What Level Should I Be At?
 

The best advice I can give you is to stop doing the Black Pearl quest until you're in your 30s.

You can finish it in your 20s, but you'll find that your overall rep will outpace your weapon rep, making it more difficult to find level-appropriate mobs. Also, you will wind up with fewer HP than someone at the same level who didn't do the BP quest, because they got rep from their weapons, and will have higher weapon skills and the higher HP that comes with it.

The game is designed to have you do some things with help. Some things are virtually impossible to do alone, or take many times to succeed. The higher your rep & skills the better off you will be doing other things alone. Be prepared to die many times. Accumulate gold so you can repair your ship and buy tonics (never sail without Bartholomew Watkins is my motto).

I agree with Bilge. My first pirate rushed through it and was struggling to finish the weaponry. My second pirate I waited until I was 25 to start and it made it easier. My 3rd is doing it whenever and my 4th hasnt even started yet.

I did the same with Ruby and I have to stop myself from doing it with Mali. Ruby's 29 and PITIFUL lagging on sailing, cannon, and cutlass. I'm embarrassed. Good thing she's got a pretty face.

I plan to work more on Mali's skills.

Wenches, remind me I said that next time she's on.

"WHEREVER YOU'RE GOING , STOP AND CHOP! STOP AND CHOP!"

LOL i am basic and all my weapons are seven and your weapons are like one ahead of me and i am level 13 except for dolly

I'll agree with the other posters who are saying put the quest on hold. My first pirate finished the quest in his high 20's with some help in spots. But that being said, I was higher level when I got to Gunner (I got the PDF teleport just after finishing Gunner which seemed ironic considering how much easier it would have been).

With all of the weapons feeding it, your notoriety should be about double your weapons (and try to level them around the same rate). It looks like you're racing through the quest. After you recover the Pearl and give it back there's nothing to do but level weapons and notoriety.

Get your level up a bit (say up to level 23 to get the Padres teleport) before starting back on the quest. The higher you go, the easier it will be. For my 2nd pirate, I'm not planning on starting the pearl quest until after level 23 and have the 4 teleports. He's currently level 13 and still has to recruit Pidgley! There's enough to do with side quests to keep things interesting while you're working weapons.

If you're more of a solo pirate, work on the weapons and sailing. But to level the doll your choices are kiting (attuning something and then running around in circles trying not to get hit) or attuning an ally while they kill things- but you can't do that yet. Cannons are hard to do solo because you have to sail to a spot, get off the wheel and then take a cannon and blast away. But I am finding more ships are circling rather than sitting there nicely while you sink them. Better to tap your guildmates for cannon work.

You should really get the pistol up to hex eater shot at least. That will let you work the other weapons on the vodoo using enemies.

One other thing- your hit and vodoo points are going to be much lower than most other pirates at your level. Getting the weapons more in line with your notoriety level will help you from waking up in jail so much too.

And work the grenades as soon as you get them.

Thanks for the tips! If I stop working on this quest, what else do I work on to get my level up?

Sorry for the dumb questions. im still trying to figure this all out.

I guess I will go against the tide on this. My last guy I did everything solo, so I know its possible. I also had quite different stats, where my pistol and cannon were always leading stats.

I recall a few places there were some tough quests to do solo, such as brigands at the level that quest came along.

I started another one and have seen a few changes in things, but not really much a hold back so far, from what i can see. There also new stuff now adding to the things available.

What exactly are you stuck on may help.

As stated above doing it early has some draw back's suck as doing a ll the padres stuff , and then getting padres totem.

Just kill enemies with whatever weapon needs leveling the most.

On Ali I, like many others, rushed through the story and finished at 26, I think. It wasn't bad, but all that's left is leveling and it gets pretty darn boring after a while, especially when you're high or mastered almost everywhere, and nades are in the low teens... LoL

On Piper I haven't even started the story. She's now at 20, with all available skills at 12. I'm still not looking forward to nades (it's going to take a while to get them level with everything else), but at least I can try to keep them even so I won't be stuck with them, and them alone, later. :tongue8:

Just remember that whether you work alone or with help, gold drives everything. Johnny McVane on Tortuga and Josie McCready on PR pay 140 for killing different enemies. Sam Seabones adds an extra 25 for killing 2 skeletons of any level on any island. Bartholomew Watkins on PR pays 35 coins each for sinking 3 ships. These quests are renewable with every login. Merchants, gypsies and the occasional NPC also offer quests if you need structure for your killing. You can sell some of what you earn for gold, but in my opinion they are an awful lot of work for the reward. Whatever your strategy you gotta have the gold for weapons, ship repair & upgrade, and tonics. Of course you can always try gambling.

Thanks! I've been doing smaller quests here and there and helping friends out to help gain notoriety. It's working! Thanks for the advice!

No one has said you can't do it solo. I did about 95% of the story quest solo. It would have been MUCH easier with help in spots but it can be done (and the boss battle CANNOT be done solo as it stands- the officers would be tough even with a staff and the frigates would shoot you full of holes before even starting on the towers). I think the big thing everyone is pushing is just to slow down on the story quest for a bit.

Try some of the Jewelry and Tattoo quests. When you get to a higher level, there will be the weapon quests and the Undead Skeleton quest. Take some of the side quests from the NPCs on Port Royal (can't remember their names). Make a little gold on the side and gain some notoriety and also kill some beasties for a reason other than rep.

Your skill levels seems low to me when compared to your overall noteriety, but the whole system is rather wierd. Keep in mind I've only done around 5% of BP Quest and my skill levels are shown below. I've had no problems with any of the quests given to me so far. Looking at my stats, you can probably guess what I've been doing with the remainder of my time:

Overall Noteriety: 20

Sailing: 17
Cannons: 14
Cutlass: 9
Pistol: 7
VooDoo: 10
Dagger: 6

im at the scary mary part of the bb and its getting easier i waited until i got the padres tp to start the second list

my stats are

Notoriety: 25
Steel Cutlass: 14
Triple Barrel: 12
Witch Doll: 12
Main Gauche: 12
Grenade: 11:pirate41::pirate41:
Sailing: 8
Cannon: 12

i try to keep all my stats at the same lvl because i dont like to work on one weapon for a long time
:pirate41: :degen: