Now Boarding, Party of One....

[Bilgepump]

Question: Why do you take out the masts after grappling?

As far as I can tell, it has no effect on anything after the ship's crippled.

[Steely Jim]

I am not entirely certain to whom that question is directed, but personally there is only one reason that I take out masts after I have grappled a ship: there's a big ship circling me and my prey, and I'm waiting to board until I'm looking at their aft sailing away from me. So, no it doesn't add anything, but cannonballs are free and it's good for my timing when swinging back to my ship.

Other than that, as I alluded to in post #30, I take out masts before I fire grapples. Although, as I discovered yesterday when I was trying to test out the bug where enabled/crippled ships just kept on sailing. What I discovered is that I've become so fixated on de-sailing enemy ships in the distance, that I sort of have to make a conscious effort now to let them get to me with some sail power intact. Actually, that was born out of laziness, as I got tired of sailing out to board ships and started leaving them with sails for long enough to let them sail back toward me.

EDIT: I remembered another reason: I'm waiting to see if more mobs will come out on the deck before enough time elapses that I can't put off boarding anymore. This usually happens when I'm boarding larger ships, and hoping to take out as many mobs as I can before boarding. Again, taking out masts doesn't add anything to my character, but it keeps me occupied while I'm waiting for someone else to stroll across the deck of the enemy ship.

EDIT2: After re-reading my first post, I suppose it wasn't made clear that I did take some actions between earning boarding rights, and actually firing my grappling hooks/lines; in any case, as I divulged later in the thread, I had to give that up because I discovered precisely that it wasn't useless to keep firing even after you have earned boarding rights--after all, someone once took the boarding rights from me by continuing to fire on a ship that I had already reduced but hadn't yet grappled.

So, there can be an effect to continuing to fire on a ship before it is grappled, as you could potentially steal someone else's boarding rights.

[Bilgepump]

Ok, that makes sense.

[Steely Jim]

I just solo boarded a Level-19 Navy Centurion off Cutthroat Island. The crew consisted of the helmsman and 6 Level-10 Sargeants. I took out the helmsman and 3 of the Sargeants with regular cannonballs before I boarded. I took out the remaining 3 Sargeants with cutlass, after I boarded.

I plundered 2 Royal Chests (both emeralds), 1 Treasure Chest, and 1 Cargo Crate.


EDIT: Hmm, apparently I'm slower to report my failures, but I also had a negative outcome with a Level-20 Ironwall off Isla Perdida yesterday.

I got ambushed! After grappling, I took out the helmsman, a level-12 Thug, and a level-10 Thug with regular cannonballs. I boarded, with 14 seconds left, to find a level-10 Thug and a level-16 Grunt waiting for me. They were far enough away that I could pan the camera around to look for other mobs; I didn't see any. So, I engaged them both with cutlass drawn.

We exchanged attacks, and suddenly 4 more level-16 Grunts appeared in a semi-circle to my left and behind me...in other words, they surrounded me! I did manage to get a tonic but I was only carrying the +400 health variety; and, I was trying to switch to voodoo doll when they brought me down.

[Bilgepump]

Originally Posted by Steely Jim

Hmm, apparently I'm slower to report my failures, but I also had a negative outcome with a Level-20 Ironwall off Isla Perdida yesterday.

I've had that happen. We were out sailing, and took down a couple flag Ironwalls. They only had thug crews, so it was no problem.

Then we hit one that had all hired guns in the crew, and woke up in jail...

[Steely Jim]

Hehe, yeah, I've seen that surprisingly high level crew for a particular ship happen on most ships types, although I would definitely say that the EITC seems far more likely to both field generally better crews than Navy ships of around the same level-type, and also more of a chance of a better than average crew ship type.

It's sort of funny though. I do sort of pick on EITC vessels more than Navy vessels, so the I laughed at the "ambush" tactics. It was sort of like they were "settin' a trap fer ol' Steely Jim."