Balancing fix?

[Chayton]

Greetings,
I think Pirates is a awesome game, and it reminds me greatly on the good old Amiga days. The only thing that bugs me is that the balancing is way off.
I mean at Apprentice you take out already at the very begin the number 1 pirate in his frigate without a problem, loosing a duell is even with 50 years highly unpossible. You go like "bah that was damn easy, i try next level"
You go to Journeyman (find it cool that you get there new features like choose your sword and stuff) and after just a few moments you are actually pissed, since you want to keep this features but are annoyed how suddenly hard it became. I mean you have a hard time fighting a sloop and the duells are even with 18 years suddenly hard, the advantage is oddly always going in favour of your enemy (where he strangly never taunts you, and you hit him all the time). I really wonder why there are so many difficulty levels, dont want to even know how hard it gets at the next level. In my eyes the gap between Apprentice and Journeyman is way too large.
Anyone got a clue whatever that will be fixed in a patch or if someone can work on fixing it by the fan community?

PS: a good german gaming mag also subtracted points because of the balancing, i believed it was just an over doing so they got something to substract, but it turned out that they are sadly very true.

[Large_Potato]

hmm i found journeyman to be mind numbingly easy just like apprentice...

[GrapeJ]

Journeyman is pretty easy. I usually play on Rogue then upgrade to Swashbuckler later on so I retire as Swashbuckler. I find the extra difficulty in Swashbuckler makes the game more tedious than challenging sometimes.

It's a game, it's supposed to be challenging, over coming challenges is part of the fun. That is why there are different levels, some people are challenged at different levels. Keep on trying at journeyman then see how Rogue is. If you play the game long enough you should get better.
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"Me? I'm dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest. Honestly. It's the honest ones you want to watch out for, because you can never predict when they're going to do something incredibly... stupid." Captain Jack Sparrow

[rupertlittlebear]

I give you a week to be winning at Swash. The problems go away quickly as you figure out how to survive.

There are great helping threads in the Strategy forum.

I thought that Swash was going to be a killer. Turned out to be much more fun than Rouge. (Once you figure out how to survive.)

Biggest hint was simply get married early while you can still take out that suitor. He is the best fencer that I have found in the game.

[Vulture]

By the third trip out you will be a bane to all shipping and a thorn in Spain's side at the rogue level. Learn your basic techniques at journeyman level and then refine your tactics and skill as you work your way up. You will be a swashbuckler in no time.
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32 brightly polished cannons, a bottle o'rum, ahh..... a pirates life for me!

[Pilo T]

I also experienced this, but I actually like the challenge because in Apprentice it kinda felt like Angels in the Outfield and someone was holding my hand all the time making things go my way. It only took me about 10 minutes to adjust (maybe I'm just good at the game, but I doubt it). I'm actually glad now because, unlike Apprentice, I've actually played through a character and even lost 3 duels (actually, I went to Adventurer after the first dividing of the plunder, but there's not much difference). Dancing, thankfully, doesn't get much harder. In fact, I'm glad the flashing light disappears becuase I actually find your partner's hand gestures (once you know them) to be much more forgiving and helpful than the flashing interface. Ship battles are basically the same, but it feels faster, which is good because they were a little sluggish in Apprentice (er... that might just have been because of my flag galleon...). Apprentice is, just like I said, a tutorial type thing, but since Pirates is so diverse, it has to encompass everything... that's a pretty boring, lengthy tutorial, yes? So, what they did was this, they made the tutorial be the actual game, and just made it so the game told you, guided you through. Once you learn everything, you can start on JourneyMan(Adventurer is barely higher than Journeyman, so it's obviously just to provide a comfortable learning curve from the start to the game itself), and, yea, you'll get your ass handed to you, but when you adjust, it's just like Apprentice + cool features and an actual challenge. I just have to say that that magazine must suck because the whole purpose of a review is to clear up things like this so everyone can judge the game for what it really is. I can tell the reviewer sat down for about 2 hours on Apprentice, and then threw their hands up in the air, giving up 10 minutes into Journeyman because otherwise they'd have given it a perfect score for balance because what other game has such a complete tutorial that doesn't suck? If you're getting dominated in duels, go back to Apprentice and, instead of mercilessly slaughtering your opponents, learn how it works so you can at least win your duels. Hope that clears it up

-Pilo T
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“Perhaps on the rare occasion pursuing the right course demands an act of piracy, piracy itself can be the right course?”

[Pilo T]

[Microwavegerbil]

I think he finds it much more fun simply because of the challenge.

I honestly can't see myself ever being challenged on journeyman level, adventurer at least provided enough challenge to be more fun. What, exactly, about journeyman is giving you such a hard time? Unless your crew is numbering in the thousands (making morale impossible to manage) or your computer is running choppy I can't see how it would be as hard as you describe.

I also find swash to be a little too tedious and less fun at times (only due to the crew morale usually, which is fixed by starting rogue and changing to swash later on).

[rupertlittlebear]

Sailing gets more real.
In battle, if the enemy captain decides to cross a reef, he takes damage!

You can take a Treasure Galleon, reef the sails, fact into the wind and almost stand still. If you set your game graphics detail high enough, you will see the sails flap. (Never tried this graphics setting at the lower game levels.)

The maps get even more cranky. Shorelines that often do not match. Towns that are not on the map. Cities too. Did you know that P. Principe is on a lake? The game likes to do that to you.

One game ALL the maps overlap, the next NONE of them do.

Sword fighting is harder, but do-able. Dancing too.

You can just skip out on an interceptor ship if you are fast enough. If you never fire upon him, his country doesn't care about it.

Pirate interceptors do not seem to attack Pirate ships.

Have seen 5 pirate ships swarm around a Montalban.

Much more fun.

[Bluebeard]

I think for sailing into the wind, finding things on the map, crew morale, etc. are preferable on Adventurer, and Rogue to an extent. Though the swordfighting seems to be too easy, however that can be limited by not taking skill at fencing. I've tried 1 game at Swash, and after a 12 year career mostly spent in prison, or on a deserted island I retired.

[rupertlittlebear]

Check the "just keep thrusting" thread. You should be able to thrive at swash.

[bryce777]

stand still? heh I sometimes go backwards if pointing a frigate into the wind...you really gotta reef the sails.


I think it is kind of silly to complain about the balance and difficulty levels so long as you can enjoy one of them yourself. One thing to keep in mind is that the game is a remake, and a lot of the players played the original game A LOT. That a brand new player can be a little challenged at a lower level is a *good* thing - your game is supposed to be a challenge. After you practice a bit you are sure to find it wills oon be a very easy difficulty level for you. Obviously that magazin didn't spend very much time actually playing the game before reviewing it.

Even adventurer was just too easy for me my first game out and I switched to rogue in pretty short order, and I had not played pirates in many years.

Swashbuckler is pretty damn challenging when you start it, but it is doable - a a game's hardest level should ideally be nearly impossible to win.

[DrBeast]

I think the key word is patience. Keep trying, even if you fail. Save often. In swordfights and dancing, keep your eyes on the enemy and the lady. respectively. Don't count on the keypad flashing, even on Apprentice. That way you can adapt faster to a higher level of difficulty. And always remember: practice makes perfect!
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Let the Beast inside you free!

[rupertlittlebear]

[dragoniv]

I've seen almost every ship, except my trusty Brig'o'War, go backwards in the wind at the Journeyman and Adventure levels. Apprentice, meanwhile, let you sail in almost any direction without much respect to the wind...your speed was fast and faster.