Stumped on a Pirate Campaign!

[Greysect]

With the summer rolling along I will have time to arrange an ongoing campaign with continuity, unlike my usual improvised adventures. I asked some potential players what kind of game they'd like to try and one of them yelled "Pirates!", and soon got the rest of the group going. I never thought of doing a pirate campaign before, and I got myself a copy of Stormwrack to help me out. Thing is, the book didn't help to much to capture the spirit of pirating, only of seafaring.

What I ask of the playground is what one would expect from a pirate session of D&D, spanning from level 8 to 10, with a Drow Beguiler, a Changeling Bard, and two to four more players of unknown class and race? What are some staple encounters, or plot skeletons that are exciting, but not overdone? What makes a Pirates encounters any different from an adventurers, and how to I let them know they are in such a setting and no, say, a dungeon on an island, or are just on a boat between adventures?

P.S, I haven't watched the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, and will not watch them in fear I become too derivative.

Thank you all in advance.

[Velaryon]

Are the PCs going to be pirates, or fight against pirates? Or maybe both?

[Tvtyrant]

You have ruled put Pirates of the Caribbean, but what about One Piece? The idea of being chaotic-good/chaotic-neutral pirates fighting against an oppressive government in search of something forbidden seems pretty good for a campaign.

[dsmiles]

You have ruled put Pirates of the Caribbean, but what about One Piece? The idea of being chaotic-good/chaotic-neutral pirates fighting against an oppressive government in search of something forbidden seems pretty good for a campaign.

Seconded. Either that, or some old Erol Flynn movies.

For a lighter, sillier pirate campaign, watch The Pirates of Penzance (especially since there's a Bard in the party).

[Toofey]

I was actually comming in here to say that you should check out some old Errol Flynn films, both for plot purposes, but also to see what sorts of situations shake out in common, to get thinking about ship to ship combat, etc..

[Greysect]

Velaryon, there's a Drow in the party, and she loves the Drow of the Underdark supplement, so she will be Neutral at best. The Changeling suggested pirates in the first place. I'm guessing both.

TvTyrant, I didn't consider One Piece. I am familiar with the series so maybe I can pick up something from that, probably some types of outrageous crew.


dsmiles, I haven't heard of Erol Flynn, so I'll check that out, too. And the Bard is already excited to make her own songs.

What I'm concerned about, now that I remember, is capturing a pirate atmosphere, distinct from the tavern. Assuming they are fugitives, they would need ways to return to civilization from the sea and meet up with other pirates and sailors on uneasily peaceful terms. Anyone know how pirates safely returned to ports without being taken by the guards or navy?

[dsmiles]

Anyone know how pirates safely returned to ports without being taken by the guards or navy?

Lots of ranks in Disguise and Bluff, and a Masterwork Disguise Kit?

[Beleriphon]

What I'm concerned about, now that I remember, is capturing a pirate atmosphere, distinct from the tavern. Assuming they are fugitives, they would need ways to return to civilization from the sea and meet up with other pirates and sailors on uneasily peaceful terms. Anyone know how pirates safely returned to ports without being taken by the guards or navy?

The fact that most pirate crews weren't identifiable on sight, and generally didn't fly pirate flags when entering into ports where they were wanted. The other thing is that if you only pray on say Elven vessels then the Dwarven empire isn't going to want you arrested, given that you haven't attacked them directly. Mind you most pirates weren't that discriminating, although privateers with a letter of marque certainly would be.

[Tvtyrant]

The fact that most pirate crews weren't identifiable on sight, and generally didn't fly pirate flags when entering into ports where they were wanted. The other thing is that if you only pray on say Elven vessels then the Dwarven empire isn't going to want you arrested, given that you haven't attacked them directly. Mind you most pirates weren't that discriminating, although privateers with a letter of marque certainly would be.

And were usually far more successful, since they got better prices for stolen goods and could actually buy ammo openly rather than having to steal it.

[Greysect]

The fact that most pirate crews weren't identifiable on sight, and generally didn't fly pirate flags when entering into ports where they were wanted. The other thing is that if you only pray on say Elven vessels then the Dwarven empire isn't going to want you arrested, given that you haven't attacked them directly. Mind you most pirates weren't that discriminating, although privateers with a letter of marque certainly would be.

Ooh, Privateers? Sounds cool. There are already two major cities I could name that the group could exclusively prey on. I just need to pit them against each other.

[Xefas]

You could check out Poison'd, an RPG made specifically for running pirate games. It's a $7 pdf, and even if you don't use the system, it may give you a lot of ideas.

[fusilier]

What I'm concerned about, now that I remember, is capturing a pirate atmosphere, distinct from the tavern. Assuming they are fugitives, they would need ways to return to civilization from the sea and meet up with other pirates and sailors on uneasily peaceful terms. Anyone know how pirates safely returned to ports without being taken by the guards or navy?

1. Pirates would fly whichever flag suited their purposes.
2. Foreign ports may not be on the outlook for the pirate (as long as the pirates hadn't attacked their shipping).
3. I assume there were a lot of ports, and navies and garrisons were relatively small, so they would have to be dispersed only to the most significant ports.
4. Finally, they didn't typically stop and inspect every single ship that entered a port. Being able to identify a pirate's ship would probably require having seen it before (unless it was a very unusual ship). A pirate ship should not be a warship, it should be a well armed and capable merchant vessel, so it won't look out of place.

Edit -- basically reiterated what Beleriphon said.

As always I would recommend the GURPS book on the subject. I'm not recommending the GURPS system (although I would do that too), but the book is mostly full of practical information about pirates, travel times, and various hooks and potential plots. While it assumes a historical setting, the genre is easily transported, and should provide you with plenty of ideas.

[dsmiles]

You should try to find a copy of the fluff in the Forces of Warmachine: Pirates of the Broken Coast. Oh, wait. Here it is. The fluff is AWESOME, and the characters are great.

[Yanagi]

@ Greysect

From the OP it seems like you're looking for plot ideas/frameworks? Any sense of whether your character want to be pirates, fight pirates, or just dabble in pirate-y themes? Also, are these established characters or ones built for the adventure?

Classic pirate stuff:

Privateer, Buccaneer, Pirate

Depending on alignment and setting details, piracy could just be good old-fashioned crime on the high seas...or it could be nonconventional warfare, as it was during the Golden Age of Piracy...when British privateers (and eventually US ones) would have government OK to harass Spanish ships and confiscate their contents...monopolizing the cross-Atlantic trade was quite a plum prize, so a few holds of booty weren't much to pay to sabotage the opponent's economy and damage their fleet. The only problem was that some privateers figured out that if you got writs for both sides, you could double your income. And others didn't care about sanctioned versus unsanctioned targets at all. And since all of this was happening in an empty ocean, there was a lot of ambiguity on who was how loyal.

In framing a plot, this opens up options on how your PCs tie in with pirates. Good guys could be privateers up against a capital-E evil empire; I mean, frame it right and you could build a case for a paladin pirate (first thought: free slaves from an evil empire). Neutral and bad guys get the option to squirm about in their nominal alliances: maybe the PCs are truly mercenaries, maybe they get caught up in the ambiguity because they get on a boat without knowing the captain's playing multiple sides.

Capture a ship, steal a ship

Again, as both crooks and military irregulars, a ship is a valuable thing before you ever get to its contents: it's worth good money, can theoertically add to one's fleet, and deprives an adversary--be that enforcers charged to bring you in or the enemy navy--of an asset. Better yet, it's probably got cannon....

I guess I should ask if you're doing a gunpowder setting. If not, this all still works--piracy was up and hopping all the way back when the Phoenicians and the Greeks were outfitting triemes. No cannons means ramming, archery and ballista, and deck-to-deck melee.

A nighttime expedition to steal a ship means stealth, skill use, combat scalable from clumps of twos and threes to a full ship-to-ship donnybrook. Making the adventurers the crack team actually stealing the ship also lets them shine, as opposed to being just part of a giant melee. The extreme version of this is the team needing the ship to escape (with no other crew) from the pirate lord's island/the naval officer that hunted them down/THE KRAKEN.

A variant on this is a commando mission to cripple or scuttle an anchored fleet.

Raid a settlement:

Piracy is basically harrying with a naval component--since in the Caribbean island colonies were just as isolated as ships at open sea, they were just as vulnerable to a-viking style raids. Again, plotwise this works with both just-criminal piracy and iregular-warfare piracy. Raid the powder magazines, fire the barracks, snatch everything vaguely shiny, and scarper.

Again, plot-wise this let the PCs operate without a cloud of shipmate NPCs, if that's wanted/needed. Also the scenario can be tweaked for more combat or more stealth/intrigue/roleplay. The scenario can also be reversed...the PCs have to defend a settlement from pirates/pirate-hunter/THE KRAKEN.

Run down a Spanish[-expy] galleon:

The classic aspiration for any self-respecting buccaneer was a shoot at a Spanish galleon...which is shorthand for both "giant ship packed with all the gold and silver of South and Central America" and "...surrounded by the world's most trigger-happy frigates."

This is a good one if your players want the sampler platter of ship-to-ship warfare; boats, cannons, more boats, more cannons, and then a giant bloodbath.

Mutiny

Instead of throwing PCs into a established pirate setting, have them be on-hand (and participant) in launching a vessel's pirate career. Maybe a bit hard to pull off, but would be a great arc starter, particulary if the palyers are now the ones making the decisions.

Alternately...know how longs trips in-game just blink by because everyone wants to get to the good stuff? Throw a curveball by setting up expectations of something interesting at the end of sea trip, then spring a mutiny. Good for a constrained combat scenario, or as launch pad for another plot.

Treasure (hunt on an) island:

The Robert Lewis Stevenson book, beginning to end. Add magic, make the Black Spot an actual curse, give Long John Silver Rogue levels.

Oh...and Captain Flint is a dragon and wants to eat your tasty, tasty soul.

'Nuff said.

Actually, read Poe's The Gold Bug.

Piratical Revenge spree

More of a frame device or background than a total plot, but in continuation of the fine traditions of Cpts. Blood and Nemo: man lashes out at society in a nautical-themed manner, possibly via a supership...or by RELEASING THE KRAKEN....

Again, the frame pivots to fit the PCs...are they the ones on the spree, along for the ride, trying to stop the madman, or the precise targets of his furious violence? This also opens up a magical/fantastical element if desired.

Nautical stuff that would fit with pirates:

Ghost Ships, Cursed Ships, Graveyard of Ships

As in nautical folklore, but also The Flying Dutchman, the middle bit of Rime of the Ancienet Mariner, and the Pirates of the Caribbean Franchise.

Pirates versus undead pirates...meh, it's been done. So attack the PCs with an ship animated by the souls of the hundreds of sailors who died when it sank to the bottom. It may or may not be full of giant zombie lobsters. Or set up an investigative plot where they have to escape a cursed ship.

Peter Pan, backwards

Immortal child-kidnapping man-boy with a sword who picks fights with pirates. Nothing to work with there....

Finally, of course...

THE KRAKEN ...and less meme-worthy seamonsters:

I'm very, very sorry about this in-joke; Lawrence Olivier and Ray Harryhausen are to blame for my compulsion.

You should just be grateful I didn't bring Gilbert & Sullivan into this.

[Morph Bark]

Anyone know how pirates safely returned to ports without being taken by the guards or navy?

Pirate ports? Ports of countries that the pirates work for? (There is a term for that, but dunno the English one.) Ports of a country that tolerates piracy due to not being subjected to it itself?

[Ranger Mattos]

There's the Dread Pirate PrC from Complete Adventurer, so you'd definitely want that on the BBEG.

Everything else I can think of has already been said, really.

[Knaight]

You could check out Poison'd, an RPG made specifically for running pirate games. It's a $7 pdf, and even if you don't use the system, it may give you a lot of ideas.

Poison'd is a very, very specific game geared towards a single thing in particular. As such, it is totally inappropriate for the situation. 7th Sea is much closer to the feel being implied, though neither of the systems really seem to work all that well for it.

[Nachtritter]

Sahaguin pirates who worship the sea goddess, and plunder other ships both for sacrifices and offerings to her watery deepness. You can even throw in an H.P. Lovecraft feel to it - numerous coastal cities are being ravaged, and all of them have at least lost a few people to the predations of these scaly pirates. All except one. If the PCs choose to investigate that town, they find that the locals have a great love of seafood, are mistrustful of strangers, and don't like outsiders poking into their religious customs.

[Greenish]

I haven't heard of Erol Flynn

Pirate ports? Ports of countries that the pirates work for? (There is a term for that, but dunno the English one.)

Privateer, as mentioned earlier.

[Katana_Geldar]

What about Monkey island for inspiration.

You fight like a dairy farmer!

[Greenish]

You fight like a dairy farmer!

How fitting, you… well, you know the rest.

[Requiem_Jeer]

If you're looking for some encounters, I have a few suggestions:

Dryad pirate captain, with the ship's mast being her bonded tree. It is protected with numerous abjurations (like ironwood), making damaging it difficult.

Sahaguin. They are the scourge of all sea-fearers.

A lich pirate. With a massive ship run by a skeleton crew. If necessary, make a custom undead that can sail ships. This is the big one.

[Knaight]

With a massive ship run by a skeleton crew.

I see what you did there.

[mint]

Stumped on a Pirate Campaign?
You get a hook or a wooden leg, obviously.

[Noneoyabizzness]

if your campaign world has multiple countries and the potential for war...

for films if not willing to go too far into the high adventure of errol flynn, elizabeth the golden age just to get an idea on how a pirate might be a criminal to one country but a national hero to the other.a fewinterestng naval combat scenes as well.

[dsmiles]

Now, now. Not everybody is as well-versed in older movies as others of us. Plus, the OP may, or may not, be American. A lot of those older movies don't get around much.

[Jay R]

What will make it feel like a pirate campaign will be the following:

Ship-to-ship combat
Low armor (Don't wear armor on board the ship; if you fall off, you die.)
Occasional ports and port adventures
Tropical jungle settings, with excessive heat
Gold mines

Note that I assume a Caribbean-like setting. Since what they want is the feel of a pirate setting, that's what will make it feel right.

Remind them that they need to be useful in ship-to-ship combat, so they should plan their abilities accordingly. Touch spells go down to near uselessness, but Weather Control and Gust of Wind become far more valuable.

I would arrange some ship encounters, some cities, a fleet they have to avoid, some island adventures when they need to repair the ship, and probably a hidden low-tech civilization like the Aztecs, Incas or Mayans -- possibly a separate race.

If it were my campaign, I'd have an Aztec -like culture, with some very impressive achievements, but not as high a level of tech in general as where the ships come from. They probably have lots of magic items usable in the tropics.

Zombies have their origin in the Caribbean, and there should be a village or tribe that uses them for manual labor. But don't man a ship with them, if you don't want to be derivative of Pirates of the Caribbean.

By the way, I've found that the best way to not seem derivative is to watch the movies, get some general ideas from them, and then deliberately start with a focus that you know is not similar. I wouldn't use an undead ship, a living heart or a Calypso goddess bound to earth, But a ship manned by monsters would be good, as long as they are not similar to Davy Jones's crew.

Also, you'll need to figure out how to stop the magic attacks that automatically take down a ship. A fireball in the rigging means the ship cannot move until they put out the fire and replace all the sails -- unless there's a non-sail-based way to move the ship. A lightning bolt at the waterline should swamp the ship in no time, unless there's a spell to keep the water out. A Cold attack that freezes the water around the rudder stops the ability to steer -- unless you have learned to steer with telekinesis or to warm the ice.

Unless your Wizards are far above any other ship's wizards, these tactics have been worked out long before your characters get there, so you have to work them out before the game starts. (Ideally, the PCs' ship is easily beaten in their first encounter, because they are new to ship-to-ship combat. But if I were running it, that would result in their being marooned on a desert island that has a lost treasure or some other important encounter.)

There will be hidden treasure that pirates expected to come back for when they were sunk -- but it won't include any items useful in ship-to-ship combat, unless they didn't have anyone who could identify or use them. Note that a wand of fireballs or Lightning is a cannon-equivalent.

What's the tech level? The presence or absence of cannons makes a huge difference, and what we think of pirate battles includes cannons.

How did they become pirates? Are they pirates or honest sailors? Answering these questions will give you ways to invent encounters.

[Greenish]

Low armor (Don't wear armor on board the ship; if you fall off, you die.)

Having armour that doesn't interrupt your swimming isn't that hard. Say, Least Crystal of Aquatic Action for 250 gp, or just armour with no ACP.

Of course, armour isn't very buckaneery, so one could use the Defense Bonus UA variant.

[Gruffard]

A thing to remember, depending on your setting, is to remember that the big water that is in between your cities/countries slows down communication and word is carried by said boats. This is advantage to your PCs at higher levels and a weakness at lower levels.

Rumors of things like the ghost ship, the magic ship, or treasures, that most land lubbers don't believe in, but these up and coming adventures might wish to find out if it said thing is true. As the adventures move and level, make the locals of a far off location just hear about their first big encounter. Don't forget what they hear could be outdated too. If this type of misinformation is to your liking.

Most classical D&D tricks can work just with a little twist. Far off dungeon with dragon with treasure becomes cursed island with ghost of something scary with treasure. You really don't have to do a lot of work unless you want to, and basic classes could just use a few tweaks to be relevant. (Classes that have Handle animal and ride skills could be dropped for skills more useful on a ship).

Overall this thread already had lots of good ideas. G'luck.

[Velaryon]

There's the Dread Pirate PrC from Complete Adventurer, so you'd definitely want that on the BBEG.

Everything else I can think of has already been said, really.

My preference is for Scarlet Corsair from Stormwrack, but they're both good. They can even fit on the same character, if one wants to badly enough.

One thing I would add, since I don't think anyone has mentioned it yet: If you're going to run a seafaring campaign of any kind, you should have at least a rudimentary knowledge of how a ship works. That is, know the basic nautical terms, know the various parts of the ship and what they're for, and know what the different crew members are.

You can handwave this stuff away, especially if your campaign is high-magic, but I find that doing so really detracts from the atmosphere and feel of it all. Better to know (at least in general terms) how ships work, and incorporate that into the game as best you can. I haven't read Stormwrack in awhile, so maybe that provides enough information on this subject. If not, you should do a little more research in that area before you craft the campaign.