Enemy ships normally activate as part of the Enemy Phase. The procedure for activating an enemy ship is to check its dice value (printed on its card) and roll that many Enemy dice. Then check if any player ship is within the enemy ship's Engagement Range and not in a Port space. If one is, the enemy ship will try to attack it, and otherwise, it will move towards its destination (if it has one).
If multiple player ships are in the enemy ship's Engagement Range, it will try to attack the one that is nearest, in terms of least dice spent to perform the attack. In the event of a tie, roll the Fate Die to decide which player ship it attacks.
If the player ship is in a hex that the enemy ship can reach with its Artillery, it directly deals as much damage as it can, using all Damage outcomes on its dierolls. Each Damage outcome deals one damage. It will also convert each pair of same type of other outcomes, like two Move or two Omen, to one damage.
If the player ship is not in range of the enemy ship's Artillery, the enemy ship will spend Move outcomes to move into attack range.
If there are any unspent Move outcomes after performing the attack, the enemy ship will use them to move towards its destination. If there are any pairs of unspent Damage or Omen outcomes, they will be converted to extra Move points (one point for each pair of other outcomes).
If an enemy ship reaches its destination, it is Banished, advancing the Enemy Agenda by as many steps as its remaining health before it disappears. When this happens, shuffle the enemy ship card back into the enemy ship deck and remove its miniature from the board.
Enemy Phase
The game alternates between Player Phases and Enemy Phases. In each Enemy Phase, the following things happen, in this order:
1. If the Elder One Arises effect is triggered, that happens first.
2. If the Elder One is in play, it activates next.
3. If there are any Storms on the Game Board, roll the Fate Die for each Storm to determine how it moves. On 0-4, the Storm moves one step towards the player with the First Player token; on 5-9, the Storm moves one step in any direction the players choose.
4. On Deck enemies activate. If there are multiple such enemies, the players choose the order in which they activate, except that when one enemy on a player's ship has activated, the other enemies on that player's ship must activate before activating enemies on other ships.
5. Enemy ship activation. Activate each enemy ship once. If there are multiple enemy ships in play, the players choose the order in which they activate.
6. Advance the Enemy Agenda two steps, plus one more step for each player. If the Enemy Agenda advances beyond the end of its track, it wraps around to the first position, and causes the Enemy Discovery token to advance on the Discovery Track.
7. Pass the First Player token clockwise.
Then, the next Player Phase begins.