Ability to duel crew mates

I think it would be cool to initiate a gentlemen's duel, like pistols at 10 paces. Melee duels would be pretty interesting too, something akin Flint's duel at the beginning of Black Sails. Why not make it an open ended option and include all players on the server? Would make for an added depth of role play

@selcouthrogue I mean there would be nothing stopping players using the emote with other crews I just can't imagine anything special happening. I suppose it would be like how players emote at the start of a duel in other fighting games, a more respectful way to start a fight.

@kalsb Well, if they added friendly fire I think adding duels would be a good way to offset having huge ship battles be a necessity. It presents the option for trial by proxy, but doesnt necessarily have to mean anything, kind of like the flags.

If they did implement it, I think have a victory counter (and corresponding cosmetics of course) would have to be a necessity.

Yup, this is something I've always wanted and would really add some fun to the game as well as some great youtube content.

This is a feature that I want in Sea of Thieves really badly!

The way I imagine it:
You hold your sword in your hands. Then, you face the crewmate you want to fight, and hold the 'block' button. A fight commences where the two crewmates can deal damage to eachother's 'duelling healthbars'. This is a secondary healthbar that only applies to the duel with your crewmate. This way, both parties have an equal amount of health when the fight starts.
Once your 'duelling healthbar' runs out, you fall to your knees. You can get back up, or your crewmate can help you back up as a sign of friendship and sportsmanship.

The reason why I think a secondary healthbar is needed, is to prevent the duelling feature to be abused or exploited during fights with other crews.

You want the duel to be fair, so that's why I think the duellists need to have an equal amount of health to start the fight with. If you have health regeneration from meat you ate realier, it would be an unfair advantage against your duelling partner.

Another way to equal the fight is by resetting the healthbars of the duellists to 100%, which would eliminate the need of a secondary health bar. The problem here, however, is that you could use this as an exploit to heal up during a fight with another crew. That's why I think there should be a secondary healthbar that isolates the duel between crewmates from a real fight.

I said that by holding your sword and blocking towards eachother, you commence a duel. I think this would work, because you should always approach a fight with caution. It also eliminates the necessity of needing to create a new emote (although more emote options would be nice).
This way of commencing a duel does require a sword though. If you prefer a gunfight, you can always grab a gun from the weapons locker after starting the duel.

I think this feature can definitely help us practice duelling in a low-stakes situation. I have been looking for a way to practice my man-to-man combat in this game, and this would be a perfect way to do it. Also, this would be a great way to burn time inbetween islands.

Thanks for reading all the way through!
Hopefully Rare is as excited about this feature as we are!

I'm sure it will get abused and misused, what doesn't😆, turn off FRIENDLY FIRE entirely.
It would do a lot to improve the game in many ways.

1. create this opportunity to duel each other
2. improve boarding tactics
   a. can't just cannonball the hell out of a ship when your crew is on board.
3. help reduce spawn camping
4. increase ship to ship combat rather than board right away

@lil-fokker Thank you I have a huge thread about this exact thing.

https://www.seaofthieves.com/forum/topic/89369/balance-the-boarding-tactic/73

Before anything else, Friendly Fire should be enabled via Crew Menu and not tied to a duel. Direct FF would be of benefit and desirable to more people than a simple single use duel system.

Once FF itself is added, dueling could be something built on top of it.

FF would be fully opt-in and only FF interactions between crew members with it enabled.

I also strongly believe Cannonballs should be FF enabled at all times. Gunpowder Barrels and CCB's don't discriminate, neither should standard CB's.