As Sterling Archer once said "I'm not going to be a Pirate! i'm going to be a Pirate King!"
pretty much says it all right there:-)
And i play with my wife and kids as well, however embracing a Pirate's Life was never a big problem (they are big big fans of the PotC movies) and no you don't have to be Evil! but a healthy dose of CN anarchy goes a long way.
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Sure. I'd go so far as to say my PCs even tack good. Piracy is a part of it from time to time, especially in the second book but it's usually against other pirates or evil empires your PCs could probably justify away. The second half of that book is actually a treasure hunt with evil monsters as the antagonists. By the third book, the PCs are infiltrating a spy ring and then engaging in a boat race. By the fourth book they're exploring the island that was granted to them by the government and hosting a party for other pirates. In the fifth book they're getting revenge on an old enemy from the first book and by the sixth fighting an evil empire and corrupt government in the Shackles.
Good is fine in Skull & Shackles. Lawful is more problematic.
I agree with what's been said, but the players still need to want to be pirates or else the AP is over by the half-way point of chapter two. Gaining fame and loot, as your wife put it, is actually much more of a driving factor in this AP than in any other, to the point that the rules have incorporated those motivations.
I'd proceed with caution.
Pirates aren't mean just misunderstood:-)
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See, it sounds like a ton of fun to me, but my wife is wary of having to be mean. She'd want to be a Robin Hood type pirate making the world a better place.
I'm thinking I'll have to give up my dream of a pirate adventure.
Thanks for the help.
Being Robin Hood is totally possible though! Keep in mind, during the sandbox parts, just because a GM puts forth a ship encounter, the PCs aren't required to attack it, right? Can PCs attack tribal villages and innocent merchants? sure, but they don't have to. Heck, if your PCs are so inclined give them a chance to defend a tribal village against pirate slavers.
The only fights I can see being required to happen for the most part are with Rahadoumis and Chelaxians, both slave-holding empires, and other pirates meaner than the PCs who probably have it coming.
I have been having more fun running this AP than literally any other game I've ever been a part of. Don't turn away from it so easily because a GM who's willing to work with his PC's wants and desires can make the game work for "good guys" just fine. I'm telling you, I am!
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As an aside. The opportunity came to raid a coastal tribal village. Half the party wanted to, half didn't so those who wanted to took longboats ashore to give it a go. The warriors came out and as soon as the gunslinger fired his gun at a guard dog, the tribesmen all ran and hid in their huts in fear. The PCs had a total change of heart at that moment and straight up retreated back to the boat without hurting anyone.
So, the next time they had a chance at one of these villages, I spun it so that they came upon the village being overrun by incutilises. They fought off the monsters and they headman of the village GAVE them the villages loot as thanks. This can totally be done.
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I'll be looking to start a new AP in a couple months, and I've been dying to run or play in Skull & Shackles because, well, pirates! The problem I have is that my wife can't get behind greed as a motive. That is, she has no interest in playing a game that is just about gaining fame and loot.
I understand the first book is about getting conscripted by pirates and mutinying for freedom. Thanks not a problem. But what's after that? Is there an overarching goal to the AP that's deeper than just becoming infamous pirates? If not, how hard would it be to add one?
As a related side note, it IS possible to succeed in the AP without being EVIL pirates, right?
Shackles Pirates are in something of an off-and-on war with Cheliax. If your wife's character has a motivation to want to put the hurt on the Thrice-Damned House of Thrune, say with a former halfling slave, you've got a motivation well beyond mere loot.
I am the GM for my group's S&S campaign.
The goals of the AP are success, fame and riches, of course...but most of all, the primary goal is control of your character's destiny and that of the Shackles as a whole.
Everyone knows that the Shackles are ruled by the Hurricane King, so what better way to bring about change for the better...
...than to become the Hurricane King yourself?
While I would not recommend allowing LG characters in the campaign, a group of NG and CG characters can get along just fine in it.
All in all, though, if your players (including your wife) aren't excited about a campaign setting, you're probably better off looking elsewhere. You can't force someone to have fun.
It sounds like you have some great ideas already. Just wanted to make one additional suggestion:
Thanks to some lucky natural 20 Diplomacy rolls at just the right moment and some ad-libbing that was a little more effusive than I intended, I ended up introducing the threat from Cheliax (at least as a vague danger) earlier in the campaign.
You could do this intentionally and spin Skulls & Shackles as an Adventure Path about freedom fighters trying to keep the freedoms of the Shackles alive despite leaders too involved in their own petty disputes to see the big picture. No need to give away Cheliax's plans exactly, but their attempt to clamp down on piracy shows up as early as book 2. You could even weave in mentions of a Cheliaxian attempt to regain the old colony of Sargava.
*Raise Thread*
Hope I not too late. Read this thread:
Re-writing Skull n' Shackles for good(ish) characters - spoilers obviously
/cevah
Also if one doesn't like the sand-box-y nature of book 2,
Plunder & Peril is a much much more heroic find the pirate treasure adventure module that is designed to replace Raiders of the Fever Sea, its actually quite awesome and responds very well to those of a more goodish nature (it also comes with a poster size fully marked map of the Shackles Isles)
Also if one doesn't like the sand-box-y nature of book 2,
Plunder & Peril is a much much more heroic find the pirate treasure adventure module that is designed to replace Raiders of the Fever Sea,
I have to disagree. Plunder & Peril is definitely NOT designed to replace Raiders of the Fever Sea. P&P assumes that the PCs are not in command of their own ship and the first part of the module involves them trying to join a pirate crew. There is no mention in P&P whatsoever regarding what to do if the PCs already have a ship of their own and it will take significant work-around to make them do what the captain in P&P wants them to do. If they have their own ship, it also invalidates a large plot device in P&P when the captain tries to maroon them on an island.
P&P overlaps the levels that RotFS is written to cover, but it's not a seamless replacement for what is, in my opinion, a completely worthy module. P&P also doesn't cover an important role that RotFS does if you are using ship-to-ship combat rules, which is train the GM and PCs in their use. If the PCs have to get into ship-to-ship combat in later books, the learning curve will be steeper.
They do cover ALL those issues, page 3
I'll agree with both of you :)
I find P&P to be a much better idea and it is better written and executed than RotFS. However, it is a much different experience as the PCs are not in control of their ship or their course. Its also not seamless, a GM would have to know what they wanted to do from the beginning of the AP.
And skipping ship to ship combat isn't necessarily a bad thing. As many posters have noted that experience as printed is not so good. However it would also be pretty easy to add that to P&P if you wanted to.
yeah its actually incredibly easy to mesh the two
one way is to have the party in lilywhite to squib their ship and this opportunity comes along, or what i'm doing is having her ship knocked out and needs the PCs ship to find the treasure. the marooning is also easy to accomplish as its you know pirates, so people get left behind:-)
besides if my party doesn't get to ride hippocampi they might mutiny against me:-p
and it provides some more cliche find the lost treasure action which i felt S%S needed more of:-)
and we hardly use Ship-to-ship combat and mostly resort to captain vs captain type fights (not all the time mind you) and i plan on integrating some of raiders into it (like issabella locke)