Z-Man Games ZMG7062 Merchants and Marauders Board Game,Gold

Product Information

At the upper-left of the board you will find the "At War!" space, used to show which two nations are currently at war. I've been playing this game for a while now so it's as good a time as any to share the top 25 tips I've made up. The first action of the game should always be a port action (unless you're playing Bruce Nicholson obviously). A naked ship isn't profitable.

Roll your Captain's Scouting skill. If successful, you find the ship you scouted for after which a battle takes place. Battles against players and NPCs are elaborate affairs while the resolution of a Merchant Raid is faster and more abstracted. A cry went up from the lookout post today. A ship has been spotted! It is a Dutch merchantman, riding low in the water. We cannot know what booty it contains, but we do know that it is heavy with potential plunder. My helmsman is Dutch, and begged me to permit the ship to leave unmolested. He entreated me in front of the crew – such dissent I cannot permit to go unpunished. You may not scout for the same target twice during the same turn. However, you may scout for another target in the same Sea-Zone, or move to another Sea-Zone and "scout" if you have enough actions. The Game Board is divided into 17 Sea-Zones. 16 of these have a port associated with them, represented by a national icon from one of the 4 nations in the game (Dutch, English, French and Spanish).

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There are no workers to place on resource-gathering points, there are no nonsensical resources and mechanics. Instead, you’re sailing around the Caribbean on your boat and doing whatever you want, legal or otherwise.

We often see board games that use the theme like a coat of paint to mask otherwise generic gameplay. Merchants & Marauders handles its theme perfectly to the point where everything in regards to the game just makes sense. Declare which of your goods (Cargo Cards) you wish to sell. All goods can be sold for the price of 3 Gold per card. However, the good in demand (the good displayed on the Demand Token next to the port) can be sold for 6 Gold. Sold Cargo Cards are placed face-up in the Cargo Card discard pile. The love-it or hate-it, part of Merchants & Marauders is the downtime. As every player gets 3 actions per turn, you’ll have to wait for some time until it’s your turn again. I didn’t have much of a problem with it, as focusing on what the other players are doing gives you an edge. Merchants & Marauders Review (TL;DR)

Setup

Merchants and Marauders is an open-world board game, where play and exploration is completely open and players can try to achieve victory as they wish. Released 10 years ago, a nautical season wouldn’t be the same without a review of it. In Merchants & Marauders, players draw captain cards to determine their skill at naval combat, scouting, leadership, and influence. Captains also have their nationality, home port, and special abilities. Most Sea-Zones have a unique advantage or disadvantage which is written in each Sea-Zone. This Sea-Zone information can also be found on the Player Aids. Randomly place one Merchant Token (nationality side down) in each Sea-Zone including 'The Caribbean Sea'. On a successful Leadership roll you can fill up your "Crew". If the roll fails, "Crew" may be recruited for 2 Gold each. Your "Crew" can never exceed the "Crew" value of your ship.

When you are in a port you may (once per turn) take the "port" action to do any number of the following port activities:

Game Play

When you buy a Ship Modification you take the token and place it on your Player Board on the area corresponding to the modification you bought. The port now no longer sells any Ship Modifications. You cannot buy more than one of each of the same type of Ship Modification. Generally, you cannot transfer Ship Modifications from ship to ship - only in St. John as you can see in the St. John info text on the board.

First-time players will struggle with Merchants & Marauders, partially because of the complexity of the game, and because of how long the game session will take. Expecting someone to be attentive for four or five hours is unreasonable, which is why this game will take several playthroughs to figure out. Then we have the ships: sloops, flutes, frigates, galleons, and man-o-wars. These ships have varying levels of toughness, cargo capacity, crew count, cannon firepower, and maneuverability. Some cards have an immediate effect, while others have an effect that takes place on each player's turn or at the end of the entire turn. Once the effects of the card have been carried out, put the card in a discard pile unless stated otherwise. To retire you must start your turn in a port and retire before performing any actions. Then, on your next turn, you go through the same steps as when dying, after which your new Captain starts his adventures.There are so many things to do in this game, it feels like an open world pirate game. You can seek your fortune through completing missions, acquiring rumours or trading goods at different ports. You can upgrade your ship with ammunition, hire crew members or even buy a new vessel. You can fight with non-playing characters from different nations or decide to go head to head against your friends and plunder their ship. The only Ship Modification that can be bought in a given port is the one represented by its "Ship Modification" token. Face-down tokens are revealed in a given port right after the "port" action is taken.