Everything I am going to write in this post will be based on the premise "Sailing could be improved by a stronger Cordorian naval presence", so if you disagree with that I would love to hear why. It's always possible I am missing something. But essentially the main thing I think that is holding the navy back is that its reliant on one ship that's player owned to be represented. It's just not reasonable to expect one person to play enough to be bad at running something that should be much bigger than it is, let alone the impossible feat of actually being good at it.
Now, I could probably stop there, and have most people that engage in sailing nodding along in agreement. But they would all have their own reasons for the why and solutions to fix it, which is the goal of this thread, to try and narrow those two things down. And I think for the why, we can examine what works with the easiest place to get into sailing, and Sencliff. Specifically, the pirate only rentals.
These two boats are generally always available due to restriction, and even if they aren't its usually easy to figure out who's out on them and send a speedy (often thanks to an ic note left on the dock) and hope for a summoner on board. So even if I am part of the crew who's captain owns the pirate "flagship" I can always get out sailing with both potential recruits and with randoms who just want to get out and sail, which is what keeps sailing steady on the cliff.
Now, of course I have an idea for an easy fix. I don't believe you can call something a problem if you don't have a potential solution. But again, this thread is about getting feedback to try and get us to the best idea.
Thoughts?