Discussion Self Restrictions for Roleplaying and Items

[SillyWilly]

Ahoy my friendos

I feel like I play this game the same way every playthrough so I was wondering what restrictions and challenges you give yourselves when you play? Also if you add roleplaying restrictions as well? What I have come up with so far are restrictions before being able to purchase/use items like the below though I need more and I need to edit this to make a little more sense roleplay wise:

Use Grenades: (defeat a fort)
Have 2 Bodyguards: (Level 5 Leadership)
Have 3 Bodyguards: (Max Leadership)
Use Musket/High Damage Gun: (Max Melee)
Use Nicholas Sharp's Sword: (Capture Mefisto)
Use Clint Eastwood's Gun: (Fully upgrade a tier 3 ship)
Use Trident: (Finish main questline)

Also, do you guys have restrictions or guidance on restricting hiring officers/passengers from taverns? I feel like I make the game a bit too easy by hiring a bunch of low level officers early in the game and just have them sit on the ship passively leveling until they are maxed out. Let me know what you guys do so I can add in some fun to my next playthrough!

 

[SillyWilly]

Should have added above in terms of game settings/options:
-Nathanial Hawk storyline.
-I have realistic sailing ON
-Trader/Item scaling is OFF (which allows all items to be purchased at stores)
-No restrictions on ships (which allows them to be purchased at shipyards)
-Leveling is by actions (so not the stock POTC leveling)

 

[Grey Roger]

There is no restriction on hiring officers - in fact, hiring low level officers, assigning them to positions and letting them level up is exactly what you are meant to do.

My own restrictions - self-imposed, without any coding to enforce them - include:
. Don't use muskets at all except on land - in reality they'd be too cumbersome for use on a ship, especially on lower decks.
. Only sell captured ships at a port belonging to a nation for which I have a Letter of Marque, or a pirate port, or Tortuga (officially French but friendly to pirates).

. No buying ships, at least not if I'm playing a pirate or privateer, which is most of the time. There's only one respectable way to get a new ship, and that's by taking it from someone else.
. No buying weapons either - again, take what you need from dead enemies, earn it in quests, or find it in dungeons. (But I do buy armour, though only battle cuirass and gold cuirass. I haven't changed the scaling, which means they're only for sale when I'm high enough level and then only from traders in richer ports.)
. No supernatural stuff - no visiting Vanderdecken, no trident, no killing Blackbeard to get his sword. In fact, except when needed during "Hoist the Colours", don't go to Isla de Muerte at all.

And a couple which do involve changing settings:
. In "InternalSettings.h", "ITEM_REALISM" is set to 1, which means no skill bonuses from gems or Indian trinkets.
. In "Options", "Survival" set to 130 - dead means dead, no resurrecting to the nearest tavern (partly because it's liable to foul up storylines and sidequests).

 

[SillyWilly]

There is no restriction on hiring officers - in fact, hiring low level officers, assigning them to positions and letting them level up is exactly what you are meant to do.

My own restrictions - self-imposed, without any coding to enforce them - include:
. Don't use muskets at all except on land - in reality they'd be too cumbersome for use on a ship, especially on lower decks.
. Only sell captured ships at a port belonging to a nation for which I have a Letter of Marque, or a pirate port, or Tortuga (officially French but friendly to pirates).

. No buying ships, at least not if I'm playing a pirate or privateer, which is most of the time. There's only one respectable way to get a new ship, and that's by taking it from someone else.
. No buying weapons either - again, take what you need from dead enemies, earn it in quests, or find it in dungeons. (But I do buy armour, though only battle cuirass and gold cuirass. I haven't changed the scaling, which means they're only for sale when I'm high enough level and then only from traders in richer ports.)
. No supernatural stuff - no visiting Vanderdecken, no trident, no killing Blackbeard to get his sword. In fact, except when needed during "Hoist the Colours", don't go to Isla de Muerte at all.

And a couple which do involve changing settings:
. In "InternalSettings.h", "ITEM_REALISM" is set to 1, which means no skill bonuses from gems or Indian trinkets.
. In "Options", "Survival" set to 130 - dead means dead, no resurrecting to the nearest tavern (partly because it's liable to foul up storylines and sidequests).

Nice! I really like the pirate roleplay I gotta go all in on that one

For the trader scaling are you worried that you may miss out on anything by having it on? I mean that the game decides what you can buy so you may miss out on an item entirely if you out-level it. That's really the only reason I have it off lol

Also the officer hiring thing just bewilders me I always go back and forth on it . I feel like all I ever do is hire a bunch of low-level guys then have them turn to god's by just chilling on the ship. No risk to them or reason to put them in harms way. I end up hiring 2 of each type of officer and just have one bodyguard of a guy that is oinly good for fighting anyways.

 

[Grey Roger]

There's no point in buying low level items, apart from a spade and pickaxe if you don't already have them when you need them for a treasure quest. But if you take a treasure quest which needs a spade and you don't already have one, item traders will stock it just for the quest. The same applies to the pickaxe. Other weapons don't concern me, I don't care whether traders sell them because I don't buy them anyway.

That reminds me - I never buy medicaments either. Bandages are the first things that can be found in random chests and occasionally on dead enemies. Looting everything in sight means I soon have plenty of bandages.

Another thing I do for FreePlay is pick sidequests appropriate to the character. Many are general-purpose quests suitable for anyone. But I'll only do the "Peter Blood" quests, "French Pirate in the Tavern" and "Silver Train", and not do "Escort Vigila Mendes" if I'm playing as a pirate; I'll only do "Hard Labours of an Assassin" and "Sinking the Vogelstruijs" if I'm playing as an agent. And, ironically, I never do "Smuggling for Thomas O'Reily" if I'm a smuggler because it turns the smugglers' guild against me. The main point is so that FreePlay is not always a matter of going round collecting all the same quests - pick some suitable for the role, complete those, earn some money and levels, and then quit that game and start another one doing something else.