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7th Sea - Pirate Nations

Hmm. 7th Sea. Hmm - i personally have mixed feelings over this system, but i'm reviewing the Pirate Nations sourcebook so i won't delve into those.

Pirates, Arrr ! Lets face it - most people who bought 7th Sea did so for the pirate angle. And this is the book that puts the meat on the bones, or at least tries to. What we have here is some pirate locations, a breakdown of all the major pirate factions, including stats for the main characters involved, advanced ship combat rules, some player and GM advice for playing pirates, some new skills, a new swordsman skill and a new twist to the character generation process.

Locations

Details of some pirate haunts, including a neutral ground and the La Bocca prison amongst others. The area are nicely covered, and give you some good starting points for land based pirate action. One gripe - the numbered locations on the maps don't all correspond to the text. In fact, on one map there are no references made to a series of numbered islands. You can work it out, but thats pretty damn poor editing IMNSHO !

Factions

Each of the major Pirate nations are covered, including the uber-anti-hero Reis. The nations vary from benevolent to the truly evil to those driven by revenge, giving the DM (or storyteller or whatever the hell) the ability to create an encounter with the type of pirates he wants - they're not just all the same groups dressed differently - definately one on the plus column. As well as stats for the captains, it also gives you detail on the major crewmembers aswell. This does take up a lot of the space in the book, a whole lot of space. I was left with the feeling they could have thinned down on these specs and given us a bit more content perhaps.

Rules Stuff

In here are mechanics for getting more out of ship combat, a few new skills, a new fencing school and most interestingly of all a new twist on character gen. Using a Tarot deck, you get to put a bit more of a history on your character - and sketch out a little of his future. This breaks down as laying out 5 tarot cards, 2 representing strength and weakness, and 3 to represent past, present and future. You then look up the cards in the book to see what this gives the character - anything from extra money to no money to an enemy to a patron. Being pirates, you use the Cups and Swords suits representing money and violence, and in the future supplements you'll be getting more tables using different suits. I liked this - its obviously inspired by L5R heritage tables but different enough to have the right "taste". It does give each player a glimpse of future conflicts etc, so this does load more weight on the DM to customise his campaign to his players - but we're up to that right guys ?! Theres also detail on pirate provisioning, encounters at sea and prices. Theres also some sample Syrneth artifacts listed - enough for a start but we really need more info on the whole Syrneth deal really. And a few more sea monsters would have been nice.

Overall

Layout is clear, nicely illustrated in the main. I do have a gripe with the maps (see above), but there are some cutaway illustrations of the main pirate vessels at the back so i reckon that this cancels that out. Price isn't bad , i paid £12.95 for this so i as pretty happy - i would have felt scammed at the £15 or above mark. I felt more could have been added in the GM section and pirate details in general, at the cost of some of the NPC stats. I guess i'm happy with the product - happy not ecstatic.

One curious point to note - strange how this release coincides with the 7th Sea pirate CCG eh ?!

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 3 (Average)

Pirate Nations
Author: John Wick & Kevin Wilson Category: game Company/Publisher: AEG Line: 7th Sea Cost: £12.95 Page count: 128 ISBN: 7-29220-73001-5 SKU: AEG7301 Capsule Review by Pete Rogers on 09/21/99. Genre tags: Fantasy Historical	7th Sea - Pirate Nations Hmm. 7th Sea. Hmm - i personally have mixed feelings over this system, but i'm reviewing the Pirate Nations sourcebook so i won't delve into those. Pirates, Arrr ! Lets face it - most people who bought 7th Sea did so for the pirate angle. And this is the book that puts the meat on the bones, or at least tries to. What we have here is some pirate locations, a breakdown of all the major pirate factions, including stats for the main characters involved, advanced ship combat rules, some player and GM advice for playing pirates, some new skills, a new swordsman skill and a new twist to the character generation process. Locations Details of some pirate haunts, including a neutral ground and the La Bocca prison amongst others. The area are nicely covered, and give you some good starting points for land based pirate action. One gripe - the numbered locations on the maps don't all correspond to the text. In fact, on one map there are no references made to a series of numbered islands. You can work it out, but thats pretty damn poor editing IMNSHO ! Factions Each of the major Pirate nations are covered, including the uber-anti-hero Reis. The nations vary from benevolent to the truly evil to those driven by revenge, giving the DM (or storyteller or whatever the hell) the ability to create an encounter with the type of pirates he wants - they're not just all the same groups dressed differently - definately one on the plus column. As well as stats for the captains, it also gives you detail on the major crewmembers aswell. This does take up a lot of the space in the book, a whole lot of space. I was left with the feeling they could have thinned down on these specs and given us a bit more content perhaps. Rules Stuff In here are mechanics for getting more out of ship combat, a few new skills, a new fencing school and most interestingly of all a new twist on character gen. Using a Tarot deck, you get to put a bit more of a history on your character - and sketch out a little of his future. This breaks down as laying out 5 tarot cards, 2 representing strength and weakness, and 3 to represent past, present and future. You then look up the cards in the book to see what this gives the character - anything from extra money to no money to an enemy to a patron. Being pirates, you use the Cups and Swords suits representing money and violence, and in the future supplements you'll be getting more tables using different suits. I liked this - its obviously inspired by L5R heritage tables but different enough to have the right "taste". It does give each player a glimpse of future conflicts etc, so this does load more weight on the DM to customise his campaign to his players - but we're up to that right guys ?! Theres also detail on pirate provisioning, encounters at sea and prices. Theres also some sample Syrneth artifacts listed - enough for a start but we really need more info on the whole Syrneth deal really. And a few more sea monsters would have been nice. Overall Layout is clear, nicely illustrated in the main. I do have a gripe with the maps (see above), but there are some cutaway illustrations of the main pirate vessels at the back so i reckon that this cancels that out. Price isn't bad , i paid £12.95 for this so i as pretty happy - i would have felt scammed at the £15 or above mark. I felt more could have been added in the GM section and pirate details in general, at the cost of some of the NPC stats. I guess i'm happy with the product - happy not ecstatic. One curious point to note - strange how this release coincides with the 7th Sea pirate CCG eh ?! Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 3 (Average)