Hornblower Quest Completed Successfully

[Grey Roger]

Melee 2 is indeed very weak - I'm surprised you survived the main storyline with that! Armour is pretty much essential for both yourself and your officers if you intend to go up against enemy warships as their crews will probably be as tough as Quelp. The German rapier is a moderately decent sword but the swept-hilt rapier is better, while the Hibernian, Polish szabla and Templar sword are better yet. For a truly awesome sword, go to Bonaire - you'll need to either moor at a beach and walk overland, or go into Kralendijk under a false flag, as Holland is hostile to Britain in the "Napoleonic" period. If your reputation is good, there's a man in Kralendijk tavern who may trust you with a problem, and if you help him, his reward is the best sword in the game. Alternatively, if you're near Port au Prince, sneak into town and try to find Angelique Moulin, who also needs help and the end reward may be a very good sword.

You earn relation points by sinking or capturing enemy ships. The ships which you can sink on behalf of governors certainly help, but so do any other enemy ships you find on the high seas. Look at your "Relations" screen and when the value for Britain turns green, it means you have enough points for a promotion. Then go and talk to a governor, whose dialog should then have a new option "I've heard I'm up for promotion."

 

[Grey Roger]

You can also just attack any enemies of Britain at random. Hit the big ships, get more points. Hit a town, even better.
Everything contributes to your points and when your nation rank turns green in F2>Nations Relations, then it's time to find a governor again.

Hitting a town is beyond your current ability as Hornblower. Until you earn that promotion to captain, you're in a small frigate with 12lb guns. To attack a fort, you need at least 18lb guns and a tough enough ship to withstand the fort's guns. If you have the "Landing Party" ability then you can attack unfortified colonies, which means the various pirate outposts plus Aruba.

Those ship-hunting quests can be fun to find a guaranteed relatively evenly-matched challenge,
but once you have a Letter of Marque (LoM), or you're in the Navy, it's probably a bit boring/restrictive/ineffective to keep doing them.
Their main purpose is that when you don't have a LoM, you can use those quests to gain points with a nation, get some "safe" experience/money/points and also reduce the cost of a LoM when you decide to get one.

That depends on your definition of "safe". They're still warships, and if you have Melee 2, a modest sword and no armour, they might not be that safe to capture - though you can still try to sink them. Otherwise, look for merchants, whose crews are weaker and which are more likely to surrender after being shot up a bit. You don't get as many points for them but at least you're more likely to survive. (If you don't have a LoM, attacking merchants, even enemy ones, is piracy. But if you're Hornblower and have completed the main storyline then you're a naval officer who effectively has a LoM built in.)

 

[Pieter Boelen]

If your reputation is good, there's a man in Kralendijk tavern who may trust you with a problem, and if you help him, his reward is the best sword in the game.

Is that really the best one? If I recall, you can get that one relatively easily at the beginning of the game.
Isn't that almost like a "cheat" then?

That depends on your definition of "safe". They're still warships, and if you have Melee 2, a modest sword and no armour, they might not be that safe to capture

Very true; that's why I wrote it in quotation marks.
The code does aim to give you a somewhat evenly matched battle while you're on a low level with small ship (can't remember anymore if the ship is on player level or ship tier).
But then... Once you've got a LoM, I recall adding some code to start "upping the ante" so it won't stay so evenly matched forever.
In the end, you might be put up against the biggest ships the enemy has to offer.

 

[BathtubPirate]

For a truly awesome sword, go to Bonaire - you'll need to either moor at a beach and walk overland, or go into Kralendijk under a false flag, as Holland is hostile to Britain in the "Napoleonic" period. If your reputation is good, there's a man in Kralendijk tavern who may trust you with a problem, and if you help him, his reward is the best sword in the game.

Is it still the Sword of Nicholas Sharp? I'm somewhat surprised it is the best one in the game, since it's not that difficult to obtain. Although I think "the best" is a bit up to personal interpretation. In the basic game, Conquistador has the best block, Corsairs Pride the best pierce and Windmill Slayer the most damage, but I think Vagrant, Squall and mostly Falchion are the most balanced.

Thanks for the advice, I think I get the whole LoM system now. As I said I might have been not that well prepared, but I also never really got out of the main quest.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Is it still the Sword of Nicholas Sharp?

I'm somewhat surprised it is the best one in the game, since it's not that difficult to obtain. Although I think "the best" is a bit up to personal interpretation. In the basic game, Conquistador has the best block, Corsairs Pride the best pierce and Windmill Slayer the most damage, but I think Vagrant, Squall and mostly Falchion are the most balanced.

I always liked the Solingen Rapier as well.

Thanks for the advice, I think I get the whole LoM system now. As I said I might have been not that well prepared, but I also never really got out of the main quest.

Not being prepared and just DOING stuff is a great way of learning!

 

[BathtubPirate]

I always liked the Solingen Rapier as well.

It's getting OT but that would be the one called Silver Leaf in the original? Très chic, but not available in the stock game, it's assigned to street merchants and should appear in rotation with Schiavona and Yataghan but doesn't. I gave it to Amerigo Vieira so you get it as a trophy when you defeat him, similarly to how you get the Squall by defeating the teacher.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

It's getting OT but that would be the one called Silver Leaf in the original? Très chic, but not available in the stock game, it's assigned to street merchants and should appear in rotation with Schiavona and Yataghan but doesn't. I gave it to Amerigo Vieira so you get it as a trophy when you defeat him, similarly to how you get the Squall by defeating the teacher.

It is a mod-added sword, but I think you're right that it is a more golden retexture of the stock game Silver Leaf.

 

[Grey Roger]

Is that really the best one? If I recall, you can get that one relatively easily at the beginning of the game.
Isn't that almost like a "cheat" then?

You can only get that quest if you have a good reputation. If you get it right at the beginning of the game then it probably is a cheat, in that you used cheatmode to raise your reputation enough for Toff Oremans to trust you. But you can certainly get it a lot sooner than, say, Francis Drake's sword, as Angelique Moulin doesn't appear until you're at least level 15.

Is it still the Sword of Nicholas Sharp? I'm somewhat surprised it is the best one in the game, since it's not that difficult to obtain. Although I think "the best" is a bit up to personal interpretation. In the basic game, Conquistador has the best block, Corsairs Pride the best pierce and Windmill Slayer the most damage, but I think Vagrant, Squall and mostly Falchion are the most balanced.

Stats have changed a lot, as well as names. Going by dodgy memory, Conquistador is now Spanish Nobility Longsword and still has a good block (56); Corsairs Pride is still Corsairs Pride and has good pierce (49); Windmill Slayer might now be Dutch Admiralty Sword, in which case its damage isn't that wonderful compared to some others (min 27, max 37); and Nicholas Sharp's sword outclasses them all (damage 27 / 45, pierce 70, block 80). There are also the Portuguese Officer's Sword and Back-Bladed Sword, not as nice as some but still pretty good and can be found lying around in dungeons - which, incidentally, are good places to get some Melee training.

Amerigo Vieira now has a much better sword, and the Dark Teacher now has armour as well as improved skills - if you can't take on Quelp then you probably don't want to face the Dark Teacher yet, either...

 

[Pieter Boelen]

You can only get that quest if you have a good reputation. If you get it right at the beginning of the game then it probably is a cheat, in that you used cheatmode to raise your reputation enough for Toff Oremans to trust you. But you can certainly get it a lot sooner than, say, Francis Drake's sword, as Angelique Moulin doesn't appear until you're at least level 15.

You only need to get 1+ in reputation. If I recall, that's quite easy to do.
Talk to a bunch of citizens, say the nice things and there you go.

 

[Grey Roger]

Maybe bump up the reputation requirement to "Matey", alias REPUTATION_GOOD, which is currently 65? While you can achieve that by being nice to citizens, don't forget that they have a chance of picking your pocket, so you end up with reputation "Matey" and no money - unless you choose to try to get your money back and probably lose reputation in the process...

 

[BathtubPirate]

We could raise the required reputation and/or level, or switch Toffs reward saber with the one you get during the Level 15 quest on Port au Prince. If Nicholas Sharps saber is that good, then I don't think any of those changes would be too drastic.

For example, I don't think the following would be too much for the best Sword in the whole game. Hope the code is correct though.

  case "daughter_3":
   if (makeint(pchar.reputation >65) && (makeint(pchar.rank) > 6)
   {
    Dialog.snd = "voice\TOOR\TOOR008";
    dialog.text = DLG_TEXT[18];
    link.l1 = DLG_TEXT[19];
    link.l1.go = "daughter_4";
   }

 

[Grey Roger]

Don't use absolute values like 65, use variables like REPUTATION_GOOD, which is currently 65 but could theoretically change. The original check was against absolute value 50, which might have made sense originally but is now midway between REPUTATION_NEUTRAL ("Neutral") and REPUTATION_PLAIN ("Bloke"). You can find the variable definitions in "PROGRAM\Characters\characters.h".

Anyway, I've already made the change to reputation required. It's gone into a last-minute revision of the update archive.

The reward for this quest remains the Nicholas Sharp sabre. The reward for "Find Angelique Moulin's Father", which is the level 15 quest in Port au Prince, is Francis Drake's sword. This has slightly inferior stats to Nicholas Sharp's sabre but it doesn't wear out the way most swords do, including Nicholas Sharp's sabre.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

The reward for this quest remains the Nicholas Sharp sabre. The reward for "Find Angelique Moulin's Father", which is the level 15 quest in Port au Prince, is Francis Drake's sword. This has slightly inferior stats to Nicholas Sharp's sabre but it doesn't wear out the way most swords do, including Nicholas Sharp's sabre.

Heh... Funny how an accidental lack of bonus interface screenshots caused it to be more special!
Though in this case, indeed I think it was intentional. There's a remark about it in the description, isn't there?

 

[BathtubPirate]

and wait till you see what happens when you're promoted to Post Captain...

Check. Nice quest in best Hornblower fashion! But to be honest, I thought the battle against the Natividad was easier then some of the battles I fought to get my promotion...

Assuming there isn't anything else in terms of story-quests, I think I'm done with Hornblower for the time being. I'm just not that much of a fan of constant sea battles, I prefer story-oriented quests and land-stuff. Now it's full time Woodes Rogers, and then I have 5 more main stories to explore.

But I also bought a treasure map and the chest was empty. How are the luck skill and the chance of the treasure actually being there balanced? My Hornblower only has a luck skill of 2. Also, when does the code determine whether there is a treasure or not? I did reload a save from after accepting the quest several times, but after 5 or 6 unsuccessful tries I gave up. Of course, if the code decides that the chest is gonna be empty as soon as I buy the map, this undertaking was useless from the beginning.

Oh, and guess what, I found my grandfathers old Hornblower novels at the attic! Unfortunately, they were printed in the 40s which means most of them are in Fraktur, which I can barely read.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Assuming there isn't anything else in terms of story-quests, I think I'm done with Hornblower for the time being.

There isn't.
Other than the regular side quests.

But I also bought a treasure map and the chest was empty. How are the luck skill and the chance of the treasure actually being there balanced? My Hornblower only has a luck skill of 2.

Better get used to plenty empty treasure chests then.
I can't remember the exact formula, but Luck 2 doesn't give you very high chances if I recall.

Of course, if the code decides that the chest is gonna be empty as soon as I buy the map, this undertaking was useless from the beginning.

It does indeed.
That seemed like the least cheat-prone way to handle it.

Oh, and guess what, I found my grandfathers old Hornblower novels at the attic!

They're good ones! Recommended.