Post/Author/DateTime	Post
The Abominable Darkling 08-11-05, 12:18 PM	So, I had this absolutely enchanting idea for a terror of the high seas the other day, and I've been thinking about how to incorporate it into my game world. But the more I think about it, the more it seems that being a dread pirate is actually rather difficult in D&D world. Unsurprisingly, magic is the root of all these difficulties, and that is why this post is here. Problem #1. Plain old attack spells. Suppose a pirate sights a likely target and begins pursuit. Also suppose that he has an extreme speed advantage (say 25 ft./round) and heavy winds (so he closes the gap between him and his target by 75 ft./round). That still means that he's going to have to suffer through 6-7 rounds of long range spells before boarding his target. Being a fairly high level character, this probably doesn't bother him too much. Unfortunately, these spells will decimate his crew of jolly mooks (who are just low level experts after all). Trouble is, he needs those chumps to sail his ship. What can be done? Problem #2. Being a pirate will make you a lot of powerful enemies--the crown and various wealthy merchants, in particular. These are the sorts of enemies for whom scrying is a trivial expense. It seems inevitable that every dread pirate will (sooner or later) fall victim to a bunch of scrying, teleporting mercenaries. Simply scrying on "the dread pirate Roberts" is enough to find him. The scry spell doesn't care if you know where he is, what he looks like, or even what his real name is. What can be done?
jameswilliamogle 08-11-05, 01:04 PM	heh, a crew of Svirfneblin will be pretty good as pirates with spell resistance and non-detection. uses disguise self when in town. some of the crew casts illusions on the ship to keep it from becoming too recognizable. blindness/deafness has a pretty good range, too, at 100'+10' per level. heh, with the Elemental Summoning feat (i think RoF) you could summon earth elementals to appear on opponents ship just to sink them, maybe...
Kyuketsukiouji 08-11-05, 01:47 PM	#1: Cast Antimagic Shell on the figurehead of your ship. Or Spell Reflection. Or Otiluke's Dispelling Screen. Of have it work like a Rod of Absorbtion. Or a Ring of Counterspells. Or hire a mage to countespell. A successful pirate is bound to get enemies. And some of those enemies are bound to use magic. Spending money on that makes sense.
spoogemonkey 08-11-05, 01:58 PM	hahahaha.... 12 gnome crewmen all casting "gust of wind" would be a cool way to pick up speed.... (although gnomes might invent a system of mechanical arms that would do the rowing) Pirate campaigns are best at low levels... where their basic brutailty shines... and magic is not so prevalent/powerful... and that "know/intuit direction" spell/skill would FINALLY be worth it... at sea... in a storm... and you can fight all of those specialty sea creatures that we almost never fight: kuo-toa, saughin, etc.... (Krackins! OMG) Ship to ship battles are better if there is no gunpowder... only ballistae... and fire-arrows... and alchemist fire...
Rhadamanthus 08-11-05, 02:04 PM	Summon water elementals as much as you can. Did anyone other than me remember that they can capsize ships?
Gold Katana 08-11-05, 02:21 PM	Check out Green Ronin's Freeport series of books for excellent story lines, backgrounds, feats, combat techniques, etc - all based on the pirate theme.
mvincent 08-11-05, 05:51 PM	For question #1: - Use a bow/ballista to fire a feather token-anchor into your target ship and you can catch up with them quicker. - If they have spellcasters/magic, you should too (kinda like each side having cannons) - Some decent archers or ballista gunners can ready an action to fire on (and disrupt) enemy spellcasters. - Use cover/concealment (fog cloud, darkness, illusions, etc... or just attack during spooky, foggy nights). If they can't see you, they (usually) can't target you. For question #2: - Cast Forbiddance on the ship - Cast a Permanent Mage’s private sanctum on the ship - Be privateer (i.e. "work" for an equally powerful opposing nation) - Assign expendable crew members the title of "captain" or "dread pirate"
guru7892 08-11-05, 07:55 PM	well first of all, you probably don't want to sink the ship, mostly because you can: A:create a fleet of piraiting ships. B:sell, the ship. now even nations are likely to capture ships instead of sink them because they can sell them or just re-outfit them to make a combat worthy ship. now this is because, with magic, you could build a a sizable combat ship in 6 months, and for loads of gp, starting at 10 k for a smaller ship, all the way up to 25 k. this price does not include the crew,any magical augmentation,any extra armor, or any weapons.(as per the arms and equipment guide, 3.0) now if you capure a ship, it might already as things like magical augmentaion and weapons so you could sav yourself a pretty penny. now that thats over... #1 well he doesnt HAVE to cast spells at long range, chances are that the wizards on the other ship arnt going to start casting untill they think they can hit the ship oh and if you wizard sinks the ship he doesnt get the ship, or any treasure unless he is a very good swimmer. and starting the ship on fire is not a very good idea either( mostly becase it might(will) sink with the treasure). although things like cold and electricity may be better for ship capturing. #2 being a pirate can allow you to make allies as well. a merchant company could pay you a small fee and then when you board a ship, if they posses papers that show they are from the merchant company that pays you a fee, you leave them alone. this also works in reverse. a merchant company may pay you 1k gp for every time you give them authentic papers of a rival shiping companies ship. heck, if your 'pirait o' da month' they might start protecting you and your ship with some magical wards, at no cost to you... you see it all works out
NeueRegel 08-11-05, 07:58 PM	Just a wild guess, but I'll bet some of that might be covered in the new thingy, "Stormwrack"? (I'm too lazy to go to the home page to look at the title). Me, "Mr. Pure Core", might be tempted into asking for that one for my birthday, even if it "is" a splatbook, so-to-speak. Rather than being a tangental variant, it sounds like the first "completely new" addition that is something "normal" that needed covering in the original rules. NeueRegel
The Abominable Darkling 08-12-05, 02:16 AM	I do have Stormwrack. In fact, my pirate idea was inspired by the elf wingship (a nifty, if narrow, vessel indeed). Unfortunately, it doesn't give as much treatment to the ships as I would have liked. I was considering using the rules for Wondrous Architecture from the Stronghold Builder's Guidebook to add magical augmentations to the ship.
NeueRegel 08-12-05, 05:22 AM	I do have Stormwrack. In fact, my pirate idea was inspired by the elf wingship (a nifty, if narrow, vessel indeed). Unfortunately, it doesn't give as much treatment to the ships as I would have liked. I was considering using the rules for Wondrous Architecture from the Stronghold Builder's Guidebook to add magical augmentations to the ship. Well, sight-unseen, having absolutely no idea what type of layout they use for ships in Stormwrack, I might suggest you grab the ship deckplans from the old Spelljammer Downloads #1-#6 (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/dnd/downloads). Keep in mind that some of these "ships" are based on watercraft, but some are instead built for dry landings, and some are not built for landing at all. But there are still quite a few really neat layouts. Good Gaming, NeueRegel