Tournament season is upon us! Adepticon is coming up next week and there will be substantial tournaments for both Land and Sea games, at 200 and 250pt respectively. I put myself at “the mercy of the people” this year and let the community vote on which faction I would play for the tournaments. Our Patreon backers chose the Spanish Mission Garrison for my land force and you can check that force here. I put the choice of sea faction up to the members of the main community of Blood & Plunder players on Facebook.

The members of the large Blood & Plunder Facebook Group chose the Pirate Nation by a large margin!

And then they chose the Golden Age Pirates.

So, Golden Age Pirates it is! It would probably be my last choice of the Pirate factions when considering power level for a tournament. But the people have spoken so I will with this faction and see what I can do to build a strong tournament force with it.

Basic Tournament Considerations

What does a tournament force need to do? Cover all the bases reasonably, and have a plan to win. Sometimes you can build for the scenario you know you’re going to play, but a tournament force needs to be fairly well rounded, prepared for a variety of enemies and scenarios.

Variables to Consider

There several variables to keep in mind when making a tournament force:

• Role (Attacker vs Defender)
• Scenarios
• Possible lists I will face
• Primary Tactics deployed against me

Role

The Role of Attacker or Defender can make a massive difference in how scenarios play out at sea. The role of Attacker usually gives a player an advantage with the wind direction, but it also puts more pressure on you to accomplish something specific during the scenario. It is generally considered advantageous to take be the Attacker at sea.

Scenarios

The possible scenarios are listed in the Tournament Packet are listed as:

• Control the Field
• Encounter
• Escort
• A Wanted Man
• Chase’s End

Control the Field rewards excellent sailing. Encounter can go any direction. Speed and sailing are again very important for the Escort scenario. A Wanted Man will usually go best with a strong melee force, but again, speed and board control are key. Fatigue management are is the name of the game for Chase’s End.

With those 5 scenarios in mind, board control through reliable and fast sailing is probably highest on my priority list, followed by Fatigue mitigation.

Possible Opponent Forces

As far as what kind of list I could be encountering, it’s always hard to know. There’s nearly 100 different factions for Blood & Plunder players to choose from and there isn’t a really defined meta for the tournament space. But I can look back at last year’s tournament winning lists and see what has been placing high.

2025 Top Sea Lists:

• The Flying Gang
• The Last Buccaneers
• Brethren of the Coast
• British Royal Navy
• English Buccaneers
• French Buccaneers
• Armada de Barlovento

That’s a wide variety. But I notice that the Golden Age Pirates aren’t on it! Many of them have a bonus to their role to determine who the Attacker is in the scenario. The British Royal Navy is usually very cannon0focused, and the Armada de Barlovento could be as well. But most of these lists are more well rounded, or hard to pinpoint exactly what they may plan to do. But looking over last year’s lists, nearly all of them had a good number of cannons on board.

Tactics Likely to be Deployed Against Me

As far as primary tactics I can expert to be used against me, that’s difficult to nail down but here’s the basic approaches I can expect:

• Fast Boarding
• Great Guns
• Small Arms Sniping
• Well Rounded

Last year at Adepticon, Dan won with an aggressive Fast Boarding list, Christian got second with a cannon list, and Tyler placed third with a Small Arms list, all undefeated! So the meta is pretty diverse at the top. A tournament list needs to be ready for anything.

The Golden Age Pirates have some real limitations and won’t be able to optimize some of these tactics as well as some other factions. So I need to lean into my strengths, and have a plan to respond to all of these basic approaches.

Fast Boarding – be prepared to out-run or out-melee my enemy.
Great Guns – Don’t let the shoot more than once or twice before boarding! And maybe take a 5 Fortitude or a Heavily Built ship to mitigate that deadly damage. A Carpenter would be a good choice as well.
Well Rounded – My best defense here is suppress their Cannons and come in and out melee them.
Small Arms Sniping – A fast ship with a lot of muskets on it can be annoying because it doesn’t need to present a broadside. I’m not going to outsnipe a minmaxed French Buccaneer small arms list with 18th century drunk pirates. So I need a FAST ship that can catch anyone on the sea.

Golden Age Pirates 250pt Tournament List

So let’s look at the Golden Age Pirates’ strengths. Their biggest strength is their abundance of Commander options. The two rules for this faction are hard to build around. If you’re the Defender, you have a 40% chance of some of your units being Drunk. If you’re the Attacker, you can use the False Colors rule which can prohibit your opponent from firing on you until your ships come within 12″ of each other.

To Drunk or Not to Drink

While drunk provides some benefits (bonus to Fight and Resolve), the penalty on everything else is really rough. But the benefit for being the Attacker is substantial. More board control through False Colors. So I want to be the Attacker as much as possible.

But, I need to be prepared to be Drunk. And that’s the real killer for the Golden Age Pirates in a tournament setting. You want to plan to avoid being Drunk, but you have to plan around it actually happening.

So, the best thing I can do to give myself an edge in the Attacker roll is to take a Sharp-Eyed Lookout. This Character lets you reroll your (or possibly your opponent’s) die when rolling for Attacker/Defender. Since the Golden Age Pirates have no bonus to their roll, it’s still not a real high likelihood that I’ll be Attacker the majority of the time. With most Sea Factions enjoying a +2 bonus, and some have of a bonus of up to +4 (like the British Royal Navy).

I was curious about chances for winning the Attacker roll vs a +2 or +4 modifier:

• Unmodified d10 will win vs a +2 bonus 28% of the time.
• Unmodified d10 will win vs a +4 bonus 15% of the time.
• d10 with Advantage will win vs a +2 bonus 42% of the time
• d10 with Advantage will win vs a +4 bonus 24% of the time

The ability to possible reroll the opponent’s die if they roll high can help that math a bit, but it was too complicated for me to crunch the numbers. Suffice to say, I’m still in danger of being Drunk. Good thing I got my drunk pirate from Adepticon 2025 painted up…

Basic Strategy

Knowing that I have a possibility of being Drunk, I think it wise to look to the basic tactic that can enjoy some of the benefits of having Drunk units. And that’s pretty much Fast Boarding tactic. The Drunk rule could still mess up my Sailing actions, and even the Grapple action, but once it comes to melee, Drunk units get a bonus on both their Fight and Resolve making them pretty terrifying when they actually get the jump on someone. On the flip side, they get a penalty to their Fight Save which is no fun, but that means I need a good Commander or strong Characters to help me manage a decisive aggressive boarding action.

So let’s jump into key elements for Fast Boarding;

• Fast Ship
• High Model Count
• Stinkpots
• Brace of Pistols to support extended Melee
• Plenty of Command Points
• Special Rules like Bold, War Cry, and Hard Chargers to support melee

Commander

There’s plenty of decent options for Commanders in the Golden Age Pirates. So many! This Faction has 13 options just for named commanders! And, being obstinate in my affinity for 3 Command Point commanders, I’m going to choose the very highest cost possible! Sometimes maligned as costing too much, I’m choosing Edward “Blackbeard” Teach as my commander. He’s a full 32 points, but he brings some great bilities to the table. He’s even better in his faction but I got to stick with Golden Age Pirates!

Blackbeard brings:

• 3 Command Points
• Terror
• Tough
• 4 Fortune Points (God’s Blessing or the Devil’s Luck)
• Bold
• Cold Blooded

There’s so many good things going on here for a Fast Boarding list. Terror can mess up their first turn, or at least prep them to be helpless in a charge situation if I can get one more point of Fatigue on them. Cold Blooded plays right off Terror and makes up for not getting Ruthless from the Flying Gang faction. A ful compliment of 3 Command Points can make that key boarding turn decisive. So much can happen! If you activate Blackbeard’s unit, plus give actions to three other units, that up to 6 actions before the enemy can respond at all. Grapple, shoot, throw stinkpots, charge, charge, charge. That can be a massacre. You got to set it up correctly, but it can be awesome. And those Command Points count as Dedicated Actions which is helpful for boarding ships that are taller or shorter and need that awkward Climb action.

Blackbeard doesn’t give me that valuable Inspiring ability, but hopefully I can make the game a “merry one and a short one” and not need as much Fatigue management as usual. He lacks any bonus to sailing a ship, but I can supplement with a Sailing Master character.

Characters

Let’s spend more points on command structure! I’m adding a Sailing Master for that extra speed which can help me catch my hapless prey. Expert Sailors and that potential for a speed adjustment is gold for the boarding list.

I’m also adding a Sharp-Eyed Lookout for the reasons discussed above. I don’t really want to be drunk and I’d prefer the advantageous position so I can board faster!

Finally, I’m adding a Reformado. It’s a bit much, but having another unit with a Command Point for Grapple/Charge makes the list that much more solid.

Units

Ok here’s the main body of the force.With 6 possible Core units, we have lots of options.

For my Command Unit I’m going to make a really powerful unit of Roundsmen. Nine Roundsmen with Buccaneer Guns, some free Blunderbusses, and a Firepot and Stinkpot. That’s a 67 point unit, but it can get 3 Actions off any Activation Card (assuming 1 Command Point), and it can really dish out ranged or melee dice and that 6 Shoot Save and Tough from Blackbeard will help keep it in good shape.

For my other main threatening melee unit, I’m going to run full unit of 12 French Marins with Brace of Pistols, 1 Stinkpot, and a Reformado. My plan is to have them in the bow of the ship on a pair of Swivel Guns. They can take a bit of a beating and still have some units left when it comes to boarding. The Reformado means they can get that Dedicated Charge if we need it

Now the chaff. To fill out the list, I’ll use 3 units of 3pt models: Pirates and Inexperienced Jamaican Privateers.

• 7 Inexperienced Jamaican Privateers with the Sharp-Eyed Lookout
  • Add 1 Blunderbusses
• 6 Pirates with the Sailing Master
  • Add 2 Blunderbusses
• 6 Pirates
  • Add 2 Blunderbusses

These are lousy units, but I can keep the Pirates prone on approach to absorb hits with solid prone Shoot Saves and the Jamaican Privateers can provide some good Sailing actions if necessary and some ranged firepower.

That brings my total model count to 40 which is a nice round number for Strike Points.

So here’s what I came up with after a couple drafts and test games.

The Force has 5 units, 40 models, 3 Command Points, a mix of Trained, Inexperienced and Veteran units, and some fun Special Rules and abilities to mess with the enemy. It’s light on deadly ranged attacks and mobility.

If my units are Drunk, it won’t ruin my basic strategy of boarding, since they will actually get bonuses in melee. But the penalty on things like Grappling, Sailing Master, and Shoot Tests will be frustrating.

Ship

I’m going to run with the trusty Light Frigate. It lacks the 4 Swivel Guns in the front that would be helpful, but I need that 5 speed! And of course I’m going to run with the Freshly Careened Hull to get that bonus move at the start of the game. And I’m going to go one step further and take the Streamlined Hull as well! This let’s me reduce the Windward Penalty on one movement per turn. With the high likelihood of being the Defender, I anticipate having to fight my way upwind a lot. Between the Sailing Master and the Streamlined Hull, and using some tricky sailing, I should be able to make pretty good progress upwind.

The Light Frigate has the advantage of having that starting Hull Fortitude of 5 as well, which makes it last longer against a determined Great Guns opponent.

So that’s the list!

• Blackbeard
• 5 Units with 2 main boarding units
• Light Frigate kitted out for speed
  • 1 Pair of Swivel Guns
• 3 Characters to help with speed, initiative and melee
• Stinkpots to shut down Defensive Attacks

Weaknesses

In my playtesting, my main noticed weaknesses are Fatigue management and producing sustained ranged attacks.

With no Inspiring or Lead by Example or anything, I’m relying on brute force Rally actions to remove Fatigue on everyone except Blackbeard’s Tough Roundsmen. That doesn’t feel great. I mentioned Fatigue mitigation as one of the most important things in managing the 5 Tournament scenarios and when all said and done that’s still a weakness. I may have made some poor decisions here!

Two of my 5 units are only armed with Brace of Pistols which is basically useless as a Ranged Weapon until you get into ranges under 4″. I’m relying on 2 Swivels, 9 Roundsmen, and 7 Jamaican Privateers for all my Ranged attacks. That’s pretty weak to be honest. I’m really counting on being able to close the distance and still have enough men to accomplish the boarding action when I get there.

Test Games

I’ve only got two games in with this list. In the first I was fighting another boarding list. We both had Freshly Careened Hulls and were eager to get grappled. I ended up getting initiative on the crucial activation and doing massive damage to the defending crew during Blackbeard’s activation. In spite of missing some Grapples and dropping some explosives on myself, I was able to take control of the enemy ship pretty quickly.

My second game was against an entirely different beast. 250 points of Ruthless French Buccaneers on a Light Frigate under L’Olonnais. I was the Defender in A Wanted Man and I had to fight upwind to chase this nasty French Buccaneer Gun that was running. It was a nightmare to catch, but I eventually did catch it, in spite of their frustrating anti-grappling measures! It was a very close game that we actually weren’t able to finish. It could have gone either way. I took a lot of casualties coming in, but my sailing measures paid off and once those Stinkpots hit, it was difficult for the Boucaniers and Engages to function.

Final Thoughts

Key parts of the Golden Age Pirate Tournament Force:

• Blackbeard as a decisive Boarding commander
• Sharp-Eyed Lookout to attempt to avoid being Drunk
• Moderately high model count of 40 models
• Fast and tough ship with the upgraded Light Frigate
• Sailing Master for extra speed
• 2 key large boarding units
• Smaller cheap units for utility and damage soaking
• Force built so that Drunk won’t ruin the overall plan
• Stinkpots to shut down Defensive Attacks
• Brace of Pistols on 4 of my 5 units

We’ll see how this goes! It was fun to work with a faction I wouldn’t have naturally chosen for the tournament. And it’s obviously very fun to run the legendary Blackbeard! I’m looking forward to playing some great games with great folks at Adepticon and seeing if I can strike Terror into people’s hearts with Blackbeard and some Golden Age Pirates this year.

With the recent release of the Golden Age Pirates Faction Box, I wish I had the time in the next few days to paint up a bunch of new models. But I doubt that’s going to happen. I have a lot of planning and packing to do!

As a reminder, if you’re playing in the tournaments, we appreciate you getting your force lists in early so we can do a check over and make sure all is perfect and ready for tournament play! You can submit your tournament forces here and we’ll check them over and send you feedback if anything seems amiss.

We will have Jason, the TO look over the lists to prevent any of us who are actually playing in the tournament from having any unfair advantage from seeing lists as they come in.

Article by Joseph Forster

Additional Recommended Reading

• Check out Joseph’s Land Tournament force for 2026 Adepticon
• Read Dan’s Faction Review of the Golden Age Pirates
• Check out the newly released Golden Age Pirates Faction Box
• Review all the events happening at Adepticon 2026
• Sharp Eyed Lookout Mini
• Sailing Master Mini
• 2025 Adepticon Sea Tournament Recap
• Full article on preparing for your (first) Blood & Plunder Tournament
• Blood & Plunder 2 Player Starter Set that includes Blackbeard