"Best Ruleset for Pirate Wargaming?" Topic

What do you recommend?

My friend wrote his own based on Mordheim. Blood and Swash by Buck Surdu is a good set for tavern brawls and island raids.

I like Legends of the High Seas offered by Warhammer Historicals.

Still trying to determine that myself, so glad you inquired.

There are many rules sets out there, and many have their followers.

I would like to know which people think are some of the best also, and more specifically, why.

Spring is perfect pirating weather.

There are a lot of opinions in the archives, but I can't recall which were listed as some of the better ones right now.

I like Blood and Swash, or modified Chain Reaction.

The QRS for the CRmod is available on the TwoHourWargames yahoogroup:
PDF link

I don't know about the "best" but my rules set is more fun then a barrel of piratey monkeys :D ARRRGH!

Brian Carnes,
Designer, Sailpower: Fun Scale Combat in the Age of Sail
Sailpowergame.com
blog.sailpowergame.com

Come be a pirate and fight for Glory at Origins 2009!

Over 40 15MM scale ships, massive play surface, full treasure hunting rules, and this year -demos of Sailpower in 28MM! Be there! All the cool pirates will!

The question should probably be broken into two: best land based pirate rules, and best sea based pirate rules.

LIST of PIRATES RULES

(Some readily available; some hard to get; some OOP. URLs may be out of date…)

"Privateer" by Steve Winter (2003)
Skirmishing during Piracy's Golden Age. Designed for 25/30mm figs, one fig equals a single warrior though small scale battles can be fought, scenarios, quick play sheets. Available from onmilitarymatters.com

"Once Upon a Time in the West Indies" by Pete Berry/Partisan Press (1991)
Pirate skirmish rules add-on to "Once Upon a Time in the West Country." Both rules sets required because "West Indies" – mostly ship rules and scenarios – uses the land combat rules in "West Country."
Available through Caliver Books (UK): caliverbooks.com and onmilitarymatters.com (US)

"Treasure Island" by Over the Wire
A set of rules with 25/28mm figures for playing out pirate action and the search for treasure. Contents include rules, 10 character figures, 10 pirates, 2 treasure chests, 1 skeleton bits and a palm tree.
link

"Fifteen Men" by Eureka Miniatures
Designed for Hollywood style action and quick exciting games of piracy on the High Seas, these skirmish rules require only fifteen pirates per side.
eurekamin.com.au/index.shtml

"Pirates!" by Flagship Games
Fun system for 28mm; company sells ships, use whatever figs you want; fantasy crews (elves, dwarfs, undead, etc.); rules and ships can be purchased separately.
flagshipgames.com

"Pieces of Eight" -- 1st ed. by Peter Pig (1994) peterpig.demon.co.uk
Rules for 15mm; very basic system; covers both ship combat and HtH

"Pieces of Eight" -- 2nd ed. by Peter Pig (2000) peterpig.demon.co.uk
Rules for 15mm land; 1/450th naval.
Available in the U.S. through Brookhurst Hobbies: brookhursthobbies.com

"Hoist the Jolly Roger" by Ross Rigby and Neil Morris
For 25/28mm; thorough but not too complex; has random event cards; covers both ship combat and HtH (for ship and land); looks to be very fun and accessible. Only available directly from the authors (in
England; very hard to get mailed to U.S.) Check out the Manchester Area Wargaming Society (MAWS) web page for pics and info at link

"Treasure of Sandheap" by T. Sheil and A. Sheil
A beginner's game for fast play with toy soldiers.
link

"Corsari, Pirati & Bucanieri" by Riccardo Affinati
In Italian; free on website:
link

"Blood & Swash / Thunder & Plunder" by Buck Surdu (Jodie-Press)
link

"Shiver Me Timbers" (OOP) by Village Green

"Davey Jones Locker" (OOP) by Daniel Fox (Sutton Hoo Games)

"Them As Dies Is the Lucky Ones" by Johnson/Ratcliffe (thru Redoubt) (Cannot find any reference to rules at Redoubt site) redoubt.force9.co.uk

"Buccaneer, Broadsword & Blunderbuss" by Old Glory
oldgloryminiatures.com

"Evil Stevie's Pirate Game" by Steve Jackson
Free at: io.com/~sj/PirateGame.html

"Strange Grogge" (now Strange Tydes?) by Steve Blease, et al (Wessex Games)
link

"Pirates of Sartosa" (Warhammer system) by [Author unknown]
Free at: link

"Pieces of Eight" by Andy Watkins
Free at: link

"Wooden Ships & Plastic Men" by Mathew Clayson
Free at: link

"Debauchery, Rum and Bloodletting" (Fire & Steel variant)
link

"Jolly Roger" (I have copy, but no designer listed)
Land and sea battles; with special action and event cards

"Pirate Raiders" by Brian Whitaker (Not published)
Simple raiding party rules special action and event cards

"Legends of the High Seas" by Warhammer Historicals

"Barnacle Bill" by David Raybin

RULES THAT CAN BE USED WITH PIRATES
(Horse & Musket era, or good rules for other eras that can be retrograded)

"Sacre Bleu!" by [Unknown]
Mass skirmish rules 1660-1830. 25mm Skirmish rules 10-100 miniatures.
Available through Caliver Books (UK): caliverbooks.com and onmilitarymatters.com (US)

"Freikorps" by Bryan Ansell of Foundry
Simple skirmish rules for period from about 1700 to 1850; land combat only; random initiative; roll for hit location on body.
Free through: icenter.net/~gisby/rules.htm

"Rencounter" by Edward Allen
Another system covering approx. 1700-1850; far more comprehensive than Freikorps
Free at: link

"Stand To!" by Steve Winter
Covers small "Colonial Era" battles; very simple, fast, fun system
Free at: link

"Limeys & Slimeys" from Outland Games
15mm Age-of-Sail naval warfare; no land combat.
Free pdf at: PDF link

"Matchlocks on the Warpath" by Jon Lundberg / Historic Enterprises (OOP)
Skirmish combat during "the settling of America"; land combat only; roll for hit location on body; rules look great -- too bad they're for land only.

"Swashbuckler" by Yaquinto Games (OOP)
Man-to-man, phased combat.

"Fire and Steel" – by Mark Evans and Dave Wilson
Skirmish wargames rules 1700-1900

There are numerous Age-of-Sail rules that could be applied or adapted for naval action.

Just wanted to let you know that "Blood & Swash/Thunder & Plunder" is no longer caried by JodiePress. Most all of the Jodipress titles are now distributed by LMW Works. The lisitng for Blood & Swash/Thunder & Plunder can now be found here:
link

Do any rules adapt to skirmish of individuals and also against groups, i.e. Government troops, marines, town militia?

I like Pirates! by Flagship games…

One that we use is The Sword in the Caribbean, a variant of The Sword and the Flame, by Larry Brom.

There are several battle reports on our group's web site: angelfire.com/games3/jackson gamer . Just click on pictures of games and scroll down to the Golden Age of piracy section.

The rules can be obtained from sergeants3.com in the US.

Jim

I am with ColCampbell for The Sword in the Caribbean, a great set of rules using groups of figures for pirates, militia, townsfolk etc.

I have used This vey ground for land actions ideal for skirmishes in jungles and the like

for simple ship action LOTHS

We started useing the Pirates supliment for mongoose runequest. works very well for one on one action. Of course it should, as the original runequest was developed by people going out and whacking on each other, then makeing the rules fit what they learned as close as they could. The sailing part does need work, but there are plenty of great sailing games to steal from.

Do any rules adapt to skirmish of individuals and also against groups, i.e. Government troops, marines, town militia?

Legends of the High Seas does.

Just a clarification on the list provided:

Strange Grogge is a fantasy swashbuckling land based skirmish game.

Strange Tydes is a naval game.

Strange Grogge uses a version of the Bottle system also used in Scudbusters and Firewall 2120.

Haven't read or played Strange Tydes.

I'm a big fan of Pinnacle's Showdown rules. If you have their Pirates of the Spanish Main rpg you can easily add the weapons into Showdown and have an excellent rpg which can easily handle 20-30 figure per side skirmish games. Or a skirmish game which allows roleplaying depending on which way you want to look at it.

Excellent post Schogun, all or nearly all the pirates ruleset summed.

Under the Black Flag

link

For ship to ship actions, the following rules sets can be easily adapted:

Broadside – Napoleonic era rules for 15mm scale vessels (easily adjusted for use with other vessel scales).

Pretty much just a ship to ship set of rules, with some rules for musket fire and boarding actions.

Prevailing Winds – 15mm scale War of 1812 rules – again, fairly easily adjusted for use with other scales, and for other periods. The smallest cannon in these rules, other than swivels is a 9 Pdr., but you can easily just shift/adjust the numbers to permit the use of smaller cannons prevalent in the pirate era, e.g. 3 – 4 Pdrs., 6 Pdrs., etc.

Pretty much just a ship to ship set of rules, with some rules for musket fire and boarding actions.

Their 1812 resin vessel range looks superb.

Sailpower – designed for use with vessels from the pirate, and Napoleonics eras, using 15mm scale vessels (anyone notice a trend here?).

They permit ship to ship actions, and have limited rules for land-based actions as well. They appear to be primarily designed for game play at the local club, or convention.

Brian also produces a very nice range of 15mm scale vessels made in resin to go with them.

Note, none of the above are really designed for shore actions, in a RPG setting, like many people want for this era. Still, they can be easily used with them, as excellent supplements for them, when decent ship-to-ship rules are required.

I am in the early concept phase for a campaign / role play system for Sailpower that would be party based role play.

Eg, each player plays 4 to 6 characters, and can choose any of them depending on the mission to role play.

The thing is, I wish to avoid the level up mechanics prevalent in the standard RPG . . . And i would like to set up gameplay that allows your individual characters to die but the player to live on thru the ship. Eg the ships crew as the "character"

it's all very early, and not much is firmed up yet. But i just wanted to note that i have heard from folks out there that there is interest in a good RPG. The key would be to make something unique, and not "just another role play system."

Brian Carnes,
Designer, Sailpower
sailpowergame.com
blog.sailpowergame.com

Brian I for one would certainly be interested in a campaign game for pirates. Particularly if yyou can make it work with your sailing rules.

Levels per say may not be needed, but think about some form of improvement. After all, we real people do get better at things (we hope so anyway), and a game where everything is always the same gets a little flat after time.

I like experience based skills that grow, but physical stats which remain fairly static . . . Also I like luck to make certain hard things possible to a less skilled character. I dislike the D and D originated concepts of leveling in which originally you can't do anything fun then grow to practically "godhood"

Nelson was a great leader, but never amounted to much phyically.

Lt Cochran was a fairly brilliant, but many of his exploits were aided by a serious amount of luck

Pirates either had the bent for piracy or did not, Stede Bonnet tried his best to be a good pirate, but never was any good at it.

To me tho, It's about the ship. The ship has exploits, the men are the agents of those exploits, but a storied vessel like the Victory had many captains, and many heroes. Thus if you were to say, play a cadre of interesting folks and the vessel on which they serve it would be fun.

So you would have say, the ships captain, a doctor, a marine, and a carpenter. And you could switch between characters, depending on the mission that week.

Your overall character might be your crews current command, and perhaps the equivalent of leveling up may be tied to the captain who "levels up" by getting a better ship.

It might be a silly thing historically for the crew to follow from ship to ship, but games are an abstraction, and such liberties were used by authors of great fiction such as the Hornblower series to provide continuity to a bigger story.

Pirates by Flagship games

I have seen very few real historical pirate games. Most all of them have had fictional fun stuff added. After all, we are playing games.

Not that there isnt a more serious side to things, but I get enough real life at my job. I play to have fun, and fictional pirates are great fun.

Owen

Black Bart didn't want to be a pirate, but was elected captain nonetheless, and proved to be very effective, and successful.

Rum and Debauchery the link is broken does anybody have a copy or a new link – I have an old incomplete set I printed off a long time ago. Thanks

For gaming w/Pirates, I like the "beer & pretzl" types, so for ship-to-ship action – "Limey's and Slimey's" and for land based games – "Pirates" not by Flagship Games, but written by Craig Martelle & Aelred Glidden – published through "The Gauntlet" several years ago.

P.

I did a Google search for R&D, but nothing appropriate came up.

If you're wanting some fantasy with your pirates there's Ron & Bones from Tales of War, Freebooter's Fate from Freebooter Miniatures and Cutlass! is coming this Spring (around Salute) from Black Scorpion Miniatures.

Each also has their own dedicated minis

in: "RULES THAT CAN BE USED WITH PIRATES"

"Argad!" by myself :-)
28mm skirmish rules for all periods, with its 17th-18th century charts. "Friendly simultaneous" game system. Suits if you like to imagine your own adventurous scenarios yourself, but not for competition!
Free PDFs available here: argad-bzh.fr/argad/en.html

Joe's! Play test next Saturday, come on by and enjoy.