[Faithful Reader]

The latest set, Phage is out. The set introduces the first new affiliation to the game in the Committee era. For some fun, tel's do a draft. You'll pick five cards and each time they are put in a deck, you get a point. First to get one hundred wins.

A few rules. Actually, a lot of rules. Many more than usual.

Your entry must

.. come from cards making their debut in Phage.

... be in before Saturday, August 3.

... not duplicate another entry entirely.

... not contain a dilemma.

... contain at least one personnel/ship.

... contain at least one event/interrupt.

... contain at least one mission.

... not contain Vidiia, Locus of Infection.

That should cover it. If you have any questions, please let me know.

Have fun!

[Danny]

Ship: Redemption, Medical Vessel
Mission: Vori Planet, Intervene in Local Conflict
Interrupt: Honatta
Personnel: Delanh
Another card: Vidiian Harvester

[jadziadax8]

Vidiian Harvester
Honatta
Avery III, Develop Cure
Bridon
Drenol

[Armus]

Honatta
Vidiian Convoy Lane
Delanh
Losarus
Vidiian Cruiser

[Psionic Hobo]

Ilari, Oust Warlord
Honatta
Delanh
Drenol
Vidiian Harvester

[Faithful Reader]

We are off to the races! A couple Vidiian decks were played over the weekend.

Ethan Cohen has Vidiian first try which is a sleek deck looking to dabble in battling adding in a few support cards along the way.

vidiians 1.0 by Trek Barnes offers a lot more hardware for the battling and capturing along with more personnel to not dilute itself.

Looking at the draft, no one picked an optimal slate, but there are a couple two way ties.

Armus 7
Danny 6
Jadziadax8 6
Psionic Hobo 7

[Johannes Mette]

We are off to the races! A couple Vidiian decks were played over the weekend.


.....................................................

Where were they supposed to have been played.

[jadziadax8]

Good point. They're not attached to any tournaments.

[Faithful Reader]

Considering that these two players not only played in a tournament over the weekend, but both played Vidiian, I stand by my statement!

[The Guardian]

Also, I played against both of them. They look like what I played against, though obviously I can't vouch for every card.

[boromirofborg]

I linked mine to the tournament now. I will say Borg are not the optimal matchup to play against - twice when you want to battle and get some captives.

[Faithful Reader]

We have three new decks to look at.

Ted Reebel brought in the Think Tank (and a Reprimand) for Orlando Regionals 2024 v1.5. Tellingly, the only mission from Phage in the deck is Vidiia, but takes a quicker route to get the win. With personnel getting worse as the game goes on, having a two mission solve mitigates that.

The first Tournament, and Regional, win goes to Eric R with Organ Dontation. This deck augments the capturing and punishing side of things to succeed.

The final is courtesy of Johannes Mette flying fidia. This seems more like a way to print off the maximum number of cards and cull off the ones not needed, but it is there if you want to go Vidiian. Simply add in the cards you want and take out the ones you don't. The dilemmas combine the new Temptations with Chula; what could go wrong!

As you can see below, the draft is in a three way tie. We'll see what happens with an Atlanta tournament followed by Worlds the following week, but this seems more and more as if it will come down to missions.

Armus 17
Danny 14
Jadziadax8 17
Psionic Hobo 17

[Faithful Reader]

Worlds has come and gone bringing with them a couple new decks!

I'm not entirely sure which mission Daniel Giddings will play the title card on, but Vidiians - Favor the Bold but at least one is probably not going to be targeted. That event has interesting implications with the affiliation.

Eric R has revised his Organ Donation deck for Organ Donation V2. My team is pouring through them to see the differences but the newest version is larger with retooled verbs and a half dozen non-aligned personnel.

There are ten Vidiian decks and three cards appear in all of them. There are four cards that are not in decks yet. Results thus far are below as we are at the one third mark, but that can balloon as the online tournament is over bad decks get posted.

Armus 34
Danny 25
Jadziadax8 31
Psionic Hobo 33

[Danny]

Worlds has come and gone bringing with them a couple new decks!
I'm not entirely sure which mission Daniel Giddings will paly the title card on, but Vidiians - Favor the Bold but at least one is probably not going to be targeted. That event has interesting implications with the affiliation.

Deck Strategy (if it can be called that):

• Complete a space mission (Score: 35 points)
• Complete Norcadia Prime (Score: 70)
• Favor the Bold, uncompleting Norcadia Prime (Score: 65)
• Attempt Norcadia Prime for a second time, getting all the benefits for having only one completed mission.
• Complete Norcadia Prime (Score: 100)

[Faithful Reader]

A couple new decks were played last weekend.

... And there was an online event I completely missed!

We have not one but two Think Tank decks, complete with Seven! We are Vidiians by Sean O'Reilly is pretty streamed down, Think Tank Assistance (Phage Release Event version) by Adam Bargar a little less so. Both have plenty of non-aligned personnel in the help out.

2e Vid by Michael Van Breemen and Phage Release by Ted Reebel are pretty compact streamlined solvers. Vidiians 2.0 by Trek Barnes a little less so as there are a lot of maneuvers to go on the offense.

Looking at the draft, a bunch more cards have crossed the double digit threshold, only three of them not personnel. The totals are below as three players pull away for first. It is fair to say we are nearing the halfway mark.

Armus 46
Danny 35
Jadziadax8 44
Psionic Hobo 44