I was thinking of playing a NG Andoran privateer, probably a bard or fighter. He was an orphan who grew up as a cabin-boy on an Andoran trading vessel that was taken by the Okeno slavers. He was then purchased by the young Druvalia Thrune. He suffered greatly as one of her slaves, and grew to despise her while still believing her capable of redemption (see: stockholm syndrome). He eventually escapes her estate and finds his way back to Augustana, where he resolves to become a privateer and fight against slavery.
When he sees Druvalia again during From Hell's Heart, he shouts that she has already lost the battle and angrily demands that she stand down and face justice for her crimes.
Completed the AP a few months ago with all good characters (one, the captain, was LG). Had not a single problem. Very fun.
The idea was that they were all good characters, but none of them *knew* it.
Also might have something to do with how i see alignment (As two separate words rather than a phrase, Lawful just means rules, never says what rules or who's, Good is self evident).
If you can play a Lawful Good Hellknight (as the world guide clearly states) you can have a Lawful Good pirate!
I hold the belief that you can play anything as any alignment, save maybe paladins (and even those I would allow to be Neutral or Chaotic). It's a balancing act between the alignment helping to define the character and the character suiting the alignment to his/her person.
In terms of the AP, a rewrite may or may not be necessary, but any AP is the basic bones of your unique, individualized experience. I'd say whatever works will work. Certainly isn't a bad idea to proliferate a general theme in order to encourage good acts.
Are any PBP campaigns going on now (or about to start) in which somebody tried to rewrite Skull & Shackles into an serious adventure good for Good characters (as described in the start of this thread) instead of whatever it is?
Here is my idea for this, which also aims to provide a more sensible way for the player characters to get into the Adventure Path: Rewrite it into an undercover mission for Andoran agents to infiltrate the Free Captains. Problem is: Cheliax (and possibly some other Inner Sea powers) has gotten the same idea, and so has Nidal, but Nidal is further along with it than either Andoran or Cheliax, since they actually trade semi-openly with the Free Captains. The plan of the Eagle Knights (or related Andoren commanders) of the player characters' group was to slip them quietly into the Free Captains fleet, but things go horribly wrong when the ship they are on runs afoul of a ship working for one of the above-mentioned enemies, and then The Wormwood comes along and captures the crippled combatant ships. From this point the Adventure Path plays out with more mild modifications that others have posted. To help with the problem of (potential lack of) infamy, the Andoren spymasters could work behind the scenes to set up fake financial transactions that get passed off as the player characters' loot being fenced.
(On a larger scale, this could work for faction play as well -- multiple Inner Sea nations have the idea of infiltrating the Free Captains, and the player character groups could be in any of the factions, although obviously not all of the factions are particularly compatible with Good characters.)
^To answer my own question above: YES! And it's awesome! Finally, a Skull & Shackles that doesn't have the seedy railroad start or cheesy pirate tale . . . .
(Performing Thread Necromancy on 2 threads about this -- maybe 1 will revive.)
I was thinking of playing a NG Andoran privateer, probably a bard or fighter. {. . .}Scrolling through this thread and dying to say this myself.
Play a privateer!
Definition - Privateer: An armed ship owned and officered by private individuals holding a government commission and authorized for use in war, especially in the capture of enemy merchant shipping. {. . .}
And that's where THIS Awesome PbP is going. And with a much less seedy/cheesy and much more interesting way of getting press-ganged (although this is moved in location and time as well as method relative to the default -- but that is part of what makes it much more interesting). Check it out -- DM Barcas and the players have got an awesome thing going!
Been running a game off and on for awhile now with mostly good characters. They are now in book 3. Alignment has not been an issue for them. There are plenty of slavers and rich merchant ships to keep them in business as well as Chelish ones. The captain being CG does not tolerate murder or senseless torture. All prisoners have been given due respect of their station. They did not raid any villages either. The crew has been given extra rations and sometimes extra plunder so morale is high. Most of their money has gone into the ship or maintaining the crew and not buying magic. She was rather reluctant to take a letter of marque from the Pirate King though and the group resented having to bribe him for it, but saw it as a necessary 'evil'.
We finished the 1st part of a 'goodish' S&S campaign and had no issues whatsoever with alignment. I 'borrowed' heavily from some other campaigns in the 'set up'.
Granted that the 1st part is easy but we were going to do the second part as you have all discussed here (go after slavers, corrupt merchants, other pirates, etc.). I started another game but I make pick this one up in the future.
Game on!