Who are we? Trying to re-define the United Pirates.

Ahoy crew!

We are pirates. But does the word "pirate" still suit us? Maybe not so much. We do all the landlubber crap, with the exception of our bad manners and our love for ale, gold and wenches. I want to start this discussion with a couple of suggestions that are supposed to bring back the real pirate life into the United Pirates crew. I also have the upcoming "Adventures on High Seas" expansion in my mind, which may offer us even more possibilities to lead the life of pirates.

I want all active crew members to read and comment this (constructive landlubber comments are welcome, too), and to add own ideas and suggestions!

One of the big drawbacks are the Trammel rules, because they basically prevent any pirating activities unless you have guild highlighting, but unfortunately there's nothing we can do about it.

Buccaneer's Den - A Pirate Town

With Buccaneer's Den Britannia has a real pirate town without guard protection but we never use it, which is a shame. I know that the only towns frequented by players are New Haven, Britain and Luna. I myself mostly go to New Haven and Britain for banking business and interaction with the community. But I think we should change that. We should try and re-populate Buccaneer's Den.

Buccaneer's Den would be the only town of Britannia that is run by OUR rules, and not by the laws of the crown. Landlubbers or rich-looking persons going there would not be safe from us. We could tax people as much as we like, we could arrest them, we could make them dance for us. People should know that when they go to Buc's Den they better have some gold and ale in their pockets to bribe us pirates. Of course, all this would require appropriate highlighting (I don't really want to do this in Felucca yet, because otherwise we'd soon be the constant target of the Yew gate PKers looking for an easy kill, and other RP guilds would probably never come there).

Mesanna started a program where players and guilds can claim protectorate over any town in Britannia. Since we don't really want anyone else but scoundrels to determine the laws in Buc's Den, I think we should offer to "protect" this island.

I can see a lot of role playing action and activity emerging from this, given that other guilds are willing to care about Buccaneer's Den and pirate activities. Which leads me to the next topic:

Sacking Towns

By sacking towns, we can almost "force" other guilds to recognize the pirates and deal with us (assumed that we have their basic approval).

Using Buccaneer's Den as our base, we could plan plundering raids to other towns, preferrably New Haven and Britain (since all other towns are deserted). On relatively short notice we could decide to sack, say, New Haven and set sails to our target.

If we arrive in such a town, we should not show any mercy against other guilds (however, this should be discussed with those guilds first to avoid drama). This means for example, we could demand gold mostly from highlighted people, and if not enough is payed, we attack without any further warning.

A lot of playing fun could arise from such activities:
Guilds could spy on us in Buccaneer's Den to find out where we plan our next raid. This would allow them to prepare, call the Royal Britannian Guard for help and welcome us accordingly (I would expect that in such a situation they should attack us on sight as soon as we set foot on their town).
Guilds (or the Royal Britannian Guard) could take concerted action against the scum living on Buccaneer's Den and plan a "cleaning" raid.
And so on.

Seafaring

We pirates are seafaring folk, of course. Unfortunately, currently the seas of Britannia doesn't offer much for us to do, not even in Felucca. The days where people used boats and you always found some victims on the ocean to attack are long over.
BUT as you all know, a seafaring expansion has been announced. This may change things a little. First off, I think people will start using boats again, since the seas will receive a lot of new features and content. 120 Power Scrolls will be available through fishing, and I assume in Felucca only. Time for us pirates to show that we rule the seas!!!

The new ships will get a lot of new features like cannons. They also can be damaged and boarded afterwards. Thus it is essential that we perfect our sailing and sea battle skills. After the release of the new expansion I don't want to see any pirate in our crew who doesn't know how to use boats. We also have to improve the activity of our guild members, because you can only win sea battles if you have a skilled crew. You have to navigate the boat, use ranged attacks on enemy players, reload and fire the cannons, repair the damage. You can't do it all by yourself.

You haven't navigated a boat yet? Start today!

The time of pirate-wimps is over!
Let's start to behave like real pirates again!
What say you?

I may be echoing you a bit here, but here's my plans:
1. Prepare for the seafaring expansion:
If this means I have to re-skill my entire section of the crew, so be it! We're pirates and have no excuse not to rule the seas when the new ships are created.

But that's a long term plan. Crew training comes when the booster is released.

2. Thinking in terms of small scale interaction. Quite frankly, our crew isn't big enough for the larger scale "wars" which I would like to see happen. So I'm going to do the small things with anyone who will play along and post my adventures here if they're fun enough. Think of that as sort of a recruiting tool.

I'm going to move to different locations based on who is interested at the time. For example, Kalmar expressed (out of character) interest in a war with the pirates, so I set up a toll booth in Umbra last night. I definitely plan on doing that again... hopefully at a time when some CoD or RBGU (if they still exist, the RBG political game not only sucks, but is confusing as well) come along to play. We aren't highlighted, so the solution will have to be a creative one.

If I see ANY orange players anywhere, interaction will happen, even in the thick of battle.

3. I plan a series of tavern nights outside of my pirate duties, probably using the Twin Oaks tavern in Ilshenar. The point of not being officially involved with the pirates is two fold (Though it will have to be a pirate event, since all my characters are pirates in name, if not in deed):
First it will provide a neutral ground where the "evil" groups can interact with the "good" groups without having to make up a story about how to get there (i.e. Paladins wouldn't go to and Undead town without looking for a fight).
Second, it will give me a chance to introduce the role-players who are to the role-players who want to get to know us. I've had a lot of excellent interactions with people over the last few weeks with people who claim not to be roleplayers, and I want to encourage that behavior. My character for these tavern nights will be Dedigan (the tavern wench/gypsy seer).

I figure to start up next Saturday and keep it up on Saturdays when we don't have Black Markets until nobody is interested any more. After the Twin Oaks, we'll likely go bar-hopping, with Olympus being the first hop.

Now on to responses:
Bucs Den:
We have Red Skull Bay. I don't want to abandon that to fix ourselves in a town that we didn't create ourselves, especially after we've already been "blessed" with our own docks. But an event here and there or a scheduled Bucs Den patrol is something I wouldn't oppose.

Sacking Towns:
I have to see people in other towns before I sack them. And to get people in other towns, the role players for other towns have to get their acts together. That is why I'm interested in Umbra. CoD really has their act together. They have a plan and are making it happen. In that light, our first target is Umbra. I even have reasons to make it so (in character).

Anyhow, I hate to say it, but the GMs of certain other guilds have proposed getting together with us to plan this kind of thing. It is probably a good idea to go along with their plans, as much as it will cut into my "fun" time.

Ahoy Cap'n, Your points are well made and of true course.

I say Aye!

You are right, I thought about that too. Still it somehow feels weird to have Buc's Den and not use it. I wouldn't want to abandon Red Skull Bay, my suggestion is just to use Buc's Den instead of New Haven for banking business. I currently hang out in New Haven as much as I do in the Red Skull Bay.

At certain times there always are people in New Haven or Britain. Umbra would be nice too, but the problem is that we cannot reach it by boat. I also appreciate the efforts and stories of CoD.

I know, I have meeting requests of a couple of people. Now I only have to find the right time to meet them.

Whenever I can I will join you on your Saturday adventures. I'm up for misfit.

I would think of it as being the outer circle of our organization. Open Role Play with all and the place to seek out the United Pirates if ye be considering joining the crew. Once you have made it into the first circle the second circle would be Red Skull Bay. Red Skull Bay is our hideout and should be reserved for only scurviest of dogs and saltiest of wenches!

Perhaps we could hold the Black Market there? Each seller taking over a shop temporarily? Perhaps part of any customization done by the EM staff could include a market-type-area, replicate the feel we have at the current location?

My 2 gold pieces...

Good feedback! Keep it coming!

About the Black Market: It took some time to establish the market hall next to the Jolly Roger Inn as the official Black Market location. I ask myself if it would be wise to change that. Maybe we can do other activities on Buccaneer's Den?

I will resist moving the Black Market to my dying breath.

For Bucs Den, I'd say the import and export of precious cargo would be a good event to share with groups like PGoH or RBG.

A pirate-oriented festival could also be planned, but that would take an actual staff of participants rather than a rag-tag bunch of pirates. And some of our prvious festivals didn't go off all that well with the community at large either. The beach party I think (earlier this year, celebrating the docks) was a bunch of pirates and Aedon (Thanks Aedon for all your support by the way!).

So for now, I think that our plans for Bucs Den should be kept very simple. i.e. "We will be at Bucs Den and rumor has it we have a cargo of pillaged goods to offload." or "We will be at the tavern in Bucs den... drinking. Feel free to join in!"

Well moving the Black Market was just a suggestion as a way to interact with the community, the town (Bucs Den). I think the current location is top-notch.

We could hold recruiting events/times where UP members may be found on the docks or in the taverns. With the new booster on the horizon now is most likely the best chance we will have at growing our numbers and crewing that flotilla mentioned above. I also like the street fair idea, independent of the Black Market.

I don't expect we will spend much time there, but scheduled time to fit in with ongoing plots should not be too hard to manage... PROVIDED we have the crew members to make it worth while.