Guide for New Players regarding Item Selection and Progression

In the last update, players now have the ability to receive a FREE Legendary Red or Green item by doing a considerable amount (10M) of damage/healing with that item. I think that this can be highly advantageous to new players if they plan accordingly. This is a guide on how I would do this as a new player. This is not a definitive way, but how I would approach it. This method is best for free-to-play or light spenders.

Summary
Pick Shooter or Fixer. Buy and only use Uncommon Red and Green items. Save all Epics. Use Rare/Epic Blue and Yellow items. Profit.​

Remember.... the goal of this method is to create the strongest Mk5 and Mk6 ship. We do not really care about the strength from Mk1-Mk4, because these are early-game. We are only focusing on the mid-late game.

Ship Selection
The best way to capitalize on this is to play as either a Shooter or a Fixer. These boats have mostly Red/Green items rather than Blue/Yellow items. You can switch boats later in the game, but for now stick with these two.

Blue and Yellow Items
You are going to want to try to use and level Rares or Epics of whatever Blue/Yellow items you want to use. I would save all Epics no matter what. You never know what you'll want to use later on. If you are saving Rares and Epics of the same item, you can scrap the Rares once you receive 4 Epics, unless you are planning on running two of these items. For example, a player that might eventually run double Tesla Shields on an Enforcer would save all Rare and Epic Tesla Shield. Do not bother with Uncommon Blue/Yellow items other than at the very beginning of the game, because these items are not viable at mid-end game.

Red/Green Item Selection
Pick your favorite/the best Red/Green items. Plan ahead for using an Mk5 ship. You will spend a long time on Mk5 before you hit Mk6 and can adjust for Mk6 during this time based on what items you've received.

The following instructions only apply for Red and Green items. Do not follow them for Blue and Yellow items.

The Overall Gameplan:

1. For whatever Red/Green items you plan on using, buy an Uncommon version as soon as possible. You are going to focus on only using Uncommon Red and Green items for as long as possible. The reason for this is because they are easy to level compared to Rares and Epics and you will eventually receive a free Legendary of that item, which is immediately better than a max leveled Rare and you will save a ton of resources.
2. Save all Epics. Don't scrap them even if you don't think you'll use them. RNG might end up giving you 6 Epics of the same item and that is what you should use.
3. If you are planning on using THREE of the same item at Mk5 or Mk6 (for example, 3 Sniper Cannons on a Shooter), then save all Rares and Epics of that item.
4. If you are planning on using TWO of the same item at Mk5 or Mk6, then save all Epics and Rares until you get 4 Epics. Once you get 4 Epics of that item, you can scrap all of the Rares.
5. If you are planning on only using ONE of the same item at Mk5 or Mk6, then only save all of the Epics. Scrap all of the Rares.
6. Once you get 4 Epics of an item, you can begin to level that item. The reason for this is because an Epic Tier 4 item is better than a Legendary Tier 1 item.
7. Once you get your Legendary of that item, you can then scrap your beloved Uncommon.

The slot specs for a Shooter from Mk1-Mk6 are:
Mk1 - 3RRR 1B
Mk2 - 4RRR 2BB
Mk3 - 5RRR 2BB
Mk4 - 6RRRR 3BB
Mk5 - 7RRRRR 3BB
Mk6 - 8RRRRR 4BBB

The slots specs for a Fixer from Mk1-Mk6 are:
Mk1 - 1R 1Y 2G 1B
Mk2 - 1R 1Y 3GG 1B
Mk3 - 2R 1Y 3GG 1B
Mk4 - 2R 1Y 3GG 2BB
Mk5 - 2R 1Y 4GGG 2BB
Mk6 - 3RR 1Y 5GGG 2BB

Format for slot specs is:
Mark of ship - # of points # of slots for each color

Red Items:

• You need to choose at least one cannon. The Sniper Cannon is likely the best choice in the early game for both Fixer and Shooter, but the Blast Cannon and Explosive Cannon are excellent mid/late-game weapons.
• Mortars are very strong in early-mid game. I'd pick either the Ballpark or Long Range. Standard Mortar is not a great choice. Big Berta is good early-mid as well.
• Fire Bombs, Napalms and Flares can all help considerably on farming resources. Fire Bombs work the best on Shooters in early-mid game.
• Swift Torpedoes and Big Torpedoes are very good in the mid-late game. I personally love the Swift Torp. Trip Torp is decent, but not as useful.
• Mines, Missiles, Trip Torp, Railgun, Explosive Cannon, Carronade, and Grenade are better end-game weapons than they are starting weapons. You can select these, but understand that they will be far more powerful later on than they are right now.
• Standard Cannon and Standard Mortar should not be selected at this point. If they receive a buff, I'll revisit this, but they are not very effective in mid-late game right now.

Green Items:

• The Repair Pulse is the bread and butter of the Fixer. Some Fixers try to not use it, but it is ubiquitous among the top Fixers.
• Repair Bolt is extremely popular right now due to the range and speed advantage. It is likely the 2nd best green item in the mid-game.
• Duct Tape and Repair Box are the best ways to heal yourself. These two items also clash on the training tree. Duct Tape is probably the better choice currently.

What I would select:
This is a theoretical setup and is in no way the best setup. Please test out many different weapons to see what you like. Watch videos of top players using these weapons. Consult the forums on what is currently the "meta".
Use my setup as a template for how to progress towards your projected setup. Also remember that our goal is to progress as best as possible towards an end-game setup. Therefore some of your setups at lower Mk's will not be ideal.

For a Shooter:
The Mk5 Shooter's setup is 7RRRRR 3BB
Red Items: 1 Sniper Cannon (1 point), 1 Ballpark or Long Range Mortar (1 point), 1 Fire Bomb (2 points), 1 Swift Torp (1 point) and 1 Explosive Cannon (2 points).
Blue Items: 1 Big Shield (2 points) and 1 Turbo (1 point).

The way that I would progress towards this is:
Mk1 - Sniper Cannon + Ballpark/Long Range Mortar + Swift Torpedo, Turbo
Mk2 - Sniper Cannon + Ballpark/Long Range Mortar + Fire Bomb, Big Shield
Mk3 - Sniper Cannon + Ballpark/Long Range Mortar + Fire Bomb, Big Shield
Mk4 - Sniper Cannon + Ballpark/Long Range Mortar + Fire Bomb + Swift Torp, Big Shield + Turbo
Then the Mk5 setup as stated above.

For a Fixer:
The Mk5 Fixer's setup is 2R 1Y 4GGG 2BB
Red Item: Sniper Cannon
Yellow Item: Nitro
Green Items: Repair Pulse + Repair Bolt + Repair Bolt
Green Items: Turbo + Small Shield

The way that I would progress towards this is:
Mk1 - Sniper Cannon, Nitro, Repair Pulse, Small Shield
Mk2 - Sniper Cannon, Nitro, Repair Pulse + Repair Bolt, Small Shield
Mk3 - Sniper Cannon, Nitro, Repair Pulse + Repair Bolt, Small Shield
Mk4 - Sniper Cannon, Nitro, Repair Pulse + Repair Bolt, Small Shield + Turbo
Then the Mk5 setup as stated above.

You can level each of the Uncommon Red/Green items as much or as little as you want. You can use two-three of the same Uncommon item if you want to reach your Legendary faster. If you are getting close to completing your Legendary mission, then you can stop leveling that item. I would try to keep all of the Red/Green items at the same level... for example, all level 20 Uncommon, then all level 30 Uncommon, etc. This will minimize your resource usage while still allowing you to get stronger overall.

Training:
You are obviously going to want to base your training around what you plan on using. The crew members to the left are cheaper/more efficient than the crew members to the right, so you should focus on training the left members first. Only focus on the crew members that have the items that you plan on using. Make sure to use the "overfill" strategy to train beyond your sugar capacity.

I hope that this guide can help many new players stick around in the Bay. I will update it if there are relevant changes.

If anybody else has additional input, please share. Please keep it constructive.

 

Additional Tips:

• Use your pearls on expanding your inventory at first. 50 is a good goal for Shooters. Fixers can get by with much less. This is important as you'll be collecting most of your epics before upgrading them.
• Do not get bogged down on infamy, matchmaking and being underpowered. The focus should be on the end-result. Just enjoy playing and let the process work it's magic.
• If you are ever planning on spending money on this game... Your first purchases should be the Pearl Diver. Buy the Pearl Diver early and often, even if you don't immediately need them because it takes time to collect these pearls and you'll want to have them on hand when you actually need them. Don't waste your pearls too quickly either. You'll need them more in mid-late game than early on. The second purchase would be the VIP subscription. This will help you grind much more efficiently. The third purchase and the only time you should spend large chunks (unless you are going to be a whale ) is the holiday offers. Save your money/gift cards for when the devs present great offers at the holidays (Christmas, Chinese New Year, Launch-Day Anniversary (May 4th), etc.). These offers are usually $100 for 8 Epic Crates, which is an excellent value (albeit still expensive) and can get you enough items/parts/pieces to get you over the hump if you've hit a wall.
• Join a guild. This is one of the best ways to gain additional rewards. HOWEVER... I would highly recommend against altering your setup and progress plan to help with guild quests. This might feel selfish, but you will help your guild out more in the end if you are a stronger player.

 

@The Grim Repair.... if you deem this guide worthy, could it receive a sticky? It is at least as useful as the other two "new player" guides.

 

Oh really? Whoops. I was using the useful links posted by @Joey who. Maybe somebody should update that. Idk if Joey is still around or not but I could make a nice table if he’d exchange the links. I’ll work on this tomorrow.

 

Updated the ship tiers. I'm going to consolidate this information into a graphic soon so there isn't as much reading. A picture is worth a thousand words.

 

While it's a great thread and there's lots of solid advice, I feel like I want to expand on this with a few caveats (and some math, of course!) here. Disclaimer - Opinion post follows.

You should definitely get on Uncommon items as soon as possible. Commons are junk tier; an L10 Uncommon beats out a L25 Common, roughly speaking.

The problem starts to arise when you realize that the "Tier III" talent is gatewayed behind Captain Level 18 for Cannons, Level 20 for Mortars/Carronade/OB/Nitro/Grenade/Frost, and Level 21 for everything else (including all the Green and Blue items). You're well into your Mk3 ship (Captain Level 16) before you get your Tier III weapons, and Defenders and Fixers will unlock their Mk4 at the same time. And until that point, you're stuck with L20 Uncommon gear.

An Uncommon L20 is just barely better than a Rare L10 - but because of the "roadblock" of the needed Captain level and talent training, the Rare will likely be able to hit L20 faster than the Uncommon will hit L30. And at that point, the Rare L20 is better than the Uncommon L30 from a pure statistical level; plus it gets a second Perk slot, and remains a viable item up until the endgame. Getting a third copy then is gravy, because your Rare L30 is now well better than an Uncommon L40.

Once you know what weapons you like, you need to save up, overflow your Gold, and buy a Rare version as soon as possible - ideally before you do 100,000 points of damage or healing, so that you have a guaranteed duplicate for that sweet Tier II version.

That's just me though.

 

There are definitely different ways to get an end-game setup. I did state in my guide that this will leave you underpowered until you unlock your Legendary items and that we really aren't focusing on the strength of the ship during the early-mid game, but rather focusing only on the late game.

Your method is the traditional way of using Rares, but this will eventually result in you getting a free Legendary that is instantly better than any Rare that you have poured lots of resources into. That is the one piece that my strategy tries to avoid. Especially when rares get much more difficult to level in the higher tiers.

Also consider that my guide encourages players to focus their Rare/Epic parts on leveling their Blue/Yellow items. So it is not like they aren't leveling any Rares or Epics. This just allows them to only have to use Rare/Epic parts for a smaller portion of their setup.

This is just how I would advise a new player that is focused on reaching the end-game the most efficient way. Ultimately, a player can go any route they want. Only use Commons if you really want to...

As a light spender, if I started a new account right now... I'd instantly buy an Uncommon, Rare and Epic Sniper Cannon and strap all 3 onto my Shooter then go to town on getting 10mil damage.

 

The key word here is "eventually" for that Legendary item. 10 million is a lot of damage, and it's going to take a long time to get there especially if you're limited to Uncommon gear. Because of the better scaling in Rare and Epic items, they get better faster than Uncommons do, and for players hitting Evolution-related roadblocks, doing more damage now is worthwhile since it will get you to those Legendaries faster (relatively speaking, it's still going to be a while for a weapon that does 500dmg a shot to rack up 10M!)

 

I agree and tried to say that (obviously not clearly enough) when I stated to "save all epics". If you get Epic Blue/Yellow items, feel free to go ahead and upgrade and use them.

1k infamy is early game. I am very specific in that we are focused on the late game, which is roughly 3k+ and standard cannon is outclassed. I might revisit Standard Mortar, because I had a strange amount of success running it for guild quests. Even an underleveled one.

Not sure I get what you are arguing against. Can you explain?

Welcome. An Epic T4 is better than a Legendary T1 (and about equivalent to a T2), but it'll take a lot more resources to get the Epic to T4 when you could focus those on other items.

Yes, it will take a while. Hopefully players will want to play for a long time. I think that a combination between my method and yours would be ideal where you only level your rares to a certain level (when they are better than Uncommons can be) and then wait it out for Epic dupes/Legendary achievement. I'll think on this some more... but my method still has a big strength in that you'll be more focused on leveling up Rare/Epic Blue/Yellow items, which could easily consume all of your Rare/Epic parts. It does all depend on RNG though.

 

I wonder why it is taking awhile...

 

Lol, thanks for the compliment. There are definitely some different ways to achieve the same result (some of which Chris and I discussed here, so please read the entire chain of comments). I'd even say that I could create an even more efficient way than what I've written in the OP. I would really just use this guide as a reminder to keep your eyes focused on the end-game and not worry about the path that gets you there. And I also think it would help a lot of people to use more uncommons early on instead of being so hyped about those purple guns. If they only leveled Epic/Rare blue items, they would end up with a very strong ship once they unlock their Legendary weapons.

 

This guide is a little out-of-date and I meant to update it. You should definitely be able to use Uncommon weapons, but unfortunately the seal clubbing issue pushes stronger and stronger players downwards. I hope the devs can implement a way to "shield" newer players and spread out the lower levels.

My recommendation is just pick a few weapons that you like and use only Uncommons until you get a few Rare/Epic duplicates of good weapons. Then start building those weapons.

I think so, but not positive.