Imagine What We Could Achieve...

by Rogue Shindler, Achievement Master

5th September 2011

Over six months have past since the Achievements system was introduced, and we've logged eight months worth of tournaments since the system went online. There was some underlying concern that the idea would not be well-received by our player community, but I happy to say that between the 4600 achievements earned by our players this year and the resounding feedback on the boards and in person, the achievements system officially a success!

As time passes, though, fewer and fewer "WNOHGB" gold awards have been popping up, and many people have completed some or all of the achievements they are interested in. With the overwhelming popularity of Achievements the level at which they have energized the game play experience, it seems only fitting that we expand the depth and diversity of available achievements. Going live today are over 100 new achievements that will set your sights on new and greater heights!

Dilemmas
Yes, you have to enter your dilemma pile into the system for your deck to be eligible for achievements now. But fret not! We’re opening up a new facet of deck building achievements with a series of goals targeting dilemmas. Dilemma types, keywords, and quantities can all earn you a variety of achievements in both editions. Balancing Act and it's counterparts earns you an achievement for playing with no dual dilemmas. The Highlander group of achievements rewards you for not duplicating dilemmas in your pile or seed deck. Playing or winning with a skill-, damage-, kill-, or capture-focused pile or seeding different quantities of 1E dilemmas can likewise earn you new achievements.

TDs & Organized Play
We’re also broadening the types of director achievements to reward our hard working Tournament Directors to thank them for organizing events in which we so enjoy playing. TDs are now eligible for a variety of achievements for running diverse event formats and high turnout. In addition, the Prylar group achievements rewards TDs for continuing to recruiting new players.

There is even a new achievement, Papers, Please, that your play group can earn collectively if all participants of an event post their decks to to the builder, attach them to the event, and complete a tournament report.

Deck Building
Of course, we couldn't have new achievements without developing a new series of deck building challenges to test your mettle and your allegiance. Among them are new Mirror TOS and Mirror Starfleet sub-affiliation achievements, as well as a collection of new deck types that reward you for not duplicating species, playing Federation without humans, and eschewing the gimmicks of the game and just solving your missions.

In addition, First Edition has had a particularly rough time with the single affiliation achievements, since it has been a long time since a competitive non-Borg deck held only a single affiliation. Enter the Treaty series of Achievements. You'll have to maintain a strong balance of cards, to ensure you are committed to this alliance and not just splashing in a few cards for flavor, but if your deck is a solid hybrid of factions, you can walk away with one or more Treaty achievements.

Tribbles!
Perhaps the most requested set of achievements since the release of the system has been the addition of Tribbles deck building achievements. Thanks to the addition of the Tribbles online deck builder this summer, this possibility is now a reality! Earn achievements for your Clone, Bonus, Rescue, and Poison decks, playing with all virtual tribbles, and winning with certain numbers of tribbles. Rainbow Litter even rewards your for your variety of tribble breeding. And don't forget to file your breeding report!

Thresholds
In addition to new achievements, lifetime threshold awards such as WCT points, tournament participation counts, and lifetime tribble breeding have been increased with additional milestones for those who continue to go above and beyond.

The Seen and Unseen
As before, a number of new hidden achievements have been sprinkles through the the system to reward interesting, innovative, or entertaining decks. As before, they will become visible once the first player happens across each one. We've filled in the gaps, so there is now at least one for each affiliation, as well as other, more esoteric goals.

As an added bonus to the system upgrade, the Deck Builder will now tell you what visible achievements your deck is eligible to receive. No more wondering if you have the ratios right on your personnel and/or ships. No more wondering afterwards why a tournament didn't net you the achievements you'd expected to earn. Now, once you've entered your complete, tournament legal deck (remember, it's not eligible for achievements if it's not complete!), you can see in advance what potential badges you might earn, or if you need to make adjustments to strike the balance you need to claim your target achievement!

With all of these new achievements, plus the added Deck Builder functionality, there should be plenty of options for inspiration as we get past that post-Worlds lull and into the new season of league events. Go forth and Achieve!