[Enabran]

Why is "A Change of Plans" on the Watchlist?

Trek-CC's reason is: Gained in power as objectives proliferated outside of

"A Change of Plans" has a Borg Use Only icon.

Glossary entry to the Borg Use Only Icon:
A card bearing the “Borg Use Only” icon in its title bar can be stocked in your deck and used only when playing the Borg affiliation. (see playing Borg)

Rule:
playing Borg –
You are playing Borg (or are a “Borg player”) if you stock any [Borg]-affiliation personnel, ships, or facilities (or any [Borg Only] cards) in your game deck or in any side deck, even if you have not seeded or played them.

As I read this rules you cannot use BO-Cards in your non-Borg Deck; so there is no need for this card to be on the watch-list.

[nobthehobbit]

But as a Borg player, I can use ACoP to get non- Objectives.

[Pazuzu]

I think it's meant that this card got more powerful since ever objectives became a huge part of the game for non- affiliations. I think back in First Contact times, Objectives were meant (more or less) only for players to score points.

Though, I cannot think of a broken download chain here. Maybe someone can enlighten us

[Iron Prime]

It opens up a lot of options to a Borg player. I've heard a lot of Establish Tractor Lock stories lately, among others...

[Hoss-Drone]

There's nothing wrong with A Change of plans.

The VAST majority of objectives are affiliation restricted which means the borg cant use them. Another chunk are bonus point related which again, means nothing to borg. Another chunk are species enforced so again, irrelevant to borg. A small number are commandeer related so again, borg cant do.

The list of ACoP-able, non-borg use only objective cards that even mean anything to borg are:

Establish Tractor Lock
Orbital Bombardment
Post Garrison
Reflection Therapy
HQ:Defensive Measures
Navigate Plasma Storms
Construct Starship
Defend Homeworld
Divert Power
Engage Cloak
Examine Singularity

This is really just about a small group of haters that are hating on Establish tractor lock, Orbital bombardment and post garrison. Problem is that these things are not broken or abusive. You can stp your tractor locked ship. You can battle the drones and break the post garrison. A change of plans itself can be stopped via Goddess of Empathy/Quinn/etc. There should be an affiliation that can punish landed ships.

If someone makes the argument that ACoP restricts design i'll throat punch them. Anytime a card is made its up to design to figure out how it might be used. Given that borg cant use affiliation, species or point based objectives its not hard to keep something out of borg hands.

Borg need an interrupt speed method for interacting with their opponent in order to balance out the fact that they are speed controlled by their own borg rules on completing objectives.

I'll say it right now - if they errata change of plans I'm out, I'm done, I quit this game and I never come back. 1e borg is my favorite affilation - favorite thing to play in this game. A change of plans flexibility is the only thing that keeps them competitive. I know this because I've been playing borg since 1997. I was playing them long before they were even remotely competitive b/c of all the broken nonsense non-borg players could do. Borg are really only competitive now b/c they finally nuked all the broken cheese non-borg affiliations could do.

There are not a lot of things borg players can do compared to non-borg affiliations and design hasn't exactly flooded the market with things for them to do. It would be not just disappointing but infuriating if they take away the ability for a borg player to do interesting things like surprise an opponent by change of plans'ing for HQ:Defensive measures to protect a high point space mission then swoop in, blow them up and be able to salvage starship at that mission.....or seeding say, 4 badlands missions and saving a seed spot and grabbing a navigate plasma storms to punish anyone who comes in to battle them or has to pass through on a cytherians.....or having an interrupt speed ability to get a skill by d/l'ing reflection therapy......or having the ability to dial up a Bajoran Wormhole via Examine Singularity.

Leave it alone people.

[Iron Prime]

Borg need an interrupt speed method for interacting with their opponent in order to balance out the fact that they are speed controlled ...

I think this is really the heart of it. The whole post is spot on - but this is the TL;DR part in my opinion.

It is very easy to make an objective un-usable by Borg. And while ETL, Garrison, etc can cause a little hearburn for an unprepared player they still took at least some resource dedication on the part of the Borg player.

[Mogor]

Jeez folks, watch list doesn't mean errata incoming, there's been cards on the 2E watch list for 13+ months before being dropped off the list. All being on the watch list means is that someone expressed concern over the card, and I believe it's almost automatically going to go on the list, but it doesn't mean errata team is going to recommend errata for it. This would be a great area for commdecker to chime in on

[jjh]

Quit Threats are getting old around here.

What else can we do to win friends and influence people?

[Iron Prime]

I hear good things about candy...

[Jono]

There's an Establish Tractor Lock deck which pretty much locks an opponent out who isn't using multiple ships.

[JeBuS]

There's an Establish Tractor Lock deck which pretty much locks an opponent out who isn't using multiple ships.

But that's not abusive. That's a flaw in the 1-ship deck design. You can also easily lock out a deck with only 1 personnel.

[karonofborg13]

There's an Establish Tractor Lock deck which pretty much locks an opponent out who isn't using multiple ships.

But that's not abusive. That's a flaw in the 1-ship deck design. You can also easily lock out a deck with only 1 personnel.

Please elaborate, JeBus, by all means...?

[rsutton41]

I have to second what Sean is talking about. I have played against the Borg deck that he speaks of, it is very brutal when played by someone who knows what they are doing with Borg. Every deck I build I have to consider the horrifying ACoP objective download deck as a threat. Can all players in the community pay it well? Absolutely not. Maybe 10%. It is a super precise deck to play and can only be played successfully by players who are very very skilled with Borg. As for player experience (especially new player experience) IT IS PAINFUL and will make most everyone want to quit playing. As I was playing against this deck at GenCon this year Dave Bowling and I kept looking at each other telling each other how much we hated this deck (in a silly way) -- Now with that said it was painful to play against. However, it is not unbeatable or the best deck ever. Dan didn't win Masters with it because of virtually one mistake that caused him a MW. The deck works like the Borg in the show and I love that flavor. On the flip side wow it is painful to play against especially a deck that isn't prepared for it at all. I would hate to change ACoP to use just Borg cards unless new Borg Objectives were created that allowed them to do more than just the old decipher Borg Objectives.... We need the threat of Borg to balance the game. A Change of Plans (IMO) needs to be looked at closely before it is stripped of it greatness for Borg. I would look at errata-ing the troubling Objectives before errata-ing ACoP.

[KazonPADD]

If it does get errata'd (which would just fix an oversight on the original card in my opinion), then I'd also like to see a Borg specific version of Establish Tractor Lock be made, with an appropriately Borg assimilation twist. We never saw the Borg do things like Posting a Garrison, so not fussed about that, but Tractor Locks we saw aplenty!

[Tyberius_Deangelo]

Since someone brought up the topic of new Borg objectives, I think they really need some new directives from the Decipher-Era objective cards. A friend of mine who casually plays Borg (without the Harness Particle shenanigans) really complains about the 25 point Establish Gateway and Assimilate Planet. I wonder if it would be possible for the CC to create 35 point objective for the borg with maybe more probe setup? My friend's issue is that he has to complete four objectives while I need a three mission win. I know since the days of First Contact the game has increased in speed so it might be time to revise Borg too. Just a thought.