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Strategy Articles
Burn the Turn
by Nathan W, Staff Writer
18th March 2010
As I stared down at the menacing dilemma stack set before me, I caught a glimpse of my tableside adversary. The stoic expression on his face when I breezed through my first mission had been replaced by a smug smirk that somehow told me things were going to change in his favor very quickly. I glanced at my hand to find an uncomforting slew of events I didn’t need and personnel I couldn’t afford to play. Begrudgingly, I exhaled for no other reason than to keep the thoughts in my head from becoming the words in my mouth.
The next few moments resembled the madness one feels when pulling off a band-aid well before it's time. There was dreadful terror in the anticipation. The agony and ecstasy as each hair tempts fate to a life of freedom or death. And then, the realization that beneath this peaceful blanket, the hidden tempest had not subsided.
"Perhaps it’s a bluff dilemma," I tried to lie to myself.
So my hand crept forward – finally resting on the top card. What had at first seemed only to be a few cards somehow appeared to have multiplied from the time it took me to reach the stack. Was there five? Six?!?
Knowing, yet unknowing, I replayed the events in my head that had led me here. It was the tournament director’s fault for setting me up in this pairing! No. It was my friend’s fault for calling me up this morning and reminding me of this event in the first place! Not that either. The reality was: I arrived at this scenario because I was not fully prepared for what was in store.
With that, I gave a silent goodbye to my mission team and flipped over Tragic Turn.
Introduction
Tragic Turn is a high-risk, high-reward dilemma that has been prominent in a number of recent championship decks. Combined with even a small degree of deck support, this card and its subsequent "killer" dilemmas are able to ravage an unprepared mission team and leave the victim turns behind by requiring him or her to draw, pay, and play an entire new crew. However, as most dilemma piles that rely on Tragic Turn need to be filled with a number of regular, "random kill" dilemmas, facing this dilemma pile is predictable and beatable with a solid deck and intelligent strategy.
Deck Design
"Thus, what is of supreme importance in war is to attack the enemy’s strategy."
-Sun Tzu
As Shania Twain once sang "So, you've got an Emergency Transport Unit? That don’t impress me much."
While being a good and useful card, an Emergency Transport Unit or two will not guarantee your team's survival when you've been hit by the Turn. Equipment Malfunction is a very simple counter that is played quite frequently, and many commonly-used "killer" dilemmas stop the personnel first, meaning they will not be present with the Unit when the condition for the kill is resolved. So what other options are there to consider? Instead (or in addition), try and prevent kills using any of the other generic mechanisms such as Escape. Or, if you have access to affiliation-specific cards such as Medical Teams, consider using them as well. Remember, if you can somehow prevent the first kill, you will not be hit by Tragic Turn. So, even some wild and unorthodox strategies may work in your favor.
While preventing kills is an effective strategy at minimizing collateral damage, a more direct approach to combating Tragic Turn is to simply eliminate it from the game altogether. You can accomplish this in mission selection, personnel you play, and the events you use.
Alternatively, you can design your deck to take advantage of the predictability of Tragic Turn-based piles. Typically, the dilemma draw itself is not consistent or powerful enough on its own. Deck events and interrupts are necessary to fuel the large dilemma stacks. This makes event destruction an even greater ally. And speaking of those large Tragic Turn dilemma stacks, the order of these often has to be meticulously determined. Perturbations can really throw a monkey wrench into that plan.
Strategy
"Know thy self, know thy enemy. A thousand battles. A thousand victories."
-Sun Tzu
A well-designed deck simply provides the tools necessary to beat your opponent. With a poor strategy, even the most carefully-designed decks are susceptible to being humbled by the Turn.
So how should you go about your strategy when you anticipate or know you're going up against a Tragic Turn dilemma pile? One may argue that space may be slightly safer as many Tragic Turn piles are designed to leave maximum damage on missions two and three, which are typically chosen as planet missions.
However, the statistician in me wasn’t convinced and I delved into the question: what is a good mission team size to avoid getting hit by the truly evil Tragic Turn combos? Tragic Turn itself is expensive to play, and most of the "killer" dilemmas aren’t cheap either. Obviously, the fewer mission team members you bring down, the fewer will die. But, you still would like to give yourself a chance to complete the mission. And if not, stack enough dilemmas underneath to get an easy score on subsequent turns.
What I arrived at are two sets of calculations expressed in the figures below. The first is simply the probability your opponent draws Tragic Turn from a certain number of dilemmas. The second is the expected number of deaths from a certain number of dilemmas drawn (and spent). This second calculation required a number of assumptions including average "killer" dilemma cost (2.7), probability that a dilemma could be played at this mission (80%), probability that a dilemma wasn’t a repeat of another dilemma (75%), and finally that all dilemmas, themselves, only kill one personnel.
Figure (top): Probability of drawing Tragic Turn when three copies exist in a 35-card dilemma pile. Figure (bottom): Expected number of deaths when facing a Tragic Turn dilemma pile (3 in 35). The top line represents when you cannot stop any deaths. The bottom line represents if you can stop exactly one death. Note: Tragic Turn will not necessarily appear in the dilemma stack.
What these results show is the significance of being able to stop at least one kill, prevention of numerous dilemma draws, and attempting (and completing) missions with a limited number of personnel.
My deck
With these results and strategies in hand, I set out to make a deck that could effectively ‘Burn the Turn’. Choosing Deep Space Nine personnel as my core group meant I could rely on Medical Teams and Ezri Dax (Resourceful Counselor) to prevent kills. I debated the merits of going Mouth of the Wormhole, but found Earth (Home of Starfleet Command) to better emulate the other facets of my results: event destruction with Luther Sloan (Man of Secrets) and attribute boosting to micro-team with Joseph Sisko (Creole Chef).
In the end, this deck accomplishes the goals set out for it. While perhaps not immune to every scenario, I believe it could survive (and thrive) against the average Tragic Turn deck. The deck is also small enough (and customizable enough) for you to add and remove anything that fits your fancy, so feel free to do so.
And as always, do not forget the words of Sun Tzu.
"Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat."
-Sun Tzu
-djl-
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