The README file

This is basic information that would have been in a README file and much of what would have been in a manual.

Key commands

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F1 - This doesn't bring up help, it brings up the main menu. ESC also does this. Some help is available in the F2 Game Info screen by pressing and holding the right mouse button while pointing to an item on the screen.

F2 - Game Info. Quest log, Inventory screen (needed to equip items), and a lot of others that are useful. Explore.

F6 - Quicksave. The quicksave game in the load games screen is not marked as such, but looks like a normal save. The developers recommend NOT using this option as it causes game instability, probably when the game is loaded.

F9 - Mutes the music and some ambient sounds on some systems, useful during long sea voyages on the deck of the ship. No key to unmute it, but going to the cabin does it.
Note: this also mutes ambient wind noise, but not ambient rigging sounds, so using the Options screen to reduce music volume to zero is preferred if the music gets too repetitive.

F9 - Quickload. Loads the latest quicksave file. Mutes the music (on some systems), but has no other effect if there's not a quicksave. The developers recommend not to use this as it can apparently leave the game in an unstable state. Thanks to BethG for including this information in the Russian language guide to the quests.

F11 - Takes a screen shot that appears in the same folder as your engine.exe file.

F12 - Standard Steam screen shot key. Screen shots appear in your Steam console...
View->Screenshots and can be uploaded to Steam from there.

F12 also displays the character's name and health points, but these don't appear in the screen shot. (Thanks to Ladrón for reminding me.)

Numpad slash - Toggles the hud and other graphics, but not the aiming reticle when sailing. Useful for screen shots. Also works on land to toggle character icons upper left.

R - Toggles 2x fast passage of time. Pressing numpad + or - will increase or decrease the rate at which time passes. Press R again to turn it off.

Numpad + or - keys - Speed up or slow down passage of time in the game, regardless of pressing the R key. Press R to return to normal time. (Thanks to Ladrón for pointing this out! I'd missed it.)

E and F - When sailing, change the zoom on the radar mini-map upper right. Press and hold E to zoom in enough to see the firing arcs for your cannons.

E - On land, toggles fighting mode. Draw or put away your weapon.

The 1 key (above the letter keys, not on the numpad) - Loots a body if you're standing over it.

The 1, 2, 3 and 4 keys (above the letter keys, not on the numpad) - Change cannon ammunition during sailing. 1 loads cannonballs, 2 loads grapeshot, 3 loads knippels (barshot or chainshot), 4 loads bombs.

Enter key - Brings up various action menus including fast travel in a town, a self-dialog for selecting ammunition to use or which healing potion to use by default, sail-to on the sea, and others.

The space bar - This is the "instant action key" that activates the function of whatever icon is in the upper right beside the radar mini-map. A hand icon opens a chest, for example. When sailing, an anchor activates mooring (landing on shore) and a grappling hook icon initiates boarding. A compass takes you to the World Map, pressing space again brings you back to your ship.

The TAB key - Toggles between first and third person views when on your ship or on land. It also frees the camera in the World Map so you can scroll around to find your destination (thanks to downloadman87 for that important info!).

M key - Brings up a map if you have one in your inventory. Maps can be purchased (they're very expensive) or given to you during a quest. You may be able to find one in a chest or body. I prefer to have maps loaded on my tablet, details in another section of this guide.

Some of these are in the key binding options, but not all.

Important info

If you buy or find an item you wish to use, such as a sword, you'll have to equip it before you can use it. Press the F2 key to bring up the info screens, select "Items", scroll down to the item you wish to use and select "Equip". If you've lost all your items, but are given some later, you'll need to equip them.

If you find a purse that contains coins, you'll have to equip the purse to gain access to the coins.

Commands when walking around or looting a ship after boarding

These are commands specific to walking around town or in the jungle. Other commands are used when walking around on the deck of your ship. Most are the same, but some are different.

The W, A, S and D keys - Basic movement. W moves forward, S moves back, A and D move sideways.

Right mouse button - You can move forward with the right mouse button if you don't have your sword drawn.

Shift key - pressing the shift key and a movement key will run or walk, depending on the default you've chosen in the game options. You can put a checkmark in a box there to "always run" if you prefer.

Ctrl key - Allows you to look around without turning your character. Hold the Ctrl key and move the mouse. Releasing the key returns your view to the front.

Tab key - Toggle between default third person view where you're watching your character from behind, or first person view where you're looking through the eyes of your character.

Left mouse button - Click when close to a person or doorway to talk to the person or go through the door. The door will have an icon that shows if it's locked or unlocked. If no icon appears, you cannot go through that door.

If you are walking around a ship looting it during boarding, do NOT press the left mouse button until you are ready to proceed to the next stage of boarding. The left mouse button takes you to the next deck or the ship transfer screen, even when no icon is visible. Use the space bar when there's a hand icon in the upper right instead. Opening a door (unlocked icon) will take you to the next stage of boarding.

Enter key - Brings up the action menu. You can perform various actions there, like the "thinking out loud" self-dialog, the option to talk to another person, the option to exchange items with an officer travelling with you and others. Under "thinking out loud" there's a option to "rest" which is unlocked some time during the initial quests, and you can choose the time from an hour to a day. You can also choose which healing potion to use by default, or which ammunition to use for your pistol.

The action menu items that appear are context sensitive. They will only appear when they are appropriate, and sometimes an expected item will not appear.

Space bar - Instant action key. Perform the action indicated by the icon in the upper right. A hand means you can open a chest, a lock means you can go through a door, and so on.

E key - Enter combat mode. See below for commands specific to that mode. You will draw your sword, and have the option to fire your pistol. Sometimes the game does this automatically, other times you have to initiate it yourself. Press E again to exit combat mode.

X key - Use a potion to restore health. Buy potions at a street market dealer or find them in chests or looted bodies. By default the X key drinks a health potion, but this can be changed in the "think out loud" self-dialog. There are several options there depending on what you have in your inventory.

V key - Drink an antidote potion. Restores health and cures poison.

U key - Drink a special "ultimate potion" available from the natives. This potion is described in the initial dialog with the guy who shows you around town at the beginning of the game.

The 1 key - (above the letters, not on the numpad) - Loot a body. Stand over the body and press 1 to loot it.

K key - Perform crafting, which is available after talking to your brother after returning from Guadeloupe.

M key - brings up a map if you have one in your inventory.

Commands to officers

(Thanks to Ladrón for reminding me)

H key - Stay here. Officer will not follow you if you move away, but if you change locations the officer will appear there, but not follow you if you move.

G key - Follow me. Officer will revert to default mode of following you wherever you go.

J key - Attack at will. Officer will attack nearby enemies. This is usually the default action during combat mode.

You can give orders to your officers by initiating a dialog with them as well. These include Stay and Follow, but you can also have them select ammunition to use by default for their pistols, or which potion to use by default to restore health.

More info in the Officers section of this guide.

Commands in combat mode while on land or during boarding

There are a few differences when you're in combat mode from just walking around.

The W, A, S and D keys - move the same as they do normally. Note that you don't move forward with the right mouse button in combat mode.

Left, right and middle mouse buttons - perform various kinds of attacks. Holding the shift key and pressing one of these buttons does a different move, see the key bindings options for more details. I have not researched these yet.

Space bar - hold your sword up to block incoming blows. If your attacker initiates a strike from above, jump back with the S key or move to the side with A or D, as that attack will penetrate your block and does considerable damage.

Q key - fires your pistol if you have one equipped, you have ammo, and the pistol is loaded. It will take a bit of time to reload after firing.

Shift key - pressing shift key and a movement key will run or walk, depending on the default you've chosen in the game options. You can put a checkmark in a box there to "always run" if you prefer. Pressing shift key and a mouse button will do an alternate attack move.

E key - exits combat mode. Put away your sword. Sometimes the game does this automatically, other times you must do it yourself to proceed.

Commands when sailing in first or third person.

I'm going to concentrate on first person sailing, where you are walking around on the deck of your ship, because that's how I always do it. Commands in third person are generally similar. I will note differences where I know them. Sailing and combat have a particular rhythm that you can experience better when watching from the deck.

Third person is a view of your ship from the outside, first person has you walking on the deck. You do not see your character or other crewman in first person view.

Tab key - Toggles between first and third person views. You always start in third person view, so if you want to sail from the deck of your ship, press Tab.

Right mouse button - Walk forward on the deck.

Middle mouse button - Walk backward on the deck.

Left mouse button - Fire cannons if the aiming reticle is visible and the cannons are loaded. The reticle turns red when you're at the proper elevation to hit the target. If you are some distance from the target, you may have to move the reticle up a considerable distance to get it to turn red; don't expect to hit much if your cannons are elevated very much.

W key - Raises sails in two steps, so it will take two presses to get full sails.

S key - lowers sails in two steps.

The intermediate sail stage is called "battle sails" and is useful for moving slower when necessary, and may prevent some damage to your sails from enemy cannon fire.

Space bar - Instant action key. Perform the action indicated by the icon upper right. An anchor means you can moor there (go to the dock), a grappling hook means you initiate the boarding process. A compass icon means you can go to World Map mode. Press space again to return to your ship.

The compass is unlocked by dealing with the pirate ship outside the pirate colony. Before that you cannot sail to other islands; there's nothing there, only the land mass.

The radar mini-map in the upper right shows the wind direction as a thick arrow, and your best speed course by thin arrows. To make your best speed, sail in the direction of one of the thin arrows, but just slightly away from the direction the wind is blowing from; your ship drifts a bit and if it crosses that arrow into going upwind, you slow down a lot.

E and F keys - Change zoom on the mini-map. Zoom in with the E key to see your cannon firing arcs. These are useful not only for combat, but also to determine directions when sailing and for navigation. Details in a later section of this guide.

Two icons below the mini-map show the wind speed and your ship's speed. Below that is an icon that shows what cannon ammunition is loaded. If it's blinking, you don't have enough of that ammo to load your cannons.

The 1, 2, 3 and 4 keys - Load a different cannon ammunition type. 1 key loads cannonballs, 2 loads grapeshot (useful against crew), 3 loads knippels (barshot or chainshot, useful against sails) and 4 loads bombs.

The Ctrl key - zooms in if you have a spyglass equipped. You get a cheap spyglass in the Rum Matters introductory quest, or you might find one at a street merchant. To equip a spyglass, press F2 to get the info screens, select "Items", scroll down to the spyglass and select "Equip".

Commands when sailing on the World Map

The World Map provides an overview of the entire area you're sailing in. If the compass icon is available when you're sailing in first or third person view, pressing the space bar will take you to the World Map. Sometimes the Compass icon is available in the Action Menu when you press the Enter key.

Things happen on the World Map that you won't see sailing on the deck of your ship. For example, you will encounter other ships and storms.

Time passes very quickly in the World Map, about one day for each 15-20 seconds of real time. That's an hour in about 1.5 seconds. Compare this to an hour of game time in about 4.3 minutes when on your deck. You'll move much farther in the same amount of game time when on deck, so use the World Map sparingly if you need to get somewhere quickly. The shortest amount of time you can spend in the World Map is about 30 game minutes if you hit the space bar quickly upon entering.

The sea is divided into regions. Each island has a region, and there are regions of open sea between island regions if the islands are far enough apart. You cannot sail between two regions on your ship's deck; you must go to the World Map to change regions. If you sail beyond a region boundary when on deck, going to the World Map will move you back to the spot where you entered the new region. If you don't go to the World Map, the destination island will be nothing but the land mass; no trees, towns, ships or anchor points. Also, loading a new island region causes the surrounding land masses to load as well so you can see additional islands in the distance.

The W, A, S and D keys - Basic movement. W moves forward, S stops, A and D turn your ship.

Mouse wheel - Zoom in or out on the view of your ship.

The Tab key - This unlocks the camera from your ship so that you can move the mouse to move around the map to help find your destination.

The Ctrl key - Pressing this and moving the mouse allows you to turn the camera. By default, the camera faces north.

The Enter key - Allows you to initiate combat with nearby ships on the World Map. It also brings up the Action Menu if one is available.

C key - Displays your coordinates below the compass in the upper right if you have a map available.

Space bar - Exit the World Map, go back to the deck of your ship.

Tips and other useful and important information

Equipping items

If you buy or find an item you wish to use, such as a sword, you'll have to equip it before you can use it. Press the F2 key to bring up the Info screens, select "Items", scroll down to the item you wish to use and select "Equip". If you've lost all your items, but are given some later, you'll need to equip them.

If you already have a sword equipped, you cannot un-equip it. You can only equip another sword. If you wish to store your original sword before visiting the governor for the first time (who may remove all your items), you'll need to find or buy a cheap Harpoon to equip to free up your sword.

If you find a purse that contains coins, you'll have to equip the purse to gain access to the coins.

If you have a map, press the M key to bring up a screen. Equip the map to view it.

If you have an amulet you wish to use, you'll need to equip it; it's not enough to have it in your inventory. Most amulets only work for a specified time and disappear when removed. Many amulets take something away as well as giving you something, so read the descriptions carefully. Give an amulet with a bonus to trading to your Purser as that's where it will do the most good.

Assigning officers

After you buy your ship, you'll need to find a Navigator. Once you have one, you'll have to assign him as Navigator after he's hired, as he starts off as a Passenger. To do this, press F2 to go to the Info screens, select Ship, then select the empty Navigator position in the list on the left. Left click and it will give you the option to assign any Passenger to that position. Removed officers become passengers.

More info in the Officers section of this guide.

Avoiding bugs and keeping the game stable

The developers have made a thread about how to avoid problems with the game. It's available here:
http://steamcommunity.com/app/223330/discussions/1/412446890554436248/

Basically, it says this:

- Defrag
- Don't set graphic setting for ENGINE.EXE through your video card control panel
- Don't ovewrite saves - always make save in free slots
- Get to the menu or character screen before alt-tabbing
- Mods are good, but be careful with them until we turn the Steam Workshop support
- Quick saving is evil in this game, I am serious

Defragging may or may not help. If you have the game installed on a Solid State Drive, do not defrag; it won't do anything as the SSD will move things around as it sees fit.

Changing the graphics settings

To change graphics settings for the game, go to the folder where your game is installed. On my computer it's:
D:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Sea Dogs To Each His Own

There you will find two .EXE files: engine.exe and config.exe. Run the config.exe program to change graphics settings.

Disabling the intro videos

If you've watched the videos that play at the beginning of the game enough times already, you can disable them to keep them from playing.

Look in your Sea Dogs folder. On my computer it's this:
D:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\Sea Dogs To Each His Own\RESOURCE\VIDEOS

Find three files named AkellaLogo.wmv, Blackmark.wmv and Title.wmv and rename them. I simply put an x at the beginning so they'd sort to the end of the files and I could find them easily if I ever wanted to rename them back... for example before a game update. Example: xTItle.wmv

I've started the game many times without the videos and have seen no bad effects.

Officers

After you buy your ship, you'll need to find a Navigator. Talk to people in the streets or offices. Once you have one, you'll have to assign him as Navigator after he's hired, as he starts off as a Passenger. To do this, press F2 to go to the Info screens, select Ship, then select the empty Navigator position in the list on the left. Left click and it will give you the option to assign any Passengers to that position. Removed officers become passengers.

Once assigned to a position, left clicking on the officer's portrait there will give you the option to remove that officer to assign him elsewhere or to assign someone else to that position.

Note that without a Navigator, you can still sail but your expenses will be extremely high. Pressing the right mouse button over your Navigation skill shows the minimum skill requirements to sail various classes of ships. You can sail a class 6 without penalties. To sail a class 5 (which is what your starting lugger is) you'll need someone with a Navigation skill of 25.

I suggest looking for a Purser as soon as possible. Talk to people in taverns. Find one with high Trading skill (look on the right with the character selected). This will reduce expenses and improve both buy and sell prices. It's best if he has other useful skills, as you might later find a better Purser to hire.

Selecting an empty ship's officer position, then pressing the right mouse button will tell you what skill an officer holding that position needs to have. If there's no officer assigned, the game uses your skill for that position.

If you want an officer to accompany you when you're out walking around, assign him to a Border position. Do this for the native that you get from the quest in Guadeloupe. He has a weapon, but you'll need to give him health potions, and he's very good with pistols. Give him a pistol, ammunition and gunpowder.

If your officer is assigned as a Boarder, he'll accompany you. Initiating a dialog with him by left clicking when facing him or selecting "Dialog" in the Action Menu that comes up when you press Enter gives you a few options. You can tell the officer to stay where he is (he'll go with you if you go to another area, however), or to follow you (which is what he normally does). You can tell him to use a specific healing potion as default, or tell him what ammunition to use for his pistol, if he has one. You can also dismiss him with this dialog if you no longer require his services.

The Action Menu also has an option to exchange goods with the officer and brings up a dialog similar to the one you get when you open a chest. This is the only way to give an officer an item. If you want to give your Navigator an item, first un-assign him as Navigator, then assign him as Border, move to another area so he'll appear, then do the exchange. Then reassign him to the Navigator position.

When you upgrade to a larger ship, you can go to the cabin, then through the door, cross the deck, and there are two doors. On the left is the Wardroom where you will find all your officers and can exchange items with them or get a report from your Purser. The starting Lugger does not have this option. (Thanks to Captain Fracasse for mentioning this in the forum.)

You can have an officer equip an item by pressing F2 to bring up the Info screen, then select Items, then select the officer's portrait on the left. You get the standard inventory screen where you can select an item for the officer to use, then click on Equip.

If you have a Purser, you will only get the benefit of his Trading skills if he's in the Purser position on the ship. Do not take him with you when you're buying or selling stuff.

Officer loyalty is generally raised if you're both good or both evil. If your officer is good and you do evil things, his loyalty will go down. If you prefer to be a scoundrel, then hire officers who are also scoundrels. The exception is the native bodyguard you can get in a quest on Guadeloupe; his loyalty will be maximum no matter what you do.

You will also have problems keeping officers if you're sailing a ship that's larger than your Navigation skills allow. Note all the minus numbers beside your skills in such a case. There are considerable penalties for sailing a ship that's too large for you. More information in the Skills section of this guide.

Skills

Your character and your officers each have their own skills. To view them, press F2 to bring up the Info screen and select "Characters". Select your character or one of your officers.

On the right side of the screen are the character's skills. Pressing the right mouse button while pointing at a particular skill will give additional information about that skill. For example, using the right mouse button on the Navigation skill shows the minimum necessary skill to sail different classes of ships. Your starting lugger is class 5, so you need a Navigator with at least 25 Navigation skill to sail that ship without having major expenses and negative adjustments to other skills.. A class 4 ship requires 45 Navigation skill. (There is an amulet that adds 10 points to the Navigation skill. When equipped it's indicated by a green + number.) The closer your Navigation skill is to the skill requirement for that class of ship, the lower your expanses will be, and the negative adjustments for skills will be improved.

The large number on the right is the skill of that character. The smaller number on the left shows how far along you are to gaining the next skill point. If you select a skill, there's a field at the bottom center of the screen that shows your progress in points. For your character, the green plus number indicates how much your officers are adding to that skill. If that number is a red minus, it's because you are trying to sail a ship of higher class than you have the Navigation skill for, or possibly because of poor health.

On your "Ships" screen, pressing the right mouse button while over an empty officer position displays the skill required for that position. Your Navigator needs high Navigation skills, while your Purser needs high Trading skill, for example.

Performing various actions in the game increase your skill. Talking to people increases your Charisma, fighting improves your fencing abilities with the weapon you're using, and so forth.

Completing some action requiring you to sail to another island increases your Navigation skill. This can be delivering something, and maybe works for trading as well. Just sailing doesn't appear to improve this skill, although sailing in a storm increases it a lot.

Buying or selling anything improves your Trading skill.

Your officers will also get a skill increase for performing their jobs. They will get more experience if you have the "Shared Experience" ability described in the Abilities section of the guide.

Your crew also has skills, indicated at the top of the Ship section under F2. Their skills improve by doing the action described, and can go down if they don't do that action for a while.

Abilities

Press the F2 key to bring up the Info screens, then select Characters. On the right of the character portraits is a column labelled Abilities. There are two tabs in this column, one for the character highlighted on the left, the other for the ship. Hold the right mouse button over the abilities column to bring up an explanation of what is there.

If an ability background is yellow, that character or ship has that ability. If the background is blue, you do not have that ability. Left click on an ability to describe it. Click on the Ship tab in the Abilities column to view the abilities the ship has. Green text means the ship is getting that ability from one of the officers, and bright white means the ship has that ability from the captain.

As you gain in rank, you get points to assign to abilities. If you have a point to assign to abilities, the ability description dialog will tell you. You may assign an ability or cancel to assign the point elsewhere or save it for future use.

A useful character ability is Shared Experience, which increases the amount of experience your officers get during play. A useful ship ability is Dutch Flag, for example, which allows you to raise the Dutch flag so you can sail to islands friendly with the Dutch. You already have French Flag and Pirate Flag at the start of the game. You might also select Spanish Flag. Your ability to pass as a Dutch or Spanish ship will depend on several factors, including Stealth and probably Luck.

Sailing and navigation

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I prefer sailing in first person view from the deck of my ship. Press the Tab key to toggle between first and third person. In first person view, the right mouse button moves you forward, the middle mouse button moves you backwards, and the left mouse button fires your cannons if the aiming reticle is visible, even without a target. Move the aiming reticle up and down when in combat. When the reticle is red, it is the correct elevation to hit your target.

The W key raises sails, the S key lowers them. Press twice to get full sails. The A and D keys turn your ship.

The radar mini-map in the upper right shows the wind direction, very important for sailing. The large arrow points in the direction the wind is blowing, and the thinner arrows mark the course to follow to get the best speed. You can sail closer to the wind than the thin arrow, but you'll sail slower, and this works the same with sailing with the wind. Note that you cannot sail directly into the wind.

Don't try to sail exactly on the thin arrows, turn a tiny bit away from the wind. Your ship drifts a bit around its heading, and if you drift even the smallest bit into the wind your ship slows down dramatically until your heading drifts back. Watch your speed in the icon below the mini-map.

Your best speed to sail to a downwind destination appears to be two points into the wind from your destination. Two points is the difference between E and ENE, but don't sail past your best speed into the wind. Two points is about half the width of your forward cannon arc... put your destination just beyond the edge of the arc and sail on, adjusting your course as you get closer to your target. I pick a point on the ship's rigging to line up with the destination and turn as necessary to keep the target there.

For example, if your destination is directly east, and your best speed would have you sailing north, turn so that you are sailing east-north-east (halfway between east and northeast). Your target will be just beyond the right edge of the forward cannon firing arc as indicated by the aiming reticle; it disappears when you move it outside the firing arc.

This may be different on ships other than your starting lugger, but is a good rough estimate until we get the actual numbers.

When sailing into the wind your speed drops by more than half as soon as you are sailing closer to the wind than your best speed arrow. Sailing to a destination that is into the wind you are better off sailing on your best speed and "tacking" (turning through the wind to sail on the opposite best speed arrow) as necessary. As long as your target destination is forward of your beam (directly to the side), you will be getting closer. One of your best speed arrows will put the target farther forward than the other; sail on that best speed arrow. Sail closer to the wind than your best speed arrow only when there is no other choice, for example, if there's no room to tack, as your speed will be very slow.

If your destination is a fort (or an anchored ship near your destination), you can "cheat" a little by looking at the fort through your spyglass, and watching how fast the distance to the fort is decreasing. (If you're too far away to do this easily, you're too far away to use this idea.) Turn your ship a bit toward the fort while watching the distance numbers until they decrease at the fastest rate. This won't necessarily be your best sailing speed, but will be the course on which you make the best time toward the fort. As you get closer, your best course will be closer to the fort. This should be about two points into the wind.

You can get a rough estimate of how fast you can sail relative to the wind direction. For the starting ship with the minimum cargo load, if I'm sailing close to the best speed arrow, I can do about 60%-70% of the wind speed. Halfway between best speed and sailing directly with the wind, I'm doing about 40% of wind speed. Sailing directly with the wind it's 25%. These numbers are approximate for an 8-10 knot wind and will be lower if the wind speed is higher (because of drag from the ship moving through the water), and higher if the wind speed is lower. I've seen anywhere from under 50% in very high winds (14 knots or higher) to well over 70% in winds under 5 knots. A lightly loaded ship will sail faster than one that's more heavily loaded, and it appears that hull damage reduces your speed as well.

Once you have determined your best speed for a particular wind and ship condition, you will sail about 65% of this speed halfway between best speed and with the wind, and 40% directly with the wind.

Sailing any closer to the wind than your best speed arrow drops speed very quickly. Estimate that just past the best speed arrow when sailing closer to the wind drops your speed by more than half, and it goes down from there. Halfway between best speed and the direction the wind is blowing from, you'll be doing about 10% of the wind speed.

The wind speed and direction will change over time, so watch the mini-map at the top of the hour, shortly after the lighting changes in the game. The wind can change any time between the time the lighting changes (54 minutes after the hour) and the top of the hour.

The mini-map shows the firing arcs of your cannons. If you're are looking in the direction of one of the firing arcs, the aiming reticle appears, and it disappears when you look outside that arc. This is very valuable information for navigation as well as combat. For example, if the mini-map shows the forward edge of your broadside arc pointing directly north, if you turn so that the aiming reticle appears and disappears as you look left and right, you are looking directly north. Obviously this works for any direction.

You can use this to get a rough estimate of your position on the map when you are between islands. In the simplest case, if one island is directly south of you and another island directly east, look on the map and plot a line directly north of the first island, directly west of the second. Where these lines cross is about where your ship is. Be aware though that the map is not always totally accurate.

For example, if you're sailing between Saint Martin and Saint Christopher, you're about halfway between the two islands when Puerto Rico appears slightly north of west, about halfway between west and west-north-west.

Note that the boundaries between two island regions is not necessarily halfway between the two islands. See the next section on sailing between islands.

If you have a graphics program that allows you to measure distance in pixels, you can get a very rough idea of how long it will take to sail between two points. Measure the distance, then divide the number of pixels by 10. This will be about how many game hours it would take you to sail that distance on the deck of your ship if you're sailing at your best speed. Remember that one hour of game time on deck passes in 4.3 minutes, and you'll have to spend some time in the World Map where time passes very quickly for the distance you sail, so the actual time will be longer.

My best time sailing from Basse-Terre on Guadeloupe and St. Pierre on Martinique, about 150 pixels or 15 hours, was 12 hours and 18 minutes, including about 1.5 hours on the World Map, but I had perfect winds the entire way. I did not use sail-to on this voyage, and it took about 45 minutes of real time with no use of time compression. My worst time was around 24 hours when the wind was blowing directly from my destination.

Sailing to another island

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First of all, you can't sail to another island until the World Map option is unlocked, by dealing with the ship at the pirate colony. Also, you can only sail between Martinique and Guadeloupe before talking to your brother after returning from Guadeloupe. In either case, there will be nothing at the other islands but the land mass. No trees, no buildings, no anchor points.

To sail to Guadeloupe the first time, go to your ship. If you have a favorable wind, sail on. If not, go back to the dock and try again. The most favorable wind will have one of the narrow arrows pointing close to the direction you want to go... and it's best if you can sail out of the harbor without going against the wind. Be patient, you'll eventually get good winds, and very little game time will pass.

You can go to the World Map as soon as you get the icon. It appears as soon as you no longer have the anchor icon, or you may press Enter to get the action menu where the compass icon will usually be the second option. Sailing on the World Map takes a VERY large amount of game time (but little real world time), and sometimes you want to get there without a lot of game time passing.

Another option is to sail there in first or third person view without using the World Map any more than necessary. When you're a bit more than halfway to your destination, hold down the W key so your ship moves immediately on the World Map, press space to go to the World Map, wait one second, then press space again to return to the deck of your ship. This is necessary for the game to load the new island; prior to this there's nothing there but land mass. You can quickly tell which island region you're in by initiating a save game. ESC to bring up the menu, select Save and an empty save slot, look at the file name that will be used for the save file, then cancel the save. If you're sailing from Martinique to Guadeloupe, it will say either "Martinique - Sea" or "Guadeloupe - Sea". If it says Martinique, you haven't sailed far enough toward Guadeloupe. If you sail too far towards Guadeloupe, you'll be kicked back to where you crossed the border between the two island's regions, so don't wait too late to do it. You can sail between the two islands in about 18-24 hours of game time, depending on winds, maybe an hour or so of real world time. Going to the World Map and quickly back will use a minimum of 30 minutes game time.

If there is a considerable distance between two islands, you may enter an "open sea" region with no islands in sight. Just sail for a while, then use the World Map as described until you get to a new region or an island. The name of a new save game tells you the name of the region you're in.

If you're sailing to an island beyond another, for example sailing from Martinique to St. Christopher, you'll have to go to the World Map when you're between Martinique and Guadeloupe, then again when you're between Guadeloupe and St. Christopher. If you don't load the Guadeloupe island region, you won't even see the land mass for St. Christoper. If you pass Guadeloupe, hoping to eventually see St. Christoper, when you go to the World Map you'll be on the border between Martinique and Guadeloupe.

Time passes on the World Map at an hour of game time for 1.5 seconds of real time. On the deck of your ship, one game hour passes in 4.3 minutes of real time. You'll sail much farther on your deck in the same amount of game time as you will in the World Map.

Sailing on the World Map is necessary to see other ships on the sea. If you're looking for a particular ship for a quest, you'll probably only see it in the world map. Quest ships have different color sails there, green or purple. Pirates have black sails. If you're looking for ships to battle, you'll find them on the World Map. You can also encounter storms, which raise your Navigation skills quickly but can damage your ship.

Wooden ship combat

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Do not present your bow or stern to the enemy's broadside... it does more damage that way. If he's turning to hit you with a broadside, turn to present him with the side of your ship and lower sails to battle sail (press the S key) to reduce sail damage. Fire at the enemy when his bow or stern is facing you if possible.

The starting lugger ship is maneuverable enough that you can "spin like a top" and hit him with one broadside after another. You also have bow and stern cannons you can fire. When the aiming reticle turns red, press the left mouse button to fire, and I prefer to keep my reticle on the ship until after my cannons fire. You may have to move the reticle up to get it to turn red, but if you have to move it up too much (because the target ship is far away) you won't hit anything.

I suggest loading grapeshot during the initial battle at the pirate colony. Press the 2 key to load grape, the 1 key to load ball. Grape will reduce his crew to the point that boarding is easy. It has a shorter range, but your gunnery skills aren't really good enough early in the game to do much damage from a distance.

When you think the enemy's white bar (denoting his crew) is sufficiently low, get in close until you get a grappling hook icon upper right and press space to board him. You cannot reduce his crew to zero with grapeshot anyway, and he'll also be firing grape at you. Go to third person view to check the status of your crew and ship.

After you win the boarding action (you win if you don't die during the boarding combat), do NOT press the space bar or left mouse button when the unlock icon appears. Walk around the deck of both ships looking for loot. When the hand icon appears, press space and take everything. You may find some really good stuff that way. Don't forget to loot the bodies; stand over a body and press the 1 key. When you're done with looting, press the left mouse button and a new deck will appear, or if you're done a transfer screen will appear. Take everything on his ship, and any remaining crew.

You can assign a captain to a defeated ship (but not in the initial encounter outside the pirate colony). If you sell a captured ship, remove the cannons and sell them separately. Repairing a captured ship brings more money than it cost for the repairs. If your hold doesn't have room to transfer all the goods from the captured ship, you can sell the goods at the store by selecting that ship from the list at the top of the sales screen.

You can sell any excess gunpowder and ammo and cargo at the store. Keep 150 or so of each ammo, and at least 200 gunpowder for your own use. You can hire replacement crew at a tavern, and sometimes sailors will come up to you on the street to offer their services. You won't be able to hire a replacement crew after the initial action at the pirate colony until you've sailed to Guadeloupe and back and talked to your brother a second time.

Trading

Trading. Buying or selling anything, especially buying goods for sale and selling them for a profit. Buying and selling raises your Trading skill.

The most important thing in trading is getting a Purser. Preferably one with high Trading skills. This will lower the prices you have to pay, and raise the prices you'll get for selling stuff. The Purser also reduces your monthly ship expenses.

Where to find goods

You can find small items for personal use from street vendors. Each vendor has a specialty, and will pay higher amounts for goods in his specialty if you sell stuff there. For example, the weapons merchant will pay more for that Machete you found than other merchants will.

Goods for the use of your ship (food, cannon ammunition, etc) can be purchased at the store. This is also where you buy goods to sell elsewhere at a profit. More on that later.

Always visit the lighthouses on every island you visit. The lighthouse keeper will offer goods at very low prices. I've never seen a bad deal from a lighthouse keeper and you can get from 2 to 5 times what you paid from a store. He also offers other goods for sale, and he pays 100 times the going price for bottles of rum that you can find or buy at a street merchant.

If you see a native walking alone in the jungle, talk to him. Ask what he has for sale. So far I've gotten white metal (silver nuggets) and yellow metal (gold nuggets), and sold them to the banker for about twice what I paid. Be SURE to note how many he has for sale, as you only get one chance to buy. When he asks how many you want, type that number into the dialog.

The banker deals in gems and doubloons, and offers the best prices on gems and jewelry that you sell him. Go to him to buy doubloons for pesos.

How do you know what items will bring a profit?

Press F2 to open the Info screens and select Trading. This will bring up a list of stores you know about, with their last known prices in the list on the right. Here you can find the best prices to sell that Leather or Mahogany you bought from the lighthouse keeper. Hint: it's usually Curacao.

If you're going to another island and you know the prices at both islands, you can find a good to trade. Look for something at the local island that sells for considerably less than the buying price at your destination. Note that the prices at the destination may differ a bit from what's shown; they're dynamic. If someone buys a lot, prices go up. If someone sells a lot, prices go down.

Note well that the higher price in the store is what you'll buy goods for. The lower price is what the shopkeeper will pay you if you want to sell something. Don't get these two mixed up when looking for trade goods.

When you're at the store, be sure to ask the storekeeper about news; he'll often have the latest prices at another island. Also, if you see a friendly merchant ship, send a boat and ask the captain where he's coming from. They have the prices at that island. In both cases, these are added to your Trading screen. Note that military vessels don't have this information, only traders.

The captains of friendly merchant ships may have excellent prices for goods, better than the stores. If you have goods to sell, always talk to these captains under the "Let's trade" option, and compare their prices with the prices in your Trading screen. He may also have goods to buy at a good price.

If there is more than one town on the island (Martinique has Saint Pierre and Le Francois), be sure to check both stores before buying goods. One store might have a cheaper price, and you may need to visit both stores to get enough goods to fill your hold or use up all your money.

As an example, I was sailing from Martinique to Guadeloupe, and wanted to find out what trade goods I could buy. After comparing prices on everything, the only good available that would make a profit was Ale at 164 pesos each, and the number was limited, so I bought all they had. I sailed to Le Francois and found the price to be 154 and they had more than I could afford. I took the goods to Guadeloupe and sold them, making a profit although the price I got was a bit less than what Trading screen showed because of the dynamic prices. I should have checked Le Francois first. :)

Check the lighthouse first, as he'll have goods at the lowest prices, when he has goods at all. Then check friendly merchant ships and the store for good deals. Finally, ask if someone needs cargo delivered, as that usually doesn't pay as well.

Maps, lots of maps

There are maps available for the game.

The overall world map is available here, with region boundaries marked:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=767990494

There are 23 detailed island maps available here:
http://www.piratesahoy.net/threads/all-23-original-detailed-island-and-main-maps-of-sd-teho.27136/

I have these maps loaded on my tablet (I have a Kindle) so that I can refer to them during play without ALT-TABbing out of the game.

Important note: If you intend to use the overall map for navigation, do NOT stretch it sideways to fit the screen. You will not be able to get accurate compass headings from it like that. Also, note that the map is not necessarily completely accurate in the placement of islands.

Finding your way around the Martinique jungle

You start the game on Martinique island.

Going into the jungle can be confusing, but it doesn't have to be. If you don't want to take the time to explore and learn your way around, here's how you get from place to place.

You start at the town of Saint Pierre. Going out the gate into the jungle, the first right takes you to the fort. Talk to a soldier for a quest there. For everything else, you turn left.

To get to the pirate colony of Le Francois, turn left, then right, then left again. Leaving Le Francois, if you go right, there is a bay there that serves as the port for the pirates. Everything else is the other path.

To get to the grotto, where there's a cave with a treasure chest, and where you help the man find his daughter, leave Saint Pierre, turn left, then left again, then right. If you're going there to fight, the entrance to the area will be locked until you talk to the man you're helping. This is a good place to save your game.

To get to Lamentin Beach, keep turning left after leaving Saint Pierre. To get to Le Marin Cove, turn left leaving the town, then keep turning right.

When you first leave Saint Pierre and turn left, in the new area watch for two men running to the left. Don't chase them. Go right a bit and find a body to loot, press the 1 key while standing over the body. This may not happen until other events in town trigger it, but watch for it until it does happen.

The Maps section above has links to maps needed to get around the world and the various islands.

How to view this guide in the game

You can view this guide while playing Sea Dogs by pressing shift-TAB (not ALT-TAB) while in the game to bring up the in-game Steam interface. The available guides are on the right. If this guide does not appear in the top three, you'll have to click on View All Guides to get a complete list.

[hastatus]

I just wish there was a more clear explanation of PIRATES attributes, the ingame description ain't cutting it for me alas.

[Overlord]

That's good because I hated not having enough for hiring a crew +navigator at the beginning

[Overlord]

oh ty

[LHookins]

After this guide was written they added an option when talking to the brother the first time to see the abbot in the church for a loan. This disables all the other tutorial quests but if you get the wine quest before getting the loan you can still complete it for almost 30,000 pesos profit.

[Overlord]

Money cheats plox, the beginning of the game is monotonous.

[LHookins]

Skywarp: A cannonball fired down the length of the ship has more things it can hit. Of course that cannonball has to actually hit the ship... :D

[Skywarp]

Good guide. What did you mean by "Do not present your bow or stern to the enemy's broadside... it does more damage that way."? It's a much smaller target and most of his volley ends up splashing around me. Am I just lucky, or is the game hard coded to do more damage to these locations?

[HermitKermit]

epicly awesome guide. thanks! lots to read and learn and have fun with. :) this guide is getting me to try the game again as I had little luck with some of the things outlined in the guide and got frustrated. cheers!

[Mad_Marx]

An essential source of information, much appreciated!

[LHookins]

david: There is a walkthrough in the guides section that may help.

To use pistols, you need balls and powder for ammunition. Press Q to fire the pistol. You'll need to wait for it to reload before you can fire again. You also have to "equip" a pistol in the Items screen to use it.

The rest of the map will be unlocked after you visit Faday at Guadeloupe then return to talk to the brother a second time. This also unlocks many other things in the game. There are no profitable trades until you find a Purser; you can find officers to hire in the taverns, but not until the rest of the game is unlocked as mentioned above.