HG loss farming...

@foambreaker i mean i am level 150 how much higher do you need to get?

Why should that bother you? Do you want to do HG for the PvP battles? Or for the curses?

Because if it's for the curses, then you've now found a faster way to do it (note that your data doesn't take into consideration rep earned through winning streaks and handing in flags).

If it's for the PvP battles, then it doesn't matter. Big rep, small rep, who cares! You're in it for the fight!

Honestly it is a huge non-issue. Increasing rep from wins will probably just mean fewer people jump out of the mode sooner, so there will be longer wait times in the queue for fights. People will get the curses they want and bounce. That's pretty much what I plan to do, and probably what a not insignificant number of people are going to do as well. There's a reason you face the same people over and over in HG battles: the player-base of the mode isn't that deep.

Also, you state that "loss-farming is too efficient", however increasing Rep earned from wins won't do anything to make that any less true. They'll still be getting the same gain toward the next level as they were before, and in general people are doing this because they want the curses and don't like PvP. PvP in this game can be extremely stressful and some people just really don't enjoy it, so they farm losses.

I’m a loss farmer until I reach 100 and I’m out. Yeah that my way. But I find it funny, I’ve never once encountered another loss farmer.

It always the heavy boarder and setting ship on fire, while I’m typing “hurry up and sink me” on a non moving ship.
Even if I sit still and there shooting cannons…they miss.

@maximusarael020 i think you might have missed my point. The problem i see with this is that loss farming is more efficient than regular winning. When a game decides to launch a more competitive pvp mode i think it's quite reasonable to expect to to gain more from winning rather than losing. As of now if i dive and let my opponent sink me i would have gained in 10 minutesof loss farming the same amount of xp i would have gotten if i won a 30 minute match (if my math is correct).

The loss farmer isnt building a killstreak, if you continue to win youll be getting far more rep per win the longer you go.

They are not gaining gold, if you continue to win and sell your HG you make loads of gold.

The loss farmer isnt making progress towards many of the commendations tied to the different factions.

I wouldnt worry about it

@soulstinger2k20
yeah but hourglass isn't really about the gold. Hourglass is mainly for the commendations which i agree they do not get, and the rewards. The average player that is decent at pvp (which is no small feat i might add) will manage to get a 2 streak and one flag at best. Given how in order to do this you buy and loot for supplies as well as trying their best to win a match it could take close to 40 minutes to get basically a level (if you manage to get that 2 wins). Compare that to someone who just goes afk and lets others sink them and get in the same amount of time pretty much the same rep (maybe a tiny bit less).

Maybe the HG should reward doing damage. So if you do your best and fight and even if you lose, you'd still get a bit more than currently. And if you just wait and sink doing nothing, then you'd get nothing. Then it wouldn't feel so sad losing a close 45min fight either.

Old arena was sort of like that. The higher score you got the more you were rewarded.

@korpp1s
I said a while back that one way to handle loss farmers would be to institute a timer and a point system.

Each ship gains points for any number of actions done during a match. The xp awarded for losing is then based on the ratio of loser points to winner points, provided the winner's points crossed some level of threshold that would signify a "good fight".

@gosva5434 "Efficient" at what? You don't gain commendations, you don't get gold, and they don't get the fun of the battle.

Again, if you're just in it for the "levels" and the stuff that comes with levels, then go loss farm then. Who cares? If you want gold, glory, commendations, and win streaks, then play the mode to win.

It's not a problem, and certainly nothing Rare needs to devote time to "solving".

@maximusarael020
i think we have a completely different mindset on this, so agree to disagree. No point going in circles with the same argument.

@gosva5434

I guess in general I'm just not really that concerned with things that don't affect me.

The curses are never an actual sign of skill or anything, simply an indication of time spent. Everyone who continues to play HG will eventually get the base curse if they continue to engage in the mode. All wins, all losses, doesn't matter. What matters is doing things the way you enjoy doing them. Want to farm losses? Ok. Want to engage in PvP because you think it is fun? Great! Don't like Tall Tales, don't do them 5 times each to get the gold curse. Etc. And don't worry about what other people are doing (as long as it isn't harming others).

@burnbacon said in HG loss farming...:

It always the heavy boarder and setting ship on fire, while I’m typing “hurry up and sink me” on a non moving ship.
Even if I sit still and there shooting cannons…they miss.

There are much less good crews in solo sloop than there are in other ship sizes, mainly because a lot are trying to learn PvP, and doing strategies they think work the best. They don't know how to aim good cannon shots on a moving or immobile target, they can watch all the PhuzzyBond guides and read up on tips and strategies and such, but not even Hourglass has proven to be a good stepping stone in becoming better at your naval (The skeleton fleets and ghost fleets especially don't do the job either in my honest opinion, but eh).

I’ll tell you why I resorted to some HG loss farming and why so many others do too. I joined Sea of Thieves on Xbox during Season 6. Arena did not exist for me.

Sea of Thieves Arena did not exist for me. Most of my time on SoT is mostly PvE, and as a Solo Slooper with hardly anyone to play with…I was constantly getting sunk by Brigs/Gallys.

I can’t double gun, and I still can’t one shot with a Blunderbuss. Essentially my PvP skills are not God Tier, let alone even be mediocre. Imagine Hopping on a sloop and getting destroyed 5+ times in a row losing consistently. For me, there’s no point wasting 30+ minutes with only the same result of losing…

So…Its much faster for me to lose in 2 minutes and get the same rep I would normally get for losing in 30 minutes. I have played with ppl who let me get a free win because of the same reasons. They are not good PvPers. Even if we try all fights are mostly the same.

Scenario: You and a friend who are semi-new launch hourglass. You pop up and see a ship called Dampbeards Hauler. Hourglass has only been out for a couple months. Yet there are two ppl with Gold Athena Blessing Curses on the other ship. You barely launch off a couple of shots before you realized “How the Hell?!!”you’ve been boarded not less than two minutes in. Then they kill you both, loot your supplies, kill you both again, all while spamming RODL or EZ as they drive you out of bounds.

So much easier to sink in 2 minutes than to constantly deal with that scenario that happens more than often.

I struggle to understand loss farming.

Video games are supposed to be for entertainment. They're supposed to be fun.

I can't imagine anyone is actually having fun loss farming...they seem to be treating it as a job...and a bad one at that.

But...to each their own...at least you get your curse I suppose.

@lordqulex said in HG loss farming...:

@sweetsandman You don't have fun loss farming. That's not the point. They are unlocking the curses they want in the most efficient way they're capable.

I understand they're unlocking the curse in the most efficient way they feel they can...but why?

Why bother? Why subject yourself to hundreds of hours of an activity you don't have any fun doing in order to unlock something that doesn't enhance the gameplay whatsoever?

That goes for any cosmetics in this game. They don't make your pirate faster, stronger, or more powerful in any way shape or form.

The cosmetics are supposed to tell the story of your pirate, and most importantly, give you stories to tell.

The story of a loss farmers is not one I can imagine people want to tell.

All I'm saying is: this is a video game. This (aside from some streamers) is not supposed to be a second job. It's supposed to be for fun.

We had a crew try boring us to win.

These guys were stacked with wood, and literally stayed anchored and only focused on repairs and guarding ladders, it was a gally and I must say they were efficient with their repairs because they never did sink no matter how many shots we laid on them.

As someone who liked arena, I find this mode absolutely terrible. It's no wonder people resort to this. Some major adjustments need to be made to it or it will end up like arena as well once most people have their cosmetics

I have some ideas to decrease the farm and reward both sides, looser and winner.

• Use a point system, like arena, if you hit cannons you get points, if you kill someone you get points -> With certain restrictions to avoid abusive spawncamp, for example, 5 kills in a row from X to Y, the next ones will decrease your points as penalty for griefing other players, yo do not need more than 3/4 kills to sink a ship or take it out of the circle, at least on sloop, it can be modified on larger ships.

• Give more Exp according the duration of the match, this will prevent loose farmers to get quick sinks. But this needs a new feature, circle closing after first 5 minutes to avoid edge runners, this will force them to fight and win or sink. People is tired of runners on adventure, stop it on HG because is really pathetic to deal with them.

• Daily extra exp, your first 3 wins of the day will give x2 exp, only wins. This can be exploitable, but at least is an improve.

• Put more rewards between 1-100 to make the progression feel better and less useless, hats, guns, whatever.

• Make lower streaks more valuable, for example x2-x4 streaks more exp, same amount of gold but more exp. This will make (IMO) people try hard to get at least x2 and an important exp increment.

Of course we need a limit of points to avoid eternal fights, lets say 1 extra level maximum, if now you get like 1/4 level per win, you can earn 1 level and a quarter now, is a huge increase and it can be extended with streaks

"But all this ideas can be easy exploited" Matey, people already use tons of exploits and glitches to avoid the farm.

Dummy method, X2 streak matching with a friend, Gally farm on Xbox only servers.... people always find ways to make the grind easier so this is a minor problem to be honest.

The idea here is to help legit players to get the curses/1.000 levels, if glitchers find ways to abuse it, just make that abuse public and Rare should fix it asap.

@lordqulex said in HG loss farming...:

@sweetsandman Because some pirates like me have been waiting literal years for these to be released. We yearn to own them.

I struggle with that reasoning. If it was something like a Role Playing thing that you participate in, I could at least sympathize.

Outside of that, it doesn't enhance the gameplay at all. It doesn't make you more powerful, faster, stronger, or better than other pirates in any way. It doesn't unlock new voyages or any new fun ways to play the game.

There are players that will exclaim "wasted time" when they're sunk in adventure mode. They've said it for years (not saying you're one of them). Then, Season 8 dropped and there's hourglass loss farmers just looking to check the box. I'd venture a guess that they're largely the same people. The irony is comical.

@lordqulex Time is precious. Have fun, folks.

@lordqulex However you want to justify it 👍

I'll be honest: this is really a consequence to the design of the grind and the lack of overhaul on PvP. I get that they got opinions from partnered content creators as a part of the design of the Hourglass system, but my biggest issue with this game's PvP is that it's hard for it to be enjoyable without being in a winning, skillfully unfair fight. Outside of that, fights are long, dragged out, frustrating, 'hit-reg-gy', feature unfavorable strategies that are considered fair, favorable strategies that are considered cheap and unfair; Nothing is consistent, and nothing is truly fair, yet we're all meant to eat this up and "learn and move on from it".

Hourglass is pure PvP combat, you opt in to fight, and you're expected... a fight. What kind of fight you get at this point is RNG based on your MMR and available ships diving in your region. You're gonna get people spamming boarding shots, chain shots, ladder launching, sword lunging, double gunning, and cursed cannonball spamming. The only part of PvP that is fun is when you win, because everything else in comparison, is unenjoyable. Maybe it's the concept of PvP, the amount of working gears that are required to be in everyone's heads (which, for most of the people complaining, they have too many gears running or not enough) and on the ships are just a lot for the average player to handle. It's a lot of comradery between people that likely don't have good synergy for a matchmade fight, and as such, it's a bad grind because there really isn't room to play your own way because you're fighting players... smarter than you.

If loss farming has the ability to be solved, the biggest and most valuable solution is to not kill the content itself, but to make the base version of the content enjoyable. PvP, has to be fun for this grind to make sense. We have to open 100 vaults and finish 100 LotV voyages, this grind is just as egregious, but the success rate is much lower than usual because not only do people not enjoy the content, they're food for the meat grinder that is the PvP sweats going on streaks as it is.

Hourglass was not only meant to be a way to funnel all the PvP-hungered sweats into an activity everyone can participate in regardless of level requirement, but it is a primary way to get into PvP and get genuine practice. No one is practicing because the PvP is not fun. Maybe it involves changing the player mindset, maybe it involves officially promoting what people cry are "exploits", just something needs to make the concept of PvP approachable, as to make wins and losses not matter, and without modifying the current distribution values, as it's likely they were set that way for a reason, whether we like it or not.