Sailing in SL

OrinB

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I've always believed that the whole sailing community in SL was a little bit geeky and a little bit odd. Very close-knit and... well... i dunno... i just never tried it!

UNTIL YESTERDAY!! :D

With my new Linden Home Houseboat, i squandered way too many L$ on 2 boats. I jumped in with both feet and managed to get them rezzed, then just haphazardly ventured out.

Oh my what fun! The boats are stunning! So many details of animations, sounds, effects and just amazingly built creations. I was uttely blown away by the experience. I've just spent an hour and a half whooping south down through about 14 sims, then struggling to tack all the way back up them again. But i succeeded without crashing over a sim border and even managed to dock my yacht at my houseboat without de-rezzing! As you can tell i'm so happy at the moment hahaha. I don't want my little bubble to burst now :p

Has anyone else been involved in sailing in SL? Any tips?

Me on the ocean:

 
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Brenda Archer

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I still mostly go around in an ancient little sail boat from the prim era. No menu and a bit hard to control but a lot of fun once it gets going. I also spend a certain amount of time exploring as a mermaid.
 

OrinB

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I've had a little row boat before and have tried out jet skis and varous other smaller motor boats. This sailing thing with the use of the wind and the handling of the vessel through commands and using the compass and maps to navigate. It's really clicked with me. I guess it's finally the immersion i've been craving :)
 

Fionalein

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Archer

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Yeah, that's one of the first things I did when I got my Houseboat. I spend hours on my sailboat. It is amazingly immersive if you have your headphones on and the sounds turned on. There are many small canals and rivers to explore in Bellessaria so I also splurged on a small motorboat. It's quite an experience to see all the houses from the water side of things.

There is also a fishing system for any LL waters, by Northern Operations. They keep track of your catch and post a running total on their website with weekly winners for total catch and a whopper chart. They just paid out 10K Lindens to their fisher-of-the-year.

That's awesome that you found you really enjoy sailing. There are quite a number of people in the same boat....
 
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Khamon

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Happy that hear that you’re enjoying the wind and water. The ancient texts tell of Loki Pico rallying to retain wind physics and open waterways when The Grid All Hail The Central Grid was newly formed from the etherial void. Give thanks to the horned orange giant.
 

Benjamin Opel

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I've always believed that the whole sailing community in SL was a little bit geeky and a little bit odd. Very close-knit and... well... i dunno... i just never tried it!

UNTIL YESTERDAY!! :D

With my new Linden Home Houseboat, i squandered way too many L$ on 2 boats. I jumped in with both feet and managed to get them rezzed, then just haphazardly ventured out.

Oh my what fun! The boats are stunning! So many details of animations, sounds, effects and just amazingly built creations. I was uttely blown away by the experience. I've just spent an hour and a half whooping south down through about 14 sims, then struggling to tack all the way back up them again. But i succeeded without crashing over a sim border and even managed to dock my yacht at my houseboat without de-rezzing! As you can tell i'm so happy at the moment hahaha. I don't want my little bubble to burst now :p

Has anyone else been involved in sailing in SL? Any tips?

Me on the ocean:

Wait, I am confused (doesn't take much lol) did that houseboat come free with your Linden Home? Or did you purchase this from the marketplace?
 

OrinB

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Wait, I am confused (doesn't take much lol) did that houseboat come free with your Linden Home? Or did you purchase this from the marketplace?
As Fionalein says, the Housebat is the Linden Home. Though you do get a choice of which style to rez on the space. There's space to rezyour own boat/s next to the houseboats if you want to and access to wider areas of water so you can motor/sail out and back.
 

Da5id Weatherwax

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...I am clueless how RL sailing works and just tuck at the sails until I get sufficient speed.
At its most basic, in RL sailing, setting a sail comes down to only one thing. If the sail is smooth and not flapping anywhere, it's working right. You just let out the sheet until you see the sail start to flap, then haul it in until it just stops. If it's hauled in too far too much of its force is going to tipping your boat over instead of moving it forwards, if it's not hauled in far enough it's not generating all the force it can.

That's a gross oversimplification of the art, there are lots of other subtleties involved in getting the tension on the sail from different directions right and making the correct choices for combining wind and tide with your crafts best "point of sailing" but that oversimplification WILL get you from "where you are" to "where you want to be" on the water under sail :)

Fortunately, in SL, that oversimplification is pretty much all there is. I haven't seen a SL craft where you need to worry about luff tension, tweaking the kicking strap or adjusting the hauldown point on your jib sheets, and most will gybe your spinnaker pole and adjust its guy for you :)
 

Khamon

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Khamon has only ever puttered around in a green prim motorboat Lynn Lippmann assembled a hundred years ago. I am tempted now to try the physical sailing but will have to dig around for a sailboat. Kipper has gifted me the odd sail through the years; wonder if I can attach one of those to the motorboat ha ha ha I so crazy.
 
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CronoCloud Creeggan

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Khamon has only ever puttered around in a green prim motorboat Lynn Lippmann assembled a hundred years ago. I am tempted now to the the physical sailing but will have to dig around for a sailboat. Kipper has gifted me the odd sail through the years; wonder if I can attach one of those to the motorboat ha ha ha I so crazy.
Khamon, there's a couple of good freebie boats out there. I think there's a free Folkboat up in Second Norway and there's the usual Bwind and Tako you can find at many Sailing hubs/rez points.

I don't sail myself, I have a couple of motor cruisers since I'm on the mainland. Sailboats wouldn't work very well in some of the narrow channels and changes of direction anyway.
 
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Trifina

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I've always believed that the whole sailing community in SL was a little bit geeky and a little bit odd. Very close-knit and... well... i dunno... i just never tried it!

UNTIL YESTERDAY!! :D

Oh my what fun! The boats are stunning! So many details of animations, sounds, effects and just amazingly built creations. I was uttely blown away by the experience. I've just spent an hour and a half whooping south down through about 14 sims, then struggling to tack all the way back up them again. But i succeeded without crashing over a sim border and even managed to dock my yacht at my houseboat without de-rezzing! As you can tell i'm so happy at the moment hahaha. I don't want my little bubble to burst now :p

Has anyone else been involved in sailing in SL? Any tips?
Welcome to the community!

Your 50/3 is a great start (and perhaps a high bar for your next boat). It's a recent release with the latest BOSS sailing engine and the immersion factor is pretty intense, IMHO. If you're interested, I have textures for it I'd be happy to share.

My best tip is, "Don't overdress!" LL has done some good work on sim crossings recently, and I often sail the Blake in a Maitreya body and bikini, now. However in "bad weather" (those SL days when nothing's working) I have better luck with a base avatar, texture clothes, and hair that weighs under 2K.

Here's a (right-handed) tip: Learn to use AD to steer the boat and WS to handle the sails. You can then use your mouse to click on the HUD to move yourself from side to side as you turn. Then, when using a separate jib, you can use E and C to control it. Hitting WE and SC along with A or D becomes second nature. So yes, you can come about, change your sail, and hike to the other side, all at the same time. :)

The boats are becoming more realistic all the time. Little steps now, maybe, but we're edging towards more realism without giving up workablilty and fun.

My vote for a freebie to start with would be the Shields. It's a "serious" BWind boat with a friendly and active creator, and a sizable following. All for free!
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Shields-Class-sailboat-V2/7352166?page=1
 

OrinB

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Welcome to the community!

Your 50/3 is a great start (and perhaps a high bar for your next boat). It's a recent release with the latest BOSS sailing engine and the immersion factor is pretty intense, IMHO. If you're interested, I have textures for it I'd be happy to share.

My best tip is, "Don't overdress!" LL has done some good work on sim crossings recently, and I often sail the Blake in a Maitreya body and bikini, now. However in "bad weather" (those SL days when nothing's working) I have better luck with a base avatar, texture clothes, and hair that weighs under 2K.

Here's a (right-handed) tip: Learn to use AD to steer the boat and WS to handle the sails. You can then use your mouse to click on the HUD to move yourself from side to side as you turn. Then, when using a separate jib, you can use E and C to control it. Hitting WE and SC along with A or D becomes second nature. So yes, you can come about, change your sail, and hike to the other side, all at the same time. :)

The boats are becoming more realistic all the time. Little steps now, maybe, but we're edging towards more realism without giving up workablilty and fun.

My vote for a freebie to start with would be the Shields. It's a "serious" BWind boat with a friendly and active creator, and a sizable following. All for free!
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Shields-Class-sailboat-V2/7352166?page=1
Thanks Trifina, I'm loving the boat. So no plans to really change it at the moment. I have a few commercial texture changes already and i'm looking to adapt some of the textures for myself - so that will be fun. I've acquired a speedboat too, but i'm not as keen on that as i am the yacht though i'm looking forward to be able to attach a floater to the back and play about with that :)

Yes, i'm getting a few outfits together where i remove all the scripts etc. With more than one person on the boat, staying low ARC is essential.

Thanks for the notes on handling too. I've still yet to get to grips with it all, but i'm really enjoying the process. I've got a few cruises on my list to try so hopefully i can ask some additonal tips from them. I've just got hold of a compass/navigation hud that has been really helpful, though i still have some major problems tacking in a particular direction... I'll get the hang of it soon :)
 
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Caete

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From time to time I still sail around. My BTR-90 makes a lack of channels not a problem as long as I can get out of the water. My Batboat is fast, maybe too fast. My Nautilus is slower and well, UNDER THE SEA! My pt boat is fun as well. Odly enough I have a lot of boats/subs but those are the main ones I fall back to.
 

OrinB

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I joined my first sailing cruise yesterday. I had way too many problems trying to keep up. But it taught me a lot of things and i loved every minute of it. We went for a 2hr cruise round the fruit islands and despite not seeing any of the other boats after the first sim crossing, Jono and I still enjoyed the experience and saw some amazing little islands. It really opened up SL for me. TP'ing between isolated sims has always felt a little "cheating" in SL. I've always loved the larger estates for giving you a sense of space. Whether they be RP communities, social residential estates or to a certain extent, parts of the mainlands they always give you that wow factor.

I hope to do a lot more :)