Kazon Basics (Part 2 of 2): Big Fleets

by Andreas Rheinländer, Special Delta Quadrant Correspondent

7th June 2018

In part one of this series, you learned a bit about the basics of playing Kazon.  Now, you will see how to get your fleet into other quadrants and some of the odder variations on Kazon theme.

Multi-Quadrant Decks

If a player wants to go for interaction in any event, the best way is a multi-quadrant deck. Any Kazon deck built for definitive interaction in any quadrant should include one Wormhole II mission per quadrant (as well as a download for Bajoran Wormhole), so that the mobile Kazon base can jump to any quadrant without being stopped, ready to attack immediately. A seeded copy of Make It So will unstop the ship, so it can attack again. Note that you have to download Culluh at first and than download Razik in turn 2 using Defend Homeworld to do that, because Razik is the matching commander of Kazon Warship. You can skip the Defend Homeworld download and go directly for Razik so that you can attack on turn 1. However, that means you don't have Culluh in play. You can, however, get him later, by using Going To The Top.

Voyager is not needed in such a deck, since it cannot be transported aboard the Kazon Warship and there are no free reports aboard it in the Alpha Quadrant. So such a deck can use New Arrivals, because only one free report will be used each turn. Additional personnel can come from Holodeck Door, since they do not count as free reports.

If a player wants to go for war full scale, he or she can add 1st Rule of Acquisition and an appropriate facility to download Gint, play him aboard the Kazon Warship using Temporal Micro-Wormhole and draw cards for killing or damaging ships. One can also think about including Data's Medals for bonus points.

Some readers may ask, “How do I report my Kazon aboard the Warship in any quadrant?” That is easy. The ship must be seeded at Caretaker's Array, where there is also a Kazon Outpost seeded. A copy of The Kazon Collective must be seeded (!), not downloaded by the outpost. During the seed phase or during turn 1, the player then uses the special download on Kazon Outpost to download The Kazon Collective onto the Kazon Warship, which allows the Kazon (and their equipment) to report aboard the warship which solves as a mobile base.

Such a deck is flexible enough to work in any quadrant. I strictly recommend seeding at least two copies of Make It So (three are better!). The first one is used for the first unstop and the second is used to download at least Captain's Log. The use of Captain's Order cards (and Ready Room Door) is strongly recommended in such a deck.

Here is my recommendation for a prudent use of Captain's Order cards. As long as the ship is still in the Delta Quadrant, I suggest downloading Tactical Console. As long as the Kazon Warship is docked at the Kazon Outpost and if Culluh is already aboard, a copy of Make It So can be used to download it. One of the mission specialists can be Ayala, et voila, the Kazon Warship is already a 8 – 14 – 12 ship in turn 1 without Captain's Log, as long as Ayala is aboard. Since those (Non-Aligned) mission specialists are precious and shouldn't be used otherwise, the bonus will be there.

Another card very dear to me is Divert Power. It can be used to either increase WEAPONS (or SHIELDS if needed) by 2, without the need to discard it, or to increase WEAPONS and SHIELDS by 4 until end of the next turn. In case of a turn where the Kazon Warship attacks twice, that is a rather strong bonus and since it is an objective, it cannot be nullified.

Since a Kazon Warship deck without Voyager reports only one personnel per turn for free, one card is a wonderful addition: Sleeper Ship. It can even be seeded, so in case of a two-attacks turn (which can only happen once per game due to the restriction of Make It So), it means an extra two personnel reported directly from hand. Since those are not free reports, they do not discard New Arrivals. They can be either Kazon or Non-Aligned. One can think about seeding Quark's Isolinear Rods to download a Computer Skill x2 personnel, so it can then be played. I recommend 10 and 01, who download Bynars Weapon Enhancement, giving the Kazon Warship additional WEAPONS +2 immediately.  It is obvious that Captain's Log and Defiant Dedication Plaque should be included in such a deck as well.

Using all of the means at hand, a Kazon Warship can be 10 – 17 – 15 in turn 2 or 3, bonuses from Divert Power not included. If Divert Power is used to, well, divert power, it can be 9 – 19 – 14. If another copy of Divert Power (second option) is used as well (as a card play or downloaded using Vic Fontaine), it is 9 – 23 – 17. With Breen Disruptor Burst as a tactic card, it is 9 – 25 – 19.

In case of a fleet assault, one additional option is Multivector Assault Mode to make the Kazon Warship WEAPONS and SHIELDS +5, so it would become a 9 – 30 – 24 ship. Those other two ships can be ships downloaded using Hidden Fighter. They will most likely be destroyed next turn, but the WEAPONS total (30 + 5 + 5) is enough to damage a regular outpost facility. Since it doesn't cost a card play, it should be considered to use Battle Bridge Door (second option), increasing the damage by 3 more.  In such a battle, the Kazon Warship wouldn't even be damaged by a Borg Cube.  The addition of (another) Bynars Weapon Enhancements, Metaphasic Shields or Nutational Shields is optional.

There is one other way to get a (bigger) boost in SHIELDS and RANGE. Once a Non-Aligned ship has been downloaded, a player can use the Vic Fontaine download to get Equipment Replicator, which does not play on a Delta Quadrant ship, but can be played on Yridian Shuttle. Once done, it can be used to download Plasmadyne Relay, boosting the Kazon Warship substantially.

Other Possible Additions

If a player plans to use Artifacts, an interesting and old school way to increase a ship's attributes is Kurlan Naiskos and Data's Head. Kurlan Naiskos is rather sensitive to nullification, however.  Data's Head can also be nullified using Disruptor Overload, but on a ship full of equipment, the chance is much smaller. I would recommend seeding it using Cryosatellite, pershaps in the Delta Quadrant. Possible candidates for personnel also seeded there are Lakanta (for easy travel), Khan (to annoy Federation players), Madam Guinan (dilemmas), N'Rana (punishment), Rishon (to protect event cards), The Foragers (see below) and Samuel Clemens (see below) or any other personnel with high STRENGTH (like Ruk).

One way to boost the number of cards played in a Kazon deck is Devidian Door. If that is the case, especially when playing a multi-quadrant deck, as mentioned, it can be a nice additon to use The Foragers and Samuel Clemens. The Foragers allow three personnel (Ophidian Cane) to be played at a planet and Samuel Clemens gives the player 10 points for the cost of a copy of Devidian Door.  Especially those three personnel, when using Ophidian Cane, can report to an opponent's planet and wreak havor there.

Not So Typical Decks

Since the Kazon will, in many games, be alone in the Delta Quadrant, that has a variety of consequences. One interesting way to make use of that is to appreciate the small spaceline. That opens up the space for a way to report additional personnel, especially in a deck does not necessarily plan to leave the quadrant. Using T'Ong. One might ask: T'Ong? A Klingon ship? What about it?

T'Ong does allow to report three people at the end of a spaceline. If the spaceline is only 4 cards long, which I recommend, the personnel aboard is available easily. Since any Kazon deck should include a Non-Aligned ship, personnel aboard T'Ong can be beamed aboard the Non-Aligned ship and than to the Kazon Warship.  What personnel should be reported aboard T'Ong? Easy: any Non-Aligned personnel considered interesting or necessary.  If one wants to be on the safe side and T'Ong should be able to move, the player should include multiple copies of M'Vil. She can switch between Klingon and Non-Aligned and has a solid set of skills. It should be considered that the use of T'Ong to report extra personnel (which do not count towards New Arrivals) is not restricted to the Delta Quadrant. It can be used in any quadrant and is therefore also available to any deck that wants to inflict damage in other quadrants as well.

Final Thoughts

This article was trying to give an overview regarding the Kazon affiliation. It is important to point out that it is not conclusive or complete.  There is a lot more to say, but I was trying to give an overview showing the basic aspects of this affiliation. Just like with the Dominion article series, most of the bullet points here could easily become an independent article with a lot more information, but for the moment, I hope I could encourage new and old players to play the Kazon.

Do not hesitate to contact me, if questions arise, but most of all: have fun!

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