Port Royal

What it is

Port Royal is a warband skirmish game from Firelock Games, the studio behind Blood & Plunder. Firelock describes it as “a campaign based, tactical, small-scale warband-sized skirmish wargame” that’s easy and fast to learn.

The setting is Jamaica in 1692. On 7 June that year an earthquake wrecked the town of Port Royal, a buccaneer haven, and much of it sank into the harbour. The game is loosely based on what came next. You run a small company of pirates, privateers, Native Americans, African Maroons, or local government forces, fighting the other companies for the plunder left in the ruins. The ruins fight back too: Firelock lists falling buildings, wild animals, and desperate civilians among the dangers.

Between games your company picks up loot and experience and builds infamy. Firelock funded the game on Kickstarter in 2024, and in March 2025 Goonhammer reported it shipping to backers. The whole range is now in stock on Firelock’s own store.

It uses 28mm miniatures. Seven factions are playable:

Jamaican Pirates
French Buccaneers
Spanish Guarda Costa
Dutch Kapers
Maroons
Carib Raiders
Forces of the Crown

How it plays

Small companies, simple buying. A company is 4 to 10 models. In Goonhammer’s review, each faction has four types of officer and four types of crew. Officers lead, are a little tougher, and gain experience faster. Crew gain experience as a group. Models come with no gear, and every weapon or item costs one piece of eight. The suggested starting company is 30 pieces.
d10s, low is good. Tests roll a d10 against a target number set by the character’s attributes, so a lower score is better. Opposed rolls use three d10s, and the side with more successes wins. One of the three is a primary die, and a 1 or a 10 on it is a critical.
Fortune tokens. Each player gets six Fortune tokens every turn, and they don’t carry over. Spend them on extra actions, rerolls, or a secret initiative bid of up to three. A tied initiative roll triggers a random event.
Two actions each. An activated character gets two actions. Fortune can buy more, up to three in one activation, and too much fatigue can cut them.
Reactions. Once during an opponent character’s activation, one of your characters with line of sight can try to act in response. It has to pass an Experience check first. Goonhammer’s reviewer, an Infinity player, put it first among the things he liked.
Quick setup, lots of variation. Players place terrain and take turns placing five Plunder tokens, then roll for one of ten scenario variations and one of five deployment styles.
The campaign. After each game comes the aftermath: record results, deal with injuries and experience, and turn up treasure. The player with the most infamy wins the campaign.

Firelock supports head-to-head, solo, co-op, and multiplayer games.

How to start

Get the rules. The printed rulebook is $35 and the PDF is $20.
Or get the core box. The Port Royal Corebox is $99. It has the rulebook, 15 character models, six d10s, punchboard tokens and rulers, 27 punchboard terrain pieces, and a paper terrain mat.
Pick a faction. Each of the seven factions has its own faction box at $45. There are also sprues of customizable characters at $15.
Already play Blood & Plunder? Goonhammer notes that 12 of the 15 core box models match Firelock’s plastic Sailors box, and that the rulebook’s appendix has rules for building Port Royal companies from Blood & Plunder factions. If you already have a force, you may have enough to start.
Print the free sheets. Firelock’s game page has free quick reference sheets, a campaign sheet for every faction, printable rulers and tokens, and the errata, in Letter and A4.
Build a small, busy table. The play area is 2’ × 2’, and Goonhammer found it works best with fairly dense terrain.