The Skills of Edward Kenway

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The Skills of Edward Kenway

Ahhh yes, the open sea before you, salt spray in your face, your crew at your side, and a stiff wind at your back.  It’s a pirate’s life for you, eh?  Well here’s a look at a few of the skills possessed by Edward Kenway, pirate assassin extraordinaire!  The Edward Kenway Workout helps you gain the body of a notorious pirate captain, now here’s where you gain the skills…

Free Diving

Free diving is the art of diving without any specialized equipment besides fins, a weight belt, and maybe a snorkel.  Now, Edward has one extra piece of awesome equipment in his diving bell, but that is not necessary to get some serious dives (30+ feet underwater) going.  I still remember having contests when I was a kid to see who could sit on the bottom of the deep end of the pool the longest.  I was (and still am) very competitive, so I figured out some tricks to win.  Interestingly enough, I found out, years later, that I did basically the same thing free divers do.  Here’s some tips:

Relax
You want your heart rate to slow down.  A slow pulse means you’re calmer, using less oxygen, and requiring less effort from your body overall.  When swimming, you want to move with slow, graceful motions.  Panicking about being underwater or being deeper than you’ve ever gone can cause you to use too much oxygen too quickly, and ruin your dive.

Prepare
You want to spend some time before diving inhaling and exhaling.  Deep, slow breaths are best at first, to lower your heart rate and get a good exchange of fresh air into your lungs.  Finally, you want to take a slow, deep breath in, exhale about half of it out, and dive!

Equalize Pressure
If you’re feeling pain from the pressure in your ears, you want to seal up your nostrils with your fingers and “pressurize” your head, so-to-speak, but trying to force the air from your lungs but not allowing it to escape.  It also helps to wiggle your jaw back and forth.

Sailing

As captain of the Jackdaw, Edward is a masterful sailor, able to manage his crew and captain his boat as well as any man on the sea.  I would love to be able to teach you how to sail but it’s honestly too big a subject to teach in a single blog post.  Of course, I’m not going to leave you high and dry (harr harr pirate humor), so here’s a couple links on the subject:

Small sailboats:
http://sailing.about.com/od/sailasmallsailboat/ss/Learn-How-To-Sail-A-Small-Sailboat-3-Basic-Sailing-Techniques.htm
http://www.startsailing.org/sailing-basics/

Tall ships like the Jackdaw are a different beast entirely, requiring a full crew and LOTS of experience.  If you’re interested, I highly recommend looking to see if there’s anywhere you can go and apprentice/learn in the area.   If you’re in North America, here’s a good place to start:

http://www.sailtraining.org/

Cutlass Combat

The cutlass is basically a shorter, sometimes less curved saber.  Very common in naval uses the cutlass was preferred on ships because its shorter, broader blade carried a bit more heft in close combat, while still being workable in close quarters both above and below deck.  Edward Kenway fights (very proficiently) with two cutlasses, striking down foes.  In the real world, dual wielding like this is less useful than having a hand free to brace against the ship, entrap your foe’s hand/weapon, or just deliver a hefty punch to the jaw when you don’t have room to swing your blade.  Someday we may do an official Be a Game Character video for Edward Kenway’s combat style, but until then I close this post out with a link to an EXCELLENT playlist about saber and cutlass combat.  Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B7VBxc8WsXc&list=PLRxS9lxXSDVDgVFxjvy7z0V9PqoNwx2dj

That’s it for today!  What did you think about this post?  Go discuss it on the forums by clicking here!  Come back tomorrow for a DOUBLE post featuring the skills of Solid Snake, AND the skills of Batman!  Until then, remember to live boldly, change the world, and continue to be awesome.

Dan “DaRatmastah” Wallace