0 Getting Around - Whisking FAQ

Shortlink for this page: http://tinyurl.com/whiskFAQ

I actually had another use for this in mind... then of course, I got lazy.

Introduction

How do I get to a particular island?

Let’s say that you have a ship ported at Rowes (or another middle of nowhere island) and you have no idea how to get that ship back to civilization, or that you'd like to get to zombies or skellies at a particular island.

How do you get to those islands in the most cost-effective way possible?

Luckily for you, there are many ways to get from island to island (i.e. whisking)!

Of course, the regular (and most expensive) way is to buy a Whisking Potion and then clicking on the island in Yer Known World.

But are there other ways of getting around?
What if you don’t have the island on your map?

This article is here to help answer these concerns.

Thanks to Crickket for her contributions to this article!

TL;DR aka Overview

Here’s a flowchart to help you out. If you only want to read one thing, this flowchart would be it.

You may notice that if things don't work out, the ultimate option always circles back to the whisking potion. D;

The Nitty Gritties

Whether you're a new pirate on the seas or just new to the concept of whisking, you'd probably need some further elaboration.

---

Basic thought process is this:
1. Use the ferry if possible
2. If not, get islands on YKW and whisk to them
3. Whisk to them using alternate means

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Part I: Using the Ferry

You should first check if the destination island is both colonized and in the same archipelago as the island you are on.

This can be done by first clicking on the docks, scrolling past the ships your crew has.

You will be able to ferry between same archipelago, colonized islands without charge or hassle.

Check here for islands that are...ferriable. Wait, that’s not a word is it?

Understanding Ferries

Many Archipelagos make up the Ocean. Emerald has 8 Archipelagos.
A group of islands (both colonized and uninhabited) make up an archipelago.

In very basic terms, colonized islands (in green) are islands you can set as home.

On the other hand, Uninhabited Islands (in red) are islands that only have a dock (and/or a basic fort), but you cannot ferry to or from uninhabited islands.

You may ferry between the colonized islands in the same Archipelago.

You cannot ferry between colonized islands in different Archipelagos.
(Loathe's post here elaborates more on this with actual examples)

Getting Islands to show on Yer Known World (YKW) and using Whisking Potions

Having islands on the YKW means being able to whisk to them with whisking potions.

Accessing YKW

Yer Known World (YKW) is akin to the world map of YPP.

Islands can either appear temporarily via charts on a ship, or appear permanently if you've set foot on it before.

By having islands appear, you’re then able to use whisking potions to get to islands that are inaccessible by ferries.

Understanding YKW

When you start out with a new pirate, you have none or only a few islands on YKW.

Your goal is to eventually visit (or explore) all of the 92 islands so that it looks like the wiki map of Emerald. Essentially, it creates a sense of "exploring the Ocean".

NOTE!:

• You need to have actually set foot on the islands for them to permanently show on YKW.
• If you got whisked there on a crewbie’s boat, be sure to hop off onto the island for a second!

• Having the island and the LP (league point) of an island on YKW are different.

• For the LP associated with the island to show, you can either hop on and off the island from a ship or log in and out at the island scene 4-5 times.

Having a chart to an island makes it show

You can board a ship that has charts to the island you desire.
This also works with navy ships.

However, these islands only show up temporarily until you log-off. So if you can, be sure to set foot on them to lock them in. Forever.


NOTE!:

• Getting someone to chart you to an island that you don’t have on your YKW doesn't make it whisk-able.

Asking others to invite /job you there also works

As you are usually whisked straight to the island or the ship at the island, you’ll have it show permanently on YKW. See also section 4.

Using Whisking Potions for islands already on YKW

Once you have the island on your YKW either temporarily or permanently,

you can then use a whisking potion to whisk there.


To use a whisking potion, simply click on it in the booty panel, and click “drink”.

You can buy a whisking potion at any apothecary and whisk to the island you desire.


They are the most expensive way to whisk around (on the green oceans, anyway).
You can find them at apothecaries, under potions.

They’re not particularly expensive, but the delivery price is what is really hard to swallow for just 9 whisks. Trust me when I say it really builds up.

(And you know that is what makes you fork out 50-odd-k to buy a measly sloop!)

Straight whisking methods

Asking others through chat

Ask someone that has your wanted island set as “home” to either job you to a ship ported there, or invite you to a building on the island.

Some great channels to try are /crew, /fo chat, or the inn.

Well.. the man has a point.

If your crew has ships everywhere (Cubelets does!), a crewbie can stand on a ship in your crew at your wanted island.

You will then be able to board the ship and be automatically whisked there.

You could also have a friend job you onto one of their ships ported at your wanted island.

What if your friend is at your wanted island, but their crew doesn't have a ship ported there?

• You can job them (while off a ship) to your crew and ask them to hop on one of your crew ships at the island. 

Asking others through the noticeboard

This is only to be used as a last resort.
By clicking on the ship’s name, you can see where it is currently ported at on the Ahoy! tab.

Taken from Tinnitus' Pillaging Guide

Check to see if any ships are ported at or are at a colonized island in the same archipelago as your destination island.

If so, you can then send a /tell to the person advertising on the notice board and ask if they would mind whisking you there by offering you a job.

Note!:

• Be sure to ask before applying!
• If you job solely for the sake of whisking to the island you may find yourself on a “do not job” list or the recipient of less than pleasant tells!

• If it says "last seen at <island>", it means that they are already at sea and won't work as a whisk.

• Being planked whisks you back to your home island. You have to leave yourself.

Using alts

This is meant to be used more for repeated whisking.

Setting an alt’s home island where you need to whisk to repeatedly can be pretty convenient and cost-effective.

I myself have about 10 alts stationed across the ocean on various islands with Explorers' Halls.

It doesn't sound that troublesome as you can technically have 3 (or more if you were here during the merger!) pirates per account.

Each computer can create up to 5 free accounts (write them down on a piece of paper!), so there are plenty of alts to go around!

Using missions

Sometimes you hear others saying things like "skellies/zombies at <insert island here>".

You could use any of the above methods to whisk.

Or, if you are Renowned+ in Swordfight or Rumble, you'll be able to see "Defeat the Skeletons" and "Defeat the Zombies" missions on the board respectively.

Relevant quick links

Emerald yppedia map

YKW yppedia


I haven't forgotten xD Love you all

Squishat

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2 BK FAQ

Shortlink for this page: tinyurl.com/squishBKFAQ

Introduction

Did you ever find yourself on one of my BK trips only to be left wondering
“Uhh why does she have so many rules? I know they are effective for us winning quickly... but why?”
“Did I get a trinket?”
“How much are they worth?”

This article should hopefully answer most of your queries.:)

BKs are a fairly recent obsession of mine... in relative terms. I started doing them possibly in May 2012. Since then, I've gotten Gold Longship, Baghlah, Junk and diamond MB (one and only) just from doing BK Compasses.

If you think you’ve seen parts of this guide before, you probably have. It was once the BK FAQ I linked to on the crew page, before the blog existed xD

Have a question not already answered? Leave a comment for me to add it!

Longship BKs

How many do we sail with?

We start BKing with full ship, which is 15. Type /w to see how many currently aboard.

Why do we need to hop till 8 left?

The short answer is, to spawn an easier BK.
The long answer, involves understanding of might rings and spawn difficulty.

The difficulty of the bots you fight is dependent on the number of people on the ship.

So we technically spawned a BK for 8, and then fighting it with 15.

Can we hop till 7 or 5 or something?

No. If the number is too low, the spawn will be too easy, and the BK will flee (refuse to engage).

What is DND, CAH?

Do Not Disturb (needs to be off so you can hear the whistle) and Call all Hands.

I can’t hear the whistle!

Turn DND off. ‘Nuff seid.

I can’t seem to hop off the ship!

When ships are out of port (when you can see the ship on the mini map), you will not be able to “leave the vessel” by clicking the mini-map or “leave the vessel”.
Instead, click “to home”.

Who are the BKs?

From left to right:
Madam Yu Jian | Widow Queen | Brynhild Skullsplitter | Barnabas the Pale | Gretchen Goldfang | Admiral Finius | Azarbad the Great | Vargas the Mad

Don't team on them until the end!!

Why do we need to kill BK last?

This is one that is highly debated.

Most recently, it has been added to the list of Rumors on the YPPedia, and marked as false.

This makes me a sad panda because I do believe that it does make a difference, and very noticeably too in the cases of brynhild, WQ and Barnabas.

The "minions" tend want to "avenge" their King, so they start to fight much harder and tend to become super hard to kill, doing full screen clears and instas to the humans.

This is especially true in the case of Barnabas the Pale.

I am going to ask for you to kill the BK last when on my trips, just for consistency’s sake. It isn't too much to ask to check your teaming after every kill.

I don’t think I got a trinket?

If you have a pirate badge or above, you got it.
There is no line of text that says “Ye received xxx”. The BK defeat speech is it.

Barnabas the Pale says, "Very well, I shall give each of yer dedicated hands one Ectoplasm in ransom for my release."

Which BKs are SF and which are Rumble?

Barnabas and Azarbad (Brigand King) are always SF.
Vargas (Barbarian King) is always Rumble
The rest can be either/or.

I need to leave soonish... how do I let you know?

Preferably by saying in a tell “Hey, this upcoming battle is my last” BEFORE the battle ends.
This is so I can plan around it, and thus faster battles for all.

How many of these do you have?

That’s not really relevant, but I usually do anywhere from 6-12 of them in a row depending on my schedule.

For reference, my highest record is 28 wins 3 losses in a day, and 22 wins straight. Yes, that takes a long time.

Sloop BKs

Why do we not team on sloop BKs?

They have 12...while we only have 7. We’re vastly outnumbered.

When they're maxed, they only have half a board. If we don't spread out and "waste" our resources on the same half-dead bot, then the others will have time to build "instas or semi instas".

By not teaming, we get to bring their numbers down efficiently to 6 or 7.
Otherwise, we'd only being able to knock out 3-4 at the beginning, leaving them with 8 or more still.

I also noticed that sloop BK spawns tend to stall more if you team in 3s on them.

The rest of this is more informational rather than FAQ-y.

Informational 

How many wins for each of the BK trophies again?

Wins	Trophy
1	Bronze
10	Silver
25	Gold

How many types of trinkets are there?

YPPedia page on BK trinkets
total of 49 different types of trinkets

How many colors do the trinkets come in?

Either 6 or 7 colors.

All BK trinkets come in Red, Orange, Green, Aqua, Blue, Violet.
The 7th color is Yellow, and only applies to Azarbad, Brynhild, Yu Jian (a.k.a. the new BKs)
This brings the total of unique trinkets to 312.

Wow that is a lot of trinkets!

Yes, and to get them all in your name is a giant pain in the behind. (Well, the Galene Doll kinda makes up for it :P)

To date, on Emerald, I think only Everclearboy and Shooshy have complete sets all inscribed with their name.

Delores is currently missing one, and I am currently missing two.

But I have no idea which colors I got!

Blue and aqua can be quite confusing, and some of the trinkets are really hard to tell apart.

Okay, how about you just match them to my trinkets here and see which ones you got :)
Squishat's YPPedia Page on Trinkets

What is the point of the trinkets?

You can either trade them for BK eggs and banners at the Trading Post, or you can collect the trinkets on their own.
And then of course you can sell the trinkets. Different rarities have different values.

Which trinket is the rarest?

I used to keep data, then it became too tedious. So I do list the rarest/second rarest first, and the most common ones last. But everything in between is “by feel”, and loosely corrected based on ECB's numbers.

Gretchen Goldfang – Lucky Rabbit’s Foot

Rarest				Most Common	Most Common
Lucky Rabbit’s Foot	Ivory Toothpick	Wooden Amulet	Salt Shaker	Golden Horseshoe	Stained Wishbone

Widow Queen – Arsenic Ring

Rarest	Rarest			Most Common	Most Common
Arsenic Ring (HAHA I typed “arse”)	Rose Goddess Perfume	Jeweled Brooch	Silk Handkerchief	Concealed Blade	Ruffled Garter

Barnabas the Pale – Music Box of Lamentations

Rarest				Most Common	Most Common
Music Box of Lamentations	Ectoplasm	Will o’ Wisp	Cursed Idol	Spectral Chain	Key to the Nether-sea

Admiral Finius – Baby Portrait of Admiral Finius

Rarest	Rarer			Most Common	Most Common	Most Common
Baby Portrait of Adm. Finius	Porcelain Cup	Fish Eye Lens Monocle	Royal Anchovy Tin	Prestigious Naval Medal	Self-Addressed Love Letter	Pearl Pocket Watch

Azarbad the Great – Exotic Confection

Rarest				Most Common	Most Common
Exotic Confection	Ornate Earring	Jeweled Dagger	Heart of Fire	Scented Beard Oil	Golden Oil Lamp

Vargas the Mad – Siren’s Comb

Rarest	Rarer			Most Common	Most Common
Siren’s Comb	Reading Pipe	Jigsaw Puzzle Piece	Scientific Tome	Grimoire Page	Yo-Yo

Madam Yu Jian – Cut Stone Box

Rarest				Most Common	Most Common
Cut Stone Box	Jade Comb	Hand Fan	Jeweled Finger Guard	Jade Carving	Lucky Coin Tailsman

Brynhild Skullsplitter – Mjolnir Amulet

Rarest				Most Common	Most Common
Mjolnir Amulet	Engraved Wristband	Solar Compass	Runestone	Wyrm Scale	Hoard Brooch

That moment when mistyping “BKs” to “BJs” every single time when writing this guide,

Squishat

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4 YPP Tip of the Day - How does "Decay" work?

Which items will decay?

Fortunately for you, only things that you "use up" will be subject to decay.

This means badges, clothes, and weapons. 

What is the concept of Decay?

In YPP's sense, it means that some items have a timer to them (usually in days), and that they will disappear after a given amount of time.

Items that decay will start out at "New", and then go on to "Good", "Old" and eventually "Dust" (i.e. disappear)

This concept will initially be difficult to wrap your head around if you're used to games where when you buy something, it is yours forever.

How does it work exactly?

As always, we begin with resources that are already available.

Yppedia page on Decay - This page documents the basics, but it is rather... confusing to say the least. 

Do items have the same decay rates?

Nope, you can check this page :) 

YPPedia List of Decay Rates - Lists all the items too. 

What about this old -barnacle- that I just got from that SMH?

All old items that you get from SMHs (HS, CI & Atlantis) degrade in 10 log-in days.

So all clothing doesn't decay the same way?

• When you have clothing of the opposite gender dust(filed under misc.), they just disappear.

• When Hats and Feet dust, they just disappear.

• When Torso and Legs dust, 

1. If they were the only item of clothing in your invent, they turn into new rags of their primary color.
2. If you had lots of other clothes, they just disappear. 

• When Rags dust,

Galene greeter chats, "All rags when dusting, can dust randomly into any of the 4 starter colors, regardless what color they were initially."

But in my experience...  

1. If the old rags were of a non-starter color, they turn into new rags of starter colors (red, blue, tan, white). 
2. If the old rags were of a starter color (red, blue, tan, white), they dust into rags of random starter colors. 

So in the screenshot at the beginning of this post, 

will turn into Spring Green Rags Torso.

What's the dealio with furniture decay?

Furniture does not decay when you leave it in your inventory. 

Instead, it only decays when you:

1. place it / remove it from a scene (decays by 5 points)
2. move it around the scene by clicking "commit changes" (decays by 1 point)
3. Old furniture doesn't dust. Instead it degrades to a prop, which you can no longer move. And then when you decide to "trash your prop", that is when it will dust.

Make up your mind before you place furniture, and even old furniture will last you 5 years. (at least) 

You can always use preview mode to see how it will look before placing it for realsies. 

Not all types of furniture decay.

Sleeping Animals, Decennium Furniture, Various Boxes do not decay.

(Even if you move them 50 thousand times.)

What about Chart decay?

Yppedia page on chart decay - I know... they're all on different pages. Why can't it be easier?  

(Look who's talking, your own blog isn't that great either. I know D; but at least I'm working on it.)

Calendar days vs. Log In days?

Log in days = only days that you logged in on.
(E.g., If you only log in on Saturday and Sundays, then the log-in dusting will only apply 2 days out of 7.)

Calendar days = every single day 
(Following the above example, things that dust according to calendar days will apply 7 days out of 7, even if you only log in 2 days a week, or even not at all.)

The decay of an entire log-in day applies instantaneously to everything in your inventory the second you log onto the game after you click on your pirate.

i.e., The entire day decay applies regardless of how long you are online for that particular day, even if you only log on for 10 minutes. 

How do I slow something from decaying?

The official party line is that you put that stuff into the their respective storage furniture.

The "cheating" line is that you can pretty much use alts as "storage", and put a set of clothes, charts or whatever on the alt to use for later.

This is useful for storing charts for memming and preventing them from dusting before you get around to them.

The trick is that you cannot log on the alt when you don't need it, and you have to keep in mind that everything on said alt dusts a day when you do log on it. :P

Another trick is that because things only dust when you log-in again, you can trade an item that is due to dust in a set time (e.g. A BK compass) to a pirate who isn't logging off to "keep it alive".

You can play hot potato with it for as long as you can manage :P

Why is it necessary?

In every game economy, there needs to be money fountains and money sinks.

Explained in very simple terms, money needs to come from somewhere (e.g. Pillaging), but in order to not have infinite money in the game (causing the PoE you just earned to be worthless), the money needs to "disappear" somewhere (e.g. things dusting, ships sinking).

(*plays Circle of Life from Lion King*)

In this game, there are many fountains and sinks, but in this case it means that things need to have a reason to be replenished so that the economy can move along.

Not unlike the real economy. ;o

(Oh my god, I just KNOW I definitely need that latest i-insertnounhere even though my current i-insertnounhere works just perfectly fine!!) 

Hope this was an entertaining read! I know it was a bit longer than my regular YPP Tips xD but anyhow~ 

Squishat 

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0 Ravenzor's Gunning Guide

Introduction

Gunning is one of those puzzles that you either immediately get how to play, or you get frustrated and don't understand it for years on end.

If you fall into the latter category, you're likely to be stuck there as you will not get a chance to gun for others since you don't get how it works.

It's a vicious cycle.

Moreover, searching for "gunning videos" does diddly squat because they're just way too fast for you... and you're left thinking, "Sorry, what just happened?"

Hopefully we'll get you out of that rut with this guide.

In a nutshell, gunning is all about manipulating the pieces into the guns in the right order by placing arrows on the board to affect how they move.

Alright, I'm not going to lie. You gotta be fast and precise to get good at gunning. The better you're doing, the faster the pieces will move, but don't worry, the faster the pieces, also the better the rating.

Let's get started with the basics.

1. Basics

The board

A typical board

The gunning board consists of 4 guns, 2 on each side. The position of the guns will never change, but the position of the crates and things on the board will. That is what makes certain boards "good" (easy) or "bad" (hard). 

All pieces turn right when hitting obstacles. More on that later.

Your goal is to fill the guns as fast as possible by directing the pieces in order into the guns. 

Red, white, black.

Placing Arrows

Two ways to place them. 

One way to click and drag in the direction you want, the other to use WASD and then place with a click.

There are gunners who swear by either method.. whatever works for you.

You can only place 3 arrows on the board at any one time, so you should fill guns using a loop of 2 arrows or less (you need 1 to place stuff inside the guns).

Barrel (Piece Spawner) 

The Barrel is from where the pieces enter the board.


It is positioned in the center of the board, and divides the board into two down the middle. The behavior of the pieces takes a bit of getting used to, and will be outlined in the next section.

Pictured below is the barrel that spawns the pieces.



The barrel spawns one piece at a time, each piece in a specific DIRECTION clockwise, but the order in which the pieces come out is random.

The order which pieces are spawned towards is ALWAYS UP, RIGHT, DOWN, LEFT (clockwise from top), and repeated twice in that order, until 8 pieces (2 of each type) are on the board.

Pieces

The board will only have two of any one piece at the same time.

There are 4 types of pieces (outlined below), making 8 pieces total on the board at any given time.

• Bucket (blue)- a waterball used to clean out booched or dirty guns
• Powder (red) - Gun powder, first piece to load into cannon
• Wad (white) - piece of cloth, second piece
• Shot (black) - cannonball, the last piece. These cannonballs will be the ones that you will use from the ship's hold and booty.

Filling a Gun 

To fill a cannon, you need 3 pieces. A Powder (red), then Wad (white), then cannon ball (black).
Pictured and fill in this order.


If you do happen to fill the gun in the wrong order, simply send a Bucket down it to try again.

A dirty gun

To get rid of a piece, just send it off the board with an arrow through the hole next to the gun. The piece will leave the board, and the spawner will spawn another.

i.e., kick a red, get a red. Kick a white, get a white.



After a cannon has been fired, you need to clean the dirty cannons with water in order to continue gunning. It will look similar to this.
 

A typical board

Speed Bar

This bar at the bottom controls the speed at which the pieces move around the board. There are two marks, one is a small line that indicates the recommended speed, while the slider, is one you can manually move to set the speed of the board.

Blue = slow, red = fast

When first starting out, it is advised that you keep the speed slow, so that you can understand how the pieces move, and practice placing the pieces into the guns in the right order.

As you first need to understand how the pieces move, don't worry about your score just yet when using this to practice.

Now that the basics are out of the way, here's where it gets complicated.

2. How the pieces move

The movement of the pieces may seem random at first glace, but there is an order.

How the pieces move is the most complicated part, and is the key to understanding how to gun. A slow and careful read is advised.

You can use any board and do fine (literally), but some boards can be crappy, while others can be amazing.

Good or bad boards are determined by the ease and speed at which you can fill guns with, as that is how gunning is scored.

As already mentioned in the previous section, the direction with which pieces come onto the board is always Up, Right, Down, Left.



It was also mentioned that the Bucket splits the board into two down the middle.

Pieces always travel to their right side when hitting an obstacle or a wall.

An easy way to remember where the pieces will go is:

• the left side of the board sends pieces upward, 
• the right side of the board sends them downward.

Illustrated in the screenshots below.


This is the left side of the board. The path of the bucket will go as follows.
The water will hit the left wall, and go up into the corner, bounce off the wall, then head back down.

The water will go down to the bottom wall, bounce up, and head back up.

The water will continue bouncing up and down in an endless loop.












This is the bottom right gun on the board. The pieces will always go downwards on the right side of the board. So start at the top of the image.
The piece will come down (follow the black arrow), hit the edge, and
bounce back up, going towards the rest of the board (following the red arrow).






Below is an example of a complete board, and a fairly good one at that.
The arrows outline the path of the pieces depending on which direction they come out of.

Up - The piece will go up, hit the wall, go right. Then hit the right side wall, go down, left, up, and loop at the top of the board.

Right - The piece will hit the right wall, and then follow the same path as red.

Down - The piece will go down, hit the bottom wall, go left, hit the box and go up, then continue in the red loop at the top.

Left - The piece will hit the left wall, follow the red path, and continue in the loop.

This board is a great one because it is known as a "one arrow full board loop".

If you place a -> arrow right where the top left cannon ball is, you can see that the pieces will travel around the board in a clockwise direction.

3. Gunning Styles

There are two main ways to fill guns effectively. 

• Freestyle
• To fill each gun individually by guiding pieces one by one into the guns.
• Looping   
• A very common method to increase ranks with the navy, by looping guns on the same side (whether that be top 2, left 2, bottom 2 or right 2)

The best gunners use a combination of the two, regardless of the boards that they're given.

4. How it's scored

TL;DR : The rating goes by how many cannons you fill, based on how long you take.

The best chance you have, is to hop on the station, look the board over.

If you don't like the board (i.e., cannot loop easily), then hop off and try again.

You can take some time assessing the board before it counts negatively towards your score, but if you're just looking to improve your rating, you should look for a good board.

It doesn't matter how many arrows you throw on the board, but generally, the fewer the better.

However, the faster you go, the better your rating.

Throwing pieces off a board loses you almost nothing, and you could constantly have pieces thrown off and still get incred.

The only real way of doing bad is going slow, or messing up on filling a cannon.

If you don't do either, you should do well.

Don't worry about lining all 3 pieces in a row. You can fill each cannon with a gunpowder, then cloth, then cannon.

If you can fill all 4 cannons in under 40 seconds, you will be guaranteed a excellent or incredible.

So you can fill 3 cannons in 30 seconds, and still get the same rating as 4 in 40 seconds. Just remember to abandon station after, so that your "speed" isn't diluted by that extra time.

5. Gunning in Battles

Gunning in a battle has more variables for you to take into consideration as opposed to gunning with the navy.
You have to deal with cleaning out the cannon, AND you have to worry about when the ships turns.

Ship turns left = Barrel slides left
Ship turns right = Barrel slides right

If possible, you should ALWAYS TRY to get on the gunning station right AFTER the turn starts, so you don't get effected by any movements. You then have 45 seconds to clean and fill all 4 cannons. If you can do so, than you're golden. However, if you don't manage to fill them all, than hit esc. It will stop the piece spawner (barrel) from rolling around.

If you're looking to up your rating, DON'T GUN IN A BATTLE.

Additional Reading:

YPPedia Page on Gunning - Also has additional links to other gunning demonstrations and resources. 

Read More...

0 Chat Tips and Game Options

Quicklink to this page http://tinyurl.com/yppchattips

Did you know about all the chat options you could do?

Here are some of the most asked questions I get. 

- How to copy chat

- Using /w commands

- How to chat while puzzling

- Whole bunch of other stuff

Experimented a lot with this video, so yes the sound is not the same for the different sections.

Well, I won't bore you with how I made it, I just hope you enjoy... and comment.

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2 How to Fray Effectively

Short url for this page: http://tinyurl.com/fraytips

Contents

Part I: Introduction 
1) Weapons 
2) Comboing Attacks - SF 
3) Comboing Attacks - Rumble 
4) Managing the Board 

Part II: Swordfighting 

Part III: Rumble 

Part IV: Fray 
1) Openers 
2) Teaming/Reteaming <-- MOST IMPORTANT PART!! 
3) Stalling
4) Demonstrations 

A while ago, I made this recording out of sheer frustration that we kept losing cits because people were fraying as if they were doing a 1v1.

Then I got remarks such as "how could you ramble on for 7 minutes about teaming?"

Well, I'll admit it was slightly rambly, but I was following an outline :P So now, expanding on that, I wrote this.

Part I: Introduction

This is a guide for how to build basic combos in SF and Rumble, and some tips you need to know to be able to fight effectively in frays.

The point of this guide is not to go into the details of all the different strategies you could employ when fighting other players -- there are plenty other guides for that, and some will be linked from here. Not to mention I'm not nearly good enough to give good insight on those subject matters, but rather how to become an effective team player even if your skills aren't that good (mine aren't).

In fact, I'm not even sure that I like SF or Rumble that much... I wasn't sure I liked them at all. But playing them is part of ypp, so you might as well learn to enjoy them... right?

If you’ve ever been on a ship in any sort of battles at all, you’ll know that the outcome of the fray is what determines a win or a loss. The bnav score naturally helps a lot, but since the fray is what ultimately determines the outcome, knowing how to fight in frays effectively is rather important for the average jobber.

All the tips given are to help you stay alive as long as possible in a team setting, while killing off the bots as effectively as possible, even when you can’t dish it out.

Any way of building is a matter of opinion, but the underlying mechanics are facts. 
Develop a method that works for you.

If you can't, you can always start by copying someone else, and then going from there.

Generally, you need to understand:

• Building basic combos for SF and Rumble
• Openers,
• Teaming/Reteaming
• Very important!!!! You shouldn’t concentrate on your board so much to the point where you forget about teaming.
• Stalling
• Managing the board

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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.

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