Blockade Fun

A great blockade is coming to all the oceans thanks to Azarbad the Great. It is non sinking and i figured if we could get people on we could place Ascalon's name amongst those competing for the grand prizes. Thats right actually prizes for this if we win. The blockade for Sage will be held June 29th at 3:30 pm PDT on the island of Cromwell. The ships that are allowed are Dhows, Baglahs and Xebecs. Any other questions here's the link http://forums.puzzlepirates.com/community/mvnforum/viewthread?thread=102700.

Prizes
First - A large island blockade package

A large island war chest

4 Xebecs, with 400 shot & 100 fine rum

5 Baghlahs with 300 shot & 75 fine rum

Second - A medium island blockade package

A medium island war chest

2 Xebecs with 400 shot & 100 fine rum

3 Baghlahs with 300 shot & 75 fine rum

3 Dhows with 200 shot & 50 fine rum

Third - An outpost island blockade package

An outpost island war chest

2 Baghlahs with 300 shot & 75 fine rum

5 Dhows with 200 shot & 50 fine rum

Sounds good although I'm not sure about the hour. In any case, I have a couple of dhows, a baghlah and a Xebec we could use. All we have to do is bring them up to Cromwell. Nothing to it

The blockade has now changed to Friday the 27th at the same time. http://forums.puzzlepirates.com/community/mvnforum/viewthread?thread=102700

Ok, I hate to do this but I believe one should be realist even in a game. I'm afraid we have no chances of succeeding in the event blockade.
The blockade will be probably won by the flag that will be able to fill more baghlahs and I don't think we have enough of them. Why bags? Simple. Dhow are easy to fill, but their influence ring (2 tiles) is ridiculous, not to mention that they can be easily be sunk by baghlahs and xebecs with their double cannons (2 moves are enough to annihilate a dhow). Xebecs are hard to fill and their influence on the board doesn't justify the time one needs to fill them.
Our crew has only 2 baghlahs, how many have yours? We need at least 6 (8 would be better) and 2 of them should be always filled and on the board.
At the beginning dhows could be deployed in order to rush to free buoys and try to influence them, but I think there will be many of them trying to do the same.
But it should be fun, so I'm willing to participate.

Our crew has 1 baglah and i have one that is on order. If i can get that one finished by friday the Wave riders will have 2 as well. Even if we don't have a chance to win if we don't do it i think it will be fun to participate in and i will be there in whatever ship i can be . And think that everyone who can be should try and make it as well.

Ok, in that case let's start planning concretely the event.

1. Each crew will move its fleet (dhows, baghlahs) to Cromwell. Some ships might be pretty far from that island, therefore we should call on more efficient ways to move them:
a. swabbie transport . The only issue here is the cost of the swabbies.
b. floating (for those unaware of what floating is, check this page: http://yppedia.puzzlepirates.com/Floating). Floating it's free but it takes ages and should be done in a crew different than our main ones, if we don't want to tun the risk of losing the pvp rank.
2. We should move there stock on ships easier to navigate and with a big hold (cutters and merchant brigs).
3. We should stock a ship and then move the stock to each ship we pull in only when said ships are loading.
4. We should design a jobbing contact, a few bnavers and XOs. I would like to have a list of possible gunners (renowned+).
5. Do we want to use voice chat?
6. Are we looking for an Admiral?
7. We should use a blockading crew. Blades of Ascalon it's our alt crew for such kind purpose. Bnavers, Jobbing contanct and XOs either move there their character, or put an alt with an officer badge. That should be done at least a couple of hours before the event.
8. Let's do some math about the financial aspects:

Stock
Assuming that we'll be able to deploy two baghlahs for the whole round, and that those baghlahs will be permanently shooting (from one side), they can fire 8 x 2 (2 turns in a minute) x 45 (minutes of a round) x 2 (nr. of ships) = 1440 medium cannon balls. For 3 ships it's 2160.
No idea about how much rum we shall have on board, but I think 50 per ship it should be enough. Let's say 300 rum in total.
The stock can cost in total about 75k.

Pay
It depends on the numbers of jobbers we will have, how much will the other flags pay for and on the settings (I'm for Performance/Even). I guess most of the flags will set the pay in a range between 200 and 300; but I expect to see some flags offering more than 500. If we have few flaggies online, I'm afraid we'll have to face the paywar and get ready to offer up to 500-700. Filling a baghlah at 500 costs about 9k per segment (36k a round). So let's say the pay will cost 100k in the worst case.

A decent warring machine costs therefore 200k. We don't have a flag coffer, who pays for that? Well, I propose to share the costs among Royals (the ones who are supposed to earn some prestige if we win) and bnavers (the ones who will actually have fun). It might be about 30-50k each. I think it's affordable.
Unless of course we don't want any sort of organization and each crew plays by its own (which can hardly be done, once we'll have a jobbing offer on the notice board).

you are aware they changed the date to the 27th.

i'm not sure if i'll be able to help out. the event time is not ideaal for me.

Ok, I don't know about the alt if it is absolutely necessary to have one then i guess i will do it but i don't think its a big deal. I don't think an Admiral is necessary we will only be have a couple of bags in and there prolly won't be that many backup ships to need to have an admiral and worry about losing him/her as help in a ship that is participating. I think that using a voice chat is a very smart idea that way we can coordinate with each other and avoid shooting ourselves.

Hope I'm not too tired tonight, but if not so I come and have some fun in the blackade.