Re: (TFT) Pirates!

["Jay Carlisle" <Jay_Carlisle@charter.net>]

I've done work on this.

IMO

If you give players a sailing ship then your pretty much gonna need a whole 
planet for an open ended campagin in which players have free choice.
Of course you can frame things in such a way that players have little to no 
control over events, such as shanghied Figures, but one lucky mutiny...
This was also the age of elploration.
I use Earth.

Also, an open ended game will need rules for sailing.
I suggest modified Car Wars.

Weather is important.
Many of my globes and atlases have prevailing winds and currents marked and 
I use old alminacs to set likely conditions for a given week.
I also use the major storm info from whatever year (1990 for 1590 say) to 
mirror the hurricanes and such, not to mention other natural disasters.

Popping off cannon at ships means you'll need seige rules and 
fortifications.
Since you'll already have to build forts, you might as well throw in 
buildings in general.
Raids on settelments played quite some part in classical pirateing.
I use a SimCity type setup for building with material being described in ST.

Raids require rules for small Unit engagements.
I use a modified Illuminati to describe a commander or sub-commanders power 
structure, and use a modified Lords of the Underearth type system to run 
battles with cards in the power structure usually representing counters on 
the battle map.
(Of note is that commanders don't get to actually see the battle map, that 
is a GM tool unless they possess some kind of magic that would allow them to 
view that info.)

I also suggest setting the amount of resources as part of campagin design 
and paying strong attention to the economey before play starts.
Unless the players are playing natives (orcs, goblins and other "monsters" 
in my gameworld... but only by culture) there should be very clear reasons 
why a "nation" from a long sail away would be mucking around somewhere else 
to begin with.
ALL sailing nations should have not only their fleets fully described but 
also what's qued to come up in the next few years in the shipyards.
Natural resources should be set by total quanties available and technology 
required to profitably extract said resource and the the labour:rate ratio 
of extraction.
Some resources, like timber or bird poop, will replenesh over time.

And of course, it may not be cannon with a crew of gunners at all but rather 
a Wizard and group of aprentices throwing a really big Magic Fist at the 
waterline...

I'll dig up some old notes if your interested.



Also, hiya all.
Long time no type.
I've not only been saddled with the mundane matters of living lately but got 
pulled onto a mmprpg, or whatever you call it, project.
I doubt there will be any radical departure from the current model but I 
think I got the point home that if you want more casual players to 
participate then there will have to be more to the thing than killing things 
for levels and profit.

The villages in the Goblin port are built and working now with the Abby and 
Keep coming along and the rest of the Counts domain outlined so the place 
isn't in a vacuume.
Jay abhors monsters/resources outta thin air.
Only universes and dust bunnies should come outta vacuumes.
"Steve Weinburgh returning from Texas,
brings dimensions galore to perplex us.
But the bulk of them all,
are rolled up in a ball,
so small that it never effects us!" 
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