William Death

Yes, topmasts and topgallant masts have a lower thickness and lower HP when compared to the lower masts. They fall easier and from farther away, as they should. You may lose a topmast, even with a great mast mod, but at least you haven't lost your lower mast (the part that takes the most of your sail repair to rebuild). Regarding fights up close, read what I wrote above: if the thickness of your mast is greater than the penetration of the cannon, at that range, you won't get demasted. Example: The thickness of this Santisima's lower masts is 108cm+39.36cm = 147.36cm The base penetration of a 42pd long cannon is 140cm at 50m. My enemy cannot demast me at 50m without having at least 5.3% increase to pen. Thats assuming he can elevate his guns high enough to hit my masts at that 50m range (he can't, a first rate's hull is too tall). Of course, double charge exists, stronger penetration modules, etc. But the lower masts on that Santisima won't fall from any long range "sniping," short range "sniping," rolling broadsides, or anything else; unless the person shooting those masts is equipped to deal with a ship having masts that thick. Its not a 100% prevention for demasting (nothing is), but it is quite close.

Once again, to the people saying demasting wasn't a tactic and happened "by accident." Thats just silly. Do some research before you say that. It was a tactic, used in many naval engagements, not just by the French vs Brits, US vs Brits, etc. Downing a mast would cripple a ship, at least till the mast could be cut away. It was certainly something that guncrews could be trained to do. Captain gives the order to demast the enemy, the gunners aim for the shrouds, chainplates, topmast caps, and the masts themselves. Also I'm very skeptical of the idea that a pine mast could "bounce" a 42pd iron cannonball simply "because the mast is round." I'd like to see something to back that up. Everything I've researched regarding the power of these naval cannons says that, unless you've got some massively thick oak timbers, you won't be bouncing much. One note to people who complain about getting demasted in game: you know that there are no less than 5 mast-specific modules that you can run that will make your masts literally impossible (or very nearly impossible) to shoot down, right? You can even stack some of them! But don't confuse mast thickness modules with mast HP modules. The first type (+mast thickness) are great. If your mast is thicker than the penetration value of the cannon you're being shot with, at the range it is fired, it will do no damage. The second type (+mast HP), however, is nearly worthless. Mast HP values are so low that buffing them, even 10-20% can be worth as little as 1-3 extra cannonball hits before the mast falls. What a waste of an upgrade slot. So don't complain you got demasted. Next time run a Kiritimati, Elite French Rig, stacked French Rig and Pino Ocote masts, or some other combination (I think there's a PvP-mark permanent upgrade for mast thickness...navy mast treatement or something like that); and you won't get demasted, at least not nearly as easily. The game caters to the iron mast crowd too much already, IMO. No need to make demasting more difficult (we tried that not even a year ago and found gameplay suffered with default iron masts). I think the ideal balance for demasting could be achieved as follows: -mast HP very high -mast thickness very low -1 rig repair, 1 hull repair, With this, demasting would take a very long time (especially with small guns vs a big ship's masts), but could be done with smaller guns, and at longer ranges.

What kind of cannon are you using? Touch-hole or a proper flintlock mechanism is what you'll find on the cannons aboard my ships ^this exactly. Demasting was EXTREMELY common in naval engagements. Have a look at Constitution vs Java for a great example of demasting used in a 1v1 heavy frigate duel. So while you likely wouldn't have *every* cannonball land on a mast when firing guns IRL, the gun crews were not bad at what they did. They knew where to aim to demast ships: cutting the rigging up with cannonballs would make the masts fall under the stresses of a press of canvas. We don't have that in game, so you have to hit the mast itself. Furthermore, regarding real-life accuracy/realism, you also didn't have 25-60s reload times, ability to turn through 180* in less than 45s, etc. Time is compressed in NA, as a result: shooting is sped up, performance of guns is increased, etc. If you want a truly accurate simulator its going to take you over an hour to weigh anchor, set sails, and begin moving out of the harbor. Who knows how long till you see an enemy to attack... Not many will play that game.

Yeah the Kiritimati doesn't make my masts invincible, but it comes darn close when fighting other frigates, especially those sailed by the average noob (1-2 lazy broadsides into my masts, if it doesn't fall, they try something different). Persistence is rewarded in the demasting game . 116.16 mast thickness means double charged 18s *just* can pen my lower sections at 250m. Its not a good OW hunting mod, sure, but for dueling, I quite like it. The +10% turn rate and 30% mast HP is nice too I'm not particularly concerned with speed in duels. I've tried builds like yours and builds like mine, I like and use both, but I often prefer the slower tank over the more nimble fighter. Undeniably, both are effective, in the right hands. To each his own though, I suppose. 100% agree with you about Cartagena being pretty much necessary to get the most out of Trinco. I've just crafted one blue 4/5 that'll get Carta on it before I take it out. Regarding my use of the Endy: I always run 24s because they only require one more crew per gun (so 28 crew more on Endy, no big deal), the pen is so much better, and I almost never find myself waiting on the reload in the kind of fighting I do (I'm normally waiting to get a good shot or for the enemy to waste his broadside while I'm angled). Also, while charged 18s might demast a 2nd rate, 24s will do it from further away, and can take down first rate masts too. One fight I was in comes to mind: my Endy and a buddy in Surprise vs a (rather poorly sailed) Victory. The Surprise stern raked and graped while I focused the Victory's mainmast. Once it fell, we went in and traded him back and forth in boarding a couple times. Fun fight. Couldn't have done it that way without those 24s. I suppose we could have tried side-hugging tactics, but this was pre-first rate HP nerf, so he had lots of HP on that LO/WO Victory, and Determined Defender wasn't a perk at that time so we had to be more cautious when getting close to him. More than one way to skin a cat, as they say (also ewww). I've tried 18s on the Endy, and each time I try it, I regret it. I'll stick with the 24s and accept the slightly longer reload time. I'll have my dueling Trinc ready and we'll hopefully get a chance to duel soon. I've added you on Steam (same name in game)

While I prefer the Endymion for OW PvP (can't beat the ability of 24pdrs to demast anything that floats [assuming the target isn't running mast mods]), I have sailed the Trincomalee a lot, especially back when we had the duel room, it was my preferred dueling frigate. Turn rate, when maxed out for turning is excellent. I also feel the turn acceleration is higher on Trincomalee than on Endymion, but I haven't found any spreadsheets or tools to confirm that. If anyone knows of a source for that information (turn acceleration, not turn rate or speed acceleration), I'd be grateful for the link. I've got this Teak/WO one and it feels like it bounces properly. Very tanky, but slow. Not for OW stuff, obviously. Fun in duels though. At least, the way I duel Spinny, bouncy, tanky...handles nicely. The extra weight and slower deceleration of teak/wo seems to carry her through tacks nicely. One thing to keep in mind is Trincomalee's hull shape: specifically the curve from bow to stern that is quite pronounced. If you are angling to bounce shots, I've found its important to make sure you're not angling in a way that puts the rear 1/3 of Trinc into a good shooting angle for the enemy. Trincomalee has this curvature pronounced more so than most other ships, although Santisima, Bellona, Pavel, Wapen, Ingermanland, and a few others have also a fairly decent fore-and-aft curve to their sides as well. This can be a great asset if you are careful (a skilled Santisima skipper can bounce shots as well as the ugly L'Ocean), or it can hurt you a lot too. Regarding Hachi's theory about Teak/Teak being better and getting reload shocked less...I'll believe it when I see it LOL. When we "dueled" I was in my Teak/WO failfit speed Endy because I'd been out hunting. I think he was in that same Teak/Teak Trinc he posted earlier in this thread. Even with no thickness, HP, reload, etc mods (even had trim speed working against my turn rate), we were damaging each other roughly equally; I didn't reload shock him though, and I don't recall him reload shocking me either. Mostly we were fighting for the wind and each other's weak sides. It came down to who could get the last broadside into who (both of us were nearly into structure on one side each). Hachi was able to spin around faster than I could (my 60% sails couldn't spin me too well ) and got the broadside into me and then we called it. Was a good, fun fight. Perhaps I could have made the outcome more favorable to me had I been in a ship build more conducive to dueling. We'll have to duel again some time. *now I need to build a dueling Endymion because why not?*

That’s nice, but will we get the old fashioned duel room back? No ship loss, no rewards? That was one of the best parts of NA, IMO. Also Hachi we need to have a proper duel one day. You beat me handily once Trinco vs my Endy, but in my defense, that was a fail fit speed Endy with speed trim. All it was meant to do is farm a few marks and then easily run away from the gank squad (I could have and should have run away from the fight with you but I really wanted to see what would happen). I am grateful you let me live too, I do love that Endy 😀. But I feel I did at least better than the average noob lol. And in a proper fighting ship I might surprise you 👀 I’ll build a decent Trinc and perhaps we’ll both be online at the same time at some point and get something set up. Could be fun. Or you can play on my turf and have a first rate duel with me 😁 #duelsareforprosandshallowboatsarefornoobs

NAME : [SANTI] iniciador de fuego LOCATION & AND IF IN SAFE ZONE: NE of Mortimer Town. Inside the Safezone. SCREENSHOT: CARGO (IF APPLICABLE): Did not loot. I believe that he dropped a navy structure refit. CAPTAIN'S NOTES: Can you say....COUNTER-GANK! Pirate Coast Guard avenging the loss of one of our traders. My lovely Victory's superior speed and agility proved most valuable to me in this fight. Well done Pirates. We must sink these cheeky Spaniards everywhere we see them. AAARRRGGGHHH! #givenoquarter #notevenalittle

NAME : [CSA] Jacquotte Delahaye LOCATION & AND IF IN SAFE ZONE: W of Walker's Cay, shortly after the Port Battle ended. No safezone. SCREENSHOT: CARGO (IF APPLICABLE): Fish. Possibly some repairs. CAPTAIN'S NOTES: Straightforward battle I shot hull while Lady Hamilton boarded. Unfortunately, Lady Hamilton was dragged into the battle as well, rendering our fleet less capable to fight the other USA outside without our Requiens to keep the US tagged in battle. #givenoquarter

NAME : [CSA] Robert Lance LOCATION & AND IF IN SAFE ZONE: E of Walker's Cay, shortly before the Port Battle started. No safezone. SCREENSHOT: CARGO (IF APPLICABLE): Some repairs and some basic module, I don't remember which. CAPTAIN'S NOTES: I sullied myself with bumper boats today. And oh how I dislike shallow water fighting compared to fights in big ships that are actually fun and skill-based...but this Requien is stupid OP. Needs to be a fifth rate. Anyways, I got a CSA Rattlesnake Heavy so I reckon thats a few more points on the board for me. I was going to demast, decrew, nearly sink him, and then finally board...but then I remembered I have like 2x his crew and marines to boot....simply got him upwind and I slammed on the brakes till I got the "G" button. Such lovely game balance here. Xebec is *definitely* an 80 BR ship. Certainly not stronger #givenoquarter

Port Battle of Lorimers and Related Engagements Pirate Battle Commanders: Christendom, El Presidente Amplify, and William Death We formed our line and set a course to cut the Prussian line in two. At the last moment, those sneaky Prussians modified their line to be a looser formation. I took heavy damage in the opening shots and had to drop out of the front of the line. We proceeded to chase the Prussians and finally managed to separate and sink a few of them. Multi-ship-single-target focused-fire is a wonderful thing. One poor soul lost an absolutely beautiful Santisima: What a shame to see a ship so beautiful sail to a watery grave. Despite a few close calls, none of our large ships were sunk. The battle ended when the Prussians left (I assume to go defend Salina Point). Now if only we'd had long cannons on our bow instead of carronades to tag them with... Upon exiting the port battle, we found ourselves in another battle, this time with some French captains from UWS. Their soft Teak/WO and LO/WO ships were no match for our BLACK Ironwood constructed ships. But they were faster than us. One of our faster ships, the beautiful Santisima captained by Amplify, was running low on repairs, so we decided to call off our chase. Now if only I was sailing a real first rate, like a Santisima, instead of this ugly second rate L'Ocean abomination, I may have gotten some kills instead of all assists. Nevertheless, I appreciate having it loaned to me (my proper PB L'Ocean was tucked away on an alt and I showed up too late to claim a Santi spot) and am pleased to report it will be returned to its owner with nothing more than a few scratches. #creatingcontent #heavyassists Thanks for the battles everyone.

Excellent fight in the reinforcement zone just outside the St. Marys Port Battle. US tagged a Basic Cutter, so we joined in the fun to defend the poor Frenchman in his cutter. WO wouldn't do it, but VCO and XXXXX did! The United States First Rate captain apparently assumed his fellow captains could handle our squadron, and subsequently escaped. It was our pleasure to prove him wrong. Masts fell, planks were shattered, leaks were formed. Ships sunk. Several managed to escape from us just before they were sunk. Lucky captains. More would have been sunk, had we had more time in the battle. Despite their best attempts with chainshot, raking, and even some focused fire, our staunch third rates refused to let us down. Toward the end of the fight, there was some confusion among our friends outside (they had been previously fighting French captains) who joined the wrong side of the fight (in their defense, it was the only side that was open by that time). Somehow I managed to go through that whole fight and not get any kills on ships. But I was the master of heavy assists! Overall, good fight US, we enjoyed it very much. o7 #heavyassists #creatingcontent

I am no dog sir! I am a Pirate, former officer of BLACK (the most successful and most feared clan to grace the oceans of PvP2), skilled first rate duelist, and fearsome lone hunter. I am the Dread Pirate William Death, and I sail with VCO! Care to duel this “vicious dog”, Mr. Wind?

I thought the meme referred to Ingermanland's inclination to become inverted at inopportune times.

NAME : [SANTI] iniciador de fuego LOCATION & AND IF IN SAFE ZONE: SE of Kingston Port Royale approximately 1 horizon and just outside the safezone. SCREENSHOT: CARGO (IF APPLICABLE): Navy Hull Refit dropped, a few hull repairs. CAPTAIN'S NOTES: It was horribly unbalanced in our favor...but we'll take what we can get. #givenoquarter

Yeah you guys were ahead of me and got the tag. When I heard it was Barnabus I turned around to sail back to Tumbado because I wasn't even going to join. Then I saw the Spanish and more US coming over the horizon so I joined to avoid getting tagged (hence my extremely far away join location facing the wrong way too). Also, I immediately typed into the battle chat "all" chat that I'd not be shooting unless those outside joined. When they did, we fired a few volleys and then, as you say, we pulled away thinking we had saluted and were calling it done. That tag in OW was definitely an unwelcome surprise. Had we been prepared for it, sailing more tightly grouped, I feel strongly that we'd have sunk at least a few of them. I nearly sunk the Santisima and had one of the Bellonas very damaged by myself. No matter. The true colors have been revealed and I'm always happy to see more targets, even if some of them are old shipmates. #captainsoftherealBLACKflag #givenoquarter

Actually, since we’re in a game with ship construction we should be using feet inches and eighths and pluses since that’s what they’d likely be using. That’d be 2-3-4+ for 2 feet 3 and 9/16ths inches. But perhaps that’s too nautical for you metric types 😀

Ok but I want an option to change all measurements from your silly metric system to the proper Standard (FPS) system. Inches and feet. You know, the measurement system that actually makes sense to use. [insert man on the moon remarks here] “Hmm what’s half a millimeter? A quarter of a millimeter? Uh....lemme calculate that real quick for ya *bunch of zeros behind a decimal*” Vs. “Hmm what’s half a sixteenth of an inch? 1/32nd an inch. Half of that? 1/64th.” Yes this is definitely what NA needs most right now. We don’t have any OP ships that need balancing or any broken game mechanics. 😂

Basically this. Except I run fleetships sometimes to carry extra repairs. "Repair Buckets" I call them. Before the rum days they were also "Crew Buckets" that I could sail up to and replenish my crew from. 1-2 repairs of each type and unlimited chainshot that does damage the same way it does now would be great. It wouldn't be hard to implement and would make combat a lot more enjoyable for both sides, I think. Currently if you can survive 4 chainshot volleys from the fastest ship and have enough sail repairs, you can probably get away or run out the clock. Thus uneven fights are encouraged when you're trying to catch a faster enemy because they can repair sails/masts every 12 minutes and you can only chain 4 broadsides. The apparent solution for most players is to bring along friends so that they have more chainshot to throw. Thus the "Revenge Fleet" squad assembles to go split 11 PvP marks 8 different ways over a 1 hour chase. #content

Teak/Wo Endy (since we're using Endy for a lot of these examples) with navy hull, copper, and art of shiphandling should outrun most AI fleetships in OW if you don't want to fight them. And it should be able to fight any reasonable fight. Emphasis on reasonable. I don't know why you'd want to try to fight a 4v1 if the thought of being chained by 4 ships at once bothers you. So you can be Mr. "I build myships to fight not run" and have a "fighting built" ship and sink a lot because you are forced to take almost every battle you find (because you can't outrun them), or you can do like the other 90% of PvP hunters and sail a ship thats teak/wo, teak/teak, teak/fir, or similar with speedmods and choose your battles. Now I believe we were discussing chainshot on AI, not the finer points of ship selection for PvPing. Why, again, would you expect to be able to win or escape a 4v1 where every opponent is in the same size ship that you are in, and are all in chain range at the start of the fight? (your scenario as described in "Dave" vs "Bruce") The only logical course of action in that scenario is to not get tagged in the first place (or do get tagged and hope the player is a noob that you can sink really quickly and get some marks from). If you're sailing something thats not build like a floating brick, that shouldn't be a problem. What outcome would occur if the AI had no chain? You'd sink the player and then leave. Or just be able to chain/demast your way out of the situation. Right?

Solution: Dave shouldn't have gotten tagged by Bruce if he didn't want to face 3 Endymions shooting chain at him. Outmaneuver him in OW and avoid the chainshot rain. Its pretty easy since a fleet Endymion is pretty slow, even fir/fir since the AI won't use your ship-knowledge books to make it faster. I know thats not what you want to do (you want to fight and get some PvP marks, or make an escape from the battle and make it into port)....but whats the issue again? You got tagged by 4 ships (assume all Endymions), chained, and ultimately sunk by them. Would 4 players tagged within chaining range yield a different outcome when they have 16 volleys of chainshot vs your 4? I rather doubt it. The key word in that scenario being "within chaining range at the tag." Yeah they can spam chain but limiting AI's chainshot will see them waste it, doing little to no damage (pretty sure I've seen my AI chain the hull before). The best/easiest solution is to just bring back unlimited chainshot for all. Or go the full way and limit all types of ammunition, except round ball. Now let me give you different outcome of a similar scenario: Dave is sailing an Endymion alone. He wins a few fights and the counter-gank squad shows up in a mix of ships & fleetships to chase him. He outruns them in OW with smart maneuvering and a proper ship build. Also it helps that all of their ships are sailing 1-5knots slower in OW because their fleet ships are slower than their main ships. Thus, he avoids their fleet's chainshot spam and lives to emerge in a slightly different location half an hour later and collect more PvP marks.

Are you arguing that a lone player should be able to win in such a situation? And if the "ATTACKING fleet" is running such large, heavy, slow ships, how did you, the "DEFENDING fleet" get tagged into battle by that unless you are of a similar speed? I'll assume that a similar speed "fleet" (whether thats one ship or a legitimate fleet) would be of similar size and able to fight it without needing to run away. I just don't see what the problem is if someone sails with some 3rd or 4th rates or 5th or 6th rates in fleet: they'll be slower in OW since speed books and sail force modules don't apply, so really any reasonable speed ship should be able to outrun it at some angle (unless we're talking about an Xebec with 3 fir/fir Xebecs in fleet, but thats more an issue of Xebec's current overly-good sailing profile). And in battle, they will be captained by rather incompetent AI. IMO, if you let the AI do significant damage to you before you can significantly damage it or outsmart it...well...thats on you/your positioning/your ship (or your enemy's superior abilities in the same areas). Perhaps you don't like the fleetships because it makes solo hunting more challenging when a player sails with some AI fleetships and uses them competently to either deny you a target or force an engagement where you otherwise would have escaped? As someone who also solo-PvP hunts...sail a bigger ship or fight smaller targets/targets without fleet. Or bring a fleet with you to counter theirs.

Counter to AI chainshot spam: Chain or demast the AI (which cannot repair). Remember too that if the player has more than 1 AI ship, he has sacrificed more perks than the standard fighting setup (1 fleet slot) to achieve that, so he may not have carpenter perks, double shot/charge, prepared, determined defender, etc. Instead of focusing only on the benefits of sailing with AI fleet, let’s not forget the drawbacks associated. And at the end of the day, it’s still just AI and not too hard to outsmart. Moving back to limiting ammunition and repairs. I agree with @Gregory Rainsborough either bring back unlimited chainshot or limit repairs and limit grape as well.

Aaarrrggghhh! Fear me! About time I got some respect around here (throwback to the days of painted ships) From our siege of Cartagena on PvP Global: #BackInBlack

Hmm...very interesting and good testing too. I didn't realize they were that fast downwind. That could use some nerfing perhaps downwind.

Must have been some slow frigates or else they weren't trying to run away from you. They should have easily outran you downwind if they wanted to. I don't think any semi-reasonable Xebec build can hit 13km-14kn+ running broad reach or running before the wind. If it can...well that would need to be changed I'd think. Trinc and Endy can both reach those speeds at downwind angles without sail force modifiers. But I do tend to agree with you about it being a good troll ship. Tiny upwind boats (Lynx, Privateer, Gunboat, Prince, and Xebec) make great trolling boats...they seem to be frequently used for that purpose too. "Just keep them tagged in battle while we assemble the fleet outside," situations are common uses for them. They'll be fast enough even at their worst point of sail to keep many slower square-rigged ships tagged long enough to serve that purpose. Thats not to say that this is all they are good for: there are plenty of examples where 6th rates beat other 5th rates or larger in PvP, but their trolling/griefing ability seems to be used frequently as well.