Card Extras Remastered - Space-Time Portal

by Daniel Matteson, Writing Team Manager

3rd July 2021

Note: During the release period for Official Tournament Sealed Deck Remastered, we thought it might be fun and nostalgic to take a look at some of the Card Extras articles written for these cards on the Decipher site, and compare the original uses for these cards with some more modern uses. Please enjoy these Card Extras Remastered articles, releasing daily between June 30th and July 7th.

Space-Time Portal

By Bill Martinson (billm@decipher.com)

This doorway, like the Alternate Universe Door, meets your basic need for a way to play AU-icon cards. In sealed-deck play, this helps you make the best use of your Alternate Universe booster pack and ensures that all of your AU dilemmas are seedable. (And if you pull a heavy hitter like Major Rakal or Jack Crusher, so much the better!) Although the Space-Time Portal allows you to play only one AU-icon card per turn, in a typical sealed-deck environment this doesn't usually hinder you at all.

In regular play, the ability to move an entire ship with crew from your hand to the spaceline, and vice versa, can be very powerful -- especially since you can do it during your opponent's turn and at any spaceline (or timeline) location. Save up enough crew in hand to staff a scary AU ship like the Decius, then wait for your opponent to stray from his outpost and pay him an unexpected visit.

Which doorway to choose? Well, if you plan on playing more than one AU card per turn (perhaps you have lots of AU interrupts, or AU personnel with Red Alert!), go with the Alternate Universe Door. But if you don't mind the one-per-turn limitation, choose the Space-Time Portal and enjoy the extra benefits and protections it gives you. Or better still, seed *both* doorways at the beginning of the game; your Space-Time Portal will be ready for immediate discarding whenever you need it, and your AU Door will still be there to let your AU-icon cards enter play.

Combos:

Space-Time Portal + downloaded Alternate Universe Door - Ah, I see you have a PNZ deck. How about if I nullify your Temporal Rift on *your* turn?

Space-Time Portal + Devidian Foragers - Get a hefty boost to the STRENGTH of one of your AU personnel just before you initiate a personnel battle.

Space-Time Portal + ship in trouble - Cytherians about to run you into the black hole? Or stuck behind a Q-Net? Just return that ship to hand and report it again!

Space-Time Portal + Future Enterprise + all-AU crew - Report your future dream crew for duty anywhere -- at interrupt speed!

Space-Time Portal is arguably the most essential card to cross from OTSD into constructed play. Often used in place of Alternate Universe Door for reporting of cards, and just as often seeded in addition to Alternate Universe Door so a player still has the reporting capability even after discarding the door. Frequently used to "bounce" a ship in trouble back to hand to get it out of the way of an approaching armada or to play around Cytherians. Decks are built around its ship report with crew function. Seedable, playable for free when stocked in the draw deck, even downloadable with Temporal Micro-Wormhole; Space-Time Portal is a perennial all-star.

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