Light Harpoon

[Lanliss]

When you are using a giant harpoon to fish,and that harpoon is bolted to the ship, yes, you can leave it. As far as it swinging wildly, I doubt it. Once the line is taught there will be little give. Your ship will be pulled, or pull theirs, and the gun may swing if they decide to change direction, but for the most part the strain will be on the line and the bolts. Maybe there can be a bit of damage penalty for leaving the gun in attended, but I would expect it to be reinforced, since the builders specifically planned for it to be attached to enemy ships.

 Also, yes, to reel someone in, you would need to be on the gun, but once the line is hooked on the enemy you can leave it. If you do not plan on reeling them in there is no reason to be on that gun anymore. This would allow for a deadly pursuit, depending on which ship you are flying. I imagine most dangerous would be a galleon, with the light gun on the side as a harpoon. Top engie can fire harpoon, then get back to repairs, allowing the bottom engie and gunner to open up with heavy weapons.

[MagKel]

Top engie can fire harpoon, then get back to repairs, allowing the bottom engie and gunner to open up with heavy weapons.

and this is exactly why the harpoon need to "lock down" both the enemy ship and a crew member of the firing one. In your scenario the harpoon becomes an un-counter-able meta, once you take it for 30 seconds (2 hwacha) you will be at the mercy of the enemy ship with no possible escape and your destruction assured. That is not fun.

but if you make it snap once the operator leaves the gun, then it is a gamble for both sides of the fray.

[Lanliss]

True, but that is the worst case scenario. On basically any other ship the harpoon will have one light gun to support, if that. It could also be shortened to something like a fifteen second break time, so that the enemy is not held helpless for quite so long. Then again, all of my arguments are from the point of realism, so they can easily be ignored, in favor of making the game more fun.

[Richard LeMoon]

If there was no one on the harpoon after it hooked, it would not do anything. It would be free spinning. It would only pull if someone was actively pressing the winch button.

If you hit a target in the wrong place, this would give you the option of disengaging right away instead of the instant pull the would bring a Galleon broadside into your face, or, leave attached and wait to see if it will come in useful in the next 30 seconds.