Game: Corsairs

Thread: Re: Is this game rendered obsolete by "Loot"?

sightreader — 2008-10-04T01:54:51+00:00

shawn_low wrote:
Aside from the pirate theme, both games are different. Not a fair comparison.Oh.... hmmm... they "felt" sorta similar to me, with people trying to get the numbers on a ship and overwhelm the other guys, but Loot seemed to be a lot simpler and have more strategy (especially in teams).
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Thread: Re: Is this game rendered obsolete by "Loot"?

shawn_low — 2008-10-03T06:17:20+00:00

Aside from the pirate theme, both games are different. Not a fair comparison.

Thread: Re: Is this game rendered obsolete by "Loot"?

sightreader — 2008-05-02T07:26:35+00:00

Windopaene wrote:
Loot is Knizia filler, while Corsairs feels more like a light main course...
True, but maybe Corsairs wanted to be a light filler that they couldn't trim down enough?

Thread: Re: Is this game rendered obsolete by "Loot"?

Windopaene — 2008-05-02T07:04:52+00:00

I don't think so. Other than the fact that the rules as written make Corsairs a bit too long, and while they are about capturing ships by playing cards to them, the mechanics of how that is done feels very different. Loot is Knizia filler, while Corsairs feels more like a light main course...

Thread: Is this game rendered obsolete by "Loot"?

sightreader — 2008-05-02T06:37:57+00:00

Just curious. They seem quite similar in structure, but Loot is a lot quicker.

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Ceryon — 2008-01-26T16:04:09+00:00

German box front

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elora_c — 2008-01-11T01:38:56+00:00

End of game. Blue snags one last boat to win.

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spearjr — 2007-12-14T03:44:26+00:00

The player on the left is soon to win a galley or two.

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spearjr — 2007-12-14T03:43:27+00:00

Game in progress

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spearjr — 2007-12-14T03:42:42+00:00

Corsairs pieces

Thread: counterattacks

djnesq — 2007-05-07T03:09:28+00:00

The rules say that other players may counterattack a galley or galleys that the active player attempted to board. Does that mean that other players may counterattack when the active player's boarding attempt failed?

Also, if a counterattack fails, must the counterattacker roll the color dice and possibly lose provisions, just as the active player must?

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itiswon — 2007-03-18T13:47:44+00:00

back side of tiles

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itiswon — 2007-03-18T13:44:45+00:00

score board and marker before punched

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itiswon — 2007-03-18T13:42:37+00:00

box plate

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petersjs — 2007-03-10T16:50:15+00:00

The scoring track tokens, player indicators, and scoring track.

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Ceryon — 2006-12-28T23:31:57+00:00

Thread: Re: 2 Player Any Fun?

markhu — 2006-07-02T07:05:19+00:00

It better be--the back of the box explicately says, "especially good with 2 players."

Thread: Session Report: Corsairs (at the bowling alley)

jasonhibbs — 2005-10-01T04:32:40+00:00

Tonight, I decided to take a different game to our weekly bowling league; normally we play some version of Carcassonne, but tonight a pirate-themed game was necessary (we were bowling against the top team!).

Normal Winfield Gamers present were Jason H and Brandon S - also playing was James K, a student at the high school where the rest of us teach (he is also a member of our HS gaming club). We decided to play a full game - using all of the galleys, but now I realize that we unconsciously made some other adjustments as well.

As you would expect, we were able (with only 3 players) to move through galleys quite quickly. My first three were a black galley (8 points) and two maroon (both 8), which gave me the early lead. Brandon captured three smaller-value galleys in as many turns, but then was stuck playing defense when he could get no yellow/banana provision cards. James played conservatively, focusing on one galley at a time.

Once we each had four ships, we began to utilize the broadside attacks much more often - nearly every turn in the hopes of stealing a provision card from your opponent or at least trying to cripple their chances of winning the galley. Also, we began to get more aggressive on counterattacking (challenging) the attacks on galleys by other players - I personally like this mechanic, as I was skillful/lucky enough to steal one galley from each of my opponents.

Interesting moments:
-five galleys in a row were worth 4 or less points - none of us could decide whether to play aggressively or not
-we laughed at James who missed on four or five broadsides in a row, but then he got both of us later

In the end it was close - we had to recount to make certain:
Brandon 66
James 65
Jason 58

Thread: Re:2 Player Any Fun?

KakarisMaelstrom — 2004-12-14T18:38:41+00:00

An update: We did pick this up and try it with two. It's not bad at all. I honestly don't think the strategy is going to change all that much with more players. The main thing is just when you do fire across the bow it's often in desperation. You have no good cards to play so you take a shot.

In 2 player there still is a big factor in keeping people off boats you're trying to get on. If you can knock even just one card off you pretty easily defeat a counterattack.

Thread: Re:2 Player Any Fun?

g0dolphins — 2004-11-09T14:05:06+00:00

KakarisMaelstrom (#64313),

It's not bad. You tend to focus even more on boarding ships yourself and less on firing across the bow. It becomes more of a race to build your points than preventing your opponent from accumulating their points.

Thread: 2 Player Any Fun?

KakarisMaelstrom — 2004-11-08T21:19:33+00:00

Anyone know if this game is good for 2?

Thread: Session Report

ethim — 2004-06-13T17:35:40+00:00

Vero and I played a 2 players game of Corsairs. We used a slightly modified rules where each boat color is present in at least 4 copies for a total of 20 boats. It is easier to have 3 of one color and score double the points of the highest (advance rules). Vero quiclky grabed lots of boat. I trailed behind for the whole game, but thanks to a few good rolls for me I narrowed the difference in score at the end.

Vero 72
Martin 68

Appreciation: Vero 9
Martin 8

Thread: Session Report

Yoder — 2004-05-03T15:34:32+00:00

After playing this game once, Rob ran out and bought it. This was my first game.

Things started pretty well for me; I took the first two ships, although one was only worth two points. Then things started to go downhill. Rob contested my boarding of a ship, even though he needed an 11 or 12 to do so. Lo and behold, boxcars! So a six point ship went to Rob’s motley crew of pirates.

The worse was yet to come, however. At this point all the ships that were out needed white (bread) cards to board. Of course, I went round after round without drawing a single white card. After the first draw, the deck was shuffled, so I didn’t even have the option of discarding to get them. Rob took one ship after another with no opposition. I managed to get one ship only by a lucky broadside which captured his white card. Seeing that he was killing me, I requested an early end to the game, something I almost never do.

Besides being frustrating, this occurrence made me wonder about the viability of the game as a two player. It seems like with three or more there would be more cards out in people’s hands, and thus less chance that a certain color will be monopolized by one person. Of course, even with more players, Corsairs is basically a luck fest. Which is okay–sometimes games like that can be fun, especially if they’re about pirates and feature stealing your opponent’s rum.

Thread: General Comment

BoardGameGeek — 2002-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Does anyone have an answer to these questions?
Since I haven't been able to find an English translation of the rules I have to rely on the Italian one.
#1 If you counterattack twice during other player's turns (and don't draw new cards) in theory you may start you next turn with 0, 1 or 2 cards in hand.
The rules state you HAVE to play EXACTLY three cards. Can you play less in this case?
#2 If you try a counterattack and fail the dice roll do you have to roll the 2 coloured dice and see if you lose provision cards as if you were the active player?
Thanks to everyone

Thread: General Comment

BoardGameGeek — 2002-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Neither of these situations is covered in the English rules, but we've encountered similar situations.

1. I'll assume so, since you cannot possibly play the 3 cards because you are not allowed to replenish your hand when you counterattack. When it is your turn again, we skip all the phases and just draw 6 and move on to the next player. The price of multiple failed counter-attacks, we say!

2. If the counter-attack(s) fail on a single galley, the victor, whoever it may be, takes the ship as prize, and all action cards are discarded. Our reasoning for this is because the ship has been captured, rather than the boarding being repelled.

Hope this helps!

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-07-08T08:58:12+00:00

After Carcassonne, I asked the Titan group (which was down to three now) how much longer they'd be. "Just another hour or so!" Came the reply... yeah, right.

So, I asked if people wanted a lighter game and I introduced them to Corsairs.

After demonstrating the utter joy of speaking in nothing but pirate-talk and going over the rules, we began.

I've played this a number of times now and my opinion slowly drops each time. The game is way too dependant on luck and the game drags on for too line for what it's worth.

I completely dominated the game by collting three groups of three colour (optional rules) and gained a VERY heavy bonus by the end of the game.

In the middle of the game, Rob2 (currently playing Titan) was in a very bad position; he had no way of winning, yet could not leave the game until one of the other players finished him off. (On an aside, this is the big weakness of AH games; a) too long, b) too easy to get in a 'too far behind' position and have to sit for hours waiting for the game to end.

I felt bad for him so, between his turns he came over and we played Cathedral (one of my favorite two player games.. I like to call it Go-Lite.. very Lite)

This was good for me too as it gave me something to do while I sat through Corsairs.

Rating for Corsairs: 6

Once the game finshed we took a break and broke out the Traders of Genoa for it's second play with the group.

Thread: Session Report

PBrennan — 2001-06-23T05:31:59+00:00

Sticking with the pirate theme after Meuterer, we played this as a closer, but deliberately constructing our play pile from only half the ships provided to bring it in at a length suitable for the game play. Although the theme is meant to be boarding and raiding ships, it makes more sense to me to think of it as provisioning ships back in Hornblower's times. The quartermasters are racing to see who can provision the ships fastest, but there's skull-duggery abounding, trying to steal each other's provisions. The dice off at the end represents how weevil-rotten the provisions you tried to lump on the captain were (unbeknownst to yourself) and how closely the captain checked them. Maybe more sense, but not as marketable obviously.

The game play itself is simplistic. 4 ships are turned over. Each ship lists the provisions it needs (two red cards (rum?), two white cards(flour?) say) plus a dice roll you need to exceed. Each player competes to get matching cards against each ship. When you've got the set of required cards out, attempt to beat the dice roll. If you do, any other player with a card against the ship has a chance at completing their set and out-scoring you. Whoever rolls highest scores it (hard ships score more). If you don't roll the required amount, you roll the colour dice to see if you lose any cards. Turn over another ship to replace that just won. Repeat until the ships run out. It gets repetitive. Especially as there's no sense of thematic progress, or at least rising tension, which dice games need to make them stand out. Just turn over another ship.

There are various actions that allow you to try and steal other players cards (which we used most turns), or exchange cards and seek what you need in the discard pile for use next turn, but most of the game play is laying out cards and rolling. Which is ok, but hardly rocket science. Fun enough as a mindless past-time, but no need to play again. The game was nicely summarised in the following exchange late in the game:

Game Boy: "I should have listened to my mum."
Rick: "What did your Mum say?"
Game Boy: "Never play dice games."

Scores: Nick 30, Pat 21, Rick 18, Andrew 12

A rating of 4 after 1 play for 'poor game, but could be talked into it on occasion'. The suckiness and pain of bad dice rolls is unfortunately not offset by the pleasure of the occasional win. Although rolling a 12 when I needed an 11 or more to beat Game Boy out of a ship was a pretty outrageous feeling. And which in no way helped raise Andrew's rating of the game :-)

Thread: User Review

gschloesser — 2001-06-11T23:54:37+00:00

" Yo, Ho Ho and a bottle of rum … and a bunch of bananas, green beans & meat, too!"

You see, pirates need to be well fed and boozed in order to be effective scourges of the sea. Without the proper provisions, they are nothing but rejects from the SS Minnow (For those of you who didn't spend their youth watching U.S. sitcoms, that's the name of the ill-fated boat from Gilligan's Island!).

In this light and entertaining game from designers Thorsten Löpmann and Andreas Wetter, players roam the high seas in search of galleys laden with booty, which they will promptly attempt to board and loot if its treasure.

Similar to Cartagena, another pirate themed game released at Essen 2000, Corsairs ( Störtebecker in Deutsch) is fairly light and is essentially a card game. Players attempt to assemble the correct combination of provisions in order to be able to board galleys, but they also must possess a strong enough crew in order to board the ship and fend off their opponents potential counterattacks.

The game comes complete with a variety of components, including 30 galleys tiles in five different colors. Four of these galleys are placed face-up on the table and are ripe for the taking. Each galley indicates a combination of provisions, which must be played before a player can attempt to board it. In addition, each galley indicates the victory points it is worth, as well as the 'boarding' strength, which must be met or exceeded for it to fall prey to the pirates.

Players are each dealt an initial hand of six cards, most of which depict one of six different types of provisions (water, bread, meat, rum, bananas or, of course, beans. What good is a German game without beans?). In addition, several cards depict corsairs (pirates) with values ranging from 2 - 4. These corsairs are important when one attempts to take control of a galley.

On a turn, each player MUST play exactly three cards, with the following actions available:

1) Play card(s) beside a galley. The idea here is to begin amassing provision cards so as to eventually match the provision requirements indicated on the galley. Once a player assembles all of the necessary provisions, he can attempt to board the ship.

Each player has his own section beside every galley where he places his provision and corsair cards. Provision cards played next to a galley are played face-up, while corsair cards are played face-down to conceal the value of the card(s).

2) Players may discard 2 or 3 cards from their hand and replace them with 1 or 2 cards, respectively, from the discard pile. The neat twist is that a player may search through the discard pile and choose the card(s) he desires. Thus, players should keep a careful eye on which cards have gone to the discard pile and choose this option in order to retrieve the cards they need or desire.

3) Fire a broadside. This is the nasty part. A player may play ANY card onto the discard pile and then roll the two 'color' dice in attempts to confiscate matching provisions from his opponents' sides of the galley. If one or more colors on the dice match the color of provisions previously played by opponents beside the targeted galley, the attacker may confiscate these provisions and place them on his side of the galley, provided they can be used by that player. If they cannot be used (meaning he already has that provision beside the galley), then the affected provisions are simply discarded. Not only are you hindering your
opponent's efforts in assembling the required combination of provisions, but you may well be aiding yours as well if you can use the provision which is confiscated!

Further, by removing opponents' provisions from a galley, you are also helping to prevent potential counterattacks if you are ultimately successful in boarding that ship. Remember, your opponents must be able to assemble the correct combination of provisions before being able to attempt a counterattack. If you were successful in removing one or more of their previously laid provisions, you have decreased their chances of accomplishing this requirement.

If a player manages to assemble the required provisions by a galley, he may then attempt to board it. He reveals any face-down corsair cards and totals their value. Further, some provision cards depict a corsair symbol, and these symbols are added to the total. To this figure, he then adds the sum of two dice. If the resulting sum is equal to or greater than the 'boarding' value listed on the galley, he is successful. If not, the player may lose up to two provision cards from beside that galley. They must roll the color dice and remove any matching provisions.

A successful 'boarding' roll doesn't guarantee success, however. You see, each opponent has the opportunity to usurp control of the galley (those scurvy dogs!). To do so, they must also have the necessary provisions next to the galley. If they don't, they can, if possible, add provision cards ( NOT corsair cards) from their hand to accomplish this. If they are successful, then they, too, roll the bones and add the value of any corsairs they have beside the galley. After all players who desired to counterattack
have made the rolls, the player with the highest roll succeeds in boarding the galley ... assuming the highest total was equal to or greater than the boarding value listed on the galley. The successful player then takes the galley card and records its value on the score track.

You can easily see the value of corsairs when making such attempts. The more corsairs a player has beside a galley, the better his chances of successfully claiming that ship. The danger, however, is that if a ship is captured by an opponent, all cards played to that galley are discarded, including the valuable corsairs. Arrgg!

Following a player's turn, he refills his hand to six cards and play passes to the next player. This entire procedure continues until there are only four galleys remaining in play. When the next galley is captured, the game ends and the player with the highest value in galleys is victorious.

There is no denying that the game has a heavy luck factor. Dice are rolled for boarding attempts and Broadside attempts. Cards are drawn randomly from the deck at the end of each turn. Yep ... there's luck involved.

However, there are mechanisms to help reduce the luck factor. As mentioned, the ability to discard cards and search through the discard pile for replacements is extremely important. It is important to keep a careful eye on which cards are being discarded and utilize the discard action to search through the deck and locate the card(s) you need. Valuable corsairs and rare provisions tend to be scooped immediately. Players who are willing to use 2 or 3 of the card plays on a turn to retrieve needed cards are usually richly rewarded in following rounds.

The odds of successfully boarding a galley can certainly be improved by the play of sufficient quantities of corsairs beside that galley. This also helps reduce the chances of an opponent usurping control of the galley from you. A wise player will refrain from playing most of the required provisions next to a galley until he is ready to launch his attack. Otherwise, opponents will sense this impending attack and be emboldened to launch broadsides against that galley in an attempt to remove some of these provisions. This tactic also allows a player to launch a counterattack by playing the required provisions from his hand in the
event of a successful boarding attempt by an opponent.

OK ... time for a gripe. The game simply takes too long with the rules as written. The rules call for the removal of 8 galleys with four players. This leaves 22 galleys to compete for during the course of the game. As such, the game lasted for over an hour, simply too long for the enjoyment derived from what is supposed to be a fairly light romp. I've experimented with removing different amounts and have found that removing 12 galleys prior to the game works extremely well. This amount allows the game to clock in at 45 minutes or so, which seems just perfect. As is, the game is fun, but wears out its welcome after 45 minutes. The number of galleys removed should be adjusted accordingly if playing with less than four players.

The game also has several Variants suggested. There are two I heartily recommend:

1) If a player has boarded 3 or more galleys of one color, that player scores a bonus equal to the average of the values of these like-colored galleys.

Please note: the official rules state that the bonus is equal to the value of the 'highest-valued' galley in this set. I have found this to be too generous and we now play using the average method. We have found that this still makes a set worth pursuing, but it doesn't completely eliminate the victory chances of those players who are unable to secure a set.

2) In the basic game, only one visible galley is waiting 'on deck'. This galley will replace the next galley successfully boarded. With the variant, three galleys are visible. Thus, players can plan ahead by saving provisions and corsairs in preparation for the appearance of these galleys.

These variants serve to add more decision-making layers to the game by offering players other options to pursue and giving them an opportunity for a bit more long-range planning. Without these variants, players tend to simply pursue immediate gratification by playing cards from their hand to whatever galleys require those provisions.

My opinion of Corsairs has grown with each subsequent playing. By removing those few extra galleys and playing with these two variants, I've found the game now works very nicely, flows swiftly and doesn't wear out its welcome. Another plus is that, like Cartagena, it has proven reasonably popular with both my gaming group and my casual gaming friends. No, it's not a 'shout from the mountain tops' ecstatic experience, but it is a fun romp on the high seas … which is all that it intends to be. In this regards, it fulfills its goal quite nicely.

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Coursairs x2 - I didn't get to play this, but everyone else seemed to really like it; I'm hoping to play it tonight.

I'm off to Lobster Trap - I expect I will see some of you there!

Thread: Session Report

wavemotion — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

CORSAIRS - My first play of this pirate themed game (goes nicely with the theme in Cartegena which was also played). The game sees each player trying to plunder various ships using cards as the leverage point - some require water, some rum, some produce - and when you have amassed enough cards on the table to take a ship, you roll dice to determine if you were successful. Other players who also have some vested interest in the ship, may try to counter attack and take the ship. In addition, there are pirate cards which are face down which help you in these attacks. One neat mechanism is the 'Broadside' attack where you can attack other pirates in the vacinity to steal their influence cards which might let you take the ship (by rolling special color dice to see what types of cards you can steal). Finally, there is the ability to exchange cards at a loss (2 cards for 1, 3 for 2, or something like that) but we never used it in our game. Mostly if you didn't have a good play, a broadside was called for!! Anyway, the game is very luck dependent - both in the attack dice, broadsides dice and the card distribution. And I was on the poor end of all those things - without some luck it can get fairly bleak rather quickly. But overall it was still an enjoyable game - light and not too long (about 1 hour tops it seemed). I wonder, however, if the game will only have the "fun" factor with 4 players and lots of broadsides, attacks, etc. With 2 players, it's conceivable that you could largely stay out of each others way for some (much!) of the game. If 4 is the optimal number (and is the max number of players), this might hinder the replayability somewhat. Anyway, in our game Eddie could do no wrong - capturing some heavy ships and doing some serious plundering. He managed a convincing win with the rest of us languishing behind (Alison gave him a bit of a run for his money, but couldn't catch up). Still - a fairly neat game if you don't mind the luck!

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Corsairs

Players: Chris, Steve K, Garry

By this time, seven of us had gathered and so we split into two groups. While the others got stuck into a game of Big Boss, three of us tried Corsairs for the first time. This is a fairly light game of plundering pirates and, yes, I felt obliged to use my best Long John Silver accent. The object of the game is to capture galleys (ships), which are worth varying amounts of treasure. To be able to attempt to board a galley, you need first to have laid down a specific combination of cards required for that galley and possibly some Corsairs to assist in the fighting. Each ship has a defence score which needs to be equalled or beaten by a 2x D6 die roll, combined with the value of any Corsairs played. If that is achieved, the ship is boarded and you might be able to get away with its treasure. Might, because other players who can also fulfil the card requirement have a chance to outroll you and steal the treasure. Once all the galley cards have been put into play, ( you start with four and a new one is added as each galley is boarded), the next galley boarded ends the game and the player who has amassed the most treasure wins.

This is quite a fun game, which is very luck driven, but goes on way too long. It took well over an hour with rules explanation, and was probably half an hour too long. Chris won (sceptics please take note!) but he will probably admit that this was because the die rolls went more in his favour than the rest of us. Probably quite good as a family game, but you need to play with probably two-thirds of the galleys detailed in the rules so that it doesn’t drag on too long.

Result: Chris, Garry, Steve K

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Waterloo Gamers Session Report December 10-2000 "Pirate Theme"

Games Played: Corsairs, Freibeuter.
Present: Ralph Boerke, David Steele, Rob LeGood, Sean Bennesch.

We took to the high seas with a new one from Rio Grande and an older title from Hans im Gluck.

A stack of ships is shuffled. Four are placed on the table. These are the ships the pirates (players) are attempting to sack. Each player is dealt a hand of cards; these indicate provisions on them, such as beans, meat, bread, rum, etc...Every turn, a player must play three cards. Each ship has a value, a number that must be equalled or excelled to sack it, and a list of provisions that one must place in front of the ship in order to have a shot at sacking it. For example, a ship might have two white barrels, a green barrel and a red barrel on it. That means a player must place two breads, a bean and a meat card on his side of that ship (since the ships are square tiles, players have their own side to place provision cards against) before he can attempt to take the ship over. Players can also play pirate cards, these add a total from 2 to 4 when attempting to take over a ship. To take over a ship, players roll two dice, adding any pirate cards to the total. If the number is equal to or greater than the number on the ship, the player has taken the ship and adds the value to his point total. If he fails to capture the ship, he loses a provision card.

That's the short version of the rules. There are many other interesting mechanics, besides. Players may exchange cards from their hand, obtaining new cards from the discard pile. Since all the cards around a ship are discarded when a ship is taken over, this is a good way to keep the pirate cards circulating. A very cool mechanic is the firing of a "broadside". A player discards a card. He then announces he's going to shoot a "broadside" and rolls two coloured dice. Any colour rolled means that he can scoop those coloured cards from another player's provisions placed alongside a ship. For example, I have a rum (black) card placed alongside a ship. This entitles me to fire a broadside, should I desire to do so. Ralph has a bean (green) and a red (meat) card beside the same ship. I roll the coloured dice and get a red and a green. This enables me to scoop both of Ralph's cards!

We enjoyed this game a bit. Personally, I enjoyed it immensely. The mechanisms were fresh, and it felt neither too light nor too heavy. There was some strategizing involved, as well as a bit of luck. Fun stuff.

Winner: Ralph (35 points).
Ratings: Dave 6; Ralph 8; Rob 7; Sean 9.

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Time for the second of the new pirate-themed games: Corsairs. This time, players roam the high seas in search of galleys laden with booty, which they will board and loot.

Similar to Cartagena, this one is fairly light and is essentially a card game. Players attempt to assemble the correct combination of provisions in order to be able to board galleys, but also must possess a strong enough crew in order to board the ship and fend off their opponents.

Four galleys are placed face-up on the table and are ripe for the taking. Each galley indicates the combination of provisions which must be played before a player can attempt to board it. In addition, each galley indicates the victory points it is worth, as well as the 'boarding' strength which must be met or exceeded for it to fall prey to the pirates.

Players are each dealt an initial hand of six cards, most of which depict one of six different types of provisions (water, bread, meat, rum, bananas or, of course, beans). In addition, several cards depict corsairs (pirates) with values ranging from 2 - 4. These corsairs are important when one attempts to take control of a galley.

On a turn, each player MUST play exactly three cards, with the following actions available:

1) Play card(s) beside a galley. The idea here is to begin amassing provision cards so as to eventually match the provision requirements indicated on the galley. Once a player assembles all of the necessary provisions, he can attempt to board the galley.

Provision cards played next to a galley are played face-up, while corsair cards are played face-down to conceal the value of the card(s).

2) Players may discard 2 or 3 cards from their hand and replace them with 1 or 2 cards, respectively, from the discard pile. The neat twist is that a player may search through the discard pile and choose the card(s) he desires. Thus, players should keep a careful eye on which cards have gone to the discard pile and choose this option in order to retrieve the cards they need or desire.

3) Fire a broadside. This is the nasty part. A player may play ANY card onto the discard pile and then roll the two 'color' dice in attempts to confiscate matching provisions from his opponents sides of the galley. If successful, the removed provision(s) are placed on your side of the galley. Not only are you hindering your opponent's efforts, but you may well be aiding yours as well if you can use the provision which is removed!

If a player manages to assemble the required provisions by a galley, he may then attempt to board it. He reveals any face-down corsair cards and totals their value. To this figure, he then adds the sum of two dice. If the resulting sum is equal to or greater than the 'boarding' value listed on the galley, he is successful. If not, the player must lose two provision cards from beside that galley.

A successful roll doesn't guarantee success, however. You see, each opponent has the opportunity to usurp control of the galley. To do so, they must also have the necessary provisions next to the galley. If they don't, they can, if possible, add cards from their hand to accomplish this. If they are successful, then they, too, roll the bones and add the value of any corsairs they have beside the galley. After all players who desired to counterattack have made the rolls, the player with the highest roll succeeds in boarding the galley ... assuming the highest total was equal to or greater than the boarding value listed on the galley. The successful player then takes the galley card and records its value on the score track.

You can easily see the value of corsairs when making such attempts. The more corsairs a player has beside a galley, the better his chances of successfully claiming that ship. The danger, however, is that if a ship is captured by an opponents, all cards played to that galley are discarded. Ouch!

Following a player's turn, he refills his hand to six cards and play passes to the next player. This entire procedure continues until all galleys are captured, at which time the player with the highest value in galley is victorious.

There is no denying that the game has a heavy luck factor. Dice are rolled for boarding attempts and Broadside attempts. Cards are drawn randomly from the deck at the end of each turn. Yep ... there's luck involved.

However, there are mechanisms to help reduce the luck factor. As mentioned, the ability to discard cards and search through the discard pile for replacements is extremely important. In our game, we all kept a careful eye on which cards were being discarded. Valuable corsairs and rare provisions were scooped immediately. Players who are willing to use 2 or 3 of the card plays on a turn to retrieve needed cards were usually richly rewarded in following rounds.

The odds of successfully boarding a galley can certainly be improved by the play of sufficient quantities of corsairs beside that galley. This also helps reduce the chances of an opponent usurping control of the galley from you.

OK ... time for a gripe. The game simply took too long. The rules call for the removal of 8 galleys with four players. This left 22 galleys to compete for during the course of the game. As such, the game lasted for over an hour. Next time, I'll remove more (I'll try removing 12) so the game can play quicker. It's fun, but wears out its welcome after 30 - 40 minutes. However, once whittled down to that time frame, I can see this one becoming a regular 'filler', one which can be readily enjoyed by both my gaming group and my casual gaming family & friends.

We had an extremely close match, with most of us competing for the lead throughout the game. Jim fell a bit behind, but the successful boarding of a 13 point galley near the end of the game swooped him into second place. Tabea proved the most ruthless pirate on the high seas and captured the victory.

Tabea 27, Jim 25, Erin 22, Greg 22

Ratings: Tabea 8, Jim 6.5, Erin 6, Greg 6

Thread: Session Report

gschloesser — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

My opinion of this game has risen with each subsequent playing. In order to reduce the time required, we did eliminate 12 galleys as opposed to the 8 suggested in the rules. We also played the variant wherein bonus points were earned if a player collected three galleys of the same color, but altered the points received to the average value of the set, rounded up. We also displayed the three upcoming galleys so players could better plan ahead.

Ted and I fought early over the orange galleys, which ultimately cost us both control of that color. Ted did manage to capture the three black galleys, while I never did secure a set.

Finals: Ted 29, Rob 27, Dennis 26, Greg 15

Ratings: Greg 7, Rob 7, Dennis 7, Ted 6

Thread: Session Report

BoardGameGeek — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Players: Steve G, Mick, Steve O, Garry

When Chris arrived, we split into 2 groups and, while they got stuck into Attila, we plumped for Corsairs. As I’d played this once before, I attempted to guide the others through the rules. I managed to make a hash of a couple which we discovered later on, but we persevered nonetheless.

Mick suffered most in this game and it took him most of the game to be able to claims his first ship. He maybe made too many 3 for 2 swaps early on, which meant he wasn’t playing cards on the ships. Hence he was playing catch-up to the rest of us. Fewer broadsides were fired in this game than in the last game I played and the die rolls were kinder to all of us. I managed to get some good high-scoring ships boarded and eventually came out the winner. We played with two-thirds of the recommended number of ships, which shortened the game to about the right length. However, this isn’t a game I’m keen to play that often.

Result: Garry, Steve O = Steve G, Mick

Thread: Session Report

wavemotion — 2001-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

CORSAIRS - My last game of the evening - got to play this with Ben, Bob S and David H. A light pirate game with plenty of dice and cards. Everyone understood that broadsiding was fun and boarding galleys was more difficult that it first seems. We didn't finish the whole game but everyone seemed to enjoy the theme and saying things like 'Arggghh!' from time to time. I wonder if this game is a bit too long for the enjoyment derived - it's definitely fun for me but only for about a half hour. We decided to pull out 1 square galley card of each color to reduce the number of galleys that had to be taken to allow the game to end quicker.