It's About Pirates Faction Abilities: How the Six Crews Shape Your Build

What Official Sources Actually Say About It's About Pirates Faction Abilities

Elderwoof Games released It's About Pirates on Steam on November 6, 2026, and the official store page lists "6 Factions with unique abilities" among the game's core features. That line is also the limit of what the developer has published: no faction names, cooldown values, or damage tables appear in the official material reviewed for this guide. So any honest discussion of It's About Pirates faction abilities has to separate two things — the confirmed framework, and the parts you have to test yourself.

This article covers the first part thoroughly and gives you a repeatable method for the second. It also collects the dated snapshots you need before buying: price, reception, and release status.

Confirmed Build Systems at a Glance

The table below pulls only static feature counts from the official Steam listing and the Elderwoof Games press kit, both captured on 2026-11-09. These are design facts about the game, not live statistics.

The takeaway is structural: factions sit on top of captains and build-shaping items. The 150+ collectible ship parts are a separate documented customization collection; any combat role for those parts is for reference only until verified. That is why It's About Pirates faction abilities matter more than a single stat bump — they are a layer you choose before the loot starts dropping.

How Factions Layer With Captains and Items

The developer's own pitch describes the loop as combining "deadly weapons, powerful items, and a fearless captain to create unique builds." Factions are the fourth ingredient, and the press release frames them the same way: "Use unique abilities from one of 6 factions."

Because the game is a survivors-like with naval combat, your build has to survive escalating waves rather than a fixed level layout. The Steam description names flamethrowers, harpoons, and mortars as examples of the arsenal, and notes that enemies get harder as a run progresses. A faction ability that covers a gap in your weapon spread is therefore worth more than one that duplicates it.

Practical framing for your first few runs:

• Pick a faction, then build around it. Treat the ability as the spine of the run and let the 140+ items fill in the rest.
• Use ship parts as a collection goal. Parts come from quests across different pirate realms. Whether the 150+ collectible parts provide permanent combat power is for reference only until verified by the developer or in-game.
• Expect a boss at the end. The launch announcement states each run builds toward an epic boss battle, so save a burst option.
• Lean on manual aim if you want precision. Auto-aim is available, but the toggle exists because timing matters for "devastating impact" hits.

None of that requires knowing a faction's exact numbers. It requires knowing which layer you are solving for.

Testing It's About Pirates Faction Abilities Without a Published Wiki

Since Elderwoof has not published a breakdown, self-testing is the reliable route. The good news is that the structure of the game makes comparison easy: 30 adventures and an Endless mode give you plenty of repeatable scenarios.

Run the same early adventure with two different factions and keep your item picks as similar as you can. Then answer these questions:

1. Does the ability scale with items, ship parts, or nothing at all? If it stays flat while your weapons grow, it is an early-game tool.
2. Does it favor auto-aim or manual aim? Test both on the same wave and compare clear speed.
3. How does it behave in Endless mode? Endless is where flat abilities fall off and multiplicative ones keep pace.
4. Which of the 10 captains amplifies it? Captain choice is the cheapest variable to swap between attempts.

Write your results down. Six factions is a small enough roster to map in a weekend, and a personal notes sheet beats a half-remembered forum post.

Where the Faction Choice Shows Up on the Leaderboard

Steam Leaderboards support is listed on the store page, and the press kit explicitly invites players to "compete on the leaderboard and claim your place among the top pirates." That matters for build planning: score-attack pressure rewards consistency, not novelty.

A faction ability you can trigger reliably on every wave will usually outscore a flashier one you mistime. If you are chasing ranks, treat It's About Pirates faction abilities as the fixed variable in your build and tune items around them — the reverse of how most players approach a first run.

Dated Snapshot: Price, Reception, and Release Details

Everything in this table reflects the Steam store page as captured on 2026-11-09 at 20:13 UTC. Prices and review totals change; treat these as a frozen observation, not a live quote.

A few notes on that snapshot. The 34-review total is small because the game was three days old at capture, so the Mixed rating reflects a very early sample rather than a settled verdict. The developer is Elderwoof Games, an independent studio based in Graz, Austria, which the launch announcement describes as debuting on Steam after two years of development.

If you want the live numbers rather than this snapshot, check the official It's About Pirates Steam page directly.

FAQ

How many factions are in It's About Pirates? Six. The official Steam store page and the Elderwoof Games press kit both list "6 Factions with unique abilities," as observed on 2026-11-09.

Are the individual It's About Pirates faction abilities documented anywhere official? Not in the material reviewed here. The developer confirms that six factions exist and that each has a unique ability, but names and numeric values are not published, so the details have to be learned in-game.

Do factions replace captains in the build system? No. The store page lists 10 captains and 6 factions as separate features, alongside over 140 build-shaping items and over 150 collectible ship parts. Faction choice is documented as a build layer; any combat role for the 150+ collectible parts is for reference only until verified.

Is the launch discount still available? The Steam page captured on 2026-11-09 showed a 15% introductory offer at $9.98 USD from a $11.75 USD base price, with the offer listed as ending November 16. That reflects the observation date only — check the store page for the price at the time you read this.