Character too weak...

[LittleMorgan]

I'm having some serious troubles here - my character is too weak and has too low combat skills.
Compared to my officers I simply suck... they mow down almost a whole town single handed while I am happy if I can win a "normal" 1v1 duel.
I thought them skills will raise nicely through boarding battles, but most of the time the enemy either surrenders or if a battle starts my crew and officers mow down the enemey crew before I can get close to one to land a single hit...
How do you train your combat skills?

 

[Sordid]

<!--quoteo(post=325705:date=Jun 6 2009, 01:10 AM:name=LittleMorgan)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (LittleMorgan @ Jun 6 2009, 01:10 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=325705"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->How do you train your combat skills?<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
By fighting, go figure. <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/laugh.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":" border="0" alt="laugh.gif" />
Your suckiness probably has severeal reasons. Firstly unless you modded the game you have disproportionaltely low basic stats compared to your officers; check the thread in the modding section for a fix (you'll have to start a new game, though).
Secondly, the combat prowess of your crew is determined by their soldiering skill; if they're skilled and you're low level it's quite possible they vastly outperform you.
And thirdly, this game at least attempts some realism. Don't expect to mow down hordes of enemies all by yourself, that simply doesn't happen, at least not without some tactical stuff like positioning yourself in a narrow doorway. In boarding battles numbers trump skill; hence why I usually participate by making sure none of my guys are fighting one on one, that only bogs down the battle. If I see that, I run over and help my guy out. We take the enemy down quickly and <i>he</i> can then go help out other guys too. Once you establish numerical superiority you've won. Well, unless the enemy has vastly more skilled soldiers...

I've found town dungeons quite suitable for training combat skills. Walk into the light, lure a bunch of skeletons to a narrow doorway where you can take them one at a time, and start hacking. Rinse and repeat until there are no skeletons. Then walk into the light again.

 

[vietanh797]

combat skill only improve in fighting but you can improve personal abilities and ship abilities by attack fort
one fort with about 8x cannon can bring you much more exp than 5 dynamic battle

 

[Tahlendorf]

As Sordid said, town dungeons are the best way for combat skills training at the beginning of the game and the objects looted from the corpses of the skeletons become a good source of initial income of piasters (specially those heavy statues that raise you HeavyWeapons +10 are paid by 1,000 piasters each) and little stats boosters. If you have combatant officers put them as passengers, because it´s easier to play solo tactics fighting on narrow passages (specially at doors) fighting 1 skeleton at a time, because companions tend to do suicidal runs asking for a painful dead as a sword-brochette. You can allow them to come with you only at level 25-30 and loaded with a 20 potions or even more... they only treat her wounds and the poisoning of the skeletons once thay´ve finished the nearest objectives, but they continue running through them even on 5% of health.... in this cases IA sucks badly, specially when they go crazy for the enemy and they block your pass, and you can only shoot the enemys... well, let´s say in these cases you´re lucky if you can shoot them because most of the time your officer is right in the middle and the shoot goes for him.

<b>BEST REGARDS</b>

 

[LittleMorgan]

Ty, ty - this dungeon boot camp is working pretty well indeed... <img src="style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/duel_pa.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":ixi" border="0" alt="duel_pa.gif" />