120 Point Game
A7XfanBen vs. Captain Randy vs. Kogz03
9/5/2022
This was a 120 Point Game with 3 different players from the Pirates CSG community! Captain Randy ran a mostly Cursed fleet, while Kogz03 (of the discord server) ran a Pirate fleet. Labor Day was the “big Pirates day” of my 2022 Vegas trip, with both triple digit build total games happening on Monday! These are the house rules we used, with all game pieces in the Master Spreadsheet. Randy went first, followed by myself and kogz03.
Randy is in the south, myself in the southwest, and kogz03 in the north. Randy was wary of my Mysterious Island plans and chose one of them as his home island to take it out of play. My initial plan was to use an MI’s “negative” ability to fling treasure closer to home, where some of the canoes could pick up the excess. My canoes started in the northwest while Randy placed his French RtSS canoes in the east.
Randy’s fleet included a loaded Guichuan with some international crew, Grinder + helmsman, Coeur du Lion + Princess Auraa and Deleflote, Sea Monkey + explorer, Death’s Anchor, Sea Duck + explorer, and Jolly Mon + The Hag of Tortuga.
Here is the fleet I used:
Zhanfu + captain, helmsman, oarsman, Soul Mark (this Zhanfu is a wood paste model from Cloud of Craft Gaming)
Frontier + tribal chieftain (swapped for Yeshaji Angria on turn 1), canceller DNT, helmsman, oarsman
Star of Siam + helmsman, explorer, oarsman
10 American native canoes
USS Vermont + Calypso, Captain Charles Richard, tribal chieftain
Patagonia + Robinson, Lord Mycron, Bratley
UT’s: Nemo’s Charts, Protection from Davy Jones, Trees, Neptune’s Figurehead
Kogz03’s fleet:
Black Pearl + Calico Cat, captain, helmsman, oarsman
Revenant + Sean “Cannonball” Gallows, captain, helmsman, oarsman
Harbinger + Crimson Angel, captain, helmsman, oarsman
Raven’s Neck + Norrington, captain, helmsman, oarsman
Raven + explorer
Bloody Jewel + helmsman, explorer
Banshee’s Cry + explorer
Jolly Mon + The Hag of Tortuga
Two thirds into the first round and both 10 masters have moved into the safety of fog. Calypso fails her first roll which foils my early plans a bit.
The Frontier is given a second action via Mycron and explores the great turtle out from under Randy’s French canoes.
A sharpie-lined Black Pearl is even more formidable than usual:
At the upper left, the Sea Monkey and Death’s Anchor are being attacked by the Zhanfu after taking out some American canoes. The Star of Siam has emerged from fog to explore a wild island. The Frontier follows French canoes south while the Pirate fleet splits up.
Randy and I were aware of our playing status/rivalry throughout the game, but kogz03 was a new opponent for both of us and probably the most poised to create chaos in multiple areas of the board. In a big blow to Randy’s gold game, the Grinder was sunk by a dual attack from the Black Pearl and Revenant! The Harbinger eliminated 3 of the 4 canoes in my “canoe screen”, but the Raven’s Neck was abysmal against the Star of Siam, barely removing a single mast.
The native canoe at the bottom right has loaded two 2’s, Nemo’s Charts, and Neptune’s Trident. Not far away, Randy’s Guichuan attacks! She sinks the Star of Siam and blasts two masts off the Raven’s Neck.
After sustaining 4 hits of damage in her battle against The Cursed, the Zhanfu is victorious in sinking the Death’s Anchor flotilla and captures the Sea Monkey as a prize. The gold-laden canoe has her 2’s yanked off by nearby support canoes, who use their ability to divvy up the treasure and duck into the big fog bank nearby. This is because the other canoe is preparing to give its UT’s to the Zhanfu…. At the bottom right, the Frontier and Randy’s French canoes have emptied Mysterious Island #12 in the southeast.
1-2: Move all treasure coins from this island to any other wild island.
3-4: No effect.
5-6: When this ship explores this island, replace one treasure coin with a unique treasure from your collection.
The Black Pearl continues south and sinks the Sea Duck:
The Guichuan redocked and sank the Raven’s Neck. It was pretty obvious that Randy was trying to keep the Guichuan docked as often as possible, which made it even more obvious that SS Bianco’s Haulers were probably on the ship. The surprise for me was when Randy revealed F&S Lenoir to also be aboard, which he revealed to cancel the RN’s captain when kogz03 went to shoot the Guichuan.
I had a good idea the Trees UT was in the northeast, and transfer Yeshaji Angria to the Zhanfu because I anticipate the Frontier needing to dock at home sometime, likely upon towing the Sea Monkey home for repairs. However, the Frontier’s free hoist explore does net her the Nemo’s Charts UT, as she is the ship most likely to “farm” the mysterious island if needed. Plans are set in motion.
After another round, ships are scattered around the map. In the north, the return of the Raven and Banshee’s Cry to kogz03’s HI has put him in the lead for gold. The Zhanfu and Frontier stay together, towing the Sea Monkey to the northeast via round earth. At the lower left, the Vermont has unloaded Calypso to my HI to avoid triggering her ability. I was worried that creating more whirlpools would give more avenues the other players could use to attack me, especially with a Deleflote-powered Guichuan and a trio of action generators in the Pirate fleet. Randy’s canoes sail home with coins aboard, while the Coeur ducks into the fog bank to avoid any potential ram and board threat from the Revenant. We are getting into the endgame phase, but barely any gold has been unloaded to home islands! I was fully expecting a home island raider crew and Bianco’s Haulers on the Guichuan, which is why I kept the Frontier loaded with gold and my gold canoes in their fog bank. I was hoping to wait for Randy to go after kogz03’s home island, at which point it would buy me time to pull off a grand combo and/or get more gold home in the meantime.
The Frontier explores the northeastern island and the Zhanfu uses a free explore to repair from 6 masts to 10 with the Trees UT! Randy was grumbling, as he now had a healthy 10 master to potentially deal with. Little did he know that there was a far bigger threat… just not one currently in play.
Success! Just as kogz03 was sailing his gunships towards the Zhanfu and Frontier (possibly because by now I had revealed HI Raider Yeshaji Angria in order to spy on some coins to make endgame gold calculations), Captain Randy took the Guichuan over to his HI and raided it with SM El Fantasma! The Black Pearl was sunk in short order! The climax had been set in motion!
Randy’s other two canoes had arrived home with gold, which I knew from the Frontier’s exploratory efforts was likely more than my canoes had aboard. If he was going to nab some of the Pirate coins, I was at least able to spy which ones via Yeshaji. However, I knew my time was running out. Due to the fog bank chain connecting kogz03’s HI to Randy’s HI, the Guichuan could probably remain completely safe in fog if she wanted to as soon as she stopped raiding the Pirate HI. From there she could dock home stolen loot, at which point it would be extremely difficult to permanently steal, between the Guichuan’s protective firepower and ability to re-steal it. Thus, I had to prevent the Guichuan from getting home, preferably sinking her with as much gold as possible aboard to deny it from going to Randy or kogz03. I did use my remaining 4 canoes to move the great turtle towards the Guichuan, but due to the moving restrictions I couldn’t get it into an effective blocking position.
The Zhanfu started towing the Sea Monkey again, as I really thought she might prove useful in the long run if I could ever get her back to my HI for repairs. The Frontier sped to the southeast with Mycron assistance and did something quite rare and unusual… she used the Hoist keyword to unload one of her own coins to the wild island. She docked there and rolled only a 2, which changed to a 4 due to Nemo’s Charts (no effect).
Randy redocked the Guichuan twice more (dismasting the Harbinger in the process) to steal an additional two coins from the Pirate HI, bringing the Guichuan to 4 coins total from her thievery. With a fog exit nearly guaranteed on the next turn for the Guichuan, I knew now was the time to strike. The Frontier redocked at MI #12, finally getting the 5-6 roll needed to bring in a UT from outside the game. I was really happy that I had brought some contingency UT’s in my tin on the trip, as I punched a fresh one out and placed it face down on the Frontier. Mycron then gave the Frontier a second action, with the ship using her hoist to dump another of her own coins on the island before redocking again. On one of the MI rolls I got a little help from Nemo’s Charts, and with the second roll I had secured the ultimate combo of Pirates CSG. I went back into my tin and punched out another secret UT and put it face down on the Frontier. After some brief consideration I knew now was the time to play the combo, immediately.
THE ODIN MISSILE.
I flipped Runes of Odin face up to place an iceberg from outside the game right behind the Guichuan. Next came Runes of Magic, which was used to move the iceberg straight into the hull of the Guichuan. And just like that, the Guichuan, all her defensive crew and all her stolen loot was removed from the game! O_O
Ironically, I had planned to use the same MI for low roll farming in order to fling coins closer to home. That option became pointless once the coins on the island were gone. However, once I found Nemo’s Charts and figured there was no better (or easier) option to eliminating the Guichuan as the main threat to my game, the high roll farming became key. How ironic that in Vegas it was a UT gambling scheme (with a little help from the house 😉 ) that took down a high roller ship. XD
Now I just had to make sure I would end the game with the most gold. kogz03’s stolen loot had just gone to the locker, so I peeked at one of Randy’s coins with Yeshaji. Seeing a 3, I knew he couldn’t have more than me since he only had one other coin. Throughout the game I was trying to track how much gold was available since we started with 45. Before the Odin Missile combo I knew I had 15 between the Frontier and canoes in the fog bank. Essentially “saccing” the lowest value coins on the Frontier (both 2’s) for the Runes brought me to 11, still enough to win since Randy’s second coin couldn’t be more than 7 (so he couldn’t have more than 10 total). Knowing all this I quickly brought the Frontier and my canoes home, ending the game as quickly as possible now that the Guichuan had been eliminated.
The final scores:
- Ben: 11 gold
- Randy: 7
- Kogz03: 5
Quite the finish! The Guichuan only had 6 gold on her when she went down, but that still would have been enough for Randy to win with 13 (or kogz03 to tie me at 11) if she hadn’t gone down. Theoretically I still had the most at 15-13 over Randy if we both had just brought all our gold home, but I have a feeling it would have gotten more complicated than that and Randy would have raided my HI for more (at which point it would have been extremely difficult to re-steal between the Guichuan having Ghost Ship, a canceller, and Bianco’s Haulers). Besides, it was far more fun for me to sacrifice 4 of my gold to deny 6 gold from either of the other players, essentially ending the game in a grand climax of epic combo savagery!! Another 10 master crushed by the power of the Norse gods, called by the Frontier’s crew with Nemo’s help!! O_O
