Recently started playing this again and have been enjoying it. Say someone comment in another thread about not dividing plunder and thought I'd ask here...
Why not?
TBH, I'd prefer not to because I hate how I lose my fleet and especially all the crew, which I find hard to re-amass.
But, I thought that you had to divide otherwise your morale would get so low that it would have very negative consequences eventually.
Everytime you divide the plunder, you're loosing 6 months off your pirate career. Your health is getting worse (because you're getting older), you're loosing your crew, all ships except the flag ship, and most importantly - gathered loot, which directly governs crew morale. After dividing, you're pretty much starting from the scratch.
The more loot you have, the happier your crew is. If you've gathered ~300k of gold you're pretty much sorted for the morale and can sail until you'll get bored
Guardian, makes sense, I guess what I was wondering is... are there any detriments to poor morale (cannonfire becomes less accurate, movement is slowed, etc...) other than desertions?
So, build up to 300K and you're all set for morale.
Not to my knowledge, no. There are rumors that the happier crew it is, the less people are dying during boarding, or it affects things like sea combat maneuvering but I personally haven't confirmed it.
And obviously, if you want to sail with like 500 crew your loot has to be bigger. Generally first part of my career I swim with unhappy crew, when after visiting tavern growing numbers are causing it to become mutinous I attack several vessels/ports to trim them and they're unhappy again. Due in time you can keep more and more people at unhappy, later on it's Content/Unhappy, and so on.
There are rumors that the happier crew it is, the less people are dying during boarding, or it affects things like sea combat maneuvering but I personally haven't confirmed it.
Aye this is true. I don't think morale affects anything else besides the ship fights.
You need about 3k gold per crew member. More discussion on that here.
As for dividing the plunder don't do it. Do whatever is nessacary to keep your crew in line. This means: downsizing your crew, plundering 24/7, keeping only one ship so they can't run off with your gold at sea.
I've reached the point where I can pirate indefinitely because if you never divide your plunder you can live forever. Two of my friends has already played past the 20th century.
Aye this is true. I don't think morale affects anything else besides the ship fights.
You need about 3k gold per crew member. More discussion on that here.
As for dividing the plunder don't do it. Do whatever is necessary to keep your crew in line. This means: downsizing your crew, plundering 24/7, keeping only one ship so they can't run off with your gold at sea.
I've reached the point where I can pirate indefinitely because if you never divide your plunder you can live forever. Two of my friends has already played past the 20th century.
I have verified for myself that the strategy of never dividing plunder works on Apprentice playing level. 1000 gold per crew member (your total crew, not just the crew on your flagship) is enough to prevent mutinies even though at this bare level of loot your crew is quite unhappy. after you have built up to 90k (without ever dividing the plunder) you can support an unhappy (though not mutinous) crew of around 90. that is more enough crew to defeat any ships including named villains and named pirates and to capture Montalban's hideout city since it is protected by about 100 to 120 in Indian guards
the max crew happiness of ~1000 gold needed per total crew to prevent mutiny does not fully kick in before about five and one half years into an expedition. hence the sooner you attempt to capture Montalban's hideout town within that time period, the more crew you can bring along and not have them mutiny
after capturing Montalban's hideout town and then defeating Montalban himself in a duel (for the third time) your reward is 100k, enough to permanently keep another 100 crew from mutiny (in addition to the crew you currently have)
at around 2000 gold per total crew they suddenly go from being unhappy to being content, and you once again will have offers of crews from captured ships to join your own crew
at around 3000 gold per total crew they suddenly become happy, but I am unsure what additional benefit this gives you. at 4000 gold per total crew they suddenly become very happy
the crew unhappiness cap levels are reached after approximately five and a half years of sailing, the exact number of months dependent slightly upon difficulty of your playing level. the cap amounts are NOT dependent on difficulty level, and so the captain's share of the plunder does not influence happiness cap levels (despite what some online guides say)
that link you provided has a detailed calc if someone wants to know the exact amount. the spoiler below quotes from that link to summarize the results
Spoiler:
for the purposes of the crew happiness cap levels having a cook specialist reduces your effective total crew size by 19 crew. the quartermaster does not seem to factor into this at all, raising the question what his purpose is then
the crew happiness level thresholds go up each by factor R which maxes out at 999 (~1000)
these crew happiness cap levels are NOT dependent on playing level, but how soon the cap levels are reached very slightly is dependent upon playing level. R caps at 999 after sailing for a certain number of months, the longer your expedition has lasted, the smaller the relative impact of the 3-Stringed Fiddle and the Concertina, although in terms of how much they reduce the *absolute* amount of loot you need to prevent mutiny, they're still noticeable for as long as R has not maxed out at 999. after R has maxed out at 999 the "1000 gold per crew member" rule of thumb applies regardless whether or not you have these two items. R caps at 999 after sailing for 68 months on Apprentice level, and one month less on each higher difficulty level, so 64 months for Swashbuckler. in other words, for the first five and a half years, roughly, your crew's gold demands build up to those 1000/2000/3000/4000 per crew member figures, and after that it's capped and you can sail forever with fixed crew happiness levels (and a non-mutinous crew). (however you captain still ages with time and I find his health becomes so poor he becomes unable to win duels anymore. hence playing beyond a captain's age of around 48 apparently requires the player to only have naval battles that end in overwhelming victory so that duels are avoided.)
the crew unhappiness caps are at around five and a half years into an expedition, long before your health as captain of the crew declines (if you never divide the plunder). since the captain’s health does decline with age (and max crew unhappiness takes five and one half years into an expedition to set in) the sensible course of action is to nail Montalban asap. you get 100k gold for capturing his hideout (town) and defeating him (for the third time) in a duel. finding the four Lost Cities are 200k. once all five of these quests are satisfied you would have 300k from these quests alone, enough to permanently prevent a crew of 300 from mutiny
since large crews on the Apprentice level are only necessary to capture land garrisons of over 100, it makes sense to divide your 30 year life as a pirate into two stages. the first ten years you pursue the five quests named above, defeat the named pirates and find their buried treasure, and get married. this is the "small crew" phase, and could be accomplished with a max crew as small as 90. at this point the only remaining fame points come from wealth and rank promotions, and these are more readily achieved by capturing towns. hence the last 20 years of your expedition is the "large crew" phase where you get the remaining fame points. since capturing towns also re-arranges the political map of the Caribbean, this is also your chance to use the Lesser Antilles strategy to get the ever elusive Ship of the Line
the Lesser Antilles strategy to get a SotL is to capture these islands for one European power, reserving one town for ship repairs for yourself with a nation unaligned with your target nation. the towns here are closer together than on the rest of the map, and that is why this area is picked. your primary target if your goal is to acquire a Ship of the Line is merchant ships coming from wealthy towns. eventually such towns in desperation will turn to of the Frigate class of ships to finally get some goods delivered. to keep the wealthy towns wealthy immigrant and governor ships are allowed through the blockade and pirates and war canoes if seen are sunk
NOTE: the reason not to divide plunder is to eventually build a large (non mutinous) crew and permanently keep more than one ship. larger crews are necessary to take larger garrisons, particular for inland cities where Indians and pirates cannot be used to reduce the defending garrison beforehand. more than one ship means at the minimum you can haul around enough food to feed your ravenous multitude of crew without continually buying food in ports or attacking grain transports. and for prestige purposes (not directly a game goal of course), you certainly do not want to give up that second Ship of the Line if and when you ever capture one
if you do divide the plunder your share of it as captain of the crew is 5% on Apprentice level, and 90% of that amount is put in a bank account of some sort where it only counts towards your wealth fame score at the end of the game. however those wealth fame points primarily accrue from land grants given by grateful governors for services rendered and so this money in your bank account is moot anyway. the rest of your share of the divided gold plunder (one half of a percent of the divided plunder on Apprentice level) is seed money you use to start your next expedition
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