Many years ago a thread similar to this was one of the reasons I left the Ubisoft forums. I'm older and calmer now. It was called something like 'The Million-Tonner's Club".
Part of the problem is that anyone can rack up huge scores by playing the stock game at the easiest level. I joked back then that playing Sid Meier's Pirates I turned the entire Spanish Main into the English Main - on Level 3. On Level 4 I couldn't survive the first week.
Even with a good realism mod you can set the game to the easy levels and gather tonnages that make the best real kaleuns look like rank amateurs. That is fun for some. For me it's a waste of time. I don't use manual targeting and my best single-patrol tonnage score is still about 25,000, and that was exceptional. I usually consider myself lucky if I get half that in a patrol. Of course I also play in a manner that gives me the occasional empty patrol - 0 tons.
