As with any MMO shortly after launch, this game has it's issues. However, this is a PvP lover's dream.
Most MMOs on the market these days cater to casual masses. While some of these games are amusing for a short while, they never last. If you are the hardcore type who loves pvp, I am sure you know what I'm talking about.
First off, this game is not about the PvE. If you prefer good raids and smart, challenging NPCs just go ahead and move on now. Just like EVE, the NPCs of this game are there more for something to grind on to acquire money and experience than anything else. They also serve another purpose of making it more difficult to spot actual players in pvp circles, allowing you to sneak up on or maybe pass by enemy players unseen. The quests aren't too shabby and rarely become boring. Other than the storyline RP mission, the game does a good job of avoiding the old cliche of making missions take longer by making you run all over creation to do it. It's easy to enter a town, grab up all the missions you can find, then head to the docks and just crank out one after another without having to travel around at all. Most of the quests are just about the right duration with very few dragging on. Definitely no killing 100 bears hoping for that last bear liver in this game. Leveling 1-50 happens pretty quickly as well, and since it's not too hard to compete in pvp by about 30, you can be pvp'in it up within a week without too much trouble.
The ship battles in this game is just plain awesome. A good pvp battle can last more than 10 minutes with both you and your opponent constantly maneuvering for better position, using skills at the right moments, and choosing whether to sink from a distance or rushing up and try and board. None of this crap with most recent MMOs that usually have pvp fights feel more like ganks because the fight can begin and end in under 15 seconds easily. This is a thinking man's pvp game. Working with a group is a lot of fun, especially if you are all on vent and have built your characters with complementing skills. Although, don't worry about choosing the wrong skills when you first start out as it isn't too hard to respec, especially the first time or so.
The most compelling element of the pvp, as mentioned above, has nothing to do with the fighting however. Instead, it is the fact that you are afraid to die. This game shares a lot with EVE online in this respect. I am so stinkin tired of these MMOs catering to the casual player by giving out these "slap on the wrist" death penalties. I miss the days when I was AFRAID to go explore that cave on the bottom of the lake because I didn't want to die, lose experience, AND have to try and get my corpse back out. While at the time I remember hating such death penalties, I have since come to realize that being afraid to die is integral to my immersion in the game. If i'm not afraid to die, then it just gets very ho-hum real fast. This extends into pvp where I want to be careful about which fights I choose and I want my enemies to fear me.
All that being said, the death penalty in PotBS isn't lost experience; it's lost money. As in EVE, money is the name of the game. Now the game isn't punishing to the point that you can't go out and pvp, but you won't be just charging headfirst into battles you probably can't win either. Although, unless you are filthy rich, you probably won't be taking the best of the best ships out for ordinary pvp. This is a good thing however, because when you do see an Invincible first rate in battle you will probably be giving everyone in your vent channel a "holy crap, that guy is in an Invincible!". I don't think they'll be quite as rare as the titans of EVE were, but they'll be rare none-the-less.
Now I know I've been comparing this game to EVE, and some of you are probably thinking "oh no, another game that takes forever to really get rolling in." That is what sets this game apart from EVE (other than this game's better ship battles); you could jump into this game long after it has been out and catch up to the veterans level wise in a month or so. In EVE, unless you were willing to wait a year or so to be able to compete it was not worth getting into after it had been out a while.
The boarding battles add an interesting twist, but are undoubtedly also the weakest part of the game. It is still a good thing the melee combat exists as it does add strategic depth, and the battles are usually mercifully short when it comes to boarding during ship to ship combat. The swashbuckling quests however vary from a short and quick 1on1 battle to long, drawn out, incredibly boring treks through the jungle killing basically the same npc with a different face over and over. Hopefully avatar combat will be tweaked as the game goes along into a more in depth endeavor, but until then these long swashbuckling mission are by far the game's weakest point. Luckily, you can play right on through the game and never do a mission except for your class career mission every 5 levels. The quests are definitely optional, and while they generally pay better than just hunting npcs on the open sea, the experience is definitely better the old fashion way of just running (or sailing in this case) around killing stuff. Also, it's pretty easy to leave a quest and cancel it out of your quest log should you enter it to realize it is one of those long and annoying swashbuckling missions. This is a good thing as the ship combat quests are usually a lot of fun. This game sports a healthy sense of humor with funny quest names and npc dialog, al la WoW. For example, one of the early pirate missions is called "Beach Slap."
All in all the game has the normal share of opening MMO bugs, but is pretty stable and definitely playable. The bugs and strange things like the crappy chat boxes are pretty easy to look past until they iron them out. Support for the game appears to be exceptional with the devs cranking out balance changes and new content patches at a quick clip. None of this 6 months in between balance patch stuff WoW has been doing. One balance patch has been released, followed by a smaller patch to fix bugs and make some more balance tweaks, all within the first month. The next patch is making major game overhauls to just about everything in the game, and that is due out in the not too distant future. All in all, it looks like the devs are behind their game 100% and are not going to be the invisible money mongers of other MMOs that give you balance changes every 6 months, which is usually 5 months later than they were needed. The support for the game gets an Antpile 2 thumbs up.
Moral of the story is: if you are tired of MMOs that hold your hand and your little sister could probably do just fine in, then this might just be your game. The pvp is intense and strategic, the PvE is secondary (as it should be), and most importantly... it sucks to die! YES!