Online Masters Draft Results

by Ross Fertel, Tightrope Walker

23rd February 2023

The Online Masters is over, and we ran a draft of affiliations for a bit of fun. Let's take a look and the decks and see how things worked out.

Ted Reebel had the sole three affiliation deck with triple HQ that hates facing Dilemmas v1.5. The deck had three of each personnel making liberal use of Optimism among some other tricks to simply avoid having to face those pesky dilemmas. It is notable that this deck had the only Founders Hoemworld headquarters in the event.

The only dual affiliated deck was Greg Dillon's Give me (Ghe)More which has Kira as Iliana as a central reporting strategy. Dissidents abound in this deck of the Cardassian, Federation Insurrection and Borg varieties. The deck strategy has ways to reload Iliana's ability each turn keeping the reporting going strong. There is a tournament report to give you more information.

Mathew McCalpin brings us Fanboy Design- Voyager with a lot of tricks familiar to the faction. Looking at the missions of Alsuran Sector, Utilize Abandoned Relay Station and Plasma Storm Depths, Search for Missing Vessel, you can see where things are going and the deck follows through with support cards.

Daniel Giddings builds his own Expanse with Standard - The Expanse goes further than we thought... You would never guess it by the title, but there are no missions natively in the Delphic Expanse in this deck. You have two, and only two, Spatial Reconfigurations to use strategically though this deck does not go all in on that tactic.

Adam Berger made some changes to a basic build with Enhanced Ferengi Beginner deck. Where the titular enhancements are there, the deck still relies on managing your cards under the headquarters.

Alexander Schmitz played the other Ferengi affiliated deck with Ferengi DoubleDouble turn. True to the title, this can string three turns in a row if things work out. This deck also goes into the Commodity route for a bonus to cunning with Tulaberry Wine.

Deep Space Nine is represented with Maggie Geppert's DS9 Skittles deck. While this goes the rainbow route, there is a lot of Bajoran/Federation synergy in the deck to speed things along further.

Terok Nor is represented with Benjamin Rostoker's Because Skill Diversity isn't the key to the Alpha Quadrant - the Dilemma Piles are. And whoever controls Terok Nor controls the Dilemma Piles. v.2 and is chock full of ways to obliterate a dilemma pile.

Joseph Wisniewski brought the Next Generation along with a deck from last year with Blocked Drain v89 - Stolen from pfti (2022 2E Masters) going the Alternate Universe route. As you would expect, the Battleship crew takes up a good portion of this deck though recent cards from The Menagerie are along as well. If you haven't dipped your toe into that well, this deck has the tricks to give you incentive to do so with Quantum Incursions letting you manipulate your hand and top of your draw deck along with New Life to draw those cards back.

While not leaning that far into the Alternate Universe of it all, Tjark Ott's Der Herr der Bluthunde Masters online 2022 wants to get that icon out for tricks of their own with the Cardassians. There is some non-aligned support to speed things up.

Benjamin Liebich also brought back a modern classic with Falling Toward Apotheosis. While a bit more focused on the Cardassians themselves, this deck wants to get on a ship and go to the Gamma Quadrant with tech to get there a little easier and tech to make missions there not as challenging as they have to be.

Steve Nelson once again shows the capabilities of the Maquis with the Continental Full Nelson. This time, Alex Porter, Campaign Veteran is there to give your opponent some help at the risk of giving you an easier path to the win.

Brian Sykes played the 2022_Masters_KCA_3.txt which does not have as many cards form Shattered Mirror as you might think; only six cards are from that set! Some Klingons from All Our Yesterdays are there to help get things going. For more, check out the tournament report.

Kris Sonsteby brought the Klingons with My Name... is Gladiator, a deck that goes the solving route primarily though there is a Past support engine and Treachery to make it run a bit faster.

Christopher Janna's Klingon Treachery deck does have that skill in spades with a whopping twenty-three who have that skill, meaning three personnel in the deck don't have it. There is a bit more support to get them in paly and keep them around, particularly A History of Collusion. Have fun using discreet means to forge your path to victory.

The winner of the event was Michael Van Breemen with Risa for Recuperation! The only Original Series deck showing up, Risa, Shore Leave does not come to mind when you think of that faction but when you consider Vulcans, Dax and a non-unique Caitian, the case is suddenly viable to say nothing of the non-aligned personnel, none of whom have a species in The Original Series. The Law is there for Legal Proceedings along with Weyoun, “Defective” Clone to benefit from having that skill in play.

Looking at the draft, Armus, Lore, Monty42, Pfti, Psionic Hobo and ugly with glasses had a winning slate! The draft for Masters in Georgia this weekend is open, have fun joining in!

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