Stonemaier Games | Libertalia: Winds of Galecrest | Board Game | Ages 14+ | 1-6 Players | 45-60 Minutes Playing Time

Product Information

With the recent reprint of Libertalia, Stonemaier Games has also provided a new Automa for solo play, which is what this review will cover. I’m quite new to the concept of solo board games but I’m really enjoying it. It's great for when I’m desperate to play a game but can’t gather enough people. Before Setting Sail More characters means more variety from game to game. This equates to more replay value. It also means sometimes you might get a hand of crew members that don’t work together well. This can be annoying, but if you can still try to figure out a better synergy than your opponents. Starting from left to right, the characters chosen will activate a daytime power, should they have them. This may be gaining doubloons, taking loot tokens or making matters difficult for your opponents. Once the day has happened, the dusk phase happens, starting with the rightmost player. The cardboard doubloons are fine, I would’ve liked a few more but only because I take the coins for things like Loot tokens as I go which depletes the stash a little. I think having the coins in their own storage tray that can be used during the game is another lovely Stonemaier touch. The pirate theme in this game is carried through to great effect; all 30 of the cards have great artwork, relate well to what the character they portray is supposed to be and do, and interact well with one another. The looting mechanic is fun and flavorful, especially with the two direct action items, the Spanish Officer and the Saber.

Two more voyages will follow, with six more characters drawn into the hand, new loot placed out and doubloons gained. At the end of the third voyage, count up your money and the highest total wins. Final Thoughts Libertalia(2012) – a very innovative simultaneous role selection game that involves direct conflict and plays in about 45 to 60 minutes. The card role interaction will remind some players of Citadels but on a much grander scale. Great for casual, avid, or strategy gamers.

Setup

Overall, Sea of Thieves is a tad complex to set up and to teach. But its open world approach allows players to get invested fast. It feels great to play, and from cursed dice rolls to ‘gotcha’ card play, is full of little moments that are sure to make you and up to three friends laugh (in a pirate-y accent, of course, aha harr).

One thing Paolo Mori worked on improving for this release was the two-player game, which was somewhat bland in Libertalia. And… it’s fine. Definitely better. I’m glad it was tweaked. The two-player game now adds a mid-ranked character who’s always on the Island for players to compete with. This two-player mode is certainly an improvement but still isn’t terribly robust. Pirate games need treasure, and Libertalia gives treasure collection its own phase. Your crew’s abilities will be played from lowest value to highest (typically higher numbers have stronger effects), but you collect booty from highest to lowest (assuming your crew survived the day).The youngest player shuffles their character cards and draws 9. They read the number (the rank) and name out loud so that each player chooses the same cards as them. Each player takes these 9 cards in their hand. Important It’s my opinion that you could play this game indefinitely without it feeling repetitive. With 30 characters, the number of possible combinations coming in sets of 9/6/6 are plentiful, and there are so many options that I don’t see it getting stale. That strange idiosyncrasy aside, the game is one of the best designed on the market. Gameplay is elegant. And once more it bears mentioning that the art design is second to none. Artists Ben Carre and Stéphane Gantiez have created a feast for the eyes, each character perfectly rendered to a degree that they could come to life right off the cards. The art alone inspires and supports the theme, and makes the game that much more enjoyable. Granny Wata (27): Gain 2 doubloons if there is only 1 Granny Wata, otherwise discard all Granny Watas (night). Firstly, this is a joy to teach. Identifying what each loot does is important, but can be done on a day-by-day basis. There are forty character cards to learn the abilities of. However, as everyone is drawing six of the same cards per turn, there is ample opportunity to talk through the cards before each journey. After that, once you have explained the day, dusk, night and anchor activation you are good to go, even the latter can be reinforced on the first turn, or a dummy run. With the basics mastered, the strategy of optimising when to play cards from your hand and how best to utilise them, really comes to the fore.