Chris Glein Game Design and Life
Rum Runner
This is a succinct version of the rules you need to play Rum Runner. If you are seeking clarifications or more examples, try the rules reference.
SETUP
- Place the coins 🟡 somewhere in reach of both players. This is the bank.
- Determine who will play the crown 👑 and who will play the pirate ☠️.
👑 CROWN SETUP
- Take the 4 island 🏝️ cards and place them in front of you in a row.
- Find the 4 starting hazard 🌊 cards (with a 👑 icon), shuffle them, then place one face-down in front of each island (between the island cards and the pirate player). You may look at these cards after they are all placed.
- Shuffle the crown cards into a face-down deck and place it on the Home Port island. It may be convenient to place the Home Port island either to the far right or far left, depending on your handedness. Leave room near the island for a face-up discard pile.
- Take 5 🟡 to start your personal supply.
- Draw a hand of 5 cards from your deck.
☠️ PIRATE SETUP
- Find the 2 starting ship cards ⚓ (with a ☠️ icon) and place them front of you.
- Shuffle the pirate cards into a face-down deck. Leave room near the deck for a face-up discard pile.
- Take 5 🟡 to start your personal supply.
- Draw a hand of 5 cards from your deck.
GOAL
Both players want rum. The crown wins if they fund 4 points ⭐ worth of rum (where different bottles will have different point values). The pirate wins if they raid 4 points ⭐ worth of rum (where each bottle is always worth 1 point ⭐ when raided; when it comes to rum pirates only care about quantity, not quality). Each player will track their score by accumulating scored rum cards in a personal score pile.
The two players play differently.
- The crown 👑 will primarily play cards face-down as information hidden from the pirate. The crown will start investments (including rum) across their various islands and raise hazards to defend them.
- The pirate ☠️ will play their cards face-up. They will buy ships and hire crew that together will raid the crown’s islands in hopes of finding rum.
ICONOGRAPHY & TERMS
| Icon | Meaning | Icon | Card Type | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 👑 | Crown | 📜 | Event card | |
| ☠️ | Pirate | 🍾 | Investment card | |
| 🟡 | Coin | 🌊 | Hazard card | |
| 🧭 | Navigation skill | 🏝️ | Island card | |
| ⚔ | Combat skill | ⚓ | Ship card | |
| ⭐ | Victory point | 🪝 | Crew card |
Cards
- To trash a card place it in the owner’s face-up discard pile. If there were any 🟡 on it, those are returned to the bank.
- To discard a card take a card of your hand and place it in your face-up discard pile.
- To score a card remove it from play (return any 🟡 on it to the bank) and add it to the player’s score pile. If the total points ⭐ on cards in the player’s score pile is 4 or more, they win the game.
Coins
- To +1🟡 (add) a card take a coin from the bank and place it on top of the card.
- To pay 🟡 those coins must come from your personal supply.
- To remove 🟡 those coins are removed from a card and returned to the bank.
TURN
Each player alternates taking turns, with the crown always taking the first turn.
The turn phases are as follows:
- Start turn
- 👑 Reveal funded investments
- ☠️ Ready ships
- Take 3 actions
- End turn
START TURN
The two players start their turn differently.
👑 Reveal funded investments
At the start the crown’s turn they may flip any face-down investment cards that are funded to their face-up side. An investment is funded if it has 🟡 on it greater than or equal to the investment’s price (shown in the top left of the card).
The top half of the text on an investment card (black text on a light background) is the funded text and is for the crown. That is executed when the card is funded and face-up. The text immediate applies and may indicate effects that triggers every turn.
The bottom half of the text on an investment card (white text on a black background) is raid text and is for the pirate. It is only executed when the card is raided (see “The Raid” below).
| Example | |
|---|---|
This investment requires 1 🟡 on it to be funded. While funded it gives the crown an effect each turn where they can +1 🟡 on of their cards. If raided the pirate must pay 🟡 equal to the amount of 🟡 on the card or they may not trash it.
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☠️ Ready ships
At the start of the pirate’s turn they remove 1 🟡 from each ship ⚓ in play (returning the 🟡 to the bank).
ACTIONS
The rest of your turn (whether crown or pirate) functions largely the same. You will take 3 actions. Some of the available actions are shared, while some are only for the crown and some are only for the pirate (as indicated below with 👑 or ☠️).
You make take the same action type multiple times, and you make take actions in any order.
Gain coins
Take 2 🟡 from the bank and add it to your supply.
Draw
Draw cards from your deck until you have 5 cards in your hand.
Play an event
Play an event 📜 card from your hand into your discard pile face-up. You must pay its 🟡 cost (shown in the top left of the card) from your supply to the bank. Execute the text on the card.
👑 Play investments
Play any number of investment 🍾 cards from your hand face-down on any islands in play that do not already have any cards on them
👑 Play a hazard
Play a hazard 🌊 card from your hand face-down in front of one of your islands. If there are already hazard cards in front of the island, the new card goes in the position furthest away from the island (closest to the pirate player).
👑 Recall
Return one of your cards that is in play to your hand. Any 🟡 on that card are moved to your supply.
👑 Invest
Pay any number of 🟡 from your supply. Add a single 🟡 to the same number of your cards in play (hazards or investments).
☠️ Play a ship
Play a ship ⚓ card from your hand in front of you. You must pay its 🟡 cost (shown in the top left of the card) from your supply to the bank.
☠️ Play crew
Play any number of crew 🪝 cards from your hand into available slots on ships ⚓ in play. For each crew card you play must pay its 🟡 cost (shown in the top left of the card) from your supply to the bank.
When you take this action you may also rearrange crew 🪝 in play between crew slots on ships ⚓ in play, and you may recall any crew in play to your hand.
☠️ Raid
The details of how a raid works are covered below in “The Raid” section.
END TURN
After taking your 3 actions, draw 1 card from your deck.
If you have more than 5 cards in your hand, discard 1 card from your hand into your face-up discard pile.
Discarded cards are raided cards
👑 If the crown player discards a card (through this or any other game effect), treat it as if that card had been raided. See “Raiding a card” below for details.
When your deck runs out
👑 When the crown’s deck runs out, that’s it. They must make do with the cards in their hand and already in play.
☠️ When the pirate’s deck runs out, nothing happens until they need to draw more cards. As soon as the pirate needs to draw 1 or more cards then they flip their discard pile face-down, shuffle it, and form a new draw deck. After doing so they remove the top 5 cards of their deck from the game (return to the game box). Then (if any cards remain), they resume drawing cards.
THE RAID
At the center of the game is the act of the pirate raiding the crown’s islands. If the pirate does not raid, the crown will eventually win.
Generally, a raid is started by the pirate taking an action to do so, although there are event cards that will also start a raid as part of their action (e.g. Treasure Map).
The 6 steps to resolve a raid are as follows:
- ☠️ Choose a target island
- ☠️ Form the raiding party
- 👑 Raise hazards
- ☠️ Face hazards
- ☠️ Raid the island
- ☠️ Trigger crew effects
For a detailed example, see “Example of a Raid” in the full rules reference.
1. ☠️ CHOOSE TARGET
The pirate chooses and announces one of the crown’s islands as the target for the raid.
2. ☠️ FORM PARTY
The pirate then chooses 1 or more ships ⚓ that will join the raid. The pirate may not choose a ship that has any 🟡 on it, or a ship that has no crew 🪝 slotted into it. For each ship chosen the pirate must then pay a 🟡 from their supply on the chosen ship.
The ships that are joined to the raid and the crew on those ships are called the raiding party.
3. 👑 RAISE HAZARDS
For each face-down hazard 🌊 in front of the target island the crown may pay its 🟡 cost (shown in the top left of the card) to flip it face-up. This cost may be paid using any combination of 🟡 from the crown’s supply or 🟡 on the face-down hazard card. Any 🟡 on the hazard not used to pay its cost remain on the card after it is flipped face-up.
After flipping a card face-up the crown may pay additional 🟡 from their supply to the face-up hazard. The number of 🟡 on a hazard generally affects how many uses it has.
4. ☠️ FACE HAZARDS
The pirate encounters the face-up hazards 🌊 (if any) one at a time, starting with the furthest away from the target island.
Each hazard has one or more costs listed at the bottom of the card. The pirate checks to see if they can fulfill each of these costs. If they could pay multiple, then they choose one to pay. If they cannot pay any of the hazard’s costs then the raid will be stopped.
Some details on hazard costs:
- If the pirate can pay one of a hazard’s costs then they must, even if they don’t want to.
- Hazard costs are read from the pirate’s perspective, and any choices are theirs.
- Only members of the raiding party can be affected by the hazard.
- Many hazards require skills like navigation (🧭) or combat (⚔) from the raiding party. To meet a requirement for 🧭🧭, for example, the pirate player could source that from a combination of a ship (their Sloop) and one of its crew (Stinky Pete). Each ship or crew skill icon can only be used once per raid, so if a second hazard is encountered in the same raid then those costs will need to be met by different members of the raiding party.
| Example | |
|---|---|
This hazard may be overcome by either discarding 2 cards or by trashing a crew 🪝 (from the raiding party). If either cost can be paid, the raid continues (assuming there are crewed ships remaining in the raid). Note that this particular cost can always be paid, as a raiding party will always have at least one crew. However if after paying the cost there are new crewed ships remaining in the raiding party then the raid will be stopped and will be unsuccessful.
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After a hazard has been evaluated check if the hazard has any 🟡 on it.
- If it has one or more 🟡, remove one 🟡.
- If it has no 🟡, trash the hazard card.
The hazard is now resolved.
- If the pirate was unable to pay one of the hazard’s costs then the raid is stopped.
- If one of the ships in the raiding party no longer has any crew then that ship is no longer part of the raiding party.
- If there are no ships in the raiding party then the raid is stopped.
If the raid has not been stopped this process continues with the next face-up hazard closest to the island, then the next, until no more remain. When all face-up hazards have been resolved and the raid was not stopped the raid is considered successful.
5. ☠️ RAID ISLAND
If the raid was successful:
- If there is one card on the island, raid it.
- If there are multiple cards in a deck on the island (e.g. Home Port), raid the top card.
- If there are no cards on the island, and it is Home Port, and the crown has 1 or more cards in their hand, then raid a card chosen randomly from the crown’s hand.
- Otherwise, no card is raided.
Raiding a card
When raiding a card reveal it to both players. If the card has “raid text” listed at the bottom of the card, the pirate executes it. Then trash the card (unless prevented by the raid effect text).
6. ☠️ CREW EFFECTS
After a raid has ended, whether successful or not, execute the game text of all crew in the raiding party. If there are multiple crew the effects may be resolved in the order of the pirate’s choosing.