Neil's Day One Ride

by Neil Timmons, Players' Representative

19th August 2009

Game 1: Phil Schrader “Team Jersey”
This was an ironic matchup and made both Phil and Neil sad. We are both from Northern Virginia/DC, and go to a lot of the same tournaments. The last three tournaments we have attended by driving together, we have been paired first round. Surely, worlds would be different. We were on the same plane for two hours and suffered the curse of traveling to the tournament together. 29 other people in attendance and we get paired first round. It was irony if not frustration.
The game. Phil was playing a Borg deck that he just built this week. It seemed solid; however, I knew that if I could catch him at his space mission with a bunch of dilemmas, I could stop him then strip him of his people and ship. I knew he was going to download and play events, so I dug for my event destruction. We were both racing to build up a mission team first, with me also buidlng an attack team. His team ran into Tragic Turn, while my team blew through dilemmas. I started doing the Defiant shuffle, and ended the game before he could recover. Phil is a fellow Team Jersey player, so I really wanted him to do well, but I was really trying to go 8-0 on the day. FW 100-0

Game 2: Jeremy Benedict
Jeremy was playing the one deck I was the most afraid of. Mot and Vic. These dudes are the definition of microteam. However, when I told people that I had an answer for these two guys, I wasn’t kidding. Jeremy seemed to know what he was doing, keeping his ship safe, and he did manage to get at least one mission complete. The Klingons, however, had other plans. I don’t remember if he completed two missions, or completed Investigate Maquis Activity and had a whole bunch of dilemmas under his second mission. I played A Few Minor Difficulties to break his ship, allowing me to keep my Hindrance in play, and I was able to play Uninvited to pull out Secret Identity. But the climax of this game came during his second mission when I had a perfect dilemma draw, then caught two All-Consuming Evils. After shooting some guys off of his ship, I just went and finished my missions with him still rebuilding. FW 100-(35 or 70)

Game 3: Pat Bortz
After facing the deck I was most afraid of and beating it, I was excited about how things were going. I sat down to a game against Pat Bortz, who was a very nice guy. Pat made a couple of mistakes that worked out in my favor. First, he played You Have Always Been My Favorite at the end of his draw phase, downloaded the five cards that he most wanted, then left them there. I used a Grav-Plating Trap to send You Have Always Been My Favorite away -- along with everything on it -- during my turn. Pat was also not very careful after I played Kruge, and allowed his ship to be caught at a mission where I could take it. He did, however, have some really cool Klingon screens to put over his Borg Spheres when I took both of them. While he was building up a third crew, I was able to complete my missions and win the game. FW 100-0

Game 4: John Corbett “Team Jersey”
One of the best players in the field, John was also playing Borg. I couldn’t believe all the stuff that went wrong in this game. I had trouble getting guys out and was forced to discard some important stuff that I wanted for later. John used Grav-Plating Trap to destroy both of my Birthrights on my space mission. I forgot to use Worf to unstop a personnel who would have prevented me from taking a trip Where No One Has Gone Before, but the kicker was his first mission attempt. I fully understand that karma ebbs and flows. All year playing Tragic Turn, I can think of tons of games where I managed to get Tragic Turn on three different missions. With as much consumption as happens, that’s hard. John reminded me of all those games when I drew nine plus nine plus nine dilemmas, burning two unexpected difficulties at his first space mission and finding zero copies of Tragic Turn. It would have been hard, but had I caught a Tragic Turn, I would have destroyed his crew and taken his ship. But I took a trip, I found zero Tragic Turn cards, and was in the end unable to complete my space mission. On top of the bad draws and forgetful play, John is also one of the best players in the game, and did not let me recover from such bad luck. I did manage to destroy enough of his personnel that he was not able to get a full win before time was called, but that doesn’t really matter. We did see “Kruge of Borg” show up, though he didn’t do anything other then get 'Secret Identitied' away. ML 0-65

Game 5: Ben Hosp “Team Jersey”
Am I going to play all the guys from Team Jersey? What about other people? Are there other teams who came to GenCon? After coming off of a loss to John, I was scared of Ben. I knew what he was playing because I told him what to play. I told him to play Klingon, kill guys, and make Day 2. So I knew what I was in store for. I have been planning for this matchup for a while, so I had been keeping some secrets that I was ready to break out at Worlds. I pulled a fast one on him and attempted “Rescue Prisoners” very early on with a minimal crew and got a dilemma for my trouble. Ben and I have done Klingon vs. Klingon too many times, and this was one of my secrets I had been thinking of for a while -- to throw him off -- and maybe see if I can scam my first mission. Not only did it work, but it paid off for me in the long run when he tried to do the same thing to me in Day 2. I hit him with a really bad Dreamer and made him discard his Defiants, so at that point I knew we were going to actually have a knock-down drag-out fight. When I completed my space mission, I downloaded the Qel’Poh and said “we play this game old school,” implying that both of us have to go out and actually complete missions, not just Defiant dilemmas away. Two turns later, Ben flew over to his space mission with many dilemmas under it and attempted with six personnel. I was not able to add enough draws to get to a positive number, so all I had were my interrupts and it looked like he was just going to walk his mission. I played Uninvited twice and downloaded two different dilemmas: A Royal Hunt and Don’t Let it End This Way. So, A Royal Hunt stopped a person, Tragic Turn stopped a second person, Don’t Let it End This Way killed a stopped person, and Tragic Turn killed a second personnel. My next turn, I asked if there were only four personnel on that ship as I downloaded Point Blank Strike and flew over to take his ship. He scooped his cards and just said “Good Game.” I felt like Sean Connery from The Hunt for Red October and I had just caught him with his weapons’ safety system engaged. FW 100-0 by scoop

Game 6: Mike Harrington.
Here he is, the famous Mike Harrington. Very highly ranked, head of the Orange hats, my initial reaction is that he is a really nice guy, but a tough opponent. No surprise, he drops down a Next Generation headquarters. This is another one of those silly Mot/Vic decks, the deck I am most afraid of and most teched against. The game went perfectly according to plan. He got a bunch of dudes together, and went out and did a mission. Ugh; draw six, spend five for seven dudes... that’s rough. Fortunately, he ran into Tragic Turn like a truck and got enough of his dudes killed that my friend Kruge could talk about his ship. The I.K.S. Enterprise-E showed up. While he was building his crew back up, I blew through my space mission and downloaded the Defiant. Now I have two big ships, but not very many dilemmas to move over to a planet mission. I had played A Few Minor Difficulties to break his Enterprise before it came to service the Klingons. When he tried his space mission again, I saw that he had snuck another Vic into play even after I had placed the captive Vic right by his Headquarters so he would see it; no big deal, I won’t raise a fuss about it, just put him in the discard pile. I had played A Few Minor Difficulties to break the Enterprise-E to stop him from bouncing events back to hand, however when he no longer commanded the ship, I left it in play to catch him trying to play the ship at a discount. It worked. He played Data for one cost because of his completed mission, then attempted to play the U.S.S. Enterprise-E for its cost reduction; I got to remind him that A Few Minor Difficulties was still in play and he was not able to use its game text. So he had a bunch of dudes at his headquarters with no ship until the next turn. After fighting with my planet missions for a while, I was finally able to get through them all for a full win. Mike is a very good player, but he seemed to lose his head half way through the game. I am sure the loss of his ship and crew had something to do with it, but having him make the two mistakes of playing a previously-captured Vic and trying to play a ship at a discount when there was no sale on ships that week, gave me ample time to complete my missions for the win. All that play testing against Next-Gen Earth with the Klingons had paid off. FW 100-35

Game 7: Alex Schmitz “Team Jersey”
Things are swimming along nicely. Another team Jersey guy?!? What, are all of us on top? At this point, I am excited. With my win against Mike, I am sure I have made it to Day 2. I also see that if I win out, I can repeat and win Day 1. It’s time to turn it on and win out!!
Alex is a good player, who has a very solid Borg deck. Unfortunately for him, I know his deck pretty well. The only thing I saw different was the dilemma pile he was running was not the Tragic Turn pile he had run in the past. No worries, I am a lot happier knowing my dudes aren’t going to die left and right. This game started out badly for Alex as I started with Korath, two equipment cards and a Grav-Plating Trap in my hand. So, as soon as he downloaded and played Energize, I just destroyed it. Then he downloaded it again, and I destroyed it again. Then he tried to play it again, and I just destroyed it a third time. He gave up at this point because it was getting too costly to try playing it again. Dukat was putting his dudes out of play, so his Queen would have no one to swap. I had bought myself enough time with him trying to play an event that I was able to go out and start my missions. I blew through his dilemmas, then went and shot at his ship. He ran into Tragic Turn like a semi, giving me ample time to complete my final mission. I hate beating up on a fellow Jersey guy, but I was out to win Day 1. FW 100-0

Game 8: Nat Kirton
This was a game of Neil getting too arrogant. I knew all I had to do was get a full win, and I would win Day 1. I was out with a vengeance. While he was putting his cards into piles, I counted them out. 36 cards? I shouldn’t have any problem chewing through that. Heck, if it was 36 personnel I wouldn’t have a problem. Cadets? There are only ten cadets, and he needs three to finish his space mission. Sounds like time to murder some kids. I started killing guys and killing guys. I was unable to take a ship as he attempted his space mission too early (before I was setup), and he kept flying his ship home. But I figured it wouldn’t matter. After his second mission attempt, he had three personnel in play, three cards in his hand, three cards left in his deck, 40 points, and a ton of dilemmas under his second mission. I figured the game was all downhill from here, and relaxed. That was my first mistake. I had used Mara to download all kinds of cards from battle to utility; however, none of them were a copy of Grav-Plating Trap. When he played “In a Mirror, Darkly” I saw all of my kills get shuffled back into his deck. It took him a few turns to build back up, but he was able to complete his second mission a couple turns later. I had gone into speed mode and tried to speed through my own missions, but was just not fast enough. It’s tough to keep up with four personnel per turn. If only I would have used Mara to download a Grav-Plating Trap instead of some of the useless events I had downloaded instead. If I had only played The Dreamer and the Dream when on his second mission attempt, and stripped that Mirror out of his hand when I had a chance.... But alas, I did none of those things and placed third instead. FL 100-70

GenCon was going very well so far. I had participated in the Star Wars Premiere Draft Thursday night, and beat a guy when my Blast Door Controls canceled his Rebel Escape. I had played several games of Battletech (the card game) and had a lot of fun with the old game from 1996.
So there I was after Day 1. An awful draw against John Corbett, a negligent mistake against Nat left me in 3rd place. I had found some issues with my Day 1 deck design (which I fixed before Day 2) that were mostly personnel/event mix preferences. 'Too many events, not enough personnel' had left me drawing a few turns that I didn’t want to draw. I had some deck edits to do, but other than that, I was confident that I would at least give my opponents a run for their money on Day 2.

Stay tuned for a report of Day 2!!!

-djl-