Weekly 1E Roundup - 23 OCTOBER 2019

by Charlie Plaine, Director of First Edition

23rd October 2019

Welcome to the Weekly 1E Roundup, a weekly column looking back at the past week in the world of First Edition as well as a preview of the week ahead. If you've got an event coming up and you'd like to be featured in this column, feel free to contact me at cplaine@gmail.com or on the forums via PM to MidnightLich.

The Big News

On Monday, we announced the existence of borderless, full-art promo cards for both First Edition and Second Edition. These cards were the idea of Lucas Thompson (edgeofhearing) and the result of the hard work of Lucas, Art Director Johnny Holeva (jjh), and Warehouse Manager Dan Hamman (SirDan). Right now we're running a contest to give away one copy each of the first nine 1E promos - you can enter it every day with that link. We'll be announcing the winners of November 4th, so stay tuned. These cards will be available via social media giveaways and via contests here on the site, so there will be opportunities for all to get them.

The Road to Worlds 2020

The Road to Worlds 2020 has already begun with the recently completed Online Masters dubbed "Masters of the Universe II". Hosted by our Director of Organized Play Kris Sonsteby (LORE), this event saw Jeremy Huth (9of24) victorious over a field of twelve (12) of some of the best players in First Edition. Jeremy was kind enough to agree to answer my questions about his deck in the usual interview. Jeremy has also written an excellent tournament report for you to read.

Masters of the Universe II winner Jeremy Huth (9of24) Deck Title: Ahab's Whale (Jeremy's deck is also attached to this article below.) Deck Archetype: Borg Interference/Battle Play Engines: They Will Be Coming Draw Engines: None Bonus Point Mechanics: Resistance is Futile Dilemma Strategy: Mission Attempt Enders (w/Mission Debriefing)

Jeremy's Commentary: Why did you choose the deck that you used? What other decks did you consider using? It had been about a year since I played Stop First Contact and I wanted to run my favorite deck again. There weren't really any other decks I was considering. What sorts of decks were you hoping to face while playing your deck? What decks did you hope not to face? Fed/Starfleet solvers are nice to see, even if they get out ahead early on, the game mostly ends when Stop First Contact is completed. Heavy personnel battle/capture decks are problematic, I still have a lot to learn to play well against that style of deck. Prior to this tournament, did you have much experience playing this deck (or decks like it)? Did you learn anything new about it when you played it this time? As I said, SFC is my favorite deck to play. As such, I have played many variations of this deck. It is a deck that is both strong in game play and in theme. I think this may have been the first event where I went "off-script", i.e. battling, in many of my games and I have some ideas for how tweak the deck for that to work a bit more efficiently. 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? There were a few, Holodeck Door, Call for Reinforcements, a handful of backup objectives. Eliminate Starship was quite useful in this event. I believe it let me put 3 of my opponent's off ships for a majority of the game or outright ended the game. I'm not ready to cut any of them yet, but Call for Reinforcements is the closest to being cut. What was your toughest matchup of the tournament? I think my game against Greg Dillon (Latok) in round 4 was the most competitive. With his mix of Starfleet and Vulcan, I was concerned that he may be able to out speed me or even protect most of his people at his time locations when Stop First Contact was completed. After the game it seemed like a fortunate random selection in my favor disappearing Syrran, who had Seek Hidden Reliquary played on him, preventing some bonus points and cutting him off from Surak for the game was a key point in our game. How often were you able to Stop First Contact? If I am remembering correctly, it was only 3 times. Battling won the other 2 games. What would you nominate as the MVP card from your deck? I'm going to give the nod to Eliminate Starship this time. Having that extra pressure on helped to slow my opponents and in some cases, flat out won me the game. Do you ever worry that as more people learn to play Borg they will become a problem? I'm not sure if you're asking if Borg will become a problem because more people are playing them or if the people who understand how to play Borg would be a more of a problem to play against. So I'll address both. The first isn't something I've really thought about. I suppose when any single affiliation becomes overly prevalent, that is probably an issue. So it wouldn't be any different if the Borg were that affiliation. However, at least from my play experience, that is a long ways off. As far as playing against more players experienced in how Borg play, I would welcome it. The best way to improve as a player and a deck builder is to play against the strongest competition. First edition is a game that is probably impossible to fully know and understand, but one should always be endeavoring to learn more. Why do you think aggressive Borg have shown up more in recent years? Any time the predominate meta is fast solvers, and especially greedy solvers, aggression and interaction are going to show up to knock them down a peg. Whether that be in the form of Kazon Armada, Invasive Jem'Hadar, or a Cube knocking on your door. Flavor of choice is probably going to depend on the player, but for me, Borg have the biggest ships, the ability to flip between battle and scouting fairly easily, and the advantage of being the mysterious enemy your opponent may not fully understand. Do you have anything else you'd like to say about your deck? I think the Stop First Contact is a powerful Borg deck that is relatively easy to understand. You have a two mission win plan, with the option to go on the offensive and blow up some ships. If you're looking to try playing Borg, and I would encourage anyone to do so, this deck is a blast to play.

This Day in Trek

Today is the 66th birthday of writer and producer Ira Steven Behr, most famous in Trek circles for being one of the masterminds behind Deep Space Nine. Arguably, Behr deserves the lion's share of the credit for the Dominion War story arc DS9 is known for. Most recently, he's been the creative force behind What We Left Behind, a documentary taking a retrospective look at the third Star Trek series. Happy birthday, Mr. Behr; we hope it's a good one!

Tournament Reports

As mentioned above, the Online Masters recently completed. Jeremy and his Borg won, going undefeated across five (4) rounds. Martin Felber (Enabran) took 2nd place with an deck titled Welcome to the 23.t century. Greg Dilon (Latok) and Jon Carter (pfti) rounded out the Top 4, with both of their decks unknown.

In Auburn, Washington, four (4) players took part in the inagural OTF Complete event of the League of Eternal Destitution. Michael Van Breemen (The Ninja Scot) won with an unusual Cardassian/Terran Empire (Fed) deck he called Cadets, Maquis, Terrans and Dissidents, Oh My. Justin Ford (Resistance-is-futile), the host, and Ken Tufts (Worf Son of Mogh) took 2nd and 3rd respectively, both playing Bajorans. Leianne (LeianneK) came in 4th with a Kazon deck.

That was all for official tournaments, but I suspect more of you are out there playing 1E than I know about. We'd love to cover casual games too! If you'd like to have your 1E get together covered in this column, let me know! You can find my contact information at the bottom of every column, and you're welcome to email me, PM me, or just post on the forums.

Tournament Previews

We've got two events this weekend, both taking place in the midwestern United States. First, on Saturday, Kris Sonsteby is hosting an OTF Complete Constructed event at the Fantasy Flight Games Center in Roseville, Minnesota. In addition to Kris, Jason Tang (Pants o.t. Tal Shiar) and Justin Kaufman (CrimsonRavage) are signed up to kick off their T2E Tough Enough league.

On Sunday the 27th, Brian S. (JeBuS) will be hosting a Cube Draft tournament in Mt. Prospect, Illinois. In addition to this being an Infinite Diversity in Chicago league event, it will be the first South Dakota Cube event in the Windy City. Kevin Jaeger (Hoss-Drone) told us all about his cube in an interview in this column back in July, so I'm excited to see how it works here in Chicago.

Further down the road, the Road to Worlds 2020 will continue in November with two high level events: Space Coast Trek Masters in West Melborne, Florida on November 10th and British Nationals in Greater Manchester on November 16th. Both events are looking for more players to pre-register, and we'll be covering both in more detail as we get closer to the event dates.

First Weekend First Edition will be back November 1st-3rd, so get your plans in motion now. As I hinted at last week, participating will give you a chance to win one of the new borderless, full-art, foil promos! Check back next week for more details! But even if you're playing outside that weekend, let me know! Contact me at any of the links at the bottom of this column, and I'll happily promote your event in a future edition of this column!

Short Takes (In Other News)

• What do you think about Battle Borg? We touched on it above with Jeremy's interview, and one of his opponents (Spectre9) started a thread discussing the power of this kind of Borg deck. What do you think? Is this strategy too powerful for an affiliation that already has so many tricks? Or are there practical ways to prepare yourself for rampaging cubes?


• Which expansion is your personal favorite? Continuing the Friday questions, last week I asked about favorite expansions. Many people have identified First Contact and The Next Generation as faves, but what about you? It doesn't even have to be a traditional expansion, but if you have a favorite, we want to know about it!


• What kind of Ferengi deck am I making? After soliciting suggestions, I've put up a poll for you to vote on which kind of Ferengi deck I make. The three options are a Where Opportunities Are Made deck, a "latinum antics" deck, or a deck based on repeatedly playing Ferengi Conference. Go vote, and next week we'll start building the deck.


• Can you split end of turn draws Takket wants to know if you can play a Q's Tent in between end of turn draws. The answer seems to be no because playing a Q's Tent isn't an end of turn action. However, there does seem to be a window there - is there anything else you can do between end of turn draws?


• Let's try the word search again. Apparently my link to last week's puzzle was bad, so nobody had the chance to take a look. I've fixed that with this link to the One and Only Word Search. Grab a copy and see if you can decipher the clues and find the hidden words. If you do, you'll be one step closer to solving the meta puzzle.

The Time Capsule

Last year, we released the Enterprise Collection Remastered, which has recently been officially matched to the originals as errata. This was a project to provide modern, rules-accurate, and high resolution versions of the last official 1E product. My announcement article last year included a deck that used every card in the file. Have a look!

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That's all for this week's roundup of First Edition news and events. For more news, you can follow The Continuing Committee on Facebook, Twitter, or bookmark our front page. News about upcoming First Edition projects can be found in the most recent Project Status Update from August 2019. My next Office Hours will be Wednesday, November 6th at 6 PM Pacific time. If you've got an event coming up and you'd like to be featured in this column, or if you have comments about this column's content, feel free to contact me at cplaine@gmail.com or on the forums via PM to MidnightLich. Until next week, may you expand your power in the universe and live long and prosper.

Discuss this article in this thread.

Decklist

Print Decklist • Copy Deck

This deck is legal in the following Card Pools:

• Complete

This deck is legal in the following Rules Sets:

• Modern
• Open
• Warp Speed

This deck is currently eligible for the following family or families of achievements:

• Borg Player
• Good Casting: Armstrong (Two of Nine)
• Chair's Challenge 2019: Assimilate This!

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