Naval Combat System Suggestions?

[UngainlyTitan]

The collectible game Pirates has a very simple set of naval rules that could be adapted to D&D

One thing to consider, while historically before gunpowder naval battles were decided mostley by boarding actions and were fights between galleys in D&D world sailing ships would be effective and use magic to destroy the rigging.

Also naval action is slow enough that rituals should be effective.

 

[Hussar]

What do people think about Broadsides (by Living Imagination) or Corsair by Adamant? Yeah, they're 3.X, but were they good and how well would they port to other systems?

I love the rules for Broadsides. The unfortunate thing about them though is they are SLOW. Incredibly detailed if you want to go that route, but, man, are they a bloody slog. The other major problem is there really isn't anything for any other PC than the captain to do for the vast majority of the system.

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I'll take a look at all the great ideas and see what I come up with.

This first couple of encounters will be pretty simple. My party's just escaped from a Sea Devil fortress with the religious relic they were sent there to retrieve. They're now attempting to flee and are being pursued by three pirate ships.

For now, all I really need is a way to simply make it thematically clear that this is a naval battle. There's no gunpowder and the level of magic isn't currently all that high. So, I think it'll be able maneuvering the various ships around to gain the best advantage.

My advice? Go cinematic. Don't even bother trying to make it a mini game. Give them two or three rounds of actions before the ships come along side and then go straight to standard combat rules. Honestly, I know that the idea of moving the ships around, and thinking tactically and everything else seems really cool, but, in practice what happens is you've got one or two guys moving the ships and the rest of your group is breaking out the PSP.

I've been trying to do naval combat in D&D for years and it's never, ever worked for me. Cinematic is the only way I'll go now.

 

[Rel]

My advice? Go cinematic. Don't even bother trying to make it a mini game. Give them two or three rounds of actions before the ships come along side and then go straight to standard combat rules. Honestly, I know that the idea of moving the ships around, and thinking tactically and everything else seems really cool, but, in practice what happens is you've got one or two guys moving the ships and the rest of your group is breaking out the PSP.

I've been trying to do naval combat in D&D for years and it's never, ever worked for me. Cinematic is the only way I'll go now.

You know, this strikes me as the perfect time to develop this as a Skill Challenge. Figure out what the group's goal is (evade? catch the enemy? lead them into hazardous shoals?) and come up with ways that they can use their skills to help move things in that direction. With the parameters of the game given (no cannons and relatively little magic) I agree that you don't need all that much of a naval battle system to deal with that.

When I ran my WFRP Pirates of the Caribbean game (that had quite a bit of naval combat in it) I came up with ways to keep the whole group involved. One guy was the captain and he decided what their ship would ultimately do and made leadership rolls to give bonuses to one area of the ship's operations per turn. Another guy handled all the sailing rolls and navigation when they were out of combat (because his character was best at that). Another guy was the gunner and made all the attack rolls with the cannons and kept track of which guns were loaded. The last guy tracked damage their ship had taken and which crew were wounded. The division of labor helped to insure that people weren't bored during the fights.

 

[DaveyJones]

you could add a variation of the spelljammer rules from 2edADnD

 

[Mark]

Check this out - The Uncharted Seas | BoardGameGeek

 

[Hussar]

Rel - I think you have a pretty good point here. A nice mix between cinematic and doing some dice rolling. Gets everyone involved (hopefully) and doesn't take too long to resolve. Heck, you could have some players dealing with sailing while others are dealing with combat all at the same time. Ooo, that would work nicely I think.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

The Corsair sailing rules are much simpler than Broadsides! (I have both) but are designed for a more "Age of Sail" setting. They do have a fantasy-directed appendix however. For 4E I like the idea of treating it as a Skill Challenge.

 

[helium3]

Rel - I think you have a pretty good point here. A nice mix between cinematic and doing some dice rolling. Gets everyone involved (hopefully) and doesn't take too long to resolve. Heck, you could have some players dealing with sailing while others are dealing with combat all at the same time. Ooo, that would work nicely I think.

A skill challenge does seem appropriate. In my head, I figured that the whole point of this particular naval set-up would be trying to avoid having to deal with all three ships at the same time.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

A skill challenge does seem appropriate. In my head, I figured that the whole point of this particular naval set-up would be trying to avoid having to deal with all three ships at the same time.

That's how you can structure it - 0-3 failures meaning they deal with 1, 2, or all 3 ships at once... but they still have to deal with all the ships. You can get the Skill Challenge done relatively quickly, and then move on to the combats between the ships.