If you are in your home port or St-Maarten and have extra coin. Go ahead and stash. Glory points and your stash are the only two things no one can take from you (barring very rare exceptions). When you sell the "Good in Demand", you randomly replace the Demand Token with a new one from the reserve pool. After changing the Demand Token you cannot sell any more goods that turn.

Ship vs. ship battles have a little more detail and require several successful rolls before defeating a ship completely, starting with each ship battling with cannons, and ending with crew vs crew combat as one attempts to board the other. The basic rules are incredibly simple, which allows players to concentrate on the more intrinsic elements of being either a merchant or a marauder. Merchants and Marauders has several types of cards that all fit neatly onto different parts of the player boards. If all failed and you still got boarded and killed, don't think this is game over unless it's late game AND you are really far behind in glory. I've been pludered and won, and I've been beaten by a player I plundered. Defeating a player in combat makes you look like a badass but it's the glory points that win you the game. In Merchants and Marauders, players take on the role of a captain of a small vessel in the Caribbean. The goal is to be the first to achieve 10 "glory" points through performing daring deeds (through the completion of missions or rumors), crushing your enemies (through defeating opponents and NPCs in combat), amassing gold, performing an epic plunder or pulling off the trade of a lifetime, and buying a grand ship. While some points earned from performing various tasks are permanent, players earn points for amassing gold, which can be stolen or lost (or at least diminished) if their captain is killed. Points due to gold are hidden so there's some uncertainty about when the game will end. I should start this section by saying that if everyone at the table is playing Merchants & Marauders for the first time, set aside at least 5 hours for the game. The rulebook is well organized and there are no edge cases, so if everyone read it, it would help speed up the game. 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.Once a player declares they’ve accumulated 10 glory points by revealing the secret points accumulated through stashing gold, the game ends after everyone has had their turn. Note that most of the combat related ship modifications do not have an effect during Merchant Raids. They are mainly used for the elaborate Player vs. Player or NPC battles. Having sailed into port for an action, Juarez then takes his second action – a port action. This is… an involved process, involving any or all of the following: We have been sailing the Caribbean now for several days. We are being hunted by a Dutch Man O’ War – it dogs our steps. We have been preying on the Dutch that we see – we are hated anyway, and our need for plunder grows greater every day. Our early successes have emboldened my crew, and now they seek every opportunity for death and glory. But I am more cautious. The Dutch warship would destroy us within moments should we stray too far into its path. We must hope its patrols do not bring it into our waters.

Extended Cargo Hold: Adds +1 to the ship's Cargo value. Move your "Cargo" hitlocation cube up one step. A ship's "Cargo" can never exceed 5. The winner of crew combat gets to plunder the other ship for one of their cards, gold, or even their ship. Death is not the end in the Merchants & Marauders as players can return with a new captain and keep their glory and stashed gold. Earning Glory Swivel Guns: Just prior to Crew Combat (at sea), roll 2 dice. Inflict one hit to enemy "Crew" on one or more successes. It does not matter who initiated the boarding. 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. Reinforced Hull: Flip this token to absorb 1 point of damage done to any hit-location (after hit-locations have been determined). "Repair" the token for 3 Gold in any port to refresh its ability.

In the Captain’s Chair

This can give Merchants & Marauders a slightly overwhelming feel to begin with, but the counter to this is to teach the game as a storytelling experience rather than an optimisation puzzle. Merchants & Marauders is not a game in which a player can plot every move perfectly and expect everything to go their way – it’s a game that offers a structure in which the players can operate as they almost roleplay the character that best suits them at the time. If you want to start the game as a harmless trader, then flip to a life of piracy once you can afford to buy and upgrade a frigate, then you can. Similarly, some captain skillsets help them focus on either missions or rumours because they are fast and have a higher chance of rolling the right outcomes on the lovely custom dice.

If you are a merchant, never sell goods that are not in demand. It's much easier to get those three of a kind when you already have cargo on board, and don't be afraid to dump cargo if it means making room for a different three of a kind that can get you glory. When in your home-port you may stash all or part of the Gold you have on your ship by placing it in your stash container. When stashing, you are hiding your Gold in a safe location where other players can't touch it. Every 10 Gold you stash secretly counts as 1 Glory Point. Remember: only half of the winner's points may come from stash! Special Weapons can be bought in any port for the price of 3 Gold per token. You can only have one token of each Special Weapon, but all three if you wish. Combat can occur between Non-player Captains and players or between two players. The process consists of three stages: declaration, seamanship contents, and action. Combat relies on captain skills and dice rolls.With 2.5 to 4 hour-long sessions, Merchants & Marauders is far from a short game, but it gets better once the group becomes more experienced. It does not have a solo mode and is limited to only 2– 4 players. This is a little misleading though because port actions are actually broken down into many different things that can be done, all in exchange for a single action. Sometimes the nature and number of turns will be altered by events, but this is the standard game flow. Merchants and Marauders: Broadsides is a 2-player standalone game, set in the world of Merchants and Marauders. Rather than focus on open-world exploration with multiple win conditions, Broadsides has 1 goal, destruction of your opponent through the constant pounding of your cannons. By hiding the amount of gold you’re carrying, and especially the amount of gold you’ve stashed, you’re not placing a huge target on yourself for other players to exploit. Likewise, you should keep tabs on what other players are doing and try to estimate how much gold they’ve accumulated to find the right moment to strike and plunder. Pros & Cons Pros:

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)You can buy all the Nautical Tabletop Month products from our tabletop sponsor, Firestorm Games. Merchants and Marauders: Broadsides has 2 double-sided ship boards. The 2 boards are cosmetic differences only. As a result of the next event card, a Dutch Man ‘o War moves south into Juarez’s sea-zone, and it begins to hunt for him. Its admiral has a scouting skill of three. He rolls three dice, and succeeds. He’s found Juarez, and his little sloop… Even though you’re free to take whatever path you’d want to, the starting captain has certain skills that make them better for piracy or trading. With that in mind, you can select your starting ship — flute for transporting cargo, or sloop for maneuverability. Non-Player Captains Randomly place a Ship Modification token facedown in the second square area of each Sea-Zone. No Ship Modification token is placed in the "Caribbean Sea" Sea-Zone. A Cube is placed on each "Hit Location" so that it matches the values on your ship card. "Hull" and "Masts" correspond to the "Toughness" value while the other locations match the names of the values on the card. So if you have a ship of toughness 2, you place a cube in the second space of that location. If you place the cubes for a Sloop correctly, all locations will have a cube in the second space, except for "Cannons" which has a cube in the first space.