Topic: Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag

[Cobra951]

Thanks for the tip on the metal.  I haven't progressed enough for the underwater diving yet.  I saw some video of wrestling a shark, and after similar experiences with jaguars, I'm not looking forward to it.  I don't care much about desynchronizing either.  There seem to be no real consequences outside of missions (and even in missions, they're not usually much of a problem).  If the activity is obtuse enough (like mash-a-button fights with jaguars), it doesn't even injure my pride.

[Xessive]

I took down my first Legendary ship (Northwest). I'm not even full upgraded, it can take me out in two shots, but I managed to close in too close for its cannons and jump kept ramming it and blasting it from the rear while avoiding its sides.
That came with a due sense of accomplishment.

[Cobra951]

My encounter was against 2 big suckers (Level-75 man-o-wars), and they kept tag-teaming me.  They would out-sail me into the distance, then charge at me in unison, wide apart.  I could last through several passes, but I never seemed to make any progress against them, regardless of how many mortar shells and volleys of heavy shot I lobbed at them.  Maybe I should look for an easier one my first time around.  Did you see damage displayed, or is this aspect of the game like so many other boss fights, where the usual rules (like a damage gauge) don't apply?

[idolminds]

I haven't gone after any legendary ships yet so I cant help there. But speaking of man-o-wars, I've started finding them more and attacking. On top of a large cargo hold they also award money when you capture them. A 3-4 heavy shot volleys tends to do the trick. They are slow to turn it seems so if you get in just sort of behind them they cant turn quick enough to get their guns on you which you're hitting them with full force.

I took down some more forts including one in the hard area of the sea. I did ok but I took a major beating and my ship was down to the last half of the last bar of health. I sailed back away from the fort and just hit them with mortars while avoiding their mortars. And once I thought I was in the clear...nope, some ships came into the area and started chasing me! I had to sail quite a ways away to lose them so I could sneak back and dock with my sliver of health. Was quite a rush!

[Cobra951]

Heheh!  I swear that's the best part of the game.  The whole naval aspect is hard to stay away from for long.  I've been taking down some Level-36 man-o-wars.  I have 3 of them in Kenway's fleet now, all Spanish.  According to that sideshow, they're slugs.  (Where one schooner shows a speed stat of 67, the big beasts all come in at 9.)  That wasn't my experience with the legendary bastards, though.  They would sail away from me until they were entirely out of range, then next time I saw them, they were bearing down on me fast.  The Jackdaw seemed completely outclassed (not to mention outnumbered).

I've been running into more metal cargo too, always on the bigger ships.  The last 2 I brought down had like 150 metal on them (near where you mentioned), so I've been able to make more upgrades.  It's still a slow process compared to the other resources.

[Xessive]

Ok, I did something a little weird. I approached an enemy vessel without starting naval combat, I jumped off the Jackdaw, swam over to the vessel, climbed up, and eliminated everyone on board in typical Assassin fashion. I was a little miffed when that didn't simply count toward taking the ship. Although, when I went back to the Jackdaw the enemy vessel was now stationery, real easy to blast out of the water and then I had to "board" it which automatically spawned some enemies for me to eliminate.

[Cobra951]

Oh, wow.  That has to be a hole in the logic.  Entertaining nonetheless.  I have to try it now.

[Cobra951]

Getting a low wanted level (1-2) helps a lot with metal.  Most hunter ships seem to carry it.  I'm sailing routinely now that way, and I'm up to 785 metal with nothing useful (i.e., non-cosmetic) to spend it on.  What I'm lacking now are the plans for some of the elite upgrades.

Level 3 works too, but the challenge level spikes a great deal.  So I avoid going that far.

[PyroMenace]

I'm at the tail end of the game. I've explored and gathered all the collectable stuff from all the locations, got all the keys and mayan stones. I still have a handful of buried treasure to get and those scattered chests and animus fragments around the map. I'm sitting on about 90k money right now with not much else to spend on.

[Xessive]

Did anyone else notice that health/armor upgrades which you craft are already on Kenway's default outfit from the beginning? I think they were planning to make the outfit change slightly visually with each health upgrade (like in the original and Ezio trilogy) but then scrapped the idea at the last minute.

[PyroMenace]

I'm not sure to be honest. I thought it changed but I messed around with switching outfits a bunch so I couldn't really notice.

[Cobra951]

Has anyone messed around with Kenway's Fleet?  It's more engrossing than I thought it would be.  Online only, but it makes sense, with it being real-time and persistent.  It gives the best reason to capture ships, and seek out the ones at the higher levels.

[PyroMenace]

Yea its pretty cool. I sort of stopped messing with it so much as I was gaining money from it too quickly and thus making the game easier, I enjoyed boarding ships and plundering them for money instead. I only used it for just getting the unlocks.

[PyroMenace]

Well I finished it up earlier today, finish as in I collected everything, inside and outside of the animus as well as the story. I also took out all the legendary ships, the dual ship one was a bitch. You really have to get a feel for their maneuvers because it comes down to exploiting that, also you can't just take down one of the ships at a time. Doing that buffs the other ship and it does ridiculous ramming damage, killing you quickly, so you want to get them both down to really low health taking them out in succession quickly.

Anyway what a game. I would place this in a spot in league with Red Dead, in that the carribean pirate world they created is just as absorbing and fun as Red Dead's western one. Red Dead wins it with it's really impactful story, but AC4 may have your typically underwhelming ending as most of the AC games do, they still provide with awesome characters and great dialogue and voice acting. Overall, and this is coming from somebody who finished off AC3 right beforehand, you can tell they learned a bunch from that one as a lot of the gameplay systems and mechanics are just done more smart and less obtuse and even frustrating, like the outside animus stuff is pushed more to the side and even serves as an environment to optionally explore and gain more insight to that side of the story if you are interested. Story missions are much more fun and I at least didn't encounter a quarter of the bugs I did in AC3, though there were some. So if you haven't jumped into the AC games in a while, don't worry about any of the other ones, just play this.

[Cobra951]

Thanks for that post mortem.  I am very much in agreement, about what I have experienced so far.  As I do with all games that give me so much freedom and suck me in so deep, I'm taking my sweet time.  I can't get enough of the sailing/piracy thing.  It's starting to feel a bit repetitive, but I keep doing it anyway.  I still don't have that diving bell, for example.  Sweeeeet . . . time . . .

I'm so very happy for the generous checkpoints in that mainstay of AC games, the absolute-stealth missions.  I hate it when just being seen by the enemy basically kills you off and moves you back.  I've never liked that mechanic in any game.  It's less frustrating here, because you never seem to lose more than a few minutes of progress on a desync.  I was glad to see them mix it up sometimes, encouraging stealth, but allowing other tactics and even combat.

Bugs are so scarce that it feels odd to run into one now and then.  I had a funny one last night when the game wouldn't let me into the final room of a captured castle to kill its leader.  It kept saying I had to become anonymous to interact.  But the only people who kept getting these yellow bubbles of awareness were a couple of my crew, who were following me around, making small talk.  The game wouldn't let me attack them.  Finally I picked up a powder keg, set it down between them, and shot it.  They blew up, and then I was able to open the door.  Haha!

I can't do the legendary ships at all yet.  I'm alarmed about that because I'm as upgraded as I can get without all those elite plans.  (I have to get further in the story to access those maps and treasures, I assume.)  I've tried 3 different ones now, and they all take me down while still showing most of their health.  Kinda discouraging.  I'm not giving up, though.

Edit:

Yea its pretty cool. I sort of stopped messing with it so much as I was gaining money from it too quickly and thus making the game easier, I enjoyed boarding ships and plundering them for money instead. I only used it for just getting the unlocks.

It's even easier when you exploit the simple battle logic.  [spoiler]A fast schooner in the first slot and a man-o-war in the third slot will always kick ass.  The middle slot is flexible, but I usually stick a second fast schooner in there as well.  The enemy always attacks the largest ship first, until it's gone.  The third slot grants a defense bonus, so putting a tank there completely shields your other ships.  The first slot grants more speed, and a 70-speed schooner there will always fire first.  Often it will fire twice before the opposition can do anything.  Also, you can "re-roll" the enemy's attack ships as many times as you want.  If you don't like what you see, back out and choose the battle again, until it's as easy as the peril of the route will allow.[/spoiler]

[idolminds]

I'm getting near the end, I think Im on the last sequence. But I'll have a lot more to do after the story ends, lots of treasures to find yet. I did get all the Templar keys and the Mayan stones so I've unlocked those 2 outfits. I wish all of the had hood, though. Its weird in certain cutscenes Edward will make a hand gesture of pulling a hood up...with no hood.

I tried my luck at one legendary ship. It was going pretty well. Avoided the mortar fire as I approached and got in behind him, then I could fire chain into him and ram him over and over. Ha! Exploited you! Then he got to half health, turned on a dime and wasted me with a single barrage of heavy shot.

Then I sailed away to do other things...

[Cobra951]

Haha!  Been there, done that, if not quite the same way.  I've barely whittled their health at all.

Finally got the diving bell.  This is more fun than I expected; or maybe expecting to get wasted by sharks just took the pressure off.  I've been nearly ignoring them.  If I get eaten, I respawn in the bell, and everything I've collected is still with me.  After learning how to swim (damn, those controls are finicky) I did much better.  I seldom get killed at all now, after about 4 underwater areas.  Those air-filled barrels also restore some health, and that makes all the difference.  [spoiler]I'm well on my way to all the elite upgrades.  So that's where they all were.[/spoiler]

I know what you mean about the outfits.  I crafted a shark-hunter outfit, which makes him look like every other rogue out there.  No-hood issue, plus some mission dialog about how I looked wrong was just . . . wrong.  So I felt silly wearing it, and went back to hooded outfits.

[idolminds]

Finished the story missions. Good times. Still a lot of pirating to do!

[Cobra951]

I did it!  I took down a legendary ship, the [spoiler]HMS Prince[/spoiler].  Not much dancing around either.  We just traded blows until one of us went down (soon before the other would have).  I've gotten much better with reading when I have to brace.  It's a silly mechanic, preventing damage by bracing.  (I could see it helping with crew-member attrition, but not ship damage.)  So I didn't realize how important it is for defense until more recently.  It also helps that the ship has all the upgrades that matter.  Only the elite fire barrel storage is missing, and I still don't know what good those are unless I'm trying to run away.  (If I wait around for a tough opponent to run into my mines, it's all over but the crying.)  All I got was money, a lot of it.  I was hoping for something for the ship.

I went the other route, idol.  I only have a little over 40% of the story missions done, but over 80% of side missions and 100% of side activities.  I have the most fun in freeform in this big open world.  I dread missions like the one I just suffered through--[spoiler]tailing a row boat through a swamp on the Jackdaw and also on foot, then chasing someone down through a ridiculous obstacle course[/spoiler].  They've helped this sort of mission a great deal by adding lots more checkpoints.  But they don't seem to get that these just suck, no matter how much mercy we get on them.

Edit:  One thing I found out recently is that your pistol ammo tops off whenever you fast travel.  This has to be a bug, but a helpful one.  I empty the pistols during every few ship captures, and shops (not harbormasters) are seldom outside of the main areas.

[Cobra951]

I took down the twin legendaries last night.  It's so much easier with a fully upgraded ship.  But I still can't do much with La Dama Negra (literally "the black lady"--sounds much better in Spanish).  Those crazy mortars are murder, and her armor is ridiculous.

OK, so, aside from the unfortunate tailing-mission overkill, this has turned out to be one of the very top gaming experiences in my long controller-wielding life.  It has become a living world to me, one I want to be in as much as possible.  I even started a new game under another profile so I could reacquire and redevelop the Jackdaw from its humble beginnings.  I'm not done with the story in my first (and still main) game either.  That has become secondary, really.  It's the being-there part, so comprehensively detailed and realized, that matters.

Such detail and realization seemed inconceivable, so I dug a bit into the backstory of the game.  I figured that Ubi had just piled up their collective achievements on the franchise over the last 7 years--and that's true, but it's not all.  It turns out that seven different studios, about 900 people, worked on this game.  What makes it such a standout, the age-of-sail naval universe, comes from Ubisoft Singapore.  Everyone was so impressed with it in AC3 that they brought it to the forefront in AC4, and even chose the period of the game to best suit the wonders Singapore had wrought.  I think I'm a fanboy of this company now, willing to forgive a few grave sins of the past, like always-online DRM.  What they have done, organized and distilled into a single product is unparalleled.  I mean, there are like 4 separate games here, all seamlessly blended together into one kickass experience.  I do so hope they can keep it up in the future.

[idolminds]

There is a rumor going on now that they are making Assassins Creed Unity for PS4/XBO, but also AC Comet for PS3/360 which is supposed to be a continuation off Black Flag. Possibly Black Flag 2? If they want to do the AC2/Brotherhood/Revelations thing but in the Black Flag setting then I am all for it.

[PyroMenace]

But I still can't do much with La Dama Negra (literally "the black lady"--sounds much better in Spanish).  Those crazy mortars are murder, and her armor is ridiculous.

Go fer the arse capt'n!

[Xessive]

Yarr, The Black Dame's booty it be!

[Cobra951]

There is a rumor going on now that they are making Assassins Creed Unity for PS4/XBO, but also AC Comet for PS3/360 which is supposed to be a continuation off Black Flag. Possibly Black Flag 2? If they want to do the AC2/Brotherhood/Revelations thing but in the Black Flag setting then I am all for it.

If they do, I'm there as well.  No doubt.

The Impoluto is history now too.  The Lady's arse, eh?  Arr, mateys!  Me thanks!

Edit:  Yahaha!  Down to planks!  She got me once, then I got her the next time, with just a sliver of health left, while the screen went a glitchy black & white.  My last barrage was a heavy-shot broadside into her bow, right before she would have rammed me.  Wee!  My heart's still pounding too hard for an old fart.

A new perk unlocked too.  Yowza!

Didn't think this was worth a new post, so I'll add it here.  Curious about some of the rewards, I logged into Uplay, and found I had 320 of their point units (whatever they're called).  So I grabbed the things I wanted, these in particular:


Love the wheel, sails and especially the skull/harpy figurehead.


Arr!  Finally the pirate look.



YARR!  Couldn't find a decent image of these together, so I made mine own.

[idolminds]

I still havent taken down any legendary ships. Didnt help that I was out of mortar shot when the last one I attacked would sail away from me to set up a ram, could have been hitting him. Ah well, Im having fun running aroung gathering the collectibles and doing assassinations. I also hacked all the computers and collected all the notes in the modern day side so I have no more reason to leave pirate world! Hooray!

[Cobra951]

Finished the story.  That was rather abrupt.  I expected at least one more sequence, given the plot points left open, plus the last assassination target was hardly the most interesting.  My biggest disappointment is that I don't get Adewale back.  That chick's strident voice is annoying, and a woman does not belong on a pirate ship in the 1700s, much less in the role of quartermaster.

I have absolutely everything except like 3 challenges I'm chasing down.  A 4th, 100% sync, probably ain't gonna happen.  I have no interest in replaying some of those instant-death-rinse-and-repeat missions (with even less leeway, to ace them).  They can keep them.  What makes the game is the sandbox, on land and sea.  Many missions were awesome too; it's just the infuriatingly obtuse ones that bring the linear aspects of the game down.

Two of those challenges are head scratchers.  One is kill an enemy with every type of weapon.  Huh?  I have 8/9 on that.  9 what?  Enemies?  Weapons?  Unique enemies and weapons?  I guess I can look that up, but up till now I've refused to do that.  No outside help at all to get this far (well, except for the tip on La Dama Negra, which came unsolicited).  The other puzzling challenge is disarming an agile guard and killing him with his own weapon.  I've managed to get 1/3 on that, and I don't know when I did it, or how.  So who's agile, the guys who can chase me down and tackle me?

The 3rd doable challenge is winning 2000R in the tavern board games.  That's just a matter of taking the time to do it.  Here's a side activity I mostly ignored.

Anyway, on to a bit more piracy.  I'm chasing a million reales.  I've earned over 1.4 million, but spent nearly 700K.  I want to see it show a mill.  Plus I'm hopelessly addicted to the naval game, so it gives me something to do it for.

[idolminds]

I just did the 100,000 reales challenge. Had to stop myself from buying my last upgrades until I completed it. But after running down all the assassination missions, naval contracts, and finding all the treasures I managed to get there. And then boom boom boom bought my upgrades because I had lots of money and cargo.

Im still a bit sore about the stuff requiring kenways fleet. I could 100% a couple things but I cant get the last 3 treasure maps without the fleet, and one of those maps has my ships last storage upgrade. And its the fire barrels...like who gives a shit about those? UGH. I also see the "harpoon every sea creature" and Im one short...which Im assuming is the white whale, which I also cant get.

Now I need to sail around and collect all the random chests and animus bits, then try fighting the legendary ships now that I'm upgraded. Also have one more really expensive upgrade to my pirate headquarters, and I need to buy all the other weapons and outfits.

Speaking of weapons, I also have that 8/9 kill with every weapon type. I'm sure its 8/9 weapons but...I dont know what the last one is. I thought I already have killed everyone with everything. Too weird.

[Cobra951]

I don't blame you for being sore.  This is Ubisoft.  Their mission in life, or at least the mission of some asshole in a power position, is to force online on everything.  They couldn't do it with DRM. so they moved on to more subtle approaches.  I've been thinking about it, and there's no reason why Kenway's Fleet should be online only.  It's a single-player feature, and the real-time aspect of it could easily be handled with your system's internal clock.  It should at least provide a canned set of missions offline, enough to get everything that matters to SP.  Make it so you stop earning money after those canned missions, if cheating (by playing with the internal-clock settings) is a concern.  The forever online component should be an extra perk that kicks in if you have a way to get there, and you choose to use it.  But . . . Ubisoft.  Oh, well.  Like I said before, I'm too fond of this company's output otherwise.  You're not missing anything important.  I couldn't reach 100% upgrades for Edward, I assume because of gear that comes with fancier editions, or that I have to get separately?  Whatever it is, the vendors don't have it (and all my world's icons are yellow, and all treasure maps are used up).

Got to be a millionaire yesterday.  So I celebrated by . . . starting a new game.  Now those Blades of Toledo I got from Uplay make sense.  They're way better than the starting swords, and what little money I have is going into better things.

Edit:  I know I go on and on about this game.  I've been trying to think why it is that it has grabbed me the way games used to grab me 20-30 years ago, back when they were full of new ideas and wonder.  I think it goes beyond the freedom and size of the world.  The setting is near and dear to my heart.  I don't mean the golden age of piracy; I mean the Caribbean--land and sea.  I belong to an island a couple of hundred miles East of the AC4 map.  It's roots, culture and development very much mirror Cuba's (up till Cuba's tragic fall to Communist dictatorship in the early 60s).  They should, and very much could (with Havana assets) give us old San Juan.  That would really make my day. 

Nothing beats island hopping on a boat, or a ship.  I did plenty of that as a kid.  I guess AC4 sort of transports me to a better time and place in my life.

[idolminds]

I sorta slowed down after doing all the missions. Now its sailing around to pick up the extra bits. But I'm going to save that just in case this high speed internet thing works out in the next couple weeks. If so, then I can sail around for things and hopefully make use of the community stuff at the same time.

[Cobra951]

Maybe I should have posted this in Pugnate's group-hug thread.  


Edit:  In regards to this virtual world at least, this man is my new hero.

[Cobra951]

The schedule for the final (!) round of community events is stickied on Ubi's AC forum.  Whoever wants these items I guess needs to play now or forever hold their peace.  Quite a crock, really.  The game has been out for less than a year, and they're already pulling out of the only method to unlock shit you already have on the game disc.

The good news is that they've made it super-easy.  All you have to do is perform the activity once, and the related item unlocks.  There's still time to get everything, as the schedule repeats once.  After that, I guess any newer chances depend on how much of a shitstorm develops over this.

[PyroMenace]

So after this those items can never be obtained again? No buy method or anything?

[Cobra951]

According to that thread I linked, apparently not.  The reason given is that the way these items are implemented means they must be earned in-game.  They can't be bought like DLC, or unlocked externally somehow.  I suppose a patch could take care of it, but what are the chances of that?  It just highlights the bullshit of locking game content behind connected activities.  What you can get is limited by how nice the mothership is willing to be, and for how much time.

[idolminds]

Well, I'm screwed. Thanks, Ubisoft.

Probably has to do with them announcing AC Rogue for PS3/360. Looks like its the "sequel" to Black Flag. All I know is it has ship battles so...we'll see.

[Cobra951]

Yep.  We will see.

Edit:  Official reveal thread.  Hmm, 360 and PS3 only.  That's fine for me, but I hope you guys get a PC version eventually . . . unless it sucks.

[Xessive]

You'll rue the day you crossed me, you rrrogue! (Connery)

I'm curious about the story and how it fills the gap between Black Flag and AC3, but also considering the timeline it looks like it will also be a some overlap and possibly set-up for the events of AC Unity.

I'd hope to see a PC version. I almost expect they'll release one eventually like they did with AC Liberation.

[Cobra951]

What is that quote from, LXG?  I googled, and get bombarded with a Trebek variant.  Even when I specify "-Trebek" I still get a ton of hits with Trebek misspelled.  I assume that's the satirical encore, not the original, right?  Or is it?

Anyway, I'm really hoping this turns out to be good, but I'm concerned that it will be a rushed minor release to catch the tail end of the last gen.  It seems so unlikely that they would restrict it to the waning 360 and PS3 if it were a major title in the series.  It also seems unlikely that a major sequel/prequel would hit this soon after AC4, and basically in the same time frame as Unity.  I know Ubi has multiple studios working in parallel, so it's possible.  I hope so.

Edit:  Ah, hell.  Who am I kidding?  I know I'll be picking this up even if it's flawed.

Edit 2:

[Xessive]

Haha I think my mind amalgamated real Connery with Darrell Hammond's Connery in SNL's Celebrity Jeopardy

"Rough? That's the sound your mother made last night just the way your mother likes it, Trebek!" haha
[I screwed up the quote ]

I'd consider getting it for PS3 except that I know that on PS3 for some odd reason Ubi decided to swap the trigger/shoulder buttons and I have a lot of difficulty playing the AC games on PS3 because of that swap and they don't allow me to customize the controls. On PS4 however they controls are in line with the PC and Xbox, with the triggers behaving as they should.

Apparently the reason for the swap seems to be that the PS3 trigger are convex so people don't like to use them so most games will set default controls to them e.g. If "Shoot" on the X360 is RT on the PS3 it will default to R1 (equivalent of RB) instead of R2 (equivalent of RT).

I'd rather wait and see if a PC version comes around. If not I'll probably have to skip it. Controls are way too critical an issue for me to enjoy a game.

[Cobra951]

Ahaha!  I was going crazy trying to get Google to get past the Trebek stuff.  I didn't even know about it.  I ended up reading a bunch of unflattering stuff about Sean "slap-happy" Connery.

I'd be shocked if this game doesn't end up getting released on other systems.  Ubi's AnvilNext engine is set up to make multiplats quite viable.

Idol, I now have both weapons from the community events, and you're not missing anything of substance.  Both the pistols and the scimitars are considerably worse than the stuff you earn while completely offline.  They're just cosmetic fluff.

[idolminds]

Yeah I figured as much. Just kind of sucks that I wont be able to get the achievements and such. Not that they matter but...I played the shit out of the game and they'd otherwise be something I could easily get, you know?

At least I know not to get the next game at full price if this is the kind of thing they'll be doing.