“It was weird” to put it short

Results!

A huge thank you to everyone taking part (or at least everyone who could make it). The first ‘ship only’ battle ended pretty well I feel. Players were sticking to the rules (mostly), and we had three huge ships fight it out at the end (+ one dhow).

Note: I’m not actually sure who built/owns that ship that I call ‘dimondknight’s ship’. I only call it that because I thought he owned it >.>

A explanation of the battle (because this one was a little different, and needs an explanation):

There weren’t as many people taking part as I would have hoped at the beginning, sadly. And those taking part took their time getting ready and organizing their crew haha.

I was expecting around 4-5 ships to take part, but we ended up having only two large ships; the Shadow Wanderer (sov copy, I’ll just call it SW from now on), and Dimondknight’s ship (the one from last week). The teams were pretty unfair from the start; the SW saw its first action, but had 5 experiences sailors on board with lots of cannons and armour. On the contrary, Dimondknight’s ship had SnapCrack as a captain, with 3-4 other inexperienced crew members wearing little armour, and the ship had only a few cannons, and was barely armoured.

Round 1:

As such, I delayed the start of the battle by around 20 minutes to ensure Snap could contact the rest of BE to get on and help fight. While I like seeing ships blown up, I don’t like seeing them get annihilated within the first few minutes of the battle.

When the ships finally set off and started shooting at each other, it became clear that the SW was by far the superior ship, and dimondknight’s ship was being obliterated. This engagement can be considered as ‘Round 1’ of the entire battle. After many deaths, and seeing the ship heavily damaged, I offered Snap a chance to ready another, larger ship that was docked at the Freeport, and that I would give him 25 minutes to get a crew ready.

So, dimondknight’s ship surrendered, the SW sailed away to repair, and I helped Snap and the rest of BE prepare a new ship; the Iron Duke.

Round 2:

The SW was repaired; the Iron Duke now had a sizable crew, sails, cannons, and armour; and surprisingly dimondknight’s ship was hastily repaired too by LogoTRT and JamminMas. PhlawedPhilosophy (a member of the old Lon Ship) also readied his own little dhow as a one-man team.

By now, the SW had a crew of around 8-9 people. The Iron Duke had Snap as the captain, and another 5 or 6 people fighting. SS Boneyard (previously dimondknight’s) now had himself and LogoTRT on board, with added armour and cannons. Finally PhlawedPhilosphy’s ship was a wooden box with a single cannon on board.

This ‘Round 2’ is what I considered the true battle – as teams were now much more on a level playing field (at least more so than before), and we had around 15 people actively taking part.

Winners from Round 1 (including the people on board from round 1):

1. Shadow Wanderer – Kauhy (Captain), JUSAplayer1, Riverwood202, Kepopie, The_Network
2. DimondKnight’s Ship – SnapCrack (Captain), dimondknight998, SVM_Robespierre, xMadMonkeyx, GreenRoyal, CrazyPirate1

Winners from Round 2 (the actual battle):

1. Shadow Wanderer – Kauhy (Captain), AdmiralTrench (Captain later on), Riverwood202, The_Network, Driftingsixguns, edorii, CaptainCracken, JUSAplayer1 (?), CottageCooper (?)
2. Iron Duke – SnapCrack (Captain), Bazurka (Captain later on), xMadMonkeyx, Dark_101, GreenRoyal, CrazyPirate1 (anyone else?)
3. SS Boneyard (formally dimondknight’s ship) – JamminMas (Captain), LogoTRT
4. Lone Ship 2.0 – PhlawedPhilosophy

Other rankings, based on my observations:

• Most damage received as % of the ship – Dimondknight/Jammin’s ship 
• Most damage dealt as % of the ship – Shadow Wanderer
• Most damage repaired as % of the ship – Iron Duke (because they repaired the ship during the battle a lot, while the other two ships repaired the damage during the break in between the rounds)
• Most ships sunk/disabled – Shadow Wanderer (credited with disabling 3 ships – 1 in round 1, and 2 in round 2)
• Most player kills – Shadow Wanderer (a lot)
• Most physics defying ship based on the fact that it shouldn’t be sailing anymore, so hacks were probably involved 😛 – SS Boneyard

Damage Report:

If a ship was receiving a lot of damage, and has been stationary for a while, I would give the crew 60 seconds (in practice it was more like 3 minutes) to try and get the ships moving again or I deemed them out of the battle. I was very lenient on this rule throughout the battle, as I wanted ships to continue fighting ideally until they surrendered. Jammin’s ship was an exception, I’ll get to that in a bit.

• Shadow Wanderer –  Recieved light damage in round 1, and utterly annihilated Dimondknight’s Ship with many broadsides. In round 2, she received moderate damage, but never to the point that she might be disabled. Being originally a copy of the sov – a ship that already won 2 prior ship battles a year ago, I knew that the ship had potential. The difference being that this was a version of the sov that was rebuilt, and I modified it further by adding additional armour, cannons, wool, and resource chests for fixing the ship mid-battle. All in all, she was very strong in this battle (and I even shot some of the cannons myself during the battle :P). Oh and much better looking than the Teletub.
• Dimondknight’s Ship (Round 1 only) – Yeah it pretty much died within 10 minutes. From the last battle that she took part in, the ship had gained no additional armour or cannons – only patchy repairs and as such did not have the combat strength to compete with the Shadow Wanderer. But, with some added armour and other modifications I recon that we could see this ship returning in a future battle. You put up a good fight!
• Iron Duke – Received quite substantial damage throughout the battle, losing her foremast, and most of her cannons, but she still looked great to the very end (if I may say so myself). Myself and Snap hastily made this indiaman combat ready in 25 minutes, adding sails, rigging, spare wool, armour, and cannons. xMadMonkeyx even made himself a little box in the crows next from which he shot at the SW‘s crew from above. She did gud
• SS Boneyard (Round 2 only) – If you thought you can’t kill what’s already dead, think again. This ship, after been blown to bits from the first battle, was repaired and armoued, and went to fight again. After knowing she would be outgunned by other ships, her tactic seemed to involve ramming into the SW  – which was not illegal, but was not advised as the ships may merge. After a member of the ship attempted to board the SW and block it by placing cobblestone, the SW were granted 3 TNT shot to fire into the ship (I may do that in future when ships disobey the rules). After creating a huge hole, the ship was still moving and sailing, even after Jammin was put into jail for 10 minutes for breaking the rules. She was declared out of the battle when Jammin logged off, but I guess she would have still continued fighting, somehow. As such, this ship was never disabled or sunk, rather its crew broke the rules and it was technically disqualified. But GG anyways.
• Lone Ship 2.0 – Not much to say to be honest haha. One player, in a wooden box, with a single cannon, and it was surprisingly effective, when not being shot at. PhlawedPhilosophy took out a lot of the SW‘s cannons, and dealt a lot of damage to the front of the ship, but was taken out quickly by a few shots. Good job though, you did your crew proud!

Next ship battle: 7pm UK time/2pm EST (same time as this battle), next Saturday 18th

Submarines only next battle – no ships. Plus, TNT shot, diamond shot, obsidian and stone are allowed anywhere on the submarine! – I’ll make the post soon