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No.413104
As a professional seafarer, I find that the ships and sailors used in gaming are bad
Very bad
Rather than cringe and ridicule, I thought I might put together a primer for Dms/Gms, game designers, and fantasy writers could use as a quick reference to get things right
I’m not trying to write an 800 page tome but something of a cook book to get the spirit and the flavor down
I’ve worked on everything from nuclear powered ships when I was in the navy to sailing ships as a volunteer
So what do you guys think?
Is it worth doing?
What would you want covered?
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No.413107
I think that this is one of those projects where you should just write the damn thing, anon. Don't ask for permission, just fucking do it.
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No.413108
>>413107
It's not so much as permission I'm looking for as some input from my target audience as to what is wanted
I could spend 100 pages on things that matter to me an a paragraph on what everyone else is wanting and expecting
I want it to be fun and useful not a tome to my ego
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No.413114
>>413104
Would be interesting to read, if only to better fill out an internally consistent setting. I've occasionally felt the itch to do some research and write some stuff on a lot of basic bitch fantasy is built around. Something to cover topics like
>how do kingdoms actually function
>what were the duties and responsibilities of the town guard
>what was daily peasant life actually like
These things are interesting, but they also make a setting feel more alive while making life so much easier for the GM. There's no excuse making or pulling stuff out of your ass to decide how things might work or what kind of things could go wrong (plothooks). You just know how these things work and the logical outcome is just known.
In other words. I'd say go for it, OP. Don't make it system specific. Don't try to make statblocks or mechanics for every single possible little thing. Lay out the basics, like the chain o' command, duties of each position on a ship, maybe some of the different things that different types of boats need to worry about. Educate us dumb landlubbers, but don't go overboard wew and try to put absolutely everything you know into a document.
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No.413118
>>413108
Well, nitpick. See what people get wrong in books and say "no, this is absolutely wrong, they didn't do their research" to things like "this is wrong, but they did it for the sake of gameplay"
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No.413120
>>413114
I agree the goal is to not to make it system specific and I plan to make it as separate from genre as much I can
>These things are interesting, but they also make a setting feel more alive while making life so much easier for the GM. There's no excuse making or pulling stuff out of your ass to decide how things might work or what kind of things could go wrong (plothooks). You just know how these things work and the logical outcome is just known.
My goal is to fix exactly this
I don't care if everything is technically correct but it should feel like a ship and not a 5yo's drawing of a boat
>>413118
They get everything wrong and so much of it is so wrong it's like descriptions of alien worlds rather than what I live daily
I have a feeling that if I were transported to an alien space craft that much of the structure and lifestyle aboard would be very familiar to me
the goal is when I RP that I feel that way too
so it's an elven ship powered by magic but it should still feel like a ship to me
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No.413129
OK OP... here goes:
1.) Initially, a brief history of sailing vessels from Early Dynastic Egypt to the Golden Age of Piracy... including the various time periods when major innovations in hull sailplan came about and which types of ships would be appropriate for a given period/location.
2.) Followed by a brief discussion of hull speed in sailing ships then a primer on sailplans, leading into some realistic speed figures for various sailing vessels - up to and including the effects of wind strength on overall speed and finishing up with some reminders about being becalmed and a table giving a range of wind conditions.
3.) Continuing down into the Age of Steam, the effects on adding a steam engine to a vessel - a range of early steam engines, their relative complexity and fitness for use aboard a vessel and how the radius of action of ships became effected by steam locomotion. This would be incomplete without discussing paddlewheel (mostly sidewheel, but a brief touch on sternwheelers) versus screw propeller propulsion and the merits/drawbacks of both during the period. Also touch upon the old adage "a ship of iron will wear out three bottoms, but a ship of wood will wear out three tops" and why wooden ships had heavy advantage over early iron hulls and the difficulty of sheathing iron ships 'for tropical service.' A final word on the entrance of 'ironclad' ships: casemate, turreted and oceangoing.
4.) These lead into the 'Early Modern Era' of steel hulls: the transition from broadside to turreted main armament (including the brief flirtation with 'en echelon' layouts, which may persist in a fantasy environment), the progression from expansion to turbine propulsion, and eventually to the familiar World Wars period 'All Big Gun' warships.
5.) A separate chapter covering the development of weapon technologies: the ram, ballista, archers and corvus of ancient navies; early and middle gunpowder eras where bronze and later iron hooped cannon dominated, including rough range figures/penetration tables for common sizes; ending with the transition from the large muzzle-loading rifles to breech-loading guns and more range/penetration tables for common gun sizes.
6.) A short discussion on mine and torpedo development for surface ships and submarines, some background on submarine development and the various technologies involved in their reasonably short history.
7.) A conclusion adding in various fantasy elements and the possible inclusion of lighter and heavier-than-air aircraft.
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No.413141
I'd certainly love a blurb from your wealth of knowledge and experience. I've been meaning to work on a caribean esque expansion to my fantasy setting and I've also been wanting to nail down modern-era navy style stuff for my 31st century scifi rp.
Of course, I'll never have any players who would want to be in the nitty gritty being a seaman or spaceman on a ship. Do you also have any texts or books about the navy and navy life and how things work that you'd be able to recommend OP?
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No.413146
>>413108
I'm no sailor, but I know that feeling.
I would say that, as realistic as rules could be, what you should really be focusing on is rules or mechanics that make sailing both challenging and require player input, but easy to understand. Instead of having specific rules for different kinds of ships, maybe focus on the principles of sailing, and try to avoid having lots of different, single-use skills.
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No.413162
>>413141
Three books I think would be valuable to you right now are:
Two Years Before the Mast - Richard M. Dana
Bluejacket's Manual
US Navy's Basic Military Requirements
Mr. Dana went to sea in the 1820's on a merchant sailing ship and kept a journal. What's fascinating to me is how much hasn't changed in the two centuries since he published it.
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No.413167
>>413146
>>413129
OP here, I have this stuff covered in my outline
I also have notes about seafaring culture, ship maintenance, docking and anchoring procedures, nomenclature, cargo operations, smuggling and piracy, ship handling, boat handling, and shipboard life
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No.413182
>>413129
>>413167
>toying around a heavy naval setting
>easy hook of privateers
>easy pivot to politics involving companies, criminals, nations, cities, wars, and more,
>or just straight exploration
>borrowed explicit ideas from other sources, like Moorcuck's chaos seas
>this would be required reading
>>413114
>>413162
And now I have a good couple of resources to read.
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No.413267
>>413162
Oooh sweet, I'll look these up my man!
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No.413578
1. Keep it relevant to game mechanics or storytelling.
1.1 Layout and shape matter a lot to typical PnP games based on action.
1.2 Operation matters to questions of naval combat or practical uses like travel.
1.3 Consider how fantasy vessels might be different from IRL ones.
1.3.1 How would ships made by non-humans be different? (and what races would be more or less suited to naval matters)
1.3.2 How would ships made with alternative magic/tech be different?
1.3.3 How would ships be different in a setting where limitations are looser due to artistic license?
1.4 Sailor culture is fun color.
2. Examples are good, to illustrate or for GMs to rip off.
2.1 Deck layouts are good for planning games or showing players where things are.
2.2 Stories about sailing can be incorporated into games.
2.3 How different parts work, so world builders understand how to incorporate or tweak them.
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No.413663
>>413162
>Blue Jackets Manual
Have mine right here. It’s mostly about some basic bitch history of the navy, modern ship classification, orders of a sentry, rate and rank structure and some info on SAPR why rape is bad and base housing.
what information do you need out of it?
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No.413738
>>413663
Rape is bad
You take that back right now you damn man of seafaring, some of them damsels need a good dicking and not like they're gonna ask for it.
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No.413950
>>413578
>1. Keep it relevant to game mechanics or storytelling.
Fully my intent.
>1.1 Layout and shape matter a lot to typical PnP games based on action.
Agreed.
>1.2 Operation matters to questions of naval combat or practical uses like travel.
Yes, agreed
>1.3 Consider how fantasy vessels might be different from IRL ones.
This can go a lot of different ways. I plan on giving a few different examples on how they might be different but my goal is for a GM or a designer to be able to anchor their fantasy ships and sailors in what is real enough that it has depth and soul.
>1.3.1 How would ships made by non-humans be different? (and what races would be more or less suited to naval matters)
>1.3.2 How would ships made with alternative magic/tech be different?
>1.3.3 How would ships be different in a setting where limitations are looser due to artistic license?
>1.4 Sailor culture is fun color.
Absolutely, a lot of my notes so far are dedicated to this. I am trying to give enough about it that those who use my notes can enjoy it.
>2. Examples are good, to illustrate or for GMs to rip off.
Agreed. I also want to give a bibliography so that they have much more to work with than just my note if they want to go deeper.
>2.1 Deck layouts are good for planning games or showing players where things are.
I plan to add several as well as a brief synopsis on how and why ships are they way they are layout wise so that they can have a firm idea what they need to do to make it work.
>2.2 Stories about sailing can be incorporated into games.
Certainly. It's been tried many times to varying degrees of success. The whole point for me is to help create those fantasy/scifi/pick your fiction use of ships feel much more rich.
>2.3 How different parts work, so world builders understand how to incorporate or tweak them.
This is something I keep looking at my notes about. I know a lot about how boats work and I am trying present the right level of info for the purpose.
The Caravel map is one of the better ship maps for RPG I have ever seen. It's not 100% what I would expect but it "feels" like a ship should feel.
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No.417676
Any progress or random images to give hints at content?
Still interested, or even if it is to tell me where to go for my own research.
>>413114
Also, the pdfs were lost when the board was rebooted from archive. Found the epub on gutenburg, and large pdfs elsewhere.
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No.417688
>>413104
Read all of Patrick O'Brian's books if you want some excellently detailed inspiration for a late 18th/early 19th century military sailing experience.
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No.418181
>>417676
It's going slow right now as so much has blown up in my personal life. I was assaulted in a parking lot recently and the legal fallout has been crazy.
I have go some done though. I have a standard crewing outline for commercial ships both modern and in the 1700s. I have a complete outline of what I am trying to put together and it looks like it'll be about 120 pages give or take when I'm done.
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No.418182
>>417688
I found O'Brian entertaining but Frederick Marryat is much better if you're looking for authentic Napoleonic wars naval combat. Marryat was a captain in the Royal Navy and IIRC at Trafalgar.
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No.418393
>>413104
NCIS on the seas rpg campaign? yes please.
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No.418499
I would be interested in this. I've read everything I can find, from the sea peoples to the Athenians, to the age of sail, but I will always want more tidbits of info to make my world more realistic.
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No.425835
I'd love to see this, I have a friend who has been looking for a decent set of rules for ship combat, and the best thing I could find for him was some furry pirate thing.
I should also pimp C. S. Forester's Horatio Hornblower, Charles Darwin's Voyage Of The Beagle, and Joseph Conrad as being a good nautical writer.
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No.425850
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