My (late) Ocean QOL Wishlist

[Pet Rock]

I am happy that an ocean QOL is being made, but I feel like it's missing alot of important content.

 

Nautopilots:

-Nautopilots should be able to keep up with boats, no matter their speed.

-Nautopilots should follow beacons through whirlpools created by bootleg getaways. (seriously why is this not a thing)

-Nautopilots should have unlimited range and be able to be channeled with items (a nautopilot would be attracted to a nautopilot beacon with the same item)

-Nautopilot bumpers would repel other boats and slightly repel boats from hazards in the ocean. This would prevent a lot of clunky boat crashes.

-Allow attaching nautopilots to ocean trawlers. Moving trawlers would act as a portable net and catch fish faster.

-Allow attaching nautopilot beacons to a sail (like the lightning rod attachment)

 

Crab King:

-Reintroduce the claws grabbing the boat mechanic, but make them be repelled by bumpers, slowly breaking them instead of holding the boat in place. Also, they wouldn't destroy structures anymore. This would make the fight harder and incentivize using an upgraded boat.

-Melee attacks to make the fight a bit less repetitive. He charge at players, becoming more of a moving hazard, and other melee attacks would stop players from just holding f.

-Laser attack when a pearl is inserted: Crab king would channel light into a laser attack in which many beams slowly focus into one. Players must hide behind structures to dodge this. I don't know why I want this tbh

-Entirely different attacks based on the gem inserted would be awesome and turn Crab King into a true customizable boss, but it is probably too late to add this.

 

Moon Quay:

-Cursed trinkets should charge at players, being able to be avoided with a side step. This would add more skill to avoiding the trip to the Moon Quay island.

-Cursed trinkets can be picked up by fish and birds, gradually making them disappear over time

-Powder monkey attack range is lower

-To buff pirate raids after these nerfs, they can now occur more commonly outside of the radius of the island, similar to the way it was in the initial beta.

-For immersion, Prime Mates can use horns to call for backup if a monkey has died and the pirate raid occurs near the island.

-Pirate raids can attack players on land after day 150, forcing them to interact more with ocean content (and bring the challenge to players as is so often suggested)

 

Reworked freshwater fishing:

-Combine sea fishing rod and normal fishing rod into one, capable of using floats and lures like an ocean fishing rod, and being able to fish in the ocean and in ponds. Fish would also be rarer in ponds without a lure.

-New unique freshwater fish (like eels), instead of the basic fish you'd normally get. These fish would be balanced to be worse than fish that you'd get from the ocean, since they are easier to obtain.

-A stress mechanic for reeling in freshwater fish, to fit the ocean version. (Note that the fish would still not be visible, and frostjaw hole would be changed to fit in with this)

 

More Ocean Life (Love the marotters by the way):

-3 big schools of skittersquids can be found making their rounds around the ocean and occasionally also the mainland.

-Glowing starfish fall from the sky like meteors at night near the lunar island. They also bridge the gaps between the smaller lunar island shards and the main one. Being giant and all, players can walk across them. However, like anenemies, they will close on players after a bit, trapping them and dealing repeated damage before unfolding.

-A sunken swamp outside of the normal one with lilypads (yet another ocean circle) and patches of other marshy plants. Marotters would be more common here than in other places.

 

Storms on the ocean

-Frog rain is replaced by fish rain on the ocean. Rockjaws and gnarwails can also occasionally fall, causing waves on impact.

-During rain, rough waters will contain slow moving waves.

-During lunar hail at night, infused moonshards emit a glow underwater that grows weaker as they sink/decay.

 

Sailing followers

-Followers would help with sailing a bit if they wear a bandana or captains tricorn. They would follow commands given to interact with sails, anchors, and cannons. These commands can be given by players using a steering wheel who click on the respective object with their mouse (in the form of the character yelling).

 

New system to help with boating controls:

-New controls by using control or shift with space. Control space would allow opening nearby chests/interacting with workstations, while shift space would prioritize tool actions (including using held items such as boat patches instead of dropping them).

 

Ocean Mounts

-Beefalo saddles are generalized to just be saddles, so that they can be used on other creatures.

-Gnarwails can be ridden and their signature jump can be used. Weapons can also be used. If they become untamed, they will shake you off.

-If malbatross is fed 10 fishes, it will be periodically tamed, requiring a fish every few minutes to stay that way. It can be ridden with a saddle, capable of diving underwater to grab fish (although this makes players wet and makes them lose sanity) and using its usual melee attack.

 

Ocean hunts:

-A shadow of malbatross quickly passing over can be spotted. Following this shadow vaguely will lead to another one. This process repeats a few times until malbatross finally appears. This is a way to find malbatross in addition to the others already present in the game.

 

Other:

-Make rockjaws great again! 25 damage as a compromise.

-Lunar hail overhaul that was mentioned 

-Frostjaw changes that were mentioned, expanding sheets of ice on the ocean during winter would be cool.

-Bumpers should be able to be placed under structures.

-Malbatross watering can can be refuelled by ocean water.

-Stray crab king cannon towers and claws may roam about near him.

-More surprising seed trees (to actually make it surprising)

-A small chance to slip during rain (would be funny).

-rename the gourmet salt lick to the saltier lick (please I am begging you this is the most important one).

[EatenCheetos]

These are great!

[HeatAndRun]

16 minutes ago, Pet Rock said:

Nautopilots should be able to keep up with boats, no matter their speed.

I agree with this point. I remember the moment when the nautopilots introduced in Moon Quay update. I thought finally the bigger boat is implemented in a unique way. It wasnt. The first impression was disappointing...

[Jonathan42]

Can we also get an upgraded deck illuminator that uses an enlightened shard for infinite light, so I do not need to use up precious boat space on a Glowcap.

I do also really want the Nautopilots to work and be useful. They have been so disappointing. I wanted to make the full 5 boat train so badly lol, but they just do not work well enough to use at all really.

[Pet Rock]

After some further testing (and thinking):

-why doesn't Crab King's ice shield require a pickaxe? The Frost Jaw ice requires one so it would make sense to be consistent... Also, the cannon towers do not have an impact sound when swinging at them, and ought to require a pickaxe as well.

-Crab kings cannon towers don't feel impactful enough at base, and can largely be ignored. The travel speed of cannonballs should be slowed in exchange for a more impactful hit that even causes a circle of delayed geysers to appear when landing in water (bringing back the geyser mechanic to some extent). The cannonballs would also cast a shadow to allow players to dodge them.

-There is way too much ice laying around in the crab king fight. If the issue with birds landing was annoying to some people, this brings it to a whole new level.

-Marotters are amazing

-The placement of structures on boats seems better, but is still inconsistent. I can place a chest closer to an alchemy engine than I can place an alchemy engine to a chest.

-The animation for standing on boat patches seems a bit placeholder-y. Maybe making the wood tilt inwards would look better?

-Waves should affect boats with anchors more to make malbatross a bit of a threst at least.

-To stop crab king from being cheesed with ocean trawlers (making him do the wave push infinitely) he could eventually summon a circle of geysers around him if players are still near him.

-Allow clean sweeper to change boat skins (please)

[Mervil]

Yes, nautopilots pull speed being wholly unequal to any boat speed has bothered me excessively. No matter what combination and number of nautopilots, regular sails and winged sails I have tried, I have never found a setup where the speeds are equal.

This change, I feel, is very much needed/mandatory.

I suppose another feasible option, however, would be to add a new item into the game: a tow rope. Nautopilots can keep doing what they do, but now we can connect boats/trawlers, etc.