North American Continental Championship winner Kris Sonsteby (LORE)
Deck Title: Death... Is Only the Beginning 2.0 (Kris' deck is also attached to this article below.)
Deck Archetype: Versatile Borg
Play Engines: New Arrivals, They Will Be Coming
Draw Engines: New Arrivals
Bonus Point Mechanics: Add Distinctiveness
Dilemma Strategy: Command and Control

Kris' Commentary:
Why did you choose the deck that you used? What other decks did you consider using?
I decided to play Borg at the North American Continental Championships way back in March on my drive out to South Dakota for one of Kevin Jaeger’s (Hoss-Drone) legendary game days. Over the course of 4+ hours of windshield time, he and I began brainstorming ideas and laying the groundwork for what would eventually become Project Night’s Watch (his Regional winning Black Hole deck) and Project Greasy Strangler (my NACC Borg deck.) Later that same weekend, Kevin and I walked through the main components of his powerhouse Borg design and then a few months later Jeremy Huth (9of24) was brought in as a consultant. The result was an amalgamation that used Jer’s finely tuned ratios, Kev’s full tilt aggressiveness, and my 20-dilemma prevent defense. Since I felt like none of the other top players in the field were likely to play Borg, nor would be prepared to face those dastardly Delta Quadrant cyborgs, I never strongly considered running anything else.

This looks like the first time in the CC era you've played Borg. Were you worried about bringing them to this event without tournament experience?
Absolutely. A successful tournament was entirely dependent on keeping this dense field in the dark right up until show time. Apart from my co-creators, only a handful of The Frozen Chosen knew what I would be playing at NACC’s. And even then, they only knew because I suddenly became very interested in trading for their First Contact Borg commons/uncommons.

Unsurprisingly, I was all kinds of nervous during my first game against Lucas Thompson (edgeofhearing) and that led to an extremely costly error in the seed phase. In fact, it wasn’t until my third match against Robin Honeycutt (robin1234) that I truly felt like I was playing the deck optimally. It goes without saying, but test drawing a build is a very poor substitute for in-game decision making.

What sorts of decks were you hoping to face while playing your deck? What decks did you hope not to face?
I expected to be the biggest dog in the yard so to speak, so I was fine pairing off against every other non-Borg affiliation. Even Kazon battle was not a serious concern because even if someone managed to take out my cube, I would cripple their fleet in the process and then just reboot over at the Transwarp Hub via Federation Flagship: Recovered. The Borg mirror match was therefore my only main concern, and as Jon Carter (pfti) plagiarized Kevin Jaeger earlier during Regional season, I felt it was a distinct possibility. Fortunately for me, I think Jon was intending to play it on Day 2 but never got there. Instead, he helped me tweak my design for the elimination rounds over the dinner break. Thanks again, dude!

You made some changes to make the deck a bit more aggressive for Day 2. What was your reasoning behind those changes?
Day 1 was entirely a learning process, as I had not played Borg in nearly 20 years. No joke. Like Adam Sandler’s character Billy Madison going back to pre-school, I built what Kevin and I soon dubbed a Kindergarten Borg deck that could run an A-B-C script for the first 3 or 4 turns and then kind of make it up as the game progressed. My first few matches were thus full of moments where I was learning what my deck could do at the same time my opponents were, and that unfortunately led to lots of in-game rules / timing questions.

While Borg are far from awesome at getting Full Wins, they are great at “winning ugly” in low scoring games. With Day 2 essentially being single elimination, sticking to my guns just made the most sense. I had a couple other decks in the bag to cannibalize, and at my co-creator’s insistence I also had an old starter loaded with Homeworld missions, extra Borg Queens, different drones, etc. from which to make changes. Ultimately, 4 of the cards I added: Quark’s Isolinear Rods, 13 of 19, 4 of 50, and Orbital Bombardment, were worth their weight in gold during the finals.

Did you use any situational cards (cards that you wouldn't expect to be useful in every game)? Are there any whose usefulness exceeded your expectations? Were there any that you wouldn't include if you played the deck again?
I have never been a big believer in Quark’s Isolinear Rods, but I added it just in case Michael Van Breemen (The Ninja Scot) happened to have a Computer Crash-centric build with him. Ironically, that choice ended up effectively winning me the title when Ryan Sutton (rsutton41) tried to block my download of Orbital Bombardment and I then countered by ignoring his Computer Crash.

That said, I didn't read all of the tea leaves correctly as I also swapped in Tribunal of Q and a Civil War tent for Day 2 in the hopes of catching a Kivas Fajo: Collector with a Mirror Image download of Talon Drones, but that never happened. Hell, I don’t think I ever touched my Q the Referee in either of the Day 2 matches, so I would probably dump all of that stuff if I could do it all over again.

What was your toughest matchup between the six games you played?
All of my games were tough as nails, but the final against Ryan Sutton was the most trying. I knew by then that he was running his tried and true Federation / Maquis design, whereas I was headed into my personal Game #6 with Borg in the Championship match. He went first as well, so I gambled early on by seeding ZERO dilemmas under our duplicated Evade Borg Vessel on the far-left end of the space line. I was basically daring him to come into my neighborhood, but risking a potential free pass there allowed me to seed extra dilemmas in the middle at his likely starting point.

For the first time all day I did not draw a Shades of Gray Borg Queen in my opening hand either, so I had to kind of ad lib my first few turns while he spammed out quality personnel. Once I got over to his outpost the tide quickly turned though, as 13 of 19 provided just enough of a weapons boost to hit his docked Enterprise E and destroy his 2 landed ships in the process.

What would you nominate as the MVP card from your deck?
Without question, the infamous Multiplexor Drone 9 of 17. Nearly every one of my opponents had multiple ships at the same location when I began an engagement with Locutus’ Borg Cube, and by “taking the battle to the multiplex” I was able to destroy 2 or even 3 ships in one shot. That drone just takes the devastation to a whole new level.

Do you have anything else you'd like to say about your deck?
Not really, but I would like to thank all of my opponents for a great day of STCCG. Win or lose, playing the games with the folks that make up our community is what keeps me coming back for more. Mike Shea (The Prefect) and Charlie Plaine (MidnightLich) - hey, that’s you! - also did a fantastic job hosting a fun filled weekend down in Hot-lanta. And finally, I gotta give credit to the local crew that helped me take this crazy idea on the road and bring the title home to The Land of 10,000 Champions. In no particular order, my Money, Inc. running mate, the various members of The Frozen Chosen, and my bachelor party bodyguard Jeremy Benedict (flrazor), whom printed at least a dozen pages of high-quality Borg stuff for me earlier this spring. You guys are the greatest!