Game: Plunder

Thread: Re: i need help with plunder pleas help

nightskys — 2008-07-30T06:20:45+00:00

this helped alot thanks

Thread: Re: i need help with plunder pleas help

trippcor — 2008-07-29T12:36:53+00:00

Nightskys,
I think if you look through the various post associated with this game you will find the answers you are looking for. However I will try to give you some quick feedback.

nightskys wrote:
ok first thing i have a question with is how do you plunder goods. let say i kill a ship then the next card i pull is the parrot dose that mean i get 21 wood as long as i can carry it.
If you sink a ship you do not get it's cargo. It is only if you are able to board it and take it as a prize that you get the cargo. If you have successfully board the ship then you can take it as a prize along with the cargo it is carrying. If you are forced to cut loose the prize ship for any reason the cargo it is carrying minus what your ship can carry is also lost.

nightskys wrote:
next is the stand trile card makes my friends quit the game then its no fun. they dont like it becuse over powerd cards. anyone know how to make this card less powerful(i know its pirate like and pirates life isint fair but i want my friend to play thats why i baught it i like the game the way it is)
Yes the stand trial card is tough if you loose. However it is not hard to beat in most cases. This card makes you think and plan before entering port. It forces you to employ strategy which was its purpose and to give a real feel for the danger of being a pirate. You are an outlaw after all. I have been playing Plunder since before it was released and can only think of one time the Stand Trial card cost me the game. Even then if I had not gotten greedy and used all my high cards I would have survived.

Your friend is not the only one to feel this way though. There are several folks that have posted alternate rule suggestions for this card and mutiny. Read through those and I am sure you will find something that will work.

nightskys wrote:
next is the selling goods. your crew forces you to sell plunder good if you can. and any prize ships as i under stand right.
That is correct. They are working for the plunder and want to get paid.

nightskys wrote:
lol last question is the extra rules i know they put encouters on all the cards but how do i use them and rember them i cant just wright on the cards.
This was suppose to be fixed with next printing of the game. I don't think that will happen now. I suggest making a cheat sheet and keep it with you while you play. Over time with multiple plays you will memorize the extra rules and not even think about it.

Hope this helps.

Thread: i need help with plunder pleas help

nightskys — 2008-07-29T06:30:45+00:00

ok first thing i have a question with is how do you plunder goods. let say i kill a ship then the next card i pull is the parrot dose that mean i get 21 wood as long as i can carry it.

next is the stand trile card makes my friends quit the game then its no fun. they dont like it becuse over powerd cards. anyone know how to make this card less powerful(i know its pirate like and pirates life isint fair but i want my friend to play thats why i baught it i like the game the way it is)

next is the selling goods. your crew forces you to sell plunder good if you can. and any prize ships as i under stand right.

lol last question is the extra rules i know they put encouters on all the cards but how do i use them and rember them i cant just wright on the cards.

thanks for your help and time.

Thread: Re: Adding a touch of unpredictability to NPC combat with dice

voynix — 2008-07-23T22:46:59+00:00

Seems like I am way late discovering this variant; nonetheless it seems right up my alley in that I always hated the fact you knew the outcome of combat before it started

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-11T13:21:10+00:00

How my opponent won the game - he plundered 2 Galleons with 10 cargo space, and got 10 spice for each - ARG!

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-11T06:11:03+00:00

Using Viktory II ships for the ship pieces - Looks a lot nicer

Thread: Re: Couldn't decipher rules

branchingfactor — 2008-07-10T04:46:57+00:00

The corrected rules are a huge improvement over the "Captain's Rule Book" provided in the game box. You can get them at http://www.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/12919/Precise%20P...

Thread: Re: Movement

branchingfactor — 2008-07-10T04:21:51+00:00

JohnDoeGamer wrote:
No. Its in the rules for sure. You can only move if you have 6 cards or less. Keep looking. I promise.
To clarify, this limitation (of only being able to move if you have less than seven cards in your hand) is definitely NOT in the original "Captains Rule Book" included in the game box. It is, however, included in the "corrected" rules published here as:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/12919/Precise_Plu...

Thread: Re: Prize ships and player combat

branchingfactor — 2008-07-10T03:50:46+00:00

malklavious wrote:

1) If a player is attacked by another player and decides to "cut loose" his Prize ship in hopes of making a speedy escape, can the attacking player now claim the Prize ship and any cargo that it was carrying?

If the prize ship is cut loose during the engage step and you claim it, then you can't continue your attack on the other player's ship (ie., no broadside/boarding/plunder). Conversely, if you choose to press your attack on the other player's ship, the prize ship and its cargo is lost.

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-03T16:17:35+00:00

Timber Counters - Unpunched (note: the timber counters are not perfectly outlined. The counters are a bit "blurry"- they aren't very well defined. It's not the picture)

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-03T16:16:15+00:00

Gold Coins (Both Sides) - Unpunched (Note: These are not "blurry". If they appear out of focus, it's becuase the counters are not perfectly detailed)

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-03T14:14:38+00:00

The unopened pack of cards - I wonder if all the decks have the same cards on top?

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-03T14:11:46+00:00

4 ship markers

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-03T05:52:05+00:00

Flag Counters - Unpunched

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-02T21:44:46+00:00

Silver Coins (Both Sides) - Unpunched

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-02T20:36:46+00:00

Spices - Unpunched Counters

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Howitzer_120mm — 2008-07-02T20:35:19+00:00

Cloth - Unpunched Counters

Thread: Re: Adding a touch of unpredictability to NPC combat with dice

BudsBalkan — 2008-06-17T15:44:09+00:00

Nice variant which i will try next time.
I also had the feeling that NPC combat is way to easy.

Thread: Re: Winning while not being very pirate-like

fastspinecho — 2008-06-02T23:18:26+00:00

QBert80 wrote:
I would have been in a stalemate, stuck in the port and unable to move.
You can always attack the port and buy yourself a one-way ticket back to Tortuga.

Thread: Re: Variant - Captain's Orders

fastspinecho — 2008-06-01T03:55:31+00:00

I'm very sorry to hear about your difficulties with Laughing Pan. In any case, I'm still playing Plunder and I feel like it got a lot of things right, particularly in its sense of adventure, that even the newer pirate games lack.

I mostly play two-player so I haven't experimented much with Encounter variants, since they usually end up having no effect. Are you still using this one? For some reason, I thought your variant involved rotating encounter cards when played on someone who already had one, but I can't seem to find that description any more. However, the idea of playing Encounters face-up sounds pretty cool, even more so if there is room for some negotiation and/or bluffing after the encounter is revealed but before it is assigned.

Thread: Re: Variant - Captain's Orders

kglepp — 2008-06-01T01:50:56+00:00

Intriguing! We'll have to try this variant out some times, and see how it plays. Are you also using the newer rules regarding Play Encounter? (They're in another post here.)

By the way, my conversations with the remnants of Laughing Pan Productions have been entirely unproductive, so my hands are tied in "officially" doing anything further with the game. I'm very glad people are still enjoying Plunder, and interested in it enough to continue to customize it to their own tastes.

Karl

Thread: Variant - Captain's Orders

fastspinecho — 2008-05-30T15:31:02+00:00

Like others, I think encounters could use more tension. They tend to end up as an exercise in min-maxing in which the outcome is never in doubt. This variant is meant to add some uncertainty without resorting to random elements like die rolls.

Variant - Captain's Orders

1. Immediately before a player ends a turn in Open Sea, he may declare his "orders" for speed, cannon, and crew. He does this by committing the cards from his hand to be played during his next encounter. To help keep track, the cards may be placed face down respectively above, to the side, and below the player mat.

2. During his next encounter phase, if an encounter allows a card to be played from hand to boost speed, cannon, or crew, then the player MUST play the committed card, even if it is unnecessary to meet the challenge. If no card has been committed, however, then a card cannot be played from hand.

3. After the encounter phase, unused orders cards are returned to the player's hand.

4. If attacked directly by another player, the defending player immediately returns all his orders cards to hand and combat proceeds using the standard rules. If he survives, new orders may be placed after combat.

Basically, this is meant to force some hard(er) decisions regarding the use of cards. If a player commits low-value cards as orders or doesn't commit cards, he risks being sunk by a powerful enemy ship. If he commits his higher-value cards as orders, though, then they might be thrown away on a weaker ship.

Thus, the weaker ship cards that are usually poor choices for encounters now can force a player to discard some or all of his orders. To counter this, a player might make more use of the option to sink an enemy ship without boarding it, which has the advantage of sparing the crew order card if the speed check failed. Fleeing also becomes a useful strategy rather than a sign of desperation, sparing both the cannon and crew order cards.

In addition, this changes the value of some of the unique cards. Cards such as Kraken and Sirens become more fearsome since they will foil players who rely on fixed strategies such as always fleeing or always sinking enemies. And this variant reduces the effect of the "troublesome" Stand Trial and Governor's Tax cards, since it will be very tempting to use them as orders rather than hold them and wait for a victim.

Any comments are welcome!

Thread: Re: Winning while not being very pirate-like

QBert80 — 2008-05-17T19:54:32+00:00

In fact, selling the booty at full value had a huge effect on the game. Since I won by doing so, I had no cards left in my hand, and I was in a port adjacent only to a coastland that required 20+ crew to enter, had the game gone on I would have been in a stalemate, stuck in the port and unable to move. I really shot myself in the foot by moving there (except that in our version I ended the game by doing so) and I wonder if the designers intended for this to be possible or if it's just a strange fluke the way the cards came out.

One thing I learned is that it's important to keep a couple cards in your hand at all times.

I was really lucky to draw the pirate ship. It was worth a lot, and sinking it doesn't make you the enemy of any country.

Thread: Winning while not being very pirate-like

GamingWench — 2008-05-16T22:56:26+00:00

Well surprise surprise we were playing the wrong rules. With only a cursory knowledge of the rules clarification documents that other geeks have so wonderfully provided here, I sat down with QBert to try our hand at being pirates for the first time.

The biggest rule mistake we made was that we didn't know you could change direction 90 degrees once per turn, so our map kind of ended up being a long line with a couple cards going out side to side. The only other rules confusion that happened was that QBert didn't catch the part about plundered goods and prize ships selling for half their value due to sharing your plunder with your crew. Fortunately he didn't spend much time plundering so it only had a minor impact on the game.

I thought the game had potential, but because of the lack of clarity in the rules booklet, it makes it difficult to have both a fun and well-balanced game. I think we pretty much forgot to pay our crews every turn. I got caught twice but the first one we ended up disagreeing over how long the person has to call "Mutiny!" Once this was resolved that part worked better.

My strategy was to try and plunder ships and sell them for vast amounts of booty, which I thought was quite pirate-like. QBert was running low on cards at a couple of points and I thought I'd surely get a nasty encounter to sick on him. But tragically that didn't occur. QBert went instead for more legitimate trading, buying cheap goods from a Natives card, and then selling them at a port where goods were quite valuable. He ended up winning the game having only plundered one low-value ship because he was such a successful legitimate trader. This was partly to do with the direction change rule issue, because I couldn't get up to the more valuable ports to sell my booty.

Some BGGers have noted that it goes really fast with 2 and this was definitely our experience, but we'd have to play again with the correct rules before I'm willing to jump on board a variant to correct this.

I thought it was fun, the components and theme were well done, and the mechanics, once corrected, would have potential. My only misgivings at this point other than my annoyance at the unclear rules sheet were that it seemed to break with the theme to be able to win through legitimate economics and that I'm still not sure how war would factor in significantly in such a short game.

As to war, during our game only one war was declared and while I was enemies with both Holland and Spain, QBert only fought one pirate ship and so was able to trade legitimate goods at all ports without a Letter of Marque. Only the one war came up the entire game and it didn't seem to have much of an impact at all, though perhaps this would change with more players or given a different shuffling of the deck.

All in all, it's definitely worth another try to see if getting the rules right makes it more satisfying.

Thread: Re: "Enemy" Ships going after YOU?

GamingWench — 2008-05-13T17:56:55+00:00

All non-pirate, non-enemy ships will try to flee from you if you attack.

If they are your enemy, they attack and you must fight or outrun.

All ships you're at war with will try to fight you, regardless of cannons or crew.

Thread: Adding a touch of unpredictability to NPC combat with dice

Skadar — 2008-04-07T15:14:19+00:00

I was introduced to Plunder from a game group member who recently moved away, so I had to find a copy for myself. Plunder is one of those games that almost feels right, and therefore opens itself up to any number of house rules or variants.

Here is one very simple thing I am going to add to my next game:

Adding a D6 for NPC combat

When a player decides to engage an NPC ship (either from hand or via Encouter response), that player must roll a D6 for each of the three combat values of the NPC vessel in turn... adding the result to each printed value. Those are the numbers the player will have to beat for each combat step.

Seems like this would add a healthy dose of uncertainty to NPC combat. The ship that looked like an easy mark suddenly lofts additional sail or opens up a few more gun ports that you didn't notice.

The resulting game effect seems in-line with true pirate behavior. I don't imagine that most pirates were heroic or daring... but rather hesitant to engage unless they were overly confident of victory.

Thread: Re: Basic Plunder, playable by 5 or 6 players?

Ravenlock80 — 2008-02-27T04:31:43+00:00

Sky Knight X wrote:
Are you kidding me? Plunder is a modern classic. It is the perfect pirate game. The design is brilliant. It packs everything pirety into such a quick and evocative game. Other pirate games slap on the theme or struggle with overly complex mechanics to bring out the theme. Plunder does it logically and innovatively. It's one of the very few games that I feel was designed just for me and better than I could have done. It is still one of our top two or three games played. The problem is that I don't log in my games played and I don't attend cons.

Completely seconded. Had to resurrect a dead thread just to say how much I agree with this post.

Thread: Re: New Rules and Other Updates

Ravenlock80 — 2008-02-27T04:23:49+00:00

Hey Karl, any progress on getting that new rule booklet out as a PDF? It's still something I look forward to every time my wife and I dig out Plunder, and since we just did it again with friends last weekend I figured it was a good time to come poke you as a reminder.

Thread: Re: Second Printing?

JeffyJeff — 2008-02-13T20:48:26+00:00

It's been almost a year since the "Plunder Gets a New Look for 2006" post on the LPP website. Was the reprint scuttled, or has it already hit stores under my nose?
2nd edition was aborted... found the thread via the thoughthammer site buried under the rules... see http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/153043 from the designer that confirms no 2nd edition is planned any longer

Thread: Variant - Burying your treasure

fastspinecho — 2008-01-07T18:03:23+00:00

After a few 2P games, it seemed that some of the encounter cards were too powerful, especially Governor's Tax, which cannot be defended against and can cost someone the game.

I thought of the following variant to protect against this card (as well as Stand Trial):

Act, Coastland: Bury treasure. Place any number of cards from your hand aside face down, and place any amount of your silver underneath them. While buried, for all game purposes the silver does not count as yours. Cards used to bury treasure may not be used for other purposes until discarded.

Act, Open Water: Retrieve treasure. Any face-down cards used to bury treasure may be revealed and then discarded, at which point the silver will be returned to your possession.

Act, Port: Hunt for treasure. Declare an opponent's stash of buried treasure, and discard any number of cards. If the total value of your cards exceeds the total value of the face-down cards, you may discard them and take possession of the opponent's buried silver. If not, your opponent is not required to reveal the value of his cards.

Any feedback?

Edit:

Ok, I see that there are already buried treasure variants, including one by the designer. One of the the main differences in my variant is that the amount of buried treasure is secret, which allows a player to bluff (e.g. burying just 4 silver under 5 low-value cards, to trick an opponent into wasting multiple and/or high-value cards to find it).

Another difference is that physically retrieving treasure is abstracted and occurs in Open Water (where a dinghy might be deployed) whereas hunting for treasure takes place in Port (where you would find an informant). That's mainly to avoid the record-keeping involved in the physical location of each buried stash.

Thread: Re: Fun game... but some annoying issues

Kozure — 2007-09-28T15:05:21+00:00

This suggestion sounds like a good compromise between the five card standard start and the nine card two-player start. Having only played once (with a unlikely card distribution resulting in a very small map initially), I'm going to try the rules-as-written version one more time to see how it goes, then maybe switch to this option for comparison.

As a added suggestion, for a touch of historical flair, place the two "corner" cards northwest and southeast of Tortuga, to set up a "grain" to the map which roughly approximates the diagonal NW-SE sweep of the Caribbean island chain.

Thread: Re: Combat Variant - Weather Gage

trippcor — 2007-09-28T11:12:41+00:00

Sounds interesting, though I think the speed check at the start of combat covers this. I would be interested to hear what others exprience if they try this variation.

Thread: Re: Fun game... but some annoying issues

trippcor — 2007-09-28T11:06:57+00:00

Jeff's suggestion is a good one. We play tested it and it works well especially if you only have two players.

Thread: Re: Fishbowl Syndrome and Other Minor Glitches

boltongeordie — 2007-09-28T08:50:22+00:00

Good questions and a smashing response. Having played several times I also anticipated the effect of not drawing any open sea at the start, however it just has never happened to us.

The only thing I would add about two of the questions 'easy defeat of NPC ships' and 'shortage of cards in the hand' is that we try not to short our hands too much because a short hand at sea or coast means your opponents will happily play certain NPC ships or the simpler encounters on you as an easy hit, knowing that you have to waste even more of your valuable stock of cards outrunning or outgunning them. This counts double if your speed is reduced by a prize ship.

Thread: Re: Fun game... but some annoying issues

Cinnibar — 2007-09-28T02:27:27+00:00

For your 'few cards' problem, one solution:

Instead of Four Open Seas played around Tortega to start the game, start with five or six, forming one or two 'corners' of Open Sea. This allows any ship two cards to be drawn each turn from the start of the game. This doubles the initial flow of cards, increasing the chance that terrain will be drawn to play.

Thread: Re: Fishbowl Syndrome and Other Minor Glitches

Kozure — 2007-09-28T02:06:16+00:00

Fantastic reply Karl, very responsive and well-thought through.

I appreciate you taking time to respond to each comment. Thank you for your time.

Thread: Re: Fun game... but some annoying issues

kglepp — 2007-09-28T01:21:35+00:00

In initial plays, where you're not sure what the Encounter cards can do and how to hedge against them, these can be killer. However, there are definitely ways to mitigate them, and there are ways to bounce back.

If you're worried about Stand Trial, make sure you have some decent cards in your hand before going back to port, and make sure you Trade away at least your Prize Ship and Cargo as soon as you do (since Stand Trial takes those regardless of card draw). The mix of card numbers is on BGG now - you can see by this what cards to look for to reduce the chance of Stand Trial winning. Yeah, I'm sure the pirates who were hung thought standing trial was unbalanced as well...

As far as "unbalanced," this is a game primarily about theme, and I'd call the pirate's life definitely unbalanced. Even so, there are ways around each card called "unbalanced" and ways to return and win. Without the reversals common to every pirate adventure, I would consider this game tame and lame.

"With regards map stagnation, I suppose an experienced Plunder group might just sail about a bit at first and hold off combat etc to husband cards until the map is build up a bit. If that is the case, why not just start with a bigger map?"

Variability of play. If you always want to be the gallant, start with a bigger map. If you want the feel of a local pirate, watching and building his experience of the world while scraping by with trade and bits of silver, then possibly making a break for the wider sea (maybe on the coattails of another's find), then play as written.

"...either you'll like it as it is or you'll tweak it..." A hearty AYE to that! I'm from the old mold of gamers - or is that old and moldy? I haven't yet met a game that I couldn't tweak to make it better for my group!

And thanks for the recommendation, in any case!
Karl

Thread: Re: Combat Variant - Weather Gage

kglepp — 2007-09-28T01:03:41+00:00

I'll repeat this from my reply to your other post:

If you were to flip a card each time for combat values on the ship, remember that will increase the occurence of Storm. If you really want to flip a card for NPC combat each time, at least make the same card count for cargo (you could reason that the more cargo the ship has, the more watchful its captain).

Thread: Re: Fishbowl Syndrome and Other Minor Glitches

kglepp — 2007-09-28T00:59:14+00:00

In playtesting, we did have some games that were as tight as you described. In fact, we toyed with a rule like this:

Act, Tortuga: Disband Crew. You may sell all of your ships and cargo and discard your whole hand of cards, and flip your ship sideways, just as if your ship went down. At the beginning of your next turn, before Resolve Encounter, flip your ship up, draw a new hand of six cards (one at a time, stopping if you draw the Storm card), and take your turn as normal.

However, even in the tight-map games where this was an option, only once did a player take advantage of it. What happened all other times is that people began legitimate trading until the map opened up. There was also the (slight) fear that some gamers would "abuse" the rule in an attempt to delve through the deck for that "perfect card." So, we dropped the rule. Eh, maybe if you only allow one Disband Crew for each Captain during the game, it might work as a variant.

Why isn't the eight Open Sea card setup used in all games? I felt it took too many Open Sea cards out of the deck at the start - if the lack of Open Sea cards for 3-4 players did happen as often as 2 players, I'd have done the eight Open Sea card setup for all, but that only seems to happen rarely. We really do want the feel of a different setup each time, so keeping the variability in is important to me.

NPC Combat: there is already a large amount of luck/chaos in the game, so this is one more on the "strategy" (read: will happen when the player wants it to) side. Also, even during the period of the pirate hunters, pirates took ships almost with impunity - there wasn't that much real-life fight from merchants, and pirates could (unless drunk or otherwise stuck) usually get away from individual encounters with larger ships, only attacking when boldness or circumstances greatly favored their victory.

If you were to flip a card each time for combat values on the ship, remember that will increase the occurence of Storm. If you really want to flip a card for NPC combat each time, at least make the same card count for cargo (you could reason that the more cargo the ship has, the more watchful its captain).

There is a time to play a ship as an Encounter, especially in the regular game: when your enemy has a large haul and few cards. We've had many moments where the unlucky recipient has had to make the rending decision to cut his Prize Ship and run or let his ship go down to get a new hand of cards.

Larger ports not worth sacking. Again, refer to history - with few exceptions, the only greater return from sacking larger ports was bragging rights. The larger ports usually had enough warning and/or ability to escape with or hide their goods. It really is a valid strategy to leave them alone and attack the poor Dutch. Of course, even this usually makes sense only with Fleets. I had thought that limiting Cargo by the port's Cannon would be appropriate, but our playtesting crew didn't even want to hear about it. Maybe I'll force it in after all...

We've once seen the Storm card drawn by the same player four times in a row - ask Tripp about that... (By the way, we call him Captain Stormcrow.) He still wins plenty of times, even though it can be tough. Remember - pirate's life!

Tiny hands - a very definite design decision was to force movement by the reward of drawing cards. This keeps turtling to a minimum, and much less available than in most games. Allowing other ways to return cards during a normal turn will lessen the impact of many tactical decisions, and tiny hands only appears regularly with a tiny map. This comes round to the initial paragraphs above. With all the ports that appeared on your map, you probably had good opportunity for legitimate Trade. Where there is at least one Open Sea between useful ports, you could use Trade during turns when you're building up your hand of cards. Sure, there can be difficulties getting started with this (capturing a Merchant and keeping it for your own ship would be best), but they can be overcome.

Not all pirates were Bart or Teach. Many didn't travel far, and many mixed trading with taking. Many scraped by, just existing. Tight-map games can help remind you of this part, and give you a feel of how they dealt with it.

Some have also questioned whether you play the game or the game plays you. This lets me know the game is exactly where I want it - in between strategy and luck, with a strong flavor of what the pirates felt (in reality and in their tales).

Hope this helps!
Karl

Thread: Fun game... but some annoying issues

StuartMc — 2007-09-27T23:57:05+00:00

We've played two games, one trial game with 2 players, one with 4 experienced gamers.

The underlying game seemed quite fun and had some clever touches, but IMHO we found two (fixable?) problems:

1. Map stagnation.

By round 3, players are running low on cards -> Players can't expand the map as they don't have any cards to lay -> Players can't move far as the map is small -> Players move short distances so they draw few cards -> Player run even lower on cards -> ...

Although the mechanism that players must keep moving to keep the cards flowing is genius, the fact that we were desperately trying to exactly that - but couldn't - was very frustrating.

2. Unbalanced cards
a. Play for two hours
b. Player to your right uses skill and cunning (and maybe a pinch of luck) to draw a "Stand Trial" card
c. You are foolhardy enough to go in to a port (which is the only way you can progress in the game, btw)
c. Player to your right plays Stand Trial card: you have a good chance of being knocked right back to where you started (in fact, slightly worse off as you at least started with a couple of silver coins).

Both games that we played terminated after players quit because of receiving killer encounter cards - rather than having an actual winner (although as the first game was a trial game that doesn't mean that much in that case).

With regards map stagnation, I suppose an experienced Plunder group might just sail about a bit at first and hold off combat etc to husband cards until the map is build up a bit. If that is the case, why not just start with a bigger map?

One of the other players commented that he preferred Pirates Cove to Plunder!- but I think I'd like to give Plunder a bit more chance - maybe with a few tweaks - before I decide between the two.

Despite these reservations, I'd still recommend Plunder! - either you'll like it as it is or you'll tweak it - in either case you'll have a fun Pirate game that mixes trading, exploring, fighting and gold.

Thread: Combat Variant - Weather Gage

Kozure — 2007-09-27T19:33:16+00:00

I've only played once, but already I've been thinking about how to spice up combat. Here's a variant I've been thinking about.

The Weather Gage

Combat vs. NPC ships seems too cut-and-dry. I suggest the following as a possible variant to spice up player vs. NPC combat.

When you play a ship card out of your hand to attack a ship during an open sea act, you have the "weather gage" a nautical term describing a favourable position of one sailing vessel in relation to another. Combat is handled as in the standard rules with the following exceptions: Frigates of any nation and Pirates are assumed to be too clever sailors (or at least better sailors than the lubberly merchants) to be caught completely off guard. When combating Frigates and Pirates, during each combat step (sail, broadsides, boarding), after the player has selected a card (if any) to add its number, flip a single card from the top of the draw deck and add half its value (rounded down) to the attribute in question. All other types of ships (including Treasure Fleets) behave as before.

When a ship card is played on you during an encounter, that ship has the weather gage on you. Frigates and Pirates flip a card during each combat step and add the FULL number on the card. As a balance, in this case, the enemy card flips their card first, before the player selects a counter. All other types of ships (and Natives) flip a single card from the top of the draw deck and add half its value (rounded down).

Combat between player-controlled ships is handled exactly as before - the pirate captains are assumed to be wary of one another and keeping a weather eye out for their competition. Combat with ports is not changed using this rule.

This makes standard ship encounters with NPC pirates and frigates less predictable and makes ships played as encounters potential threats (especially Pirates and Frigates) rather than the giveaways they generally are now.

If playing with the Commodore rules for additional ships, only one card is flipped per step, if applicable, not one per enemy ship. If merchants and pirates/frigates are mixed in the same group of opponent ships, the weather gage option is used as if the group contains only merchants.

Thread: Fishbowl Syndrome and Other Minor Glitches

Kozure — 2007-09-27T17:03:34+00:00

This is a sort of combination of session report, general commentary and rules questions, so I put in it in the general area.

I bought the game with much enthusiasm and set down to play it with my gaming group last night.

The game was... problematic.

Four players, standard set-up. We played rules as written, with the following modifications since they are strongly recommended by the designer:

1. Play encounters face down on any player, any encounter already there shifts to next open slot.

2. Open Sea, Coastline, Port played as encounter may be placed in any legitimate adjacent location to acting player.

We did not use the other encounter modifications suggested by the designer in this thread: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/153043

...as this was our first game.

Okay, set-up, no problem. I shuffle the deck thoroughly, knowing that the cards are completely sorted when you get it out of the box. I hand the deck to someone else to shuffle, just in case (this is important later) Players look a bit glazed after the rules explanation (especially re: scouting/moving), but that happens too sometimes.

I draw first captain. No open sea cards, one port in my hand. No point in playing the port yet, so I sail one space west and play an easy mark Dutch Brigantine out of my hand. The player to my left plays voodoo curse on me right off the bat. My ship goes down. Bad start. *shrug* No problem, bad luck, right? At least they've grasped the concept of the Voodoo Curse.

Next player. Sails south. Draws a card. Stops. Does not scout. I ask the player, "Don't you have any open sea, port or coastline cards?"

"No," he says.

He encounters a ship, defeats it. Meh, no problem.

Next player - sails east, draws a card. Draws a card. Stops. Does not scout. I ask the player somewhat incredulously, "Don't you have any open sea, port or coastline cards?"

"No," he says.

Fourth player - sails north, draws a card. Draws a card. Stops. Does not scout. I'm not believing it at this point, "Tell me that you have an open sea, port or coastline card?"

Fourth player just shakes his head.

Obviously, since none of us are moving very far, we're only drawing one card. None of us have drawn a card we can use. Back to me.

I buy some goods with the silver I already have and sail north on the next turn. I have one Open Sea card so I play that. I move in there, but don't draw another "terrain" card. I stop.

I look at my hand. I want to keep all of the cards... the only one I don't really want is "Crew is Drunk". Knowing that it forces a skipped turn, and no one has really done anything yet, I regretfully play it on the third player.

Since the other players save one have all gone in different directions than north, they have been forced to move one, back to Tortuga, drawing only one card. Except the player whose crew gets gets drunk. That player plays "Scurvy" on someone else who has moved back to Tortuga.

So in the first four turns or so, two people have already been forced to skip turns and I've lost my ship. The "map" is currently one solitary open sea space larger than the starting configuration.

This goes on for a few more rounds. No one is drawing open sea cards, so people sail back and forth from Tortuga, occasionally bagging prize ships and selling the plunder for minuscule profits there. Finally, a port is played. People sail north for that port, picking up a few cards in the process.

That opens up play a little bit, but our drought of open sea cards continue. In desperation, we start playing coastline and port cards very close to each other, forcing additional movement stoppages but at least expanding the map. Once in a while, someone plays an open sea card, but often in inconvenient places due to the existing cramped conditions. One player plunders a port on a westernmost arm of exploration and then sails east to open sea of out it, essentially "trapping" himself from the rest of the board. He gets a port, but is then trapped in an similar situation to the rest of us in Tortuga at the start of the game, but worse, because there is only one port available to him, and he doesn't have a letter of marque there. He unfortunately spends much of the rest of the game sailing in a pointless L-shape that he manages to create with many turns of one space sailing.

The rest of us sail around, but there is still no stretch of open sea longer than two cards. The rest are ports and coastlands, two of which are the ones which require high crew or card draws to enter - Dread Coast of Doom (or whatever it's called) and the Isle of Bones (?).

Needless to say, the players are restless at this point, especially the player who has unwittingly trapped himself up in the northwest. Meanwhile I'm sailing around, buying from Tortuga and selling elsewhere for small profits. The others are doing similar low-key activities.

One player gets hit with the storm three times in five turns (!). He and his ship survives, but he's essentially motionless for ten minutes of play. Before you ask, yes, he shuffled thoroughly each time! I watched.

Finally, one player draws six open sea cards in a row(?!) (starting with none in his hand) and opens up a long sea route to the south. I beeline there, picking up a lot of cards in the process.

Eventually the game starts to come back to normalcy as the open sea lane south of Tortuga bears fruit. Eventually I've made about 54 silver (most of the other players range from 10-30), but we've run thirty minutes past our usual end time of 11 PM and everyone is frustrated after an hour and forty five minutes of play. I call the game, saying that we must have drawn all of the possible bad breaks in terms of card draws.

All of the players seem willing to try the game again (the one guy who trapped himself in the northwest is leery, though), since we all agree that it was a horribly unlikely stretch of bad luck (especially the three-storm guy and the almost complete lack of open sea cards in the early game).

Anyhow... I have a few comments, suggestions and questions:

The Tortuga Fishbowl

I know it says it pretty explicitly in the rules... but is moving truly the only way to get new cards? Was any other method tested or considered? We were completely trapped in the Tortuga Fishbowl for several pointless rounds as a result of no open sea draws on the first couple of turns. Has anyone considered variants for getting cards in lieu of doing something else?

Eight Open Sea Start

Why isn't the eight open sea card configuration as used in the two-player game used for all games? Seems like it would get things off to a much speedier start. I'm sure it was playtested thoroughly so there must be a reason. We're going to try the rules-as-written set-up once more, but the eight card set-up seems like it would be much better in almost all cases.

Sure-Thing NPC Ship Combat

Yeah, I know that others have commented on this before. I know there is a "Additional Ships" rule in the Commodore's game. But it really does seem dry to have NPC ship combat when the only chance of failure is the Voodoo Curse or the traitor. Was any variant tested where the top card in the deck is flipped to add to the NPC's combat values (sail, cannon, crew)? One thing that occurred to me is that you could use standard combat for cards played out of your hand, but when a enemy ship is fought as an encounter, it uses random cards to augment its score. Still too dangerous?

Larger Ports Not Worth Sacking

A few players commented that in many cases a larger port would not be worth sacking - sacking the smallest port potentially yields just as much booty as sacking Havana or Port Royal. Could added incentive for sacking larger ports be added? Silver, related in some way to the cannon or garrison strength or trade prices? Just a thought.

Storm Card

Now, I know that it was just dumb luck that the player got that storm card so many times in one game. ~1/108^3 (or so, minus cards on the board and in hands) but man, that was tough on the guy.

Tiny Hands
After fighting a larger ship and ending your turn, you're often down by as much as four cards; usually at least three! (Sail, cannon, crew + encounter card that must be played). In our game, combined with poor open sea potential, this meant that we were often playing with zero, one or two cards. As anyone who plays card-driven games knows, lack of choice is extremely frustrating. Were any proposals for replacing combat cards or drawing more cards (see above) given in the design process?

Final Thoughts

Anyhow, I can see that this could potentially be a good game with better card draws and smarter play on the part of some players, but it's unfortunately left us with a bitter taste. I hope that others can add some comments that would aid us in better play and game understanding in the future.

Thread: Re: Mannie Oaks and never leaving port

Kozure — 2007-09-25T17:27:43+00:00

[edit: I wrote up a post about how this seemed a little broken, then I realized I had read the buy/sell prices incorrectly, reversing them, thus making it ridiculously easy to turn a profit just by staying in port. Post retracted. Prices as they exist are fine, given explanation by designer and rarity of combination + situation]

Thread: Re: New Rules and Other Updates

kglepp — 2007-09-14T01:05:55+00:00

Just had a moment to check posts again - good thing I did! Al, yes, by the new rules, you can cause an Encounter card to come to your mat. In fact, an Encounter you played on someone else could indeed come back to haunt you... However, that's a side effect of the rule.

The Commodore's Game has the original Encounter rules, is the most piratey to me, and also keeps people involved in the game even when it isn't their turn. However, our more casual players didn't like how much it lengthened the game, so that's where the simpler "play to your left" came in.

We also tried just playing to any open mat, but found that sometimes it locked up which captain you could play to, just like playing to your left does. Not really any better that way.

So in came the passing of any existing encounter. This also preserves the priority of the Encounter played by a person just to the right of a captain, just like in The Commodore's Game.

Both Julie and I like the new rule so much that, probably to Dane's dismay, we'll drydock the old Commodore's Encounter rules once we can finish the new booklet. (Now, where did the time to do that go???)

Thread: Re: O.K., I lied, I have one MORE question!

gpren — 2007-09-12T17:44:56+00:00

Thanks Chris!

Thread: Re: O.K., I lied, I have one MORE question!

boltongeordie — 2007-09-12T15:48:01+00:00

Correct

Thread: Re: O.K., I lied, I have one MORE question!

gpren — 2007-09-12T15:15:00+00:00

OK, So the procedure about taking the top card from the deck and using the type and amount of cargo on that card only applies to combat with non-player ships and ports right?

Thread: Re: O.K., I lied, I have one MORE question!

boltongeordie — 2007-09-12T11:36:09+00:00

You take their prize ship (if they have one) and all the cargo they are carrying. You can switch ships and cargo about (get rid of the prize ship you had previously, replace your pinnace with the prize ship etc) but you must end up with no more than 1 prize ship and within the total cargo capacity of your own ship, plus the prize ship. Any surplus cargo or ships are claimed by the waves.

Thread: O.K., I lied, I have one MORE question!

gpren — 2007-09-12T10:59:04+00:00

When you successfully board ANOTHER PLAYER'S ship, do you simply take whatever cargo that ship is carrying, or do you instead go through the process of taking the top card from the deck and checking the type and number of cargo on the CARD just like you do against non-player ships?

Thread: Re: One more question!

gpren — 2007-09-12T10:53:38+00:00

Thanks again Tripp, that leaves no doubt!

Thread: Re: Reversing direction

boltongeordie — 2007-09-12T09:22:07+00:00

I think I see your error
gpren wrote:
My concern is this. If, for some reason, you begin your Travel & Scout phase with no Map cards to the front, left, or right of your ship, and you have no Map cards in your hand to play, you are essentially stuck on your current Map card for the rest of the game
This is not the case. Your movement is restricted within the turn, not for the whole game. When you begin the Travel and Scout phase you can set off in ANY direction (in the example you give, South is your only option), regardless of the moves you made on your last turn.

Naturally, within this turn you must either keep moving South or, at some stage, make one turn to the left or right (East or West) and keep moving in that direction.

When the following turn comes you can, again, set off in any direction.

Hope this helps.

Thread: Re: One more question!

trippcor — 2007-09-11T23:26:44+00:00

You can attack another player ship in a coastline certainly. It works just like in an open sea. No you can not attack ships in port. Karl Lepp, the game creator, has a big post about this on the Laughing Pan Forum. Here is the link to that: http://www.laughingpan.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=77

Thread: Re: Reversing direction

trippcor — 2007-09-11T23:18:55+00:00

At the start of a players move and scout phase, they can move in any direction they want that has a valid map card. This may be one that the player puts down or one that already was part of the map.

Thread: One more question!

gpren — 2007-09-11T19:52:34+00:00

I have one more question (at least I THINK it's that last one) regarding combat.

Exactly where can you attack other players ships? I find no mention of this in the rules. Is it only on Open Sea cards...or can you also attack them on Port and Coastland cards?

Thread: Re: Reversing direction

gpren — 2007-09-11T18:03:46+00:00

Thanks for the help David,
So what you are saying is that players can "move off" in any one of the four directions around their ship (provided that there is a Map card in the chosen direction), it does NOT have to be straight ahead right?

Thread: Re: Reversing direction

dwrigley — 2007-09-11T17:52:41+00:00

I think I understand what you are saying...
At the start of the move/scout phase you can move off in any valid direction (ie where there are sea/coast/port cards placed).
It does not matter which way your ship is 'facing'.

You can also, in this phase, do one change of direction (at right angles to the current direction you are moving in ... ie left or right).

So the restriction is that you must continue moving in the same direction throughout the phase, with the one change of direction allowed (but that 90deg change would not permit a reversal of direction)

Hope I am not confusing you any more!!!!

Thread: Reversing direction

gpren — 2007-09-11T17:26:24+00:00

I'm a little confused about reversing direction when moving, I'd really appreciate any help.

Lets just say that my ship is heading NORTH when my Travel & Scout Phase begins, and that I have no open sea cards to my North, East or West. I only have the open sea card to my south that I moved off of on my last turn to reach my current Map card. Am I able to travel SOUTH back onto that open sea with my very first move?

The rules that came with the game state that you may make your very first move to a Map card that is on the table "in the direction that you're traveling" and may then change direction (either left or right)once. The rules posted on Laughing Pans website state that you can move onto the "next map card on the board" and then change directions (left or right) once. The website rules also state that "You can NEVER reverse direction during one turn".

My concern is this. If, for some reason, you begin your Travel & Scout phase with no Map cards to the front, left, or right of your ship, and you have no Map cards in your hand to play, you are essentially stuck on your current Map card for the rest of the game (since the only way to get NEW map cards is to move, and since you can no longer move... you cannot get any new map cards), UNLESS you are lucky enough for an opponent to place a Map card next to your ship (which, knowing our game group, would never happen, my buddies would simply let me flounder in one spot).

I guess what I'm asking is...can your very first ship move during your Travel & Scout phase be in ANY of the four directions around your ship provided there are Map cards on all four sides or are you only allowed to move straight ahead, in the direction that your ship is facing and THEN turn left or right once from that direction?

Thread: Re: Basic Plunder, playable by 5 or 6 players?

bluejuice — 2007-09-08T00:16:31+00:00

Maybe we'll make DC next year to play some hands in the common area. Though I'll have to adjust the maternity pirate costume .

The pictures from the Yule Ball I've seen from DC look really cool.

Thread: Re: Basic Plunder, playable by 5 or 6 players?

bluejuice — 2007-09-08T00:13:51+00:00

Why thank ye sir- You just made my day!

Thread: Re: Basic Plunder, playable by 5 or 6 players?

Sky Knight X — 2007-09-06T21:39:33+00:00

trippcor wrote:

I am glad to hear folks are still playing.

Are you kidding me? Plunder is a modern classic. It is the perfect pirate game. The design is brilliant. It packs everything pirety into such a quick and evocative game. Other pirate games slap on the theme or struggle with overly complex mechanics to bring out the theme. Plunder does it logically and innovatively. It's one of the very few games that I feel was designed just for me and better than I could have done. It is still one of our top two or three games played. The problem is that I don't log in my games played and I don't attend cons.