"Hire Crew" is one of the Services available on the Port Board when you Visit a Port. It lets you draw three Crew Boards and review those potential Crew members for recruitment. Using this Service has no cost in itself, but it can only be done once per visit to a Port, and actually recruiting the Crew member costs as many coins as indicated on the coin symbol on the Crew Board.
Port Board
The Port Board is used when a player chooses to Visit a Port. It provides a number of locations where Crew members can be placed to access various Services. Placing a Crew member on a Service location doesn't in itself cost anything and doesn't require spending a Crew Order token, but actually using the action provided by the Service may have a cost.
The available Service actions are:
- REPAIR. For 5 coins, you can repair a destroyed Node on your ship.
- IMPROVE. No cost, but only once per visit to this Port: draw four Upgrade Cards in any combination of Improvement and Artillery Cards, and decide which (if any) to buy. When getting Upgrades in this way, the whole cost is payed and the Upgrade is installed on the ship. Discard any Upgrades you don't buy.
- INSTALL. Install a Schematic you acquired elsewhere on your ship, at half the cost (rounded down) of the cost printed on the Schematic card.
- BUY. No cost, but only one per visit to the Port: draw 3 Treasure cards, and decide which to buy. Discard the ones you don't buy. (If the Treasure deck has run out when you should draw 3 cards, shuffle the discarded cards back into it.)
- SELL. Sell one or more Treasure cards you have for the price that applies to the specific port. When a Treasure is sold, discard it.
- [WOUNDS TENDED, BONES SET]. For 10 coins, the Crew member placed here heals all their Trauma.
- BACKSTREET MEDICINE. For 5 coins, the Crew member placed here heals all their Trauma, but there's a 40% risk of negative side effects: roll the Fate Die; on 0-1, lose a Positive Trait; on 2-3, suffer one Strain. 4-9 are safe.
- UNIVERSITY. Pay 5 Clues to advance the Player Discovery token. Various Traits and other effect can modify the number of Clues required, and some Treasure cards have a Clue value marked on them, allowing them to count as that number of Clues when visiting the UNIVERSITY.
- REST. Costs 10 coins and heals all Strain from the Crew member who unlocked this action.
- GAMBLE. Costs 5 coins, but requires having an additional 10 coins available in case you lose. Heals all Strain from the Crew member who unlocked this action, but randomly causes you to either lose 10 coins or gain 15 coins.
- DRINK. Costs 5 coins, heals a Strain, but requires rolling the Fate Die, and on 0-1 getting a 'Degenerate' Trait, or on 2-3 suffer one Trauma, with 4-9 having no effect.
- HIRE CREW. Once per visit to the Port. Draw three Crew Boards from the stack next to the Game Board, and decide if you want to hire any of them. The cost is indicated in a coin icon near the middle of the bottom edge of the Crew Board. Note that you will need to pay this cost again each time a new Act begins, and if you can't, you lose the Crew member.
- STAY A WHILE AND LISTEN. This is a way of gaining Clues. For 5 coin, you get a 50% chance of gaining a Clue. For 10 coin, you get a Clue for certain.
Next to the Port Board are the Denizen cards. One such card is usually available (a new one each time you Visit a Port). The cards do different things, as described on the card. Many of the cards have a vague circle or half circle drawn near the bottom, as a reminder that this requires allocating a Crew members to perform this action, just as it does for the standard Port Services.