The rules in Mongoose Publishing's Seas of Blood are very similar to those in Skull & Bones, but somewhat easier, you might be able to use it to step from one to the other.
In the most recent sea battle that I played in we used the rules from Corsair (largely the same as in S&B), with a bit of Mongoose Publishing's Book of the Sea, but we were just doing a sea battle for the sake of a sea battle. Sadly, I stomped the other players hard. I had the advantage of being a single player vs. a commitee, and the loudest voice in the other team was so afraid of taking damage that he lost the fleet. Each of us had one fourth rate, one frigate, and one brigantine, though there were shallows that only the brigantines could enter they never came into play..
In the first game I got them pinned against an island by the wind, and poured broadsides into one ship after the other. (You almost never see broadsides in the game.)
The second game they had the wind and ran away with battle sails. I put up half sails and followed, yawing to alternate port and starboard guns, while they plinked away with their sternchasers. If they had formed a line they could have raked me as I approached, instead I ate two of their ships and damaged the third as they ran away. My ship received only minor damage.
Just in case you couldn't guess, I had fun, I just wish that they had made it a bit more of a challenge. And my gods sea combat can be slow! It took around 10 rounds between shots in the second game, alternating batteries. The first game, once they were pinned the only thing to break the rounds apart was my fire while they took damage. Then I would take a few rounds moving to come to bear on the next target and start up again with the fire.
The Auld Grump
