Review: Winds of Plunder

Knucklebones: Final IssueThis is a reprint of an review written in October, 2007 for first publication in the March 2008 issue of Knucklebones magazine; it was the final issue. It’s the only review I ever wrote for Knucklebones, designed to connect up with an article I’d written several months earlier about pirate games. Despite the original source of this article, this blog is in no way associated with Jones Publishing or Knucklebones Magazine.

My pure reviews are more generally published over at RPGnet, but due to the Knucklebones connection of this one, I decided to reprint it here as well.


The Game Stats

Publisher: GMT Games (gmtgames.com)
Design: Alan Newman
Type of Game: Pirate Strategy
Players: 3-5
Length of Play: 90 minutes
Age Range: 10 and up
Price: $45.00
Learning Curve: ***
Challenge: ***

The Review

Last November Knucklebones described many of the pirate games currently on the market, but deadlines kept us from reviewing Winds of Plunder, which was released just as articles were being rounded up. It’s a pity it missed the cut as it’s one of the more strategic and thoughtful games published in the popular pirate genre.

Publisher GMT Games is mostly known for their war gaming output, but Winds of Plunder is instead the sort of strategic board game that will appeal to fans of Eurogames like Puerto Rico and The Settlers of Catan. In it, players sail from island to island in the Caribbean, improving their pirate ships and plundering and searching for treasure as they go.

Winds of PlunderThe most innovative element in Winds of Plunder is its unique wind bidding system. Each turn each player selects a direction that they’d like the wind to blow in, then everyone simultaneously bids a handful of cubes. The methodology, while amusingly not authentic, is nonetheless both strategic and interesting.

The wind direction determines which islands a pirate can visit that turn. As players decide upon different strategies—with some collecting treasure maps, others trying to earn raw victory points, and still others improving the weapons, crew, or provisions of their ship—the different islands will accrue different values for each of them, placing even more importance on wind bidding as the game goes on.

While the resource management is pure European strategy, Winds of Plunder also has a heavy dash of American chaos. Not only can players assault other ships when they land in port, but action cards also allow players to cause havoc — stealing ship improvements and wind cubes from other players or costing them actions or victory points.

Winds of Plunder is somewhat dryer than the most evocative pirate games. Nonetheless, considerable attention has been paid to the background of the game — probably moreso than any casual gamer will really notice. Simple graphics and plain wood cubes round out the rather hefty box full of components.

Conclusion:

Balanced with the somewhat simple components and theming is the fact that Winds of Plunder features more strategy than the average pirate game. Only the wind bidding is particularly innovative, but everything is put together well, resulting in a game that rewards thoughtful play and allows for many paths to victory.

If you’re looking for a more strategic pirate game, this is it.

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