Naval Combat System Suggestions?

[helium3]

I'm gonna be running a wee little battle between some ships next game session and I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions on naval combat rules that would be easy to port to a 4E game?

 

[Fallen Seraph]

I know the fan-made 4th Edition Swashbuckling PDF has rules for naval combat. It should be somewhere on the Houserules Forum.

 

[Hella_Tellah]

The 3rd edition rules in Stormwrack served my group quite well. It relies on Profession: Sailor checks for a lot of it, but you could just replace that with a Wisdom check if you don't want to add in a new "Sailing" skill. Very narrative, many different ships and plenty of crunchy bits with planning out your cannons' positions and such.

 

[roguerouge]

Seconded. But, basically, the trick to remember is that (absent lots of sonic or gun powder attacks) it's virtually always easier to kill the opposing crew. Even fireball is better at killing crew than killing ships.

 

[Rel]

I have a system that I designed for WFRP that might be of use, although it would take some adjustments to port to 4e. The main thing though is that it uses cannons as the primary means of one ship damaging another.

Before undertaking that or any other systemic application to the issue, I would encourage you to get clarity on the assumptions of your world and this battle in particular with regards to naval warfare. Without gunpowder and cannons a faster ship always has the advantage over a slower ship because the faster ship can always decide whether it wants to engage or disengage. This is still true with gunpowder and cannons but a larger ship can protect itself against another ship by having lots of cannons on board.

Wizardry can take the place of such things but it doesn't necessarily scale. For Wizards of equal ability you are still always better off to have a faster ship than a slower ship for the same reasons as above. A larger ship could (presumably) carry more Wizards but a larger ship isn't necessarily slower due to Hull Speed.

In all probability the major determining factor in any such battle is going to be the number and ability of marines on each vessel.

 

[diaglo]

Wooden Ships & Iron Men (1974) from Avalon Hill

 

[freyar]

What do people think about Broadsides (by Living Imagination) or Corsair by Adamant? Yeah, they're 3.X, but were they good and how well would they port to other systems?

 

[AJCarrington]

You might want to look into Uncharted Seas by Spartan Games. It's a fantasy based naval miniatures game that has received some pretty good reviews/comments. It's not exactly cheap (~$30 for the rules), so it might be a little too much if you're just looking for a one-time thing.

AJC

 

[helium3]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. I'll take a look at all the great ideas and see what I come up with.

This first couple of encounters will be pretty simple. My party's just escaped from a Sea Devil fortress with the religious relic they were sent there to retrieve. They're now attempting to flee and are being pursued by three pirate ships.

For now, all I really need is a way to simply make it thematically clear that this is a naval battle. There's no gunpowder and the level of magic isn't currently all that high. So, I think it'll be able maneuvering the various ships around to gain the best advantage.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Star Fleet Battles!

OK, you'd have a little tweeking to do, but the system itself would be quite flexible, and its definitely "tried & true." You just ditch "shields" and many of the internal systems, work out which weapons you want, and place a heavier emphasis on "marines."

(The old Starfire system would also work...)