Matthew Zinno (commdecker) Tournament Report - 1E - Online Event 2015-02-02 - 12:00 AM The Stars Are Made of Latinum (Tournament Version) Introduction For this "The Gamma Quadrant" release tournament, I wanted to play with the new cards (natch), and I had already prepared two decent decks for front-page articles. I made some adjustments to both, adding things like Ref cards, my real dilemma combos (making the tournament-ready and not just illustrative), plus some specifically chosen counter cards to fight other deck types I was likely to see in a release tournament. I tested the two decks agaist each other, and the Ferengi/Dominion deck came out on top. Round 1 Ben Hosp FW (+100) Ben's deck went opposite mine, starting in Gamma and coming to Alpha. His AQ missions caused me to put my AQ missions in a poor position, with Resupply Marauder between my two facilities. This made it too much span for me to do my usual flightplan, from DS9 (where ships are free) to TOC (to pick up the Nagus) and back. So instead, I CFR'd a ship to the TOC, which made a much shorter trip. I got my Conference going for three 75s, and GPL for Ablative Armor, and I was soon in Gamma. Meanwhile, Ben was having trouble drawing his expected Jemmies, and was stuck reporting Vorta to his Internment Camp and holograms to his holo-planet. He had a ship, but it needed Jems to staff it. Eventually he got himself moving by running Vic into a wall he'd seen before, just to stop him and download a staffable ship. By then I had found an Edo Probe at the Dosi planet, then moved along and solved the Wadi planet on the first attempt -- since the Acquisition setup there (Cultural Differences / Occupational Hazards -- folllowed by Inter Arma passed by Brunt and Mai'hardu) was no match for this deck. With my Rule events, that solve got me 55 points, capped at 50 by Ben's ITZ. Ben had a ship now, and revealed an Edo at his asteroid, and also flew his Xep into the Alpha Quadrant. I returned to his Edo and solved there (Dead End, but lost Brunt to a Cardie Trap), moving us to 100-(-20). Ben's adventures in the AQ were mostly limited to: briefly boarding DS9 to capture Morn and building a RSD with Ultimatum for some equipment. Then he returned. I went for my GQ space mission, and lost Hanok to Scout Encounter / Extradition, leaving me with not enough ENGINEER at that location to pass the mission requirements and thus Armus: Energy Field. Ben sensed that he probably had just one turn left, and threw everyone at the hologram mission once again (after killing Morn in the Training Ring for [9]). Hippo took Tholun far down the spaceline, and a Bio stopped at Triage leaving not enough for Med Crisis. I confirmed I could solve on the next turn -- I had two active ENGINEERS and was about to report a third, covering the bases in case Armus stopped one. So we ended. If we had played it out, I would have been on either 140 or 150 (S+P solved but no AQ), depending on if Armus stopped my last remaining 75R personnel, and Ben would have been at -21. Round 2 Alexander Schmitz FW (+40) Alex was playing Hero of the Empire, with both TOS and TMP time locations. These days I stock Containment Field for just such a deck, since many that look like this get moving quickly (or dial a skill) with the ship downloads. So when he first used his download (Kronos One for Ch'dak), I brought it out ... and trapped a Waddle! That prompted me to cycle it away, in the hopes that I'd cripple his engine, even through it cost me a card to do so (from my GPL download, which I didn't want to delay). Alas, he had plenty more. He got in the first attempt, but Ferengi Infestation (at his OP, but I decided not to dl) stuck him for a while. Again I Conferenced for 75x3, and got my ship into the GQ on turn 3. I hit Edo on the first attempt, and Ankari (failed; onto my NA ship) right after. The next turn, after 4 deaths, I evacuated, and re-attempted with my Ferengi ship, sending 4 through Chandra to die to V'Ger. No more Ferengi ship in the GQ. (A turn or two later, I drew into Needs of the Many.) Nevertheless, I still had 4 AQ people in the GQ on whom to play New Frontiers, and in a few turns I had played a Regen to start getting my cards back, and I again had a Ferengi ship in the GQ (with Morn this time), plus I solved that now-empty mission for +55/-10. By now Alex had finally found 2 SEC to get past the Ferengi Infestation, and failed a Maglock after its P-Duty lead-in filter; he solved the next turn, bringing him back up to 35 (with his bonus from HOTE, which went off near my ship explosion). At his next attempt, he lost his only MED to Hippo, and Triage hilled one of his AMS; at mine, I found THTF [-6] and Dead End ... at 49 points augh! At a space mission, his Klingons had enough Honor (Jadzia and the like) to pass the Forsaken/Ankari/Gomtuu combo and solve for another 45; on the next turn I passed Crisis (on the second try, using Sucking to give Leadership to Quark [Zek had died on the Freighter]), and his Kelvan couldn't stop my high-integrity people from passing the ship killer. This was for +45/-10 (one of the 75s was on the Freighter), bringing the score to 94-70. Alex threw his people at the Edo mission and hit Anaphasic with no MED, losing Jadzia. I then finished my Dead End mission to end the game, 149-60. Round 3 Kenneth Tufts ML (-20) Ken was playing Dominion, and he got his Founders Homeworld between the wormhole and the Dosi planet, which was shared (and placed by him). So I had a long span to get my ships from the BW to the DTP, and then again to my missions on the other side of the GQBW. I was also worried about getting attacked on my way there. After a few turns, I saw a solution: I reported Pimoo to the Dom HQ instead of for free ... then played a HF to him ... and flew my Ferengi Freighter through the BW to there. Having a Dom personnel on one ship protected it from attacks, and having my Ablative Armor on the other (mostly) proteted it. In this configuration, I spent several turns to fly past the homeworld to get my guys from the DTP, then flew back past the homeworld to go for my missions (presently ignoring the shared Dosi world, and Camping Trip which I lacked the skills for). Hippo stopped me at the planet, and Arsenal stopped me at space at first. Meanwhile, Ken had flown to Alpha, used Ultimatum, started a mission attempt (lacking Bio for Med Crisis). He also used my Celestial Temple to relocate Odo from his ship to the Bar -- not to battle or capture Morn, just to oppose him -- and also put Yelgren (how does he not have Treachery?) to the Guest Quarters. Worrying about battle/capture, Morn switched to the Shops -- and later in the game, he would trade places with Ken's Croden there every turn, with the active player probing and the other player hiding. After a while, I got a crew on my yellow ship able to pass Arsenal (with Aluura staffing), to hit Kelvan and The Cloud. I tried to come and solve with my Ferengi ship, but Ken noticed before I did that one of my solving crew there was Dominion, not compatible with the ship due to the odd wording on WOAM. We resolved the mistake by having him be on the yellow ship after all, but this lost me the mission skill. Ken then got the Bio he needed, and passed Med Crisis to solve his 40-point mission. His Cloud expired, and I stretched my my Freighter range to get Mr Brunt from the DTP to the mission to solve, for 50/-10. Time was about to run out, and Ken started his final turn. He threw a large team at a planet mission, and after Hazardous Duty, he barely passed SabNeg -- even with two Vorta and a Founder -- thanks to Kukalaka. HLE was then easy for his unreduced team, and he solved with no deaths. I had the last turn, but I saw nothing I could use it for -- the only gamma mission in range was unsolvable -- and just passed, giving him a MW. The next day, I realized that what I should have tried was flying back through the adjacent wormhole, and trying one of my Alpha missions. Round 4 Niall Matthew ML (-41) Foiled by the mission seeding again. Ferenginar came out last, and the AQ was already full of Niall's AQ missions (for Borg They Will Be Coming) on both sides of the Bajoran Wormhole. I chose to not report anyone to the HQ until they could use XQX to relocate. So my reporting was a bit slow, and I did not get my Freighter into GQ until turn 6. By then Niall had set up a Transwarp Hub next to the AQBW, and three TNGs scattered around, so he could follow me at will. And he did. I got a mixed-affil crew together for an attempt at the Dosi planet, but hit a Ferengi Infestation with no SECURITY. DH got me Maihardu, partly for his SEC and partly for the Scepter, to protect my Nagi from oncoming personnel battle against the Borg. (GPL got me a gun as well; the Ablative Armor wouldn't be effetive against his LBCube. Sure enough, Niall went for Assimilate Species (Ferengi) ... but thanks to pairings against Maihardu and Inglatu, he lost the battle and didn't get any converts. I got Sakonna out, adding SEC to Quark so I had 2, and sent 7 people into Ferengi Infestation. I would rather have sent fewer, but I needed that many for the strength ... because they got Higher and lost 7 points. Dead End then locked me away from that mission for a while. My yellow ship then attempted a space mission, and got Contingency Plan/UBI/Cyth. On later turns, that ship got assimilated and (after completing that Cytherians for 0 points) assimilated my people as intruders using Intruder Alert. All except Nog, who was later assimilated as a counterpart. Meanwhile, my Ferengi ship got Eliminated; I reported a second one and flew it to the DTP, where it got Tractor-locked by the cube. I reported a third Ferengi ship and got it out to GQ, where it tried the last dilemma at that space mission, and was stopped by The Cloud. His cube finally decided to leave the GQ, destroying my (empty) earlier Fgi ship first, and headed toward Earth with his counterpart Nog (where Hippo stopped him for a bit). I finally had a movable ship and solved the space mission for 50, and then we ran out of time. I ended with 43, and he had 84 from Nog, and Contingency Plan, and various skill dots with Add Distinctiveness. Closing Thoughts The limitation that people on the boards expected from this deck type -- namely, the inability for the two affiliations to mix aboard the Ferengi ship -- slowed me down a little, but not that much. I was prepared for it, with DH+XQX/Gaila/HiddenFighter/Flaxian. My only real problem with that was in the game against Ken, where the yellow ship got stuck and I tried to have a solving team on the other one. A bigger problem in several games was mission seeding, where unlucky randomization made my important locations far apart from each other. Perhaps I should have used Plasma Relays, and perhaps a different downloader of the BW so that I could place it after the missions. (I still need FSW for the range cuts, though.) On yeah, anyway ... fun games! And prize support! Yay!