Action - 1720 - December 17 - Franken-Gank off Turpitude

Ships in Action:
ALLIES:

Captain Bryan Barclay - 'Valiant' Third Rate

Captain Everett Wick - 'Dauntless' Frigate

Captain Virgil Kyle - HMS Pellinore ('Valiant' Third Rate)

ENEMIES:

-Vici Illa - Level 48 Cutthroat - Captured 'Santiago' Galleon

Action Setup:
After completing a patrol against Brethren fleets inside the pirate red zone around Turpitude, the captains of our small group left a completed battle, only to see Vici Illa sailing full steam into Turpitude! We desperately tried to engage him, but as we were sailing vessels that are possibly the worst in the Caribbean in terms of tackling ability and OS speed, it wasn't a surprise that we couldn't even get close to him. We left the red zone, aware of the fact that we had just missed a golden opportunity.

However, we soon saw the pirate captain leave port, and he began to sail in our direction, as we were upwind of the port. When he saw us, though, rather than turn away, he came straight for us, for reasons I am even now trying to understand. We accosted him, of course, and went about trying to catch a slow and unmaneuverable ship with even slower and more unmaneuverable ships. What a mess...

The Action Itself:
...Luckily, serendipity was on our side, as the enemy captain's wind angle designated that he would have to cross in front of us to get away. Instead of doing this, he attempted to out-run us by sailing perpendicular to the wind, a poor angle of attack for all our ships, as it happens.

Wick, although sailing in one of the slowest frigates in the game, nonetheless acted as the tackler for our colossals, and he managed to keep the galleon in the game long enough for I, Virgil Kyle, to hit the enemy ship with a full broadside of bar shot using Precision Aim. His sails quickly went from 60% to under 20%, and then it was just a matter of decrewing him and boarding him, an activity I quite relished, I must admit. After all, how many people can say they ever used a Valiant as a grappling ship? None that I know of, that's for sure!

The Result:
Victory, in no uncertain terms. Not only did we sink an enemy of the Crown, we also got a hefty consolation prize, in the form of over 800 tons of copper ore!

Although we were unable to carry all of the copper in our holds, we managed to take a large part of it, and this is in addition to our MoVs and MoTs.

All in all, a very good haul, particularly given what we were sailing!

Lessons Learned:
Pretty simply, it's that, sometimes, serendipity can be the most powerful force working in your favor. It certainly is what made everything work out the way it did in our fight against Vici. If everything hadn't gone just so, we wouldn't have managed to do what we did, plain and simple. I mean, we were literally sailing some of the worst possible ships for that kind of work, but we still got the dirty rat!

To end off with, I suppose this battle demonstrates the other end of the extreme presented in Captains Wick, McLain and myself's interception outside Irish point two days earlier - In this case, we used excessive, unwieldy force against an underpowered foe. Luckily for us, it paid off, hehehe :p

Images:
Here's an image of Vici demasted, decrewed, and ready for boarding.

Delish :)