Captains use several kinds of ammunition to load their cannons, depending on situation. There are three basic types of ammo:
| Round Shots | to damage ship's hull | |
| Dismantling Shots | to damage ship's sails and reduce its speed | |
| Anti-personnel Shots | to reduce enemy's numbers |
In general, if you want to board a ship, you would use Dismantling Shots to slow it down and then Anti-personnel Shots right before the boarding, to kill off the crew. If you are not planning to board a ship, then you can go all the way with Round Shots to sink it.
Ammo for the cannons :
Solid Ammo : Multipurpose, but better than anything against the Hull.
Round Shot: yer basic iron cannonball.
Stone Shot: a round rock. Shatters on impact. Cheap, but not as powerful as Round Shot.
Dismantling Shot : Used primarily against the Sails and Rigging.
Bar Shot: two iron hemispheres joined by a solid bar.
Expanding Shot: two objects, both hemispheres with solid bars, but they are coupled together so that once they are fired from the gun, they expand out to about double the size of normal Bar Shot.
Chain Shot: two iron balls connected by a chain - larger size than either of the above two.
Star Shot: a 10 segment chain formed into a ring. This expands out to cover a huge surface area when fired, but it ends up being somewhat weaker than the above types.
Anti-Personnel Shot : Shotgun theory - extremely effective against crew, less so against other parts of the ship.
Langridge Shot: the poor-man's canister shot. "Langridge" was a fancy name for "shove in lots of nails, gravel, clamshells - whatever" It wasn't terribly effective, but it was easy to come by.
Canister Shot: the standard anti-personnel shot. It was literally a can filled with little iron balls.
Grapeshot: a new ammunition development in the early 18th century, and still (theoretically) restricted to the navy in PotBs.