1 How to Select the Right Pillage (Tinni’s guide for the picky jobber)

At any given time, there may be lots of pillage offers on the voyage tab of the notice board (NB).  Sometimes, the voyage you’d like to apply for will be immediately apparent. (Ooooh, hearty! *job*). Other times, however,  it’s a case of picking the most appropriate out of the unfamiliar.

In this guide, the words bnavver, navigator and Officer-in-Charge (OiC) are synonymous and used interchangeably.

The variables that can factor into your decision making are outlined below.

How much weight each of them hold will vary depending on aspects such as your mood, how much PoE you plan to make, your stats, how you feel about the Pirates aboard and so on.

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Variables When Choosing a Voyage

1) Jobber Cut & Booty Shares.

• The higher, the better. Jobber's delight > Even > everything else. Voyages on the NB sort according to this by default.

2) Vessel Types

• You probably will prefer certain vessel types
• May affect how easy or hard it is to get a specific station.
• In general, the fewer the number of stations (smaller ships), and the lower the jobber turnover (fewer leavers per battle), the more likely you are to be only working on an assigned station.

3) Pillage Settings: Difficulty level and range

The colors on the icons correspond to the arrows in the pillage difficulty, set by the OiC. This decides the might-ring color of the vessels that the ship will auto-engage.

More importantly, the might of opponents that are spawned for the ship will tend to fall within this range.

The suitability of the set difficulty can be based on the following factors:

a) Navver skill

b) Jobber skill

c) Proposed route / island that the ship is nearest to

All routes on the ocean have a set difficulty, with some routes consistently spawning harder opponents than others.

This, combined with the pillage difficulty setting and the stats of all the players on board, determine the might of your spawn. (Harder bots pay more)

The routes that are more difficult will show as darker dots on the “Ye Known World” screen.

This is an example of easy/difficult routes in comparison. Note that these dots will only show as brown once you have memmed them.

Their values are not absolute, but in comparison to each other.

Using the Red/Red setting on voyages as an example:

• Admiral - Wensleydale or Aimuari - Matariki at red/red is pointless
• Scrimshaw - Bowditch or Chachapoya - Anegada is fine for most
• Red routes (e.g. Osprey archipelago, darkest routes) is only for “elite” voyages

4) The Vessel Who command (/vwho <vessel name>, or clicking on the vessel name on the NB, as shown in the screenshot above)

•  Island ship is ported at (or nearest to) gives an idea of the route and its difficulty
• As with vessel type, you may have favourite routes
• Some people prefer jobbing onto ships that sail on less populous routes

• Number of people aboard gives information on:
• How close the ship is to leaving port
• The condition of the ship at sea
• undermanned may imply trouble, expect to limp for at least a few LPs
• overmanned is when jobbing numbers > station numbers, so some players will have the “privilege” of lazing. This can occasionally feel unfair, especially when they get a share of the booty anyway.

• Names of players aboard, and their stats
• If you like the players already jobbed onto a ship you’re more likely to have fun (and vice-versa)
• The stats of the players have a bearing on the might of opponents
• The combination of player numbers and their stats aboard have a bearing on the likely “vessel condition”

**(Clicking the underlined names in the /vwho list brings you to their pirate page)

5) The Who Command (/who <bnavver>, or clicking on the OiC's name on the NB)

• Sometimes, it may be hard to tell who the Bnaver is, as it may not be the face on the NB.
• The bracketed name when /vwho-ing identifies the person that last took the wheel in either dnav or bnav
• If this is different from the face on the NB, consider checking the Pirate Page of both

• Pirate page of the Bnavver

• Bnav stat and whether that corresponds with pillage settings and route difficulty
• All their other stats, to see how the OiC is as a jobber and as a reference as to how they'll treat their own jobbers.
• Trophies of the Bnavver can give an indication of experience levels

6) The Blurb

• The speech bubble next to the OiC's face on the notice board
• The Blurb can contain information about the voyage (e.g. BKs, IOs, Vikings, Forage or TH Exped ahead, Navver roulette) and can be seen when you mouseover the speech bubble
• Bonus points for being amusing
• Penalty points for claiming to be “elite” if the stats of jobbers / navvers are not
• Some are irritated by OiC’s advertising of their bnav stat on the blurb.

7) Brigands only or barbarians only VS  both (with or without PvP)

• Some believe payouts are better if you only do one type (either brigands or barbarians)
• Ships that are actually hunting for pvp will advertise via hearty lists. When the PvP setting  is shown on the Voyage tab, It makes no difference 99% of the time.

8) Crew

• The crew’s reputation and your own experiences jobbing with them should be a large influence on your choice
• If you have good experiences with one navver in the crew you’ll probably have a higher chance of a good experience with a different navver in the crew as compared to unfamiliars.
• The better crews have established training programmes and will try to ensure all OiCs meet minimum standards
• Trips that are advertised as "Officer Training Runs" will welcome competent puzzlers who do not mind not earning as much PoE as they otherwise would.
• Voyages with more than one crew member on board → more likely to be well-run
• Two voyages running simultaneously from the same crew and both struggling to load implies bad crew organization and cooperation → less likely for either trip to be well-run

Other Considerations

How many battles do you have time for?

If 2 or less (30 minutes and under) consider sending a /tell to the navigator stating "Only have 30 minutes" or "only can stay 2 battles (or even 1 battle), do you still want me?". This will cut down on your guilt and ensure your reputation is maintained.

How promptly does the OiC answer tells?

It is sometimes a good idea to ask questions to the OiC even before applying, such as

• How many people do you set sail at?
• Which route are you sailing?
• Can I bilge?

Needless to say, if the tells are ignored, it is likely that your concerns on board ship will be treated the same way.

What are the chances that a certain station is free?.

This is to ensure you are actually helping the voyage run smoothly, as opposed to be redundant or even detrimental (eg 2nd bilge on a sloop that has difficulty getting moves).It can be judged by vessel type, and the numbers and distribution of stats of pirates already on board. Easiest way, however, is to send a tell.

How quickly does the OiC respond to your jobbing application?

This... is a tricky question. It’s common courtesy to not apply to voyages that you are not prepared to job on, so length-to-response should not be part of the “selecting a pillage” process. However, don’t wait longer than a minute before assuming that your job application has been declined and then proceeding to another voyage

I don’t care about having fun, which are the voyages making the most poe?

Basically the pillages that make the most poe/hour are the ones with

• No losses and
• Highest difficulty

The more skilled the jobbers on the boat are, the higher the payout/person.

So the highest paying pillages generally

1) Have selective jobbing, or are invite only

2) Have either a few Ultimate swordfighters or rumblers, or all jobbers can fray well

3) Have the pillage settings set to the highest it can go (i.e. red-red),

4) Is charted for a high difficulty (“red”) route

However, if the ship as a whole isn’t up to the challenge, or even if there is one disconnect (on a sloop), you lose a battle. This results in immediately knocking down the poe/hour that could be generated.

Perhaps now you find it easier to choose the voyage that is for you!
Tinnitus

Related Resources:-
PDF Map of Emerald  - Shows all route difficulties.