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Low Priority Improve Flying Dutchman Battle

Grey Roger

Grey Roger

Sea Dog
Staff member
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From the Wiki entry on Elizabeth Shaw's Disappearance:
Flying Dutchman ( it is invincible – run away ) attacks you outside Cayman Port
Click to expand...
Invincible, eh?

My fleet consists of the Black Pearl, the Mefisto and the Sovereign of the Seas. Ever since Pieter Boelen supplied the code fix which gets you the uncursed version when you board it at the end of the main quest, the Black Pearl has been my main ship for general pirating. So that's what I was sailing the first time I met the Flying Dutchman. Ignoring the above advice, I engaged, with the Sovereign of the Seas providing fire support. By the time the battle was over, the Flying Dutchman was down to about 50% damage and didn't want to play any more. When one side stands its ground and the other side uses its special ability to "sail" straight into the wind and run away, it's reasonable to conclude that the side which ran away was not the winner. :)

After reloading a game saved shortly before this battle, I swapped ship to take command of the Sovereign of the Seas, a somewhat less nimble ship than the Black Pearl - normally I only take over this ship if I'm about to go up against something even less nimble, e.g. a fort. :) Then I went to Cayman to face the Flying Dutchman again. Most of the battle was fairly dull and one-sided. The Flying Dutchman may have a silly number of damage points but it doesn't have a silly number of cannons or masts, and it wasn't long before she was minus her main and mizzen masts and down to about 5-6 guns and 5-6 crew. So when the Flying Dutchman did return fire, it was infrequent and ineffective. Meanwhile I was still pounding her with most of the broadside of the Sovereign of the Seas, having to raise battle sails, pick up a bit of speed and then strike all sail so I didn't whiz past the Flying Dutchman. (You'll probably never see me use the word "whiz" in the same sentence as the name "Sovereign of the Seas" ever again. :)) Eventually I ran out of cannonballs, by which time the Flying Dutchman was down to a few percent of hull, so I started firing whatever I had left - chains and grape. Then I ran out of powder. The Flying Dutchman was now down to about 1-2%. I was going to sail up to one of my other ships, relieve her of her ammo and finish the job, but the Black Pearl saved me the effort. With one well placed salvo she knocked off the last remaining percent, and Davy Jones went to his own locker. (Which didn't stop him from showing up in the port and giving me a headache. :))

dutchman_sinking_small.jpg
 
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Ouch! :shock

Do you have a savegame before landing on Cayman. I wonder if the Dutchman IS properly invincible at that point.
She isn't even supposed to be there anymore once you trick Davy Jones and leave.

This sounds like yet another example of quest ships persisting after they are supposed to have disappeared.
There must be some sort of persistent problem with that. And fairly new too, because it didn't use to do that. :modding
 
The main problem with any savegame I post is that it's from Beta 3, which means nobody running Beta 3.1 or later will be able to read it. ;)

The battle happened before I met Davy Jones, shoved him into the water and got a bullet to the head - hence the final comment about the headache! You're supposed to meet the Flying Dutchman, survive the encounter, land on Cayman, and do various stuff to bring the quest to a close. I haven't seen the Flying Dutchman after that. So the ship is not persisting after she's supposed to have disappeared. I just made her disappear properly. :D

Is the Flying Dutchman supposed to be literally indestructible, i.e. rigged to be untouchable like the cursed pirates you meet outside the Port Royale tavern while trying to deliver the chest during the main quest? Or is she supposed to be practically indestructible due to having silly damage points? The latter won't help if you can turn her into a lumbering, inert piece of oversized driftwood by destroying all her guns and masts. Then it's just a matter of having enough guns and ammo to knock off all those damage points, which basically means loading up the Sovereign of the Seas with all the cannonballs and powder that you can carry along with enough food and rum to actually get to Cayman.
 
I thought she was indeed supposed to have godmode on. Apparently not then. :facepalm
 
For those who use normal ships the Flying Dutchman is more than strong enough. I normally use 3 strong ships and attack the FDs sails then run to port. If the battle lasts long enough the FD will turn and leave as her crew morale is awful, but I see no reason to stick around and get my ships all shot up for no good reason.
 
Pride. :D I was pleased enough to send the Flying Dutchman fleeing in terror the first time, and continued from there. Then I wondered what would happen if I took command of the big guns, loaded up a saved game to find out, and you've seen the result. (That was just an experiment, though. I didn't get shot up much because after a few broadsides from the Sovereign, the Dutchman didn't have much left to shoot with. But if I'd continued from there it would have cost me a fortune in ammo!)

For similar reason I now have a new way of getting into enemy-held ports. Previously I'd either hoist a false flag and hope not to be recognised, or land on a nearby beach and sneak in by the back door. Now I take command of the Sovereign of the Seas, sail in openly, and blast anything which objects, starting with the fort. This works because in Build 14, when you've finished storming the fort and rampaging through the town, all the normal inhabitants are still there, including quest characters. By contrast, in Build 13 all the normal people went into hiding, leaving only some random people wandering around.
All of which means that when Pieter's namesake asked me to go into Santo Domingo to find out what the Spanish were up to, I was not subtle about it. :pirate41:
 
I like the sinking dutchman :).
But do you think we should make it invicible or is it fine just now?
 
She's supposed to be unsinkable. But I reckon, if you insist on putting THAT much effort into it,
I don't object to letting people actually being able to succeed like @Grey Roger did. :cheeky
 
If you're going to make the Flying Dutchman unsinkable (as in the film) then you should create a quest to find Davy Jones' chest, stab the heart and then destroy the Flying Dutchman (as in the film). But that's only if someone fancies writing such a quest...

As the game stands, either you have a super battleship like Sovereign of the Seas or you don't. If you don't then the Flying Dutchman is pretty well unsinkable. If you do then the main problem is that for most of the battle, the Flying Dutchman is effectively a big piece of wood. I suspect Davy Jones has no skills or perks. By contrast I have, either in person or via officers, Cannons 10, Professional Cannoneer, Fast Reload, Pre-load, Defence 10 and Professional Defence. What that means is that even the big guns of the Sovereign are firing a lot more frequently than the Dutchman, and when they do they knock out more guns. And that means that after a while the Sovereign is minus about 5 or 6 guns and the Dutchman has about 5 or 6 guns. Likewise I've lost a few crew and the Dutchman only has a few crew, reducing its firing rate even further. I'm pounding her with salvo after salvo and occasionally she fires a shot back.

So don't make the Flying Dutchman tougher, just make Davy Jones competent. You could even reduce the Flying Dutchman's damage points if that gives her enough extra firepower. If you're in anything less than the Sovereign of the Seas then you run away or get blown to matchwood; if you are in something like the Sovereign of the Seas then you have a real battle on your hands, winnable but a serious challenge.
 
Good idea. Worth looking into.
he now only has
Code: 
ch.skill.Leadership = "8";
    ch.skill.Fencing = "9";
    ch.skill.Sailing = "8";
    ch.skill.Accuracy = "8";
    ch.skill.Cannons = "8";
    ch.skill.Grappling = "8";
    ch.skill.Repair = "6";
    ch.skill.Defence = "6";
    ch.skill.Commerce = "1";
    ch.skill.Sneak = "1";

That's not very good indeed.
I'd say change it to:
Code: 
ch.skill.Leadership = "8";
    ch.skill.Fencing = "9";
    ch.skill.Sailing = "8";
    ch.skill.Accuracy = "10";
    ch.skill.Cannons = "10";
    ch.skill.Grappling = "6";
    ch.skill.Repair = "5";
    ch.skill.Defence = "9";
    ch.skill.Commerce = "1";
    ch.skill.Sneak = "4";

Also let's give him some perks.
Which ones would you say should be added?
I think:
Code: 
ch.perks.list.BasicBattleState = true;
ch.perks.list.AdvancedBattleState = true;
ch.perks.list.HullDamageUp = true;
ch.perks.list.FastReload = true;
ch.perks.list.SailsDamageUp = true;
ch.perks.list.CrewDamageUp = true;
ch.perks.list.CriticalShoot = true;
ch.perks.list.LongRangeShoot = true;
ch.perks.list.CannonProfessional = true;
ch.perks.list.IronWill = true;

That should make him more competent right?
 
It is only the Jack Sparrow storyline where he has such "low" skills. All other storylines, he has "10" for everything.
But indeed not any perks. Adding skills and perks as per your suggestion above. :doff
 
Sovereign of the Seas versus Flying Dutchman, take 2:

Since I'm playing Beta 3.1, those modifications aren't in effect - they only showed up in Beta 3.2. But it probably doesn't matter because Sovereign of the Seas is capable of taking out a fort which in turn is capable of blowing many smaller ships out of the water with a couple of salvos, which means if the Flying Dutchman is powerful enough to be a serious threat to the Sovereign then don't even think about doing the "Elizabeth Shaw" quest in any kind of merchant ship, and if she's not that powerful then the battle is likely to play out as it did here.

Knowing what to expect after last time, I'd dumped half the Sovereign of the Seas' food, rum, planks and sailcloth while at Jamaica - it's a short trip from there to Cayman so I could feed the crew with the reduced stock, then refill when I got there. Meantime that gave me room for more cannonballs and powder (I'd dumped all the grapeshot as well).

The opening shots were actually fired by the Black Pearl under command of one of my officers, who made good use of her speed and agility to get several shots in before the lumbering Sovereign could get to work. It also meant the Pearl took most of the damage from the Flying Dutchman - she lost some crew and two guns during the battle. In turn, the Dutchman lost most of her guns, almost all of her crew, and in due time her mainmast. Then I settled down to the task of finishing off the Dutchman. Even with the added load, I nearly ran out of ammo, but every so often the Dutchman would get away by "sailing" into the wind, the victory music would sound, the compass icon would show up, and on one occasion I took the opportunity to exploit Build 14's ability to transfer goods between ships via the interface screen and brought some of the ammo from the Black Pearl onto the Sovereign of the Seas. Then I'd "Sail-to" the Dutchman and continue the demolition.

There were two amusing incidents. Part way through the battle, a pair of small British warships came along. Normally they'd probably have soiled their pants and run away screaming, but perhaps emboldened by the then current condition of the Flying Dutchman, they joined in for a while and fired off a few shots. I wasn't worried that they'd steal the kill - if the 18 pounders of the Black Pearl and 24 pounders of the Sovereign of the Seas were taking so long to do anything significant, the pop-guns of the new arrivals weren't going to do much. I was more concerned that one of them might go somewhere stupid and get in the way of a batch of cannonballs on their way to the Dutchman, but fortunately they didn't do that.

Towards the end I was downwind of the Dutchman, so she was sailing with the wind and I was sailing against it. Normally that's not where you want to be. But with the Dutchman's mainmast down, the rest of her sails damaged, and not much left of her hull, she wasn't making much speed. In fact, the Sovereign of the Seas was moving faster backwards than the Flying Dutchman was moving forwards!

And so, as evening drew in, the sun was sinking slowly and so was the Flying Dutchman.
dutchman_sinking2.jpg
 
I have never come close to sinking the Dutchman. Usually I shoot out the sails and then leave.
 
LOL! That sounds like an epic story! Definitely the type of event that makes the game worth playing, I think.
I always like hearing these random things that the game throws at you that aren't at all intentionally scripted. :woot

The Dutchman is coded to be fast into the wind and much slower with the wind, based on the chase between her and the Pearl at the end of PotC 2.
So that could have played a role at the end there as well.
 
The Flying Dutchman is probably fast going into the wind because of the sweeps. It was slow with the wind at that point because any ship which is minus its mainmast and about 90% of its damage points isn't going to win any races. :)

@Hylie Pistof: the only reason I got to sink the Flying Dutchman is that I was in the Sovereign of the Seas, probably the ultimate in floating firepower, and even then I needed lots of ammo. The best you can probably hope for with any lesser ship is to hit the Dutchman so hard that you're not the one who runs away!
 
Ya, I do remember one time when the Dutchman turned and sailed away but I can't remember what I had at that time.
 
Grey Roger said:
The Flying Dutchman is probably fast going into the wind because of the sweeps. It was slow with the wind at that point because any ship which is minus its mainmast and about 90% of its damage points isn't going to win any races. :)
Click to expand...
The Dutchman doesn't have sweeps; that's the Black Pearl. She just has her BestPoint set up quite oddly on purpose. :cheeky
 
Pieter Boelen said:
You might want to give the Bartolomeu storyline a try. It has some slight fantasy elements, but I think that is limited to only one giant and the Flying Dutchman appearing once.
Other than that, there is a lot of realism-based stuff, along with very piratey things. Made by the same person who made the Assassin one, so that should tell you what you can expect.
Click to expand...
I know. In fact, I was planning to play "Bartolomeu" next for precisely that reason. Then someone decided to release a new version of Beta 3 and I promised to test out the new "Nelson" storyline. :facepalm

I've already faced the Flying Dutchman as it's one of the side quests available from "Tales of a Sea Hawk". As I said, my preferred game style is extreme violence. Which is why this happened:
 
Huehue.. You couldn't do that with the unbalanced Dutchman cannons :D Your nice Manowar would be a tiny little piece of wood after a few shots of her :D
 
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