Minogame (pronounced “meen-oh-gah-may”)
Nationality: Japan
Point Cost: 20
Segments: 5
Cargo: 3
Base Move: S+S
Cannons: 4S
Ability: Giant Turtle. (keyword below)
At the beginning of your turn, if this giant turtle does not have a fort on it, decide if this giant turtle is submerged or on the surface. If submerged, this giant turtle can only move; it cannot shoot or be shot at, and it cannot dock or touch other ships.
If this giant turtle touches an empty sargasso sea, you may choose to tow that sargasso sea as a free action – place it touching this giant turtle’s tail and move it with this giant turtle. When towing a sargasso sea, this giant turtle’s base move is reduced to S. At the end of any move segment, you may stop towing it.
Flavor Text: Striking commonalities with the legendary sea turtle of Urashima Tarō fame has made this creature a favorite of the Japanese people. After a slew of recent rescues, some Tokugawa sailors even worship him.
Giant Turtle (keyword): A ship with this keyword printed on its deckplate is a sea creature.
A giant turtle can ram a sargasso sea as if ramming an iceberg; if it does, remove the sargasso sea from the game.
Two hits during the same player’s turn are required to eliminate one of this sea creature’s segments. When removing segments, remove a fin of the giant turtle. When all four fins are removed, the giant turtle is eliminated. The giant turtle’s cannon (its head) cannot be eliminated.
A giant turtle may move across islands (except enemy home islands and enemy forts) if it does not have a fort on its back. It becomes docked if it ends movement on an island. A giant turtle may shoot and be shot at while on an island (the island does not block lines of fire to and from the giant turtle on the island).
A giant turtle can be assigned crew.
A giant turtle may be given explore actions to load cargo like a normal ship.
A giant turtle may tow other ships (unless it has a fort on its back), it may ram (the rammed ship becomes pinned instead of the giant turtle), and it may board like a normal ship.
When building a new fort, you can build it on the back of a giant turtle docked at your home island. If there is a fort on the back of a giant turtle, it cannot move more than S in a single move action; during combat the fort takes damage instead of the turtle. The fort on the back of the turtle is treated like a fort on a wild island and has its own turns. Friendly ships can dock at a giant turtle with a fort and be given repair actions while there. If a ship is docked, the giant turtle cannot move.
Any treasure in a giant turtle’s fort does not take up cargo space. Crew and equipment still take up cargo space. When the fort on a giant turtle is destroyed, the treasure is moved into the giant turtle’s cargo. If there is more treasure than cargo space available, remove the excess treasure from the game instead of removing crew/equipment to make room for the treasure.
A fort built on a giant turtle cannot use crew abilities.
Credit to AlgothAybara for the Giant Turtle model design and original STL, which is available on PSMList. We worked with Woelf on the keyword, which is long, but needs to be in order to cover all the details of such a unique game piece.