Good Swashbuckling D&D Type Game?

[Dextolen]

Perhaps I do.... is it any good?

I first played Swashbuckling Adventures (SA) at Gencon last year. I ended up getting generic tickets and playing in every single SA event there was to offer.

I purchased the rulebook and started a campaign right when I got home. It's a blast. If you like the world from 7th sea you will like SA.

I added a cinematic reward system for my players. When ever they did something cinematic I let them draw a dubloon from the chest (poker chips). I had 25 white, 10 Red and 5 blue chips in the chest. Whites can be turned in for a reroll, reds add +10 luck bonus to a roll and blue chips can be turned in for one, complete and utterly glorious success (crit hit, max damage, for example). It helped to keep the game a roaring good time.

 

[GMSkarka]

That's 'cause I'm all about the pirate-pimpin'.





What? Why are you looking at me like that?

 

[Darklone]

I have swashbuckling d20 at home and liked it when I read it... not only skimmed (as I do usually). The rules look good and the style... well it's great. Even if I didn't play it yet by myself, but some friends do and I don't think they will come back to standard d20.

 

[CarlZog]

Yes. Swashbuckling Adventures is what you're looking for.

It IS 7th Sea ported to d20. Same publisher and everything:
http://www.swashbucklingadv.com/

Check out Living Imagination too, though. Their Twin Crowns setting is well suited to swashbuckling.


zog

 

[scourger]

Here's another recommendation for Skull & Bones (just not all of it). I used the free Skull & Bones web enhancemnts to kick off a pirate-style D&D game recently. There is even a free adventure! It went so well that I bought the book. It is well-done, but it presents way too many new & variant rules for me. I can easily explain to my players that they're playing D&D in the pirate era with no "flashy" magic. The information about the Caribbean is excellent, though; and the ship rules are good. Skull & Bones also has interesting short accounts of historical pirates throughout the text.

I added a cinematic reward system for my players. When ever they did something cinematic I let them draw a dubloon from the chest (poker chips). I had 25 white, 10 Red and 5 blue chips in the chest. Whites can be turned in for a reroll, reds add +10 luck bonus to a roll and blue chips can be turned in for one, complete and utterly glorious success (crit hit, max damage, for example). It helped to keep the game a roaring good time.

This is a great idea! I'm stealing it for my game in a week.

 

[res]

Perhaps I do.... is it any good?

Swashbuckling Adventures d20 is a great game, I'm currently leading a group with it right now and another group I'm in wants me to start it in a few weeks for them.

It's a lot of fun to play, but the rules can get abused by power gamers easily. There are a lot of feats and prestige classes that all have cool abilities. The up side to this is its pretty balanced and most prestige classes all have their good abilities so you can have really nasty villians to challenge the seemingly disgusting PCs.

I'd also recomend reading the feats before you start. There are a lot of them, but you may find some that you don't want to allow depending on the type players you may have, if they are all power-gamers and you don't like that, then check over the feats. If you don't care, then thats fine.

That may make the game seem like a bad idea, but its actually not. Its a hell of a lot of fun to play and there's so many cool things that you can do. Swinnging from riggings or riding off with the damsil in distress, its all a hell of a lot of fun.

 

[Pbartender]

I'll chime in over Skull & Bones also...

Most of the varient rules aren't that difficult to port in (and can remain completely optional, if you wish). It has a really slick method of using a VP/WP style varient without actually leaving HPs behind (heal hit points by the minute!). It has a rare-magic tone that works fairly well.

It is set in the real world! (I much prefer that to a pseudo-alternate real world.) And is as historically accurate as an RPG can be while still keeping it playable.

While my next game won't strictly be a pirate game, I'm going to be using a lot of the S&B rules as house rules in my next campaign.

 

[Banshee16]

I also recommend Swashbuckling Adventures D20. As said before, it's in the world of 7th Sea, but uses D20 rules.

Great game....a lot of fun, really flavourful, very cool action. I'm running two games...one Planescape game converted to 3.0, and Swashbuckling Adventures, and we're definitely having a good time.

Banshee

 

[Wombat]

Both Skull & Bones and Swashbuckling Adventures are good rulebooks. Of the two I prefer S&B, but that is mainly because I dislike the world of Theah (I have had problems with it since its 7th Sea version).

Be that as maybe, both rulebooks provide all sorts of useful information and tidbits that would aid any swashbuckling game you see fit to run; for additional helpful information, I would strongly recommend GURPS Swashbucklers; the system may be different, but the pointers it gives on running a swashbuckling campaign are invaluable!

 

[Eltern]

I think I'm going to be running a large quantity of Freeport-age when college starts back up, and I'm trying to make sure the rules will allow for plenty of buckle swashing. Sounds like I, at least, am focused more on rules than setting. Which one's cooler? (I don't think I'm hijacking...)