Olympia PBEM

sail

Pilot a ship in the given direction, or to the specified location. If a location is specified, there must be a direct route to it from the current location of the ship.

Compass points may be abbreviated: `n', `s', `e', `w'.

The Sailing [9502] subskill of Shipcraft [120] is required to use the sail order.

The character issuing the sail order must be the ship's captain, i.e. the character must be the first unit listed in the `Seen here' report of the ship.

The captain must have a crew to assist in the handling of the ship. Galleys require fourteen pirates or sailors to row the ship. Roundships require at least eight pirates or sailors to man the ship's rigging.

ship          crew     capacity
----          ----     --------
galley         14        5,000
roundship       8       25,000

If the required number of crew are not available, travel is still possible, but will take an extra day for each hand the crew is short.

For example, a galley with only 10 men at the oars will take four extra days to travel across an ocean route. A roundship with no sailors at all would take eight extra days to traverse a route.

The sail order will fail if the ship is overloaded. Use drop to throw items overboard if necessary.

Multiple destinations or destinations may be given as arguments to sail. If the first fails, the next will be tried, until a passable route is found, or sail runs out of arguments.

For example, `sail n e w' would first try to sail north. If travel north was not possible for any reason, east would next be tried, then west. In this way exploring units can attempt to deal with the case of running into an impassable ocean route, or a coast.

Roundships sail from windy provinces in one day less than the rated time, provided the route would require two days or longer. For example, a roundship leaving a windy province across a route rated at three days would take only two to travel the link. But a roundship leaving port will always take one day, never zero days.