Careful don’t lose more than ye gain

Arr pirates!! Now we be talking 'bout Targets - their benefits and dangers. Naturally, there be benefits to gaining resources of all sorts (gold, lumber, rubies, gears, rum) from Targets and that be the reason why many pirates be wanting a piece of them. Especially the Ruby Targets.

But I want to tell ye - Careful! Don't ye lose much more than ye gain!

Ye see, we be getting also quests to capture and collect resources from Targets. That's 'cause the game be smart - they be creating situations for pirates to fight one another. Ye see on the picture an example of such a quest with a nice reward of 6 Man O' War vessels - but at what cost? Ye gotta hold the Target for 1 hour before ye can claim resources and that be difficult. If ye put only 1 Bonnie then other captains will capture it. Ye can try messaging and asking everyone not to capture, but let's face it, ye can't message them all and not everyone is "nice".

And if ye put up a huge defense making sure nobody captures then ye run the risk of someone sending a blind attack for example with 1000 Marauders as it happened to me recently and, in that case, even if ye win, ye be losing a lot of units costing ye much more than the reward from the Target.

So, be careful, try not to get into the situation where ye lose a lot more units for the sake of few.

Not Always Good Reward in Prizes

Arr pirates!! I forgot to post this one from end of April, but it be still important so here goes: Ye not gonna be getting awesome booty / loot from Prizes always, so be prepared fer some disappointments down the road.

Ye see here I be raiding a Prize level 18 Black Corsair and this be the highest level I did so far and also after 12 Prizes didn't give no rewards and I got, what I consider to be, very bad booty out of this of 94 Buccaneers and 20 Bonnie's Beauties. Now this be still some amount of resources, but I can train these units easily me-self so we be not needing such booty.

So be prepared to be disappointed sometimes with the Prizes' booty and keep sailing the seas with the wind behind yer sail - Arr!

Pirates! May 8 New Global Mission

Arr pirates!! The new Global Mission be here 8th of May, so get yer Bonnies and Marauder training up and running full speed - Arrr! - and start collecting those maps!

Make ye sure to get the 100 Idols that be costing 40 Maps - this be super important 'cause ye can increase yer galleon capacity or do the new troops' discoveries with these.

Also do yer best to get the 100 Maps required for the 10 Brethren Gunboats. Why the Gunboats and not the Frigates ye ask? 'Tis because I strongly believe that sooner or later ye gonna lose yer offense units 'cause ye be raiding a lot every day, but it be not so often that someone raid ye Haven directly and so the defensive units simply live longer if ye take care of them.

Invisible Resources - Be Careful

Arr pirates!! There be invisible resources if ye be playing on full zoom out, so ye must be careful to make certain not to lose these. Have a look below the explanation:

See this picture be at maximum zoom out of me Haven, at the bottom, ye seen nothing but the beach and the water and me Castle and market. I added the zoom so ye can see the zoom level as well.

Next ye see I zoom in 2 scrolls of the mouse and still there be nothing interesting. Just the water, the waves and no resources whatsoever.

And now I zoom in 4 bars, almost maximum and still nothing, but a very slight hint of the invisible resource there which could be easily missed by a sleepy eye.

And finally here at maximum zoom in ye see the lumber resource becomes visible and ready for the collection.

Examples are a plenty, here another one, ye see at most top of me Haven just the advisers and the tip of me island, nothing more.

Then zooming in 2 times with the mouse scroll ye start seeing the tip of the lumber.

And zooming in more ye see both the treasure chest as well as the lumber which were completely invisible and hidden behind the advisers.

So, in conclusion, especially if ye drank a whole barrel of Rum, make certain that ye go to maximum level of zoom and carefully check every corner of the Haven to collect all resources!

Use Prizes to Get Expensive Units

Arr pirates!! I've seen a lot of discussion and fights over Prizes, but I want to propose to ye to think of Prizes in a different way. Consider Prizes as an exchange service, just like ye exchange many things in life like giving out a lot of resources for one very expensive thing, similarly fer the Prizes ye can use our dearest Bonnie's Beauties and Marauders, being cheap and easy to train units, to attack targets and get Booty like the one shown below of 8 Juggernauts, which be a very expensive unit taking a long time to train, so this be the same as exchanging Bonnies/Marauders into Juggernauts packaged into a feature called Prizes.

I've also gotten 20-40 Bombardiers and 100+ Cuirassiers which I also show on the picture below this one. And I must say I prefer the rewards of the defensive Prizes over the offensive ones since offensive ones only seem to be giving the offensive units + resources rather than both offensive and defensive units.

So I suggest ye be considering Prizes as an exchange service, albeit one that is not very much in yer favor, that is, the troops ye lose usually cost more than the troops ye gain, but ye must also consider that perhaps ye don't even have the Discoveries and Buildings to train those expensive units and also it takes a long time to train them while this way ye can get them instantly.

Also if ye combine yer Prizing adventures together with the Global Missions then ye be cutting yer losses and maybe even be making a profit since ye get also rewards from the Global Mission on top of the reward from the Prize itself. In the stats I have so far, and I be probably making a separate post on this topic, the average number of Prizes to raid before getting a reward is 8.

Catching Yer Enemy’s Mistakes

Arr pirates!! Fighting a war with one or more Havens be not the most easy of things, but to increase yer chances of success, to increase the chances of yer pirates obliterating the enemy forces and sending them somewhere where they cannot find any Rum to drink means checking up on yer enemy more often then ye check on yer own mother :)

If ye check on their Haven often ye might find them making a mistake of leaving their offensive troops out in the open, which often happens when captains send out raids but are not at home when the raid comes back or are distracted by one of million things which is not yer problem, so if ye see their troops sitting drinking Rum strike fast and strike hard.

Ye see on the picture below how I destroy a massive amount of me enemy's offensive power gained 408 experience and lost only 8 Bombardiers. I was very pleased by this result and declared several hours of Rum drinking on me Haven as a celebration of crushing me enemy's forces! :)

Scouting Tips: 1 Dutchmen = 1 Relic

Arr pirates!! I know it be annoying to be losing our dearest Flying Dutchmen, which is why some of ye might be giving up and sending yer raids blindly, but there be some good news out of that big disaster, actually 3 in particular that I can give ye right now:

1) Ye got yer Deeds Most Fowle that needs to be collected and with a lot of scouting ye can get both yer medals and yer rewards!

2) Ye might be able to raid blindly for some time, but if only one time ye fall into a trap or an ambush then ye can lose A LOT more than ALL yer previous raids put together.

3) Relics! Aye! This be why I started this post in the first place. Ye can get relics fer yer scouting efforts, no matter if ye be losing or winning and below picture be the proof!