JAMAICA



OBJECTIVE OF JAMAICA: The objective of Jamaica is to finish the pirate race with the biggest fortune.

NUMBER OF PLAYERS: 2 to 6

MATERIALS: A rulemap (yes, it’s a map!), a compass token, 6 pirate ships with their Action card deck, 6 holds plates, 9 pirate lair tokens, 12 treasure cards,  2 action dice, 1 combat die, cannon tokens, food tokens and a LOT of gold doubloon tokens.

TYPE OF GAME: Track, pirate race

AUDIENCE: Family players


OVERVIEW OF JAMAICA

In 1678, the pirate Henry Morgan succeeded in becoming Governor of Jamaica. His first move as governor was to invite all his former pirate colleagues to come and live there. Thirty years later, he organizes a great race around the island where all the tricks are allowed: the pirate finishing the race with the biggest fortune will be declared the most prestigious pirate!

You are one of these pirates and your ship MUST win the race to prove to everyone that you are the greatest pirate of all time…

SETUP

Each player chooses one of the available famous pirates, takes the “Action” cards and the ship of the corresponding color, as well as a plate representing the 5 holds of his ship. Each player starts with 3 food tokens in one hold, 3 gold doubloons in another, and draws the first 3 “Action” cards from his draw pile.

The game board is placed in the centre of the table with a pirate lair token on each pirate’s lair (the skull-shaped rocks). The 2 movement dice and the combat dice are placed on their positions, as well as the treasure cards which are shuffled into a 9-card draw pile (one for each pirate’s lair), the excess cards being discarded. The players place their ship on the starting square (Port Royal).


3 players setup

GAMEPLAY

The compass token determines who is the Captain (first player). The Captain rolls the two movement dice and chooses the order in which he places them on the navigation box, one die for the morning, one die for the evening. Each player then chooses one of the “Action” cards in their hand and places it face down in front of them. Starting with the Captain, each player, in turn, reveals his card and performs each of the 2 actions according to the corresponding die. When each player has completed their 2 actions, each player refills their hand by drawing a card from their draw pile. The compass passes to the player to the left of the Captain, who becomes the new Captain and begins a new turn.

Action card symbols

  • Green arrow: the ship advances the number of spaces indicated by the die.
  • Red arrow: the ship moves back the number of spaces indicated by the die.
  • Gold doubloon: the number of gold doubloons indicated by the die is loaded into a free hold.
  • Food: the number of food tokens indicated by the die is loaded into a free hold.
  • Cannon: The number of cannon tokens indicated by the die is loaded into a free hold.

Note: You are not allowed to add tokens to a hold that already contains tokens. If all the holds are full, you have to empty one of them, thus losing its contents, to be able to load a new resource.

When moving, you must always pay the cost of the final square where your ship ends its movement. The price to be paid is indicated in food (sea squares) or in gold doubloons (port squares). If the player cannot pay the full cost of the requested resource, he pays what he can, then moves back to the first square for which he can pay the full cost. Only the pirate lair squares are free, if a player ends his move on a pirate lair where there is still a “pirate lair” token, he discards the token and draws a “treasure” card.

Treasure cards:

  • Treasure: affect the score at the end of the game, positively for treasures or negatively for cursed treasures.
  • Morgan’s Map: allows to play with 4 action cards in hand.
  • Saran’s Saber: allows the player to re-roll a combat die, his own or the opponent’s.
  • Lady Beth: increases the value of the player’s combat die by 2 points.
  • 6th hold: add a 6th hold to the boat, placed to the right of the plate.

Note: Treasure cards must be placed next to their owner’s holds, face down, all other cards must remain face up.

Hoist the colours!

If a player finishes his move on a square where there is already another ship, there is a fight (if there are several ships there, the player chooses his opponent).

Note: No fights happen on the “Port Royal” square.

The attacker (the player whose turn it is) may spend cannon tokens if he has any, and then rolls the combat die, to which he adds the number of cannon tokens he has played. It is then the defender’s turn to do the same. The player with the highest result wins the fight.

A die roll resulting in a star gives the player an immediate victory, either in attack (in this case the opponent cannot even defend himself) or in defence. The cannon tokens cannot influence this result, and any tokens uselessly spent are discarded anyway.

The winner of a fight chooses one of the following three options:

– steal the contents of a hold from his opponent.

– steal a treasure from his opponent.

– give a cursed treasure to his opponent.


Samuel Bellamy attacks Mary Read with three cannons, but she rolls a star and wins automatically!

END OF GAME

As soon as a player reaches the “Port Royal” square, he stops there and his turn ends immediately. The current turn goes on so that each player has played an equal number of turns and the game ends. Each player counts his points as follows:

  • Gold doubloons in your holds
  • Treasure cards
  • The white number shown on the square where your ship is (-5 if the ship has not crossed the -5 square).

The player with the most points wins the game and becomes the most famous pirate ever.

Enjoy! 😊


John Rackham, despite 5 treasures and some gold in his holds, has been overtaken by Mary Reed in the final sprint!
Nakoa Davis