Be a Pirate! Story: Captains, Bosses, and the Finale

Rogue's Rest and Driftmark Shoal: Recover Your Crew

The Be a Pirate! story follows a crew fighting to reclaim its people and strongholds across the Crimson Expanse. With 15 maps and 15 recruitable pirate captains, your battles connect the fleet's survival to individual rescues, debts, and grudges. This walkthrough covers major campaign milestones in the Windows game, including spoilers for late-game revelations and the finale.

The Crown has brought soldiers and warships into pirate waters, but its campaign runs deeper than a naval invasion. It has struck a bargain with an ancient power, bringing supernatural threats into the struggle over your captains' homes.

1. Defend Rogue's Rest and rescue Scarlet Wench. Completing this battle earns Find the Quartermaster and establishes the campaign's central motivation: getting your people back.
2. Complete Driftmark Shoal. This milestone earns Saltmother's Eye and reveals what the Crown is hunting.

Prepare for pressure from both directions during these defenses. Crownsmen approach over land while Crown Sloops travel along the river. Cover both routes when placing towers; redirecting ground troops leaves the naval threat moving toward you.

Official page: Be a Pirate! (store.steampowered.com)

Lashlight Key and Anchorhome Isle: Face the Undead and the Leviathan

Lashlight Key brings the Crown's supernatural alliance into sharper focus. Quartermaster Voss gets back up, making the enemy's ability to return from death part of the conflict.

Image: Steam / Noble Rogues

1. Beat Lashlight Key. Unlock Won't Stay Dead as Voss's return complicates the fight.
2. Defeat the Coilback Leviathan at Anchorhome Isle. This victory earns Sea Monster Trouble. The creature connects the dangers beneath the water to the plight of a captive crew.

Voss also has a separate combat challenge: Dodged the Skiff requires defeating him without his skiff wrecking one of your towers. Keep that condition in mind if you're pursuing achievements alongside the story.

For these battles, build around enemy resistances and weaknesses. Physical, Fire, Ice, Electric, and Poison damage have different matchups. Match your attacking towers to the threats you face, and spend Doubloons on the upgrade track that addresses the immediate problem: Offense, Range, Specialty, or Signature.

Broken Compass Cay and Marrow Cay: Fight for Your People

The campaign keeps its stakes close to the crew even as the enemies become stranger. Each defended map belongs to one of your captains, and voiced narration connects the fighting to their personal history.

Image: Steam / Noble Rogues

1. Defeat the Admiral's Herald at Broken Compass Cay. Earn More Arms Than Any Man by bringing down this boss.
2. Complete Marrow Cay and return the Stinky Rose home. This milestone unlocks Foolish. Brave.

The Herald has an additional objective worth planning around: Disarmed requires defeating him before he lands a blow on your ship. Prioritize damage against him if you're attempting that challenge.

Use the terrain deliberately. Land enemies adjust their routes around construction, while the river remains fixed. A Bridge creates a crossing for ground traffic, but Crown Sloops continue underneath it. Keep naval coverage in place when changing the land route.

Gallows Shadow and Darkmoor Reach: Voss's End and the Narrator Reveal

These milestones resolve Voss's return and reveal the identity behind the storytelling.

Image: Steam / Noble Rogues

1. Beat Gallows Shadow. Unlock Last of Darkmoor when Voss falls permanently.
2. Complete Darkmoor Reach. Earn The Voice in the Tale and discover who has been narrating the story.

Listen to the captain narration as each battle unfolds. The dialogue carries the personal reasons for defending these strongholds, alongside the larger conflict with the Crown and the Deep. Darkmoor Reach gives that storytelling another layer by identifying the voice behind the tale.

Port Raleigh: Defeat Crown Admiral Voth Kraaz

No Kings. No Chains. has a 10.0% global unlock rate and marks the campaign's decisive victory: defeating Crown Admiral Voth Kraaz at Port Raleigh and freeing the Crimson Expanse.

1. Win the final battle at Port Raleigh. Defeat Voth Kraaz to complete this story milestone.
2. Win the finale on Captain difficulty to earn The Admiral's Last Stand.
3. Use Cap'n Drake as your commanding captain when winning the finale to unlock Let's Find My Queen.

Port Raleigh also supports stricter combat goals. Not One Step Further requires killing Voth Kraaz before he reaches the halfway line. Untouchable requires winning the final battle on Captain without your ship taking any damage.

Choose which condition to pursue before committing to a replay. A victory on Captain satisfies the difficulty achievement, but the damage-free challenge also demands protection against every threat reaching your ship.

After the Finale: Captain Replays and Endless Mode

The crew gives you specific reasons to revisit completed defenses. Home Waters requires winning a battle on Captain with that map's own captain commanding. Every Captain's Tale requires a Captain-difficulty victory with each of the 15 captains in command.

1. Pair a map with its own captain when pursuing Home Waters.
2. Rotate your commanding captain across victories to work toward Every Captain's Tale.
3. Clear all 15 maps on Captain for Captain of the Crimson Expanse.
4. Enter Endless mode to test how long your defenses can survive.

At Port Raleigh, Kraken Wrangler adds a distinct Endless objective: defeat the Kraken twice within a single run. Across the full campaign, Some Ships Do Not Return requires surviving 30 Endless waves on all 15 maps.