I am disappointed so far

[Rad]

I am quite disappointed so far with game. I reached Martinique, immediatelly fire all my crew and left only two my officers but only in inactive form as passengers. So, this way I thought would needn't to pay them anything. But as was my surprise when they want me to pay them 55000 piasters after some time while I was all the time at land. For what, I ask? Is this game ever playabe somehow reasonably? I am starting to doubt about it. Everything is very, very expensive, I can hardly earn my money for repairing my frigate, replenishing some ammunition for cannons and so on. So, I have have a question. Is there any possibilitiy to remove completely all my officers so as would needn't to pay them at all for the time when will earn some more money? I am earning money with gambling and killing skeleton in dungeon and seling their valuables.

 

[Thagarr]

If you are still captaining the frigate Rad, everything will be a LOT more expensive! You should be able to get enough money fighting skeletons and looting chests to buy a sloop or a lugger to captain. All your stats take a serious hit if you are captaining a ship way above your level, even when you are on land. You can just leave one officer in charge of the frigate without a crew and she will still sail with you, although very slowly. You can earn some money fighting skeletons, but not near enough, the only way to really earn significant funds is by capturing prey and looting prey, put one of your officers in charge and bring her back to port and sell her and the cargo.

Take a sloop or a lugger and your frigate out hunting, save the game before you leave port so you can always try again if things don't go your way. Go look for a fat merchant ship(preferably not friendly) or a single pirate ship, once you engage your prey, order the frigate to sail off so she is out of harms way during the battle. Whittle your prey down a bit with chain and grape and board her. You can bring up to 3 officers along with you when you board, arm them and give them healing potions as best you can and they will help significantly during the boarding action. If you can take the "Musket Volley" skill early, that will help a great deal during boarding as well. It may take a few tries to successfully capture a ship, but with all the sword fighting experience you have gotten with the skeletons, it should be a bit easier. Don't give up on it yet mate! Trust me, it takes a bit of getting used to, but this game is really worth all the frustration starting out.

 

[Luke159]

Yes park the Frigate in port at the port contoler and buy a Sloop and visit the merchant, save the game and then ask him if he has any jobs, if the offer isn't to your liking ie, to far away reload the game and ask again. Keep doing that till you get what you want and head to the destination. Officer wise try to have a nav, cannoneer and trade officer for now you won't need any other's. Your monthly costs will be lower and you should be able to make a profit, once you have unlocked a few ship perks you can start taking on the pirates and you can start making the more serious money like Thagarr has pointed out by looting ships and selling there cargo, cannons and ships at port.

 

[Rad]

Luke, you probably didn't realize that laying up frigate cost 42000 piasters. If anybody hardly started game it is unattainable sum. Never mind I resolved this problem somehow as was advised. I let sailing it through my oficer without crew and when any battle starts I give him order to escape. This way my frigate stays undamaged so far. But there are tons and tons strange things which are going me to mad. Everything here is adjusted somehow almost maliciously, so that player is rather frustrated and nervous instead to entertain by playing. At least I have this feeling and I can't to enjoy at least by a little fluent playing. All the time it is only save-load. The worst thing I consider here is I can't to avoid any battle at sea. This way almost anybody can invade me because although even I have fast lugger and Pit as navigator, ships are very often faster than me. I fought with English 2 ships and I defeated one of them and than I wanted to espace the other. So, I rised sails as much as possible and run away quite long time. The enemy ship wasn't already at my compas visible and I was in my home port at Martinique back but I wasn't able to land because somewhere in long distance was an English ship and this didn't alloved me to land. It is very stupid adjustement whic never was in POTC. I even don't know how to exchange my weapon at my officer. Pit has two saber one worse and he has equipped it and the second, better. But I I am not able to find out how to exchange these two weapons in his case in order to be able to use better saber. I can say I have a headache from it. I tried to earn some money by gambling. But after some time nobody wanted to play with me any longer in this port. And so on and on.

 

[Luke159]

Well i would have just over minimum crew onboard the Frigate and i would use that ship to do merchant runs till i have about 100,000 then i would park the Frigate and buy a small ship. I'm not sure what sized cargo hold the Frigate has but its got to be about 2000 to 3000 which should earn you about 20,000+ piasters per merchant run so you see after about 3 runs which if you only accept local destinations that take a few day's at most you will easily have the funds you need to park that Frigate and take on a smaller ship.

It does take some getting use to, COAS play's much different to POTC and offer's more challanges, i find playing POTC to be harder when trying because i'm use to the buttons configeration of COAS now. YOu can also change the button configeration to a more suitable setting.

To change weapons, press F2, hit the iteams tab and look for the saber you wish to equip, simple click on that saber and you will be asked if you wish to equip this iteam say yes, you do this to any iteam thats equipable.

 

[Scrogdog]

Hi, Rad.

As I mentioned in another topic, the Blood quest is not a "normal" start. It is a difficult campaign, which is why I suggested a normal start for you to learn the game.

There is no question that it is difficult to get going in the game. As you get more powerful things are easier to handle. It is getting there in the first place that is bothersome.

If I were in your position right now, I'd sell the frigate and fire the officers. The ship is unique, but it's too much of a pain to try and keep it. Or you can try to use it as a merchant like Luke said.

You should be in a small fast ship with no officers to start. Say, a sloop. That's for a normal start anyway.

It's not that you aren't making money, it's that you overhead costs are consuming you. So, do away with the overhead or make more money.

At first, you'll make money by talking quests from the merchants. Use a technique called "save scumming" to make sure that you don't need to travel too far. In other words, save outside before you go in to the merchant. If you don't like the quest, reload and go in again. You can also use this when you need ofiicers - save outside a tavern and relaod if you don't like the officers you see. Forget making money on land. Land is only good to train your fighting skills.

Go to Port Control and take the quests that ask you to return someone's log to them. You will improve your navigation quickly with that. Ignore the "stolen ship" quests at Port Control.

Just keep doing those two types of quests, and get better ships as you go. By the time you get a corvette, you should be ready to really play as you like.

At some point, get a ship with a good cargo hold and then trade for money. Use the trade price lists and you'll make a killing. Precious metals and elite wood will make you a lot of money, to the point where money is meaningless. You can deposit money in a bank at 5% interest or higher. Keep it in Port Royale so you won't lose cash to a raid. Once you've got a few million, you will have no money worries again, you will make all you need from interest.

Ship and personal perks are THE KEYS to the game. The "Old Sea Dog" perk will allow you to "Sail Away" even if a sqaudron catches you, though it won't work 100% of the time. Also, if you enter a battle when you first see the battle icon come up rather than letting the enemy start the battle by getting close, you will probably be able to go back to the strategic map and make the enemy disappear just as if you had outrun them.

Get a navigator with the "faster sailing" and "better manouver" perks asap.

Use land and other ships as obstacles to your persuers. Note that you can ride right through a battle that is occuring but your persuers will veer off from encounters like that.

Trust me, sooner or later the tides will be turned and the game becomes the other way around. You will be unbeatable.

 

[Handel]

Rad, it was already said many times on the forum. Dump the ********* frigate at the port control in any town. It is good to boast with a Rolls Royce and 200 manservants but not when you cannot afford it. If you really want to use the big "booms" from the very begining instead of following the natural "growth" path then simply use the cheats and give yourselfs 50,000,000 or such.

 

[Sordid]

Well actually I'm beginning to think selling the frigate isn't such a bad idea after all. I mean, I played the game, scraped together enough cash to store the damn thing... aaaaand then I never bothered going back for it. I prefer small, fast ships, so I went sloop -> schooner -> brigantine -> Blue Bird -> Dog of War. It's nice to have in the collection, but nothing really special.

 

[Luke159]

Well actually I'm beginning to think selling the frigate isn't such a bad idea after all. I mean, I played the game, scraped together enough cash to store the damn thing... aaaaand then I never bothered going back for it. I prefer small, fast ships, so I went sloop -> schooner -> brigantine -> Blue Bird -> Dog of War. It's nice to have in the collection, but nothing really special.

LOL, you can alway's edit the ShipsUtilites in Age of Pirates 2\Program\scripts to allow the Arabella to be generated at shipyards without having to start a new game, i've done this because that ship is otherwise tied down to the Peter Blood character and makes the ship pointless since i will never play as Peter Blood.

 

[Fred Bob]

Well actually I'm beginning to think selling the frigate isn't such a bad idea after all. I mean, I played the game, scraped together enough cash to store the damn thing... aaaaand then I never bothered going back for it. I prefer small, fast ships, so I went sloop -> schooner -> brigantine -> Blue Bird -> Dog of War. It's nice to have in the collection, but nothing really special.

Arrr, dat be exactly what ol' Fred Bob done in his current game! Couldn't scrape together nuff cash tew store it, so he sold it! Dat Blue Bird be a sweet lil' ship and kin take on much larger vessels! 2

 

[Sordid]

Luke, you probably didn't realize that laying up frigate cost 42000 piasters. If anybody hardly started game it is unattainable sum.

No it's not, you can finish the Blood quest with close to a hundred thousand if you do it right.

i will never play as Peter Blood.

Oh you should! The ship isn't really worth it, but the two extra quest officers that other characters can't get definitely are, plus the intro quest allows you to get far more money and better equipment than the other characters get to start with. Overall I'd guess it's some forty five minutes to speedrun the quest with the walkthrough and it makes the early game significantly easier. If you just don't like the character model, swapping it for one of the others is five minutes' work.

 

[Handel]

I found fully upgraded Dogs of war the best ship for training the companions. The only problem is to be carefull not to give them an order to board a class 2 or 1 ship or they will sink their old ship and will transfer to the new one.

 

[Rad]

Thanks to all for your suggestions. I hope I will try to proceed somehow.