Fixed Improved Stats for Black Pearl

[Johivas]

Is it worth it to explore the temple at the end? I passed 2 hours in there because I saw a weird sign on a wall, and another one on the second floor, but apart from the akeela place (made me feel like in the 80's...), and the path leading to the end, is there something worth it? It's really an incomprehensible maze...

And I captured the black pearl before reloading to explore the maze, it's a very crappy ship without the curse, worse, it showed 24 lbs canons when I captured it (i transferred some from my ship), and once in a shipyard, the canon category showed 18 lbs.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Is it worth it to explore the temple at the end? I passed 2 hours in there because I saw a weird sign on a wall, and another one on the second floor, but apart from the akeela place (made me feel like in the 80's...), and the path leading to the end, is there something worth it? It's really an incomprehensible maze...

Not really. There is indeed the end of the maze to complete the story and the secret easter egg room, but not much else.

And I captured the black pearl before reloading to explore the maze, it's a very crappy ship without the curse, worse, it showed 24 lbs canons when I captured it (i transferred some from my ship), and once in a shipyard, the canon category showed 18 lbs.

The Pearl is being uncursed once you capture her because in her cursed form, she's quite overpowered.
Vanderdecken doesn't care though and he can sell you the cursed version.

 

[Johivas]

The Pearl is being uncursed once you capture her because in her cursed form, she's quite overpowered.
Vanderdecken doesn't care though and he can sell you the cursed version.

I'd be interested in knowing who this Vanderdecken is...

 

[Grey Roger]

The uncursed Black Pearl used to be a decent ship, but now it's fit for nothing other than to either be sold or berthed somewhere as a souvenir.

It's certainly odd that the ship's guns should shrink, though. Some of the cursed features, e.g. insanely high hit points and the ability to use sweeps to move against the wind, should be lost. But if it has 24lb guns then it has 24lb guns; the skeletons didn't throw them overboard and conjure up some lesser cannons as a last act before losing the ship! I suggest editing "Ships_init.c" to change the guns in "UncursedPearl" to 24lb. And preferably raise its performance a bit, perhaps back to what it used to be.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I'd be interested in knowing who this Vanderdecken is...

http://www.piratesahoy.net/wiki/new-horizons-faq/#1-how-can-i-play-as-this-guy-and-get-that-ship

Spoiler

Get the compass from Mr. Gibbs in the Tortuga Tavern, then go into the ship's wreck on Isla de Muerta.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

The uncursed Black Pearl used to be a decent ship, but now it's fit for nothing other than to either be sold or berthed somewhere as a souvenir.

I recall doing that. At the time, the Cursed Pearl got all sorts of unintentional bonusus and modifiers applied and I changed it so that it worked as intended.
As far as I'm aware, the Black Pearl stats are the same accross the board, but we can check that, I suppose.

In the past, the stats of the Black Pearl were unintentionally really good. The change made ensured that it becomes intentional.
I remember asking for suggestions on what stats she should actually get, but we never figured that out so nothing ever changed.
I'd still welcome someone coming up with better stats. I have no objection to the Pearl being a good ship. I only objected to the code doing unintentional things.

 

[Johivas]

Even if you made it a good ship, the Black Pearl still only got 30 (or so) cannons. To make it worthwhile in one's fleet, it would have to be a really special ship, and maybe that was the idea behind the "unintentionally" really good stats. It got about 300 crew members, so you can't really see it as a decent personal capture ship, it means it is someone else in your fleet that will command it. Next, in a decent battle, it can't really have a decisive effect with its 30 cannons, so the way to see it is as a crazy ship putting a grain of salt in one's game. For that you lower crew count again a bit, to 250, leave it at 18 tons cannons so people will use culverines, cargo hold is allright too, give it 15 knots base speed and 50 base turn rate, and finally 20000 or more hull strength. That's how I would see it, but maybe i'm describing the cursed version...

It's a shame there is nothing special in the end maze, (except bugs like invisible walls, invisible beams, and quick travel to Puerto Rico port that in fact teleport you somewhere else in the maze...), they made that big maze and the solution to it is so easy it makes the whole thing worthless, it's like they had no more imagination at that point, but they still had to separate the story by some time, so they made the player take a jog in a worthless maze to pass some time...sure that in the original game, the end was the end, so nothing much to do with something new...

 

[Grey Roger]

There are four sets of stats: "BlackPearl", "WickedWench", "UncursedPearl", "CursedPearl". Only "CursedPearl" has 24lb guns, the rest all have 18lb. "CursedPearl" has lower weight and capacity than the others (weight 1000 vs. 1100, capacity 2200 vs. 4500) and fewer crew (max 300, min 60 vs. max 324, min 65). It also has massive HP and SP (100000 and 999999 vs. 4500 and 200). "CursedPearl" and "BlackPearl" have speed 16.0, turn 70; "WickedWench" and "UncursedPearl" have speed 12.5, turn 70. Additionally, "WickedWench" is English and does not have the "unique" trait set so its stats will get the national modifiers for England; the others do all have "unique" and will get exactly what is written in "Ships_init.c".

Presumably you get "UncursedPearl" after you capture the ship and it's no longer cursed. What is "BlackPearl" used for? Should they perhaps be the other way round so you get the same speed as "CursedPearl" after you board it and uncurse it? If Wicked Wench is transformed into Black Pearl, i.e. "WickedWench" is replaced by "BlackPearl" some time during the "Jack Sparrow" storyline, perhaps "BlackPearl" should be the one with similar stats to "WickedWench"? (Though since "BlackPearl" is unique and "WickedWench" is not, they won't get identical stats anyway.)

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Even if you made it a good ship, the Black Pearl still only got 30 (or so) cannons. To make it worthwhile in one's fleet, it would have to be a really special ship, and maybe that was the idea behind the "unintentionally" really good stats. It got about 300 crew members, so you can't really see it as a decent personal capture ship, it means it is someone else in your fleet that will command it. Next, in a decent battle, it can't really have a decisive effect with its 30 cannons, so the way to see it is as a crazy ship putting a grain of salt in one's game. For that you lower crew count again a bit, to 250, leave it at 18 tons cannons so people will use culverines, cargo hold is allright too, give it 15 knots base speed and 50 base turn rate, and finally 20000 or more hull strength. That's how I would see it, but maybe i'm describing the cursed version...

There was no idea behind the unintentional really good stats, because it was a genuine bug which was responsible for that.
The Pearl is a galleon of sorts so you can't really expect much more from her than from a normal galleon.
Though she does have one of the highest SpeedRate values in the game, inspired by the quote from the films. THE highest actually, but prior to national modifiers.

It's a shame there is nothing special in the end maze, (except bugs like invisible walls, invisible beams, and quick travel to Puerto Rico port that in fact teleport you somewhere else in the maze...), they made that big maze and the solution to it is so easy it makes the whole thing worthless, it's like they had no more imagination at that point, but they still had to separate the story by some time, so they made the player take a jog in a worthless maze to pass some time...sure that in the original game, the end was the end, so nothing much to do with something new...

The release of the original game was rushed; that is common knowledge.
If you want a more interesting version of the maze, try the Maltese Knight Abbey in Bridgetown.

There are four sets of stats: "BlackPearl", "WickedWench", "UncursedPearl", "CursedPearl". Only "CursedPearl" has 24lb guns, the rest all have 18lb. "CursedPearl" has lower weight and capacity than the others (weight 1000 vs. 1100, capacity 2200 vs. 4500) and fewer crew (max 300, min 60 vs. max 324, min 65). It also has massive HP and SP (100000 and 999999 vs. 4500 and 200). "CursedPearl" and "BlackPearl" have speed 16.0, turn 70; "WickedWench" and "UncursedPearl" have speed 12.5, turn 70. Additionally, "WickedWench" is English and does not have the "unique" trait set so its stats will get the national modifiers for England; the others do all have "unique" and will get exactly what is written in "Ships_init.c".)

The Wicked Wench can probably be set to "unique" too to ensure everything matches up.
There are:
- WickedWench
- Black Pearl
- Cursed Pearl/SHIP_CURSED (showing skeletons at night and trailing fog)
- Uncursed Pearl

I can't quite remember the exact progression and whether Black Pearl or UncursedPearl is the one prior to the curse.
The idea was once that the Wicked Wench is the normal one, then Davy Jones' adds his special touch of magic when she becomes the Black Pearl.
The actual Cursed Pearl/SHIP_CURSED is way overpowered because it is the enemy boss ship at the end of the Standard Storyline, but not intended to be a player ship.
Then when you capture her in the Standard Storyline or in the latter part of the Jack Sparrow storyline, the curse is lifted and she goes a bit more back to normal.

Might make sense if SHIP_CURSED is the best one and otherwise each version that was cursed more would have better stats.
So Wicked Wench gets the "worst" and the final uncursed Pearl gets the best of the playable ships.

 

[Grey Roger]

I can understand why the cursed Pearl has the better stats, including the insane HP. The reason the uncursed Pearl used to be pretty good is probably that it didn't have the "unique" trait set so it was getting the modifiers for being Pirate. Perhaps the logical thing to do would be to modify its stats to include those modifiers. (This is exactly what happened to "PiratBattleGalleon", which was the modified version of the San Martin "SP_BattleGalleon" in the "Bartolomeu o Portugues" story. It was supposed to have better performance than the basic Spanish version, but when it got the "unique" trait it lost that edge, so I edited its stats to factor in the Portuguese national modifiers.)

In Build 13 - and in Build 14, before the unintentional performance boost was removed - the Black Pearl was a raider's dream. It could outfight anything it couldn't outrun, and outrun anything it couldn't outfight. It had the armament and performance to rival a frigate plus a big cargo hold, so if it couldn't capture a merchant ship (e.g. because you're only allowed three companion ships and this was target 4) then it could take a lot of the captured ship's cargo aboard. In Build 14, by the time I'm going against the Pearl I'm usually sailing a Razee or Flushdeck frigate and I'd like the Pearl to be an improvement on that.

@Johivas: 300 crew is plenty, many frigates have that. They may have 40 guns or more but those are only 12lb. The Black Pearl is supposed to be something in that bracket. If you want something with more guns and crew, remember that you've probably also just captured Silehard's former flagship, Sovereign of the Seas. This is not a fast, agile ship but it has enough firepower to take out any fort you like. (If you want a bit of a challenge, take the Sovereign to Cartagena. )

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I can understand why the cursed Pearl has the better stats, including the insane HP. The reason the uncursed Pearl used to be pretty good is probably that it didn't have the "unique" trait set so it was getting the modifiers for being Pirate. Perhaps the logical thing to do would be to modify its stats to include those modifiers.

Please do!

 

[Grey Roger]

Please do!

Try this. It's not exactly "UncursedPearl" modified for Pirate, it's a bit of a mix.

Weight: standard BlackPearl/WickedWench weight is 1100, Pirate modifier is *0.90, which takes it pretty close to CursedPearl weight of 1000, so UncursedPearl is set to 1000.
MaxCrew/MinCrew: CursedPearl is 300/60, Pirate modifier is *1.05/*1.10, which takes them pretty close to BlackPearl/WickedWench 324/65, so UncursedPearl gets its pre-cursed crew back.
Speed: WickedWench (and UncursedPearl before I got to it) is 12.5, Pirate modifier is *1.1, so UncursedPearl gets 13.8.
Turn: WickedWench (and UncursedPearl before I got to it) is 70, Pirate modifier is *1.1, so UncursedPearl gets 77.
Price: CursedPearl is 225000, Pirate modifier is *0.95, so UncursedPearl gets 213750. WickedWench and BlackPearl are 165600, so UncursedPearl is more valuable, as it should be.
HP: All variants apart from CursedPearl have 4500, Pirate modifier is *0.80, so UncursedPearl gets 3600.

That should give it speed and turn comparable to a frigate, capacity similar to a merchant, reasonable firepower (especially since I've also given it the 24lb guns of the cursed version) but reduced resilience consistent with a pirate ship.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Sounds good to me! Thanks.

 

[Grey Roger]

... except I fixed the wrong ship.

Looking through "quests_reaction.c" for both "Standard" and "Jack Sparrow" storylines, "BlackPearl" is the one you get at the end of "Standard" while "UncursedPearl" appears somewhere during "Jack Sparrow". (So does "BlackPearl", somewhat later than "UncursedPearl".)

So if you downloaded the file above, download it again - I've replaced it with an updated version in which "BlackPearl" is fixed. "BlackPearl" and "CursedPearl" both have speed 16, which is already pretty high, so I left it alone. The rest of the modifications (Turn, Price, HP and guns) are now on "BlackPearl". And "UncursedPearl" is back to what it was.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Then I suppose "UncursedPearl" is the one given by Davy Jones and "BlackPearl" is the one after the curse has been lifted.

I'm quite fine with all Black Pearl versions being just about equally good, with only SHIP_CURSED being overpowered.
Though the later version (BlackPearl, then?) being better than the earlier version (UncursedPearl) might be even better.
That also gives a reason in the Jack Sparrow storyline to keep playing because your ship gets better as you go along.

 

[Johivas]

@Johivas: 300 crew is plenty, many frigates have that. They may have 40 guns or more but those are only 12lb. The Black Pearl is supposed to be something in that bracket. If you want something with more guns and crew, remember that you've probably also just captured Silehard's former flagship, Sovereign of the Seas. This is not a fast, agile ship but it has enough firepower to take out any fort you like. (If you want a bit of a challenge, take the Sovereign to Cartagena. )

Yes, Silehard's flagship is excellent, it's the only category one ship I found that I decided to keep, i'll upgrade it and play with it as I do as many side quests as I can (I did the main story in a rush).

 

[Grey Roger]

Then I suppose "UncursedPearl" is the one given by Davy Jones and "BlackPearl" is the one after the curse has been lifted.

I'm quite fine with all Black Pearl versions being just about equally good, with only SHIP_CURSED being overpowered.
Though the later version (BlackPearl, then?) being better than the earlier version (UncursedPearl) might be even better.
That also gives a reason in the Jack Sparrow storyline to keep playing because your ship gets better as you go along.

I had to correct the file again as I forgot to put the HP for "UncursedPearl" back to the original value. So "UncursedPearl" should be identical in stats to "WickedWench", just a different colour. "BlackPearl", the one you get later in "Jack Sparrow" and at the end of "Standard", is the improved one. "CursedPearl" is the overpowered one with immense HP.

 

[Pieter Boelen]

I had to correct the file again as I forgot to put the HP for "UncursedPearl" back to the original value. So "UncursedPearl" should be identical in stats to "WickedWench", just a different colour. "BlackPearl", the one you get later in "Jack Sparrow" and at the end of "Standard", is the improved one. "CursedPearl" is the overpowered one with immense HP.

Did you upload the modified file? Your original post still indicates "Last edited: Yesterday at 4:04 PM"....

 

[Grey Roger]

Yes, though I didn't change any text associated with that post, so perhaps that's why it didn't change the edit date. You can check easily enough - download it and compare the stats for "UncursedPearl" to those for "WickedWench". Also, see if you are happy with the revised stats for "BlackPearl".

 

[Pieter Boelen]

Yes, though I didn't change any text associated with that post, so perhaps that's why it didn't change the edit date. You can check easily enough - download it and compare the stats for "UncursedPearl" to those for "WickedWench". Also, see if you are happy with the revised stats for "BlackPearl".

I suppose so, yes. I'll check the file tonight. Cheers.