Deed

A deed is an item that represents ownership of either a building or a ship. Deeds can be transferred to other players using the trade window.

Deeds do not exist for stalls.

Building deeds

A building deed is created when the governor of an island places a new construction site on the island. The deed is placed directly into his or her inventory, and it is their responsibility to give it to the eventual owner.

Deeds to government infrastructure buildings (fort / palace, bank, bazaar, commodities market, estate agent, and housing, but not inns) and the sole shoppe, if any, on an outpost island^[1], can be automatically transferred away from the current deed-holder. This happens when an island gets a new governor, either through a vote of the controlling flag's royalty or by a successful blockade of the island by an opposing flag. If one of these deeds is traded to another pirate, that pirate will be warned about these automatic transfers.

If a building is made to dust due to nonpayment of taxes, the deed to that building will be removed from the holder's inventory.

Ship deeds

Ship deeds are delivered into the booty panel of a pirate when they deliver a ship from a shipyard. If a ship sinks, the deed is removed from the owner's inventory. If a pirate holding a ship deed is deleted either by the player or for inactivity, the deed to the ship is placed on the market bidding table of the ship, and can be retrieved by anyone ranked fleet officer or higher in the crew. If a ship belonging to a deleted pirate is set for personal use, the ship will change itself to crew use when it is boarded. Note: There may be a delay between the deletion of the pirate and the ship registering this fact.

It is not possible to retrieve the deed from a ship belonging to a pirate who has simply become dormant or was banned but has not been deleted.

Sealed deeds

Starting with the Chocolate Mystery Box Promotion, ships could be awarded to players as a "sealed deed." This is a type of deed similar to a wrapped badge. It does not represent an actual ship until it is unsealed. At that time, the ship object is created and ported at the owner pirate's home island.

Deedswapping

Deedswapping refers to the act of trading a ship deed between two pirates, particularly during times of war or in a blockade. This is commonly done for a couple of reasons:

• To reduce the risk of sinking in times of war by transferring the ship out of a flag at war. These deeds are then traded back when the danger has subsided.
• Prior to release 2008-10-14 it was necessary to trade a ship deed if another player was to chart it. See Memorization.

Historical notes

• Prior to Release 2017-02-07, pirates could swap a ship's deed to avoid embargoes. As a result, a bribe is required to port one's ship.
• In Release 2006-03-30, the automatically-transferring infrastructure deeds were made untradeable, in an attempt to reduce scamming. This was reversed, and the warning added, in Release 2006-04-20
• Prior to Release 2005-02-11, governors could place ship deeds on a special table in the palace to commission a navy. This release repurposed the navy with introduction missions, rendering the commissioned ships obsolete.
• Prior to Release 2004-07-09, deleting a pirate deleted the deed to any ships in his or her possession. This left the ship usable by the crew, but untradeable.
• Release 2004-06-18 added deeds for bazaars and other governmental buildings.
• Creation of shoppes from construction sites was added along with blockades and colonisation, in Release 2004-04-28
• Shoppe deeds were added to the game in Alpha release 2003-06-24. Construction of shoppes was at that point done by the estate agent.
• Ship deeds were implemented in Alpha release 2003-05-23. Prior to this, ships were untradeable, and remained with the crew in which they were originally purchased.
  • Only new ships had deeds, ships purchased prior to this release remained without deeds.
• War conventions were created in part to address issues of deedswapping out of war.