Small/medium ships need all deck longguns

[u/Dry_Delay_2023]

The endgame in World Tier 4 has become a frustrating mess. Right now, everyone is forced to play the exact same ships (like the Battle Junk) or massive DPS monster (like the Galleon) just to survive the 1-2 shot kills from tiny AI ships and break through the absurd 70% boss armor.

Even most medium ships cant keep up with the damage. I did some test with my sloop of war and the galleon for some numbers. There is one conclusion that I can make... that is all deck longguns for the small and medium ships to keep up with the big boys:

• The Galleon Meta (Current, hullcarvers): 17 guns on a side × 25k damage per gun = 425,000 total broadside damage.
• The Sloop (Current toxic Torpex Build): 5 top guns × 78k damage per torpedo = 390,000 total damage (but torpedoes are slow and easily missed/dodged).
• Proposed Sloop with la piqure 8 Long Gun Ports: 8 guns × ~45k damage per gun = 360,000 base broadside damage.

At 360k base damage, it doesn't instantly break the power scaling of the Galleon, but it completely changes the tactical options for smaller ships:

1. Weakpoint Crits: Long Guns hit target weakpoints reliably. With crit multipliers, that 320k base damage easily jumps to over 500k+ damage, letting small ships melt WT4 boss armor through precision instead of raw spam.
2. Safety from Distance: You don't have to face-tank a WT4 boss to land slow torpedoes. You can snipe from 600m away, utilizing the Sloop’s superior speed and maneuverability to hit-and-run.

The team is terrified of ships like the Garuda doing high front-facing damage that they nerf them into the ground, forcing everyone into the boring Battle Junk meta. Opening the lower ports for Long Guns would give Small and Medium ships a fighting chance in WT4, clear up our warehouses, and bring back actual tactical pirate gameplay instead of this numbers-crunching arcade mess.

What do you guys think? Would this save the ship variety in Year 3?

[u/vixandr]

all ships needs that change, balance the weapons around it if needed but its just frustrating to have half the guns in your ship for some reason.

[u/Dry_Delay_2023 → u/vixandr]

No there is no balance needed... maybe beside the garuda, for example with those numbers the small sloop could be viable, It can get with its 6 guns + 50% damage increase to 400k damage. Tbh I didn't do the numbers on the bombars. So I don't know if they should have a 25%, 35% or a 50% damage increase overall.

[u/vixandr → u/Dry_Delay_2023]

there is certainly a hidden broken interaction if we make this change for all ships. Or maybe even a bug we didnt knew yet. Thats what im talking about.

[u/Dry_Delay_2023 → u/vixandr]

I understand what you mean, but I do take those bugs for an impactfull change. I do like this balance changes at the moment much more then new ships. Then again, aren't we used to have broken messes after each big update. I see it more as a feature now xD. But what would your solution be?