Matthew Zinno (commdecker) Tournament Report - 1E - Online Event 2015-05-11 - 12:30 AM A Better Alternative Introduction pfti was running a big Regional-ish tournament, with enough people to need 5 rounds. I didn't want to be occupied with the same deck for 5 rounds (and the concomitant delay of achievements) ... plus there were some tough opponents in that field. So I ran a smaller, 3-round tournament, and we had 6 people sign up. Round 1 Niall Matthew FW (+50)View opponent's ReportView original Report Solitaire against a Voyager deck using the Cafe in the Delta Quadrant. Which solver deck is faster? I went first and didn't get ABA very quickly, but seemed to be drawing well enough anyway. On turn 4 I sent a 4-person team at missions, and found an Edo Probe at Amnesty, then tried Orias and got a Murder Investigation and a Kazon Bomb (losing 1). At this point, Niall got his Delta Flyer out and tried missions with it (hm, not risking the main ship). Forsaken/Ankari got rid of 4 people and stopped him ... but he then flew Seven and B'Elanna over on Voyager to cure it. My turn, with a replacement 4th person (directly ASP'd), got stopped by Berserk Changeling. His turn, he redhirted into Gomtuu but Kes Gifted them out; second ship passed it, and then completed a self-seeded Cytherians (on a 4-mission spaceline). Next turn, I played a Romulan ship, and brought a solving team back to Orias and got my 30 points, then sent a new 4-person team at Amnesty with Edo gone. I brought the mission skills in case of LOP, but hoped to get meaningful interference from the dilemmas and NOT solve. I did hit LOP, but he put it last, with THTF in front ... so I did solve, scoring a total of 41 (35+10 from the rule -4 from THTF), but he got In The Zone and only 20 of them "counted for winning". His turn had the solve of the now-cleared mission, with 10 AMS points, bringing him to 50. My ships returned to Bajor and I sent a small team to attempt that. THTF brought me down to "46" points, and Niall thought that Dead End stopped me. But I pointed out that although my scoresheet read 46, I actually had 67 points, they just didn't all count for winning. So I passed, and the small team solved for 35. Hm, another mission? I started the turn with 50 "for winning" points, so ITZ would limit me this turn to ... exactly winning conditions. So yes, another mission, with nothing to lose from ITZ. Off to Romulus, my team of 4 passed Surprise Assault, then I lost my Romulans to DNP. Eventually, sending everyone I had passed Hanonian for the win. For fun, we played out his next turn; he would have reported the Dauntless and scooted to Alpha, mega-teaming through my MED combo to solve for 50 points (with AMS and Off-Zel points), also reaching 100. So this kind of came down to the coin flip. soon Round 2 Violet Edgar FW (+40) Another Fed mains deck using the Cafe, this time TNG. This time I started missions on turn 3, and at Quash Conspiracy my Kraxon hit a ship-damaging combo: Subspace Shock Wave (fortunately passed by Lovok), The Cloud, and (on a later turn with an undamaged ship) Gomtuu. By now Violet had found both of the YGII/SpatialRift combos, and Forsaken/Ankari, losing 9 personnel from play. Wih 2 Galors damaged, the Naprem drawing in the GQ, and the Aldara in the discard pile, I had to download the Groumall to go and solve this one (with, of course, one ship with high integrity to pass Gomtuu, and a second ship with low integrity to solve the mission. Just after this, Violet found Gomtuu, passing it with CmdrTroi on the first try, and solving Repair Mission [40-35]. I headed to Bajor, having lost no personnel, and after my first team found a MedCrisis, my Medics passed it but only one of them got through the Chandra to be long-stopped by Chula: the Game. Enough other people were left to solve on the same turn, and the 62nd Rule brought the score to 85-25. Violet then pressed ahead with Evade Borg Vessel, letting the YGII "kill" Einstein (then saving him even from Deactivation using a holodoor from hand), and passing QI (Emp+2Phy) with Einstein+Troi; mission solve brought her to 60. I was off to Romulus next turn (using DH for SecHW), and my second team getting through HLE lost 7 points and 4 people to THTF/DNP, but a Dead End didn't stop me and I solved. Round 3 Matthew Ting MW (+23) Wedge (Matthew) was the first of the four people in my games (myself and opponents) to notice that Cross-Quadrant Expansion discards immediately because I seeded a Bajor-region mission. Oops! That cost me a card draw each turn ... but also got me moving a turn early, as I didn't need a card play for the ship that goes to the GQ. I attempted Romulus on turn 2, losing Ruwon to a Cardie Trap and 6 points to THTF, then Dead End. I got Process Ore and Dabo going while I ammassed some mission skills for attempts elsewhere. Meanwhile, Wedge's deck was mixing assorted shenanigans: holodoor/DH/QIR got Crell, Lore, and B'ElannaT, and Crell and Cybernetics Expertise sent Lore from play to discard (for draws and [Car] plays), then back to hand to be free-played each turn. The rest of the deck was a mixture of Cardassians, Maquis (with their Emblem and the DMZ), and holograms (including Cyrus, who repeatedly Itemed ... I never gave points). I revealed an Edo Probe at Bajor, then tried space, but my nearby space missions both had KMS on them. I tried anyway, and underneath a KMS I found the similar YGII, which on the first try (at Quash) removed all my Romulans to end the attempt. Wedge commented that since further YGII kills were my choice, my support personnel were looking scared :-). He started at missions now, and failed my AP but hadn't left a ship ... I had his team, with nothing to do with them -- I tried to at least have them attack his other team (stopped by the earlier dilemma), but there were Cardies on both sides. My next attempt at Quash cost me two personnel to reveal that the last seed there was Quantum Incursions -- so the following turn, I finally used my available dial-a-skill to try to pass it, downloading Oran (AU, SCI, Phy) with Empathy. I had one Empathy and one AU, two of everything else so a 2/3 chance ... and rolled well: Empathy and 2 Physics. But obviously I failed to solve, since bringing that many people exceeded the Integrity requirement on the mission. Next turn I solved, getting all the Kobayashi people back, and with 5 successful Dabo spins I was at 58 (up from -6). And on the next turn, I was going to return to the Dead End at Romulus, and then try Bajor ... but we ran out of time before that. Wedge had already solved his planet mission for 35, and had exposed YGII/SpatialRift at the two closest space missions. On his final turn, I again gave him a play for "the item" -- should have given him points, since he'd win or lose on missions, 5 points wasn't going to do it. But I went with my habit of letting him play, and he got Taya. He pushed through one Spatial Rift to find QI, needed 2 SEC and almost got it, using Taya's download for Investigator Odo ... who only had one! Wedge then needed to pick whether to try the other Rift, which probably also had QI, or try an untried planet mission. He went for the planet, and couldn't handle the MED combo there. Final MW 58-35. Closing Thoughts Great games in all the rounds, and a win is always nice. Plus my deck proved itself in doing what it was supposed to ... well, except for that errant XQX.