Surprise! Sea Of Thieves Is Finally Adding Private PvE Servers

It makes sense. Sea of Thieves is a PvPvE game at heart.

Still nice to have the option for those that don't want the play the game proper.

Fantastic news. The trouble with some of the tall tales is they can take 2 hours to do, and being a live service game you can't pause. Being in a "safe sea" means I can essentially leave for a short time when life calls and not have wasted my time.
May have to redownload and give this another go in December then.

I feel like trying this game again once the Safer Seas update drops. Very good news!

@LostInBlue0 @pip_muzz I’ll also have a new go. Really like to play this game on my own pace. Without other players breathing in my neck. Great news.

The ability to captain your own ship will remain exclusive to the original mode? So, you can't do that in a private server? What's the point then? I'm not familliar with the mechanics of the game so i'm prob missing something but that sounds lame.

Don't get me wrong interacting with other players and the potential chaos that happens is very much part of the game.

But sometimes I just want to enjoy the sailing and get some s...tuff done.

@Syndrome "Captaining a ship" is a specific mechanic in SoT. Where you can buy, name, customise, and save a ship and earn rewards the more you use it. So in Safer Seas you'll be restricted to the default of getting a fresh ship each time you play.

This is long overdue. As someone playing regularly since shortly after release there's times I'd liked to have played without the risk of other players interfering. Particularly with the story missions this'll be perfect as sometimes other players being there can ruin them.

My crew will likely still stick to the normal mode most of the time to get the rewards and such though.

Now just make it an offline Playable mode and I can enjoy that wonderful atmosphere. Don't worry your precious microtransactions will still be there.

@PhileasFragg Yes, i googled the "captain" part and it's self explanatory tbh, i just didn't understand what that meant for the private server. Thx for the clarification.

This should been implemented day one. I really like sea of thieves. But since absolutely and truly, despise games that allow to be ganked so easily and often turn me off from ever fully enjoying a game. Now I just feel too far behind to jump back in. Plus there are just tooooooo many games to play.

Honestly it is to the point in gaming that it is a MUST developers NEED to be able to grab gamers IMMEDIATELY. If not, majority just move on and NEVER come back.

@PhileasFragg Which is honestly an incredibly stupid decision on their part. Should be no reason not be able captain a ship in safer seas.

Good news and bad news, it's great that they've finally listened to player feedback but I see no reason why rewards and progression shouldn't be the same. A better solution would have been to add extra rewards for the high seas

I have been interested, but I’m not a pvp fan at all.

But then reading it’s 30% of the rewards? Can’t max cap? It’s just not worth starting it.

Rare seriously pretending that PVP is necessary for their game. I'm still not playing this garbage. I don't have the time or patience to deal with screaming children whose parents use their xbox as a daycare.

@PhileasFragg got to say that still sounds like an unnecessary restriction, imo. But this is a step in the right direction that will likely bring a lot more players to the game. Maybe eventually they expand on it and give additional features to the mode while still keeping a strong lure on the PvP servers.

@Tharsman Yeh it's unnecessary, but I think their view on this is it's aimed at new players to learn how the game works, and THEN you go to the main game with long grinds, PvP, and events. Captaincy is aimed at experienced players.

@PsBoxSwitchOwner
I agree. I hate the PvP aspects of this game. My kids hate it too and it's ruined too many of our fun voyages to the point where no one wants to play it anymore. (Despite being huge pirate fans in every other way) But as great as the PvE is to see the huge reputation reduction is just insulting and is going to make my kids feel like their participation / achievements in the game mean less, unless they're willing to put up with all of the "bullies" and "jerks" in the PvP mode.

Without the risk, the Sea of Thieves loop is paper thin, but that's usually what PvE Lords love. Probably fine.

Hopefully creating a "safe space" means development has more or less wrapped and we're getting a sequel or dedicated current gen version/new map/whatever developing.

will it be playable offline now?

Well that's kinda bad that we carnt captain out own ship in that server and it should not be reduced nor should it be capped so for 1 it's a win and for 2 it's a big big loss

@CaptnDave Sounds like the typical PVP experience these days. Reminds me of why I would only play GTA Online when I could play on my own private server, you can't enjoy these games when you're being hassled by some griefers.