Design Spotlight: First Edition Maquis

by Charlie Plaine, Chairman

22nd January 2018

"The Federation abandoned us. Told us to take care of ourselves. Well, that's what we intend to do..." - Cal Hudson, "The Maquis, Part II"

Overview
The Maquis were introduced to Star Trek as a rebellious faction of former Federation citizens living in or near the Federation/Cardassian DMZ. Their introduction demonstrated the less than idea side of the Federation, and characters from the Maquis appeared across TNG, DS9, and Voyager. In 1E, they remained undeveloped until the 2014 expansion The Maquis.

At a Glance
Here's a quick look at the Maquis faction, which spans multiple affiliations:

Maquis
Nouns	49 Cards (0 Facilities, 42 Personnel, 7 Ships)
Missions	0
First Appearance	Deep Space 9 (1998)
Recent Appearance	The Maquis (2014)
Signature Skill	Treachery (33.3%)
Attack Restriction	NORMAL (NONE if previously attacked and They Call Themselves the Maquis in play)
Appears In	TNG, DS9, and Voyager
Doesn't Appear In	Enterprise, TOS, and Movies

Strengths
The Maquis have a high ratio of verbs (20) relative to their number of nouns (49); this gives any deck using personnel a number of options for tricks. Decks that include Maquis personnel can leverage them to draw cards, avoid battle, and use Treachery as Diplomacy. If you're willing to limit yourself to a property logo, you can start damaging ships or returning your opponent's personnel to their hand, too. The Maquis have a big bag of tricks they can bring to a deck, which is a definite strength.

Maquis players also can get an extra faction free play, as long as they commit to either or , as each of the Maquis engines give access to They Call Themselves the Maquis. Thus, if you're playing , you can use both Defending Their Homes and TCTtM to play two personnel a turn. That's a step above what most other affiliations and factions get out of a single seed.

As I talked about when looking at Bajorans, there is a big advantage in being able to play within a Region. The Maquis have access to two different regions, the Badlands and the Demilitarized Zone, with nine (9) and five (5) missions respectively across two quadrants.

Finally, the Maquis provide a lot of power when used as a supporting package for another faction or affiliation. If you're playing Mercenary Raiders, it's fairly easy to add in some cards and get extra help for your deck. Likewise, if you're playing Here By Invitation, you can get some great extra power when you include some cards as well. It may not be the best story fit, but the Maquis shine when they're a supporting player in a deck.

Weaknesses
The Maquis excel at being supportive, but they have quite a bit of trouble standing on their own. Across all of the property logos, there are only forty-two (42) personnel in the game; compared to Bajorans (118), Federation (81), or Klingon (68). Even Vulcans, the newest affiliation on the block, have thirty-six (36). When you try to subdivide the Maquis by property logo, it gets even more difficult: there are six (6) , including a duplicate persona (Ro Laren) and a single universal. fare better, with nineteen (19) personnel and seven univerals. It's tough to build a only deck with limited personnel options.

But even if you choose to build a general deck without property logo restrictions, a Maquis-only deck will run into skill issues. Across all the personnel, there are only five (5) MEDICAL personnel and only two (2) with MEDICAL-classification - but none are . They do better with OFFICER-classification personnel with nine (9), but only four (4) that can help pass a Maglock. Likewise, they are going to have a hard time passing "Rock People" with only six (6) Geology personnel and only three SCIENCE-classification personnel.

Looking Ahead
Dan Hamman and his team on The Maquis did a good job of creating tools to support a Maquis deck. In reality, prior to that expansion, there was very little reason to care about the icon. But the issue of source material is one that will come up a few times during this column, both now for the Maquis, and later for the affiliations. I see us making new personnel in the future, which will help address a lot of the weaknesses, but it is a limited resource.

Of course, as the recently released Cold Front as shown with Romulans, limited resources can breed creativity. I would like to see more options for Maquis players that encourage and reward "team ups." For example, what would a / Bajoran Resistance deck look like? What kind of card could design make to promote such a deck? How about and Klingon Treachery? It's not unreasonable to think the Sisters of Duras might sell weapons to the Maquis.

Finally, I'd like to see the Maquis receive a host of new Objectives (or Objective-like cards) that reward players for building decks around and completing specific stories. I can see an Objective that plays on DS9 and rewards the Maquis for stealing the Defiant, or one that plays on any ship or facility and lets the Maquis steal supplies. There aren't a ton of Maquis stories, but I'd like to see them developed and put into the game to expand options for decks using cards.

Conclusion
The Maquis spent a lot of time in First Edition simply existing, without having anything to do. Their titular expansion provided a host of resources and reasons to play personnel, but in hindsight I feel it was more of a shotgun blast of tools instead of something more focused. Still, it's nice to be able to play the Maquis in 1E, even if it does tend to be in a supporting role. But the lessons learned designing The Maquis have been well learned, and helped provide more focus in subsequent expansions. For now, the Maquis lie in wait, knowing their time to rise up and strike will come.

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