Piracy in the Age of Plastics: Firelock’s New Golden Age Pirates Faction List from Raise The Black
By Glenn Van Meter
The Gentlemen of Fortune over at recently gave us a preview snippet from the new expansion book Raise the Black from their upcoming Kickstarter, which kicks off on October 6th. As the new expansion brings the game into the 18th century and the Golden Age of Piracy, I thought it rather exciting that the first list spotted would be one of the new pirate factions. So, let’s raise the black flag and jump right in to see what it’s worth!
The new faction is the Golden Age Pirates (1690-1730), and they are what you would imagine a pirate crew to be from any Hollywood film. The faction special rules really help give this list the character you would expect in a force of bloodthirsty, throat-cutting pirates straight from the Spanish Main. They get the previous pirate faction rule allowing them to fly false colors when attacking, which lets them come upon their prey and catch them unawares – or at least start a lot closer to the ever-important booty.
The Golden Age Pirates also benefit while attacking from the Brethren of the Coast rule; letting them swap all of their activation cards once a game without spending a fortune point. So if you need some fast action and draw a slow hand, you can dump it and draw again for no penalty. To balance this out, if the pirates defend, there is a chance that they suffer from the Drunk! scenario rule.
If that is in effect, there is a good chance your pirates are braver and more aggressive than usual, but also clumsy and more prone to… fatal mishap. Finally, there is a new faction special rule, which allows veteran units with Warcry to essentially shout their opponents down, taking a dedicated action to force one or more fatigue tests on an opposing unit. However, if the opposing unit is not cowed the pirate unit gains a fatigue instead. Finally, the force has the option of taking Grapeshot for its canons, forsaking solid shot in favor of the more lethal to infantry “shotgun” effect.
From here we move on to commanders. This faction has a whole slew of options, including English, French, Spanish, or European Commanders. Available to command are Edward “Blackbeard” Teach, Charles Vane, Jack Rackham, Bartholomew “Black Bart” Roberts, Black Caesar, Samuel “Black Sam” Bellamy, Olivier “La Buse” Levasseur, Ned Low, and Stede Bonnet. That’s quite the list of swashbucklers there, but I wanted to focus in on one very successful pirate in particular. No, not Blackbeard – I’m thinking Samuel “Black Sam” Bellamy.
This legendary commander clocks in at just 25 points, which is a steal considering that he comes with 3 command points, a 12″ command bubble, and several special rules: Commodore, Broadside!, and Vendetta: English, Spanish. Not only can he effectively lead a small fleet of ships with his Commodore ability and potentially use Broadside to focus fire from several ships at one time, but Vendetta means that you can reroll a single failed die in every Rally test across your entire force when fighting Spanish or English factions.
That’s huge in this game, where keeping your units from being fatigued is of such vital importance. Lastly, he carries (in true pirate fashion) a brace of pistols and a cutlass. Also of note is that Bellamy can lead another faction called “The Flying Gang”, which I can’t wait to see the list for.
Next up for this faction is the list of core units. Here we meet some old friends and familiar faces including Sea Dogs, Marins, Marineros, Zeelieden, and European Sailors. These scallawags provide you with lots of crew for your ships, and the European Sailors can even be given muskets to go with their decent Shoot skill to help provide a base of fire.
According to a recent Facebook post by Mike Tunez, most of these sailors will also be getting additional upgrade options including Braces of Pistols and Boarding Pikes, which should all make ship to ship action a lot more lively. Two new core units stand out from the crowd though: Pirates and Roundsmen. At first glance the Trained, 3 point Pirates don’t seem like anything to write home about, with a 7/7 Fight/Save and a 7/7 Shoot/Save, plus Resolve of 6, and special rules including Sailors and Artillery Crew. I first looked and thought “Oh, more basic sailor types”, but then I noticed something – these guys get weapons that make them stand out.
They start with a standard melee weapon and a Brace of Pistols (the kind that never gains reload markers), but then have plenty more options like getting Buccaneer Guns either instead of or in addition to the pistols, 1 out of 2 models adding a Blunderbuss at no cost, and 1 out of 4 models being able to take Grenadoes and either Firepots or Smokepots. These guys can load for bear on the cheap, and be at the forefront of any attack, using Warcry to help ensure that any charge landing a hit causes extra fatigue to break the defender.
Upgrade them all to veteran for another point each, and you’ve suddenly got a crack storming party ready to go take you a prize. The Roundsmen unit comes across as the Pirates who managed to live for a little while and improve upon their skills. These 6 point Veterans have all of the same options as the Pirates but come with a 6/6/ Fight/Save, a 7/6 Shoot/Save, and Resolve 5. Presumably due to their experience on the sea, they are Expert Sailors instead of the regular variety but maintain Artillery Crew and Warcry.
Considering the boarding action experts you can include in the core of your force, I’m not certain you need Support units, but there are plenty listed. As before you will recognize a number of them while others have strange names, their quality as yet unknown to us: Vizcayeros, Marins Basques, Able Seamen, Veteran European Sailors, Warriors, Warrior Musketeers, African Warriors, Later Flibustiers, Later Freebooters, and Pressed Men. We were not given details on these mysterious newcomers, but give the names it seems safe to say that they come from every corner of the globe, searching for buried treasure.
Available allied factions for this faction are Maroons, Blackbeard’s Men, The Flying Gang, Black Bart’s Pirates, and La Buse’s Crew, all of which sound like very exciting lists. With so many named forces, I’m getting some dangerous ideas for a Pirate super-fleet, where all of the named personalities and perhaps some lesser ones sail together to finally try to take down a big prize or two. Perhaps a campaign, where each of the Pirate leaders is trying to bring riches and glory to his own crew, occasionally contesting a prize with one of the other factions? The possibilities these names suggest are endless.
In the meantime though, I’m already drawing up some Golden Age Pirates lists to work in conjunction with the new Bermuda Sloop, or even two of them. I’m envisioning a core of heavily-armed Pirates and Roundsmen manning the impressive number of swivels as the speedy but fragile sloops quickly approach their prize.
A number of European Sailors use musketry to start picking off and fatiguing crew elements before tossing grapples once they’ve come aside the ship. Finally, the Pirates and Roundsmen board her with a ferocious Warcry, hacking through the defenders and driving them below decks, leaving the ship in the hands of the Pirates. Yep, I can’t even imagine a force that could stand against them…