Pirates Ahoy! Guide and Game Tips

Pirates Ahoy! will be going offline June 7, 2011.  It will no longer be available for play after then.  Playfish is taking it down along with Gangster City and Poker Rivals. 

According to Playfish, the games are not performing at a level that can be supported. 

If you have a Playfish Cash balance for Pirates Ahoy! or the other games, you can convert it.  To find out more information, click here.

Pirates Ahoy! is a treasure quest game created for Facebook by Playfish. You have a ship that you use to sail to different islands collecting treasure, coins, and other items. Your friends are hired as your crew and you have an island home where you can build pirate related factories.

While you are sailing the oceans, you cross paths with monsters you must fight, sunken ships that need plundering, and scores of other quests to complete. With mermaids, whales, and giant rubber ducks, this game is adventure on the high seas.

• Treasure maps leading to sunken ships with treasure are found in crates dropped by monsters.
• To fight a monster, click on it. When you kill it, a crate will appear in the ocean. Click on the crate to retrieve what is inside. It usually drops coins, food, gems, or treasure maps.
• If the monster defeats you, you can fight it again. Just click on the monster again to fight it. You will usually be victorious against the monsters, but every once in awhile, one of the monsters will defeat you.
• To see everything in the water, click the zoom out bottom (gold magnifying glass with “–“ in the middle). If you click on one of the icons, your ship will automatically navigate to that item. If you bump into something, though, you will have to move around it and click on it again in the zoom out mode.
• Periodically you will have to buy items to use to fight monsters or to search for treasure. Some of these items are hedge clippers, brush, camera, piratang.
• If you see any floating bottles with messages in them, click on them to receive missions.
• Every so often you will receive quests and missions. For some of these you will have to take pictures of things you see while sailing (Mermaids, whales, etc). For other quests and missions you will have to search items or click on things in the water. Zoom out to easily spot the items you need.
• To complete the Far Corners of the Sea badge, sail to the edge as far as you can go on all four sides making sure you sail to all four corners.
• Badges work automatically.  You do not have to wear it on your ship for it to work.
  

• You receive money for visiting your friends who have a sack of money icon next to their picture. Visit those islands and you will receive a bonus of either coins, food, or gems.
• You can make money by buying a factory for your island. Check it periodically to claim the items or they will expire.
• More than one factory can be running at once on your island.
• You earn coins from quests and missions.
• Monsters sometimes drop money when they are killed.
• Your friends can send you money also. There is a quest that appears about once a day asking you to deliver a package to one of your friends. If your friends complete one of these quests, you will receive a notification. If you follow the link, you will receive coins.
• Check your friends' wall posts. Sometimes clicking links they have posted will earn you coins, xp, or other items.

• Your crew’s energy bar is at the top center of the screen. It goes down as you fight monsters, complete quests, search for treasure, etc.
• As you get low on energy, you can use the food you have found to replenish the energy.
• The energy will renew itself slowly. It takes about 12 hours to reach full energy again.

• You can ask for picnic baskets which give you 50% of your health.  There is usually a basket icon on the left side of the screen you can click on to ask for picnic baskets.  Or you can click on the crew icon at the bottom of the screen.  Under the energy options available, you will see an icon to “Ask friends to send you picnic baskets.”  You must publish the link to your wall so that your friends can click on it. 

• Your friends can also send you food daily.
• Your maximum energy increases by 10 with every crew member you gain. You gain crew members spots by leveling.
• You can hire crew members by picking up friends who have been lost at sea. When you are sailing, every now and then you will see a person floating in the water and yelling “Help!” If you click on the person, you will be able to hire them for coins.
• You can also hire friends by posting a link asking for help.
• Each task you do requires a different amount of energy points. Use the points wisely if you are getting low on energy.
• If you hover over a monster with the cursor you can see how many points of energy it takes to fight.
• You can also hover over each square of sunken ships to see how many points of energy it takes to search.
• The same thing applies to quests. Hover over the item to see how many points of energy you must use to complete the task.

• Some of the badges give you an energy boost of +10 and some will unlock an extra crew member space.  To view the badges, click on your ship to customize.  In the upper left section of the screen you will see your badges.  Click the green button to view your badges.  You can see what you need to complete the badges and earn the bonuses.     

• To increase levels, you must accrue points.
• You earn points by fighting monsters, searching for treasure, completing quests and missions, and by running your factory.
• You also earn points by collecting enough gems to complete the treasures you have found. Click on the treasure chest at the bottom of the screen to view the treasures you have found.
• Collecting items from your factories gives xp.  The more expensive the factory, the higher the xp you earn and the more money you make.