Solved A few questions!

[Lrv]

Hey! what's up, sailors of pixel waters!

I'm playing on napoleonic period 1830, (mostly because is where most of the best looking ships are and i'm in love with the "brown and black essex ship" any essex actually, and razee, and poseidon, and...)
as a pirate on Iron man mode. I waited to gather a few questions to ask them all at once

I've cheated a bit, steam ships off, and adding all the Poseidon on this era, I love that ship ( º 3º) (plus starting with a beautiful essex, was hard to decide between constitution and razee...)

I've only seen Nevis as a pirate settlement so far, is Turks friendly towards pirates on this period? can i sail there under pirate flag?

I boarded a ship, went back to nevis to sell it, and a message said "cannot sell cause it has contraband"(or something like that) the ship hold was empty i already took everything on my main ship, then again, being a pirate settlement it's not suposed to give a f*** about contraband?

Is there smugglers on nevis? (dosn't make sense being pirate right?) i've tried sleeping over and over on the tavern and never saw them (trying to "sell" whatever it was on that ship, to be able to sell it on the shipyard)
I had to sunk it at the end, the only choice i had (i have little knowledge yet on this game) the other option i thought i had was sailing all the way to the turks hoping that they were friendly, trying to look for smuglers there, (no way i'm doing that on iron mode xd)

What other things could I do in this period as a pirate? can i make "peace" with a nation by talking to the guy on the Nevis tavern, and (i guess changing the flag) go to that nation ports as a friend (for taking quests or whatever) would that still be "sneaking" with the posibility of being attack for being a pirate even being currently friendly with that nation?

I took one quest from the Nevis pirate leader to sunk a ship, got some cash. From him to give me more quests what do i need,? let time pass? lvl up? gain reputation as a pirate...?

I edited most of the ships i like to have 800 Sails HP instead of 200, trying to mitigate dismats and avoiding a little bit the graphic glitch, will that work? or does the mast counts as Hull hp? (it's the easier stuff i could think off, no idea how to edit anything related with the "dismast mod" (all that i could find in the forum was that the glitch was because "dismast mod", no other info about it))

I swear i had a few more questions on gameplay, but I'm blank, so here goes one more trivial: Is there any way to turn up the volume (ONLY) of the cannons? but without turning anything else? im asking about editing i guess..

Are there any plans for this mod to add Shanties when at sea? (that would make iron mode must more inmersive/enjoyable)

I think i had more stuff to ask that i couldn't find info on the forum, but i'm blank, so i guess i'll write it down when playing and post again when i gather a few more questions.

Thanks for reading, and for your time!

Cheers! I mean Arrr* Yaaaay or whatever x'D

Edit: where is tortuga when you play iron Man? Can't find it on the map :O

 

[Grey Roger]

Turks Island has been taken over by Britain in both "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic" periods. Don't sail there under pirate colours unless you want to put the colony back in pirate hands by force!

Nevis has two towns. The pirate settlement probably doesn't have a smuggler but Charlestown might. Probably every town except pirate towns has a smuggler.

If you've paid a diplomat, or sneaked into town and paid a governor, you should be able to sail safely into any port belonging to that nation, provided you're under a flag friendly to that nation. You can even get a Letter of Marque and be both pirate and privateer at the same time.

There may indeed be a time delay required between completing one ship hunting quest and getting another. That's to prevent you from doing exactly what you're trying, which is keep taking one quest after another to get lots of money and XP without going anywhere. If you want to make a full time profession of this, get a Letter of Marque - or tell the boss on Nevis that you want to join the pirate brotherhood, which effectively is the pirates' equivalent of a Letter of Marque. Then go out onto the high seas, find some enemy ships, and plunder them. Pirates don't stay at home waiting for the boss to tell them what to do, the whole point of being a pirate is that you go and do what you want.

I'm not sure what setting the sails HP to 800 will do, but there's an easy way to find out. Do the edit, start a new game (or pressing F11 might work), then see if everyone's masts become more resilient.

Tortuga's real name is La Tortue. It's just north of Hispaniola - in fact, it's part of Hispaniola as far as the game is concerned, and if you buy a map of Hispaniola then you'll see it.

 

[Lrv]

Hey!

Turks Island has been taken over by Britain in both "Revolutions" and "Napoleonic" periods. Don't sail there under pirate colours unless you want to put the colony back in pirate hands by force!

Thanks god you writed that, i was already planning to sail there today haha

If you've paid a diplomat, or sneaked into town and paid a governor, you should be able to sail safely into any port belonging to that nation, provided you're under a flag friendly to that nation. You can even get a Letter of Marque and be both pirate and privateer at the same time.

Thanks that was one of the most important things i wanted to know, so i can keep being a pirate, but friendly with X nation (using corresponding flag to enter their ports) without belonging to his nation, I think a letter of marque is what i'm looking for.

There may indeed be a time delay required between completing one ship hunting quest and getting another. That's to prevent you from doing exactly what you're trying, which is keep taking one quest after another to get lots of money and XP without going anywhere. If you want to make a full time profession of this, get a Letter of Marque - or tell the boss on Nevis that you want to join the pirate brotherhood, which effectively is the pirates' equivalent of a Letter of Marque. Then go out onto the high seas, find some enemy ships, and plunder them. Pirates don't stay
at home waiting for the boss to tell them what to do, the whole point of being a pirate is that you go and do what you want.

Actually, I joined the pirate brotherhood first of all, then i did the quest (guessing you had to do them to get up in ranks or something) the money part to be honest is not interesting (the XP either, i was interested in case they had something to do with climbing ranks on the pirate faction or something), since I'm getting around 10k to sink a ship, while boarding traders is giving me around 50k-100k each time I go back to Nevis for selling

The XP part is not a problem, since i'm playing on the lowest difficulty mode, mainly because how hard it scales the mele dmg (not sure in this game, but this was the case on coas/teho) and since the mechanics barely give you any room to outplay, you are dead in most of the situations with 1 sword hit or 1 bullet, and i'm here for the naval combat so thats a part of the game i have 0 interest in (with this game current mechanics, of course i would like it if there where actual "deeper" fighting mechanics)

*Talking about difficulty, does anybody know if it afects the IA on naval combat? I just play on low difficulty for avoiding all the melee stuff,is there any file to manually edit difficultys? (just interested if it does afect enemy AI on naval combat) or same effect, editing my character HP so i could play in high difficulty with 2k hp or something

What does it change being in the pirate faction vs being a "no-faction" pirate regarding your relation with other factions, can i still do what you said about getting a letter of marque and being a privateer ?

Tortuga's real name is La Tortue. It's just north of Hispaniola - in fact, it's part of Hispaniola as far as the game is concerned, and if you buy a map of Hispaniola then you'll see it.

I see, I'm used to the map of COAS /teho in wich is a separate island, with the recent mod of ERAS, you could sail there under pirate flag (aparently tortuga allowed pirates or somethin) so i wanted to check just in case, to have another "safe port" being a pirate

Thanks for answering!

 

[Grey Roger]

A single LoM (Letter of Marque) puts you into the service of that nation. Having more than one LoM means you don't serve any nation, though you can collect promotions from all of the nations from whom you have LoM's. But once a pirate, always a pirate - even if you try to join another nation by buying a LoM, you'll still be a pirate, though that nation will welcome you rather than shoot you, provided you enter the nation's ports under the nation's flag.

You do not need to do ship-hunting quests to earn promotions. In fact, you will probably do better by cruising the high seas and looking for targets. The governor will pick a target hostile to him, which may not suit you. For example, the pirate boss may ask you to sink a British ship, which you won't want to do if you have a British LoM.

Pirates are just another nation for this purpose. If you have joined the pirates then you'll remain a pirate, though having a LoM means you're friendly to the nation which sold it to you, so you can safely enter that nation's ports provided you fly its flag. (Be careful. Forts can see a long way, and if they see you under a pirate flag - or if a pirate fort sees you under someone else's flag - they'll remember you as an enemy. So be sure to raise the right flag long before you approach the port.)

If you're going to get multiple LoM's, make sure they're compatible. There's no point in having both British and French LoM's, for example, because they're almost always at war, so sinking a British ship will earn you points with France and lose you the British LoM, and vice versa. Portugal is usually allied to Britain, so having both British and Portuguese LoM's is safe. Likewise, if Spain and France are allied then having both French and Spanish LoM's is safe. But watch the international relations table carefully and check tavern news regularly, because alliances can change...

Tortuga, or La Tortue, is officially French. It does tolerate pirates, so if you're under a pirate flag, you can sail there safely. (But the soldiers don't all know this, so random soldiers in the tavern may try to arrest you for being a pirate. This can be dangerous, hilarious, or both.)

Get armour! Battle armour can drastically improve your chances of survival. Gold armour is even better if you can find and afford it. Concentrate on the personal combat abilities - I always start by taking those and don't even look at the rest until I have "Professional Fencer". Officers can take care of most of the rest - you don't need "Sea Wolf" if your navigator has it, for example. Giving armour and decent swords to the officers in your shore party also helps because they can then survive combat, especially if you've been giving them the personal combat abilities as well. If you're attacked by four highwaymen and you're on your own, with no combat abilities, no armour and no competent officers, you're probably dead. If you're attacked by four highwaymen and you have three officers with you, you're all equipped with decent swords and you all have at least some of the combat abilities, then the highwaymen are probably dead.

 

[Lrv]

A single LoM (Letter of Marque) puts you into the service of that nation. Having more than one LoM means you don't serve any nation, though you can collect promotions from all of the nations from whom you have LoM's. But once a pirate, always a pirate - even if you try to join another nation by buying a LoM, you'll still be a pirate, though that nation will welcome you rather than shoot you, provided you enter the nation's ports under the nation's flag.

That sounds great, I feel like I will play only with one LoM, since I like to have plenty of enemys, being a pirate and having some LoM will give me enough port's to travel around

you will probably do better by cruising the high seas and looking for targets.

Nice, that's what I feel more fun to do

Pirates are just another nation for this purpose. If you have joined the pirates then you'll remain a pirate, though having a LoM means you're friendly to the nation which sold it to you, so you can safely enter that nation's ports provided you fly its flag. (Be careful. Forts can see a long way, and if they see you under a pirate flag - or if a pirate fort sees you under someone else's flag - they'll remember you as an enemy. So be sure to raise the right flag long before you approach the port.)

Nice to know, taking notes!

If you're going to get multiple LoM's, make sure they're compatible. There's no point in having both British and French LoM's, for example, because they're almost always at war, so sinking a British ship will earn you points with France and lose you the British LoM, and vice versa. Portugal is usually allied to Britain, so having both British and Portuguese LoM's is safe. Likewise, if Spain and France are allied then having both French and Spanish LoM's is safe. But watch the international relations table carefully and check tavern news regularly, because alliances can change

Nice, I like British but in this period they have way to much territory, so I think I'll go with a smaller nation, but then I have to check that the position of their citys suits me for traveling/pirating, maybe trying to conquer Jamaica at some point for the pirates, it's a great location

Tortuga, or La Tortue, is officially French. It does tolerate pirates, so if you're under a pirate flag, you can sail there safely. (But the soldiers don't all know this, so random soldiers in the tavern may try to arrest you for being a pirate. This can be dangerous, hilarious, or both.)

Oh wow, i thought all cities where on the map, should I expect/look for more islands/cities that don't show on the map? (with nationalities like tortue, no talking about the secret ones from quests etc)

Get armour! Battle armour can drastically improve your chances of survival. Gold armour is even better if you can find and afford it. Concentrate on the personal combat abilities - I always start by taking those and don't even look at the rest until I have "Professional Fencer"...

Actually, I edited "corsair" to get the golden armour x'D and a good blade/pistol, but still i'm playing on landlubber, if i where to play on "hard" its still a pain in the ass, i mean if you don't want to play that part of the game (Already completed TEHO and AoP2 COAS almost 100% 0 cheats a few years ago, I just don't want to deal with that part of the game anymore, I had enough x'D)

 

[Grey Roger]

Britain has Jamaica, Cayman, Antigua, half of Nevis, Barbados (two towns), Grenada and Turks Island. France has Martinique, Guadeloupe, all of Hispaniola (three towns) and half of St. Martin. Holland has Aruba, Curacao, Bonaire and the other half of St. Martin. Spain has Cuba (2 towns) and Puerto Rico. Portugal owns nothing as Britain has taken over Grenada, Portugal's only territory in earlier periods - you'll still see their ships and a Portuguese flag will get you into British ports. America only has Eleuthera (2 towns).

In Napoleonic period, France is hostile to Britain, as is Holland. Spain might be, depending on exactly which year you start, or it might be hostile to France and allied to Britain. (Napoleon deposed the Spanish king and put his brother on the throne. Spain didn't like that and switched sides.) America is neutral unless you start during the War of 1812, in which case it's hostile to Britain, but has no convenient ports - Eleuthera is way off in the northwest.

So you probably want to sign up with Holland. The problem of signing up with a small nation is that it doesn't have many ports, that's why it's small. Otherwise sign up with Spain, whichever side it's on, because that gets you San Juan. You might have gold armour but your officers probably don't, and I've seen it on sale in San Juan more often than anywhere else - I've no idea why. San Juan also has a couple of sidequests you might like - look for a woman in the tavern in a piratey outfit, she might have a job for you...

Incidentally, instead of starting off as "corsair", why not try "swordmaster"? That gets you gold armour and a nice sword without cheating, plus good melee skill, though you'll need to find a clock and compass for yourself because "swordmaster" doesn't get those for free. You also aren't as good at sailing, but you can hire a navigator to deal with that. The armour, sword and starting skills should give you a chance in a fight.

If you've joined the pirates then you effectively have a LoM from them - it's not called a pirate LoM on screen but that's how the game works it. If you then take a LoM from someone else then you already have multiple LoM's. So you may as well get some more, provided you make sure they're not from nations fighting each other.

La Tortue should be on the map. All towns should be on the map, but might only show up if you've visited them or have bought a map of the island, so if you want La Tortue to show up, buy a map of Hispaniola. Then look at the small island to the north of the west end of Hispaniola.

 

[Lrv]

Britain has Jamaica, Cayman, Antigua...

In Napoleonic period, France is hostile to Britain, as is Holland. Spain might be, depending on...

Wow that's gonna save me a lot of time, thank you!

So you probably want to sign up with Holland. The problem of signing up with a small nation is that it doesn't have many ports, that's why it's small. Otherwise sign up with Spain, whichever side it's on, because that gets you San Juan. You might have gold armour but your officers probably don't, and I've seen it on sale in San Juan more often than anywhere else - I've no idea why. San Juan also has a couple of sidequests you might like - look for a woman in the tavern in a piratey outfit, she might have a job for you...

Edit: I don't realy like spanish port's locations, way to far from nevis , I usually don't sail that low on the caribean, and when I do feels more challenging having no close port, also I'm Spanish IRL x'D and I don't really like the history of Spain and his role, so I usually go with anyone else on any game x'D but i will try to visit undercover, to look for that woman x'D

Well haha x'D I actually Edited to have 16 golden armour+16 x4pistol plus x16swords (dont remember the name) I actually did this to put them all in the locker for the crew, i only have one official yet, and is not going to fight with me

Incidentally, instead of starting off as "corsair", why not try "swordmaster"? That gets you gold armour and a nice sword without cheating, plus good melee skill, though you'll need to find a clock and compass for yourself because "swordmaster" doesn't get those for free. You also aren't as good at sailing, but you can hire a navigator to deal with that. The armour, sword and starting skills should give you a chance in a fight.

Actually I was thinking on starting as an Agent since Luck seems the harder stat to level up, and having already 5 plust the % bonus (was 0.25?) seems really good, and well I edited too to have a good compass and clock x'D I'm roleplaying an already equiped Captain x'D as I am playing on Iron man mode I don't have that much time to start completely from zero

La Tortue should be on the map. All towns should be on the map, but might only show up if you've visited them or have bought a map of the island, so if you want La Tortue to show up, buy a map of Hispaniola. Then look at the small island to the north of the west end of Hispaniola.

Okey that's very helpful, I had no clue you needed the maps first, that's going to help me a lot, if it where arcade mode who cares right, you could sail the caribean in 2 minutes checking stuff...

Thanks a lot!

 

[Grey Roger]

The only Spanish port in the far south is Cartagena. Cuba is next to Jamaica and Puerto Rico is next to Nevis. As for history, you can always play to rewrite it. Otherwise you could sign up for Holland - most of their ports are way to the south, but there's Philipsburg on St. Martin which is close to Nevis. (Go south anyway. Especially when you get a good reputation. Someone in Kralendijk tavern won't trust you until your reputation is nice, and when he does, he has a little job for you which ends with you getting the best sword in the game.)

The point about starting as swordmaster is that you said you're always getting killed, and swordmaster gives you the sword, the armour and the melee skill so that you might survive long enough to find the compass and clock. Or just edit the game to have them at the start.

 

[Lrv]

Go south anyway. Especially when you get a good reputation. Someone in Kralendijk tavern won't trust you until your reputation is nice, and when he does, he has a little job for you which ends with you getting the best sword in the game.)

Well I'm going for the worst reputation posible x'D (trying at least) so I guess I wont be able to do that quest in this playthrough, but if you are talking about:

Spoiler

Sword of Cortés (Best one but can't be upgraded by blacksmith right?)
Sabre of Nicholas Sharp (If upgraded its better than SoC plus you don't lose 1 luck x'D unles SC has some special powers that I don't know about, apart from the +1 mele)
I found them editing to get a sword with the higher block % , for what we talked before, about no focusing on melee

 

[Grey Roger]

If you're going for an evil reputation then you'll want to do the "Hard Labours of an Assassin" quest, which gets you -10 reputation per kill and is also the one that gets you the Cortes sword. You won't like that sword, though, because you're trying to improve your Luck and that one gives you -1 Luck. But if you find your way into Port au Prince when you're high enough level (at least 15), you can find Angelique Moulin, who I believe is less fussy about reputation, and whose quest can eventually lead to another nice sword which doesn't have the Luck penalty. It can't be upgraded by a blacksmith either, but on the other hand, like the Cortes sword, it doesn't wear out.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

There may indeed be a time delay required between completing one ship hunting quest and getting another. That's to prevent you from doing exactly what you're trying, which is keep taking one quest after another to get lots of money and XP without going anywhere.

There is. I have a faint memory of exactly that.

Thanks god you writed that, i was already planning to sail there today haha

You can right-click on any island in the Archipelago Map to see what nations own the island and towns.

Portugal owns nothing as Britain has taken over Grenada, Portugal's only territory in earlier periods - you'll still see their ships and a Portuguese flag will get you into British ports. America only has Eleuthera (2 towns).

There are still a Portuguese emissary and tailor on the island though, so you can still play for them (and take over the Caribbean in their name if you want ).

 

[Grey Roger]

I'm playing on napoleonic period 1830, (mostly because is where most of the best looking ships are and i'm in love with the "brown and black essex ship" any essex actually, and razee, and poseidon, and...)
as a pirate on Iron man mode. I waited to gather a few questions to ask them all at once

I've cheated a bit, steam ships off, and adding all the Poseidon on this era, I love that ship ( º 3º) (plus starting with a beautiful essex, was hard to decide between constitution and razee...)

Something has just occurred to me. If you're playing in 1830, why disable steam ships? They're certainly a fantasy in what most people would consider the "Napoleonic" period, i.e. when Napoleon was alive - up to 1821. Since they're fantasy ships, I added another fantasy version. But in 1830 they might be more valid, and you might like that version because you're playing an evil pirate.

There are still a Portuguese emissary and tailor on the island though, so you can still play for them (and take over the Caribbean in their name if you want ).

True, but that doesn't help if you're looking for ports belonging to your choice of nation.

Of course, if you're playing as a pirate, the pirate fort on Bonaire and the smuggler camp on Grenada will welcome you!

 

[Pieter Boelen]

True, but that doesn't help if you're looking for ports belonging

Indeed it doesn't!
I only mentioned it as "bonus information for funsies".

 

[Lrv]

Halph!

When I try to quicksave says this:

Quick save: Failed you can't save without an active profile

Then I use the normal save , but after closing the game, when I load the profile those saves ain't there, and sometimes when I click Load and profiles, some of them are missing

 

[Grey Roger]

Do you have several "FreePlay" saves under different profiles? I've seen this as well, if I have more than one profile under the same storyline. But if I quit the game entirely and start again, all the profiles are there; and when I load the one I want, all the savegames are there. It just gets confused if I try to load a file without quitting the game first.

One thing I've found is that when I do a normal save, it also does a quicksave at the same time. This never shows up in the profile, even if I only have one profile. But I can press F6 to reload the last save.

The only way I know to get back to proper behaviour is to quit the game, start the game, delete all profiles except one, then quit again and delete the file "Options". I can then start the game, and can then load from and save to the one remaining profile.

And I never use quicksave. (Apart from the automatic quicksave built into normal save, that is.)

 

[Lrv]

Actually I was trying to delete other profiles from Freeplay , but after deleting them the next time I open the game they are there again lol

 

[Grey Roger]

Delete the file "Options", which you'll find at the top level of the game installation folder. If you customised any settings such as keyboard assignments, you'll need to set them again. The game will create a new "Options" file next time you start it.

Right after starting the game for the first time after a fresh install, I set up everything the way I want it, quit at once, and make a copy of "Options". Sometimes it gets corrupted and does weird things to the game, so when the game starts doing weird things, I delete the current "Options", copy the copy and rename the second copy back to "Options", and that way I get a known good file with all my settings and without the corruption. You can also do this after deleting the file and starting the game. Don't load a savegame or start actual play; just run the game, do whatever you want to the menu settings, quit the game, and copy the fresh "Options" file.

 

[Lrv]

I've deleted everything and started a new one (being the only profile) to be sure, it's working fine! Thanks!