New Icons for First Edition

by Seth Claybrook

9th November 2009

You might notice a few extra items on the cards in Things Past. In Second Edition, there are many keywords on Events and Interrupts, such as Assault, Maneuver, Morph, Pursuit, etc. When making a First Edition version of these cards (like Decipher did with All Good Things), we take what we can from the card and make it more First Edition appropriate. Reviewing all the keywords, we were faced with the problem of location. Where would these keywords fit into the First Edition template? Would they go in the lore box, making them hard to find (like Waiter or Cook on personnel)? And what happens with future Virtual cards that make use of these keywords? Some First Edition templates have no lore box. Or do they go in the gametext area and eat up the precious space that is needed when porting all that Second Edition text over?

We looked long and hard at the mountain of First Edition cards and found that Decipher paved the way for an elegant solution. First Edition has many unloaded icons, meaning they do nothing in and of themselves, but other cards refer to and interact with them: Rule, Referee, Orb Experience, and Barash are just a few. So, starting with Things Past you see the first of the Second Edition unloaded keywords converted into a new First Edition unloaded icon. What does this mean in terms of gameplay? Nothing changes except the space it takes up on a card.

Here is the first of these new icons to be unveiled: Punishment. The artwork is based off the the classic Next Generation episode, "Chain of Command Part II," where Picard is in the cruel hands of the Cardassian torture expert, Gul Madred.

Another icon you will notice in Things Past is a new era icon. Like the Original Series and Classic Films Era icons before it, the Enterprise Era icon denotes cards from a particular place in time. The 22nd Century cards will be featured on cards from the series Enterprise. The imagery for this icon is based on the 22nd Century Starfleet symbol. You can also see this icon on the First Edition Slar if you are fortunate enough to get your hands on one.

The icon you see featured on every XV Collection: Things Past card is the First Edition Compatible icon. This symbol appears for reference purposes on cards that are converted from Second Edition backwards compatible cards.

Make sure to download the XV Collection card sets Chain of Command and Things Past to Expand Your Power in the Universe.

-djl-