joelwest
Noble
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance there is a pretty comprehensive guide to Pirates at
hookedonpirates.com in the Guide section
unfortunately some of the info in this guide is incorrect or misleading
I found another post on that site crew discontent guide that gives the hidden formula on how fast the discontent of your crew rises with length of the expedition
taking these two pieces of info together apparently there are two stages to your career of around thirty years as a pirate in this game.
NOTE: all my observations below are wrt Apprentice Level, although some of the info is true for the higher levels as well. at Apprentice Level finding each of your four missing relatives takes two Raymondo searches in order to get your max fame points at the end of the game wrt your missing family. I do not find the prospect of more than eight searches for Raymondo to be "fun" or enlightening
I am going to make this strategy guide a spoiler since you should play at least one game on your own before I "spoil" how the game mechanics actually work
hookedonpirates.com in the Guide section
unfortunately some of the info in this guide is incorrect or misleading
I found another post on that site crew discontent guide that gives the hidden formula on how fast the discontent of your crew rises with length of the expedition
taking these two pieces of info together apparently there are two stages to your career of around thirty years as a pirate in this game.
NOTE: all my observations below are wrt Apprentice Level, although some of the info is true for the higher levels as well. at Apprentice Level finding each of your four missing relatives takes two Raymondo searches in order to get your max fame points at the end of the game wrt your missing family. I do not find the prospect of more than eight searches for Raymondo to be "fun" or enlightening
I am going to make this strategy guide a spoiler since you should play at least one game on your own before I "spoil" how the game mechanics actually work
Spoiler :
some players have played for hundreds of years in one expedition, but I have found your captain's reflexes will slow down to a crawl around 30 years into an expedition (even with medicine as your basic skill and the two life extending Special Items) and duels then become unwinnable (unless you have a lot more skill at dueling than I do, a distinct possibility). I conjecture expeditions beyond thirty years focus only on naval battles where the opposing ship is always sunk or damaged so much that duels never occur. (this is long after the named villains have been defeated, so all opposing ships can be sunk). at any rate most players chose to stop their expedition at around 30 years (or whenever their captain starts to slow down), I will assume this is your intent in what follows
whenever you divide your loot (plunder) you will lose all your ships but one (your current flagship), and most of your crew. crew can easily be replaced (particularly once you have some rank promotions) and one ship may be all you want if you do not mind frequent stops to buy food for your crew, but "time is money", and spending time building up your loot again to be able to once again have a large crew (more on that below) is wasteful. hence NEVER divide the plunder if it is your intent to play on Apprentice Level in 1660. if you want to play in another era on Apprentice Level, start one playing ONE level higher (so you can select another starting era), build up some loot, and divide the loot ASAP in order to revert to the Apprentice Level in that era
in any of the eras (1620, 1640, 1660, or 1680) your roughly thirty year expedition as captain (with decent reflexes in a duel) will be divided into two phases, a small crew phase where your crew will top out at about 100 to 120 (depending on how fast you can capture Montalban's hideout), and the large crew phase after you have in addition captured the four Lost Cities (and acquired all your fame points except those from wealth=land grants from grateful European power governors and rank promotions). your crew size can then grow up to as much as 350 (more if necessary if you have enough loot) in order to capture towns with large garrisons. this in turn rearranges the political map of the Caribbean, something useful if your ultimate goal is to get the ever elusive Ship of the Line (New Warship)
it is time consuming to track good prices from port to port (either from your own notes while in that port or from what the mysterious traveler reports). to make profits on the order of that gained from capturing the better loot ships (such as treasure ships and military payroll ships) you need to haul around extra ships just to carry all that non food cargo. some players apparently requested a non military way of playing the game, but a time cost versus benefit analysis indicates that all non-food cargo, including spices and luxuries, should be ignored. food extends voyages, and so is quite useful. you should only carry around as many guns (cannons for your ships) as your flagship (or largest gun capacity fighting ship) needs. at the very start of the game you may be a few guns short of this, but their sale price is so low it is pointless to stock up on guns. (the ever elusive Ship of the Line has a max of 48 guns. the much more easily obtainable Large Frigate has a max of 40 guns.)
1) small crew phase (roughly the first ten years of your expedition)
you have roughly five and a half years from the start of the game (of your roughly thirty year expedition) before your crew reaches its maximum unhappiness level of ~1000 gold per crew member (total crew, not just what is on your flagship) to prevent mutiny. it takes a coupla years for this unhappiness to start to kick in so having crews of over 300 is very possible early on (but only "necessary" if you feel the need to have a practice land battle before taking on Montalban's Indians)
although the game does not alert you to this fact, from the start of your expedition the clock is running on finding Montalban's hideout town (with its 100k in gold) and having a large enough non mutinous crew to defeat his Indian guard
if you wait until past five and a half years to attack his hideout town (and hence face his Indian guard of about 100) you will need to have a minimum of 90k in gold to appease a non mutinous crew of 90 (since you will now need the max of ~1000 gold per crew member to prevent mutiny). with a crew of just 90 you will be outnumbered, and so must be careful fighting the Indians guarding his hideout town
the moral to this story is that the sooner you attempt to capture his hideout town the more crew you can bring with you with a lower support cost (necessary amount of gold per crew member to prevent mutiny). after you capture his hideout town and defeat Montalban in a duel (for the third time) the 100k gold you receive gives permanent support to 100 crew (after their max unhappiness kicks in after five and a half years)
a small crew can easily defeat ships at sea, particularly once you have a ship you feel comfortable using. if you do not feel like firing all three types of shot to totally decimate the guns/hull (cannon balls), sails (chain), and crew (grape) of the opposing ship, just ram the other ship as soon as you can with at least around 25 crew on board your own ship. the named pirate ships usually have some (if not all) ship upgrades, as do some war galleons. to avoid costly ship repairs just ram them asap (and avoid a volley firing battle)
defeating the named pirates and acquiring their partially upgraded ships (with some of the eight possible ship upgrade add ons) is a fast way to get both a serviceable ship for yourself and to get gold to keep your crew happy (non mutinous). the loot from pirate maps is also fast and easy to obtain (once you learn to decode the map symbols). the named pirates are scattered around the whole Caribbean, so to preserve time only go after the ones nearby you find out about from barmaids in taverns
the primary focus in the first few years (beyond getting a serviceable ship and enough loot to afford to buy Special Items and info from the mysterious traveler in taverns) is to
chase down Raymondo twice,
use the completed map to rescue your sister to get a lead on Montalban, and
chase down Montalban to get first part of the map to his town hideout
then repeat the above -
chase down Raymondo twice (again),
use the completed map to rescue your uncle to get a lead on Montalban (again),
chase down Montalban (again) to get the remaining part of the map to his town hideout,
defeat the Indians guarding his town hideout (which requires a min crew of 90 and enough loot to prevent them from mutiny),
and finally
defeat Montalban the third time in a duel
----------
the only way to bypass a set of two Raymond chases to rescue a family member and hence get a lead on Montalban is to have a perfect dance with a beautiful gov's daughter. I personally find this is very difficult to do, even with the two Special Items that help and the Wit and Charm basic skill. (you may not get credit for a perfect dance even if you never stumble and apparently hit every one of the dance cues at the appropriate time.) setting up the opportunity to have such a perfect dance requires that you deter from your pursuit of Raymondo or Montalban long enough to impress some European power enough to get the rank promotion that allows you to dance with a beautiful daughter (normal promotion rank of five which is Baron), and to visit enough towns until you find one that has a beautiful daughter (or listen to the barkeep's comments on daughter reputation for beauty and go to that town if it is nearby). when a mysterious traveler gives you a report on a town (useful for garrison size and ship add on type), he will NOT tell you which type of daughter the governor has unless you have already visited that town and found out for yourself (been introduced to that daughter)
if you are able to get a perfect dance with at least one beautiful gov daughter, spending time acquiring the necessary rank promotion may be faster than the two Raymondo chases it bypasses. (however to get your max fame points at the end of the game at some point all eight Raymondo chases have to be completed, and these are easier to do with a smaller crew)
before fighting the Indians guarding Montalban's hideout town for the first time, practice a land battle to sack a town by temporarily boosting your crew size over 100 and trying to sack a town whose garrison is smaller than your crew size, but over 100 (to force a land battle rather than a simple duel with the captain of the guard for that town)
----------
at this point you will have 100k gold from capturing Montalban's town hideout and out dueling him, and no doubt at least another 50k gold from defeating named pirates, digging up their treasure maps, and from gold looted from any ships you have captured. military payroll ships and treasure ships have the most gold on board, and named pirate ships you do not want for yourself are worth selling if relatively undamaged. assuming you do have 150k in gold at this point in the game you will be able to support a non-mutinous crew of up to about 150 even after max crew unhappiness sets in at about five and one half years into your expedition
----------
as tempting as it is to stop going around in circles chasing down various people, in order to get enough loot to support an even bigger crew (and move on to the large crew phase) it is necessary to now go and find each of the four Lost Cities and get another 200k in gold. at that point you will have at least 350k in gold, enough loot to support as large a crew as you will ever practically need (to capture a town's garrison in the large crew phase)
to get those Lost City map pieces you will need to chase down Raymondo four more times to rescue your two remaining family members. however that just gives you two map pieces = one map to one Lost City. to get the other six map pieces you will have to start several romance subplots, and of each romance subplots has at least one "good enough" dance with a governor's daughter in order for it to proceed. (more on dancing later.)
any map in the game always shows "map landmarks" such as geysers and arches as reference points to what you are looking for. sometimes a Lost City map (unlike all other maps) will not have a coastline indicated. I have had this happen to me for "north of Vera Cruz" and "southeast of Campeche". to date I have found that map landmarks on any type of map ONLY occur along coastlines, not deep in the interior. so for Vera Cruz just keep walking north along that coastline, all the way to Texas if necessary. for Campeche walk south from the Yucatan peninsula along that coastline
----------
your small crew days are over once you have all the fame points except for the ones accruing from wealth and promotions in rank. you have defeated Montalban, found all four of your missing family members, and all four Lost Cities. if you have not already done so find the rest of the named pirates and their buried treasure, and finish a romance subplot by marrying a governor’s beautiful (to get the max fame points) daughter
you could opt to never go to a larger crew, but avoiding town captures may make it take longer to get those remaining wealth and rank fame points, and also does not let you rearrange the political map of the Caribbean which may be helpful if your ultimate goal is to get a Ship of the Line
2) large crew phase (roughly the last twenty years of your expedition)
you may ask "why not keep a small and hence less mutinous crew forever?" I suppose it is possible to get enough wealth and rank promotions (Captain to Duke) from the four European nations simply by sinking enough pirate and European ships of a nation they are at war with, but it is much faster and potentially a good source of loot to sack European towns (via a land battle). a very few European towns have a garrison less than 100, and so can be taken by a small crew (with a duel by the captain of the guard for that town). but for European towns with garrisons larger than 100 a land battle is necessary, and roughly you need your crew size at least at 90% of the town's garrison level to easily win. hence you need a large crew (more than the ~90 needed to capture Montalban's town hideout) to capture most towns and win rank promotions faster. (an article on the website mentioned above also claims frigates fight best with a crew of at least 167)
although the game notes the amount of your share of the plunder in gold when you retire, in actuality almost all your wealth fame points at the end of the game come from land grants made by various European powers earned by doing the same sort of things that earned you your rank promotions. your wealth fame points are maxed out once you have about 30,000 acres of land granted to you. the crew’s unhappiness support (to prevent mutiny) of ~1000 gold per crew member is independent of your playing level (and hence of your share of the plunder at the end of the game when you retire)
capturing towns allows you to rearrange the political map of the Caribbean since after one or two captures of a town you will be able to name the governor from one of the three other European powers. setting up the Lesser Antilles (San Juan to Margarita) so that they belong to one of the three non-Spanish European powers (with at least one ship repair port belonging to another nation) is one strategy to more easily generate the ever elusive ultimate fighting ship, the Ship of the Line (SotL). in that case after rearranging the political map the strategy is to harass all ships of WEALTHY cities in the Lesser Antilles until out of frustration they are forced to send out a Ship of the Line instead of a Merchantman class of ship. for those cities to remain wealthy enough to afford a SotL, governor and immigrant ships to these wealthy cities should NOT be harassed and pirate and Indian raiders need to be sunk if detected
dancing with gov daughters
early in the small crew phase (up to the capture of Montalban's hideout town) dancing is not really necessary to get leads to Raymondo since they can also be had for free from an abbot or from the mysterious traveler in a tavern for 1000 gold (however you may have to wait a while to get either one of these offers)
later in the small crew phase dancing IS necessary in order to get the remaining Lost City map pieces. hopefully in all the years of chasing Raymondo and Montalban you have sunk enough (named and unnamed) pirate ships and War Canoes plus the occasional military payroll ship, treasure ship, or even invasion ship to have gained enough rank promotion (rank level five of Baron, perhaps less with Special Items) to be able to dance with beautiful gov daughters of at least one European nation
if you are like me you will initially have a problem dancing with the gov daughters. every dance always starts out slowly enough that you can usually pick up the correct visual cues for the next dance step (particularly with plain daughters), but every dance eventually goes into double time at least once and then it becomes very difficult to continue to react to the visual cues fast enough without practice - or help (see below)
I did not notice it until reading the strategy guide, but on Apprentice Level there is a help screen in the lower right hand corner that shows what key to press, and if you load the patch to the Pirates game this key flashes BEFORE you need to press it, even after a dance has gone into double time
since you then know which key to press beforehand, you can then press it exactly when you see the daughter's head bob down (on a downbeat of the music) to get the most benefit on how well your dancing is evaluated by the AI. the strategy guide also lists some common dance patterns. at the Apprentice Level so far I have seen no patterns beyond what is listed in the strategy guide, so it becomes easy to identify which pattern you are in, and therefore the remaining steps to that pattern
even with Wit and Charm as my basic starting skill I find that how the AI evaluates your performance as "perfect" or not is unpredictable, and that a "perfect" dance is a feat rarely achieved. whether or not the AI thinks your dance is "perfect" does matter since you get a better reward from a "perfect" dance than from one that was merely "good enough" (to advance the romance subplot with that daughter). I find a "good enough" dance is easy if you install the patch, follow the screen aid that flashes before the next dance step, and become familiar with the basic dance patterns listed in the strategy guide. (the only time I flubbed a dance recently was when my num lock key was accidentally turned on, and hence none of my dance steps were recorded.)
----------
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, the game's sexist mechanics make it a complete waste of time to dance with a governor's plain daughter. the reward is the location of a criminal, something that clutters up the top of your game screen, and whose reward money makes it hardly worth spending the time chasing them down (1000 to 5000 in gold). the exception to this rule is when you are first learning to dance plain daughters give the easiest visual cues for the next dance step. (in that case you are dancing with her to practice dancing, not to get an item to substantially help you in the game. perform a quick save before entering this port so you can later resume the game at that quick save and decline to dance with this daughter.) the gift she gives you for being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, a governor's attractive daughter can give you a choice between 2 or 3 Special Items and so avoid the fee the mysterious traveler in the tavern charges. however after a while even if there are Special Items left which she could give you (see list in strategy guide), she will start giving the same worthless criminal leads that you get from dancing with a plain daughter. however if she is still giving our Special Items, you can repeatedly return to this town and continue to receive one Special Item after another as the romance subplot with this daughter continues. (I once received four Special Items in a row.) the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, a governor's beautiful daughter gives you lead on Raymondo, but an abbot can tell you this for free (if you are lucky) or a mysterious traveler will charge you 1000 gold (if you cannot dance to save your life). the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you perform a "perfect" dance, a governor's beautiful daughter gives you a lead to Montalban, and hence (temporarily if you desire to achieve max fame points) bypasses the need for two Raymondo chases. the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
keep in mind sometimes you must take action in order for a governor daughter to give you something new. if she tells you about the location of a criminal or a given Raymondo incarnation, or completes a Lost City map you must act on this knowledge (find the person or find the Lost City) if you want to receive anything new. however if your sole aim is to rapidly have a romance subplot, you already have a ring or necklace (or you get lucky and the traveler in that town sells you one), and your rank entitles you to meet this town's daughter, you can repeatedly go in and out of this town and advance the subplot all the way to her kidnapping, at which point you will have to leave and find that Mendoza clone (unless you are incredibly lucky and he spawns in the tavern of the town you are already in). after the Mendoza clone is defeated all you have to do to get married is to return twice more to her home town and propose (provided you are not already married)
whenever you divide your loot (plunder) you will lose all your ships but one (your current flagship), and most of your crew. crew can easily be replaced (particularly once you have some rank promotions) and one ship may be all you want if you do not mind frequent stops to buy food for your crew, but "time is money", and spending time building up your loot again to be able to once again have a large crew (more on that below) is wasteful. hence NEVER divide the plunder if it is your intent to play on Apprentice Level in 1660. if you want to play in another era on Apprentice Level, start one playing ONE level higher (so you can select another starting era), build up some loot, and divide the loot ASAP in order to revert to the Apprentice Level in that era
in any of the eras (1620, 1640, 1660, or 1680) your roughly thirty year expedition as captain (with decent reflexes in a duel) will be divided into two phases, a small crew phase where your crew will top out at about 100 to 120 (depending on how fast you can capture Montalban's hideout), and the large crew phase after you have in addition captured the four Lost Cities (and acquired all your fame points except those from wealth=land grants from grateful European power governors and rank promotions). your crew size can then grow up to as much as 350 (more if necessary if you have enough loot) in order to capture towns with large garrisons. this in turn rearranges the political map of the Caribbean, something useful if your ultimate goal is to get the ever elusive Ship of the Line (New Warship)
it is time consuming to track good prices from port to port (either from your own notes while in that port or from what the mysterious traveler reports). to make profits on the order of that gained from capturing the better loot ships (such as treasure ships and military payroll ships) you need to haul around extra ships just to carry all that non food cargo. some players apparently requested a non military way of playing the game, but a time cost versus benefit analysis indicates that all non-food cargo, including spices and luxuries, should be ignored. food extends voyages, and so is quite useful. you should only carry around as many guns (cannons for your ships) as your flagship (or largest gun capacity fighting ship) needs. at the very start of the game you may be a few guns short of this, but their sale price is so low it is pointless to stock up on guns. (the ever elusive Ship of the Line has a max of 48 guns. the much more easily obtainable Large Frigate has a max of 40 guns.)
1) small crew phase (roughly the first ten years of your expedition)
you have roughly five and a half years from the start of the game (of your roughly thirty year expedition) before your crew reaches its maximum unhappiness level of ~1000 gold per crew member (total crew, not just what is on your flagship) to prevent mutiny. it takes a coupla years for this unhappiness to start to kick in so having crews of over 300 is very possible early on (but only "necessary" if you feel the need to have a practice land battle before taking on Montalban's Indians)
although the game does not alert you to this fact, from the start of your expedition the clock is running on finding Montalban's hideout town (with its 100k in gold) and having a large enough non mutinous crew to defeat his Indian guard
if you wait until past five and a half years to attack his hideout town (and hence face his Indian guard of about 100) you will need to have a minimum of 90k in gold to appease a non mutinous crew of 90 (since you will now need the max of ~1000 gold per crew member to prevent mutiny). with a crew of just 90 you will be outnumbered, and so must be careful fighting the Indians guarding his hideout town
the moral to this story is that the sooner you attempt to capture his hideout town the more crew you can bring with you with a lower support cost (necessary amount of gold per crew member to prevent mutiny). after you capture his hideout town and defeat Montalban in a duel (for the third time) the 100k gold you receive gives permanent support to 100 crew (after their max unhappiness kicks in after five and a half years)
a small crew can easily defeat ships at sea, particularly once you have a ship you feel comfortable using. if you do not feel like firing all three types of shot to totally decimate the guns/hull (cannon balls), sails (chain), and crew (grape) of the opposing ship, just ram the other ship as soon as you can with at least around 25 crew on board your own ship. the named pirate ships usually have some (if not all) ship upgrades, as do some war galleons. to avoid costly ship repairs just ram them asap (and avoid a volley firing battle)
defeating the named pirates and acquiring their partially upgraded ships (with some of the eight possible ship upgrade add ons) is a fast way to get both a serviceable ship for yourself and to get gold to keep your crew happy (non mutinous). the loot from pirate maps is also fast and easy to obtain (once you learn to decode the map symbols). the named pirates are scattered around the whole Caribbean, so to preserve time only go after the ones nearby you find out about from barmaids in taverns
the primary focus in the first few years (beyond getting a serviceable ship and enough loot to afford to buy Special Items and info from the mysterious traveler in taverns) is to
chase down Raymondo twice,
use the completed map to rescue your sister to get a lead on Montalban, and
chase down Montalban to get first part of the map to his town hideout
then repeat the above -
chase down Raymondo twice (again),
use the completed map to rescue your uncle to get a lead on Montalban (again),
chase down Montalban (again) to get the remaining part of the map to his town hideout,
defeat the Indians guarding his town hideout (which requires a min crew of 90 and enough loot to prevent them from mutiny),
and finally
defeat Montalban the third time in a duel
----------
the only way to bypass a set of two Raymond chases to rescue a family member and hence get a lead on Montalban is to have a perfect dance with a beautiful gov's daughter. I personally find this is very difficult to do, even with the two Special Items that help and the Wit and Charm basic skill. (you may not get credit for a perfect dance even if you never stumble and apparently hit every one of the dance cues at the appropriate time.) setting up the opportunity to have such a perfect dance requires that you deter from your pursuit of Raymondo or Montalban long enough to impress some European power enough to get the rank promotion that allows you to dance with a beautiful daughter (normal promotion rank of five which is Baron), and to visit enough towns until you find one that has a beautiful daughter (or listen to the barkeep's comments on daughter reputation for beauty and go to that town if it is nearby). when a mysterious traveler gives you a report on a town (useful for garrison size and ship add on type), he will NOT tell you which type of daughter the governor has unless you have already visited that town and found out for yourself (been introduced to that daughter)
if you are able to get a perfect dance with at least one beautiful gov daughter, spending time acquiring the necessary rank promotion may be faster than the two Raymondo chases it bypasses. (however to get your max fame points at the end of the game at some point all eight Raymondo chases have to be completed, and these are easier to do with a smaller crew)
before fighting the Indians guarding Montalban's hideout town for the first time, practice a land battle to sack a town by temporarily boosting your crew size over 100 and trying to sack a town whose garrison is smaller than your crew size, but over 100 (to force a land battle rather than a simple duel with the captain of the guard for that town)
----------
at this point you will have 100k gold from capturing Montalban's town hideout and out dueling him, and no doubt at least another 50k gold from defeating named pirates, digging up their treasure maps, and from gold looted from any ships you have captured. military payroll ships and treasure ships have the most gold on board, and named pirate ships you do not want for yourself are worth selling if relatively undamaged. assuming you do have 150k in gold at this point in the game you will be able to support a non-mutinous crew of up to about 150 even after max crew unhappiness sets in at about five and one half years into your expedition
----------
as tempting as it is to stop going around in circles chasing down various people, in order to get enough loot to support an even bigger crew (and move on to the large crew phase) it is necessary to now go and find each of the four Lost Cities and get another 200k in gold. at that point you will have at least 350k in gold, enough loot to support as large a crew as you will ever practically need (to capture a town's garrison in the large crew phase)
to get those Lost City map pieces you will need to chase down Raymondo four more times to rescue your two remaining family members. however that just gives you two map pieces = one map to one Lost City. to get the other six map pieces you will have to start several romance subplots, and of each romance subplots has at least one "good enough" dance with a governor's daughter in order for it to proceed. (more on dancing later.)
any map in the game always shows "map landmarks" such as geysers and arches as reference points to what you are looking for. sometimes a Lost City map (unlike all other maps) will not have a coastline indicated. I have had this happen to me for "north of Vera Cruz" and "southeast of Campeche". to date I have found that map landmarks on any type of map ONLY occur along coastlines, not deep in the interior. so for Vera Cruz just keep walking north along that coastline, all the way to Texas if necessary. for Campeche walk south from the Yucatan peninsula along that coastline
----------
your small crew days are over once you have all the fame points except for the ones accruing from wealth and promotions in rank. you have defeated Montalban, found all four of your missing family members, and all four Lost Cities. if you have not already done so find the rest of the named pirates and their buried treasure, and finish a romance subplot by marrying a governor’s beautiful (to get the max fame points) daughter
you could opt to never go to a larger crew, but avoiding town captures may make it take longer to get those remaining wealth and rank fame points, and also does not let you rearrange the political map of the Caribbean which may be helpful if your ultimate goal is to get a Ship of the Line
2) large crew phase (roughly the last twenty years of your expedition)
you may ask "why not keep a small and hence less mutinous crew forever?" I suppose it is possible to get enough wealth and rank promotions (Captain to Duke) from the four European nations simply by sinking enough pirate and European ships of a nation they are at war with, but it is much faster and potentially a good source of loot to sack European towns (via a land battle). a very few European towns have a garrison less than 100, and so can be taken by a small crew (with a duel by the captain of the guard for that town). but for European towns with garrisons larger than 100 a land battle is necessary, and roughly you need your crew size at least at 90% of the town's garrison level to easily win. hence you need a large crew (more than the ~90 needed to capture Montalban's town hideout) to capture most towns and win rank promotions faster. (an article on the website mentioned above also claims frigates fight best with a crew of at least 167)
although the game notes the amount of your share of the plunder in gold when you retire, in actuality almost all your wealth fame points at the end of the game come from land grants made by various European powers earned by doing the same sort of things that earned you your rank promotions. your wealth fame points are maxed out once you have about 30,000 acres of land granted to you. the crew’s unhappiness support (to prevent mutiny) of ~1000 gold per crew member is independent of your playing level (and hence of your share of the plunder at the end of the game when you retire)
capturing towns allows you to rearrange the political map of the Caribbean since after one or two captures of a town you will be able to name the governor from one of the three other European powers. setting up the Lesser Antilles (San Juan to Margarita) so that they belong to one of the three non-Spanish European powers (with at least one ship repair port belonging to another nation) is one strategy to more easily generate the ever elusive ultimate fighting ship, the Ship of the Line (SotL). in that case after rearranging the political map the strategy is to harass all ships of WEALTHY cities in the Lesser Antilles until out of frustration they are forced to send out a Ship of the Line instead of a Merchantman class of ship. for those cities to remain wealthy enough to afford a SotL, governor and immigrant ships to these wealthy cities should NOT be harassed and pirate and Indian raiders need to be sunk if detected
dancing with gov daughters
early in the small crew phase (up to the capture of Montalban's hideout town) dancing is not really necessary to get leads to Raymondo since they can also be had for free from an abbot or from the mysterious traveler in a tavern for 1000 gold (however you may have to wait a while to get either one of these offers)
later in the small crew phase dancing IS necessary in order to get the remaining Lost City map pieces. hopefully in all the years of chasing Raymondo and Montalban you have sunk enough (named and unnamed) pirate ships and War Canoes plus the occasional military payroll ship, treasure ship, or even invasion ship to have gained enough rank promotion (rank level five of Baron, perhaps less with Special Items) to be able to dance with beautiful gov daughters of at least one European nation
if you are like me you will initially have a problem dancing with the gov daughters. every dance always starts out slowly enough that you can usually pick up the correct visual cues for the next dance step (particularly with plain daughters), but every dance eventually goes into double time at least once and then it becomes very difficult to continue to react to the visual cues fast enough without practice - or help (see below)
I did not notice it until reading the strategy guide, but on Apprentice Level there is a help screen in the lower right hand corner that shows what key to press, and if you load the patch to the Pirates game this key flashes BEFORE you need to press it, even after a dance has gone into double time
since you then know which key to press beforehand, you can then press it exactly when you see the daughter's head bob down (on a downbeat of the music) to get the most benefit on how well your dancing is evaluated by the AI. the strategy guide also lists some common dance patterns. at the Apprentice Level so far I have seen no patterns beyond what is listed in the strategy guide, so it becomes easy to identify which pattern you are in, and therefore the remaining steps to that pattern
even with Wit and Charm as my basic starting skill I find that how the AI evaluates your performance as "perfect" or not is unpredictable, and that a "perfect" dance is a feat rarely achieved. whether or not the AI thinks your dance is "perfect" does matter since you get a better reward from a "perfect" dance than from one that was merely "good enough" (to advance the romance subplot with that daughter). I find a "good enough" dance is easy if you install the patch, follow the screen aid that flashes before the next dance step, and become familiar with the basic dance patterns listed in the strategy guide. (the only time I flubbed a dance recently was when my num lock key was accidentally turned on, and hence none of my dance steps were recorded.)
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assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, the game's sexist mechanics make it a complete waste of time to dance with a governor's plain daughter. the reward is the location of a criminal, something that clutters up the top of your game screen, and whose reward money makes it hardly worth spending the time chasing them down (1000 to 5000 in gold). the exception to this rule is when you are first learning to dance plain daughters give the easiest visual cues for the next dance step. (in that case you are dancing with her to practice dancing, not to get an item to substantially help you in the game. perform a quick save before entering this port so you can later resume the game at that quick save and decline to dance with this daughter.) the gift she gives you for being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, a governor's attractive daughter can give you a choice between 2 or 3 Special Items and so avoid the fee the mysterious traveler in the tavern charges. however after a while even if there are Special Items left which she could give you (see list in strategy guide), she will start giving the same worthless criminal leads that you get from dancing with a plain daughter. however if she is still giving our Special Items, you can repeatedly return to this town and continue to receive one Special Item after another as the romance subplot with this daughter continues. (I once received four Special Items in a row.) the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you can only perform a "good enough" dance, a governor's beautiful daughter gives you lead on Raymondo, but an abbot can tell you this for free (if you are lucky) or a mysterious traveler will charge you 1000 gold (if you cannot dance to save your life). the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
assuming you perform a "perfect" dance, a governor's beautiful daughter gives you a lead to Montalban, and hence (temporarily if you desire to achieve max fame points) bypasses the need for two Raymondo chases. the gift she gives you for dancing (or being returned home after defeating a given Mendoza clone) changes to the very valuable Lost City map piece once the complete map to Montalban's hideout is revealed
keep in mind sometimes you must take action in order for a governor daughter to give you something new. if she tells you about the location of a criminal or a given Raymondo incarnation, or completes a Lost City map you must act on this knowledge (find the person or find the Lost City) if you want to receive anything new. however if your sole aim is to rapidly have a romance subplot, you already have a ring or necklace (or you get lucky and the traveler in that town sells you one), and your rank entitles you to meet this town's daughter, you can repeatedly go in and out of this town and advance the subplot all the way to her kidnapping, at which point you will have to leave and find that Mendoza clone (unless you are incredibly lucky and he spawns in the tavern of the town you are already in). after the Mendoza clone is defeated all you have to do to get married is to return twice more to her home town and propose (provided you are not already married)
