Here's a quick changelog with updates I made before NACC. The tournament didn't fire (I don't think any side events did that weekend), but Jeremy Huth and I did a two-player draft and then Huth, Kris, and I did a 3-person sealed "tournament" during 2E's lunch break. In the draft I was able to pull off the
Unstable Matrix win, and then in one of my sealed games I was able to infiltrate and
Issue Secret Orders, though I didn't do that in the best way and I think I lost that game. So these fringe strategies are theoretically possible some of the time.
(Remind me to write more about 2-player drafting at some point.)
Also, the theme of this year is "Jason doesn't have time for things," so the changes I made were based on what I had available, and I couldn't explore every suggestion given earlier in this thread. Hopefully I can update the lists soon, but that will happen no earlier than Tuesday.
Starter Decks:
-
Dr. Farek
+
Dr. Nydom
Based largely on feedback from the Germans, I made this swap, which I think worked out well. In early versions of this cube, AMS wasn't that good and so was disappointing, but with 12 seed slots and guaranteed Dr. Farek, it became good and too easy. Now it's good but you have to work for it a little.
(Also, at the last minute I swapped
Zibalian Transport in for
Mercenary Ship, but I don't think I would recommend that. I thought Mercenary Ship was being used too often, in part because it outshines the crappy Federation ships that were supposed to be crappy. On the other hand, maybe I just saw it more often than the other NA starter cards because it was a ship and always visible and sometimes seeded. Zibalian Transport might be too far the other way, though, and risks making players just feel bad if they have to play it. I had to play it in my sealed deck because my random pool only had one ship plus
Call for Reinforcements, and it was actually fine, but we don't need to take that risk when Mercenary Ship should still be worse than most ships you can draft.)
Missions
-
Reunion
+
Homeward
I've explained the problems with Reunion previously. I'm not sure the format actually needs single affiliation missions, but for now we have them. There isn't a huge reason for Homeward over anything else, except maybe I'm a sucker for the rarely-used I2PG missions. Other potential options are
Restore Errant Moon for nostalgia and
Gravesworld for its distinctive span.
-
Brute Force
+
Bat'leth Tournament
Bat'leth Tournament has similar problems as Reunion, but at least with the current implementation of piggybacks, you can spend one pick on
Koloth (or
Thopok) and add the
Bat'leth to your draw deck to get two chances to draw the card you need to solve. Not to mention that Equipment dies less often than personnel. Also, Brute Force was even worse because you needed not one but multiple hand weapons. I'm not sure this has enough support to be usable yet, but there's enough potential that I'm willing to hold out hope for a Klingon-feeling mission.
Dilemmas:
NOTE!!! This month Rules removed the Zaldan loophole (which overall is a good change, hi James), but that means that
Flaxian Assassin and
Zaldan are now walls. In the short term I will update the list of skills needed to pass all walls, and in the long term I will evaluate whether I want to keep those two dilemmas.
-
Personal Duty
+
The Metrons' Arena
As an opponent's choice filter, The Metrons' Arena is the kind of versatile dilemma this format loves having. No
S'Salk yet, because I've wanted to maintain a 24th-century aesthetic with the nouns. But I'm thinking about breaking that rule here for the fun of dilemma/draw deck synergy and also for the fun of recreating this... um... "iconic" Star Trek moment.
-
Borg Ship
I've tried the self-seed gimmick with Borg Ship, and didn't get it to actually do anything. I know some people have seeded it under their opponent's mission, but I'm not sure how effective it was. Anyway, I still need to cut Space dilemmas, and cutting Borg Ship means that I get to add "Self-Controlled" to the list of mechanics that the cube doesn't use, and we get to avoid the anti-nostalgia inherent to cards with major errata.
+
Lethean Telepathic Attack
This was in the cube until I somehow ended up with one too many dilemmas, so now it's back in. I'm not certain an auto-stop is that valuable in a format where redshirting is more prevalent, but we'll try it. Empathy is more common in this cube than usual, but getting 2 Empathy still doesn't seem like it would happen that often.
Draw Deck:
-
Dr. Nydom
+
Dr. Farek
With Nydom moving to the starter, Farek takes his place in the draft.