Uncharted Waters New Horizons

The best armor is found in Naples at 2am...and it costs 600,000. The next best armor is found in Copenhagen and it costs about half that. Copenhagen also has the third best armor, the plate mail, but I don't remember the price. It might be 8,000.

There are three swords that have the same attack power, the Rune Blade, the Magic Muramasa, and the Crusader's Sword. The Rune Blade is a straight sword and equally good at all three types of attacks. The Magic Muramasa is a curved sword and its best attack is lashing. The Crusader's Sword is a fencing sword and its best attack is thrusting. All three will work well for you.

There are two other * (star) rated swords, but their attack is 10 less than the other three. They are the Siva's Magic Sword and the Blue Crescent (the cheapest star sword). Siva's is another curved sword and its best attack is lashing. The Blue Crescent is a "heavy sword" and is best for striking. Again, they all work well.

You can find the Rune Blade in Pernambuco, the Crusader's Sword in Timbuktu, and the Magic Muramasa in Sakai. They cost either 360,000 or 380,000. The Blue Crescent costs 24,000 and can be found in Zeiton...or Changan. Siva's is found in Calicut and is under 300,000.

That would be an awesome glitch if it always works!!

I don't think I have bought the Errol's plate in many, many years. The only thing is that I find the PC version a bit umm more difficult for controls. I really didn't mind that you choose the attack type and then the next turn the defense type or that they were 1 of 3 choices (in other words a lot different from the SNES version).

Ooh. didn't realise SNES is so different. Never owned a console, probably never will.

That's when emulators come in handy.
I have a NES,SNES,GBA and N64 emulator with tons of roms. I use an SNES emulator to play UWNH and I wouldn't want to go back to the real console since the UW cartridge battery probably doesn't work anymore. Same for RTK,Bandit Kings, Nobunaga, Ghengis Khan, Shingen the Ruler, etc.

The main difference is that in the PC version you choose from a menu to 1) Parry, 2) Dodge, or 3) Block. In the SNES version you choose from 9 "cards" that have a strength value (although I don't think they worked that out completely before the release). The strength values are supposed to be used to determine how much damage is avoided if you don't choose the "perfect" defense.

For example, if you choose any strength block defense against any strength lash attack you will not suffer any damage. However, if you chose that same block defense against a strike attack you would suffer damage and the strength of the two cards would be used as part of the damage results (same if the attach were a thrust). Since a thrust attack would also be the "perfect" attack against a block defense there would be extra damage for that reason too.

So instead of choosing an attack type or a defense type as in the PC version, you are choosing from nine possible choices (there might be 7 of one type with 1 each of the other two) with a strength value that should affect the amount of damage taken or inflicted. In the end it is basically the same, you just have more "options" in the SNES version. In the Genesis version I understand that all of the attack choices may be the same type or all of the defense choices may be the same type (which sounds like it was really messed up). I've never played the Genesis version so that may not be the way it works.

with this approach there is no need for carronades, just need flagship with 400 cabins.

That depend on my mood but I get bored after a while so I try different methods.
My favorite thing to do is described here:
http://www.unchartedwatersnewhorizons.com/forum/new-forum-group1/uwnh-the-game-forum10/favorite-trade-route-thread377.0
This allows me to do everything (trading, exploring, pirating and getting rich.) I never get bored with this one. If your timing is right, you always meet plenty of merchant fleets to crush on the way so that they don't reinvest in your ports.