d20 Healing Fireball Publications The Cabin Boy's Pocket Pirate Hand Book Appendix - Roleplaying Tips and Aids.pdf - Healing Fireball Publications - R5700

Originally begun as a project for the New Jersey

Renaissance Fair and Kingdom to produce a

children’s book about pirates, it soon became clear to

me that both this book and its sister guide, the Squires

Guide to All Things Knightly, had possible use as a

roleplaying aid to players of the discussed

professions. This realization propelled me to

revamp and extend the original work to make it

more adult in level and comprehensive in scope. To

add a further degree of usefulness to this project, I

now pen this appendix to provide specific

roleplaying advice and generic systemless quick

sheets to help organize your game.

The Cabin Boy’s Pocket

Pirate Hand Book

This appendix has been compiled separate of the

original Cabin Boy’s guide for ease of reference.

Rather than having you comb the original work for

gray sidebars, I put them all here in one spot.

Alsom the original work was designed to look as if

it was written by a pirate and as such it may be used

on its own as a handout or prop at the table.

Appendix: Roleplaying

Tips and Aids

Humble Author and Gamer

Christopher Baldi

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Table of Contents

Types of Pirates ……………………… 3

Types of pirate ships …………………… 8

A Note About Knot Tying …………. 10

A Note About Weapons …………….. 12

A Note on Jolly Rogers …………….. 14

About the Pirate Code ……………… 15

Jobs Onboard Ship ………………….. 17

Roleplaying Aids …………………….. 21

MuM, Pirate Cook ………………….. 26

Types of Pirates

While most people tend to view pirates as a

homogenous group with a single goal (the acquisition

of booty), however the truth is very different.

Historically there have been many different groups

of pirates with many different goals. In this

section, I will discuss some of the more historically

important groups of pirates and their goals. I will

then offer some roleplaying tips to anyone who is

interested in playing that type of pirate in his game.

The Swashbuckler

Named for a group of French swordsmen that

would stand in the street and "swash" (strike) their

rapiers’ hilts against their buckler shield challenging

all who would dare to a duel. They have gone

down in history as adventure-seeking jovial heroes

who are quick of wit, quicker of blade and have a

love of freedom. While not all swashbucklers

were pirates, most of the classic movie portrayals

of swashbucklers are as rakish charming rogues

who love the sea.

Roleplaying: For players that choose to play a

swashbuckling pirate, you are really playing the

dashing rouge. Your character should be outspoken

and always have a snappy comment or comeback on

Authors

Editor

Christopher Baldi “MuM”

Carol Baldi

Artists

All the art in this book came from free sources.

We thank the artists for posting their art for use.

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his tongue. Swashbucklers are often supremely

confident in their abilities, almost to the point of

being braggarts. The key to roleplaying a successful

and convincing swashbuckler is to always be in high

spirits; whether in combat or out, the swashbuckler

should always be happy, smiling and making snide

comments. Your character should be the first to get

bored with the humdrum of life and is likely to do

something spontaneous, like start a barfight to spice

things up a bit. Finally, no matter how much of a

rogue your swashbuckler is he should have a heart

of gold and when it comes down to choices he will

always make the right one.

privateer must pay a certain amount of his loot to

the crown he sails for.

Roleplaying: Playing a privateer is very different

from playing a more traditional pirate. Privateers

are usually more disciplined and less like a rowdy

band of cutthroats. Privateers are usually ex-

navy men or merchant sailors who have a greedy

streak and wish to ply their trade as sailors and get

rich in the process. Privateers are usually loyal to

their benefactor nation realizing that they provide a

safe harbor. However, the player of a privateer

should play him less like an upright honest soldier

and more like a scoundrel who is willing to work

for a king when it is to his advantage. While a

privateer will never attack a ship of their sponsor

country, they are likely to attack vessels that they do

not have outright permission to attack if they can get

away with it.

The Privateer

The privateer is a truly unique type of rogue

among his fellow pirates in that he is a pirate that

sails for a country and may even be sheltered or

hailed as a hero by that country. Most privateers

are issued official letters of mark by the countries

they sail for, giving them permission to attack the

ships of one or more of their enemies. Truly

successful Privateers may even be granted titles or

land by their home country for their service. The

one drawback to this arrangement is that the

The Buccaneer

The name “buccaneer” was used to describe the

pirates that sailed the Caribbean Sea and the coasts

of the Americas. These pirates are the template

for what most people think of when they think of

pirates. The term originates with a type of rack

used in the Caribbean for smoking and drying meat.

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It became associated with pirates when the men who

used to use these racks turned to piracy when they

could no longer make a living drying meat.

Regardless of who the original buccaneers were,

their success attracted others to the pirate’s life and

the siren’s call of easy money. Buccaneers are the

classic pirate and are the group to which all the

famous pirate captains we know today belonged.

Buccaneers were primarily driven by the wealth

that could be had on the seas although some were also

interested in enhancing their fame and reputation.

Roleplaying: Playing a buccaneer is a simple

affair as these pirates are the origin of all the

stereotypes we now associate with pirates. The

classic buccaneer is as a rough, loud, boorish man

who is very self-reliant and independent. Other

variants on this general theme include unkempt

drunken louts, traitorous scheming liars or dumb

thuggish brutes. The possibilities are almost endless

as the only thing that really united these men was

their skill at sailing and their love of gold.

Muslims and as such would not attack a ship

crewed by either Arabic or Muslim crews. Their

preferred targets were Christian ships from either

England or America. The second thing that makes

corsairs unique is that they were not after gold or

cargo but were in fact after the crew itself. Their

primary tactic was to capture sailors and hold them

for ransom. If the ransoms where not paid they

would sell the sailors into slavery.

Roleplaying: The one defining characteristic of

the corsairs is their religious and ethnic identity.

For players it is important to keep in mind that

many corsairs believed that they were fighting back

against what they saw as unapproved intrusions of

English and American Christians in their waters.

Players should keep in mind that most corsairs

were very religious and in fact sometimes received

support from mosques and the governments in ways

similar to those given to privateers. Another thing

players of corsairs should keep in mind is that their

goal is not the ship itself but instead its crew. This

means that in battle the corsair should utilize tactics

to down an opponent without killing him. Finally,

corsairs, while still not as disciplined as navy men,

tended to have more civilized crews and multiple

ships under different captains could even work

well together.

The Corsair

Corsairs are the pirates that sailed the Barbary

Coast. This was a unique group of pirates for

two reasons. First they were almost all Arabic

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where everything comes to a vote may cause

arguments at the table.

Types of pirate ships

If your game revolves around a single pirate crew,

or if a subgroup of your players all play members

of a pirate crew, it is a good thing to decide at the

start of the game what type of ship they sail on.

Besides the different ship designs which are

discussed in depth in the main guide there were

basically two types of pirate ships the democratic

ship or the owned ship.

The owned ship: In short, the owned ship is a ship

that is the property of its captain or the ship’s

officers. Serving on this type of ship is similar

(albeit rowdier and with more rum) to serving on a

merchant ship. The crew is hired by the ship’s

captain or officers for a specific amount of time

and with an agreed upon method of compensation

(usually a share of the loot acquired). The

advantage of this type of ship for players is that

they do not have to be involved in all ship decisions.

For parties prone to arguing this type of ordered

ship where the officers and captain have the final

say may keep arguments from breaking out.

Players on this type of ship that are hired as

officers need not fear the crew removing their titles

and as such tend to have more power. The

drawback to serving on an owned ship is that

players hired as just salaries will have very little

say in the operation of the ship. Also there is very

little chance to rise above the position you were

originally hired for. Finally the biggest potential

drawback to this type of ship is that the captain may

be a brutal tyrant and there is very little outside of

mutiny the players can do about it.

The democratic ship: By far, the most common

type of pirate ship to sail on both the Caribbean Sea

and the Barbary Coast, the democratic ship is

almost the default for a pirate ship. On the

democratic ship there is no real owner of the (most

likely stolen) vessel; instead the crew votes on

everything including who becomes captain. The

advantage to this type of ship for players is that

they will have more say in the affairs of the ship

and may even rise to officer positions during the

course of the game. The drawback to this type of

ship is that the crew can have you stripped of your

officership if they don’t like your performance and

that since everything is voted on by the crew the

officers don’t really have much power. Finally, if

your group is prone to arguing, this type of ship

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