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[6.2] FENCING
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OVERVIEW
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Of all the minigames in Sid Meier's Pirates, this is the one you'll see the
most often. Many naval battles end in boarding action and an accompanying
sword fight, and you'll need to draw steel in many other scenarios as well.
Sword fights can occur in the following cases:
- You board an enemy ship (or they board you) and the enemy does not decide to
surrender without a fight;
- You decide to teach the annoying captain of the guard some manners when he
is bothering the barmaid;
- You track down a fugitive criminal to the tavern of the town he is hiding in;
- You decide to fight a duel against the fiance of a governor's daughter you
are trying to charm;
- You attack a town with such an overwhelming force that your men can storm the
fort unchallenged;
- You track down Marquis de la Montalban to his hideout and fight your final
battle against him.
Ship battles are the most common, and the most interesting because the fight
between your crew and the enemy's plays a big factor in the fight. When
attacking a town with an overwhelming force, this factor is present as well,
but you can barely lose those fights anyway (they wouldn't happen if you
weren't badly outmatching the enemy to begin with). In all other fights, it's
just you against the enemy without anybody else influencing the fight.
In a sword fight, your opponent and you start in the middle of whatever area
you are fighting in, and you both have the objective to drive back the other to
their end. This is done by scoring hits on the enemy while not getting hit in
return. The first one to get his back driven against the wall - or whatever
else, depending on the area - loses the battle, with various consequences.
You have the following moves available during battle:
7: high chop. A fairly slow attack that drives the enemy back 2 steps if it
connects, or 1 step if it is parried. No damage if the enemy ducks under it,
and in fact, you'll be overbalanced for a moment if he does.
1: low slash. Just like the high chop, it drives back the enemy 2 steps if it
hits and 1 if it is parried, but it can also be jumped over. In that case
you'll be overbalanced for a while.
4: thrust. A quicker attack than the high chop and the low slash, but it only
drives back the enemy 1 step. If it's parried it has no effect at all. You
will be overbalanced for a short while but not as bad as with the stronger,
slower attacks. You may be able to hit an enemy with a thrust while they're
preparing a high chop or low slash, cancelling their attack and driving them
back. If you and your enemy thrust at the same time, you usually end up
parrying each other with no ill effect to either side.
8: jump. Used to jump over an enemy low slash. Successfully jumping over one
will usually give you the time to counterattack.
2: duck. Used to avoid a high chop. If you pull this off you'll usually have
the time for a counterattack.
5: parry. Used to stop thrusts, or to reduce the damage for a high chop or low
slash. It's better to avoid the latter two when you can though, as parrying
them merely softens the blow and does not give you time for a counterattack
either.
6: taunt. This does not drive back the enemy, but it does swing the advantage
bar in your favour (see below). It's best only to do this instead of an
attack while the enemy is overbalanced, or you'll likely get hit while you
are busy making fun of him.
Winning a battle is theoretically as simple as avoiding your enemies' attacks
and countering with your own. In practice, it's made a little more complicated
by the advantage bar. This red & white bar at the bottom of the screen changes
as the battle develops to shift advantage to either you or your opponent, and
directly affects the speed at which you both move. If you have the advantage,
your opponent becomes slow and easy to predict. If your opponent has the
advantage, he'll unleash a flurry of blows upon you and you'll have a hard time
just fending them off, let alone countering. The advantage bar is affected by
the following:
- Every time you dodge a blow or parry a thrust (and only a thrust), advantage
shifts to you. If your enemy likewise avoids your attacks, advantage shifts to
him.
- If either side taunts the other, advantage shifts to them. This bonus is
nullified if they take a hit during a poorly timed taunt.
- If either side loses part of their crew, advantage shifts away from them.
- Advantage generally moves toward the neutral position if nothing happens.
Howevever, it will tend to stay on the side with the biggest crew.
The last two points aren't a factor if there's no crew in the battle, but in
most cases there will be. This is why having a larger crew than your enemy is
very important on higher levels. It will cause advantage to stay on your side
for the most part, and it will also increase the chance that your enemy loses
crew rather than you, further keeping the battle on your side.
On Swashbuckler level in particular, losing advantage is a very dangerous thing
to happen. It's possible for your enemy to become so fast that he can no longer
be hit, and/or that his attacks become impossible to properly avoid. If this
happens, it takes luck and iron will to shift the battle back in your favour.
Usually when things start to go wrong, you're doomed. On lower levels,
advantage is a far lesser concern as you'll still be faster than your enemy
even if he has the advantage. The difference between difficulty levels is
more pronounced in swordfighting than in any other aspect of the game.
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TACTICS
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On Apprentice level, you'll find that almost anything goes in sword battles.
You can just randomly attack and usually connect. Enemies are driven back
quickly and defeated before you know it. You can completely ignore the
advantage bar and come out of virtually any battle as a victor, even if your
crew is much smaller than the enemy's.
Starting on Journeyman, that approach won't work anymore. Enemies will block
and dodge random attacks, and if advantage shifts away from you, you'll feel
it. Better tactics are needed and the higher the level, the more you have to
stick with them.
First off, you need to choose a weapon for each battle if you're playing on
any level other than Apprentice. Your choice is between:
RAPIER: faster attacks but slower defense.
LONGSWORD: balanced for attack and defense.
CUTLASS: slower attacks but faster defense.
In the previous Pirates games, there was a difference in damage and range
between the weapons; one effect of this was that the Rapier was nearly always
the best choice. This is no longer the case. Weapons are now largely a matter
of personal preference, and on higher levels it is especially important to
pick what suits your style best. Most players seem to agree that the Rapier is
suitable for low levels and you should stick with the Cutlass on the higher
ones.
When you're in battle, it's best to wait for the enemy to attack; he won't
make you wait for long. Identify the style of attack, then press the right
button in response. Jump over low attacks, duck under high ones, and parry
thrusts. It *will* take you a few battles to get the hang of this, but you'll
learn soon enough. How much time you have to dodge depends on the level. Don't
worry about dodging too early; your character will hold position until the
enemy attack goes past. Even if that means hovering in the air for a few
seconds after jumping.
If you press the wrong button in response to an enemy's attack, don't panic.
Quickly press the right button and your character will correct himself
accordingly. As long as you do it before the enemy's attack connects, you can
still dodge or parry even if you started off incorrectly.
When the enemy's attack is past, you can strike back. You don't have to wait
for your character to return to neutral position; the attack is initated as
soon as you hit the button. So if you're still hanging in the air and press
attack, your character will instantly be back on the ground to strike his blow.
On the higher levels you *must* take advantage of this if you want to place
any hits. Do be careful not to press the button too quickly; if your enemy
is still attacking you might get hit after all.
For the most part, you want to counter with chops and slashes for better
damage. However, a thrust is quick and can sometimes hit where the other two
can't. Consider using it if your opponent is particularly fast (due to his
skill and possibly advantage on his side), especially if you're fighting with
a Cutlass. Much better to hit with a thrust than to miss with a slower attack.
On Swashbuckler you may want to stick with thrusts entirely unless you are
brave enough to use the Rapier.
You'll need to keep an eye on the advantage meter while fighting, especially on
the higher levels. If you let it shift to the enemy he will soon become so fast
that you can't fight him properly anymore. If this happens, dodge or parry his
next attack, and then taunt instead of attacking. This will shift advantage
back to you. Now dodge his next attack and start countering again.
If you're still having trouble after all this, keep the following in mind:
- If you are having trouble getting your attacks in quickly enough, switch to
a faster offensive weapon. Rapier is best for this, though I find it dangerous
to use on higher levels. Your mileage may vary.
- If you are having trouble defending quickly enough, make sure you are using
the cutlass. It helps immensely. The only possible disadvantage is having to
do more thrusts instead of chops and slashes, but thrusts win battles too as
long as you don't get hit.
- When deciding to either thrust or chop/slash as a counterattack, keep your
opponent's weapon in mind as well. If he's using a cutlass, you'll find his
attacks easy to dodge but he'll block your counters just as easily. But if he
uses a rapier, mercilessly counter with chops and slashes as he can't defend
nearly as quickly.
- If your opponent is slow you can sometimes hit him with a quick thrust while
he is setting up a slash or a chop. Keep this in mind especially if you are
using the Rapier, which is slow on the defense but can thrust very well.
- You *will* get in trouble if you ignore advantage. Keep it on your side.
You may not be able to do this if you consistently attack opponents with more
men on board than you have, so pick your battles wisely. Many sword fights are
lost not because your reflexes aren't up to it, but because you insisted on
fighting that pirate hunter with only 20 men on your Sloop. Keep your crew up
and avoid spreading them across too many captured ships (particularly damaged
ones). Compare crew sizes before you engage in a battle.
- Balanced swords and fencing shirts help improve your character's battle
speed. Get these items off governor's daughters or mysterious travellers. They
are especially important on higher difficulty levels. Also, getting armor
helps; the leather vest will sometimes deflect blows for you if you failed to
dodge or block them, and the metal cuiraiss will do this even more often.
- Skill at Fencing is a good choice on higher difficulty levels. It will speed
up your character considerably and make a loss of advantage a lot less
dangerous.
- If you react particularly quickly to an enemy attack, your character will do
a flourish and counterattack automatically. This is mostly luck, but the
chance increases quite a bit if you've picked skill at Fencing. Your opponents
will do the same to you if you attack randomly, however; this is why you should
rely on counterattacks only once you move beyond Apprentice.
- Be aware of the effect of your health on fencing. Your character will become
slower with age whenever his health category drops a notch. Try to offset this
with items to either make you quicker or to hold off the effects of aging, but
most importantly, know when it's time to retire. You will eventually get too
old to fight properly.
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OUTCOME
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Unlike in the previous Pirates games, you cannot flee from a sword fight. The
possible outcomes are therefore win or lose. A battle can be won in two ways:
- One fencer drives the opponent to the edge of the area;
- In ship/fort battles only: one side runs out of crew and then takes another
hit, forcing surrender.
If you go into battle with small crews, be very aware of that second possible
outcome. If you run out of crew you *can* still win, but you can't afford to
take a single hit.
What happens if you win or lose a battle depends on the setting.
- If you win a ship battle, you'll automatically plunder their gold, and get to
keep their cargo and their ship if you desire. If there is a specialist on
board you don't yet have, he'll be added to your crew automatically. You may
get the option to recruit additional crew from the enemy ship, and you may
get information on the location of a villain if he was spotted in a city near
where the battle took place.
- If you lose a ship battle, your flagship is lost, along with a portion of
your gold, and any excess cargo/crew your remaining ships can't carry. You will
escape to one of your other ships. However, if it was your last ship, *or* if
you are forced to surrender by running out of crew, you will not be able to
escape. You are imprisoned in the nearest town if the enemy ship belonged to
one of the four European nations, or marooned if you were defeated by a pirate.
- If you win a fort battle, you get to plunder the town. If you somehow manage
to lose one (shame on you, they're easy!), you get captured.
- If you lose against a fiance, you won't be getting that governor's daughter.
If you lose against an annoying captain of the guard, no ill effects occur
except that you can forget about recruiting in that town for the time being.
If you lose against a fugitive criminal, they will escape and never be seen
again. I haven't yet tried out what happens if Montalban defeats you in his
hideout.
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