FREE! Click here to Join FunTrivia. Thousands of games, quizzes, and lots more!
Quiz about All about Sid Meiers Pirates
Quiz about All about Sid Meiers Pirates

All about "Sid Meier's Pirates!" Quiz


The fun-loving, open-ended attitude of "Sid Meier's Pirates!" (PC) lives on from the ancient times of the 1980's with this great remake of an excellent classic, in 2004. How well do you know the new version of the game?

A multiple-choice quiz by headrock. Estimated time: 10 mins.
  1. Home
  2. »
  3. Quizzes
  4. »
  5. Video Game Trivia
  6. »
  7. Video Games L-P
  8. »
  9. Pirates!

Author
headrock
Time
10 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
213,874
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
25
Difficulty
Average
Avg Score
15 / 25
Plays
254
- -
Question 1 of 25
1. OK, let's make an easy start. Which of the following gameplay elements, that existed in the classic game is missing from the new remake? Hint


Question 2 of 25
2. Which of these elements of gameplay are NOT exclusive to the 2004 remake version? Hint


Question 3 of 25
3. In the old version of the game, the "light" sword, namely the Rapier, had long reach but low damage. The "heavy" sword, the Cutlass, conversely had high damage but short reach. The Longsword was in between.
In the new version, each sword has only one difference from the others. Which is it?
Hint


Question 4 of 25
4. The first Era of Gameplay in "Sid Meier's Pirates!" is 1600 (whereas earlier versions had 1560 as well). Which of these cities DOES exist on the map in 1600? Hint


Question 5 of 25
5. The Era of 1600 is considered very difficult to play if you're going to side exclusively with the Dutch. Why? Hint


Question 6 of 25
6. The kind of ship you get at the very start of a game relies on the Era you chose to play in as well as the nationality you decide to belong to. However for the most part, you are most likely to get a ________ ?

Answer: (One Word - quick and feisty ship)
Question 7 of 25
7. Merchant ships roam the caribbean in great numbers, especially in areas with lots of cities. If you've damaged a country's shipping in a certain area, they'll start sending out Escorts along with the merchants. What's the greatest danger with fighting a ship that has an escort? Hint


Question 8 of 25
8. An enemy ship is closing fast! There has to be a way to slow them down! You must order the crew to load ________ into the cannons so we can damage their sails, Captain!

Answer: (One Word (Or two with a dash!))
Question 9 of 25
9. Any ship you capture in the game can be brought into port for repairs, and also to be upgraded with whatever upgrade that port has to offer. Upgrades can do wonders to a ship, making it faster or fire more accurately, and various other improvements. Which of the following is NOT an upgrade found in the game? Hint


Question 10 of 25
10. Jesuit Monasteries, Pirate Havens, Indian Villages and Settlements are all new locations that you can visit in the 2004 remake. You can get special escort missions if you speak to the local leader. Which of the above locations can randomly provide the greatest number of DIFFERENT mission types for you? Hint


Question 11 of 25
11. Another of the new elements in this version is the Romance sub-plot. All governors in the Caribbean seem to have a daughter looking to marry, and if you play your cards right, you might be the lucky man. Daughters can be Plain-looking, Attractive, and Beautiful. Which of these is a benefit to romancing a beautiful daughter instead of attracive or plain? Hint


Question 12 of 25
12. There's also the menace of a notorious womanizer and all-around villain who will kidnap any Daughter you're seeing once you've advanced to a certain point in Romance with her. The dastardly spaniard sails a Fast-Galleon, not a true danger, but you still have to chase him down across the caribbean and defeat him so you can get the daughter back home (and maybe marry her?). Hint


Question 13 of 25
13. Lost Cities are rare prizes, each worth over 50,000 in gold! You'll have to do some serious work to get maps that reveal their locations. Their locations change from game to game, like all other treasures and hidden locations, so you can't just sail to where you found one last time. However the location of lost cities is restricted to one part of the Caribbean - which? Hint


Question 14 of 25
14. I'm not a great fan of memorizing tiny facts, and I even had to recheck the game to come up with the right answer for this question, but to make the quiz a bit tougher, here's a nice tough one:

There are four lost cities altogether, but you can only get map pieces for one city at a time. Each city belongs (well, belonged) to a different ancient Native American race. What is the order in which you recover lost city treasures?
Hint


Question 15 of 25
15. In ship-to-ship combat, what was once referred to as Full Sails and Battle Sails in the older game versions is now replaced by Raised Sails and Reefed Sails, respectively. You can click the buttons or press the corresponding key to change you sail states in battle. A ship usually sails with Raised Sails. What are the effects of Reefing the Sails? Hint


Question 16 of 25
16. The new version has a bagful of items that improve different aspects of your performance as a pirate. Each item performs one function, and has a second-level item that does the same thing, but better. However some items are sadly without any function, since their relevant aspects of the game were removed at the last stages of production. Which two basic items are therefore useless in the game? Hint


Question 17 of 25
17. Aside from dealing with strange men in bars (Yes, I'm serious), there are two more ways of getting special items. Which of these is one of the ways to do it? Hint


Question 18 of 25
18. Of the various Spanish cities that litter the Caribbean in "Sid Meier's Pirates!", in our world's history some of these remained powerful and important enough to later become the capitals of the independent nations that arose in the area. Which of the following powerful spanish cities hasn't made it to "capitaldom" by 2005? Hint


Question 19 of 25
19. In land battle:
The Cavalry unit was the most powerful unit in the game's land-combat mode, before final development stage saw it removed from the game. You can still read about Cavalry in the online Pirate-o-pedia, but they will no longer appear in battle.


Question 20 of 25
20. Without a doubt, wind is the most important factor in the game. It determines how fast you'll be sailing, both in navigation mode and in ship-to-ship combat. Wind changes strength and direction to reflect the ever-shifting currents of the Caribbean. When playing the easiest difficulty, wind direction never changes. Where is it always pointing? Hint


Question 21 of 25
21. Another one on weather: Storms in the game range from Mild to Hurricane levels. Winds around a storm are more powerful, granting you greater speed, but if you sail into a storm you risk the chance of severe damage. Sailing into a hurricane always destroys your ship.


Question 22 of 25
22. In the game's information screen, there is a list of the top 10 most wanted pirates in the Caribbean. You can move up the list by either upstaging or defeating the other nine pirates. The top pirate on the list, Henry Morgan, sails a very powerful ship - which ship type is it? Hint


Question 23 of 25
23. The Spanish are the only ones that sail Merchant- and Combat-Galleons.


Question 24 of 25
24. The Indian War Canoe is the tiniest ship in the game, but in the hands of a capable sailor it becomes virtually unbeatable. Aside from its immense sailing performance advantage over any other kind of ship, which of these quirks is unique to the war canoe? Hint


Question 25 of 25
25. My last question is about my favourite kind of ship.
The Ship of the Line is the rarest ship type in the game, and rightly so, because the ship is very very powerful. When certain conditions are met, there is a slim chance that one will appear, and only the non-Spaniards will ever release one. When a Ship of the Line appears, it will always, always be performing this duty:
Hint



(Optional) Create a Free FunTrivia ID to save the points you are about to earn:

arrow Select a User ID:
arrow Choose a Password:
arrow Your Email:




Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. OK, let's make an easy start. Which of the following gameplay elements, that existed in the classic game is missing from the new remake?

Answer: Enemies can't force you to fight

They can shoot at you on the sailing map, and if they hit they can cause damage. They can sink your ships in this way (never your flagship though), but they can't really force you into ship-to-ship combat mode like the pirate-hunters of the old classic could.
2. Which of these elements of gameplay are NOT exclusive to the 2004 remake version?

Answer: Finding Lost Inca Cities

There are LOTS of new things in "Sid Meier's Pirates!" that were not included in the above choices. Just playing the game for a few minutes can reveal a ton of new features that enhance gameplay by a great deal.
3. In the old version of the game, the "light" sword, namely the Rapier, had long reach but low damage. The "heavy" sword, the Cutlass, conversely had high damage but short reach. The Longsword was in between. In the new version, each sword has only one difference from the others. Which is it?

Answer: Speed of attack and defence

Yup, fencing is now much more dependent on speed, since reach is no longer a factor and damage is handled differently. Swordfighting doesn't affect crew morale anymore - being better always depends on being faster at responding to the enemy's moves. The more you falter in fencing, the faster your enemy becomes.
4. The first Era of Gameplay in "Sid Meier's Pirates!" is 1600 (whereas earlier versions had 1560 as well). Which of these cities DOES exist on the map in 1600?

Answer: St. Augustine

Many of the cities that appear in later era games are missing from the '1600' Era, making life very difficult for the non-Spanish nations. St. Augustine is a Spanish city on the north-eastern coast of Florida, and exists throughout the different eras playable in the game.
5. The Era of 1600 is considered very difficult to play if you're going to side exclusively with the Dutch. Why?

Answer: They have only one port at the start of the game.

The Dutch port of St. Eustatius lies at the far east end of the map, so it's considerably hard to return to after sailing anywhere else. To make things worse, the Spanish are everywhere and they're pretty strong. If you can take some of their powerful cities and give them to the Dutch though, you can shift the balance of power and make your life a bit easier.
Nations can't sell you ships at all, and the money you get for selling captured ships doesn't rely on the city's wealth nor its nation's prowess.
6. The kind of ship you get at the very start of a game relies on the Era you chose to play in as well as the nationality you decide to belong to. However for the most part, you are most likely to get a ________ ?

Answer: Sloop

Sloops are VERY common in the caribbean - every nation uses them, and they're used for a lot of different functions. The top type of Sloops, namely the "Royal Sloop", is a bit more rare, but if you set out to find one it shouldn't be very difficult. Your best bet would be to attack the Spanish - they release these as Pirate-Hunters sometimes.
7. Merchant ships roam the caribbean in great numbers, especially in areas with lots of cities. If you've damaged a country's shipping in a certain area, they'll start sending out Escorts along with the merchants. What's the greatest danger with fighting a ship that has an escort?

Answer: Escorts never surrender. You can either sink them or face their boarding party (If they can catch you!)

Escorts are tough cookies, and often well-armed. They'll fight alongside the escortee, so you need to maneuver against two ships simultaneously. Since escorts never surrender, your best bet is either to sink them (if you've got a powerful ship) or evade them altogether (with a small and fast ship). You can let the escort board you and try to fence them to submission, too. Different countries send different escorts with their shipping, the most powerful being the English Large Frigate, a fast and dangerous 40-gun ship! You have to upset the English quite a bit before they send these, though.
8. An enemy ship is closing fast! There has to be a way to slow them down! You must order the crew to load ________ into the cannons so we can damage their sails, Captain!

Answer: chainshot

Chain-shot works wonder on sails. It has shorter range than the all-purpose Round Shot, but can easily tear big holes in your enemy's riggings, slowing them down or even breaking their main mast. Grape-Shot is another kind of cannonball, which mainly kills enemy crew, but has really short range.
9. Any ship you capture in the game can be brought into port for repairs, and also to be upgraded with whatever upgrade that port has to offer. Upgrades can do wonders to a ship, making it faster or fire more accurately, and various other improvements. Which of the following is NOT an upgrade found in the game?

Answer: Extra Mast

Installing an extra mast on a ship would be dubious, but thankfully this is not an upgrade in the game, either.
Fine Grain Powder is pretty useful for big, gun-totting ships - it increases the range at which you can fire any of the different cannonball types. Triple Hammocks increase the ship's crew-capacity by 50%!
10. Jesuit Monasteries, Pirate Havens, Indian Villages and Settlements are all new locations that you can visit in the 2004 remake. You can get special escort missions if you speak to the local leader. Which of the above locations can randomly provide the greatest number of DIFFERENT mission types for you?

Answer: The Jesuit Monastery

Jesuit abbots will most often ask you if you'd like to escort a ship full of immigrants to any of your choice of desitnations. But Jesuits may also offer you to escort a "seedling ship" or an "Amnesty ship". Immigrants will add to the population of the destination city, and Seedling ships help that city's economy. Amnesty ships will erase the bounty on your head from the nation that receives it. Of course, you need to tackle the privateers that will be sent out to greet you, otherwise they can sink the ship you're escorting, and the mission would be over. The Settlement can produce only two kinds of missions for you (New Governor and Agricultural Improvement).
11. Another of the new elements in this version is the Romance sub-plot. All governors in the Caribbean seem to have a daughter looking to marry, and if you play your cards right, you might be the lucky man. Daughters can be Plain-looking, Attractive, and Beautiful. Which of these is a benefit to romancing a beautiful daughter instead of attracive or plain?

Answer: Both of these

A beautiful daughter's hand in marriage is worth 10 fame points, while a plain daughter gives only 8, and an attractive daughter 9. Beautiful daughters also hand out very good information, as well as maps to the Lost Cities which are full of treasure! However, dancing with Beautiful Daughters is harder, and dancing is always an essential part of advancing the Romance Sub-plot.

There are benefits to dancing with attractive and plain-looking daughters as well - they can give you special items, while Beautiful daughters cannot.
12. There's also the menace of a notorious womanizer and all-around villain who will kidnap any Daughter you're seeing once you've advanced to a certain point in Romance with her. The dastardly spaniard sails a Fast-Galleon, not a true danger, but you still have to chase him down across the caribbean and defeat him so you can get the daughter back home (and maybe marry her?).

Answer: Colonel Mendoza

Unfortunately, it's not random. Mendoza holds a monopoly on kidnapping in the Caribbean - if you get two daughters kidnapped at the same time, there will be TWO Mendozas sailing around the caribbean for you to catch! Catching one doesn't release both daughters though. You'd have to catch both Mendozas for that.
13. Lost Cities are rare prizes, each worth over 50,000 in gold! You'll have to do some serious work to get maps that reveal their locations. Their locations change from game to game, like all other treasures and hidden locations, so you can't just sail to where you found one last time. However the location of lost cities is restricted to one part of the Caribbean - which?

Answer: Central America

Searching for a Lost City can sometimes be a real drag, since maps often appear that lack features altogether! What use is a map if it doesn't show you where the treasure is? Fortunately, the map always describes the general direction where the treasure lies in regard to a known city. Sometimes this doesn't help very much, but there are plenty of tricks that can help. If you're unsure, go ashore and try walking through one of the landmarks near you (Like stone arches or geysers). If you can walk straight through it, you're nowhere near the treasure. If the landmark blocks your movement, the treasure is somewhere nearby!
14. I'm not a great fan of memorizing tiny facts, and I even had to recheck the game to come up with the right answer for this question, but to make the quiz a bit tougher, here's a nice tough one: There are four lost cities altogether, but you can only get map pieces for one city at a time. Each city belongs (well, belonged) to a different ancient Native American race. What is the order in which you recover lost city treasures?

Answer: Inca, Aztec, Maya, Olmec

Sorry for that one. There's no real difference between the cities - they're all worth 50,000 gold pieces, and all look exactly the same. You also get 4 fame points for each of them, although the actual recovery of a city isn't worth any points - only the four pieces of each you find are worth 1 point each, hence 4 points per each complete map.
15. In ship-to-ship combat, what was once referred to as Full Sails and Battle Sails in the older game versions is now replaced by Raised Sails and Reefed Sails, respectively. You can click the buttons or press the corresponding key to change you sail states in battle. A ship usually sails with Raised Sails. What are the effects of Reefing the Sails?

Answer: Faster turning, slower sailing, sustain less sail damage from incoming fire

Small ships are so fast and maneuverable they don't need to reef their sails at all. However big ships can use this to get a great advantage. At the hands of a skilled captain, Frigates and Brigs can turn so fast with reefed sails that they can avoid enemy gunfire altogether. And these are pretty big ships!
16. The new version has a bagful of items that improve different aspects of your performance as a pirate. Each item performs one function, and has a second-level item that does the same thing, but better. However some items are sadly without any function, since their relevant aspects of the game were removed at the last stages of production. Which two basic items are therefore useless in the game?

Answer: Indian Relic & Jesuit Relic

Jesuit Missions and Indian Villages were originally meant to have dynamic attitudes towards the player, reflecting damages the player may have done to their ships, by refusing to deal with him. Unfortunately, this aspect has been removed from the game for some reason - now both will be friendly towards you no matter how many of their ships you might sink.
17. Aside from dealing with strange men in bars (Yes, I'm serious), there are two more ways of getting special items. Which of these is one of the ways to do it?

Answer: Dancing and romancing with Plain and Attractive Daughters

Dance excellently with a plain daughter, or averagely with an attractive daughter, and she will offer you a choice of one free item. Daughters can't give some kinds of items though, and there's also a limit on the number of items you can get via romance. Daughters may also give items as your romance plot advances with them, again dependant on their beauty level. Beautiful daughters don't give items at all! There's one more way to get items, but I'll leave it to you to find out.
18. Of the various Spanish cities that litter the Caribbean in "Sid Meier's Pirates!", in our world's history some of these remained powerful and important enough to later become the capitals of the independent nations that arose in the area. Which of the following powerful spanish cities hasn't made it to "capitaldom" by 2005?

Answer: Cartagena

Cartagena, now in Colombia, is not a capital city. The capital of Colombia is, of course, Bogota.
Havana is nowadays the capital of Cuba, Santo Domingo is capital of the Dominican Republic, and Caracas is the capital of Venezuela.
19. In land battle: The Cavalry unit was the most powerful unit in the game's land-combat mode, before final development stage saw it removed from the game. You can still read about Cavalry in the online Pirate-o-pedia, but they will no longer appear in battle.

Answer: False

Actually, it was ARTILLERY that disappeared in the way described above. Artillery in the hands of an enemy force would probably be devastating, if you consider the attributes still listed in the Pirate-o-pedia. It was designed to have very long range and do serious damage, which would probably turn any enemy who had them invincible. Cavalry are still present in the game.

They are potentially very powerful, but sadly the AI doesn't know how to use them properly.
20. Without a doubt, wind is the most important factor in the game. It determines how fast you'll be sailing, both in navigation mode and in ship-to-ship combat. Wind changes strength and direction to reflect the ever-shifting currents of the Caribbean. When playing the easiest difficulty, wind direction never changes. Where is it always pointing?

Answer: West

This is an important factor. It is easy to reach the Western cities, and takes a long time to come back from them. Adjusting your strategy to compensate for this is sometimes crucial, since time is always running out!
21. Another one on weather: Storms in the game range from Mild to Hurricane levels. Winds around a storm are more powerful, granting you greater speed, but if you sail into a storm you risk the chance of severe damage. Sailing into a hurricane always destroys your ship.

Answer: False

Actually hurricanes don't really exist in the game. Besides, game storms only do damage to your sails, so they can't really sink you, only make you slower. Other than that, the part about winds around a storm making you faster is quite correct - this is very useful for sailing big-ships that are often slow at mild wind conditions.
22. In the game's information screen, there is a list of the top 10 most wanted pirates in the Caribbean. You can move up the list by either upstaging or defeating the other nine pirates. The top pirate on the list, Henry Morgan, sails a very powerful ship - which ship type is it?

Answer: A Large Frigate

The Large Frigate carries 40 cannons, making it quite dangerous. Aside from Morgan, only the English use these, as Pirate-Hunters and Escorts. You have to upset them quite a bit before they do.
23. The Spanish are the only ones that sail Merchant- and Combat-Galleons.

Answer: True

Yes, that's correct. They hold a monopoly on their use. Everyone but the French have their own exclusive-use ships. The Dutch use Fluyts of all kinds to transfer cargo and treasure. The English are the only ones to use Large Frigates.
24. The Indian War Canoe is the tiniest ship in the game, but in the hands of a capable sailor it becomes virtually unbeatable. Aside from its immense sailing performance advantage over any other kind of ship, which of these quirks is unique to the war canoe?

Answer: If you manage to board one you never have to fence its captain to capture the ship

There seems to be nothing inside the game resource files that indicates there were ever plans to allow you to fight a War Canoe's Indian Captain. If you board a Canoe, it will always surrender without a fight. Of course, boarding one can be exceedingly difficult, as these are very fast and very maneuverable.
25. My last question is about my favourite kind of ship. The Ship of the Line is the rarest ship type in the game, and rightly so, because the ship is very very powerful. When certain conditions are met, there is a slim chance that one will appear, and only the non-Spaniards will ever release one. When a Ship of the Line appears, it will always, always be performing this duty:

Answer: New Warship - Just travelling from A to B.

Ships of the Line hold 48 cannons, and are maneuverable enough to be able to use them at long ranges, avoiding incoming fire from enemy ships altogether. The ship is very fast when sailing with the wind, it holds 450 crew members at its maximum (with upgrades), and can take immense amounts of damage before sinking. Any non-spanish nation can release Ships of the Line, but only as reaction to constant damage to one of their trade-routes.

Their appearance seems quite random, but is closely related to the overall power of the nation that sends them out - the more powerful they are, and the more annoyed, the higher the chance they'll send out a Ship of the Line.
Source: Author headrock

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor Diamondlance before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.
Related Quizzes
1. Sid Meier's Pirates! Average

3/18/2024, Copyright 2024 FunTrivia, Inc. - Report an Error / Contact Us