Description

To start, the players place two of their galleons in their main harbours and one in each of their smaller ports on the opposite side of the board. The admiral sails in one of the ships in the main harbour. The object of the game is to sink the enemy ship carrying the hostile admiral. One very interesting feature is that the ships in the smaller havens cannot be moved until they are released by the other ships in their navy.

On his turn, a player has three options. He may move one galleon one or two spaces in any direction; he may engage in battle with an enemy ship standing on an adjacent space, or he may move his admiral from one of his ships to an adjacent one. You release a ship simply by moving one of your galleons to the space immediately in front of the harbour in which it rests. Once having left port, no ship may return there during the game. This ensures that all ships are kept on active service and there is no running for cover. Battles are resolved by the roll of dice, one die for each friendly ship (up to a maximum of three) adjacent to the victim. Each 5 or 6 thrown results in a hit. A hit on a galleon in full sail means that the tile must be turned to reveal the damaged vessel. A hit on a damaged ship results in the sinking of that ship.

Obviously the main tactic is to release all of your ships as quickly as possible, and try to attack on a 2 — 1 basis. Due to the choice of options, a player must move his ship next to the enemy on one turn and wait until the next before firing his guns. This means that the enemy can either turn tail, or attack and hope to get in the first blow but at the same time remaining on station to accept an attack on the following turn.