DND5e Basics Ship Combat

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Filament to Fantasy Etsy Store www.etsy.com/shop/FilamentToF... Return of the Lazy Dungeon Master (HIGHLY RECOMMEND TO NEW DMs) amzn.to/2WLmL1R Ghosts of Saltmarsh on Amazon amzn.to/3A55Lld Disclosure: As an Amazon affiliate we do earn a small commission from qualifying purchases. When you purchase the product via the links here it will benefit me at no additional cost to you. Thank you for all of your support.

[@bndrake]

Interesting. I would be inclined to check out those rules and see how they compare to Stars Without Number ship combat.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

How do they work in SWoN?

[@bozidarandjelkovic7957]

Did not know there were ship combat rules, passed this to a friend who DMs a pirate campaign.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Thank you for sharing this. If we get enough likes I will dive into one of the other 2 videos about ships and crews like activities you can do outside of combat. Another video would be upgrades you can make to your ships.

[@thejanitor3337]

I genuinely despise 5e vehicle combat rules. For all of their streamlining, they actually make things infinitely more convoluted and put the full weight of deciding how combat goes upon the DM, who might not know what judgements to make.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Yeah it doesn’t seem like it really fits the game.

[@skelletonbt9018]

I am running a warhammer fantasy dnd campaign homebrew obviously. And i want to have an arc where my players fight pirates so this video helps me a LOT thanks man. 😊

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I’m glad you found this video helpful. Hopefully you find my other content helpful, inspiring, or entertaining as well.

[@ZancoIntel]

My first DMing. I’m doing a pirate theme. I’ve added a function that lets the players cast attack spells on each cannon ball, it will be transferred to the target. Also random encounters on the sea battle board. They can see there is a random encounter token, but don’t know what it is. 20 in total, half good half bad.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I love that and I’d be interested in seeing this in action.

[@lttrbox]

I feel the UA and Saltmarsh rules for Ship Combat are really written for large ships. I now run a pirate campaign where my party of 3 has a small ship together. Instead of RAW, one PC needs to man the helm (typically the Captain) and one PC needs to man the swivel gun. These players then roll for these actions on the ships turn. (I also let them add proficiencies with firearms or nautical vehicles if they have that.) If either the gun or helm is not manned, this action cannot be taken. Admittedly, my players feel a bit weird about taking actions outside their own turn - but I think it's much better than the alternative: have a ship that can move and shoot itself, because it works on rules that are meant to simulate an unseen crew keeping it afloat.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

What do you mean an unseen crew? If the boat requires a crew wouldn't you make them impactful NPCs? I tend to let my experienced players control an NPC that is allied with the party on their turn in combat usually. I still control the roleplay of the NPCs though.

[@lttrbox]

@@MastertheGamerpg That works also! But I really wanted my party’s first ship to be a small keelboat for which they can be the entire crew, and over time they get the chance to steal larger and larger ships. And with larger ships then comes more crew, and the obligation to acquire and manage that crew. So I guess what I meant to say; for warships or other large ships the Saltmarsh rules work pretty great, but for a tiny keelboat that the players man themselves I made some adjustments.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Yeah I don’t disagree with that.

[@michaelhockman3420]

Not quite a ship question, how would you handle a storm or whirlpool? What type of checks might you call for?

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I think it would depend on the situation specifically, and maneuvers attempted. Might be able to avoid the worst of it by making some perception checks. If they want to avoid the worst of it might request DEX checks. If they want to power through the waves head on then I might require STR checks. That is just me though.

[@alexg6353]

Been looking for some good ship Rules as my 5e game is doing Ghosts of Saltmarsh

[@MastertheGamerpg]

The rules are in the appendix of that book actually.

[@Magus1299]

I have never done sea combat before, I bet that would be fun to engage in.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I think it certainly could be! I have always been interested in playing in a naval campaign. Not sure I’d want to run one focused on it the whole time though.

[@357Dejavu]

Wanting to run a 5e Airship 2-3 shot adventure. Hoping I can rework some of these rules

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I wonder if there are rules for that in Acquisitions Inc?

[@BovineTerror]

This was a very helpful video thank you so much! Just for my own reference, where are these ship combat rules written in official D&D books?

[@MastertheGamerpg]

They are in the Ghosts of Saltmarsh book. Also on D&D Beyond if you have that.

[@BovineTerror]

@@MastertheGamerpg awesome thank you so much!

[@lttrbox]

As far as I can tell the unearthed arcana rules are pretty much identical to saltmarsh: media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA_ShipsSea.pdf

[@juanperez-melchor9923]

Those ships are awesome.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Thank you I completely agree! They look amazing on my shelves right now. They are 3d printed from the Etsy store I mentioned in the description if you want to go check them out.

[@QuiteSoggy]

Super helpful stuff, my players are due an ambush off the coast of Purple Rocks tonight 👍👍

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Yeah? Be sure to let me know how it goes.

[@QuiteSoggy]

@@MastertheGamerpg one enemy ship captured and the other one destroyed 😁

[@mrvoltem9379]

This seems strange. Ships follow the same rules as characters, meaning that characters can shoot to death a wooden ship with their longbows from 600 ft away eventually. At the same time, the captain is the only one onboard the ship that makes any decisions here, there isnt anything for the other players to do if they aren aformentioned longbowmen or spell snipers. Barbarians would just stand there and be bored presumably. Isnt there a better way?

[@MastertheGamerpg]

When it comes up in my games I use the ships as terrain and let the other characters breach the other ship and fight H2H with the other people. To me that is far more interesting anyways. Or let them fight off a breach of their own ship.

[@mrvoltem9379]

@@MastertheGamerpg but that's not 'ship combat' thats just 'combat on a ship'!

[@kaboomjones]

​@@mrvoltem9379 I'm no expert, but I'd say there's a few options for those that don't have ranged spells / attacks: 1. help with repair / maneuvering - perhaps the barbarian can row and increase speed, or the monk catch a ballista bolt, etc 2. help with attacking: if the ship is outfitted with cannons / ballistae, perhaps the fighter can rapidly load ammunition, and squeeze out one more attack than normal 3. boarding crew: if your party's brave enough, split them and dimension door the barbarian and rogue onto the enemy ship and attempt to hold the captain hostage worst case: ship combat (and not specifically "combat on a ship") is at the end of the day, a ranged fight. so if you can't do the above or similar, perhaps the melee pc's will end up waiting for combat to end :/

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Isn’t ship combat and combat on a ship happening at the same time in a lot of scenes depending how the ships maneuver? Why couldn’t your melee character get a bow or work a cannon or something assuming there is one available?

[@MastertheGamerpg]

100% agree with this.

[@0-Matthew-0]

Quick Question: During the ships turn when the captain is ordering the crew does that count as an action for the captain or can they still act outside of the ships turn. Thanks!

[@MastertheGamerpg]

The Captain can do a few things as actions which may give additional bonuses. DND Beyond Rules for Ship Combat. www.dndbeyond.com/sources/gos/of-ships-and-the-sea#ShipsinCombat

[@kodystuart6685]

THANK YOU!

[@MastertheGamerpg]

Not a problem. Hopefully this D&D5e video was helpful for you. There are other rules I have been considering making videos for.

[@Cloud_Seeker]

The problem with these rules is that they suck. It is great if you play with one player, but for many players it is just bad. Each player will just man one type of weapon and give it advantage. Then they can leave and just let the captain do the rest of the fight. The rules do not engage multiple players and it does not take each players class or abilities in mind. If it did a wizard will just nuke the enemy deck with spells and fireball.

[@MastertheGamerpg]

I agree they are not the most fun way to handle ship combat. Do you have any tips for how you think it could be done better?

[@Cloud_Seeker]

@@MastertheGamerpg Nope. I have tried for years and I simply can not come up with a good way to handle it using the 5e system. I have not looked into any other TTRPG system as they might have a good system for it. But I have no idea how to make a good ship combat system in 5e.

[@sotiriospeithis6659]

I still don't understand how to determine ship movement and turning speed. Could anyone help ?

[@MastertheGamerpg]

In the stat block it tells you each ships speed in feet and that is how far they can move in combat. It can turn if it has movement speed. The dexterity will only impact Dexterity saving throws. Also as ships take damage some will lose movement speed. If their source of movement such as sails or rowers are taken out then they lose their movement that way too.