During the Player Phase, after some initial bookkeeping, each player, beginning with the player who currently holds the First Player token and proceeding clockwise, takes one Turn. During the player's turn, the player can perform a number of actions. Some actions can only be made once per turn, or when certain conditions are fulfilled.
The player's turn doesn't have any strict order of actions; players may take as many actions as they wish, as long as the conditions for being able to perform the action has been met, and as long as any required costs for the actions can be paid. Each action take must be completed before another action can be taken. When the player can't or doesn't want to take more actions, their turn ends.
The most common actions are paid for by giving Orders by spending an Order token of the type matching the action. There are three basic types of Orders: Crew Orders, Navigation Orders and Artillery Orders.
In addition to this, special actions are available if the player's ship is on specific types of hexes on the Game Board:
Note: when a player is on a Storm, the action associated with whatever hex is covered by the Storm can't be used, and the hex counts as a Rough Seas hex, no matter what the covered space was Storm.
When all players have finished their turns, the Enemy Phase begins.
End of Turn
A player's Turn ends when the player can't or won't do any more actions. Most actions have either a cost that must be paid, or a limit that the action can only be performed once per Turn, so only a limited number of actions will be possible during a Turn, although the exact maximum limit will depend on the circumstances.
At the end of a player's Turn, if that player is on a sea hex (Calm Seas, Rough Seas, Shipwreck hex or Enemy Spawn hex), the next player draws and resolves a Sea Event card for the player whose Turn ends.
When all players have taken one Turn each, the Player Phase ends and the Enemy Phase begins.