First 5 fleet 500 point game – August 2011

Posted on December 2, 2018July 11, 2019 by Ben

Originally posted to Pojo in August 2011

August 5th, 2011

I am extremely excited to start my next project: a five-way 500-point game! Cumulatively, 2500 total points! O_O (2520 if we add the ransom crew +5’s)

The factions for this massive enterprise remain the same. It will be the English v.s. Pirates v.s. Spanish v.s. French v.s. Amercursedcorsairebels. I have already constructed the fleets with crew (had to write all of it down last night, it was quite fun!, never built fleets that big). In total, I am using 151 ships and six sea monsters. Many very prestigious and well-known ships will be participating, including: HMS Grand Temple, HMS Titan, Nautilus, Enterprise, Divine Dragon, El Acorazado, Revenant, Harbinger, Raven, Lechim Namod, El Toro, Darkhawk II, Magnifique, Soleil Royal, Jarvis, and Asesino de la Nave. I am planning on using 20 islands, with ten of them being mysterious. I am also planning on using 5 reefs, 5 fog banks, 4 sargasso seas, 4 icebergs, and 3 whirlpools. I am using all of my unique treasure (22, I think?). Hopefully it will live up to my expectations.

August 6th, 2011

Today I started the much anticipated five way 500 point game (the 2500 is in total between the fleets).

The 20 islands and 21 pieces of terrain were placed, home islands chosen, treasure buried, and dies rolled. I, as the English went first, followed by the Pirates, French, Amercursedcorsairebels, and Spanish, in that order. The Leicester, HMS Grand Temple, and HMS Titan used extra actions/SAT’s to get a jump start. The Pirates set out, and had a balanced strategy that included collecting, stealing, and sinking the gold (not surprising, eh?). The French had their own corner, and had the most ships since I don’t have very many crew for them. The Amercs set out not sure of their strategy but knowing they could create havoc with their best ships (Divine Dragon, Enterprise, and USS Stephens). The Spanish were going to try to avoid conflict while providing their treasure ships with adequate cover.

Turn one passed almost without incident. During the Amercs’ turn, they revealed the All Powerful Davy Jones! Obviously the Pirates were quite ignorant of the fact that the Cursed would use him, placing two of their best gunships, the decked out Harbinger and the similarly loaded Prussian Crown, both five-masters, right next to each other! Now I know that what happens next is technically illegal, but I like to keep my games full of surprises! The Amercs rolled a six! (FYI: The OE Davy Jones has guaranteed extra action capabilities, 1-4 is for the ship he is on, 5 for any friendly ship, 6 for any enemy ship) Arguably the most feared man (?) on the sea gave his order, and the Prussian Crown began firing on her own ship, the Harbinger!!!!! Behold the incredible power and almost limitless possibilities of DAVY JONES!

At the beginning of the second turn, I rolled for my SAT with the HMS Leicester, and got a 6. I also had Myngs and the Gentleman for reroll on board (I know triple actions are also frowned upon, but you’ll see how badly I got paid back!), so I decided to go take on the Harbinger. Using my helmsman, I put my gunship right in the narrow space between the Harbinger and Prussian Crown, the Harbinger already missing three masts. Then I let the dice do their thing, and when it was all said and done both five masters had been sunk!!!!! The Leicester’s superb ability of eliminating two masts per hit let me hit the Harbinger twice, sinking her, then turn to the Prussian Crown, and with the help of Sir Christopher Myngs, sink her, too!

The revenge the Pirates exacted on me was very painful. The Revenant came up and dismasted my Leicester with one broadside! Then I tried to get the Leicester out of there, but accidentally ended up in a horribly undesirable fight! A complete disaster, the Leicester sunk without any crew being saved. The Titan was forced to stop and fight, and was able to dismast the Revenant before the Titan was dismasted by the Broken Key. Even worse for my morale, my HMS Grand Temple, newly built (out of the 151 ships participating in the game, she was the most highly anticipated) and decked out with Calico Cat, Griffin and helmsman, was sunk by a combination of Pirate ships, including the underrated Xiamen’s Claws. I thought I was going to lose all three of my best gunships before getting any treasure/captured ships, but through a small miracle I was able to extricate the HMS Titan from the action through my version of chain-towing (I checked on the Rules thread of MT, this is legal). I used one ship to tow the Titan, placing her at the stern of the nearest ship, then releasing her, then towing her and placing her behind the next ship, and so on down the line till she was out of harms way. I lost the HMS Concorde in the process, but that was a small price to pay for the salvaged ship, probably paid thirty plus points with the crew I had on the Titan.

Both the Pirates and I were happy to disengage and lick our wounds as we headed back to our respective home islands, the Pirates managing to capture the Sea Tiger with Commander Temple on board in the process. Meanwhile, I had signed an imaginary non-aggression pact with the nearby Spaniards, as we were both feeling like being nice and sharing the few nearby islands. The Pirates were doing some simple treasure running with their Darkhawk II’s, and they are trying CCMike’s idea of using a crew (Genny Gallows here) to add +2 to every treasure. Another 6+ ships and the two sea monsters, Seleucis and Teach, tried unsuccessfully to get to the battle with the British, the Britons already sailing away. It was not a large scale battle, but the Broken Key was also sunk.

The French slowly made their way away from their corner to the southeast and started to gather gold. The Soleil Royal possessed the only extra action crew in the fleet, and pounced on the Cursed ship Dark Pact, dismasting her before she could use Wraith to eliminate all the French crew, but then fell into a similar situation as the Leicester. She was isolated and didn’t have access to backup in time before she was also sunk, by the USS Stephens. The Amercs weren’t interested in a full-scale fight, so they let the French eventually capture the Dark Pact, Bashaw Folly and USS Quigley while letting the rest of their ships get away. The Divine Dragon continued to create havoc with Davy Jones as the HMS Bretwalda lost three masts after being fired on by fellow English ship HMS Granville.

The Amercs and Spanish didn’t do too much, although the Spanish got some treasure while the Amercs encountered problems. The Nautilus had Captain Nemo, Luc Savard, and a helmsman on board when she docked at a mysterious island. She rolled for effect just fine, but upon turning over the treasure, found the UT Missionary! Goodbye crew!(16 points worth, too) The new terrain I got, icebergs and whirlpools, didn’t play a role so far, but I expect that to change.

Overall, a very satisfying start (albeit a sad one) to my very anticipated game! I will be away tomorrow but will hopefully play some turns Sunday. I think things through, so moving more than two dozen ships per faction takes a while. Great time I had!

August 10th, 2011

I’ve played a few more turns, and I, as the English, was able to capture the Cursed Blade (with Captain Mission, Lucky the Parrot, and a captain aboard), after she came through a whirlpool looking to steal UT’s from my HMS Lord Walpole. The English also formed an alliance with the Spanish, and now the fleets are collaborating on what to do next. The Spanish seem content to help me get back the Sea Tiger (I want her back for Commander Temple, who is still on board). It’s possible I might go after the Divine Dragon with Davy Jones on board, but this would be difficult. The Amercursedcorsairebels have not been hostile towards anybody(besides with Davy Jones), but seem to be biding their time doing almost nothing. The Nautilus went through a whirlpool to escape the French Rocher Noir (can shoot at submerged ships within S of her), but didn’t have to lose any masts due to her finding of the UT Protection from Davy Jones earlier in the game.

Meanwhile, the Pirate ships damaged from their battle with the English are back at their HI and repairing, while some ships recently brought back some treasure.

The French are about to capture the derelict L’Aguila, who, along with the Alquimista, went in the opposite direction of the Spanish fleet, heading east for gold. Now they are both in trouble! Earlier in the game the French captured the Amercs’ Dark Pact, Bashaw Folly, and USS Quigley, and seem to be developing an effective strategy of hunting in wolf packs of ships that close in on enemy targets who have been separated from the main fleet. They are doing this because I don’t have very many French crew, so instead they have mostly empty ships (37 in the fleet to start), and want to make up for lack of crew by having the largest fleet by a decent margin.

The French and Amercs are the only factions lacking gold right now, but there should be some coming in soon for the French. The Enterprise just passed by some of the Pirate fleet without firing on them, so either a non-aggression pact or alliance may come to fruition between the Pirates and Amercs. It remains to be seen what the goals of the Amercs are, but the English/Spanish are planning to go on the attack as soon as they can repair their damaged gunships and formulate a plan of action (or a plan of extra actions, haha).

BTW: the icebergs actually were a factor today, taking down 4-5 masts in three turns.

Additional Comment:

Today I got through four more turns.

The English finished repairing their damaged ships and set out to punish the Pirates. They also managed to capture a Longshanks that was out looking for treasure alone. The English got there first, however, and now have some impressive UT’s: Dry Powder, Mines, and Marksman’s Map, although they also have Albatross, so he’s been limiting the number of extra actions ships get (-1 to die rolls made for the ship).

The Pirates are almost done repairing, and the Pandora was able to bring in some more treasure. The Black Diamond and Muerta de la Corona were out raidng the Spanish, but on their way back were surrounded by these same determined Spaniards. The Spanish sunk both ships, but the Pirates were able to put their valuable crew (OE Jack Hawkins and a helmsman, among others) on a few Darkhawk II’s that were nearby. They then proceeded to run away! I don’t have Captain Jack Sparrow, but it seemed like he was in charge, as the Pirates quickly fled from any contact with the Spanish gunships, including the loaded Acorazado.

The French completed the dismasting and capturing of the Alquimista and L’Aguila and began towing them back. The French lost some masts in the process, but not from the Spanish, but icebergs! The die rolls for the icebergs were very effective today, taking out three masts on La Vengeance and both masts on the L’Amazone. The rest of the French fleet slowly turned to the south, seeing a couple of Pirate ships separated from the main group, but the Pirates quickly thought better of it. The highlight today for the French was the building of my only fort, St. Pierre!

The Amercs continued to baffle their opponents, first reversing direction after heading due west the day before, turning back to the east where they came from. Even more surprisingly, they turned down the Pirates’ offer of having an alliance. Then they turned to the southwest to avoid coming into contact with the French. They didn’t see how close the Spanish were to them, and disaster struck (albeit a small one). I, as the British, wanted to capture the Divine Dragon with Davy Jones as her captain, and my allies the Spanish shared the same goal. The normal action for the Divine Dragon was used to explore the Nautilus (finally at the surface) to take the UT’s Protection from Davy Jones and Screw Engine. Davy Jones used another six to move the powerful Acorazado out of striking distance, but allowing the Santa Ana (SCS) to move in and pummel her! The other Spanish ships were too far away to assist, but nonetheless turned toward the sight of the Divine Dragon finally seeming mortal. The Santa Ana’s die rolls were some of the most dramatic yet, the Spanish pausing after each one to yell and celebrate. Out of four possible hits, the Santa Ana scored three, including a firepot, so now the Dragon is on fire and has three masts remaining.

The problem for the allies is that the Dragon has many possible escape routes, and has the entire Amerc fleet nearby. She can dock at the nearby island and use the UT there, Trees, to repair. Or she can use the Screw Engine/extra action to get back to her home island (probably about 8S away) before taking more damage, then repair and sit there until the enemy moves far enough away. The third alternative is to go use the whirlpool to teleport to the remote northwest part of the sea, while not taking more damage due to Protection from Davy Jones. She will not fight because she only has three cannons left, doesn’t have the reverse captain keyword available, and the Acorazado is near with a crew-killer on board. Whatever Davy Jones chooses, it is sure to cause difficult decisions for the rest of the ships involved in the skirmish: whether or not to follow the Dragon through the whirlpool (on both the Spanish and Amerc sides), and if the Spanish want a large-scale battle with the Amercs, having already gotten involved with the Pirates.

The very near future has the possibility of changing the game immensely for the duration, and we will see what exciting developments unfold!

August 11th, 2011

The Divine Dragon decided to use the Screw Engine and extra action from DJ to escape to her home island. There she was able to fully repair, but not before the captured Cursed Blade rammed her and used her ability to steal the UT Protection from Davy Jones. The Lechim Namod finally entered the fray to try to protect the Dragon from being hit before reaching her home island, and managed to dismast the crew-killing HMS Granville.

Some other Amerc ships returned home for repairs, among them the Congress and Clear Wind. The Santa Molina managed to use Broadsides Attack to sink the powerful Acorazado, and then the Amercs used the Congress’s last mast and the Concord to sink the SCS Santa Ana, which was the only other ship the Spanish had with extra action/SAT capabilities. Now they are in trouble, as the huge French fleet is now sailing for the remaining Amerc ships from the east, while the Spanish are coming at them and engaging them to the west. The Enterprise was cornered by a dozen or so Spanish ships, and decided to go out with a bang, sinking the colorful La Sirviente before being sunk in turn by L’Aguila and the Selkie (captured). The USS Stephens, back at the home island of the Amercs, used Commander Stephen Decatur to get extra actions two turns in a row so she could repair her two remaining masts, then she went and rammed the Cursed Blade, trying to reacquire Protection from Davy Jones. This she did, easily winning the boarding roll and then dismasting the Blade with her built-in captain ability. The only problem is that the Blade can (I think) use her ability next turn to take the UT right back, as she is still touching the Stephens, then have the nearest English ship take it away (maybe I’m overrating UT’s, but they are fun to use).

Meanwhile, those same Englishmen were busy chasing the Pirates, who seem to be getting the better of the battle so far, sinking the HMS Titan before she could wreak havoc. The Titan still managed to dismast two medium-size Pirate ships after being damaged, though . The Pirates are fleeing far to the southeast, but they have reached the French harbour and will soon be at Ocean’s Edge .

The French are going after the Amercs with almost all the ships they have, but the stragglers that were towing damaged ships away from the icebergs of the Frozen North were sunk unexpectedly by the Enterprise.

The Spanish are also going after the Amercs, but from a different direction, creating a trap from which it is unlikely that the Amercs will emerge victorious. Despite the Jarvis and Louisiana sunk, and Santa Molina and Bosun’s Bane being dismasted, the Amercs pressed on, and the Swamp Fox used captain/Broadsides Attack to eliminate one of the giant crabs, El Toro.

These are just the highlights, many other ships have been sunk, and many more will go down in the near future!

August 12th, 2011

The chaos continued, with more and more ships being sunk/dismasted. The Amercs continued to fight off the combined forces (though not actually allies) of the French and Spanish, but they were overwhelmed. The USS Stephens sunk, while the Amercs managed to use the nearby whirlpool to warp to the deserted southwest area, although they were only able to get four ships there, the Divine Dragon, the Nautilus, the Boston, and the cursed junk Clear Wind.

In the southeast corner, the English appeared to be losing the battle, having their HMS Gargantuan sunk and other ships dead in the water, derelict. The French were attacking the Amercs with everything they had, losing one Valois, both Bonapartes, and some masts. The Spanish continued to press from the opposite direction, and the Amercs would have lost the battle…

Now for the moment of truth! The two Spanish Concepcions, loaded with gold after exploring the last island, in the deserted northwest corner of the sea, had the last treasure on board. They didn’t have helmsman (I only have two for the Spanish), and so were sailing at only L speed. The Dragon and her Amerc comrades were possibly within striking range, and knowing that they wouldn’t win anyway, decided to cause some last-minute end-of-game chaos! The Dragon raced towards them as the Spanish approached their home island. The Spanish fleet directly to the east turned around and headed towards the approaching Amercs to try to intercept them before reaching the Spanish treasure galleons. Davy Jones suddenly loomed very large. The Dragon rolled a one and a four on consecutive turns, allowing the Dragon to catch the treasure ships just before they reached their home island (not making this up, they were literally within L of it!). The Dragon had been fully repaired from her battles earlier in the game and made short work of the Spanish ships, sinking both in one turn! The treasure is not divided between the two players in a multiplayer game with 4+ players, so it was removed from the game.

Now it was time to count the treasure. This was very dramatic, and between the first three fleets, very close as well. The final count:
1. Pirates: 48
2. Spanish: 45
3. English: 43
4. French: 28
5. Amercursedcorsairebels: 9

After I finished the final count (disappointed that the Pirates, of all nations, won, and because I came in close, but still only third), I realized just how important it was that the Divine Dragon had sunk both Spanish Concepcions. Guess how much treasure was on them: 11! This would have been enough if they had made it back to their home island, but instead it was removed, allowing the Pirates to win by a tiny margin of three. Now the what-ifs start: If the Dragon had been sunk back when she was in trouble, being hit by the Santa Ana with El Acorazado not far away. If the Spanish had put a helmsman on even just one of the Concepcions, she probably would have made it back. If the HMS Granville had gotten more than one hit on the Dragon not long before she went through the whirlpool (this is significant because the Granville has crew-killing built in, so she could’ve eliminated another crew on the next turn).

Alas, it was not the Spaniards’ day; the Pirates are once again victorious. They were fighting the English on the other side of the ocean when the Dragon interfered, which appears controversial. The Pirates and Amercs apparently never made a deal for an alliance, but they may have made a secret one, as they never fired on each other and the Amercs appeared to have helped the Pirates win. We will never know, this is just speculation. Maybe it was on purpose, but it does seem like Davy Jones to want to go out with a bang rather than just running perpetually from his adversaries. In cahoots, or not? On that note, I say goodbye to the biggest game I have played of Pirates, which included many great moments, excitement, and a mysterious ending that will puzzle us all…

Thanks for reading! Check out my other Battle Reports for more adventures!

The 2011 cumulative game – Pirates CSG Battle Report

Posted on December 2, 2018September 19, 2019 by Ben

Originally posted to Pojo and Miniature Trading on November 10th, 2014.

I haven’t played a game yet, but I wanted to document an old game to the best of my ability. Plus, I don’t want this thread to get locked up. 😀

I started the Pojo version of the Battle Reports thread on July 24th, 2011, about a month after I joined MT and Pojo. I was getting back into the game for the first time in multiple years, and started playing again.

I don’t know exactly how many games I played between mid-June of 2011 and July 24th, but I don’t think it was very many. There were three reasons:
1. I was spending a bunch of time on MT and Pojo getting to know the sites.
2. I believe I did a Historical Fantasy Scenario (HFS), which is basically using the ships to wage huge naval wars without using the actual rules of the game.
3. I played a MASSIVE game that was never fully written about.

#3 has always been a very interesting topic when I occasionally think about it, which isn’t very often. Since I started the Battle Reports thread on Pojo after the game ended, a lot of the finer details have been forgotten. However, here I will write what I remember. This particular game holds a special place in my personal Pirates CSG “lore” if you will – all of my older games are documented, so I can go back and remember what happened. This one is a murky subject that is a legendary game in my book, sort of akin to the SiaB discussions and old eBay posts, among other famous posts here at MT. I have found some limited documentation of the game in the first thread I ever started at Pojo.

Back in those days, when I did HFS’s, I used an entire room of floor space, although the particular room isn’t huge, and of course has many things on the floor to inhibit space (but also provide natural obstructions 🙂 ). Because of the huge sea, ships took longer to reach their destinations.

Each faction had a harbour. The English were in the far east, the Spanish in the south, the Pirates in the north, the French in the northwest, and an alliance of the Americans, Cursed, Barbary Corsairs, and Mercenaries in the southwest. The harbours were made out of dozens of duplicate ship deckplates, with “unlaunched” ships sitting on the deckplates waiting to be bought, whereas launched ships would dock in different places in the harbour. I used to punch out all of my duplicates because I used them for HFS’s and because I hadn’t started trading here yet.

Edit (7/22/2015): I’ve made a harbour example. Here’s what a typical harbour would look like:

The game was a cumulative one, where points are spent as the game goes along to build up your fleet. However, there was a distinguishing factor that set this game apart from all others that I’ve played: the treasure distribution.

Normally for a cumulative game, each island starts out with maybe 3 or 4 treasure coins each, and treasure magically replenishes itself at the end of each turn until the original max is reached. However, when I did HFS’s, I would simply stack as much treasure on the islands as possible. When I say stack, I mean STACK. Each stack of coins would be at least 10 coins high (usually more I think), and there would be a minimum of (probably) around 6 or more stacks per island. This was the case for EVERY island, not just some “Paradise Island” in the middle. (You can see where this is going O_O)

Since I was so used to placing treasure like this, I did the same for the cumulative game. I can’t remember if I ever had the treasure replenish itself as well, but either way there was basically so much gold on every island that you could barely see the island itself, not to mention that the stacks were taller than some of the ships. XD

Edit (11/27/2015): Here’s an example of what an average wild island would look like for this game:

Also, I used custom rules with the introduction of infantry and artillery units from RISK, but they didn’t play a big factor in the game.

EDIT: I wrote all of this before I found the old thread on Pojo, which I’ll quote from occasionally to supplement the report I wrote today.

06-20-2011

a7xfanben wrote:

I am starting a long game where each player starts with 20 points for ships/crew. I placed 20 islands in my room, 14 of them mysterious. I placed all of my unique treasure, and I am going to experiment using the infantry and artillery units from Risk (I don’t have any forts, sadly). Here are my rules for them (still in the early stages):

Infantrymen units (cost two points): They can be stationed at home harbour (or home island, I use harbours so I can fit all the ships) or on island. A player with an infantry or artillery unit on an island is occupying the island. The infantrymen are eligible for invasions/shoot actions. Invasions: An invasion counts as a general action. Therefore, a ship cannot dock at an island and invade that same turn unless her ability lets her dock and explore in the same move action.

The infantry units act as returning fire, not as an actual cannon. When an enemy ship fires on them, and misses twice in a row, one mast from the enemy ship is eliminated. Boarding parties: When an enemy attempts to invade, they roll on a boarding party as normal. For the designated infantry unit, roll a d6 and add one. If the ship has the higher result, the infantry unit is eliminated and the controller of the ship is allowed to place one of their own infantry units from that ship on the island. Each infantry unit represents one short-range three-rank cannon, for land combat (these cannons can only shoot at other infantry/artillery units). An infantry unit is not allowed a land shoot action the turn it is landed successfully. Infantry units take up one cargo space.

Artillery units (six points): Can be used in invasions, and can be stationed on island or at harbour. On land, they are a long-range two-rank cannon and require two hits from the same infantry shoot action to be eliminated. They can shoot at enemy ships as a regular shoot action, and are mobile (you can position them at any place on the island for optimum range), but cannot be given any extra actions. Artillery units take up two cargo spaces.

This game was bizarre in many ways: unspeakable amounts of gold, huge distances between harbours that hindered battling, and weird rulings that came up as part of my house-rulings and somewhat limited collection.

06-21-2011

a7xfanben wrote:

I am making progress on my big game today. The French and alliance of American/Mercenary/Cursed/Corsair have had terrible luck with island placement and mysterious islands. The Spanish were the first to purchase infantry and artillery units for the defense of their harbour. It has been all gold collecting so far, but now the Pirates are gunning to take down what looks to be the fastest-starting faction, the Spanish (mainly because of the Joya del Sol with a helmsman). The Pirates are sending the Revenant and some supporting ships (Muerta de la Corona for +1 to cannon rolls against Spanish ships, and Freedom for gold stealing) to wreak havoc. I am playing as the English, and my harbour is somewhat isolated, at one end of the room, but I have been able to buy some good ships for this gold-running start (HMS Hyena is 9 pts. for S+S and five cargo spaces, HMS King Edward has six cargo spaces).

The Pirates began a small fight against the Spanish in the middle of the ocean between their two harbours, but the first action didn’t last long at all. However, it made the Pirates hate the Spanish, which would become more important later on.

I remember the English having to travel the furthest distance to get to their wild island(s), and so they wanted to expand to some more. The Spanish were the closest harbour, and so the English picked on them. (the Pirates were to the north, but their harbour lay around the corner of a cape, so they were harder to get to.) Some English ships including HMS Leicester began attacking the Spanish, inflicting heavy losses on both sides. The attack was eventually repulsed because it was so close to the Spanish harbour, so the Spanish had a much easier time getting reinforcements to the front lines.

Probably the most memorable part of this game was the system of chain exploring set up by the Spanish. The following is a quote from the Rules Thread.

a7xfanben wrote:

Warning: This is extremely specific and impractical. It only would only be feasible in huge games, and games where the islands have more treasure on them than normal (a non-standard game with stacks of treasure on islands, or treasure that replenishes each turn). Line up a bunch of empty ships touching at the bow and stern, with the lead ship in the line docked at a wild island. The final ship is docked at your home island. Ideally the island is as close to home as possible. Also, it would help if all of the ships had the same cargo hold. The lead ship explores the island, and each ship on down the line explores the ship in front of her, taking the treasure all the way to the last ship, where it is automatically unloaded.

This is too wacky to even try in 99.9% of games, but in this way you could have a supply line of ships that automatically transports treasure from an island to your home island.

Due to the fact that cumulative games don’t have a point limit, this particular game lent itself well to exploiting this idea. The Spanish had a perfect storm going: there were huge stacks of treasure on the wild islands, one of these islands was close to their harbour, and they had bought a lot of ships (the only ones I know for sure were two copies of the Cazador del Pirata) with around 3 masts and at least 3 cargo hold.

With the nearby island to the north of their harbour, the Spanish set up the system. One ship docked at the island, and then another ship lashed herself to the stern of the first ship, with the last ship being docked at the Spanish harbour. The line was at least 5 ships long, maybe 7 or 8. There may have actually been TWO lines, but I don’t know for sure. In addition, they still had a handful of ships sailing to and from the island as normal and bringing back gold. I would estimate that the whole operation consisted of at least 20 ships, all at this one island. (I think they almost were able to set up a second line of ships to another island, but they got attacked before it could be completed.)

Naturally the Spanish were getting rich very fast, milking one island for probably an average of at least 5 coins per turn overall. They launched more ships, both goldships and gunships, making their fleet even more impressive. This is not to say that all of the other factions struggled, for they were generally successful in running gold in a normal fashion. The Spanish were the only ones to set up the chain-exploring system, which hasn’t been seen since.

The other extremely memorable part of this game concerned a single game piece. It wasn’t a ship or even a named crew, but a UT: the Cursed Conch. The Cursed Conch lets you sacrifice one of your ships to move an opponent’s sea monster. However, my collection at the time didn’t contain a single sea monster, and so I house-ruled the ability to say “ship” in place of sea monster. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but soon it became apparent just how dangerous this UT had become.

Which faction discovered the once-legendary Cursed Conch? Naturally, the Spanish. :/ XD

I’m not sure whether it was discovered on the island they had built a chain to, but it was discovered relatively early on in the game, and therefore had a huge impact.

Now, for a word about the harbour system: the harbours function much differently than home islands. They serve the same purpose, but each harbour was much bigger (probably about 2 feet wide by 2 feet long), with docks coming out from the wall of the room. Each harbour had designated places where ships were launched (on the outside where they could immediately start sailing), and ships were repaired (inside the harbour). The large number of docks and passages lent well to “hiding” ships if a faction wanted to do so.

After the Spanish discovered the Cursed Conch, I think they put it on a 4 master, and began “saccing” her each turn to cause havoc and chaos in other fleets. The Conch was later transferred to either a 1 or 2 master, because the Spanish wanted to use the bigger ship since it was more valuable.

Since the Pirates were the closest harbour (to the north), they were messed with the most. This further angered the Pirates, who had already lost a short skirmish against the Spanish earlier in the game. The Americans were also a target of the Conch, and they were the first to attempt to retaliate.

After the Conch was transferred to one of the smallest Spanish ships, the Spanish docked her deep within the bowels of their harbour, so she could “hide” and be “safe” from enemies looking to sink her or steal the Conch. However, the Spanish harbour was consisted mostly of docks facing due north, and they didn’t have a place to hide their ship in the recessed southeast corner of their harbour. Therefore they docked her almost all the way to the back against the wall in one of the inner docks on the west side. This became important later on.

Edit (7/22/2015): Here’s another mockup picture showing a harbour example with the Honu Iki at the top of the picture approximately how far back the Spanish sloop was:

Again, pretend it’s a Spanish ship, but this is basically what the Pirates and the Cursed Blade were after:

The Americans quickly grew weary of their ships being moved about by the Spanish, and sent some ships (the Enterprise was one of them) east to attack. Their goal was to sink or steal the Conch, but their efforts were too scattered. The Spanish either held on to it or stole it back, and the losses the Americans suffered as a result of these disorganized attacks dealt them losses that were hard to overcome. Additionally, I didn’t have as many good gold ships for the Americans, Cursed, and Barbary Corsairs as I do today, so the Americans weren’t likely to win the game anyway.

06-23-2011

a7xfanben wrote:

In my game today, the Revenant was quickly repelled from her attack on the Spanish harbour when two of her masts were knocked out from the harbour’s artillery batteries.

The infantry haven’t played a role yet, but then again there have not been any real battles (the Revenant action was the first and it was brief-she didn’t have enough backup). The Spanish have had luck with the mysterious islands-the one closest to them lets you take two treasure from every other wild island in the game and put it on this one before you explore, if you roll a five or six.

On the other hand, the French have had their Petit Dauphin sunk, Danae dismasted, and Courageaux damaged at a single island (Roll 5d6. For every 4-6 result, eliminate one of this ship’s masts). The Spanish are calmly and steadily accumulating more gold, while the nearby pirates are scrambling to put a good fleet together to wipe them out (or die trying).

I am using all of my unique treasure, including the Cursed Conch, but I don’t have any sea monsters (normally it lets you give a sea monster an action instead of the ships it is on), so I changed the ability to let the controller move any ship in play. This has had an undesirably overpowered effect. The Cursed Blade has been thwarted from stealing it by being sent back to where she came from, and the Enterprise was moved onto a reef, losing two masts.

Tomorrow the Pirates will attack and we will see which fleet is stronger. As the English, I sent a squadron to steal unique treasure from the other factions, the French and American/Mercenary. Then I finally bought the Leicester for 18 and decked her out with Admiral Morgan (5-6:extra action), Ducie Chads (5-6 same action twice, +1 against Pirates) and the Gentleman (captain ability and die re-roll for the above effects).

With one attack repulsed (pun intended; I think I actually used La Repulsa in this game), the Spanish went about their business of chain-exploring. However, they realized what a threat the Conch was to other factions’ security, and so transferred it to a smaller ship that they hid in the back of their harbour. It wasn’t long before it was the center of attention once again.

With the Americans weakened and the French and English having slow gold fleets, the Pirates had in the meantime built a fleet that was surpassed in size only by the Spanish. As a result, the Spanish began using the Conch exclusively against the Pirates, which led them to the conclusion that they must attack the Spanish or face elimination. A battle fleet was gradually launched and assembled, and they began clustering in the ocean to an area to the northwest of the Spanish harbour, but still out of striking distance.

More than anything, the Pirates wanted the Conch. They wanted to steal it and use it against the Spanish. For this they launched the Cursed Blade, one of my favourite ships and the perfect ship for the job. They also considered the Raven because of her speed, but they didn’t want to risk losing a boarding party. With the strategy they were planning, they would have just one shot at the Conch.

The Pirates knew that the small Spanish ship had the Conch and no other treasures. The Cursed Blade didn’t need to win a boarding party to steal the Conch, but only to make contact with the Spanish ship. The Blade was crewed with a helmsman to boost her speed to S+S+S, and Calico Cat to give her an extra action to move twice for a total of 6S. She probably had other crew aboard such as a captain and/or oarsman, but I don’t remember if I had a Pirate reroller back then.

The Cursed Blade positioned herself at the southeast edge of the cluster of Pirate ships accumulating in anticipation of the upcoming battle. The Blade would go in first in an attempt to take the Conch. She had to wait a few turns for the SAT from Calico Cat, turns that were spent in anxious anticipation. There was also a lot of time spent measuring distances and ranges, for the Pirates knew they had one shot at it. They would end their move deep in the Spanish harbour with ships sailing to block the entrance off before she could escape.

The Cursed Blade finally got the SAT, and she zoomed in 6S straight into the Spanish harbour, crashing into the small Spanish ship. I believe the ram took out a mast, and it may have been a 1 master, which would mean she was totally dismasted. Either way, the Blade was successful in grabbing the Conch. The problem was, she couldn’t use it or transfer it to safety until she made it out of the harbour. I don’t think she did.

This is where my memory fails me. All I remember is that all hell broke loose. The Spanish panicked, the chain broke, and the Pirates attacked! I can honestly say that the Cursed Blade’s action that turn altered the game forever, in a single, solitary moment of brilliance that caused a chain reaction that would be felt for the rest of the game.

I want to say that neither the Cursed Blade nor her crew got out of the harbour alive. If they made it out, I think they were sunk soon thereafter. The entire cluster of Pirate ships (probably 2/3 of their overall fleet) sailed down upon the Spanish, and the battle was on! Due to the Spanish being backed up against their own harbour, the battle was extremely close-fought, and I remember a lot of ramming and boarding. The chain broke because the Spanish wanted more of their numbers in the main battle area, which quickly spread a little bit towards the east, where the chain was originally docked. The battle was very chaotic, because the Pirates were in a manic rage to kill as many Spaniards as possible, and the Spanish didn’t expect such a large battle.

The other factions took notice of this epic clash between the two largest navies. The English joined the main battle, but they did so from the east, near where the chain had been. This meant that the Spanish were fighting two foes at once, since most of the Pirate ships were more to the west and south. In the end, the Spanish were generally eliminated through all the carnage, and the Pirates eventually retreated back to their harbour to repair their considerable losses. However, the English had arrived late to the battle, and still had fresh ships sailing up as the battle was ending. Therefore, they kept on sailing west through the area where the battle had been.

In the meantime, the Americans somehow managed to get the Cursed Conch during all of the chaos:

06-25-2011

a7xfanben wrote:

The Pirates are almost finished wiping out the Spanish, and the English eventually got involved also. The Americans/Mercenaries managed to get the Cursed Conch with the Santa Molina (with help from the Enterprise), but now they are under attack from the French.

Many ships were sunk today (the highlights being the Leicester, Revenant, Harbinger, and Acorazado), and now the fleets are trying to salvage what they can after the long melee and distribute shipwrights (because their home harbours are too far away, and they don’t have treasure to repair, I usually require a ship to pay two treasure points to repair at her home island if she doesn’t have a shipwright there, this is what I have done for years with my fantasy scenarios).

The French were exposed to the battle the least and have the most fresh ships. I am looking forward to the final conclusion of what looks like a week-long game, which will probably happen near the American/Mercenary harbour (where they headed after they got the conch).

The French (with their harbour based in the northwest) had started to sail southeast towards the main battle as well, but they didn’t get there in time. However, they arrived in the middle of the ocean just as the English were sailing west, and another battle became imminent!

The English and French didn’t have fleets nearly as large as the Pirates and Spanish, so the battle was shorter and less grand overall. I’m not sure who won, but both fleets were battered and weak by the end of it.

At this point, the Pirates had done a bunch of repairs and were ready to have another battle. They weren’t at the full strength they had been at before the Spanish battle, but they were plenty large enough to defeat any of the remaining fleets. They spotted the winner of the English/French battle and promptly sailed southwest to clean up the scraps. It was relatively easy for them to win, and for reasons I don’t remember the Americans had been eliminated as well (possibly as part of the English/French battle). The Pirates were the last fleet sailing, and therefore were the winners of this long cumulative game! 😀

That’s the best I can remember. It was one of the most memorable games I’ve ever played, and now that I’m done writing this it’s much longer than I expected it to be.

06-26-2011, 06-27-2011

a7xfanben wrote:

I am finishing up an unlimited point game where the fleets accumulate ships/crew as you go along, and it has taken about a week. At one point I had well over 100 ships in play at once…

The Pirates ended up winning, as the English and the French got tied up in a decent fleet action, which allowed the Pirates plenty of time to repair, regroup, and bring back some of their sunken ships.

The Hourly Campaign Part 8 – Second full play session (Turn 5+)

Posted on December 1, 2018December 1, 2018 by Ben

The Hourly Campaign Part 7 – First FULL play session (Turn 2+)

Posted on December 1, 2018December 1, 2018 by Ben

The Hourly Campaign Part 6 – Finishing Fleets + START OF PLAY!!!!

Posted on December 1, 2018December 1, 2018 by Ben

8 fleet tournament begins after HMS Grand Temple fleet dominates – February 19th, 2013

Posted on November 30, 2018December 7, 2018 by Ben

HMS Grand Temple dominates, and a Tournament with 8 fleets gets going!

I’ve recently played a few more games: a series of three standard (40 points with gold) games between two fleets. The fleets consisted of a Pirate fleet of the Darkhawk II, Raven, and Bonnie Liz, versus a (mostly) Spanish fleet of La Santa Isabel, La San Jose, El Algeciras, and the Carrion Crow.

The first game went to the Spaniards, without much action.

The second game was one the the hardest fought games I’ve been involved in. Three of the seven ships were sunk, a fort was built, there was ramming, boarding, stealing, shooting, and just a great amount of good, honest, pirating . The Santa Isabel managed to trap the Darkhawk in between herself and an island, since I’ve recently implemented the 90 degree rule: A ship can turn no more than 90 degrees for each move segment of their move action. However, the Pirates fought back well, using the fort Dead Man’s Point to derelict the Algeciras. After the Santa Isabel stole all three gold coins (totaling 8 gold) from the Darkhawk, she made for her HI with just one mast remaining. The Darkhawk also only had one mast, and she caught the Spaniard just before she could unload the gold. After taking out the Santa Isabel’s final mast, the Darkhawk took back the gold and made for home. Meanwhile, the Raven was dismasted by the Carrion Crow and San Jose after she rammed the Crow in an attempt to steal a treasure coin. The Crow headed for home (just a few move actions away) with the Raven in tow, but the Darkhawk (now partially repaired, at three masts) sunk her former comrade, ending the game with the odd amount of treasure going to the Pirates, giving them a satisfying victory!

The third game also went to the Pirates, who took advantage of their HI being in a good spot. The Raven made a few nice treasure runs, and the Darkhawk took full advantage of Captain Blackheart, saccing for at least three extra actions. The Darkhawk had Blackheart, a helmsman, an explorer, “Cannonball” Gallows (the 0LR +5 version), and two oarsmen aboard, with a third oarsman on the HI. This way, the Darkhawk would sac two oarsmen on the way to and from a wild island, and pick up another one after she unloaded the gold.

Additional Comment:

Those three games were actually the first three in a mini-tournament. The second series of three involved my HMS Grand Temple fleet (now with the London instead of the Meresman, since I’ve finally acquired her) facing an all-treasure fleet consisting of the Tiger’s Eye, La Dijon, Le Bon Marin, Le Coeur du Lion, Coral, and Rover. It was no contest, with the GT fleet winning all three times in dominating fashion. The UT’s helped a bunch in slowing down the runners, as they’re supposed to.

The final three games pitted the GT fleet against the Pirate fleet with the Darkhawk II, Raven, and Bonnie Liz. This fleet was harder for the Grand Temple and the London to defeat, but the English still won all three games. In addition, there was no English bias involved, as I even made the English HI extra-far-away from the rest of the islands for the last game, to give the Pirates a head start running gold.

It appears that the GT fleet is only to be defeated by fleets utilizing defensive abilities or cancellers .

Additional Comment:

Today (2/3/13) three games were played: 40 point deathmatches between the HMS Grand Temple fleet and the Acorazado fleet. It was the first time the GT fleet faced the Acorazado fleet with the London instead of the Meresman, so I expected the English to do better than before. They didn’t. El Acorazado won all three games, and never lost more than two masts in any one game. Now this fleet is 24-9.

Additional Comment:

2/15/13: I should be able to get my ships out again in the next few days. I’ve recently acquired a handful of the best pieces in the game (Banshee’s Cry, Neptune’s Hoard, L’Artesien, some events, etc.), and look forward to using them.

Instead of one or two huge games, there will probably be mostly smaller actions. The fleets may be very competitive. I’ll definitely try out Norvegia and this beast. There may be a long tournament of standard games, although I’m not really sure quite yet.

Additional Comment:

8 fleets have been created, and they are all standard 40 point fleets designed to win. I tried to put together just about the best stuff I had from each faction, without using the same exact fleets I’ve used in the past. There will be a tournament, with each fleet squaring off against another fleet in a series of three games. Here are the fleets:

English: HMS London, Aberdeen Baron, HMS Hound towing the Gibraltar flotilla.
French: Le Bonaparte + the French trio of super-runners: L’Artesien, Le Bon Marin, Le Pique.
Spanish: La Santa Isabel, La Joya del Sol, El San Jose.
Pirate: Neptune’s Hoard, Bloody Jewel, Banshee’s Cry.
American: Ghost Walker, Carolina, Rattlesnake.
Cursed: Grim Reaper towing the Death’s Anchor, Sea Rat.
Mercenaries: Shui Xian.
Barbary Corsairs: Tiger’s Eye, Algiers, Carthage.

Additional Comment:

Half of the first round has been completed. The Pirates lost the first game to the Shui Xian, but quickly recovered and took both of the final two games to win their series. The Spanish soundly beat the Barbary Corsairs 3-0, but the Corsairs probably could have won the final game.

For the other first round series, the French will face the Cursed, and the English will take on the Americans.

Additional Comment:

The French have just completed a three game sweep of the Cursed. However, the games were very hard-fought; the Cursed didn’t do as badly as they usually do.

Additional Comment:

The English have beat the Americans 3-0, completing the first round of the tournament.

For the semifinals, the Pirates will be pitted against the French while the English take on the Spanish.

Additional Comment:

In the first series of the semifinals, the Pirates beat the French in all three games. Even when the French went first, the Pirates still got to the islands faster due to their sac crew.

In the second series, the English beat the Spanish two games to one. The third game came down to the wire, with the Gibraltar’s guns proving to decisive.

The final round will see the English take on Norvegia! Read about it here!

Wizkids Pirates – First physical game in 11 months

Posted on November 27, 2018March 26, 2024 by Ben

Wizkids Pirates – First non-solo physical game in 11 months

Finally played another physical game of Wizkids Pirates for the first time in quite a while! (This site contains affiliate links for which I may be compensated) It was a simple 1v1 game at a 50 point build total with an opponent who hadn’t played for a few years.

I rolled to go first with a mixed fleet of allied minor faction ships:

Grand Mountain + captain, helmsman

Fenrir + captain, helmsman

Pasha’s Delight

My opponent went with a Cursed American fleet:

USS Georgetown + captain, helmsman

Pawtucket + captain, helmsman

Nightmare (OE version) + helmsman

Here’s the setup; 2 wild islands with about 6 coins apiece.

4 ships docked at the islands, while the Grand Mountain and USS Georgetown engaged in a gunnery duel.

While the Fenrir and Pasha’s Delight took the best 3 coins from the two islands, the Grand Mountain sailed into combat, nearly dismasting both captained enemy ships while losing 3 masts of her own. The luck disparity loomed large in this game, as I was luckier than usual and my opponent missed even with the 2L cannons.

The Grand Mountain abandoned her pursuit of the Pawtucket to go after the slower and less dangerous Nightmare, but only hit 2/3, allowing the Nightmare to unload all 4 of her coins! However, with USS Georgetown out of combat, the Fenrir and Pasha’s Delight were able to safely extract the final coins in play without issue.

In a close finish, my minor faction alliance fleet emerged victorious by a score of 17-15!

VASSAL Campaign Game 4 continues after 5 month hiatus

Posted on November 25, 2018November 25, 2018 by Ben

VASSAL Campaign Game 4 has continued! Gingerninja is too busy to continue playing, so the remaining three players have divided his three fleets amongst ourselves.

The new turn order – we simply added our new faction to the end of our turns.

Xerecs
1. Spanish
2. Jade Rebellion
3. Hyrulian Conglomerate/The Alliance
4. English

A7XfanBen
5. Pirates
6. Cursed
7. Vikings
8. Barbary Corsairs

PirateAJ14
9. Dutch
10. Americans
11. Mercenaries
12. French

Each “absorbed” faction can launch points at the beginning of their first turn with their new owners to get them to the starting build total of 30.

You can see a video summary of Xerecs’ turn, in which the Spanish had some UT shenanigans with Pandora’s Box, and the English did their first launch.

Here are the UT’s my factions placed on the Santa Isabel via Pandora’s Box:

Pirates: Message in a Bottle
The Pirates flung the SI a short distance to the island with metals that the Pirates have explored, as there are multiple wild islands with no treasure coins, so the Pirates picked that island. I think the controller of the ship would still choose where at the island the ship docked, so I just docked her on the far side of the island away from the Pirates.
Cursed: Runes of Death
Vikings: face down positive UT (they are simply announcing to everyone that it is a positive UT, rather than keep its nature a secret)
Barbary Corsairs: Maps of Hades

In this picture, the new Spanish home island is at the top, with the Pirate home island at the bottom. The Cursed Blade has used Elizabeth’s Piece of Eight to allow the Neptune’s Hoard to move twice, and she has moved astern of the Santa Isabel.

The Corsairs launched 3 of their 6 point ships with no crew to fill out the remaining 18 points of their fleet. The Tiger’s Eye explored the island she’s docked at and found (essentially) all negative UT’s: Monkey’s Paw, The Cursed, and the custom Marooned. Since the TE doesn’t have any crew on her I left Marooned face down on the island. She also found Textiles though. The Cassandra and Dragon have round earthed to the north, while the Vikings gather lumber and escort their turtles home.

This does present a strange situation where 3 of my 4 fleets have home islands quite close together – Vikings, Pirates and Corsairs all concentrated in the northern center area of the map.

NINETEEN games between El Acorazado and HMS Endeavour – January 13th, 2013

Posted on November 23, 2018November 30, 2018 by Ben

A Classic Matchup for the Ages: El Acorazado vs. HMS Endeavour

I was able to play a few games today, earlier than I expected. I only got out two ships, however, and everything is already put away.

The matchup was a duel for the ages: El Acorazado versus HMS Endeavour. I’ve been wanting to see these two ships (alone) pitted against each other for a long time. Arguably the best defensive ability in the game against arguably the best offensive ability in the game. On paper, it looks like an even matchup, with both ships weighing in at 21 points, both powerful 5 masters. Their abilities are opposites, and most of the time, the crew on both ships were similar.

I expected El Acorazado to win, and I almost wanted her to. As a side note, there was no English bias at work here, since I don’t even know which ship I like better.

Since each game was a quick, one-on-one deathmatch (with HI’s about 5L apart), I was able to play 19 games in around 2 hours.

The first three games saw the ships go at each other bare-bones with the exception of a generic captain. El Acorazado won 2 out of 3.

The next series of 12 games saw the two ships duke it out full of crew. El Acorazado went with her maxed out setup: Luis Zuan (MI version), Admiral Alarico Castro (SM), Nemesio Diaz, Joaquin Vega, Duque Marcus Vaccaro, and a helmsman. HMS Endeavour was crewed with Hermione Gold (MI), Sir Christopher Myngs, Rhys Gryffyn Owen, Christian Fiore, and a helmsman. I would have maxed out the Endeavour’s point cost, but she has 4 cargo spaces. In this stretch of intense games, El Acorazado went 7-5.

Then a series of three games was played with the Acorazado exchanging her helmsman for a shipwright. The idea would be to let the Endeavour fire first, and then repair with a double action as needed. This backfired, as the Endeavour won all three games.

After 18 games, each fleet had won 9. For the final game, the ships went back to their standard crew, from the 12 game setup. HMS Endeavour won the game, but I’m not convinced that she is actually the better ship.

Joaquin Vega was one of the reasons El Acorazado won some of her games. When the Endeavour would shoot first, she would need to have all five guns hit in order to eliminate 4 of the Acorazado’s masts. If she missed even once (with a one), the return fire from the Acorazado would be crippling (since El Acorazado’s ability (and Vega’s) is applied before the ability of the Endeavour, it seems to be slightly more effective than the Endeavour’s ability). Also, when the Acorazado would get the first shot (not often, since she’s slower), she almost always won, because if she hit at least three times, she would automatically win (since the Endeavour would need three shots just to dent the armor of the Acorazado).

Command the Oceans – Rules and Conditions (9/10/2017)

Posted on November 21, 2018November 21, 2018 by Ben

Command the Oceans

The time has come for me to play another solo campaign game! It will be the first game of this type since my Experimental cumulative game in January 2016, and the first (hopefully) longer-style physical campaign game I’ve played since Economy Edition in June 2015.

I’ve taken my own advice and used my Guide to huge games post to plan this thing out.

Rules

I will generally be using my Basic Rules. Most of the core game rules stay the same for those, and some of the bigger changes like the endgame rules won’t apply here since it’s a campaign game. However, I will point out two things from my Basic Rules to keep in mind:

-Ships cannot do damage by ramming.
-When a ship wins a boarding party, the winner decides whether they will take gold/resources or eliminate crew. The winner chooses which gold/resources to take, but the loser chooses which crew is eliminated.

Those are probably the two biggest things to remember from my rules for the battle reports for this particular game.

Now, onto the house rules! Some of these are subject to change depending on how things go.

-All ships and forts must be hit twice to eliminate one of their masts. These hits can come at any time; they do not have to come in the same turn or during the same shoot action. This rule also applies to ships such as El Acorazado, whose ability now reads “four hits are required to eliminate one of this ship’s masts” (not necessarily the same shoot action). (I did this for my Century of the Empires game in 2013 and generally enjoy the rule quite a bit, and as I did back then I plan to track damage by putting the tiny dice next to a mast that has a hit on it)

-To make things even more realistic, ships with no masts remaining must be hit twice as many times as they have masts in order to sink. I used this rule in CotE as well, because ships almost never sunk from pure combat. However, in order to alleviate how many derelicts could be floating around as a result, scuttling attempts succeed on a die roll of 4 as well as 5 or 6.

-Ships can be shot at even if they are docked at their home islands.

-If a faction does not have any ships docked at their home island, all opposing ships may raid their home island freely, taking as much gold and resources as they want.

-Forts and flotillas do not follow the no-duplicates rule.

-Return to Savage Shores game pieces may be used.

-Custom game pieces may be used, as long as they aren’t too overpowered.

-Return fire: After a ship is shot at, that ship can return fire with any remaining cannons, but must roll a 5 or 6 to hit. This occurs during their opponent’s turn, and therefore does not count as any kind of action and cannot be used in conjunction with ANY abilities other than those on the ship that shot first. (such as a defensive ability that would still work as normal)

Land combat/ground forces

There will be opportunities for fleets to purchase army units from RISK for use in the game. There will not be territories and RISK rules, but there will be land warfare. These rules are extremely subject to change.

Infantry: 1 point, L move; can shoot at 3S to eliminate crew only (considered crew)
Artillery: 3 points, S move; can shoot at 2L as a regular cannon (considered equipment)

-These units can only use their abilities on land.
-These units count against the point and cargo restrictions on ships.
-These units must be unloaded with an explore action or an explored island marker – they are not subject to the “free transfer while docked” rule.
-Ships can fire on army units that they can reach with their cannon ranges, but once they are out of range they cannot be shot at. (in which case the attacker would need to land army units of their own on the island or somehow draw the units back into range)
-Army units are unloaded on islands at the location where the ship docked. They must be given move actions to move to other locations on the island. Army units cannot be given more than one action per turn, and they cannot be given extra actions by any means.

During land warfare, infantry units have a 3S cannon that can shoot at other army units, while artillery units have a 2L cannon. Infantry units are eliminated with one hit from any type of army unit, while artillery units are eliminated with two hits from infantry units and one hit from artillery units.

Money!
As of now, I am tentatively planning to use a combination of gold and resources on wild islands. Resources will follow the system implemented by cannonfury for his Economy Edition rules. For those unfamiliar, each resource is assigned a number 1-6 starting with lumber. An initial roll for resource value is made, which follows the “Die Roll” row below. Then 2 d6 are rolled to determine how many turns the values last before they change. As with Economy Edition, I will be using face up coins for resources and face down coins for gold.

Die Roll……1……2…….3…….4…….5…….6
Lumber……1……6…….5…….4…….3…….2
Textiles……2……1…….6…….5…….4…….3
Metals……..3……2…….1…….6…….5…….4
Fish………..4……3…….2…….1…….6…….5
Spices……..5……4…….3…….2…….1…….6
Luxuries…..6……5…….4…….3…….2…….1

Other rules

As you will eventually see, various custom house rules will need to be instituted during the game for different reasons. These include longer range lines of fire from higher altitude vantage points, in addition to custom rules for “special” game pieces. I anticipate this game getting chaotic to the point of absolute bedlam, but I will do my best to create rules so that certain things make sense and can be explained thematically and hopefully with proper rules as well.

Starting Conditions

As the name of the game implies, there will not be just one ocean area for this game. In fact, the space constraints and logistics of the two different rooms I’m playing in will result in not two but THREE different oceans! The general sizes of these oceans are 6×3, 5×3, and 3×3, for a grand total of 42 square feet of ocean!

I will not say how many or which factions will be participating. All I can say is that the number is more than 4, but less than 10, as not all of the factions will be playing individually. The main factions will become obvious once play begins, but the factional boundaries will not necessarily stay constant until the end of the game. Along with the uncertainty of in-game house rules, this is one area in which even I don’t know what the future holds.

-Fleets will have 30 points for their starting fleet.

-Flat earth rules are being used.

The setup will be revealed in due time, don’t worry. I will be purposely leaving some things “off camera” until the viewer needs to see what they are.

Also, the factions don’t know the various areas well at all, as they’re new to the locations. As a result, things will seem a bit off at times, but this is simply to emphasize that the scale of the oceans is larger than it appears, so fleets cannot simply “see” something even if it looks clear in the actual pictures, since it’s farther away than it looks to us. This is part of the reason that the oceans will not be revealed from the start – the factions have to find their way by sailing around, so the reader of these reports is discovering things as the factions discover them!

An important note about the setup: I consider the aesthetics of my games a pathetic joke compared to the gameplay itself, so if you don’t like how something looks, make a prettier version of it and send it to me lol. I am a firm believer that you can spend far too much time pondering about this game, making fleets for it, making detailed and beautiful custom terrain, but then complain that you don’t get to PLAY as much as you’d like. I am the opposite – I am sacrificing aesthetics and long hours spent toiling on stuff in order to PLAY THE GAME!

Victory Conditions

-Last fleet afloat wins the game.

-As I’ve warned with my other physical campaign games, this game may end very suddenly at any point in time. It may abruptly stop all of a sudden without me expecting it to. Even if it doesn’t, it may require an artificial “ending” depending on the circumstances, as physical campaign games are difficult to play to true completion (aka last fleet afloat wins). Therefore, in the case of an earlier finish, the fleet with the most points in play will win.

Other
-One of the three ocean areas is on the floor, but I will be preventing any disasters with proactive measures.
-To avoid this game taking over my soul like Economy Edition did in June 2015, I am going to attempt play limits. After the first week or so of play, I plan to only play one turn per day. I plan to do battle reports consistently, possibly even on a per-turn basis.

–Please comment what you think about this game! I would LOVE to have feedback on the rules I’m using, the setup, the house rules I’m implementing, and anything else you find interesting. Don’t hesitate to comment which faction you’re rooting for, or what you thought of something that happened. I want as much interaction as possible!
-I have some surprises for you all, and some things that people will be happy to see. I am very excited to play this game and I hope that a lot of people read about it! Even if you don’t plan to post in the thread, go ahead and hit “Watch this topic for replies” at the bottom of the page so you don’t miss the excitement!

Final note of warning: I am about as hyped for this game as I have ever been before starting a game of Pirates CSG. I have purposely made this post somewhat nonchalant, but I believe my enthusiasm will show through indeed. If this thing somehow, someway, works out, we are all in for a wild, WILD ride. O_O