Ken says: A game with a "classic" feel to it, Pirateer is a game set on the high seas. You command three ships whose purpose is to reach the center island, collect the treasure, and race back to port. The board itself is divided into squares rather than the more traditional hexes. And you cannot move diagonally, except along the trade-winds. The mechanics of movement are nicely handled by rolling two dice. On the first die, you can move one ship, one direction (no turning) as far as the roll allows (no stopping short). On the second die, you can move the same ship again or move another. You can capture opponent's vessels by landing on them, if you roll exactly.

There is only one treasure and the ship that captures it must move towards or parallel to it's own port (this has caused a real argument as to how far "parallel" can extend). A sneaky trick is to send one of your ships into your opponent's port to await his/her arrival.

The real plus in this game is the wide variety of variants. One, called "Hurricane" will allow you to roll three dice, but if you roll three of a kind you lose the ship furthest from your port. Another, called "Flotilla" will allow you to stack ships and move them as one. But the most popular has got to be "Nukateer". Where you can declare one of your ships a "nuclear device" and explode it. Anything within the blast radius (determined randomly before ignition) is destroyed, including the treasure ship.

Pros: This game can be a lot of fun and is especially good for family night or when non-gamers drop by.

Cons: It is not, however, a candidate for repeated play despite the variants. And the game designer has developed such a notorious reputation on the internet news sites that any mention of him or his product may draw the wrath of hundreds of angry gamers. Thus I apologize to any who may be offended by my review of his game.

Tips
For those brave enough to sail these dangerous seas;

- Forget going outside the tradewinds (towards the outer edges of the board) as this is usually a waste of time unless you're trying to capture an opponent's ship.

- Don't try to be cute with taking the treasure off the island.  If you can grab it before the others can get behind your ship, do so.

- Remember that a ship loaded with treasure must move TOWARDS its own harbor.  We've had many an arguement over the meaning of "TOWARDS".  Basically, every square the treasure ship moves must put it one square closer to it's home harbor square (i.e. the square in the back of the home harbor).  A ship can move parallel, but it must not move AWAY from that home square.  

Addendum: One of our gamers is known as "Nukateer Bob" for his proclivity at setting off his own ships, even if they have the treasure aboard.