Overview

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Port Royal is a skirmish game from the team behind Blood & Plunder. It modifies the basic system from the earlier, larger-scale game and focuses on more detailed action. Two big features are reactions and a campaign system. If you’ve read my other reviews, Blood & Plunder already had some sketched-out rules for larger-scale games, but this is a more defined self-contained game that explores the smaller scale.

This game follows in the tradition of campaign-focused skirmish games that started, to the best of my knowledge, with Game Workshop’s Necromunda. The campaign rules are focused on a single chapter, but I’d argue a lot is distributed throughout the rules in a properly designed game of this genre. The rules for the actual tabletop play need to be written with the expectation of the campaign rules. My personal experience of this genre is focused on Games Workshop’s Necromunda which along with cousins Gorkamorka and Mordheim established many tropes of the genre:

• Small forces.
• Models can be equipped and upgraded individually.
• Individual activation of models.
• Rules to have the characters evolve over a campaign.

I love skirmish games as an idea: They seem to fit well with modern ideas like a rapidly changing meta for the game and encouraging players to play multiple forces instead of hyper-focusing. I feel like a lot of modern games like Infinity and Heavy Gear Blitz! (which I do support for) take inspiration from these concepts even if they don’t focus on elements like campaign rules as much.

It should also be said that skirmish games can, to varying degrees, act as a sort of ‘feeder’ for players of the main games they’re often attached to. Necromunda doesn’t directly lead to Warhammer 40,000 play as the gangs can’t easily be fit in to the larger setting, but it builds up a lot of concepts.

Port Royal is a skirmish game paired to Firelock Game’s Blood and Plunder game. It uses similar concepts, but altered to fit the reduced game size (four models per side is listed as a minimum). It could definitely be used as a way to get into the larger game.

Theme and Background

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Surprisingly there’s a lot less background material in the rules compared to the earlier Blood & Plunder. A single page sets up the background of the “Richest and Wickedest City on Earth” destroyed by an earthquake. We’re quickly moved to the call to action that the players take on the role of scavengers picking over the remains.

The book does include a basic but stylish map of Port Royal post-earthquake.

The book maintains Firelock Games’ high standards. There’s lots of art showing actual minis in an at least possible play situation. One thing I notice is how the art definitely suggests you want a lot of scenery for this game, which we’ll get to later.

Mechanics

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A skirmish game like this tends to have multiple ’levels’ of mechanics. The most essential level is the normal gameplay, where you play out a scenario on a tabletop. Wrapped around that is the campaign system. In this case, the players create a Company which is equivalent to Necromunda’s Gangs. The player is effectively the Company, as they may get to keep playing even if the Commander is killed off.

A feature I like of these rules is most chapters have a leading section that introduces new terms for the chapter, making the game easier to learn. This is written as a “learn to play” book compared to the “rules compendium” style of some games.

Campaign Rules Overview

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The Campaign rules are near the end of the book in chapter 9 and encompass a mere ten pages. These rules have some hooks into the rest of the rules.

A Designer’s Note suggests that players should keep notes on certain major events during a scenario, like who kills whom and control of the key Plunder Tokens. This should probably be ‘mandatory’ as it is actually required if you don’t have a great memory.

Campaigns are recommended to have a fixed length (although “the rest of their lives” is a suggested option.). The recommended time is a month with an expectation of only 3 games, which seems short: That’s effectively only two chances to meaningfully upgrade your Company. This is loosely the minimum time as well with as three games played is considered the minimum to be eligible to win a campaign.

Essentially “Infamy” is used as a rating for a Company and, together with unspent Pieces of Eight, is totaled to determine the winner of a campaign. There’s a lot of things in the system where Pieces of Eight (the “points” equivalent) are invested for uncertain rewards in Infamy and ability: As I’ll explain later, weapons and equipment are often randomly priced.

A Company is built for 30 Pieces of Eight. I’ll explore these later but that’s enough for a couple Officers (including the mandatory leader) and several Crew plus equipment for them.

Campaign Post Game Procedure

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A big part of Skirmish games is a post-game procedure players follow. It’s several steps and is meant to simulate recovery, downtime, and “other activities” the Company might engage in.

Injuries

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The first step is rolling on the injury tables. Theres’s separate tables for Officers and Crew. Essentially, Crew must make a simple 4+ roll to avoid being removed from the roster due to death.

Officers have a more elaborate table using a d100. The best results can grant XP (Experience Points) or the Vendetta trait. (The Vendetta trait is one place where those notes matter, as there’s a second roll to determine if the Vendetta is specific to the character that caused it, the company, or the entire faction.)

Lingering Injuries are common on this table. These are long-term effects and a player can attempt to remove these every game after they’ve been assigned. You’ll want to keep these in your notes, as you get a bonus to remove them based on how many games you’ve played with the result. Most of the Lingering Injuries also have harsh penalties if rolled multiple times: Three rolls of Concussed/Head Trauma mean the character is retired, while merely two Arm Injury results upgrade from the Frail rule and disallowing two-handed weapons to a retirement of the character.

I like some fun results like Lost in which a character may miss multiple games, or Lost Equipment where random gear is discarded.

Experience and Income

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There’s separate steps for earning Experience and Income. Models gain an experience point for participation. Additional experience points are awarded for various achievements: Again hopefully you kept a log of the game. An interesting mechanic is the player who loses gets a point to assign to any of their officers that isn’t their Commander. Looks like a nice mechanic to act as a consolation prize of sorts.

Note that Advancement (IE improving based on earning Experience) isn’t handled until several steps later in the process. This seems a bit academic, but it does mean your character might not get to roll for advancement if there’s a Mutiny or Exploration goes very, very wrong.

Next is Income which is based on a d10 roll modified by the number of Plunder Tokens taken in the game. This results in 10 to 25 Pieces of Eight (with a Company’s starting budget being 30 Pieces) and rolling a 10 provides a piece of equipment as well as the loot. Loot is important: The upcoming Divide Shares step is, essentially, the ‘payroll’ for the Company and can lead to major issues if the company rolls poorly.

Explore

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The Exploration Table looks like a fun thematic rule and can provide good or bad results. Rolling on this table requires the Company have an Officer who is still able to participate after the last game: Take too many injuries and you may not be able to roll to see what interesting things you find. This is another d100 table and has no modifiers.

A range of results include the awesome Treasure Map which makes a secretly designated Plunder Token in the next game played worth an extra 5d10 Pieces of Eight to whomever controls it. There’s caches of weapons, or simply a lootable home. Several results provide special characters:

• Priest: An Officer who generates an extra Fortune Point per turn.
• Surgeon: An Officer that also allows re-rolls on the Injury Table.
• Important Official: A hostage that acts as a living Plunder Token worth a hefty ransom.
• Old Freebooter: An expensive veteran Officer.

Almost all options are at least somewhat positive with the exception of a 6% chance of a Wild Animal Attack. A few, like Rotting Corpses and Barrels of Rum, are mixed bags: The Corpses require nominating three characters to loot bodies and they may come back with the Infected injury result. It’s a good reason to keep some cheap characters around. The Rum postpones a mutiny and inspires courage, but the crew may be too drunk to fight well next game.

The last result (a roll of 1) is an tiny tiptoe into the more cinematic side of pirate lore: Morgan’s Sword is, well, a sword… but also a sword that provides the Very Inspiring rule and an additional XP per game. If this is rolled twice the second player may reroll or force a game with specific terms and the sword as the prize.

I like this concept: It allows a bit of randomness and doesn’t favor winners.

A feature of this table I like is many results have choices that look interesting: For example the Suspicious Smuggler can be used to buy arms and equipment, or you can just rob them. I feel this softens the blow in several similar systems where you might have a down-on-their luck team get offered a valuable item at a cost they can’t afford. At least here you can turn the opportunity into some cash.

A minus is there’s some equipment and options that aren’t documented elsewhere on the tables, such as the Cuirass. it’s not described under equipment and is only available here.

Divide Shares

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This is a critical step: Essentially, a Company has to make the payroll or bad things happen. Crew gets a single Piece of Eight, while Officers get two. This can come from the newly acquired funds or saved resources.

If payroll isn’t met, there’s rules for a Mutiny. At best, some crew abandon ship. If it’s really bad, the commander is lost. Note that if the Commander was killed in battle the Company is immune from mutiny: another consolation to a player that has probably had a run of bad luck.

Recruit

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New characters can be added to the roster. Note that there’s some randomness here and a system is used where the player selects what kind of crew they want, then rolls a starting XP value and calculates a cost for that character. A this point the player may choose to back out if the cost is too high.

Advancement

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Officers advance every 3 XP they gain, while Crew advance at 5 XP. There’s limits to prevent a character getting superhuman stats, but also a system to handle rolling advancements that would break the limits.

Advancement is a d100 table. This is a table used for all characters but references the Faction descriptions, which have unique tables to suit each faction. Due to the base system’s use of “Low numbers are better” for statistics you have some slightly cumbersome terminology like applying an ‘Advance’ to a value means reducing it by one. A fun result is a Crew might see one of their number promoted to Officer, which would be a memorable campaign experience.

Trade, Re-Equip, and Calculate Infantry.

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The last few steps are mostly cleanup, but Trade has some interesting details.

A Company can only acquire three items per game other than those found by exploration. This is probably a major reason a Company would limit recruitment, which also means the game isn’t going to spiral into huge, unwieldy, forces too easily.

The process for buying items is broadly similar to that described under recruitment: The Player states their desired purchases, a value is randomly determined, and the player may choose to buy or not. Selling items is allowed at fixed low prices.

After trading the player may move gear around (or put things in stores) and the Company’s Infamy is recalculated. It’s essentially the cost of every character plus equipment and advancements. One interesting thing is I am unsure if equipment uses the generic values or if you gain infamy off the amount spent: For example, is an Axe worth 1 (a common item’s sale price) or the 1-5 spent on it as Trade?

The Actual Game

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Chapter 9 was the Campaign rules, so there’s several preceding chapters of the actual ‘game’ rules. These cover the usual basics like measuring (In an attempt to be a fast playing, range markers are included in the box), marking game state (lots of tokens), and dice. On the subject of dice, Port Royal remains a d10 based system.

Characters

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Characters are broadly similar to the larger Blood & Plunder but perhaps arranged a bit better: In actual play you’ll use the Fight and Shoot scores, noted as ‘6/7’ or similar with the number before the slash being the value used for attacks and the value after being the value used for saves from that kind of attack.

One stat that seems awkward is the Experience stat: This is a numerical value replacing the three named levels used in the earlier rules. My concern is it’s going to conflict with XP, which is generally considered an abbreviation for Experience Points. Experience is used in the rules simialr to the other stats.

Characters also have a Cost and a Resolve. Lower numbers are better. A ‘Standard Test’ is a single d10, but in a break from the earlier rules there’s options to add dice to to the roll. Opposed Tests use 3d10 with the important number being the number of dice that equal or exceed the target. To re-state, if our sample character is in an opposed Fight (6) test they would roll 3 ten-sided dice and have a result of 0-3 based on how many device exceed 6.

Criticals could be better explained, because in the above one die should stand out by being a different color: This die makes the roll a critical success if it’s a 10 or a critical failure if it’s a 1 no matter the result.

Game Flow

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The game is “I go, You Go” with every model activating individually. Each character must take all of their two actions as part of their round. Fortune Points can be used to give a character a third action. Fatigue returns from the previous rules, with characters with two or more fatigue tokens losing an action.

A fun mechanic is if there’s a tie for initiative an Event is figured, which adds some chaos to the game: Corpses to loot, weather, or even the ‘Angry Old Pirate’ who aggressively dislikes everyone.

Reactions occur at the end of each action but a character may only trigger reactions once per turn. Only a single Reaction is allowed per action and requires Line of Sight. The Reaction requires “a standard test called an Experience test: This is not as clear as I’d like, but I’m assuming that means it’s a single d10 rolled to meet or exceed the character’s Experience statistic. If successful, the character may take a single action. This doesn’t have to be an attack, but if it does the target must be the character who started the whole thing.

There’s no real “cost” for reacting, at least up front. I was surprised there’s no Fatigue tokens given out or similar. Surprisingly a character may theoretically react multiple times a turn.

The end of the turn, after both players have had a chance to activate all of their characters, uses a Strike Test mechanic familiar to the previous rules. A Company gains strike points as it loses characters and sees the opposition complete objectives. The Strike Test rules have some annoying complexity: They’re not used directly, but instead if a Company exceeds a certain value which is based on the turn and the opponent’s strike points, the Company makes a standard test based on the Resolve of an officer in the company. More concerning is officers can only be used if they’re not a casualty or shaken. Fail the test and the company will flee the game. I feel like the intent is that more games should be determined by a failed Strike Test than the game’s 6 turn limit.

Actions

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Fatigue is detailed here along with the term Threat Zone. Fatigue is an incrementing stack of tokens, with a single token having no impact, and six tokens resulting in the character being removed from the game as a casualty. Two tokens is a minor hindrance, while three applies the Shaken state where a character can only act to remove Fatigue and is very vulnerable.

A common action is Attacks which are an opposed test. Note that in the example stat block given earlier the Attacker has an advantage: They’re rolling against a 6 for both melee and shooting attacks, while the defender is rolling against a target of 7.

For a sample attack, the Attacker and Defender both roll three dice with one of a different color. The Attacker gets a success for each roll fo a 6 or higher, the defender 7 or higher. Critical rolls are an extra success. Equal success favor the target of the attack.

Damage uses a subtraction method to add a small ‘margin of success’ mechanic. To determine damage a number of dice is rolled equal to the attacker’s successes minus the target’s successes. The target number for this roll starts as a 10, but this is modified by weapon traits (weapons range from 0 to -2 on this roll) and the target’s fatigue tokens.

The Damage roll, if successful, will cause a character to be immediately removed. If failed, the target gets a point of fatigue…. Which triggers a Fatigue test which may grant another point of fatigue.

Most ranged weapons will incur a Reload Marker to the model no matter if an attack hits or misses.

Other actions beyond attacks:

• Move: 4” of movement. Subsequent movement reduces the movement granted by an inch. Short walls or gaps (no more than 1") may be ignored and characters do block other characters, but there’s a rule to allow a Shaken character to be repositioned. Climbing is an ’easy’ system of simply an inch to go up an inch, requiring the character climb the full distance in an activation. Climbs that require additional actions require an Experience test to avoid a fall.

• Conceal: Being sneaky specifically does not trigger reactions but also doesn’t require cover (although it is enhanced with cover). It’s essentially a way to earn some small defense bonuses in return for using a turn and lasts the character’s activation. It is even called out that a character can take this as a Reaction.

• Go Prone/Stand: Another way of gaining some bonuses. Prone lasts until the character spends an action on the Stand action. In addition to the bonuses being Prone limits what the character can do.

• Reload: Remove a Reload token. Note that while they seem somewhat obvious, I had to hunt through the Weapon Characteristics section for the statement that, “A weapon with reload markers may not be used until all of the reload markers are removed.”

• Rally: This is a Resolve test to remove Fatigue.

• Interact: A somewhat generic action: This is a placeholder for scenario-specific ways of messing with terrain such as grabbing loot or similar.

• Charge: Essentially a combined “Move” and “Fight” with a Reaction only on the Fight aspect.

Terrain Rules

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Port Royal suggests a very small, portablee 2’ square board with at least a third covered in terrain. The art of the book strongly suggests a lot of multi-level terrain with ramshackle buildings and similar.

Terrain is defined as either Area or Object. The former is used for regions with defined boundaries and specifically includes the open clear areas of the board. Object terrain is the usual line of sight blockers like walls, stacks of barrels, and similar.

It is then classified as below:

• Open: The default for the table.
• Rough: 1" movement reduction
• Cover: Waist-height that doesn’t fully block line of sight.
• Elevated: 2" or higher elements.
• Dense: Overgrown areas or suggested for a partially filled warehouse.
• Impassable: Blocking terrain. If a character is forced into this they have to roll to avoid being considered a casualty.
• Dangerous: Suggested for quicksand, spiny plants, or crocodile-infested waters.

The Company and Factions

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A COmpany is built by selecting a faction, then choosing Officers and Crew. After this equipment is purchased and extra Pieces can be used for experience points on characters.

The factions are a bit simpler than the previous game as they’re a sort of template for a wide range of actual bands that might prowl the destroyed city of Port Royal. The Forces of the Crown could be well-meaning peace keepers or a murderous band trying to use their uniforms to intimidate and spread fear.

Faction have a couple Faction Rules, then around four each of profiles for Officers and Crew. There’s also an Equipment list and a Special Rules section containing the faction’s advancement tables.

The Faction Rules often have a rule that matters during Company creation but is ignored afterwards. Some rules are negative, like the Carib Raiders have ‘Limited Reloading’ which means every time they use Black Powder weapons they gain an additional Reload token.

The Factions are:

• Jamaican Pirates
• French Buccaneers
• Spanish Guarda Costa
• Carib Raiders
• Maroons
• Forces of the Crown
• Dutch Kapers

None feel quite as much of an ‘outsider’ faction as some of the factions in Blood & Plunder. I don’t feel they’re as distinct as one might hope but that might become more clear in play.

One small but valuable bonus is the PDF has a roster sheet for each faction. It’s jsut inclduing the faction rules, but still appreciated.

Special Rules, Weapons, and Equipment

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Six pages cover the special rules and related aspects. Like the earlier game, there’s a lot of shared rules and many are the same or similar to those in the earlier book. This section gets used a lot of character traits, weapon attributes, and similar. There’s a lot less ‘stuff’ than the previous games. The equipment list is only four items! Somewhat surprising, but they obviously want to keep things simple.

Miscellaneous Fun Stuff

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The PDF includes an Appendix on using Blood and Plunder units. There’s some restrictions on model count as well as some guidleines for conversion, like the way the Experience rating translates from the Blood & Plunder terms to the Port Royal numbers.

Summary

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I think the game still has some organization issues as noted in previous reviews of the Blood & Plunder line. The game does what is intended: it’s a small model-count skirmish game and undeniably a sibling to the larger games.

I feel like it’s missing some of the fun of the older games due to the need for simplicity. I’ve heard Blood & Plunder referred to not just as “the pirate game” but as the “pirate ship game.” My initial hope was replacing the ship rules with something innovative and fresh: Maybe some more interesting terrain interaction rules or similar.

Would I try these rules? Definitely. I think the core of the game is the campaign rules and am curious how the modified system will work in actual play.