User:YoHoHoPiratePerson

Chat Commands

/speak: Normal speech. It shows up in a chat bubble. Only works in shops and in chat circles.

/think: Thinking. It shows up in a thought bubble. Only works in shops and in chat circles.

|-/emote: Emotion. Appears in a curvy rectangle box, and | /em:    inserts your username immediately before it. Example: | /e:     "/me does something" would become "Segekihei does |-/me:     something". Works only in shops and in chat circles. The four commands are interchangeable.

/shout: Like speak, except heard by all on screen. Works anywhere. Only available to subscribers.

|-/tell:  Add a username of a logged-on user after /tell and type |-/msg:   a message to be sent privately to them.

/crew:  Speaks to your crew only. Appears in orange. Works anywhere, provided ye are in a crew.

/jcrew: Speaks to your jobbing crew only. Appears in purple. Works anywhere provided ye are jobbing with a crew.

/vessel: Speaks to the pirates on yer vessel only. Appears in           white in a ship-like shape. Usable only while on a           vessel.

/fofficer: Sends a message to all officers in yer flag. Works anywhere, provided ye are an officer and in a flag.

/royalty: Sends a message to all royalty in yer flag. Works anywhere, provided ye are royalty in yer flag.

/fbroadcast: Sends a message to the entire flag. Works anywhere, provided ye are royalty in a flag.

/who:   (no username provided) Shows who is currently logged in            and who is at sea in what ships. (with username) Shows link to information about said pirate, where they are if they are logged in, and when they logged in last if they are not logged in.

/fwho:  (no name provided)  Shows who is logged on in your flag. (name provided) Searches for flag names, provides link to information about them.

/cwho:  Searches for the crewname given after /cwho.

/vwho:  Searches for the vessel name given after /vwho.

|-/afk:   Add a messsage after /afk or /away to auto-respond to all |-/away:  /tells with said message.

/back:  Clears /away or /afk message.

/blackspot: Can only be dealt by officers or up, places a tag on           jerks in game. They must be on screen and online to do           so. Used for things that aren't necessarily a violation of game rules, but still slimy.

/complain: Useable by everyone, you can /complain about a           violation of the game's Terms of Service. Don't use it           lightly.

/bug:   Add a description of an in-game bug that you have discovered and it will be sent to the developers for logging.

/clear: Clears the screen of all chat bubbles for clarity.

/gwho:  Shows all greenies and greeters currently logged on.

/job:   Jobs the pirate with the username used after /job. Only useable by officers and up.

/mute:  Silences the pirate listed after /mute.

/unmute: Allows chat from pirate listed after /unmute.

/plank: Throws a pirate off a ship. Requires that ye and the pirate listed are on the same ship. Officers and up           only.

Jobbing with the Navy Jobbing with the Navy is the very first thing many pirates do. To job with the navy, while on the docks, click the Notice Board. This is near the dock, and is a small column with paper attached to it. Look in the middle section that appears (Navy Vessel Jobs) and apply for one of those jobs. Ye will be whisked out to the vessel where ye will work on that ship as it sails. Easy as that! There is minimal human interaction, however, and the pay is not extremely high, as players usually do not attack navy ships. If no place is hiring, though, feel free to job with the navy to  make a quick buck.

Jobbing with a Crew Jobbing with a Crew is another important part of the game. When you feel like sailing, and noone in your crew is on, job with a  player crew! To do so, go to the Notice Board and look at the bottom section (Jobbing for a Crew). Apply for one of those jobs and a message will be sent to that ship. If they want ye on the ship, they will respond with an invitation. Click "Accept" and ye  will be whisked off to their ship to work with them. NOTE: Only apply for one job at a time, and wait ten to fifteen seconds in  between applications. Only one invitation can go through at a  time, and it takes roughly ten to fifteen seconds for a crew to   respond to a job notice.

Joining a Crew If ye've jobbed with a crew and ye feel like they are a good place to work, join them! While jobbing with the crew, ask the head officer to offer ye a job. If they offer you a job, click "Accept" and ye will be hired into the crew as a Cabin Person. Ye  can advance the rankings through the crew's advancement policy, which varies by crew. NOTE: Ye can only be part of one crew at a   time, so when ye permanently join a crew, ye'll leave your previous crew, if ye were in one. Ye can still job with other crews, though; that's a temporary situation.

Starting your own Crew Feel like making it on yer own? Start yer own crew. To do so, however, the requirements are stricter than to merely join one. - Ye must be a subscriber. - Ye must be at least Narrow in ranking in Sailing, Carpentry, Bilging, Navigating, and Sea Battle. - Ye must own a ship. If ye meet all three requirements, ye can start yer own crew! First, leave the crew ye're currently in. You can do this by  going into the CREW tab on the right-hand side of the screen and scrolling to the bottom of the listing of crew members. Click "Crew Info" and move to the bottom. Click "Leave Crew" and confirm the decision, and you'll be out of that crew. Next, go to  the CREW menu on the right-hand side of the screen and click "Create a Crew". On that screen, ye can organize the crew's name, description to be publicly shown, information to be privately shown, your pay rates to different ranks, and your crew cut. When created, ye will become captain of that crew. Ye now have full authority to do whatever ye want with yer crew.

Crew Government There are three different ways to run a crew: - Democratic:  Everyone Pirate-rank and up votes on all issues. - Oligarchic:  Senior Officers and Captain vote on issues. - Autocratic:  Captain decides issues. The easiest way to run a crew is Autocratic. This way, as long as  you remain active, the crew remains active. Oligarchic is harder, because it requires a voting majority amongst the SOs and Captain. If an SO goes inactive, they can't vote, and if enough go  inactive, nothing can happen in the crew. This happened with an  old crew of mine (which is now on the rebound, apparently) when the Captain and three Senior Officers went inactive, leaving the two active SOs to do nothing.

Ahh, puzzles! The heart of the game! In the following section, I  will give you information about how to play each puzzle available in the game.

Sailing is the most important of the skills o' piracy. Accessed via the ship's rigging, many Pirates may sail simultaneously, combining their efforts and further increasing your speed. Other skills you'll need on a vessel are bilging, carpentry, gunnery and navigation.

A sailor's task is to align falling blocks into target spaces of the same color, filling and clearing platforms to give your ship a boost of speed. Warmed up on that, a skillful sailor creates cascading chains of breaking blocks, filling the platforms on the last drop, and multiplying his efforts greatly! It is in these chaining clears that a master Sailor revels!

Basic Sailing When Sailing two joined pieces fall from the top of the screen. They may be moved left and right with the arrow keys, and rotated using the up or down arrow. The sailing pieces represent water, wind, and rope.

The objective in sailing is to place the correct pieces into the open targets on the platforms, clearing any fixed square pieces that may get in your way. Placing four or more pieces of the same color in a column or row clears them from the board. This will score you points, just make sure you aren't clearing pieces you are using to clear platforms!

Clearing Platforms

To clear platforms you will need to match the outlined targets with pieces of the targets' colors. Blank spots between targets can be filled with any piece (or none at all). Because pieces remain joined until one of them is cleared, filling the right spots can be tricky. Hey, nobody ever said that a sailor's life was easy!

Chains To achieve great sailing performance you should seek to form chained moves. For example, clearing a column of four pieces to let an attached piece fall into the last spot on a platform, clearing the platform with a "Double!" combo. It is possible to get "Triple!" and higher combos as well. The diligent use of chains is the secret to great sailing performance. What is the largest chain you can achieve?

Clearing the Board Should you eliminate all the platforms on the screen, you clear the board and are given a new one. There is no special bonus for clearing the screen so concentrate on making those chains. If the board fills and there's no room for the next piece then you've messed up, the ship suffers a small penalty in speed, and a new board is drawn.

Sailing Scoring Each time you clear a platform, row or column of pieces the ship accelerates until it has reached its maximum speed. Finishing platforms will provide more acceleration than rows. Sailing is scored based on your efficiency at using pieces to create acceleration, i.e. score per piece, rather than score per second. However, as in all duty puzzles, prolonged times of inactivity will lower your score so keep an eye on the performance indicator if you slow down. To achieve excellent reports you want to use each new pair wisely and with a certain degree of alacrity. The sailing performance indicator shows you how well you are sailing at any particular moment:

The sad blue sail to the left is not really adding to the speed of the vessel, whereas the golden glowing sail to the right is full-speed ahead! Font-size of score feedback is also a good indicator of just how good a clear was.

Blockades & Maneuvers In blockades where maneuvers are enabled, sailing takes on an additional level of complexity. Target platforms and four like-colored pieces in a row are still cleared as usual. If you are sailing well, some of the pieces you receive will have a maneuver shape in addition to their normal color. If two of these are adjacent and within a platform or four-in-a-row that is cleared, your ship will gain progress towards the associated maneuver. Additionally, if the cleared platform or four-in-a-row is at least the third in a chain of clears, additional progress will be earned.

Although progress may be earned towards any maneuver, the navigator may request a specific maneuver. This requested maneuver is shown in the maneuver indicator along with the current progress of the bilgers, carpenters, and sailors on the ship towards that maneuver. The progress bar for sailing is shown in yellow and wider than the others while in the sailing puzzle. Once each bar is filled to the top, that maneuver will be added to the navigator's tokens and the ship will perform its maneuver; moving with great speed or agility, firing powerful cannon shots, or dropping flotsam behind the ship to slow and possibly damage opposing ships.

Sailing Strategy The key to successful sailing is in chains. When one first starts Sailing it is usually best to clear the platforms at the top of the board first, as they are easier to get at and can obstruct activity in the lower part of the board. However, to create successful chains, an experienced sailor will start at the bottom. Try to nearly fill (leaving one empty target) platforms at the bottom of puzzle first. This way, you leave those lower platforms open to chaining pieces dropping from the platforms above. Be sure to keep the way clear for your chaining pieces to drop to these lower platforms. Take advantage of the joined nature of the pieces to set one side of a pair to fall and complete a lower platform when its conjoined piece is cleared from an upper platform. Thus, a chain and multiplied points. In general, try to always clear in chains. This maximizes your score for even the smallest clears. Even when cleaning up junk try to chain from one four-in-a-row to another.