Ancient Hero
Get all of the Native Pillars to complete the quest that gets you this armour set.
Camper
Bribe bartenders to find supply camp locations. This dramatically reduces the time that it takes to get this achievement/trophy. Randomly stumbling into a supply camp requires major exploration and time investment. It’s not worth saving a few thousand pounds (especially in the late game).
Defense First
Any time that you see a vessel with an aggressive spike under its bow, you know that you’re dealing with a possible ramming situation. Expose your broadside to these ships and give them the opportunity to make an attack. Once they do, you’re going to lose sailors early in the fight (before you can even react). After that, it’s one big melee. Use traditional swordfighting techniques to counter the enemy attack, and you’re going to get your achievement/trophy quite soon.
Denied
Walk around New York alleys to encourage Stalkers. They’ll come after you in spades. When you hear them shout from above, start tapping the Counter button, and avoid their attacks. Don’t sprint away or dodge their attack; your goal is to let them launch an air assassination, counter it to get credit, and then repeat the process.
Do Not Want
These counters happen naturally over time, but you can speed up the process by going for Gang Headquarters. Instead of assassinating the leaders, make sure they see you coming and have a chance to flee. These foes love using pistols and bombs to defend themselves, giving you a chance to work on your countering skills.
Another method is to wait and fight defensively in large melees of criminals. Their buddies like to toss Smoke Bombs into those frays, giving you the opportunity to counter them.
Freedom Fighter
Hunt in the open waters of the North Atlantic. You can’t force POW ships to spawn, but that’s where they appear. Spend enough time up there and you’ll see them. If you want the achievement/trophy, hunt them carefully. Destroy the escorts first with really careful cannon fire. Check your line of fire before shooting, so that the POW ship doesn’t take any hits. Board the main ship after its buddies are down, and that’s about it. You need to do this a few times to get full credit, but hunt for resources in between so that you don’t feel like this is wasted time.
Hunt the Hunted and I Endure
You have to unlock the Hunted cheat before you can attempt this achievement/trophy. Once ready, purchase all of the ammunition that you can and make sure that you have as many upgrades to your ammo capacity and armour as possible. The latter is the most important, but having a huge pile of heavy shot and mortar shells is almost as essential.
Then, go into the North Atlantic and turn on Hunted mode. Enemies just keep coming, and you have to splash 10 enemy ships in a row. It’s easier to do this in the southern portion of the map because there are more weak vessels there. The privateers that attack you are ramming brigs and man-o’-wars, but there are normal enemy ships still in that location. Destroy them as softer targets to pad your numbers and reach 10 kills way sooner than if you sit and let the privateers come to you. Even gunboats count, so hunt weaker ships aggressively while fending off the larger vessels.
The same technique makes I Endure a piece of cake. Hunt the southern waters where the pickings are easy while taking as little damage as possible. If you’re crazy (or just foolish), go after I Endure while you still have your Wanted level from Hunt the Hunted. We did, and it worked; remember to switch the cheats first.
Also, ouch. Hunting 10 ships while letting a man-o’war chase after you is fun, but it really hurts.
Ice Breaker
Ice Breaker is gained when you take the Morrigan through lots of ice sheets. These are commonly found in the upper-right side of the North Atlantic map. You need a ram upgrade that can break ice to do this, so it can’t be done before a specific section of the game has passed. Once you get that upgrade, you can come here and do this whenever you like.
Nap Time and Instant Vikings
Good Locations: Large ship battles, Old Growth Forest Patrols, Sequence 03/Memory 04
Finding a really large group of enemies can be tricky. There are a few missions where this happens reliably, but you can make your own luck instead. Find multiple clusters of guards in an area (groups of two and three are fine). Prepare a Sleep Grenade but don’t use it yet; just have the tool ready. Then, shoot a pistol near one of the guards you pass and run to the second group. Once all of the targets combine, you’ll have enough members to qualify for the achievement/trophy. Use the Sleep Grenade to knock the group out and get Nap Time. Then you can comfortably set up the Berserk Grenade for Instant Vikings while the enemies are still asleep. It’s a two-for-one deal!
If some of them keep stopping to prepare bombs or ranged weapons, then go around corners to break line of sight. This forces the entire group to come after you. You can even shoot the Berserk Grenade at your feet when the whole horde comes calling. Getting credit is more important than surviving the ordeal.
Killing Machine
Get all of your health upgrades before attempting this.
When you’re ready, activate Endurance. Then go around and kill guards. Don’t do this in New York unless you’re very good at avoiding Stalkers. They can ruin your run with even a single attack that gets through. Areas in the North Atlantic are easier because you won’t have to deal with Stalkers.
Ninja
Bring all of your darts and grenades before trying to earn this achievement. It’s possible to do this with pure skill and stealth, but that’s a harder task. To make life easier on yourself, use Sleeping Darts and quiet assassination against rooftop or watchtower gunners, secure these upper areas, and then pick off the little guys below at leisure. Use your Berserk Darts to have enemies kill each other when you’re far away. Always go for the key holders first so that they die before anything spooks them. At least you’re going to get the money that way, even if something goes wrong with your undetected status.
Also, look for multiple locations with outposts. If you have trouble at the first site, move to another and keep practicing until you get the achievement/trophy.
Phantom Queen
Get your Renovations and Gang Headquarter activities done early so that your money is rolling in. Then start the long hunt for Blueprints. Even with infinite cash you can’t complete this achievement/trophy; you need those Blueprints, and they’re all over the world. The “Collectibles” chapter in this guide gives you the locations you need in one convenient place.
Repairman
Wait until you get Level 3 Security Access toward the end of the game. That’s when you can go anywhere in the entire Abstergo complex. Hunt for all of the computers before beating the game, because you won’t be able to go back and finish this achievement later!
Smashing
Stay in the northeastern part of the North Atlantic map and hunt icebergs for fun. Or, simply treat icebergs as targets of opportunity and always trash them whenever you see them. The latter method takes way longer but won’t require any extra effort on your part. You can simply play the game and wait for the achievement/trophy.
Stalker Killer
This one is also a New York special. There are so many more Stalkers there. Walk through the alleys to improve your chances of running into a Stalker, and always put your finger on the Counter button as soon as the whispers start. If you’re tapping Counter, it’s easy to stop their ambushes. Just make sure that you finish the attack to get credit.
Don’t kill off your Stalkers if anything goes wrong. Instead, give them a chance to attack again. There’s no point in slaying them in a non-Counter fashion.
