[Guide] Ship PvP

[Maximvs]

Also - kodos should be given to Irorhawk for information on I/O (what I call Inner / Outer Hull Damage) as he has an entire posting with Pics in the News Section. My information is experience, but he actually took the time to do before/ after / after-again (LOL) screenshots for everyone here...

Thanks Ironhawk

Here is the thread showing Full Pics of Before / After Damage

[Chris]

oh ok i didnt know what his guide was about bc i dont use a test account ah but now that ive seen it i understand ok

[Ironhawk]

Chris, here are some points not covered or need to be corrected :

We CAN dock at any island including enemy's base island.

There is also a third quest "The Caribbean Struggle" available from any shipwright on main islands.

Also in Privateering mode we don't get rep or plunder from NPC ships.

Pressing ~ button will display the Privateer Scoreboard

[Chris]

we can? i couldnt when i tried to dock at the french island i ended up sinking i just got the you cannot sail to close to this island

[methadose]

to clear up the docking issue, you cannot dock while under attack at any island, you must not be under attack for about thirty seconds, then you can dock

[Carnage]

Is Ship PVP in Public already??

[Chris]

Yup PvP ship is in the open servers

[MacIronhawk]

Nice guide chris and right with this big update!
I can't wait for the pictures.

[Chris]

they are coming i promise i just need all this lag to pack up and go to another game

[Silver Beard]

Great guide Chris!

BBBBBBBaaaaad! BBBBBaaaaad to tha BBBBBones!

[Ironhawk]

You can't dock when enemy still firing at your ship.
You need to wait 30 second after last hit before you can dock.

In test once i saw 18 Spanish ship versus 9 French ships so it's not limited to 5 ship.


Also you might want to add tips on how to kill other pirate using broadside.
When we got killed during battle we don't go to jail but respawn on the ship
and invincible to any attack for 10 seconds.
We are also invincible for 10 seconds after sinking (30 second invincibility for ship)

Captain of the ship can't teleport anywhere but crewmates on board can.

[Chris]

Ty i added that to the guide tyvm for that information. as for the ship limit i have no clue.

[Edward Edgemenace]

Originally Posted by Chris

Ty i added that to the guide tyvm for that information. as for the ship limit i have no clue.

The limit is 10 ships per side. If your side has three more boats than the opposition, you will be prompted to launch your boat from the opposition side (but prevented from launching on the side you tried.) When there are less than 5 boats out on each side, the delta-limit is 1 instead of 3.

When there are twenty ships at sea, you are prompted to join a privateering crew. Clicking YES activates the normal "Lookout" mechanism to "Find a privateering crew." I don't know what happens if there are none (that has never happened to me - when ten boats are out, there just is always a crew to join...someone somewhere remembered to turn it on...as everyone should.)

There was a question about ranking earlier. So far, only the contest rankings are available. The contest said it was "score" which is composed of a combination of kills & bounty.


There was an earlier question about bounty, when two opponents sink a ship. The bounty is divided proportionally to the amount of damage dealt by each person (and sub-totaled for each ship.) I haven't figured out who gets the credit for damage from "OPEN FIRE" but it seems to be the person at the helm (for each cannon shot by crewmates that has double damage.)

When you sink an enemy ship, you get some amount of gold, proportional to how much damage you personally dealt (from how much the total bounty on that ship was.)

I am still not sure what happens when an enemy ship with a high bounty is damaged severely, lands and relaunches, then is sunk by a new allied ship. I THINK that the bounty is still split, instead of going entirely to the new ally ship. Still have some more testing to do to confirm or deny this.

Note that attacks to ships count - attacks to crew do NOT count towards the bounty. So, when I shoot twenty rounds of grape shot to immobilize a crew for a full minute, I get no gold at all - my crewmates get it.

I still believe that the guild should fully describe repair-while-sailing (with as many holier-than-thou admonitions you feel are appropriate.)

A pirate hammering on a repair spot repairs 30 hull points per second. If four pirates are repairing, it is 120 hull points per second. Occasionally, when hull is completely repaired, the pirate will continue repairing for a long time...I believe this is "fleet repair" magically doing 30 points per second hull repair to damaged allied ships.

Moderators: Sorry about the consecutive posts. Should this just be a separate thread?

Contest weekend tactics:

Small guild formation - all with mastered sailing, but very different skill point allocations. One pirate with rank 5 "Full Sail" another with rank 5 "Ramming Speed" and another with rank 5 "Wind-catcher" all trade off on the ship's helm to chase down opponents, in a faster-than-possible manner.

"Not one of us" small guild tactic - eliminate all friends list entries. No new guild members for at least one week prior to event. During event, launch only once at the very beginning. Guild operates in shifts to keep boat (and bounty) alive during off-peak hours.

"Bounty ping-pong." Guild launches one ship from French, one from Spanish. All people on both boats are in a single crew. Boat A sinks boat B. All crew gunners teleport to boat B and from there sink boat A. Gunners TP to boat A and sink boat B. This inflates bounty rapidly. As other boats appear, let them engage in battle, giving them as much encouragement as possible to deflect suspicion and dilute the inflated bounty. Alternately, use crew chat to avoid "allied" ships entirely.

"Dinghy forest." Launch as many boats as possible on "enemy" shore. Leave a mule parked on each boat's helm - do not allow that boat to engage in battle. War galleons are ideal for this, as the are easiest to hit from far away (to further inflate bounty.)

Lunch time. Launch light galleons from enemy shore. Bring them into battle, so that your war sloop and war frigate can sink the light galleon 15 seconds into a major battle - giving your real ships 12 points bounty plus +200 SHIP SAVING SALVAGE right in the middle of the battle. Snack on as many light galleons as you want. If not on a diet, use galleons or war galleons for the same purpose.

Cannon variety (mainly war sloops.) All gunners camp on their guns, never EVAR pressing ESC. Additional crew can be on board for repair spots. Ideally, captain will have one side's broadsides at rank 5, the other side at rank 1. All gunners camp on the rank 5 side. Front-most gun uses lightning. Second gun uses grape shot. Third gun uses fury, fourth gun preloads explosive. (Round shot and firebrand are good too, but the VARIETY is the most important factor.)

Loner tactic: Use crew matching. Join a crew or recruit one, but don't ever sail alone.

Chasing tactics:

"Driver switching" so that the person with the highest rank full sail presses 3, then when it has run out, switch drivers to person with highest rank ramming speed. Repairs-while-saiing may confound this tactic somewhat.

"Cornered." Chase enemy to "The end of the world" where they have to turn. If they aim straight East, they will hit the wall soonest, so follow directly and wait for them to make their turn (bwahaha.) If they aim North, aim between them and Cangrejos. When they are caught, be very aggressive...do not shy away or your grape shooters won't hit. They are turning so they will get the first shot, but you get to use ramming speed as an attack. If they turn and run, your gunners will mop them up easily. But if they turn and fight, you have to get in there fast and make your turn, so your gunners can get to work.

Know thy enemy: If you know which "side" is the enemy driver's strong side, you know which way they will turn. Cut their triangle.

Angling. During a long chase, you go faster when you don't make slight direction adjustments. This will naturally skim the angle of attack as you proceed - HOLD YOUR COURSE. Your gunners will usually fire single test volleys to measure angle and range. Your normal chase will improve that angle for them - DON'T MAKE MINOR CORRECTIONS. If the enemy is dealing more damage to you, than you are to them, turn off and try something else. (If both boats are using repair-while-sailing, then you catch up and fire at each other, but you fall below 50% before enemy does, turn off QUICKLY. Their glitches are better than yours!)

Chasing ammo: do not use thunderbolt. Range is not the problem, aim is. Three shots of round shot cover more area than a single thunderbolt (that takes much longer to recharge.) Fury and firebrand are ok, but I've found that round shot (infinite ammo) seems to recharge the fastest - meaning I get to take more shots in the dark. Minor hits to the enemy ship, fluster the enemy crew enormously and can breach the outer hull early. Remember that initial shots hitting a quiescent boat (that hasn't been hit in 10 seconds?) "shake" the boat so crew members can't walk straight nor aim right.

Getting ammo: When starting a chase, it is tempting to send crew to go get ammo. DON'T DO IT. Wait until after the battle (you'll have plenty of time on the long drive back.) Keep as many extra pairs of eyes on board as you can during a chase - every person counts (even if they don't realize it, or think it seems boring at first.)

Get close baby. You have to be closer than you realize, for grape shot to work. Since grape shot automatically stuns all enemy pirates in range, you get three seconds of them unable to attack. When your crew has the enemy crew "graped," GET CLOSER AND STAY CLOSE. Do not let the enemy boat drift away out of range (or they will come back with blood in their eyes.) DO NOT TURN. Don't change the angle on your one helpful crewmate that has the enemy paralyzed with grape shot...just patiently wait for your broadsides to recharge and slowly but surely defeat them. Every third time this works, remind your gunner to get more grape.

General tactics:

"Battle line." By lining your ships up, they can sequentially attack a big nasty, one after the other. As long as damaged ships run clear before sinking, this works quite well. But if an allied ship sinks, the enemy ship gets salvage, eliminating any advantage you had.

Goose. Form a V, like geese flying south for the winter. This wedge is the fiercest attack formation. Strongest boat at the head of the V. Try to keep up.

Home turf. When you sink, your ship respawns at your island in an invulnerability bubble. If you sail out immediately, your bubble pops. If you stay there and shoot, your bubble lasts for a minute (or two?) while you use thunderbolt to eliminate all enemies within two compass diameters.

Cowardly lion. (AKA "Chicken ****") Cluster all allied ships together around ship with highest bounty. Use thunderbolt to harass enemies two compass widths away. Wait for the people on the high bounty ship to get back from lunch (or work or school or wherever.)

Flanking. The notion of a wall of allies sweeping in the from a side works for armies, but not so well with such small numbers of ships. A light sloop parked off on the side can add a surprise element, but that's about it. Not very useful in this arena.

Spy games. Join enemy crews. Send every crew you get near, a PvP challenge. Invite them to a treasure map quest. Spam blithering nonsense in the privateer channel. Steal the wheel and drive into the middle of an enemy forest. Scream "CHARGE" - especially when everyone is repairing.

Counter spy: always click NO when in SvS to any PvP or treasure map...you won't get the helm of the black pearl and they will just send you to jail to make you groggy. Whenever ANYONE says "CHARGE!" say "Oh, I thought I had him on IGNORE already." Ignore all trash talk...do not even think about baiting them.

When someone says "there is a Spanish mole listening" ignore that person - it likely is them. But there is no benefit from remaining silent - give your allies the information they need. Any possibly benefit the enemy could get from knowing your plans, will be delayed to the point of uselessness. The skirmish will be over before the enemy gets the message relayed to them. The only person that would say that, is someone trying to confound communication by making you afraid to talk. Nonsense! Continue to give encouragement and warnings as you have been.

Communication/definitions:

"Bogey on your six!" Picture the face of a clock. The front of the ship is the bow. Whichever way the ship is pointing, is 12 o'clock. Directly behind the ship is 6 o'clock; port side is 9 o'clock, starboard is 3 o'clock. "Left10" means there is an enemy on the port side, slightly ahead. A "bogey" is an enemy.

"Wheel?" This is a request to the captain to press ESC so that someone can momentarily take the helm, to ahve it taken back again immediately. Doing so, enables the repair-while-sailing glitch.

"Cowards!" Enemy landed their ship at a random island - they were too scared to even play the game, or didn't even realize they lose their score when they do that. (If they just get sunk, they can come back with full health and get the bounty back...instead they panicked and lost out.)

"Damage?" The captain can't see the enemy health meter; tell him approximately what percent the enemy has been damaged or has remaining. E.g. "5% down" or "30% left."

"Incoming!" An enemy ship is in sight, approaching.

"Repair!" The captain does not know what he's doing. He is asking you to repair when he doesn't even understand that he did the glitch wrong. Just remain silent and continue pressing SHIFT...he will wake up eventually. It takes a couple tries to figure it out, at first - harsh words will not help.

"Right!" We are approaching an enemy that will appear in range of this ships starboard cannons - please charge your ammo up now.

"Run!" Captain, you don't seem to be watching this ship's health meter - if you don't disengage from this battle now, we are dead.

"Mayday!" The person saying this is an enemy spy, trying to throw people off. Anyone that is close enough, already is helping...calling for help from distant ships prevents those allied ships from finishing the attacks they SHOULD be finishing.

"HALP!" I am sinking in the next moment or two. Laugh with me. It was good.

[Arioch]

Originally Posted by Maximvs

Also - kodos should be given to Irorhawk for information on I/O (what I call Inner / Outer Hull Damage) as he has an entire posting with Pics in the News Section. My information is experience, but he actually took the time to do before/ after / after-again (LOL) screenshots for everyone here...

Thanks Ironhawk

Here is the thread showing Full Pics of Before / After Damage

Actually instead of referring to it as an inner or outer hull I have been calling it an Armor belt. This belt can be avoided by aiming extremely low on the hull so that you can do max damage to the enemies Hull without having to pierce the armor belt.

another method is if you use strong concentrated attacks in one spot with pinpoint accuracy you can pirce the armor belt quickly in one shot so as to do max damage without have to completely remove the opposing ships armor first.

aim for the burning holes. These holes only appear in certain locations on each different ship type so if you know where to aim you can sink each ship type faster as you can make there armor useless.

As for the SVS events they are all a crock. Because any and all guilds use the above methods to artificially inflate their score.

Plain and simple they should reduce the SCORE to zero upon sinking and or add another factor into the mix.

If a ship is sunk the score remains however a tally is also kept on the amount of times sunk and this number is used for the final tally of the event and that each sinking is such a negative impact that no guild would intentionally sink in order to inflate the value of the bounty.

By simply adding this extra feature it will undermine 90% of the cheating in SVS

Simply put in the events the large guilds rig the playing field so much by launching apposing ships on other side to use as salvage or to prevent others from launching.

Also as a side note during an SVS event it would be a good idea to boot any ship from SVS in the event it has been more then 30 minutes since it has last sunk a ship. In doing so it would end the long chase scenes and get rid of salvage only ships and mules.