Cardassian is Bajoran, Bajoran is Cardassian!

by Derrick Marsh, Dogs of War designer

19th March 2021

So I was brought on board as a first time designer with the focus of the final 10 episodes of DS9 because I'm a huge fan of the series. I've been on the Babylon team (a revisit of Nor usage) for a while now and I really wanted to help contribute to my favorite affiliation, the Cardassians! Thankfully, I got the opportunity to work with the team on bringing together another fun subgroup of the affiliation: Damar's resistance!

At this point in the series, Cardassia is basically a punching bag for the Dominion. The Dominion have set up base on Cardassia as they've been cut off from the Gamma Quadrant with the Bajoran Wormhole being inaccessible. At this point, Damar has had enough of being a puppet for the Founders and has decided to revolt! But wait, what's this... this sounds awfully familiar in Cardassian history, NOW the shoe is on the other foot! This time it is the Cardassians who are being oppressed, murdered, and driven out of their homeworld. A lot like we've gotten in the arcs about the Bajor Occupation and the Maquis with the Demilitarized Zone and the Badlands. So we thought it would only be fitting that their new play engine from this set be very similar to those play engines.

So I'm happy to present to you, the Cardassian Liberation Front! A card that allows your Cardassians to directly report to a Cardassia planet location. Now this card is slightly different than Bajoran Resistance Cell & They Call Themselves the Maquis, because this play engine plays on the mission and not just on the table. This acts more like a "home base" for the faction. We wanted to differentiate this from the others. But the ability to not require a facility and still be able to report personnel, equipment, and small ships is amazing!

Speaking of personnel, you get to report a Cardassian personnel with "resistance" in lore, or a Cardassian dissident once per turn for free! Now this is no different than a typical play engine, it just limits who you get for free. But you'll be glad that Legate Damar and Kira all get some help in this set with some additional "resistance" in lore folks in this set, such as Elim Garak or Disik!

You'll also notice that once per turn, in place of your normal card play, you get to download Stolen Attack Ship or Revolutionaries, which in turn lets you download 2 Universal dissidents. That's pretty awesome that you get to download a ship or 2 personnel! So that will let you keep up pace with decks that can report 3 personnel per turn, and still get an extra card draw from New Arrivals. And think about what you could achieve with those Invasive Transporters you've just stolen!

Lastly, I will mention that this engine is not always the easiest to run on its own. We knew that coming out into release, but we wanted it like this because it is very thematic. Just like the Alpha Quadrant Dominion can't just be traditional Dominion (they need the Cardassians, the Breen and the Son'a to help) the same goes for the Cardassian Liberation Front. Damar had to ask the Federation for help, so Kira, Odo, and Garak had to come to their base and train the Cardassians in Bajoran resistance tactics. So it’s only fitting that they may require similar assistance from other non-facility reporting play engines. You can stack them with Bajoran Resistance Cell (if you have the right treaty), or They Call Themselves the Maquis, or even the Nano-biogenic gang, and that was an alternative deck-building choice we aimed for.

I think Cardassian Liberation Front is the basis of a very thematic and very fun deck that gives the player interesting choices. Don't forget they just got a special toy to damage opponent's ships with Secret Sabotage. It’s going to require guerrilla tactics and ingenuity to play this deck and I like that challenge.

I hope you'll rise and join me and Legate Damar on retaking Cardassia back from the Dominion.

FOR CARDASSIA!!!

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