Weekly 1E Roundup - 25 MARCH 2020

by Charlie Plaine, Director of First Edition

25th March 2020

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 have questions, comments, or suggestions for content, you can contact me at cplaine@gmail.com or on the forums via PM to MidnightLich. I'm happy to write about your tournaments, get togethers, or other 1E-related goings-on. But for now, let's get into the column and see what's been going on in the world of First Edition!

The Big News

The Neutral Zone, a brand new, fifty-four (54) card virtual expansion, is releasing on Friday, April 3rd. This expansion introduces enough cards to make them a playable faction, but also includes more personnel to augment any deck. Aside from the Romulans, you'll find androids, new dilemmas, a new dilemma strategy, and various non- one-off cards to splash into all kinds of your decks. We hope you've been enjoying the daily spoilers so far, and will continue to do so until next Friday when you'll see the whole expansion.

In the mean time, if you haven't checked out the announcement article you can do that. There's also a puzzle from Kaufman, an article about a new site from Paddy Tye (KazonPADD), and a beginner-player friendly article from Maggie Geppert (jadziadax8). Stay tuned for more articles this week and next, and enjoy the new cards from The Neutral Zone!

This Day in Trek

Last week we saw the actor behind General Martok, J.G. Hertzler, turn 70; today, it's Robert O'Reilly to join the septuagenarian club! O'Reilly played Gowron for nine (9) years, across both The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine, first appearing in "Reunion" (TNG Season 4) before meeting his end in "Tacking Into the Wind" (DS9 Season 7). According to Memory Alpha, he tried to play Gowron as cold and calculating in his first edition; it wasn't until his second, when he "flared his eyes," that he secured the part. O'Reilly also played a gangster in TNG's "The Big Goodbye," a count man in DS9's "Badda-bing, Badda-bang", and a bounty hunter in Enterprise's "Bounty." Happy 70th birthday, Mr. O'Reilly!

Tournament Reports

We didn't have any scheduled tournaments or game reports from last week. However, especially in these uncertain times, I want to hear about you having any chance to play Trek! Did you play online? Tell me about it! Play with family? Send me pictures! I'm happy to cover tournaments and casual games in this column - you just have to 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. So if you're out there, playing 1E in any way, shape, or form, tell us about it!

Tournament Previews

In a time when more and more states and countries are banning gatherings, this section of this column might be pretty sparse for the near future. But fortunately, we have the ability to play online, and Director of Organized Play Kris Sonsteby is hosting a series of online, OTF Complete Constructed events to help you play. He's running these "pod" style, which means players will be divided into groups of three (3) or four (4) and play round-robin style over two weeks. If you've got the time, or the inclination to learn Lackey, give it a try!

There is still one physical tournament scheduled, an OTF Complete Constructed event in Manassas Park, VA. Hosted by Ben Hosp (bhosp), there are currently four (4) players pre-registered: Ben, Phil Schrader (pschreader), Austin Chandler (DarkSabre), and Alexander Schmitz (TyKajada). I know this event's attendance is suffering somewhat from the current pandemic, but I'm confident these players will have fun and some good games.

Looking a little further ahead, this year's Onlne Regional, an OTF Complete Constructed event hosted by Brian Sykes (Armus), kicks off the week after next. As of this writing of this column, there are twelve (12) players pre-registered, including yours truly. Kris Sonsteby is the 5th ranked player in the world, and leads the field of pre-registered players. Michael Van Breemen (The Ninja Scot) and Jon Carter (pfti), at 11th and 15th, are also major players in this event. This will be a great event, and I look forward to seeing the results in about a month. Note that The Neutral Zone won't be legal for this event. There is still plenty of time to pre-register.

Upcoming Championships

APPLY FOR A REGIONAL

Online Regional Championship Friday, 3 April OTF Complete Constructed

Online (Beccels, UK) Regional Championship Friday, 10 April OTF Complete Constructed

San Diego, California Regional Championship Saturday, 18 April OTF Complete Constructed

Glen Ellyn, Illinois Regional Championship Sunday, 16 May OTF Complete Constructed

Ypsilanti, Michigan Trek Masters Series POSTPONED OTF Legacy Constructed

If you have upcoming events, get togethers, or anything else scheduled that's 1E related, let me know. I'd love to feature you and your friends in this column. I typically only see them if they're scheduled in our tournament software, so if you're not using that, please let me know!

Short Treks (In Other News)

• The Department of Organized Play issued a statement and guidance about the pandemic. In light of all the news and the (quite frankly) scary situation regarding COVID-19, Kris Sonsteby issued a statement about the pandemic and organized play. In effect, he urges all players to follow local guidance and laws, and keep themselves safe. He's also authorized delaying events and moving them to be online, as players and organizers see fit. Stay safe, and if you can play safely, do so.


• The design team for The Neutral Zone is answering your questions. As per tradition, a Q&A thread has been started regarding the latest expansion, The Neutral Zone. You can post questions about the expansion, and it's likely that the designers - Paddy Tye, Niall Matthew (sexecutioner), Dan Hamman (SirDan), and myself - will answer them.


• How would you feel about splitting the icon into a past and a future version? LuthySloan notes in his discussion post that one of the smarter decisions made by Second Edition was splitting their version of the Alternate Universe icon into separate past, future, and alternate reality variants. Now, he's asking the question about if something like this is doable - or practical - for First Edition. Join the discussion and weigh in!


• Do you think we should make more love for Regions? With regions (particularly the Neutral Zone) being a focus of The Neutral Zone, last week's Friday question was about giving more love - or not - to other regions. Do you like the Region mechanic? Which regions do you want to see added to the game? Which regions that are already in the game do you think need more missions? Or do you want to see more region-related tech? Or anti-tech? Go sound off!


• A new Tribbles expansion will be coming in May 2020. We had hoped to be able to release a new Tribbles expansion for you on April 1st, the traditional release date. But once we realized it wasn't possible, we found a good backup date: May 5th. Not only is this Cinco de Mayo, a national holiday in Mexico, but it's the birthday of yours truly. I posted a hint about this new expansion on the Tribbles forum, even giving you the chance to guess the expansion's name.

First Edition March Madness

It's the fourth week of the First Edition March Madness tournament for 2020, and there are just eight (8) personnel remaining. We started with sixty-four (64), and have halved the field three times: check out the results from the first round, the Round of 32, and the Sweet 16. Now, it's time to cull the field again and leave us with just four (4) finalists. Your votes will decide!

Click on the link below to open the poll - we're down to just one. For fun, I've also listed a featured match.

Bracket	Link to Poll	Feature Match
Elite 8	Vote on the Elite 8	No Picard Spoilers II: (5) Admiral Riker vs (15) Seven of Nine

To sweeten the pot, we'll be giving away five (5) random First Edition borderless promo cards - one each week - to a participant who votes in the polls. You'll need to enter your email address to win, and an email address is required - if you don't care about winning, then feel free to enter in something like "no@nope.com" instead. But if you do enter your email, you'll be entered each week into a drawing to win a gorgeous foil promo! Each poll you complete is an additional entry, so if you vote in each division this week, you'll get four (4) chances to win!

And we have two more winners! First, from the drawing for Week #2: Eirik of Two Ravens (DaimyoShi)! Congrats to you Eirik, your promo will be heading up to Canada very soon. And from this week's drawing, Cristoffer Wiker (Smiley) from Sweeden! You'll also be getting a shiny new borderless promo soon!

Thank you for voting; everyone else, remember to vote each week and you'll be eligible to win a borderless virtual promo of your own, joining Brian, Eirik, and Cristoffer as winners! There are two more chances to win, so keep voting!

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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 March 2020. Join me tomorrow, Thursday, March 26th, at 6 PM Pacific for the latest edition of my Office Hours. 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.

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