Swashbuckling Plot Ideas Needed

[omedon]

I am thinking of starting a Swashbukling campaign of high adventure and I would like to hear from people who have run similar campaigns.

What are some of the plot threads you used?

Did you make any rule changes, supplements, or special exceptions (ie swashbuckling cards)?

What gaming books and resources did you find most useful?


Any help is appreicated.

 

[Morpheus]

I am thinking of starting a Swashbukling campaign of high adventure and I would like to hear from people who have run similar campaigns.

What are some of the plot threads you used?

Did you make any rule changes, supplements, or special exceptions (ie swashbuckling cards)?

What gaming books and resources did you find most useful?


Any help is appreicated.

Check out Green Ronin's Skull & Bones for Swashbuckling horror (and goodness)...

 

[Tilla the Hun (work)]

I am thinking of starting a Swashbukling campaign of high adventure and I would like to hear from people who have run similar campaigns.

What are some of the plot threads you used?

Did you make any rule changes, supplements, or special exceptions (ie swashbuckling cards)?

What gaming books and resources did you find most useful?


Any help is appreicated.

I ran a swashbuckling theme once for a gaming con. I watched about 5 to 10 Errol Flynn movies in a row, then sat down and merged plot lines from each into Greyhawk. I think the favorite one was the twisted Robin Hood tale that I spun... The characters worked for the sheriff, who was actually good, and were trying to hunt down Robin Hood, who wasn't good at all.

Intriguing thing was - the party had no way of detecting good or evil - they 'assumed' from the nature of the plot who was evil and who wasn't..

Boy that was fun.


In a different plot, there were kingdoms at war, and a fair maiden to rescue. Only a small band could penetrate to the castle, and these had to be the most courageous fencers of all, because they would have to fight their way out of the castle.

In yet a different plot, I borrowed the 'Three Musketeers' theme, and had three sword wielding guardians defending a maiden from capture... With a huge bounty on her head, but not on theirs, individual bounty hunters kept challenging them while trying to get her from point A to point B... I think it was transferring her from house arrest to prison to court, back to house arrest, then freeing her because the court was hi-jacked, all the while trying to fend off these bounty hunters. They were supposed to eventually clear her name, but we ran out of time.

I distinctly recall those players A) being highly irritated with me during the game and B) making a point of looking me up the second day of the Con to thank me for an awesome plot based game .

 

[Mista Collins]

I played in a Swashbuckling Game at one point and it was one of the best games I played in.

The DM made his own rulings and such for most of it and didn't use any outside sources that I know of, but it was one of the best flowing games I have played in.

Then again, I have always wanted to be a swashbuckler.

 

[Hunter]

I have never run a swashbuckling campaign but always wanted to!

I guess at the heart of such a campaign is the sword duel.

Who is the most skilled and the most honorable at his/her art.
I would think that elves in general would be some of the best skilled Rapier swordsmen due to there Dex and longevity. Imagine all those years to practice and perfect one's sword/fencing skill.

The first image that came to me after reading your thread was of a sea battle between two ships during a storm, with the swashbuckler character swinging across from one ship to the enemy ship.

Swashbuckler's are the quintessential adventurers!

~H

 

[Stormborn]

I am thinking of starting a Swashbukling campaign of high adventure and I would like to hear from people who have run similar campaigns.


Did you make any rule changes, supplements, or special exceptions (ie swashbuckling cards)?

parrying rules are practically a must for the feel. Dragon #301 details a swashbuckling game based on the core DnD world and has parrying rules and feats as well as fenceing styles. Black powder weapons and low magic emphasize the very physcial, as opposed to magical, nature of the setting.
I am using faster healing rates and "lives" to make up for the lack of magical healing and ressurection, and to get the PCs to risk more than they might.

Social interaction rules are good, I am playing pretty fast and loose with them, but have amped the Bard's class features with social skills like contacts, taunts, and flirting "Feats" in exchange for the spell casting that really isn't approtpiate to the setting. Deities and Demagogues can help with that.

You will eventually want ship-to-ship and mass combat rules if you are runnign a game at sea. I'm still not sure which ones I am going to stick with, the sources mentioned below have them though.

What gaming books and resources did you find most useful?
The afforementioned Dragon #301, Dragon #310s Fencer and Corsair fighter variant classes, KoK: Salt and Sea Dogs, Skull and Bones. Other books that I have heard mentioned a lot but have not used myself: Freeport from Green Ronnin, Swashbuckling Adventures and supplements from AEG, and the Seafarers Handbook, which I believe is from Fantasy Flight Games.
GURPS Swashbuckler has some good ideas for a historic setting.

A lot of what I am doing right now is homebrew for my Swashbuckling game. Flavor over Crunch. Keep the action moving, lots of sword fights and acrobatic daring do, intrigue, mystery, and romance.

Now if I can just figure out what comes next and how that all fits together I might be able to give you some REAL advice.

 

[takyris]

Okay, after a bit of research (I'm working on a swashbuckling-ish novel), here are a few random plot threads:

The Note

- Somebody always has a vital note that must be gotten to somebody else.
- The note always falls into the wrong hands
- The note always reads misleadingly out of context
- The note always contains blackmail potential if it comes to light

Doubles

- Everybody has a double who gets an automatic +15 on disguise checks to look like the other person
- The double is always the polar opposite of the other person, alignment- or allegiance-wise
- Although the person and the double both made it through their whole lives never seeing each other, vast criminal networks, sneaky stolen-goods salesmen, and corrupt politicians can quickly go through some Kevin-Bacon-esque scheme to find the double
- The double always has a scar or birthmark that differentiates him from the real person
- The double's scar or birthmark is always easily faked
- The double always manages to get at least one servant or knight to willingly go along with the "no, really, he is the real ____" plan, for some reason or another

Hedges and Balconies

- Anyone hiding behind a hedge is effectively invisible and inaudible except to people that the hider wants to see them. He can stage-whisper love advice at 80 decibals, and the babe on the balconey ain't gonna hear nothin'.
- Balconies are easily climbable, but only by people in love. Anyone trying to rob the place breaks a window or something.
- Any conversation at a balconey is going to involve someone saying something without realizing that what they're saying is deeply hurtful to somebody who is hiding behind the hedge.

Duels
- There's always a duel.
- The bad guy always has archers ready to kill the good guy if he starts losing.
- The bad guy often has the good guy's girlfriend tied to a chair, and has demanded that the good guy voluntarily lose the duel.
- Every person in the duel has amazing lung capacity, such that, while leaping, slashing wildly, somersaulting over their attackers' blades, and so forth, they can still hold a quick-witted conversation.
- There's always a chandelier, a staircase, and a bunch of barrels full of something really really flammable tied together by one frayed old rope.
- There are almost always candlesticks
- There are almost always fully functional weapons mounted on the walls

That's it for the moment. Lemme cogitate and see if I can make those more RPG-specific.

 

[RavenSinger]

Love your list Takyris. I'm a little surprised no one has thought of one of the most classic swashbuckler/pirate plots: the secret and/or stolen and/or cursed treasure hoarde. Complete with vague and sinister tales about death visiting any who dare try to find it, and a subtlely misleading map.

Make your players pay for their greed.

--RavenSinger

 

[Micar Sin]

There is a 2nd edition Dragon mag that has a piratical looking type on the cover that is entirely dedicated to swashbuckling. One of the articles, in fact, is 101 swashbuckling plots. I'll see if I can find it when i get home from work tonight...

 

[Dogbrain]

A few things to remember about a swashbuckling setting:

The "good guys" are usually far from Good in a D&D sense.
The "bad guys", even if they are Evil in a D&D sense, are usually bound by some sense of honor.
The "good guys" may be in a situation wherein the most powerful and most evil person around ultimately has the same loyalty they do (Musketeers and Cardinal Richelieu--both are utterly loyal to France).
The greatest power is political power, wielded behind the scenes by people who do not make any display of their prowess of arms (or of magic).
Motives can never be certain--so mind-probing and alignment-probing powers and magic don't fit.
Today's enemy is tomorrow's ally of convenience. The man you love as a brother can die on the point of your sword because honor, duty, and virtue demand it, and he will be trying to kill you for the very same reasons.
The great conflicts are morally very murky: "We sing our psalms in Latin and they sing theirs in French, and for this we are killing them?" "Of course, my dear Porthos, that's what wars of religion are all about."
Virtuous men only severely beat their servants when they actually do something wrong.

In short, real swashbuckling and the simple moral conventions of fantasy don't go together.


And a basic run-down of that damnable thing called "honor".

Only an accusation of lying demands a duel. Anything less can be honorably answered by firing back a worse accusation. A rough hierarchy of accusations, from least horrible to worst:

Lack of style.
Low birth (even if it is true).
Adultery
Incest
Theft
Cowardice
Treason
Lying

It is possible to apologize and back down from anything short of an accusation of cowardice, but that means loss of honor for the one making the apology.
In addition, physically striking someone cannot be apologized for. It must be answered with a duel.

Duels, in our own world, were usually not l'outrance (to the death). In general, they were fought until one side or the other either yielded or was unable to continue (or a physician stated that one side was unable to continue). The "first blood" duel was invented in the 1700s and was considered a joke in much of Europe for as long as dueling was actually done.