Thorfinn: I've heard that Newcastle determines the pirate building capabilities.
Yet I've seen pirates with hulks before I've seen Newcastle, and I've seen savegames which have hulks before Newcastle is revealed, and once I get Newcastle, it doesn't have shipbuilding capability, only repair.
I don't understand. How do you get the wharf at Newcastle upgraded if you can't build ships there?
Who told you that? That person obviously doesn't know what she's talking about!
Replace Newcastle with Edinburgh, I got confused with P4, the concept is correct I just got the wrong town. Edinburgh makes a lot more sense since it actually exists on the default map. Sorry about that.
Repairing trains the wharf too, you don't need to build to upgrade a wharf. A small repair dock has "levels" like the big wharves too. The number of lamp posts gives an idea how well trained the dock is.
Should Edinburgh not exist yet it takes the next town as reference according to the daily order. No idea what happens if you start a map without it but found Edinburgh later, if there is a switch.
If you start 1400 hulks are available for everyone from the beginning.
When a pirate captures a hulk, or is given one in the tavern, of course he has one now. Edinburgh just determines if they can "build" their own.
Edinburgh is simply the first (currently existing!) town in the internal list, it's the first that trades every day. And when you get the alderman mission to hunt a certain pirate it says "last seen near town x", but if he is sitting in his hideout instead of sailing around, the message always reads "north of Edinburgh", no matter where the hideout really is. Lazy programming if you will.
