Cannonades Rulebook

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Setup
• Turn Steps
• Game Actions
• Captain's Grin
• Game Rules
• End of the Game
• Tiebreakers

Setup

Shuffle the deck, then hand out 5 cards to each player. Put the rest of the deck (which is shared among all players) in the center of the table. The player who has most recently been on a ship starts.

Turn Steps

1. Draw. As the first step, draw from the deck a number of cards equal to 5 minus the number of your ships in play. For example, if you have 3 ships in play, draw 2 cards. If it's your first turn of the game, skip this step.
2. Actions. You can perform up to 4 actions. If you wish, you can perform fewer actions or pass without taking any.
3. End of turn. If you have too many cards in hand, you must discard them: the maximum number of cards you can hold in hand is equal to the number of players still in the game +1. For example, if you are playing with 4 players, the hand limit is 5. If a player is eliminated during the game, the new hand limit becomes 4, and so on.

Game variant: You can play with a fixed maximum hand size of 5 cards, which will change the way you plan moves and strategy.

Game Actions

You can repeat the same action multiple times, but the total number of actions remains limited to four.

• ADD a new ship to your fleet: put a ship card from your hand into play face down, so that none of the other players know its color or strength. The maximum number of ships a player may have in play at any time is 4.
• SHOOT an opponent's ship: you choose a Cannonade card from your hand and use it to touch an opponent's ship. That opponent must turn that ship face up: if one of the clan's icon of the ship card and of the cannonade card match, you have successfully sunk their ship! If they are all different, the ship is "damaged" and remains afloat face up. In any case the cannonade card is discarded. You can shoot a damaged ship (face up) even if it was not damaged by you: the same shoot rules apply.
• DRAW: you may discard a card from your hand (face up) to draw a new one from the top of the deck. If you discard a card with 1 or 2 "Captain's Grin" on it, instead draw a card plus an additional one for each grin on it. For example, if you discard a card with 2 Captain's Grin on it, you draw 3 cards from the deck.
• BOARD A SHIP: you may "throw" one of your damaged ships (face up) at an opponent's ship as if it were a cannonade, following the same rules: if the clan's icons of the two ships match, the opponent's ship sinks and both cards are discarded. If none of the icons match (this may occur when boarding a face down ship), you discard your boarding ship and the opponent's ship becomes damaged.

Captain's Grin

Some ships are stronger than others, and if damaged or destroyed they will not go away without leaving their mark! Ship cards may have up to 2 "Captain's Grin" symbols on them. When a ship with 1 Captain's Grin is sunk or damaged, its controller can yell "VENDETTA!" and choose one of the following effects:

• draw a card from the deck,
• have the player who shot your ship discard a card,
• choose a face down ship of that player and turn it face up.

If a ship has the Captain's double Grin, instead its "revenge" effect activates: when it is damaged and when it is sunk. And before you ask: Yes, the effect is also activated when it is turned face up by a Grin effect of another ship. And yes, if it is sunk at the first strike (by a Cannonade card or a Grin effect) you play both the "revenge" effects, and you can choose two different effects.

Game Rules

• During every player's first turn, that player skips his draw step and cannot shoot cannonades.
• If in their initial hand a player has 1 or 0 ship cards in their hand, they may reveal their cards and discard them to draw 5 new cards from the deck, then shuffle the cards discarded this way into the deck. Repeat this process if necessary.
• Whenever a player is left with no ships in game, they are immediately eliminated and lose the game. In games with 3 or more players: the player responsible for the elimination of a player may draw up to 1 card randomly from the hand of the eliminated player, the remaining cards are discarded. If that player has no cards in hand, the eliminating player draws no cards. The game proceeds normally afterwards.
• The maximum number of cards in a player's hand is equal to the number of players +1. If at the end of a player's turn, they have too many cards in hand, they must discard to maximum hand size. During the game the number of players will decrease. This means that the hand limit will decrease as the game continues.

Game variant: you can play with a fixed maximum hand size of 5 cards: this will change the way you plan moves and strategy.

End of the Game

If at any moment, a player is the only one still in control of a fleet (or at least 1 ship), they win the game. If you run out of cards in the deck before a player wins, the final shootout begins:

1. The player who drew the last card from the deck can draw any cannon card from the discard pile and immediately ends their turn.
2. Starting from the next player, all players take one last turn until the player who drew the last card from the deck. During their final turn, each player, instead of drawing a card from the deck (which is depleted), can draw a cannon card of their choice from the discard pile. The player who triggered the final shootout also takes their last turn (as the last player) but does not draw a cannon card from the discard pile (as they already did it previously when depleting the deck).
3. At this point, if there is no winner, the player controlling the fleet with the most ships wins. In case of a tie, all ships are turned face up, and the player controlling the fleet with the highest number of different icons wins. If there is still a tie, the player with the most ships sailing in the same direction wins. If there is yet another tie, the player with more cards in hand wins. If there is still a tie, the player who triggered the final shootout (drew the last card from the deck) wins.

Note: It's possible that due to a "Vendetta" effect, a player draws the last card from the deck during another player's turn. In this case, the player who drew the card initiates the final shootout (draws a cannonade card of their choice from the discard pile), and both players end their turns.

Tiebreakers

At this point, if no player has won yet, the player with the biggest fleet is the winner. In the event of a tie, all the players turn all ships face up, then the player with the highest number of different icons among their ships is declared winner. In the case of another tie, the player with the most ships facing the same direction is declared winner. In the case of another tie, the player with the most cards in hand is declared winner. If no player has won at that point either, the player who started the standoff is the winner.