Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced Beginners Tips are exactly what you need if you just jumped into the Caribbean as Edward Kenway and feel a little lost. The game throws you into the open world fast, and it doesn’t explain much. No skill trees, no levels — just resources, your ship, and your wits.
TL;DR
- Push the main story to unlock Great Inagua before doing side content
- Upgrade the Jackdaw early — hull and broadside cannons first
- Always board ships instead of sinking them
- Use Eagle Vision before entering any restricted area
- Save up 21,000 Reales for the Officer’s Rapiers and Spanish Officer Pistols
- Sync viewpoints as soon as you find them for fast travel
- Capture forts early — they help massively in naval combat
- Trade bones at the General Store to skip frustrating animal hunts
- Use the Swivel Gun before every boarding — it softens the crew for free
This guide is written for complete beginners and returning players who want to hit the ground running. Everything here is based on the 2026 remake — available on Steam, Epic Games Store, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S — not the 2013 original. If you want to know how long Black Flag Resynced takes to beat, check our dedicated guide.
Follow the Main Story First — Don’t Get Distracted
The biggest mistake new players make is going off to explore the moment the map opens up. You’ll see treasure chests near Cape Bonavista and side activity markers all over Havana. Ignore them for now.
Push through the main story until you reach Great Inagua. This unlocks after the 15th main mission called This Old Cove. Almost every major game system — the Jackdaw upgrades, Templar Hunts, Kenway’s Fleet — is locked behind reaching this location. You can see a full breakdown of all main and side missions to plan your progression.
Once you’re there, everything opens up. Before that, you’re just scratching the surface.
Sync Viewpoints Whenever You See Them
Viewpoints appear on the map as eagle icons. Syncing one does two things at once. It unlocks as a fast travel point and it reveals nearby points of interest — chests, animals, treasure maps, and collectibles.
You’ll be sent back to previous locations several times during the story. If you’ve synced the viewpoints, returning takes seconds. If you haven’t, it becomes a long slog.
Start with Havana, Cuba. It has 9 viewpoints and is your first major city in the game. Get them all early.
Upgrade the Jackdaw as Soon as Possible
The Jackdaw is your ship, and in Black Flag Resynced, it is basically a second version of Edward himself. You need it strong to progress. For a full breakdown of every upgrade and what it costs, see our ship upgrade and customisation guide.
Jackdaw upgrades unlock during the This Tyro Captain quest in Sequence 3. From that point, focus on two things first:
- Hull upgrades — more health means you survive longer in naval fights
- Broadside Cannons — higher damage output gets ships disabled faster
To upgrade, you need materials — mainly wood and metal. The fastest way to get these is to attack other ships at sea — check our guide on how to farm metal and wood efficiently. Use your Spyglass before engaging any ship. It tells you the cargo type, ship level, and strength rating. Brigs carry a lot of metal. Schooners carry wood, rum, and sugar.
Stick to low-threat waters early on. Your ship is weak at the start, so don’t go picking fights with high-level vessels right away.
Always Board Ships — Never Just Sink Them
This is one of the most important habits to build in Black Flag Resynced. When a ship is disabled, board it instead of sinking it.
Here’s why: time pauses during boarding. Every other enemy ship around you stays frozen right where they are, damaged and waiting. Meanwhile, you take the full cargo from the ship you boarded and you can repair the Jackdaw mid-fight before sailing back out. Leave incapacitated ships floating nearby — they’re floating health kits you can come back to if the fight turns nasty.
If you just sink the ship, the cargo goes down with it. Boarding gives you everything — materials, resources, and breathing room.
Before you swing across: run to the Swivel Gun on your Jackdaw’s railing first. You get a limited number of free shots to thin out the enemy crew from complete safety. Aim for powder kegs, captains, and brutes — the hardest enemies to deal with in hand-to-hand. On small ships you can sometimes eliminate enough of the crew with the Swivel Gun alone to skip the deck fight entirely. Then swing across on a rope for a free air assassination on landing.
Upgrade the Harbourmaster at Great Inagua
Once you unlock the Great Inagua hideout, go straight to the Harbourmaster and start upgrading it. There are three levels. Our Great Inagua upgrades guide covers every building investment and what order to tackle them.
Reaching the third level unlocks every possible Jackdaw upgrade tier. Without it, you literally cannot access the best ship upgrades no matter how many materials you’ve collected. This is not something you want to fall behind on.
The hideout also has other buildings you can invest in — the General Store improves up to three times and eventually sells rare and legendary weapons, outfits, and decorations for Edward. Crucially, an upgraded General Store also lets you trade generic bones for specific animal skins and pelts — a huge time saver covered in the next section.
Save Up 21,000 Reales for the Best Early Weapons
There are two weapons you want to buy as early as Sequence 3. Head to any General Store and pick up:
- Officer’s Rapiers
- Spanish Officer Pistols
Together they cost 21,000 Reales. These two weapons carry Edward through the vast majority of the game. The only things better than them require completing all Naval and Assassin Contracts, which takes much longer.
To earn Reales fast in the early game, complete Assassin Contracts and open chests on islands like Nassau, Havana, Cape Bonavista, and Salt Key Bank. Sell looted rum and sugar too — it adds up quickly.
Craft Pistol Holsters Early
Edward starts with a single pistol slot. That’s fine for the first few missions but becomes a problem fast.
Crafting unlocks after This Tyro Captain in Sequence 3. From that point, you can craft three additional pistol holsters, bringing you up to four pistols total. All three holsters can be crafted before Sequence 4 ends. See our full crafting guide for the exact materials needed for each one.
Four pistols change how fights feel completely. You can blow through groups of enemies without stopping to reload, and quick-firing at heavy armored enemies becomes much more manageable.
Use Eagle Vision Before Entering Restricted Areas
Stealth in Black Flag Resynced is much more flexible than in the original, but you still need to be smart about it. Before sneaking into any fort, camp, or guarded location, activate Eagle Vision.
This tags nearby enemies and highlights them in red, with objectives in green and objects of interest in yellow. Once tagged, you can track their movements through walls even after you exit Eagle Vision. That means you can time your approach precisely instead of guessing where guards are. You can also tag enemies manually by aiming at them with RT/R2 while Eagle Vision is active, locking their position on screen.
Patience is key in stealth sections. Move when the path is clear. Wait when it’s not. The game rewards careful players who don’t rush in blind.
Use Sleep Darts for Hunting — Then Trade Bones at the General Store
Hunting has changed in Resynced. You can no longer simply buy animal skins from shops with Reales the way you could in the original. Now you need bones and other hunting materials for crafting Edward’s upgrades.
The easiest way to hunt is with sleep darts. Shoot a dart at an animal, wait for it to drop, then walk up and kill it cleanly. For smaller animals like monkeys, the dart itself can finish them off on impact.
You start with only 5 darts. To increase that count, you’ll need to purchase capacity upgrades for Edward through crafting.
Here’s the tip that saves you a lot of time: every animal you kill drops generic bones alongside its specific pelt. Once you’ve upgraded the General Store at Great Inagua, you can trade those bones directly for whichever specific animal skin or pelt you still need — shark skin, ocelot pelt, killer whale skin, anything. If you’re struggling to track down a rare creature, go hunt anything at all, collect the bones, and buy what you actually need. Check our guide to all friendly animal locations if you need to find specific species on the map.
Capture Naval Forts Early
Forts become available to capture from Sequence 5 onwards. They are tough battles — you fight the fort from the sea first, then board and fight on land until you break enemy morale and defeat the commander. Our full guide on how to capture forts walks through every stage, and our forts guide covers every fort location across the map.
Why bother? Because captured forts fire their long-range mortars at enemy ships automatically. In a tough multi-ship naval fight, lure enemies near a fort you control and let the artillery help you out. This is especially useful when fighting Legendary Ships or large Hunter patrols — just sail toward a captured fort and let the mortars do the heavy work while you broadside from safety.
Capturing a fort also clears the fog of war from the surrounding sea region permanently and opens access to Kenway’s Fleet zones in that area, which passively earns you materials and Reales while you play.
Start with the three easiest forts — located in Gibara, Eleuthera, and Dry Tortuga. One important rule: do not break off the attack and sail out of the fort’s radius. If you do, the fort starts repairing itself and you have to start the damage over.
Recruit Officers for the Jackdaw
Resynced adds a new officer system where you find and assign crew officers to the Jackdaw. Each one brings a real ability to naval combat — they’re not just passive stat bonuses. Officer quests are marked with a hat-like icon on the map. Do them as soon as they appear. Our full officer quests walkthrough covers all three in detail.
Two officers to target first:
- Lucy Baldwin (Shipwright) — reduces damage to the Jackdaw when you brace just before taking a hit. She also rewards you with Baldwin’s Golden Pistols on completing her questline.
- Padre (Master-at-Arms) — upgrades the Jackdaw’s ram attack to deal more damage, opening new boarding strategies
These two together make naval fights significantly easier in the early and mid game. A third officer becomes available after the main story ends.
Keep Rations Ready for Big Fights
Black Flag Resynced replaces the original’s health potion system with Rations. Edward can carry a limited number and can activate them mid-fight to restore health on the spot. They’re especially useful against armored enemies, heavy brutes, and during boarding actions where you can’t disengage.
If you run out of Rations during a fight, keep an eye out for small blue wooden boxes scattered around the battlefield. These refill your supply and are often placed near guard camps and forts. Learn to spot them early — they’ve saved more than a few tough fights. See our healing items and max health guide for the full picture on keeping Edward alive.
Vary Your Combat — Don’t Repeat the Same Moves
Black Flag Resynced has rebuilt ground combat with a stronger focus on parries and takedowns. The old button-mashing approach from the original won’t work here.
Enemies in Resynced adapt to what you do. If you wait too long for a parry, enemies will start throwing Unstoppable Attacks that can’t be blocked. If you kick too often, they’ll start dodging it. The game wants you to mix things up.
Rotate between kicks, sweeps, rope darts, pistols, and heavy strikes. This keeps enemies reacting instead of countering. You can chain takedowns too — after a kill, look to the next nearby enemy immediately and follow up before they can react.
For heavy or armored enemies, use quick pistol shots. On PS5 it’s hold R2 then press Triangle. On Xbox it’s hold RT then press Y. This fires without entering full aim mode and is the fastest way to deal with armored threats up close.
Smoke Bomb trick: when you’re surrounded and health is running low, drop a Smoke Bomb at your feet. You can then chain assassinations on enemies caught in the cloud before they can react, or fire a pistol shot into the smoke to trigger an explosive blast that staggers the entire group at once. This technique is also extremely effective during ship boardings when a cluster of enemies is fighting your crew — throw the bomb, then shoot into it.
Use the Rope Dart Early — It Unlocks in Sequence 3
In the original 2013 game, the Rope Dart didn’t show up until Sequence 11. In Resynced, you get it in Sequence 3. That’s a massive difference.
The Rope Dart lets you pull enemies toward you, hang them from beams to kill them silently, and use them as a distraction for other guards. In combat, pull an enemy close with a quick-fire Rope Dart, perform a leg sweep, then follow up with a takedown. If an enemy is aiming a rifle or readying a grenade, a Rope Dart interrupts them instantly. It’s one of the most versatile tools in your kit and you have it almost from the start. Use it. For more on movement and parkour, see our advanced parkour guide.
Check the Animus Hub for Free Gear
The Animus Hub is accessible from the main menu and links all games in the Assassin’s Creed series together through a battle pass-style reward system. In Black Flag Resynced, completing standard in-game activities earns you Hub fragments — and many players find they’ve accumulated enough points to unlock cosmetics and weapons the first time they open it.
One reward worth grinding for: the Dark Animus Corsair Flintlocks. These are earned through the Eye in the Dark Project, which you progress by eliminating Anomalies. The anomalies reset twice per week, so check in regularly. Our Anomalies guide and rewards covers exactly what you get and how to clear them efficiently. There are also free items available directly in the Animus Store’s Additional Content section — the Rustic Flintlock pistols, for example, can be claimed for free at any time.
Build Kenway’s Fleet for Passive Income
Kenway’s Fleet is one of the biggest new systems in Resynced — upgraded from a smartphone companion app in the original to a fully fledged in-game feature. Once you unlock it, captured ships can be sent on trade routes that earn you materials and Reales passively while you keep playing. See our Kenway’s Fleet guide for full route details and the best ships to add.
To build a strong fleet, you want variety. Brigs and Schooners handle basic trade routes. Once your fleet is established, let your Wanted level rise to attract high-tier Hunter ships, then board those large Frigates and Man o’ Wars to add them to your fleet and assign them to high-risk, high-reward routes.
Adjust Difficulty Settings to Suit Your Style
Black Flag Resynced has four separate difficulty sliders — one each for combat, naval combat, stealth, and activities. Each has three settings: Forgiving, Intended, and Hard.
You can mix and match them however you like, and change them at any time during the game. If you’re great at sword fights but terrible at stealth, drop stealth to Forgiving and crank combat to Hard. The game supports this fully. There’s no shame in adjusting — use the settings to make the experience enjoyable for you.
Try Diving Anywhere for Stealth and Hidden Loot
A new mechanic in Resynced is the ability to dive anywhere in the ocean, even without the Diving Bell. This lets you find hidden chests submerged near isolated islands and approach ships or shore targets completely underwater without being spotted.
The Diving Bell still unlocks deeper zones later in the story with rarer loot, but the free diving mechanic is useful from early on. If you’re approaching a guarded ship from the sea, try going underwater first — it’s often much cleaner than a frontal assault.
Wrapping Up
Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced is a big game with a lot going on. The key for beginners is to stay focused early: follow the story to unlock the main systems, build up the Jackdaw, and get comfortable with boarding and stealth before you start tackling everything the open world throws at you.
Once the systems open up, the Caribbean is yours. Pick up the game on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Steam, or the Epic Games Store and start your pirate adventure today.
