The Best Raiders of Spain

Originally published to Miniature Trading on February 18th, 2016

This is my entry for brettb45’s Best Raider Fleet Challenge.

For this challenge, I originally wanted to use the Pirate native canoes from RtSS, but then I realized that the chieftain would have a huge target on his back from crew such as Bonny Peel. I also considered the Renard a Ailes and Rocinante as the possible backbones for different fleets.

Soon after this challenge started I thought about how hard it would be to fit lots of fun raider stuff into the 40 point limit, because stealing things in this game gets expensive in a hurry. As a result, I decided to go with something I think is pretty obnoxious, despite how ineffective it might be. It’s more of a fun little gimmick that could become more potent with some more points available.

Spain is the only faction to have the ability to not be shot at while docked on a crew. In addition, they have some nice HI raiders, one of which is the “other” El Algeciras that nobody ever talks about, in my opinion one of the coolest ships in the game. However, if a ship is docked at an enemy HI and can’t be shot at, the opponent’s next best bet is to ram and board. Therefore, I didn’t want small ships.

To combine these aspects, I needed a HI raider to house the Haulers, and then preferably another ship that couldn’t be shot at while docked with a HI raider aboard. However, Spain only has 1 ship that can’t be shot at while docked, so I was pretty limited in that regard.

The Espada de Dios is one of the cooler ships in the game, and here she’s got 4 cargo spaces open to fill up with stolen loot. The oarsman would take up space on the Academia, so he’s on the Espada.

The Academia isn’t such an exciting ship, but she’s the secondary raider. Sanchez allows her to steal gold from enemy HI’s while her ability keeps her somewhat safe. Master Bianco offsets the helmsman so she still has 3 open cargo spaces.

The strategy is simple – send the ships out to enemy HI’s, and then raid them continuously until your cargo holds are full, all the while enjoying protection from enemy cannon fire! Since HI raiding blockades are ineffective, I would recommend sending at least one of the ships out on a regular treasure run to get some gold, which could then potentially be used to purchase one of the forts. Once you start raiding HI’s, a fort could temporarily protect the gold if one of the raiders was in trouble and had to leave the enemy HI.

The UT’s were added to enhance the overall strategy as well as theoretically drive up the average value of a regular coin.

This fleet is fragile, with no captains. Also, neither ship has 5+ masts, so losing boarding parties could be a real issue. Since both raiders have the same speed, it’s likely they would team up, and in that case have 7 cannons around an enemy HI with which to fight off attackers. It’s also susceptible to enemy ships using crew-gold capturers, since the higher value crew would be easily taken off the ships. The speed is also an issue, but the HI raiding abilities are expensive enough to deny further enhancements.

Thanks for reading; comment and vote!

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