D&D General What's your view on a pirate-driven campaign?

[Lanefan]

You can run a pirate-themed campaign in 5e, but it’s not a great fit without some serious adjustments. The rules are built for land-based, small-party adventures, so naval combat and ship management rules are underdeveloped. The few official rules for sailing (like those in Ghosts of Saltmarsh) are pretty bare bones from what i read, leaving most of the exciting ship-to-ship action up to the DM to invent.

5e default is high-magic which clashes with the gritty, swashbuckling style many pirate stories aim for. Spells like Control Weather and Water Breathing remove the tension of sea travel and storms, and by mid-levels, characters become so powerful that danger and desperation fade away. Also, classes are designed for epic fantasy heroes, not the rough, morally gray scoundrels who thrive in pirate tales.

Some careful curation and pruning of the spell lists would be in order, for sure.

Another option would be to run it as an E6 style game, where level advancement caps at a fairly low number after which you only pick up new abilities (feats etc.) at a slower pace.

Exploration and resource management are barely supported by the rules. Long voyages, supply shortages, and ship upkeep don’t have meaningful mechanics and some of that can be circumvented by magic. The economy is based on getting stuff that gives boost to personal power of character (aka the magic items) while in the same time, make money past certain point useless, so rewards for plunder, smuggling, or trading cargo are not there in meaningful way. Crew and morale systems are nonexistent, so running a ship with dozens of NPCs usually boils down to flavor text.

There's all kinds of design space for magic related to the ships themselves - instead of spending the 10000 g.p. they just looted on carousing and rum, they could spend it on paying an enchanter to upgrade their ship somehow.

As for magic circumventing resource management, see above re spell pruning.

Last, but not the least, 5e lacks mechanics for the intrigue, betrayal, and social maneuvering that define great pirate fiction. If you have group that can do all that by pure role play, great. If you have group that would like some mechanical backing, tough luck.

My argument has always been that the mechanical backing isn't required as long as everyone - including the DM - plays true to their characters. It's essential, however, that the table be open to CvC intrigue, backstabbing, and so forth now and then.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Solution: have the captain be a quasi-PC shared among all the players and let the players collectively make the captain's decisions, die rolls, etc.

Other random thoughts on a pirate campaign:

--- as @payn already noted, checking out the Black Sails TV series is a must!
--- you can slip in a few land-based adventures as well, while most of the action will be at sea, not all of it needs to be
--- an out-there option is to give each PC their own ship and have them operate as a fleet
--- pirates did change ships now and then if they captured one that was better (or less damaged) than the one they already had
--- you'll need to design a setup whereby your pirates can turn their ill-gotten booty into cash or goods
--- be ready for evil PCs and-or PC-vs-PC arguments and backstabbing, it kinda goes with the territory

Were someone running this in person here in town I'd sign up in a heartbeat!

Me too! Sounds amazing!

 

[bedir than]

A good way to get around the Pirates are bad people issue, is make them Robin Hood of the Seas.

Or recognize that there's plenty of heroic pirates in the literature that inspires our games

• Most of the Dread Pirate Roberts were heroes
• The Straw Hat Pirates are all heroes
• Charles Vane from Black Sails

"These men who brought me here today do not fear me. They brought me here today because they fear you... because they know my voice - the voice that refuses to be enslaved - once lived in you, and may yet still. They brought you here today to show you death and use if to frighten you into ignoring that voice. But know this. We are many. They are few. To fear death is a choice... and they can't hang us all

• Edward Kenway from AC: IV Black Flag
• Elizabeth Swann and Will Turner
• Sayyida al-Hurra
• Lioness of Brittany
• Zheng Yi Sao (Our Flag Means Death version)

and on it goes

I'd also look at Sid Meier's Pirates!

Sid Meier's Pirates! - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Zardnaar]

Conceptually its great. The big problem is naval combat.

Even using 3rd party its sucked since 2E.
Great concrpt but kinda need to skip naval stuff.

 

[Zardnaar]

Or recognize that there's plenty of heroic pirates in the literature that inspires our games

• Most of the Dread Pirate Roberts were heroes
• The Straw Hat Pirates are all heroes
• Charles Vane from Black Sails

"These men who brought me here today do not fear me. They brought me here today because they fear you... because they know my voice - the voice that refuses to be enslaved - once lived in you, and may yet still. They brought you here today to show you death and use if to frighten you into ignoring that voice. But know this. We are many. They are few. To fear death is a choice... and they can't hang us all

• Edward Kenway from AC: IV Black Flag
• Elizabeth Swann and Will Turner
• Sayyida al-Hurra
• Lioness of Brittany
• Zheng Yi Sao (Our Flag Means Death version)

and on it goes

I'd also look at Sid Meier's Pirates!

Sid Meier's Pirates! - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Xboxone rubs original Xbox games.

AC Black flag is great. Previous comment about naval combat sucking.

 

[JamesLFlowers]

A few thoughts...
Ship to ship combat... as others have posted, the goal is to loot the ship which means you have to take it. So ship to ship combat is more disabling than destroying and then BOARDING which is standard character on NPC combat except you don't have that great over-armored character to tank the enemy's attacks. This works well in pre-gunpowder fantasy as your long range weapons aren't that powerful and so you have to close and board. Even gunpowder age pirate went after rigging and mast more than anything else or just bluffed to get their opponents to surrender.

Spellcasting ... remember, the NPC have spellcasters too! Mercedes Lackey says it best in one of her Valdemar novels, that all the wizards had worn and countered each other out with the greater magics and all that was left was the little magics in camps. So you throw a fireball or control water and they counter with something.

 

[Piperken]

Yeah, reading modern histories of pirates (Under the Black Flag, Empire of Blue Water, The Republic of Pirates, etc.) really underscores how many pirates were either sailors who threw off truly brutal treatment from European navies, screwed over politically or economically, were freed slaves, etc.

The pendulum has almost swung too far -- they weren't all proto-workers' rights revolutionaries -- but the "pirates are villainous scum" is largely British imperial propaganda, for obvious reasons.

Echo this, if you have time and inclination to do so. Especially, read about pirates from different geographic locales (not just the Caribbean); the kinds of communities that sprung up to support them were different, based on local environment and peoples involved.

 

[liteberer]

Did I ever tell you about the time Caesar was captured by pirates?

 

[GrimCo]

Some careful curation and pruning of the spell lists would be in order, for sure.

Not just spell pruning. If i would run it, i would prune classes. Fighter, rogue, bard and ranger only. They fit theme of pirate shenanigans best, you still have some magic via sub classes and bard/ranger. And this is ironically, one type of campaign ranger would fit great with it's abilities ( for instance, optional Deft Explorer level 6 ability, Roving gives it climb and swim speed equal to walking speed and +5 feet speed).

Another option would be to run it as an E6 style game, where level advancement caps at a fairly low number after which you only pick up new abilities (feats etc.) at a slower pace.

Or in general keep most in tier 1 and 2, with campaign finish by the end of tier 2 (so lv 9-10).

There's all kinds of design space for magic related to the ships themselves - instead of spending the 10000 g.p. they just looted on carousing and rum, they could spend it on paying an enchanter to upgrade their ship somehow.

Sure, one can go that route for more fantasy feel and if one wants ships to have bigger role in the game.

As for magic circumventing resource management, see above re spell pruning.

My argument has always been that the mechanical backing isn't required as long as everyone - including the DM - plays true to their characters. It's essential, however, that the table be open to CvC intrigue, backstabbing, and so forth now and then.

It isn't required, but it helps, specially when players aren't so adept in role playing that parts of game. Or if there needs to be conflict resolution mechanic that can impact narrative. While freeform can be great with right group, sometimes, you want and need something more tangible.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Did I ever tell you about the time Caesar was captured by pirates?