Advanced Ship Mechanics

Cargo Slowdown

Cargo Slow is an effect that slows down the ship based on the amount of loaded goods.

When loading more than 50% of the ship's capacity (30% for airships) it will receive a penalty to its movement speed. The slowdown ranges from 70-80% for steam-powered ships to 100% for sail-powered ships and airships. Note that items, equipped or as freight, do not count as cargo in this case and will thus not trigger the Cargo Slowdown.

The Effect can be completely removed by equipping appropriate items. Reducing the impact of Cargo Slowdown above -100% does not yield any benefits.

Movement Speed

Every ship has inherent properties that change a ship's speed depending on environmental factors such as wind or damage to the ship, these can found it the table below - an empty entry indicates that the variant has the same value as its origin:

The minimum and maximum speed displayed ingame can be deriven from the table using:

Minimum Speed = ForwardSpeed *2 *WindMinSlowdownFactor

MaximumSpeed = ForwardSpeed *2*WindMaxSpeedupFactor

Note that since steam ships do not get affected by Wind the minimum and maximum speed is the same in both cases, therefore only one value is displayed

Name	ForwardSpeed	WindMinSlowdownFactor	WindMaxSpeedupFactor	CargoFullFactor	DamageFullFactor
Special Ships
Airship	11.7	0.4	1.4	1
Salvager	6	1	1	0.8	0.5
Sail Ships
Schooner	4.4	0.5	1.8	1
Clipper	5.5	0.5	1.8	1
Gunboat	4	0.4	1.8	1
Pirate Gunboat	6
Frigate	5.2	0.4	1.8	1
Pirate Frigate	6.24
Ship of the Line	4	0.4	1.8	1
Pirate SotL	4.8
Royal SotL
Steam Ships
Cargo Ship	5.2	1	1	0.8
Extravaganza	5.2	1	1	0.8
Monitor	5.3	1	1	0.7	0.5
Pirate Monitor	6.36
Pyrphorian Monitor
Battle Cruiser	4.5	1	1	0.7	0.5
Pyrphorian Battle Cruiser	4.5	1	1	0.7	0.5
Pyrphorian Warship	5.3	1	1	0.7	0.5

Items that increase the movement speed will always calculate their effect based on the minimum and maximum speed values deriven from the table. This is true for the influence bonus as well. If the ship is affected by cargo slowdown and a movement speed increase at the same time the movement speed will work as a seperate buff not interacting with the slowdown. An example of this would be a standard Cargo Ship having 10.4 Knots base speed. Since the player has unlocked the gold influence bonus "Elite Magnate" for 25% more movement speed, the ship has now the speed of 10.4 + 0.25*10.4 = 13 Knots. If you were to use an item that increases movement speed by another 10% it would be 13+ 10.4*0.1 ~= 14 Knots.

Loading Speed

Loading Speed reflects the speed at which tons are exchanged between a ship and the kontor/pier. Both the Level 1 kontor and the standard pier have a loading speed of 2 tons per second. This increases to 3 tons per second and 5 tons per second for the Level 2 and 3 Kontor respectively whilst the pier can be upgraded to an Advanced Pier with a loading speed of 4 tons per second, given that the player owns the Land of Lions DLC. The minimum time to exchange goods is always 5 seconds even though you might only be trading one ton. When trading with third parties such as Archibald Blake, Eli Bleakworth, Kahina, (Ketema) or the Pirates at their harbour, the loading speed is an astonishing 10 tons per second.

When considering how items effect loading speed. It is important to distinguish between items that effect ships and items that effect harbour buildings. The latter will work as following: If a player was to use Hogarth the Harbourmaster who provides +100% loading speed to standard piers and the basic kontor, the base rate of goods exchanged would be 2*(100%+100%(Hogarth)) = 4 tons per second on each pier/kontor effected by the item. Following the same template, a level 2 kontor would load at 6 tons per second and the level 3 at 10 tons per second before interacting with ships that have items to further increase the loading speed .

Items that effect ships on the other hand scale with the base value of the building's loading speed. If we were to socket the item "Salima the Shipping Operator" which provides +60% loading speed and we would trade with a level 1 kontor that would result in: 2*(100%+60%(Salima)) = 3.2 tons per second. If we would trade with the same ship at the kontor with Hogarth equipped mentioned above we would get: 4*(100%+60%)= 6.4 tons per second.

Thus we see that loading speed changes depending on whether first of all, the kontor/pier has items effecting it (and thus the base rate has changed), and secondly the ship trading has items effecting it. It is worth noting that the airship loads at exactly half the speed calculated due to a hidden attribute(This needs verification when the factor actually applies).