leave this kind of feedback. When players have time, some of them do copy the discord threads over to the wiki but that is optional.
https://discord.com/channels/1166405982390337568/1166433956665774120

Please feel free to add this idea there.

If you don't do Discord at all, would you like me to add it for you. If yes, who should I credit?

[Sardonic]

Originally posted by onder.erin:

Based on my 15+ years of interaction with this game, I would like to share this following suggestion with you. Finding jobbers for pillage is taking longer and longer time. Filling big ships for pillages are impossible even. To solve this problem, my recommendation is to bring a 'Matchmaking' based Queue structure. It works as the following: the pirates get involved in the pool of pirates. And each time a pillage post job offer, the people in the pool, wherever they are, receives an invite immediately. The pirates and captains can select some filters to choose ships as they desire, but the imporatnt thing is, the ships get filled in the order it is queued, ensuring quick 'load and go'.

In addition to Perlandia's info, there are mercenaries now, meaning you can fill a ship of any size regardless of actual pirates. https://yppedia.puzzlepirates.com/Mercenary