[NoSoup4you]

Hey, I just got about 400 2nd edition cards in a trade for some extra Firestorm stuff. It looks like the Federation and Klingon starters (missing a couple cards) plus some boosters from the first three sets.

Full list here: http://www.tradecardsonline.com/im/edit ... /game_id/4

So first of all, I can't believe there's actually a community for this game, and even a local tournament next month at FFG. Sort of a dream come true after trying to scrounge up players for other old CCGs. I'm wondering, when people refer to playing online, how are they organizing those games? If it's a random night and I want to play Star Trek, how do I find an opponent? I've never seen a listed game on Lackey.

My next question is, since proxies are the norm for this game now, should I even bother getting more real cards? How much of the original cardpool is useful in constructed decks still?

The starter decks were pretty dull, as in most games - basically just generic missions and dilemmas, bring a couple backup skills, etc. It seems that you need mission personnel to get more than one dilemma's worth of value each, but almost all of them were just generic piles of skills that traded evenly with most dilemmas. Where does the game become deep? How could we modify these decks for a "real" experience?

[bosskamiura]

If you’re a new player with no one in your area, might I suggest The Dojo’s Online League? It’s all absolutely free, it’s chalked full of 2e players both old and new alike looking for pick up games, and just playing might be the best and fastest way of learning the rules.

You would be more than welcome. We actually have two to three people who just came back to the game in the last month or two just like yourself so you would fit right in.

You can find this month’s The League here!

TK

[Fritzinger]

Hey, I just got about 400 2nd edition cards in a trade for some extra Firestorm stuff. It looks like the Federation and Klingon starters (missing a couple cards) plus some boosters from the first three sets.

Welcome!

So first of all, I can't believe there's actually a community for this game, and even a local tournament next month at FFG. Sort of a dream come true after trying to scrounge up players for other old CCGs.

I had a mini existential crisis when I discovered this site in 2010 after 8 years away from the game. In a daze with all the memories washing over me, guilt over missed opportunities in all those years when I thought the game was dead but actually it was stronger than ever. Super cool to be back.

I'm wondering, when people refer to playing online, how are they organizing those games? If it's a random night and I want to play Star Trek, how do I find an opponent? I've never seen a listed game on Lackey.

The main way is by signing up for an online tournament. When I played my first one someone just sent me a link to a deck to use.

There's also a discord channel, would be amazing if enough people were there such that pickup games were possible.

My next question is, since proxies are the norm for this game now, should I even bother getting more real cards? How much of the original cardpool is useful in constructed decks still?

Should you bother? IMO no. You'll only be able to find boxes for a few sets and then be frustrated that they don't contribute that much to your favorite decks, and even then every deck is much better with 3 cards from that one set where the only box available is going for like 500$ on eBay.

At a random thumbsuck, 70% of the cards in any given deck are still from the traditional era, apart from the teams that were only introduced after the game went virtual. However, those 70% are spread out across a bunch of different sets and it's much easier just to print the entire deck.

The starter decks were pretty dull, as in most games

I think you give those starter decks too much credit. Good for teaching the rules, not so good for fun.

Here's my suggestion, ditch them and pick up some decks for the beginner-friendly Excelsior format.

It's not "beginner" like there's nothing to do other than smash people into dilemmas like the starter decks. There's enough interaction. But importantly the most abusive and verbose cards accumulated over 16 years are out, leaving a streamlined card pool. 700 cards or so at max, as opposed to the 3000+ of the complete pool.

Excelsior has storyline tournaments and you can get points even for casual play. You've timed it perfectly as well, the cardpool is about to rotate - tomorrow I believe. When it does, people will publish starter level decks shortly.

Where does the game become deep? How could we modify these decks for a "real" experience?

Here's a post explaining some strategies in 2e: viewtopic.php?f=293&t=34593 ... It's based on the Excelsior 1.0 card pool, but you can expect a lot of similarities with the card pool in tomorrow's announcement. Just bear in mind that Klingons are out and Cardassians are in. Apologies for its length, in future versions I'll split it up. And of course I'll update it with the new card pool.

If you decide you don't like Excelsior, or you can't find other people willing to play Excelsior, a good way to get into the 3000 card complete pool is to download some small tournament decks. Small draw deck correlates with less complex, and if you're reading most of the cards for the first time, in this game you _definitely_ want less complex.

Right now I would be to go to last year's world championships day 1 and print out two decks with draw decks that are under 50 cards. Here are the results with lists from last year:

https://www.trekcc.org/tournament/index ... entID=9835

Lucas Thompson's top place Starfleet looks like a good candidate, as does Maggie's 7th place TNG.

Have fun!

[NoSoup4you]

Each of those posts was exactly what I'm looking for, thanks. I'll be around on Discord, maybe try playing within the next couple of days.

One other question I suppose - is multiplayer a real thing in this game, or just pasted on?

[eberlems]

Multiplayer exists but there are not many tournament for it. Sometimes at bigger events there is one side event.

[Fritzinger]

One other question I suppose - is multiplayer a real thing in this game

Officially, yes. In reality: no .

So many cards have words on them like "the player to your left" because the creators said they wanted multiplayer to be a thing. But it is crazy boring.

Mission attempts involve one player, and one other player chooses dilemmas. So the bulk of the game is two players doing something while everyone else watches. I estimate the number of multiplayer games in the entire world to be in the single digits per year.

The community has had some success in redoing terrible decisions by Decipher so I wouldn't call it impossible that someone could come up with compelling alternative rules.

[jadziadax8]

Welcome! We're so happy you found us. I have been doing a series of articles on 2E decks for beginners in the Spotlight Series. I haven't finished the series yet, so there's more to come form Voyager, Starfleet and a few others.

So first of all, I can't believe there's actually a community for this game, and even a local tournament next month at FFG.

Paging LORE. LORE to the white courtesy phone, please.

[NoSoup4you]

Oh yeah, what's the benefit of playing with hidden personnel and equipment? Can you just take out the memorization without losing actual gameplay?

[LORE]

So first of all, I can't believe there's actually a community for this game, and even a local tournament next month at FFG.

Paging LORE. LORE to the white courtesy phone, please.

Response sent via PM!

[Fritzinger]

Oh yeah, what's the benefit of playing with hidden personnel and equipment? Can you just take out the memorization without losing actual gameplay?

Short answer: you'll take out a lot of the skill and surprise in the game, and probably slow the games down because dilemmas will be super effective.

Long answer:

It helps an enormous amount to know who your opponent has in a mission attempt.

- if they don't have the skills or attributes to solve the mission, don't give them any dilemmas. All their people will be stopped for no benefit
- if they have the skills, is there one skill that is only on one member of the crew? You can stop an entire team just by taking out that one person
- if they have the skills in multiple, how many people do you have to stop in order to reduce their total attributes below the mission requirements
- if you have a dilemma that does something nasty (stop everyone, kill a bunch of people), do they have the people to pass it? Can you take out key people so that no matter how much redundancy on skills & attributes they have for the mission, they still fail the dilemma?

Ultimately your goal is to not put lots of dilemmas under their missions, so they have to come back turn after turn and take longer to win.

Most people are playing with a general sense of, "It's Romulans so there's a lot of Treachery, An Issue of Trust is good", or "they're playing lots of cheap personnel, I should throw In Development". There's a fun surprise factor here ... "Oh no, I forgot about Klag!"

A few people in the world can tell you exactly what your crew is, down to "you have Data with 10 cunning, Seven of Nine with 7 cunning and exobiology, this person and that person with 6 ... and the rest have 5, so in total that's 36, this dilemma should stop you even though you have the skills." Normally these people know my crew better than I do. It can be frustrating playing against these people.

[NoSoup4you]

Is that actually skill then, or just remembering a list of things? Don't they get to look through your cards at some points in the game?

[eberlems]

You can look at your cards (except the deck and dilemma pile) and have to show cards when you play them and when they leave the game.
Everyone can look at cards in any discard pile or those placed out of game. Anyone can look up dilemmas on and under the missions.
Personnel and equipment are shown when you play them or when they use a skill/attribute/affiliation/staffing/cost/keyword/order... otherwise they stay face down.

Usually I take a look at the opponent's missions and track those skills and those needed to pass my dilemmas.
Also attributes can be helpful, like is the average at around 5 or 8.
If the mission needs >38 and there are 8 personnel and one gets stopped, with 5 attribute each, they can't solve anymore without help.
If they are attributes >7 Artificial Ability will stop enough.
If they are all cheap, In Development stopps enough.

[Faithful Reader]

You can look at your cards (except the deck and dilemma pile) and have to show cards when you play them and when they leave the game.
Everyone can look at cards in any discard pile or those placed out of game. Anyone can look up dilemmas on and under the missions.
Personnel and equipment are shown when you play them or when they use a skill/attribute/affiliation/staffing/cost/keyword/order... otherwise they stay face down.

Usually I take a look at the opponent's missions and track those skills and those needed to pass my dilemmas.
Also attributes can be helpful, like is the average at around 5 or 8.
If the mission needs >38 and there are 8 personnel and one gets stopped, with 5 attribute each, they can't solve anymore without help.
If they are attributes >7 Artificial Ability will stop enough.
If they are all cheap, In Development stopps enough.

Some of it you can pick up with enough practice though. There are dilemmas that are surgical targeting the specific skills you want while other are a little more ... scattershot.

And welcome to the boards.

[Fritzinger]

Is that actually skill then, or just remembering a list of things? Don't they get to look through your cards at some points in the game?

It's pretty hard to separate skill from knowledge in anything IMO.

But for the lesser mortals like me: in theory you get to look at your opponent's cards any time they need to prove something about a whole group, and also when you need to choose one personnel from amongst all their cards.

In practice the "prove" thing isn't applied very strictly. If player A needs to randomly select one person from amongst (e.g.) Treachery personnel, player B is happy to let player A search through her own cards and find the eligible personnel. This of course gives the opportunity for player A to cheat by leaving a crucial Treachery personnel out of the random selection, but for most of us ... if you want to cheat, that's your loss.

But if you want to know what your opponent has coming up, start your dilemma pile with something like Secret Identity.