Presence of the Empire

[revadr]

So, as soon as I first saw this adventure path I fell in love with it, and decided I wanted to run it, but I was concerned about dealing with people exploring the ship and all the poorly-fleshed out crewmembers in the first adventure, and decided to take my time, let someone else run something, and really prepare and put a lot of work into polishing up the campaign, and I've been slowly working on and off on doing so...ever since.

At one point, I asked my group what sorts of things they're going to want to do as pirates: are you interested in the ability to "upgrade" crew members or aspects of your boat alot? Are you going to be interested in having rudimentary trade/economics when you're selling off all that plunder? And so on. The thing that got the largest response was "Pirates are at their most heroic when they have an overbearing empire or other government as the villain (ie, more of a law-vs.-chaos than good-vs.-evil). As written, most of the adventure path takes place in a territory where there isn't much of a government. Do you want an evil empire to fight?"

The overwhelming response was "Yes."

So, I'm trying to find some ways to make life in the shackles a little more...orderly. I'm strongly toying with the idea of giving Cheliax a couple of naval bases in the area, and ramping up the number of pirate hunting ships (the majority of the islands of the shackles would remain unaltered, as Cheliax would have just enough of a foothold to be a presence, and not to overwhelm anyone. My theory being that these outposts are to protect/support the ships going to the Chelish colonies in Arcadia mentioned in the Inner Sea World Guide). But, I'm not really sure how effective that will be in providing an "evil empire" presence, and the map of the shackles is actually pretty full.

Any other thoughts on ways to give PCs options to feel "piratey" by thumbing their noses at the law, without making the existing pirate captain lords feel less...piratey? I was thinking about maybe having some tarriffs and tax collectors and contraband inspectors and things, when PCs are in port, but none of that really feels like something that the shackles pirates would do (and, those that did, they would just be extorting you and CALLING it a "tarriff.").

[Trinite]

Maybe you could play up Kerdak Bonefist the Hurricane King as being especially greedy and authoritarian. Maybe some of the other pirate lords -- Tessa, for example -- resent his imposition of taxes and restrictions, and miss the good old days under previous Hurricane Kings where they had more independence.

You could play up bureaucracy in Port Peril, and make sure to emphasize that this is a corrupt and greedy bureaucracy, not a sensible increase in order.

I'm planning on having an order of Paladins that sail around in the Fever Sea, engaging in an independent anti-piracy crusade. I actually hope to contrast the paladins' relatively fair and restrained anti-piracy with the brutal and selfish anti-pirate efforts of the Chelaxian navy.

Have you read the thread about setting S&S in a post-Chelaxian conquest Shackles? That's probably more alteration than you're looking for, but you might find some good ideas.