The game is played in a series of rounds called hands. Each hand lasts until no more Action cards can be drawn. The hand is then scored. The first player to 100 points at the end of a hand wins.

Each player is dealt six Ship cards and six Action cards. each player then places his ships on the table in front of him in a line.

Sequence of play is simply draw action cards to your hand limit and play an action card. This continues until the Action card deck is exhausted, when the hands are scored and a new round begins.

So what makes this game so interesting? Well, this is an Avalon Hill game, for starters :)

Each Ship card has three ratings:
Rating: Their are six classes of ship from 1st Rate (the best) to 6th Rate (the worst). This rating determines how many broadsides it has and how vulnerable it is to being boarded or sunk.
Rigging: Once a ship takes damage equal to or greater than its rigging it is dismasted and cannot move.
Hull: Once a ship takes damage equal to or greater than its hull, it sinks.

There are a whole variety of Action cards within the deck, which you play on your opponents ships. I shan't list them all here, but the main one is the Broadsides card. Broadside cards, like ships, have a rating from 1 to 6. A ship can use a broadside card with a rate equal to or greater than its own rate. Therefore a 1st Rate ship can use all the Broadside cards, while a 6th Rate ship can only use 6th Rate cards. You simply play the card on an opponents ship, placing the Broadside either under the bottom of the ship for a hull shot or under the top of the ship for a rigging shot. As cards can be combined, a player could play a Broadside, a Rake, a Boarding Party and a Grape Broadside to do even more damage. Another card, 'Break the Line' actually does damage to every ship the opponent has, both to the Rigging and the Hull. This card is only removed when the designated attackers are put out of action or a Weathergauge card is played.

Once a ship is dismasted, it can be boarded. Combat ensues with broadside cards and grapeshot cards. If successful, the ship is claimed as a prize and can be declared as such, or repaired and added to the line to fight other ships.

This continues until all Action cards in the deck are used, with players attacking ships, sinking them or taking them as prizes. Then, scoring is worked out. Sunken ships score the value of their rigging and hull, so for example , a ship with 5 rigging and 10 hull factors is worth 15 victory points.
Ships taken as prizes are worth double their Hull and Rigging factors, and can then be used in battle.

Thats basically all there is to it. There are several other cards which add to the excitement of the game, such as fire ships that cause damage, blockade cards that prevent lines being added to, Striking The Colours which causes a damaged ship to surrender and so on.

SUMMARY:
For such a simple game, this is quite an exciting card game and always gives us pleasure when we play it. It's by no means a serious look at naval combat nor does it claim to be. It's a lighthearted fun game, with the naval combat theme well executed, not just tacked on.

Review by Brian