Description

Post Captain is a solitaire PNP game of sailing, sea chases, and espionage during the Napoleonic Wars. You take on the role of a young captain who has just been given command of his first ship. The game's missions revolve around the the tangled web of political intrigue surrounding Napoleon's plan to invade England.

The game play focuses on navigation, 1 on 1 sea battles, and assaults by landing parties. The dramatic chases of naval literature are reproduced using an abstract system that represents the relative speed and position of each ship. Each turn the ship that has the highest maneuverability is considered to have the "wind gauge" and gets to move (closer or farther away) and/or attack. The captains navigational and crew assignments choices define his ships maneuverability each turn.

The primary game play mechanic revolves around the orders you give to your crew. You assign crew to different positions on the ship in anticipation of where you think the wind or the enemy will be. The game is divided into two segments. A "Mission" segment where you navigate on a large map attempting to reach objectives on time and a "Chase" segment where ships engage each other.

The goal of the system is to simplify naval combat to focus on dramatic storytelling rather than focusing on charts, modifiers, counters, and complex rules. All conflict resolution is handled by drawing colored cubes from a cup. This will tell if a test was successful and in combat it also tells what part of the ship is damaged. As a solitaire game the goal is to achieve enough mission objectives to earn renown in order to increase your rank and upgrade your crew.