Pirate Encounter, RPG Generic Format

Sir Francis Drake

Pirates have been a favorite theme of mine in running role playing games (RPGs). I’ve used pirates in every genre of game I have run, except for espionage (but I’m working on an idea). There is a certain appeal of pirates in gaming, as a player and as a game master (GM). No matter if you are playing them as a GM against your heroes, or the heroes of your story are the privateers working under letters of marque raiding enemy ships.

Here is an encounter you can use as a side adventure, a step in a current adventure, or a hook for a larger story arc. It is presented in more of a historical setting, meaning there is no magic built into the encounter.

General Setting

There is a small tropical island out of the way of the main routes and not readily usable by ships. It is found on some charts, but not on others. There are no resources listed for the island on any maps that have charted it. This is because there is no harbor or safe beach for a ship to use. Only a longboat, or smaller vessel is able to reach the shore by crossing over the reef.

No indigenous people live on the island. Although some of the closer island’s inhabitants may be able to reach the island in their boats, there isn’t anything setting this island apart from the others to justify them to risk traveling the open waters to get there.

Hooks

1 – The ship has survived a storm, but has taken damage that must be repaired. Although the island is hard to reach, it must be attempted. The ship does not appear able to survive crossing the open waters in an attempt to reach another island. There are large enough trees to provide the lumber needed.

2 – The ship was caught in the doldrums and is dangerously low on water and food. This is the first land sighted and without fresh water there is a high probability crew members will die.

Historical Women Pirates

What Can Be Seen From the Ship

There are no visible signs of habitation. There is the normal looking detritus on the shore expected on an island without settlement.

Small to medium sized ground animals are glimpsed that could be hunted for food. They look like they might be pigs, which is a sign that at least one other ship in the past has stopped at the island.

There is fresh water. There is one large stream and several smaller ones that can be seen flowing into the sea.

The Encounter

Several years ago a survivor of a storm, Jonathon, washed up on the shore of the island. Over the months after his landing, he tried to gain the attention of passing ships to be rescued. Because there is no easy safe landing on the island, ships didn’t stop. They either didn’t see Jonathon’s signaling or chose to not attempt the reef. Eventually Jonathon gave up on being rescued and settled into his life.

Jonathon has lived alone here for several years. His mental state is deteriorating and he could be considered crazy. He’s taken to calling himself the king of the island and no longer has any desire to leave. In fact, he will only leave if forced. If the landing party tries to make him leave, he will attempt escape and hide on the island, avoiding any further contact.

Jonathon has settled into the ease of his situation. There is plenty of food and water on the island. He doesn’t have to farm and the little hunting and fishing he does is when he has a desire for some type of meat.

The climate is accommodating for Jonathon to live a life of ease. He has a crudely built hut made with local materials, along with some recovered debris from the beaches. His utensils were all made by himself. And, his bed is a gathering of grasses that he changes out regularly. There is nothing spectacular or even interesting about how he lives.

Typical Sailor

Jonathon was a deck hand. He is uneducated and cannot read, write, or navigate. He was washed overboard during a storm while working to secure the sails. His shipmates considered him lost in the storm and he was never searched for.

If Jonathon is befriended, he can provide information on a few topics depending on the needs of the GM. Here are some ideas you can use.

·        Recent knowledge of ships that passed. He can describe them by the flags they were flying and the direction they were heading.

·        Ships that regularly pass by on some level of schedule.

·        He could also know about a ritual site on the island with native markings, even though he has not seen any natives come to the island.

No matter what happens with the meeting of Jonathon, the repairs and restocking of the ship otherwise pass uneventfully, unless you choose to have something more happen.

If you have a comment, suggestion, or critique please leave a comment here or send an email to guildmastergaming@gmail.com.

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Creating New Encounters by Providing a Twist to What You Already Have

Avid role-playing gamers are known to learn about the monsters they expect to encounter, especially players who also are game masters (GMs). This has made for a steady market for expansions for new monsters. But, then the race is on once again, as the players get a hold of the expansion and soon know about the new monsters. There are some "tricks" a GM can use to bring in "new" monsters their players won't know. Here are some ideas in creating monster encounters that will keep players guessing what they are running into.

I am not the only GM who has prepared a new role-playing game (RPG) adventure and wonder what monster I can use as an encounter that my players won't know. Since my gaming group has members who have been playing Dungeons and Dragons for over thirty years, and most of them over twenty, when we play they have a good understanding of the monsters in the standard works and many of the outlying supplements. Providing an encounter where they don't immediately know what the monster is, and how to defeat it, can be a hard hurdle to get over. This isn't just the long standing classic games either, players like to be prepared, and GMs can prepare as well.

Dealing with this escalation of knowledge can be handled in different ways. One of the popular ways is to buy another book of monsters for your game system. These books can be great resources for you to use and as long as there are enough people buying them, companies will keep writing them. These books provide a multitude of monsters to draw upon. For this to continue to work for surprising your party, you need to make sure others in your gaming group are not dipping into the pages. These additional books are great for games with complex creature building systems and you don't want to spend the time building up a new encounter.

Many people like building new monsters. Building your own creations allows you to specialize the monster to the setting, adventure, and encounter you want to run. Another advantage of having the monster be your own creation is you control the information. Unless you give it out, no one at the table is going to know the monster they are encountering. The downfall for creating these monsters is the time involved in making your creation.

I have used another method of creating encounters which is quicker and easier, and you can still surprise your players. I use existing monsters and provide variations to the look, stats, or another factor of the monster already presented. This has worked with my home group and where I have GMed a game at an open gaming table. Let me provide a couple of examples of what I have done recently.

 

I was GMing a party beginning characters, with new and experienced players. I wanted to make sure the new players would get the awe factor of the encounter without the experienced players voicing their knowledge about what was happening. The group entered a swamp and a number of creatures were swimming up the open channels and surrounding the small island the party was camped on. I described the creatures as overgrown frogs of 3–4 feet tall when they stood on the ground. The experienced players were making judgements of what the characters were seeing based on the players knowledge of the monsters. None of them were able to discern what they were really encountering. The new players were given the opportunity to play out the encounter without corrections about how they described it, or the actions they chose. In simplicity, I had changed the description of kobolds and gave them claws instead of spears.

I did a similar twist with another group of experienced players. They party was moving along a road through a forest and found a small outpost besieged by short, odd-shaped lizardmen. These were lizardmen straight from the Monster Manual with a twist on their description and fighting tactics. Because they didn't fit into the knowledge some players already had about lizardmen, the players maintained a steady conversation about how to handle them. They started referring to them as prehistoric lizard folk, further back in the evolutionary line. (That worked well because I used that point further on in the adventure.)

This also works well for larger, bigger, and meaner monsters. In past adventures I have used the statistics from a race of giants and with only minor changes and presented them to the party without them knowing what to do. And, who says a dragon has to look like a giant lizard? Yes, it makes them look mean. But, Asian dragons have always been described differently. With a little bit of a change a dragon can appear like a giant dog, a long coiled snake, a lion, or even a ferret. The concepts of demons and devils also open up great tweaks to existing statistics. The main block of statistics can be used with only a change in the description.

Even with my most experienced players, the changes in description and minor adjustments to abilities has kept them guessing at what they are dealing with. The other important item I have learned is, even when players are not meaning to, a certain level of meta-gaming occurs. To provide an encounter that limits the meta-gaming, don't work straight from the books. Players who also GM know the books, if they see where you are referencing in the common book of knowledge, they will have ideas of what type of creature you are working with. This, in turn, will modify their play. Keep your monster notes on another piece of paper, notebook, or laptop away from view of the players. This will help keep the suspense higher, which, in turn, will modify how the players react.

Another easy way of hiding what the party is encountering is by hiding them in plain sight. Use the hidden traits of skill, feat, advantages, training, or whatever is available in your game and drop them on a monster. This can be done as easily as changing a movement from climbing to swimming. I also reuse other resources.

I have also collected character sheets of player characters and non-player characters to use. When I need an easy encounter I have one already worked up. A few fast adjustments and it's ready to go. I did this awhile back with an encounter with orcs. The main part of the encounter was the basic abilities of a past character party with the stats dropped on the orcs. I have also done this by recycling the stats of an encounter from modules others have written. There is a wealth of available encounters in adventures from the past.

Creating your own adventures is rewarding. When you're running a campaign and have a regular weekly game, there is pressure to create new and exciting things for the rest of the group. It takes time to create the wonders when you have to do them from scratch. Luckily, there are years of material you can use, adjusting it to meet your needs and desires. I have never had players complain about me using these tactics to create adventures. Many times they were pleasantly surprised when they found out what I had done. With this strategy of creating encounters, I know at least one person who has taken up the position behind the screen because it alleviated some of the fear of running a game.

Originally posted on Stuffer Shack.

If you have a comment, suggestion, or critique please leave a comment here or send an email to guildmastergaming@gmail.com.

You can also join Guild Master Gaming on Google+, Facebook, and Twitter (@GuildMstrGmng).

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