Published to Miniature Trading on June 12th, 2017
Miniature Review: Potions and Brews – Game-changing in the right situation
Potions and Brews
Set: Pirates of the Caribbean
Collector’s Number: 080b
Faction Affiliation: Treasure
Rarity: C
Type: Unique Treasure
Ability: You can load this treasure face down. You can reveal it to force an opponent to reroll a die or dice roll. Then remove Potions and Brews from the game.
General description:
Potions and Brews is a Unique Treasure that can be incredibly frustrating for your opponent. Just when they think they’ve hit with a cannon, or gotten a critical extra action roll to work out, you flip this thing over, and make them reroll their die! As is typical for me, I am partly reviewing this game piece because it’s not very popular, with no other reviews and having been used in two fleets.
Uses:
Use it as a surprise defensive maneuver – right when your opponent gets a good die roll against you, use Potions and Brews to force a reroll where a worse result is quite possible.
Here is the full Pirate Code entry on it:
| quote from The Pirate Code: |
| Potions & Brews -This ability may be used to force an opponent to re-roll any die roll made during the game regardless of why it was rolled, including terrain and Mysterious Island rolls. The only exception is a shoot action using the Broadsides Attack keyword, which prevents all other abilities from applying to the action. -This ability can force the re-roll of multiple dice only if all of those dice are rolled at the same time. –Cannons are rolled individually during a shoot action, so this ability can force the re-roll of only one. –If multiple dice were rolled, you may choose to require all dice or only specific die or dice to be re-rolled. |
Strategies and game play:
Since it’s a one-time usage and you have to find it on a wild island first, there’s not much strategy to base around it. However, there are certain things you can do to improve your chances of finding it and using it effectively, as detailed in the next section. It’s not likely to affect gameplay very often, but when played at the right moment (and assuming the second die roll is unsuccessful) it can be a game changer! Here you might find some games I’ve used it in.
Combos with other miniatures:
What to counter:
Fleet Admirals
Opponent rerollers
Jam a bombardier cannon!
EA (extra action)
SAT (same action twice)
They finally got a 6 but not anymore!
Rolls during shoot actions
Ramming rolls
Boarding rolls
Marine shots
Fog bank rolls
Mysterious Island effects
Catamaran ability
How to really mess things up:
Davy Jones 6 roll
Cursed Captain Jack
Paradis de la Mer
Kraken Gong
Lost
Play it right after an opponent uses Runes of Thor
Nemo’s Plans: With this thing aboard, you can use Potions and Brews indefinitely!
Ways to counteract it:
-Use less abilities that are dependent on die rolls
-Find the UT first
-Take it out with Jailhouse Dog, possibly after finding it with something like La Iberia
-Steal it from an enemy ship
-Sink the ship carrying it before it can hurt you
Strengths/Pros:
-Can be very powerful in the right situation
-Die rolls are everywhere in this game, so it’s very versatile
-Sneaky/under-the-radar nature
Weaknesses/Cons:
-Takes up a cargo space when hidden
-Could be hard to find in a game
-Tough to know exactly when to use it (at the “opportune moment”)
Artwork and aesthetics:
Simple and effective like most of the PotC pictures. Definitely a unique set since they were able to use actual characters and props instead of illustrations.
Overall rating:
7/10. Potions and Brews is a nice UT, but takes up potentially valuable cargo space until it’s revealed. It also loses a point or two since it can be tough to use perfectly, and may not impact the game much at all, especially if your opponent’s second die roll is the same (or better) than their first.
Get this UT with Norrington for just $1 at RainTyger!! Or if they run out, try eBay.