4 Player Game on VASSAL – August 13th, 2017
This was a 4 player game on VASSAL between myself, xerecs, repkosai, and wifey. We used Cadet-Captain Mike’s random setup tables, rolling 6-5-1 for free ships totalling 10 cargo and four free crew. Since the game was played in 2 chunks and I was only 1 of 4 players, this is the best summary I can muster.
The play order went from left to right as the fleets appear at the top: xerecs with a mostly Pirate fleet, repkosai with a mixed fleet, a7xfanben with a Cursed fleet, and wifey with a mostly English fleet. We did round earth and included plenty of UT’s!
The fleets scatter, and the gold race begins!
Repkosai’s Black Pearl (xerecs used that ship as well) found Pandora’s Box, bringing some craziness into the game. Wifey’s Monarca found one of the worst islands in recent memory, with negative UT’s, 0 coins, and Bad Maps, which is why the island in the southeast nearly round earthed to a different part of the map!
This was taken after we resumed play this past weekend, and Repkosai has lost the Black Pearl and Gibraltar, while wifey’s Monarca and my Lilu also sunk (the latter with copier DJC Davy Jones aboard, who was copying Emperor Blackheart’s All-Powerful keyword to be just like the OE Davy Jones). Xerecs’ Flying Dutchman has just docked home a captured Benito de Soto (via Bonny Peel) for a big 9 gold chunk. Wifey’s HMS Grand Temple found misfortune in the form of UT’s and was set upon by my Cursed fleet, but escaped and rid herself of the Runes of Death via whirlpooling, repairing soon afterwards. The Cursed gathered gold for a while and here they’ve struck, coming out of the fog to dismast Xerecs’ Black Pearl.
The south became the location of a hot action, with the Hades’ Realm finally revealing her secret weapon: Captain Nemo! I was trying to use Nemo in conjunction with OE El Fantasma (sac captain) in order to sac any crew for extra actions that didn’t benefit the HR (department) while aboard. To make it more complex and fun, Wraith was aboard the Fiddler’s Green to reanimate sacrificed crew for additional usage! The Cursed had the good fortune of discovering the Eye of Insanity early in the game, using it on the Fiddler’s Green to copy El Fantasma with Wraith and give the FG the captain ability. (in)Human Resources won a boarding party against the Black Pearl, allowing Nemo to capture Emperor Blackheart! This was important but also ironic, because I had previously used Davy Jones to copy EBH to essentially use the OE Davy Jones (which is what I originally had before remembering the Lilu was 11 points compared to 12 needed for OE DJ). The Cursed once again had access to an All-Powerful crew! In addition, this gave them an incredible cast of characters all on the same ship: Fantasma, Nemo, and Blackheart, some of the biggest characters from this game.
Here the Fiddler’s Green and Hades’ Realm team up to take down the Flying Dutchman. The Jikininki was also disposed of by the Cursed, a ship notably included by xerecs in a clever (and somewhat gamey) way of exploiting the setup rules, as she’s the only ship (not including sea creatures) in the game to not have any cargo space.
Repkosai’s Resolucion has captured Xerecs’ Black Pearl, giving us a second irony since repkosai had a BP earlier in the game before it was sunk. The Cursed have captured the Flying Dutchman and scuttled her to take advantage of Eternal.
After briefly collaborating with repkosai in a secret alliance, I unfortunately turned on him because it was the best move I could make that gave me the best chance of winning the game. Nemo’s captive EBH rolled a 6 to toss the Resolucion onto a reef, where she lost 3 of her 4 masts. The Hades’ Realm knocked the last one off before moving on to the BP. The Fiddler’s Green returns to the scene to get gold, but wifey has arrived! Alas, the Concorde and Grand Temple weren’t crewed enough to take on the juggernaut that the HR had become.
Ironically the human resources department grew to a massive size, with the HR using Nemo to snag Carlos Pavon off the Resolucion and a helmsman from the Concorde. The partially-repaired Flying Dutchman won a boarding party against the BP to get Hammersmith in Bonny Peel’s hands. I needed as much gold as I could get, and Hammersmith’s 5 and the gold loaded by the Fiddler’s Green would help. Wifey’s remaining ships gave their best effort but without captains were easy prey for the now-unstoppable Hades’ Realm.
In the end, Xerecs got THREE 7’s, a 1, and Benito de Soto’s 9 gold payout, earning the win despite my fantastic second half that ended in domination of the sea but not of profit.
1. xerecs: 31 gold
2. a7xfanben: 22 gold
3. repkosai: 14 gold
4. wifey: 13 gold
This was a very fun 4 player game that saw a lot of funny moments, ironies, and good gameplay. Xerecs got high gold values, and managed to pull off his plan of nabbing a very high-value crew in Benito. My plans were foiled early, but flourished late in the game. It would have been enough with a different treasure distribution, but I had a lot of fun! Repkosai got two 7’s himself, but was really smashed by xerecs’ Pirates and later betrayed by the Cursed. Wifey played a good game but was plagued by incredible misfortune, with a horrid treasure distribution dooming her chances of victory. With that, we look forward to more adventures on the high seas!