Outside the Cube

by Kevin Jaeger, Creative Consultant

4th March 2010

I don't know about anyone else, but I get tired sometimes playing the same old tired junk repeatedly. I feel confident saying that people get tired of facing that same old tired junk. Yeah, we get it. It's top quality (and probably needs errata). So what? Klingon Sword/B'aht Qul/mass kill, Euro-Borg with Annexation Drone, Microteam, Bajoran Microteam, Ferengi Reyga, Kirk, blah blah blah. ... Don't get me wrong, those decks are great and fun come championship time. What about the off-season though? What about the regular get togethers or local tournaments year round?

I'll tell you what you should be doing, if you're not already doing it. You should be working on something different. Something that could potentially come out of nowhere. Something that while not all that great itself (see attached decklist), could certainly lead to something better. Maybe one thing in this deck is something you never stopped to think would be that great, but turns out is actually quite good.

It starts with the initial idea, as all decks do. You must first give yourself a starting point by deciding what exactly it is that is going to be so different. For this article, I mulled about several different options. One of those options was to play a deck that didn't have a single Kirk in it. Maybe without 'Kirk the crutch,' I would find myself being more ingenious and have a potentially faster deck. Another idea was to build something Maquis that had absolutely no standard disruption. No Organized Terrorist Activities, no Biogenic Weapon (Gasp!), no Stalling For Time. It would be allowed to have other general disruption (like dilemma manipulation and event disruption), though. A Maquis Revised Voyager build with Hindrance perhaps? Ultimately, though, I decided to go back to my favorite affiliation - The Borg.

What could I do with The Borg that would be incredibly different, yet still feasible? It occurred to me that I could borrow from my idea and take out the affiliation's biggest crutch. So I set myself the task of building a Borg deck that didn't use Annexation Drone, and had to have at least one Delta Quadrant mission. What you see attached to this article is the first draft of a two-mission-win Borg deck.

The idea of the deck is simple: Complete Destroy Transwarp Hub using the Borg requirements for 35 points, and destroy Hurried Departure for the additional Nebula points. Next, proceed to surprise your opponent with a quick assimilation of at least three personnel, followed by a One With the Borg for 15 points. Finally, complete either of your Alpha planet missions. Between Fourth, Requisitions Drone, and a small deck size, getting the pieces in place shouldn't be difficult. The Enterprise-J allows you to complete the Hub with a wide variety of five personnel if one of them is a Computation Drone. That's the sort of 'outside the box' thinking I'm talking about! The Borg Queen allows you to swap in Harvest Drones for low cost drones so that when you complete Destroy Transwarp Hub, which the Harvest Drone provides the skills for, you are ready for that Abduction or The Will of the Collective move. Synergy.

Without the Annexation Drone, you no longer need At What Cost?. Without either, you can run a smaller deck with more toys. Toys like Reclamation Drone, who can protect your people against Tragic Turn dilemma piles, and Bridge Officer's Test against wall dilemma piles. All without necessarily sacrificing speed or versatility. By thinking outside the cube, you open yourself up to integrating counter-strategies into your deck. Abduction plus Harvest Drone allows you to "assimilate" some dude at your opponent's mission, but use the Harvest Drone to "assimilate" that greasy Dukat sitting at the headquarters. Greasy Dukat problem solved. Is your opponent relying on a couple of key personnel? An assimilation run could be what sways the game back in your favor.

This is just a first draft. I suggest you take it, play it out a few times, and start making changes (as long as those changes do not involve falling back inside the box and going with Annexation Drone and At What Cost?)...or maybe work on your own deck that's outside the norm.

-djl-

Decklist

Hide Deck Stats

Draw Deck Total Draw Deck 42 Event 9 (21%) Cost 1 1 Cost 2 3 Cost 3 5 Interrupt 2 (5%) Personnel 28 (67%) Cost 1 4 Cost 2 12 Cost 3 5 Cost 4 4 Cost 5 3 Ship 3 (7%) Cost 6 2 Cost 7 1 Total Draw Deck cost 115

Skills Count Skill # Missions # Personnel 1x 2x 3x Total Acquisition 0 0 Anthropology 1 2 2 Archaeology 0 4 4 Astrometrics 1 6 6 Biology 0 2 2 Diplomacy 1 0 Engineer 2 10 1 11 Exobiology 1 5 5 Geology 0 2 2 Honor 1 0 Intelligence 0 0 Law 0 0 Leadership 0 2 2 Medical 1 3 3 Navigation 1 4 4 Officer 0 0 Physics 1 2 2 Programming 2 5 1 6 Science 0 6 6 Security 1 10 10 Telepathy 0 0 Transporters 0 4 4 Treachery 0 3 3 Icons Count Icon # Personnel % Personnel Staffing Icons Command Star 3 10.71 % Staff Star 25 89.29 % Temporal Icons Past 3 10.71 % Keyword Count Keyword # Cards Assault 1 Decay: 3 1 Decay: 4 1 Drone 25 Interlink: Astrometrics 3 Interlink: Exobiology 1 Maneuver 1 Nebula 2 Region: Sector 001 1