Sailing, PvP, and PvE

When parking at an island stop relying on anchor, always lift sails til you gentle drift to a stop. Their is two reasons why this is done, the first, develops an essential habbit. The second, is this allows you to be prepared for an inevitable fight. The benefits of having an anchor up allows you ship to rotate in place. This provides a ship the ability to rotate cannons on approaching ships as well as an avenue of escape if you so wish. Having anchors down is a death sentence in this game.

The second big thing is to start developing situational awareness. Ships do not come out of nowhere. They need to travel, so always keep tabs on ships around you. You should be able to recite the general location of all ships near you. This way, if you are on island you can keep tabs on the ships around you so if they approach for a fight you can be ready.

Third, and their is more but I am not writing a thesis paper here. Learn the signs of a boarder. The number one method to sink a ship in this game is to get combatants on the other person's ship. They can disrupt repairs and make a ship sink really quick. Learn that if a ship is near they will almost always send over boarders be prepared to guard ladders. Enemy boarders are easy to kill when on ladders because they literally can't fight back. Big things to look for is a cannon-shot with no cannonball following. This is always a player, most boarding attempts will come from players shooting in front of your ship so they can catch your ladder when it sails over them. If they are close enough for ship combat, watch out for sword dash boards. If you sword lunge into water, you jet through it. This is a bug turned feature, learn it quick.

Combat experience will come with time, but try to establish roles if you can until you do get the hang of it. For example someone operates the ship while the other fights with cannons and/or boarding. Always keep a person on ship if you can.

Sailing:

It's very important to know your ship and how it operates.

The first advice I'd give to new players is to make sure you choose the appropriate-sized ship....

All too often I encounter galleons with only one or two pirates as crew. Even experienced sailors struggle to correctly operate a galleon with less than four crewmates.....

If there are two of you, get a sloop.....Three, get a brig....

The other MAIN topic for new sailors is to understand that your sails are your accelerator AND your brakes.

The anchor is an EMERGENCY brake.

Treat it accordingly.

If you MUST drop it, fine - but get it back up immediately.

Eventually you'll get the feel for using the sails to gracefully glide to a stop at your destination.....

It can be an art form....lol

PvP:

The best advice I could give new players regarding PvP is to PAY ATTENTION.

Most PvP can be avoided, if that's your goal. Other ships can be seen at great distances, so keep an eye or two on the horizon constantly.

Appoint a 'lookout' if necessary.

In battle, keep your ship moving, making yourself a more difficult target, and harder to board (that's why we don't sit anywhere with our anchor dropped). The first thing an enemy boarder will try to do is drop your anchor, so protect against that by PAYING ATTENTION to the audio cues (the enemy ship firing PIRATES instead of cannonballs, swimming, mermaids, and the grabbing of your ladder all have very distinct SOUNDS)

Embrace the PvP and you will improve with experience .

PvE

As with PvP, you will improve with experience .

Sometimes it can be overwhelming, but my best advice would be to prioritize keeping your ship afloat.
Always have enough supplies onboard to deal with emergencies, and always be resupplying as you use them.....To me, pineapples and cannonballs are more valuable than treasure.....

Treasure:

Is friggin everywhere......you'll find it...lol

Personally, I just want to thank you for asking questions regarding how YOU can improve as a new player, instead of wanting the GAME to change for you.

Myself and a lot of other old-timers appreciate that.....

Good luck and fair winds to you.....

@timmypokolop
Megalodons tend to be pretty simple. Raise your sails to come to a stop and take shots on it with the cannons as it swims by the sides of your ship. If you are on a sloop with two people, one can time a turn on the wheel so the pirate on the cannon can get more shots in. When the meg goes to bite your ship, get below deck so it doesn't hurt you and knock you into the water. If you have a shot on it with the cannon, you can stop it's attack with enough damage. Just make sure you have the health to take the bite incase you don't stop it.

Skeleton ships can be avoided most of the time by staying away from the ship cloud and keeping your distance from the roaming ships around the world but when they emerge to attack you, they can be dispatched quickly if done right. If you are sailing a sloop, you should only have to deal with skeleton sloops spawning on you. Once you hear the sound that one is spawning, have your sails at half, and keep your ship straight. Once it emerges, try to get as many early shots in before the skeletons start actually doing things. I try to aim for the area on each side of the cannon. That keeps them from shooting back and puts possibly two holes in their ship that I keep making bigger with each hit. As a skeleton tries to repair it, It starts doing damage to him, keeping him from repairing and eventually killing him. Using a jigball, grogball, or sleepball will stun them. After putting 3 or 4 cannonballs into them, hit them with a stunball so they can't repair. Fire will put itself out on a skeleton ship so they don't seem to be very useful, unless you can start a fire on their cannons killing any that try to shoot your ship.

Skeleton galleons can be tough due to the firepower they have but a lot of the same techniques work. Remember to aim below the water line. Until the bottom deck is full of water, second deck holes don't help, unless you hit them with a ballistball while they have second deck holes. Don't use a ballistball and then attempt to put holes in their top deck, use it only when you fail to hit them below the water line too many times in a short amount of time, and they have multiple second deck holes that aren't taking water yet. It's good to note that skelleons have a blind spot. If you grind your ship side by side next to theirs, they can't hit you with cannons. If you find yourself rubbing ships together, start bucketing water from your ship onto theirs. You would be surprised how useful this is. It keeps them from putting holes in your ship and hitting you with cursed cannonballs and firebombs, while also helping you keep your ship dry and filling their ship at the same time.

If you have the crew to spare, you can send over someone to kill skeletons while they try to repair. I wouldn't suggest this on the skeleton sloops since they are really cramped, but on the skelleons, one can essentially hide in the brig bottlenecking skeletons into the doorway where a cutlass can make easy work of them. With a hole in the brig with you, it's just a matter of time before the water is second deck at least.

Don't get discouraged if you have trouble with them. Even the most seasoned of us still get taken out sometimes. Skeleton ships can be especially deadly if they have the right cursed cannonballs.

@dag-13ernit said in Sailing, PvP, and PvE:

@poslio This threads a rare one for sure.😂

Indeed.

I try to reply to these type of posts for just that reason.....

Hopefully it will encourage more people to approach the game as a STUDENT, willing to learn, instead of all these wanna-be game developers trying to re-design the game to suit themselves....

It's my little way of fighting back against the endless 'PvE server' threads....lol

Some good advice for you and your friends in this thread @TimmyPokolop.
I just want to thank you for taking the time to seek advice and help to improve your in-game experience.

It's a refreshing change from the usual "remove X to make this easier for me".

@dag-13ernit Whats ya GBP?

The best and easiest tips I can give you is the following:
Always get your ship full of food, wood and cannonballs. I can't stress this enough. The majority of the pvp and pve interaction (on the ship) are loose because a lack of resources.

My way to do it is make the outpost where you start empty of materials, then sail to the nearest non-active Fort and get everything you can (couple of keg are always welcome)... And ready to go on an adventure sieving the waves!!

Enjoy this awesome game and I hope hope to see you guys out there

@timmypokolop said in Sailing, PvP, and PvE:

Hi, my friends and I are very new to the game, and we are wondering if we could get any tips to help us. We seem to struggle the most on:

• Parking at an island
  • We often find ourselfs crashing
    into an island and taking damage
    or coming up way too short

Basic rules to follow: Name plate comes up - sails can start going up.

Regarding the size of the island, practice with raising the sails and keep in mind it can be more than just full and down. Use the full length of your sails to adjust speed and turn speed. Get a feel for it by just doing it often. Everyone has bumped into things, just practice no worries.

If push comes to shove, just throw the anchor down before you crash. Raise the sails and raise the anchor before you continue. Never leave the anchor down if possible. However, if you know you will crash don't drop the anchor it will actually make it more annoying, just raise those sails asap. Just take the hit and deal with it.

• PvP
  • We also find ourselfs getting
    sunk by other ships. We know
    that this is part of the game, but
    want to be able to fight back and
    not loose all of our loot.

First rule of the seas: Watch the horizon. No enemy pops out of the blue so even when on the island, make sure to do a scan every so often. If you do not see them coming then you cannot decide how you want to respond and are most likely starting off in a bad spot.

Second rule of PvP, your ship is everything. On the seas it is not about how many pirates you kill, it is about who is floating at the end.

Learn to survive and keep people off your ship by guarding ladders. Understand the limits of your ship and when in doubt bailing is faster than repairing. If your ship is safe you can try and practice fighting, shooting and boarding.

Keep moving! Nothing is easier to shoot down and control than a sitting duck. You can just do half sails front facing and not worry to much about the sails.

There is also no shame in fleeing or pulling back to repair and regroup. Having them chase you can also be a benefit. Sometimes what you have is enough and you just need to run.

For just practicing fighting, Arena can be a great place to find it.

• PvE
  • We have found ourselfs in
    multiple occasions fighting a
    megladon, or a skeleton ship.
    We try our best, to try and win
    to get treasures, but we find that
    we always get sunk or die.

Stock Up! Before you even set sail make sure you have 100 cannonballs and 50 planks, then keep gathering while out on the seas.

For all sea creatures cannons are pretty much a must and so you need ammo. Also you can assume to be hit and need to repair.

Megan:

This is a pretty easy fight

1. If you want to avoid the fight - head to land.

2. If you want to fight:

• Shoot her with cannons when you have the chance.
• Shoot her with guns if you cannot use the cannon.
• When she charges hit her with the cannon if possible and make sure one of you is below deck to not fly off the ship and can repair.

Kraken:

This is a more complicated fight but not very difficult once you understand what to do.

First you defeat her by killing enough tentacles. Therefore focusing the same one by one is smart.

Second her attacks:

1. Eating Pirates: Sucks you up into the mouth of a kraken tentacle and if hit or after a while will spit them up.
   Avoid this by going below deck or grabbing ahold of something on the ship when you notice it is targeting you.
2. Tentacle Slap: Hits your ship
   Well simply repair the damage.
3. Tentacle Grab: Grabs the ship and damages it.
   Do not attack the tentacle that is wrapped around you, it isn't useful. Instead you have to look next to the cannons on one of the sides there will be a tentacle head and you blast it with cannonballs. It might dive down and come up the other end, just keep doing that till it lets go. Repair and bail water when needed.

The water hurts you and is really black. Keep fed and if you are stocked you should be able to defeat her. Have one person in the map area and below shooting with guns and repairing while the other cannons if you want.

Raising the sails and being still can help if you want to fight, as the water does slow you at some point you will start gaining speed and might just leave the area and fight all together. Naturally you can just sail back in if you want.

Skeleton Ships

This is basic ship on ship battle, don't be on their broadside, get them on your broadside. Anything that puts water in them is progress, be it bailing on to them or crashing into them. They are also not great sailors so being near islands and rocks makes them crash often.

You can also use kegs and have one guy board and blow them up if you have them to speed it up.

These are great ships to have some basic practice if you want to get better at fighting pirates as well.

Oh and naturally... cannonballs below the waves is water flowing into their hull. Aim at the lower end, but keep in mind killing the cannon skeletons can give you a little break in their fire. They do respawn so it is temporary.

Any tips for these interactions? We would greatly appreciate it. Also, any other tips that may be beneficial such as gettin lots of treasure would be sooo helpful.
Have a nice day!
Kindest Regards- Timmy

Hope this helps. Enjoy becoming the pirate you want to be and see you on the seas.

@timmypokolop said in Sailing, PvP, and PvE:

Hi, my friends and I are very new to the game, and we are wondering if we could get any tips to help us. We seem to struggle the most on:

• Parking at an island
  • We often find ourselfs crashing
    into an island and taking damage
    or coming up way too short
• PvP
  • We also find ourselfs getting
    sunk by other ships. We know
    that this is part of the game, but
    want to be able to fight back and
    not loose all of our loot.
• PvE
  • We have found ourselfs in
    multiple occasions fighting a
    megladon, or a skeleton ship.
    We try our best, to try and win
    to get treasures, but we find that
    we always get sunk or die.
    Any tips for these interactions? We would greatly appreciate it. Also, any other tips that may be beneficial such as gettin lots of treasure would be sooo helpful.
    Have a nice day!
    Kindest Regards- Timmy

Welcome to sea of thieves!

You are here asking for tips.
This means that you are already one step ahead than other new players. We are here to help :)

Your most important thing to learn is your ship. Get comfortable with it. Playing Solo was a great way for me to learn, that and Youtube. Sneaklr has some good tips on kegging for PVP.

Parking at an island is simple, know its hard to hide, just keep your head on a swivel and dont hoarde loot.

Knowing how to escape is the key to all your woes though.

Theres a youtube video about sail angles and speeds for each type. Once you know them, avoiding fights altogether is much easier.

As for pvp, you'll pick up your own playstyle over time and practise.

I played solo from day 1 and still do mostly, its hard at first, but its through having to do everything yourself, makes you learn a whole lot more about your sloop to the point that, that extra crew member on a sloop is just dead weight.

Best advice
Solo sail around and get comfortable with the ship.

Youtube specific stuff like kegging ships, best ways to board etc etc. Seeing it is so much easier than reading.

Lastly, put it into practice.
Put a post up on discord or the xbox crew finder thing, theres a few of us who will have a few sessions helping new guys out :)

Best of luck.

I have a few tips! When parking at an island i reccomend trying to get used to raising sails but if you cant get used to it just anchor, Its there for a reason. As for pvp, you'll learn to use each gun as you try them out but dont force yourself into pvp, and the arena isnt much of a place to look as that isnt all pvp it is also ship v ship most of the time.