Couple more pointers! PvP via cannons: Basically, don't use firebombs. It's too easy to put out the fire before it spreads. If you do, use it only against an already-busy galleon on the back deck/cabin area that might go unnoticed long enough to spread (at which point it _can_ be overwhelming). It's basically gotta cook undisturbed for a over two minutes before becoming a burden. PvE Skeleton Ships: When set on fire, they will put distance between your ship and their own ship temporarily. You can use this to get better shots if they're too close, or to reduce their cannon frequency against you for a bit.
I've found firebombs to be an effective tool in situations more than just already busy crews. If a crew is uncoordinated or inexperienced, it compounds to eventually do a huge amount of damage, and can be at least annoying to those more experienced. While firing the cannons, I fire a chain of balls going "ball, ball, ball, fire, ball, ball, ball, fire, etc." for instance to just slowly crank fire into them. This gives them something else to worry about. For a crew who is undersupplied, it drains their food as ideally, the fire makes them take damage, and then they run out and die a lot. A galleon or brig can't keep firing constantly or effectively if their cannon line is on fire, neither can their helm work at 100% efficiency if they're on fire. Send a boarder, instant chaos, ship sinks. This doesn't work for higher level players, but that's not most of the people I've seen on the seas.
If you can hold the ship the ideal is across the top of the ship. It takes longer for the fire to do damage and sink the ship but it creates more holes increasing the sink rate once hull damage occurs.
@@ianbelletti6241 Across the top, you need to wait for an origin-type spread _and then_ another spread-type spread at 60 seconds to get downward fire (so that it can damage the hull). It would take your fire nearly 3 minutes just to reach the hull to do damage, meanwhile the methods shown in the video have the ship sinking before even 2 minutes, start to finish
Fire is mostly a great support tool during combat, you can make Galleon crews turn crazy if you ignite a few fires on their ship ! Definitely a great tool to use against bigger crews
@@LoonieToque I think he may have meant it as a tool to apply pressure. If you can firebomb a gally's entire deck with your cannons, you've just given that crew a lot of extra work to do, taking pressure away from yourself. For newer crews, the workload of that combined with bilging often proves to be too much.
This guy just released bop after bop. Instructional videos that feel closer to real science that just video game guides. Truly unlike any other SoT guide on RU-vid, the best of all. Keep it up. Incredible work man.
I've been doing a lot of shepherding around some friends who are newer to the game, and sometimes carrying fights as a boarder is the best way to see them through something. They can turtle, but their naval is... Well, they're working on it. Fire has been my absolute best friend for this. Sinking ships of all categories while holding down their respawns as a lone boarder is insane, and surprisingly effective. Using it as a distraction/softener on the upper decks/places you can't cover as easily from spawns so that the other crew is busier when they have to confront you on whatever deck you're holding is also just so nice
I remember watching a video that showed firebombs taking 6 minutes to sink a ship! Its crazy how these optimizations can cut that down to a quarter of the time
I'd like to add something else I've noticed, courtesy of the Burning Blade: Only origin fires leave burn marks on your ship. That's why the Ashen Roar will leave your ship looking completely charred, but some firebombs getting out of control won't.
Can you make a video on the Horn of Fair Winds? Where it spawns. How it functions. And how much speed it gives your ship. I've also heard rumors that it's easier to find in certain locations.
This finally explains some phenomena I've noticed but never really put any thought into. Namely that fires seem to take a really long time to start to spread, but once that happens you're in trouble.
Hello there, tomorrow I'll buy Sea Of Thieves on the PS5, I am hoping I can learn naval fighting with your videos, I wasted 2 hours of my day watching guides from some time ago to learn this, then I saw your video from 2 weeks ago about the sailing update, so yeah, thanks!
Welcome to the Sea of Thieves, glad to help! If you have any questions, feel free to swing by my livestreams (on Twitch) and I'll be happy to answer anything there too if that lines up 😊 there's so much to the seas for you to explore!
on sloop you can get 3 lower holes with fire, throw one at the front, and one immediately after at the stove, then you throw 3 at the back. you'll get 6 upper holes, and 3 lower
It's definitely possible, but was unreliable in my testing (the second fire would often extinguish before popping a hole). That said, if you have more than a pocket of firebombs then absolutely go for it! I find most people have no firebombs in their barrels these days, so it's BYO fire in many cases
In a pvp scenario, if im resorting to boarding and fire to sink a ship i tend to try and eat all of their food whenever they are respawning and place fire where they are likely to want to stand When successfully done it just means everyone is in a consistent one shot range unless they spawn on a part of the ship thats filling with water, which is usually where id hang around in such a scenario
On the Galleon, front mid deckand balcony/capitaains quarters are great spots. Not for sinking them, but for causing trouble. Also, after you did all this take one of their worms/food items and put it on the stove. They might not notice it if there already is fire elsewhere and it might ignite later. But thats only if you have PLENTY of time which you usually dont.
Agree! If you have the 5 minutes for the food fire to start and they haven't sunk to the other fire yet, things are probably already very much not in your favour! May as well start getting your ship with cannons back at that point
@@LoonieToque the food thingy is more of a "in case they recover" so yeah you are already back on your ship. And even if they take it off you just burnt two pieces of their best food.
Great vid, fire is kinda weird in this game. Still not entirely sure how best to utilize them while on cannons, they really feel like a boarders weapon if you miss your boards a lot. Some testing on how skeleton ships interact with fire would be greatly appreciated if youre ever doing science on how their AI works, no clue how they put the fires out if they cant bucket.
Ooo I do have notes for you. For cannon usage, yeah, basically use anything else. If you're fighting a galleon and already have pressure on them, getting fire on the back deck/cabin so it can go unnoticed and spread can be useful. It's specifically getting to that spread state that's useful. The smaller ships are too easy to put out mid-combat though, before it can ever spread. For skelly ships, when on fire, they will put some distance between themselves and the player ship. I used to do this a lot because they often get too close to hit the lower deck holes!
@@LoonieToque Oh thank you! I like cruising around and going after skele ships when im sailing solo. The desire was to use fire to clear a broadside so I can get shots, but a bullet that gives some breathing room sounds really good too! ^^
There’s something I’ve been curious about and I highly doubt it’s a feature, but if you butted up two ships against each other, could fire spread from ship to ship?
That would be interesting! A single firebomb when the ships are close to each _can_ start fires on both ships at once (I've done this many times by accident 😂) but fires otherwise won't spread between ships
Another interesting thing you could maybe tryout is how much speed do you lose if you raise the front sail of the brig just a bit. Because I'm wondering how much speed am I losing for more visability.
ive never once thought this much about the fire but every single spot you said to put the firebombs is where i throw them everytime i board a ship... lol. I have 200+ hours and lvl 100 rep reapers lol
The sloop and brig spots are pretty intuitive (entirely by accident, surely), the only odd one really is the galleon. There's a lot of "dead zones" on the galleon that cause no holes!
I remember when I picked up SoT around 2-3 years ago I seem to recall the fire would spread way more aggressively. It wasn't uncommon to have a player ship completely engulfed off 5 bombs. I only got back into the game around a week or so ago and they seem way less aggressive. Was this something they actually nerfed? Or am I just misremembering?
The whole point of putting fire on a gally is to cause chaos, make em eat through their good food, and distract the opps bilge keeping them off cannons. fire spread on a gally is always a big up. You know the intricacies but I believe you underestimated the value of fire on a gally. Just my 2 cents. -barlow24601, hg level 600
Might wanna check the pinned comment 😅 it didn't make the video, but I absolutely agree. If I discouraged this in the video, my bad, would love to know where I messed up that communication!
"Sinking a galley with fire isn't really viable" I think you underestimate how poorly it goes when we let my crews flex helm for a galley hg match. (Both ships anchored touching each other neither with an angle)
Yepp lol. I really only use it on the back of galleons when they already have a bunch of repairs to do (where it can cook unnoticed), just to push them over the chaotic edge
For everyone's benefit: basically don't use fire in PvP because it's too easy to put out. Back deck/cabin fire is useful on a galleon that's already overwhelmed because it's hard to notice before it spreads, but that's it. PvE ships don't really react to fire except by putting distance between the player and NPC ship.
I love the science behind the hole popping in the video, that knowledge in itself is a great pvp tip. If you want more fire tips throw the firebomb near the cannon line and wheel to prevent the enemy from using these in battle without taking damage.
@@UndertakerFromWWE Yea, I see fire as much more of a suppression tool than a sinking tool. Can be decent for some areal denial, and is just another thing that the crew needs to do, especially if it starts to spread out of control.
