Just played a game at 4 players, 40 points! (not solo) It would be a friendly casual game, the first in quite some time for the other 3 players. (although one played against me in November 2018)
The fleets, in turn order:
Mixed:
Bruja + captain, helmsman
Pawtucket + helmsman
HMS Comet
Cursed:
Locker + Davy Jones (OE version)
Lilu + helmsman, shipwright
Spanish:
Resolucion (OE) + oarsman
San Agustin + explorer, oarsman
Spilled Salt
A7XfanBen:
The Jades can use Calypso too!
-I replaced the Tiger’s Breath with the Sea Crane because I do not yet have a physical copy of the former, swapping out the oarsman for an explorer.
The Tiger’s Paw fittingly docked in the middle of my ships, as Calypso was the centerpiece of my gimmick fleet.
Round earth rules:
Only 1 wild island, but essentially 3 with 5 coins per beach:
Player 1 sets out, with stormy waters accurate because there was actually a storm that happened during the game!
Calypso’s first roll is successful and she’s off to the whirlpool races!
Not wanting to simply go to the nearest beach, the Virtuous Wind and Sea Crane show up at the second whirlpool near a beach north of their home island:
Predictably, most players sent their ships straight for the gold. However, there were a couple noteworthy exceptions….
Davy Jones piloted the Locker towards the Spanish fleet via round earth, while the Resolucion (out of frame to top right) headed away from the gold.
True to their faction, the Cursed attack! The Lilu rams the VW, while the Locker surfaces and slams into the San Agustin. The Cursed are disappointed to see both boarding parties result in ties.
Shades of CTO….
Davy Jones is ready to rumble!
With her path to a beach now blocked by various things, the Sea Crane doubles back to the first whirlpool Calypso created. I didn’t want to create an ocean setup that benefited my fleet, and that certainly played a factor here, with Calypso being nearly useless or negative to use for the remainder of the game with the gold in mostly one spot.
The center area was getting more crowded, with multiple factions having designs on the 15 coins. The Spilled Salt shot 2/3 to nearly “de-segment” Davy Jones’ Locker!
Davy Jones rolled a 6!! The Cursed made the most of it, moving the Virtuous Wind away to unpin the Lilu. The Spanish took advantage, with the Resolucion shooting 4/4 to sink the Jade 3 master! Jones himself surfaced his Locker, turning away to head home.
The San Agustin does the heavy lifting of the gold game for the Spanish, picking up 4 coins with her explorer. With only 1 coin left on that beach, the Sea Crane again whirls around, hoping to get some loot without disturbing the Lilu. However, she lost a mast to the whirlpool.
With the rest of her fleet struggling, Ms. Cheng has to unfurl the sails of the Tiger’s Paw, ignore Calypso’s whirlpool frenzy effect, and start slowly rowing/sailing out for some gold. The Spilled Salt of the Spanish fleet reverses direction… possibly to shadow the Locker?
Davy Jones rolled a 5 on the Locker, which allowed the Lilu to repair and get another action. Showing the truly aggressive and all-out play style of the Cursed, the Lilu shoots with her 4S mizzenmast cannon and HITS to dismast the Sea Crane! At this point I was all but out of the game, but some hearty Alestorm kept my spirits afloat. XD
You could call this the “endgame” of this particular night. The Lilu dumped both her crew to grab 2 coins, which she maneuvered home. The Locker repaired, then used an extra action to move and shoot at the Resolucion, taking off 2 masts. The Resolucion responded in kind, taking the Locker back down to 1 segment for the second time in the game. The San Agustin has unloaded her coins, while the Spilled Salt and Tiger’s Paw look for some of their own. The Mixed fleet player prefers to not engage in combat unless necessary, and was satisfied with all 5 coins they grabbed from the beach that is empty in this picture.
The north was certainly the busy area tonight, with neither Jade gold runner returning to the south and the Mixed fleet simply going to a beach and back, content with their harbor formation at home.
The finale involved one of those typically desperate “final fight” engagements where 2 or more ships fought over a single coin. Back and forth they went, with the Lilu, Spilled Salt, and San Agustin all vying for a coin that didn’t matter to the final scores in the end. The Cursed ended up getting it, despite an initial mast disadvantage and the Spilled Salt having the Lilu’s former helmsman. (by this point the Locker and Resolucion were derelict)
Not bothered by anyone, the Tiger’s Paw was able to very slowly get one coin for the Jades, helping me to avoid being shut out.
Final Scores
- Mixed fleet: 17 gold
- Spanish: 14
- Cursed: 10
- Jade Rebellion: 1
A solid return for me fellow pirates, as they raked in almost all the gold while keeping Calypso from creating too much chaos! In the end the pacifist fleet won, having gotten good values from their otherwise undisturbed beach. In a way, most of the game was just a fight for second place!
Yay, nice to see the Pawtucket get used, I got he in a pack wayyy back when my collection could fit into a pencil box. I just used he in a 150 point game actually, but didn’t take any pictures.
anywho, nice little game, with some interesting fleets.
PS, I’m not sue if it’s on my end o not, but I’m not able to post to the Customs thread, the site doesn’t think I’m logged in. I’ll do a double check now to see if the problem has resolved itself.
Thanks! The Pawtucket is definitely an underrated hybrid/gold runner. Hope to hear about that game sometime!
Ben
(looking into the Custom Ships thing)