The Hidden Blade Assassin's Creed in Depth

Assassins Creed 4 Black Flags Sequence 12 Memory 1 A Governor no Longer

An Early Death right before the assassination of Woodes Rogers.

Early Death

Many thanks to Altair Auditore, who found you can use a bayonet for ranged kills in this memory, despite all other far range weapons being unavailable. At the beginning of the checkpoint before entering the party, head left and kill the two rooftop guards, picking up the bayonet. This is the same roof Altair Auditore used to get his bayonet in the original video. http://www.thehiddenblade.com/woodes-rogers-assassination-variety-pack Now enter the party area from the back to avoid starting Woodes Rogers' speech.

Because detection leads to desynch, you'll want to remove as many guards as possible in the nearby area. Start with any guards patrolling behind the fence. In the back part of the party area your first ideal victim is patrolling. Lure him with a whistle from the tall grass. A trick I learned is to hold down so that Edward kills the guard as soon as he comes in range. This is important because if you're not fast enough, guards can detect you before you can take them out, and it isn't reliable enough to press as soon as the prompt appears.

Next guy is standing by the tables. Make sure you are positioned right behind the guard so that his body is in view of the guard inside the gazebo. Speaking of which, the guard in the gazebo may notice the body while turning in his patrol (it could take a few circuits though. Also he seems to notice the body more when Edward is closer to it). After inspecting the body, he'll search the nearby grass. The spot he always goes to is at the very edge, right next to the table. Cover kill him at that place and the body won't fall into the grass because of the torch between you and the guard during the kill. This works to your advantage because another guard spots the body.

Now that there aren't any guards who can immediately detect you, it's time for the target's death early. A gunshot is the only way to end his life without having to start the speech. Immediately after shooting, make a mad dash for the tall grass outside the fence. If you are fast enough, no guard will have spotted you. To make sure you aren't seen by any of the suspicious guards combing and searching the area, hide towards the back of the grass and don't leave until the suspicion clears (no yellow line around the minimap). Obviously I wanted to keep eliminating guards, and came close to getting seen. If you're wondering why not stay in the grass in the party area, the guards walk through there after hearing the gunshot, and I always was detected. But there's always a chance they might not bump into you if you tried enough times.

Now that you got away with pre-killing the target, there is no way to progress.

Blitz

Lets throw a blitz into this. The checkpoint starts right after Woodes Rogers is done with his speech. Therefore the fastest kill is right then. But it isn't easy because of the no detection restriction. Fortunately that isn't a problem if Edward is in blend during the assassination. The nearby civilian group won't work because you have to step outside the group for the kill, and the brief bland state isn't good enough to avoid the guards right behind the target. So that's why you hire courtesans for a mobile blending group and wait for Rogers to finish his speech (I didn't expect a guard to be distracted by the courtesans, but even then that probably didn't matter since I probably still would have been detected had Edward not been in blend). Even as he's dying you hear the beginning of the target's next dialogue. The courtesans disappear after the memory corridor, so be prepared to run.

Originally I tried using a bayonet to shoot the target for a blitz, but the game forced Edward to drop the weapon before and after the speech. EDIT: MAGLX pulled off a gunshot blitz. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Joor6QzA5HY Also if you kill the target during the speech, the "kill the target" prompt appears above him, but you can't progress, so it's also possible to get an Early Death during the speech.