One island per crew is the rulebook; more islands means fleets meet later. As many as the table fits. Two crews sit a quarter of the way round a round table, or diagonally across a folding one. Empty seats can go to the computer.
Pass the device over, then tap Ready.
Each player commands a small fleet on a 4 ft table. You score for ships still afloat, islands you hold and coins you keep.
Players take turns placing islands (12" from every edge where the table allows, 6" apart), then rocks and reefs if you like. Each fleet lines up touching its own stretch of table edge, facing in. Two players sit diagonally across a folding table, or a quarter of the way round a round one. Player 1 goes first.
First spend any coins you want. Then each of your ships takes its turn: one action, then it sails forward.
Then click forward 1 to your Move Count (Queen's Fleet 3, Corsairs 4, and so on). You can't turn between clicks, and hitting a ship, island, rock or reef stops you there. An island action skips the click, so islands are the only place to hold still. The table edge just stops a ship, and one facing off the table stays put. Ships you don't move sail on one click when you end the turn. Once every ship has gone, the turn ends by itself.
Cannons need a crew. Only a ship can fire, and a held island only fires when one of your ships is touching it and spends its action.
Each hit removes one fitting. Fittings always come off in this order: turret, then cargo, then masts (the Industry's smokestack counts as a mast). Repair puts them back the other way round, so a turret is the last thing back. With its turret gone, the Industry fires only its bow gun. A ship with no fittings is dead in the water. It can't move (it skips its click) or take island actions, but it can still fire its own guns, and the next hit sinks it. You can scuttle your own dead ship so the enemy can't take it. No friendly fire.
You only get coins by collecting from islands you hold. Spend them before any of your ships starts its turn, at the start of your turn or between ships. Each unspent coin is worth 1 point at the end.
| Coin | What it does |
|---|
Every fitting you knock off an enemy ship, by cannon or boarding party, is your prize, and so is the hull of every ship you sink or capture. When a ship is repaired, captured or raised, the fitting or hull comes back out of the pile that holds it. Last fleet afloat wins. Or, at the start of your turn, declare victory with 60 or more points and at least as many as everyone else. Only the points you hold when your turn begins count, so points earned during a turn wait for your next one. Points: 8 per island, 4 per prize fitting, 8 per prize hull, 1 per unspent coin, and +8 for most ships and most islands (ties both get it). Surviving ships do not score. With the stalemate rule on, the game ends on points when every island is flagged and none has changed hands for two rounds.
An optional rule you can turn on at setup. The wind changes at the start of every round, and the dial in the corner of the table shows which way it's blowing. A ship pointed within 45° of the arrow gets +1 Move Count, and one pointed within 45° of straight into it gets −1 (it still clicks at least once). Anything in between is a crosswind.
Up to seven crews on a round table, one turn each in seat order. The server checks every move and rolls every shot. If you drop out, reopen the link and you get your seat back.
Everything happens on the table. Tap a ship to open its ring of actions and coins. For Steer, drag the handle (or move the mouse and click) to set the heading, then tap a numbered chip to sail that many clicks. For Fire, tap a slot chip, then choose Straight out or Tipped up (arrow keys up and down) and fire. Like the printed cannons, there's no power setting. Straight out skips and skids into the first thing in line, tipped up sails over nearby hulls and comes down about 38 cm out, and every shot sprays a few degrees either way. After a bounce or two the tapered ball pretty much goes where it likes, skidding and curling to a stop. Straight out carries 30 to 45 cm, and tipped up 50 to 70. The Industry turret has its own aiming handle. Every step happens when you lift your finger, so a drag always pans instead, and a stray tap on the water never fires or sails. Tap Fire on the table to shoot. The cross chip beside the controls (or Esc) steps back one stage or cancels; tap water to close a ring. Pinch or use the wheel to zoom, drag empty water to pan. Right-drag, twist two fingers, or press Q and E to turn the view; the last camera button (or T) looks straight down. The camera follows the action and zooms in on the ship you pick. The magnifier button (or the menu) keeps the zoom where you left it, which helps when aiming across the table, and the menu turns following off altogether. The corner button goes fullscreen. Keys: arrows turn, 1 to 4 sail that many clicks, Enter sails the full count, Space fires. The panel has every action too.