I've been thinking about the possibility of doing faction specific raids. All of these raids would follow a similar pattern but would have different enemies/skeletons and types of battle.
The start of the raids is all the same; you'll see a mark on the map of an outpost to go to to begin the raid. Once at the outpost you have to go to the correct faction to begin: MA, OOS, or GH. The faction rep will tell you a quick story about a tip he/she has heard of about a party that has returned from far away and is carrying a great treasure. (The first crew or alliance to get this quest is the only one that knows the details. Anyone else will have to follow or try to intercept after the quest is done.) He/she will then tell you to go to a specific island and talk to an NPC who has been shadowing the group. Next you'll sail to the island and speak with the NPC who will tell you what map coordinates to go to in order to intercept the shipment. As a surety of his word and a bonus for taking the voyage you'll be given a down payment of a new type of chest, skull, or crate. Then here's where the raids diverge.
GH
For the GH you will go to the specific coordinates and encounter a small fleet of Knights Templar ships. These ships will always be near an island. A small ship battle will ensue and during the battle one of the ships breaks away and heads to the island. Once there they set off across the island to escape aboard ships that will meet them on the opposite side. This gives you a set amount of time to fight a group of NPC Knights Templar and their skeleton allies. These skeleton will be a new type that will require new strategies to fight (caveat: explosive barrels always work they're just not as effective). Once you defeat a number of waves of skeletons and kill the Templars you steal the loot all of which is new. The main prize is the Maltese Falcon but there will be other artifacts and chests that you receive as you kill the various Templar. You will always receive some amount of loot but in order to get the Maltese Falcon you have to kill the boss Templar.
OOS
For OOS when you go to the coordinates you will always be at an island. When you get to the island you have to find a mine through a cave system. Once there you will encounter a group of NPC Conquistadors and their skeleton allies (again a new type of skeletons). Battle ensues in the caves with skeleton waves and Conquistadors. All will have to be killed in order to receive the Crystal Skull. There will also be other new types of skulls.
MA
The Merchant Alliance quest will be a complete sea battle. Unlike skeleton ships they won't be able to spawn from underwater so the armada will have to be of small-medium size and be fought all at once. These ships will be a British Royal Navy armada that will include a man-of-war. So the armada could be a man-of-war and a combination of galleons, brigatines, and sloops. A potential armada might be: man-of-war, galleon, and 2 brigatines or man-of-war, 2 galleons, and 2 sloops. The man-of-war will try to get away but it'll be a slower, but much more powerful ship, and a crew will have to decide on a strategy for both following the man-of-war and sinking the other ships which will all give new types of loot. The main prize will be British East Indian Tea plus there will be new barrels (IPA and rum) and spice crates etc. I think cursed canon balls would come in handy here and since these ships are returning they won't have access to them giving the thieves an advantage that the British won't have.
All of these raids will create ample opportunities for alliances, double-crosses, and looting. Adding new NPC foes and new skeleton foes will add a whole new element to the game with new strategies needed to defeat the bosses and skeletons. Something that could be added to help the crews who fight these new bosses is the ability to carry more rounds for weapons only during these raids. Afterwards it would return to the regular amount of 5 shots. This would help these crews both fight the hordes and give them a slight advantage against any pirates who come to loot during the battles.
The huge caveat with using historical factions is that most of these groups have a long history of colonialism, slavery, theft and genocide. Therefore, the best option is to create similarish groups that are unique and new to SoT. I used historical groups because most people are familiar with them.
Hope my fellow pirates enjoy these ideas and I look forward to the improvements that the community will come up with.
See you on the seas.
tl;dr
3 new faction specific raids.
GH - Knights Templar with the reward of Maltese Falcon
OOS - Conquistadors with the reward of Crystal Skull
MA - British Royal Navy with the reward of BEI Tea.
