Tiny Epic Pirates Solo Mode Review - with Mike DiLisio 

We beg for more solo Mike solo content and lo and behold he delivers. What a guy 😀

I use the sails. With practice, you develop a technique for the cubes :) also agree with the setup time, i spent about 15 min setting up on the kitchen table, then my wife told me to put it away for dinner 🤣

One thing I've been doing with some games is rather than put all the parts back grouped by "parts", is to make individual player bags. Each bag then holds all the common setup parts for one player.

I just played the solo mode this weekend and the missing icons on the solo captains made me scream at the table. Incredibly frustrating.

Totally agree on the icons, I was the one to actually make the BGG thread asking for clarifications last year (when the PnP released) and I am SO disappointed they didn't adjust the rulebook when they saw how many people were having issues even back then!

Excellent solo review as always. Thank you for the great insight into the solo play!

Really enjoyed this review! Crossing my fingers for a Waste Knights review from Mike as well!

Thanks for the review, Mike. I enjoyed the game, but I had some issues with it. I never even took the sails out of the plastic bag. I could tell that was going to be an issue with the cubes. Maybe it should have come with some Tiny Epic Tweezers. I had to look up the iconography on BGG. Thankfully, someone had posted them. Overall, I enjoyed multiplayer better, but I would still play it solo.

I think you hit it on the head here, Mike. I set up and tried to play this twice so far, and have ended up putting it away without finishing it both times. I have yet to try it multiplayer, but as for solo it really is too fiddly and complicated. The game looks great, and I especially love the deluxe player mats, game mat and skull dice. It's a shame I may end up selling this one off.

I just got tiny epic zombies, played a couple rounds solo, and wondered what Mike would think about it...good timing! Not zombies, but I appreciate the review 👍

Tiny Epic games often have rule books that are less than satisfactory.

Great review, I truly thought I was an idiot when I rolled that first 6 and couldn't find it anywhere. I enjoyed it but that's also because I have a dedicated table to gaming (not a lot of tear down and putting back together). The one thing I can appreciate about it is that you can play different captains and boards and for me beating them all and the combos will be fun. Overall I agree with everything you said, and agree with the rating, will definitely have to check out Quest!

Loving the new music.

Excellent and fair review! You’ve become my go-to solo reviewer along with Liz Davidson. Tiny Epic rulebooks are notoriously sloppy. I’ve found many typos, grammatical errors, etc in every game I’ve bought.

LOVE your honest opinion. I was looking to tact this onto my tiny epic dungeons KS. The 2 knocks on solo rules and set-up are a big obstacle for me. For example I love Gloomhaven JOTL but the setup keeps me from being motivated to play more.

Quick note on the dice. In the review Mike is using the skull dice which were an add on in the Kickstarter and I think are available in the Gamelyn Games web store. The game comes with 3 normal d6s. Now comment on the solo. I agree on a lot of things. This game has a lot of small rules so I thought "hey I can just play this game solo to get the hang of things". I didn't find that fun, especially with all the little rules and no explanation on the new icons so I had to look online. Big miss on Gamelyn's part. Now after 4 plays I got the hang of everything in the base game and managing the solo pirate is quick now. But wow was I spending more time on the solo pirate than on myself. I don't mind the ships actually, but I do enjoy fiddly hobbies like laying out beads on a base plate. The only aspect I'm not a fan of is that the cube in the rear sit very tight so it can be hard to take it out unless you turn the whole ship upside down. The solo captain can be really swingy. Sometimes their victory could be a die roll away. But sometimes the die just gave the solo pirate garbage turns. Maybe this is normal for solo games with an AI I don't know, I am not experienced with solo gaming. But it felt...well lucky. Overall it wasn't that fun learning the game with solo rules (especially since this was my first solo game). I enjoy doing my turns but in this game I want the interaction of another player and due to the solo pirate has a lot of small rules to follow, I probably won't play this game solo any time soon. At least I feel comfortable enough to teach this game now!

I agree with the tough critique. I want to like the game, and played several times hoping I would warm to it, but would rather play something else than deal with the issues.

Came here to learn how to play the solo game today since I have spend the last few hours setting it up, reading the rules and trying to play and I am about to the point where I want to put the game back in the box and try something else for a bit and come back to it after watching other videos after I get more info. Explanations as to what happens when a merchant ship is in the AI's card, but they want to explore and other situations. Really hoping this game is better in group play then solo play since I really blinged it out during the campaign. On the upside, I did buy two packs of extra coins and they have become my "money" in so many other games.

I want this game! I love pirates

Still gonna grab this game for my collection, along with Zombies. Might just play a three player game or a two player game instead of the solo mode for Pirates

Couple of days ago I had this in my hands at my FLGS and decided against it as I wanted to first see a review. Seems I made the right call not picking it up.

I had a more positive experience with the solo game than you did, I'm fine with having to fiddle with the AI in a solo game and actually kind of enjoy it so perhaps it's a personal taste thing, but I do agree that the instructions were lacking particularly when it comes to rolling a six. It's definitely better as a multiplayer game, one of the best Tiny Epics so far in my opinion.

I for one love the theme, the art, and even the “fiddliness.” There is a technique for getting the booty in the ships, but you can just put it on the mats if you wish; make a “hold” at the bottom. The AI players are a little arbitrary and luck-based, but for me the challenge is doing my best work as a player. I enjoy this solo mode way more than TEDinosaurs.

I received my copy today (missing crimson silver mini expansion, but hopefuly will get that sorted out). I played against the same setup that in your review, Fearles Blackbeard. I agree on everything you have said. Game is too fiddly, bits ar so small and so many.. I think that playmat was a must for this game, as pn table it is a complete mess.. also the action on Fearless card that allows enemy to explore/search all tiles orthagonal tiles was unclear and I did not find it in the rulebook. Time playing with AI was soo looong. I finished my 1st solo game in 1,5h time, which is a lot. Overal I like the gameplay mechanisms, the idea, but there are issues for solo. I hope 2p will be a lot better. Also AI player got attacked by navy so many times, and I also got attacked by the navy ship a lot of times, perhaps must skip some turns for hiding out more, dunno. Great review, I can not aggree more here. :)

I am a big fan of sea themes and an experienced solo player. Normally I hate managing an AI like one more player because of the problem you mention, but this game lacks a quality process, a shame because they know it looks spectacular, perhaps for this reason they never canceled the game despite all its failures.

Agreed!! I only keep games that are an 8 +; Life is to short to waste time on 5s. I gave it a 4.5 due to the AI mechanic. I could live with the fiddly player ships; I was planning to replace with larger, wooden ships anyway. But the AI had way too much guessing: furthest away , farthest away, but headed towards, etc., made it unenjoyable, combined with the no player aide. I sold it to my local game store.

I place the merchant loot onto the appropriate area on the market card and my personal loot on my helm card. I had I had same issue with the solo rules. Like does the AI search all adjacent areas or one or what? Does it have to be on your map tile to steal your gold or loot? Does it matter what loot is taken? There all pretty annoying since it's not covered. *edit* I paused right before you mentioned placing them on the player mats XD

Is a review of the real game coming?

Happy I didn't back this one.

Is there any goof solo pirate board game out there?

I had no problems with the sail, they aren't in the way at all and the rolling of a 6 for the AI everything looks self explanatory. I wouldn't even call setup that big of an issue. It's nothing compared to games like Ark Nova. Even Everdell is more difficult to setup.

You confirmed everything I feared about the game. Thank you for the review. Now I know not to get this one.

This game was kind of a dud for me as well. Was really fiddly.

the fiddly cube issue wasnt caught in development, because its not an issue

I feel Gamelyn is now just pumping out mediocrity banking on the success of a few of their earlier games. Dinosaurs bad solo Mechs bad solo Westerns poor solo Now Pirates. I’m hoping Dungeons is better but if not I might just stop supporting a company chasing more money over producing solid content.

5/10? That's a pass for me.

None of these seem good solo