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!

Best Defense is Give No Resources

Arr pirates!! Have ye had the problem of a stronger pirate attacking you and wonder what ye can do about it? Well anyone can be a pain in the Rum barrel no matter how strong an opponent it is.

First of all, the reason for this post, is the main and best defense against anyone, especially a stronger attacker is to give them nothing. Hide all the troops, use all the resources on buildings, discoveries and training or send them over to Brotherhood members or Shipmates or, if it comes to that, throw them away completely (send to nearest inactive haven) - everything is better than to give anything to the pirate raiding ye.

Ye see below an example from my own Haven where I put out the Dark Corsairs together with my static "free" defense and actually got 2 out of the 300 Juggernauts destroyed while he got practically nothing. A couple of such attacks and they will stop very quickly because nobody wants to waste their raid attempts and, moreover, nobody be wanting to lose their expensive units for nothing.

Other than this ye can always be a major annoyance if ye liberate the blockades of yer enemy. This is extra annoying because he would have to re-blockade them, but, more than that, he might lose those blockades completely if either allied or enemy Brotherhood members blockade them before he manages to re-block.

Emergency Raiding with Defensive Units

Arr pirates!! Have ye ever seen a very sweet target but all yer army is out raiding and pillaging somewhere and ye just don't have the troops to raid this juicy nice Haven that ye found? Well, there are 2 choices ye can make from this:

1) Ye can sit and wait for yer offensive troops to come back to yer Haven so that ye can send them out to this new target.
But remember the longer you wait the more chance some other pirate will raid and take all those resources.

2) Take a risk and send yer DEFENSIVE pirates to quickly grab those resources!
But here also, remember that this be super risky undertaking and ye should do this when y'ar relatively sure that there be no defense out there.
How can ye be sure?
Well, if it is a target ye raided many times before and there is a good history - is one indicator. If the target be close to yer Haven so that ye get in and out quick with yer army is another indication.
But nobody can give ye a 100% guarantee - this is a risky action which best be taken with a barrel of Rum emptied all by yer-self.

Check below picture for an example me scouted a sweet target with ~19k resources and sent a whole heap of defensive units and grabbed a very nice chunk of gold and lumber and Rum. All my Haven celebrated into the morning, at least half of that Rum was drunk :)

Learn the Pattern of Yer Enemy

Arr pirates!! Ye got to work hard in thinking about the patterns of yer enemy! Yes, me know how hard this can be when y'arr down the bottom of a barrel of Rum but ye got to sober up sometimes fer the good of yer Haven and study and remember the patterns of attack of yer enemy!

What do I mean ye say? Well here I show ye an example of what strategy me be speaking of:

I had an enemy Haven captain sending me insults and threats and long story short it was clear we not gonna be drinking no Rum together so I started taking notes on me enemy and what I realized is:

1) He be sending a raid on me often being fake - with just 1 pirate.

2) He be treasuring his blockades a lot (so here I did a massive good job and liberating as many Havens as I saw he blockaded)

and last, but not at all the least ( 3 ) He be scouting me Haven with a large number of Flying Dutchmen (around 100) as well as the Dread Fleet unit called Airship which be giving a scouting boost of +400 fer 20 supporting Flying Dutchmen and the sort.

So regarding that last point I prepared my fleet of ~200 Flying Dutchmen and while his raid was coming to me Haven I put them out waiting fer his scouting army. I decided to wait even until the last moment until his raid arrives and then hide in the Harbor and, again, immediately after the raid, put them out again as me could not know when they be arriving, but based on his pattern they had to be coming at some point! And me observation of me enemy paid off in a fantastic way as ye can see on the picture below - obliteration of his entire scouting fleet as well as the Dread Unit Airship!

Inactive Haven Wakes up Suddenly

Arr pirates!! Ye gotta be ready and strong to receive absolutely unexpected bad news anytime when playing Pirates Tides of Fortune! Why ye say I be saying such a thing? Well, ye see on the below picture what a terrible loss I had attacking this Haven - this Haven was completely inactive and me army raided it a number of times in the past and there be never any defense there. I was 100% sure there be no defense and just 1 time I sent out a raid on it without scouting as I had good history raiding without any trouble with this Haven and BAM! - all of a sudden he be waking up and putting out all the defense he probably had hidden away in the Harbor exactly on the day when I did not scout - bad luck!

But can happen with anyone anytime - so be ready for accidents and be ready fer rebuilding what ye lost!