How to Impersonate a Sailor? - Page 2

jason taylor · 03-09-2015, 09:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Murrkon5

Just to emphasize, in pre-industrial times a sailing ship might be the occupation filled with the most jargon-technical skills and has the intense time pressure to employ those skills. Either as captain giving orders or the sailors acting them out.

"The nor-easter is blowing us to a lee shore! Loosen the stays on the for'ard royals!"

Standing around as a clueless noob could mean the ship piles on to the rocks or something. So, impersonating a sailing man on dry land is about the only way to do it.

It was also the most labor intensive peacetime trade and the bigger ships sometimes did have to get by with a cadre, a bunch of grunts, and a healthy application of rope's ends.

malloyd · 03-09-2015, 09:54 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Disliker of the mary sue

In a character idea I mentioned in a previous thread where a Bard is on the run from either an entire country or giant monster (or both) an idea I been thinking of while taking a boat to another continent, disaster happened and the ship was wrecked and nearly the entire crew died. The bard managed to steal the clothing of the ship captain and some identification papers and managed to get a life boat to take him the rest of the way to land. Since the captain was a private individual not a lot of people have ever seen him so people buy that the bard as being the wrecked ship's captain.

How many people on *another continent* will recognize anybody. Although identification papers that actually mean anything implies a fairly high tech level. Is somebody likely to make a phone call to his family to tell them he survived, or check his papers against a database of the issuing nation for a DNA match?

I'd also expect any state that would want captains to have papers to also be the sort of place that will investigate shipwrecks, say to find out if the captain was criminally negligent, and when the experienced nautical investigators start asking him questions.... Even if not anybody who had a cargo on that ship would really like to talk to him. I mean "the ship sank and I, the captain, am the only survivor" is not exactly the most believable story. Somebody has got to expect the real story is you the captain sold the ship to pirates who massacred the crew or something.

jason taylor · 03-09-2015, 10:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Disliker of the mary sue

In a character idea I mentioned in a previous thread where a Bard is on the run from either an entire country or giant monster (or both) an idea I been thinking of while taking a boat to another continent, disaster happened and the ship was wrecked and nearly the entire crew died. The bard managed to steal the clothing of the ship captain and some identification papers and managed to get a life boat to take him the rest of the way to land. Since the captain was a private individual not a lot of people have ever seen him so people buy that the bard as being the wrecked ship's captain.

So my question is what are resources I could find to read about how a sailor usually acted, how long could I keep such a charade going assuming the bard knows a few things about the profession, and assuming I am a magical bard with song magic how can I use my bard abilities in subtle ways to not break the disguise (assuming I am keeping it a secret from the party)

A sailor would not necessarily need ID papers. Many of them were stateless anyway. A captain might because he had to deal with legal matters but a sailor in port can just debauch himself and we have somehow still managed to get by without needing ID for that.

Johnny1A.2 · 03-09-2015, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Murrkon5

Standing around as a clueless noob could mean the ship piles on to the rocks or something. So, impersonating a sailing man on dry land is about the only way to do it.

This^^.

As a general thing, even at low tech levels, trying to impersonate something that has its own technical skills and working jargon is very hard if you have to interact with people who really have that knowledge, and doubly so if you're in a situation where you might have to use it. As noted on-thread, sailing was a particularly hard thing to 'fake it' over.

jason taylor · 03-09-2015, 11:59 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johnny1A.2

This^^.

As a general thing, even at low tech levels, trying to impersonate something that has its own technical skills and working jargon is very hard if you have to interact with people who really have that knowledge, and doubly so if you're in a situation where you might have to use it. As noted on-thread, sailing was a particularly hard thing to 'fake it' over.

But, "Hey you, here's a mop meathead" is self explanatory.

The Colonel · 03-09-2015, 01:15 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jason taylor

But, "Hey you, here's a mop meathead" is self explanatory.

That's not a sailor though - that's a landsman who happens to work aboard a ship. The merchant trade generally ran on a bare minimum of skilled men and didn't have much space for dead weight - swabbing was likely the job of ships boys who were still (literally) learning the ropes. Warships might be more likely to carry "hard bargains" because they carried far more men than were needed to sail the ship, but they'd likely stand out from the genuine sailors, even under careful supervision.

Disliker of the mary sue · 03-09-2015, 03:38 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jason taylor

A sailor would not necessarily need ID papers. Many of them were stateless anyway. A captain might because he had to deal with legal matters but a sailor in port can just debauch himself and we have somehow still managed to get by without needing ID for that.

Okay papers might not be the right words....more like something I can use to say I really am a captain and I totally didn't just steal these clothing off a corpse.

WingedKagouti · 03-09-2015, 03:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Disliker of the mary sue

Okay papers might not be the right words....more like something I can use to say I really am a captain and I totally didn't just steal these clothing off a corpse.

That would either be a ship (and a crew to back you up on your claim) or papers (with the seal of a noble/recognized official) identifying "you" as the owner/captain of a ship.

Johnny1A.2 · 03-09-2015, 10:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Disliker of the mary sue

Okay papers might not be the right words....more like something I can use to say I really am a captain and I totally didn't just steal these clothing off a corpse.

Unless you're a long way from the shore and sailors and the like, trying that is likely to be a bad idea on balance, in a realistic or semi-realistic setting. It would be really really easy to get exposed, it's the probable outcome.

The Colonel · 03-10-2015, 05:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Disliker of the mary sue

Okay papers might not be the right words....more like something I can use to say I really am a captain and I totally didn't just steal these clothing off a corpse.

Ah, now a Captain - or a sailing master (in the civilian trade particularly) would need some kind of paperwork in order to get a ship - or at least the attestation of others. Basically he'd need to be able to show that he had form managing a ship in the past - logs and journals would be typical. Even to work as an officer he'd need to demonstrate knowledge of navigation and similar things at interview, know the parts of the ship and not be obviously ignorant of any part of maritime life.