Tournaments | trekcc

James Heaney (BCSWowbagger)
Tournament Report - 1E - American National
2020-07-04 - 12:00 AM
Winning... Winning Won\'t Help In My Case (Or: Chasing Comets, Degenerately)
Introduction
My deck looks like I just netdecked Kris Sonsteby's Romulans and then swapped out the missions. And that is how it started! But I swear I made lots and lots and lots of changes. ...and then I got rid of almost all of them, because it turns out Kris's Romulans are an incredibly well-oiled machine and virtually all of my changes hurt them.

Round 1	Bye	BY (0)
Bye after a MG with warpaw.


Round 2	Stephen Hensel	FW (+100)
BionicMan was using a Romulan TNG Starter with just an extra play engine thrown in -- but this almost did me in! I couldn't very easily attack and destroy other Romulans... and then he nervily put his outpost right there at the end of my Neutral Zone! How'm I supposed to solve missions if he has a Warbird docked at an outpost inside the Neutral Zone?! So I cleared out missions without solving them, trying to figure out when to flip HQ: Defensive Measures for maximum effect. Fortunately (for me), Explosive Decompression and Gomtuu largely solved this problem for me, as did Bionic's small but substantial error in forgetting to redock a ship before having a different ship attempt a mission. He suffered a full team wipe of 8 personnel, and was able to get a single damaged scout ship back home to base, but Tomalak and Divert Power destroyed it in dock, and I solved my missions before he could get another ship out. Lovely to meet Mr. Bionic and I hope to see him again soon!


Round 3	Niall Matthew	FL (-1)
This game summed up in a single image Niall sent me after the game: I wasn't shocked to see Charvanek in this event, what with The New Hotness being OS Rommies. But I never, ever expected a hologram deck to stock Commander Charvanek as its One Big Meta Card. But this one did! And then I was sad! This went from a 3-mission win deck to a 5-mission win deck instantly. Point loss from Higher/Fewer turned it into a 6-mission win deck. And you know what? I almost pulled it off anyway, and I'm pretty pleased with that. I had cleared out all dilemmas on all six missions and solved four. PNZ #5 had a Friendly Fire on it with 1 countdown icon left and PNZ #6 was awaiting Leadership to be delivered by Devoras. I woulda had it next turn. But, unlucky for me, Earn Your Rank was still in play, allowing Niall to staff his ship for a Jol'YichU! he had already seen. That solved him his third and final mission. And I took the first turn, so double-kudos to him. My dilemmas were a massive pile of kill engines, and Niall more or less ignored them, so I'm pretty surprised to have gotten as far as I did. Niall explains why my four-dilemma combo at his main mission ground him down: "You made me expend a LOT of resources (3 Hot Quarks) to get past Misinterpreted History. "You also made me expend valuable downloads to get past Eminian Disintegration Protocol. It was about that time I think that I really needed Chervenak out, but also only had one SECURITY out, so you made me waste my Reflection Therapy instead of getting another SECURITY (I got Chervenak out that turn I think)" I Renewed Spirit'd my way out of Chula: The Game right after emptying his hand of Amandas through a little Thasian Powers fun, which was also nice. Great game all 'round.


Round 4	Brian Sykes	ML (-56)View opponent's Report View original Report
Amazingly stupid error right at the start - I got my opening D'Deridex blown up by a planet killer by not paying attention to the D'D's SHIELDS. I spent the rest of the game trying to catch back up on maintaining "air superiority" in the Neutral Zone, and just failed. Space Amoeba / Scout Encounter finished off Derenas, and I couldn't come back from that. Cleared a mission, but Brian QSD'd a freighter with Rinnak Pire on it to the far end of the Zone, had an Assault Vessel on the other end, and I just couldn't close the deal for the 60-point mod win -- even with his attempting totally frozen by Explosive Decompression. Had he hit Decompression earlier, destaffing his ships and giving me more freedom in the Zone, I might have had a shot. But, as it was, Armus had solved a mission and was managing to use Quantum Slipstream Drive to keep an Assault Vessel in the Zone but out of my RANGE when time was called.
Heaney was running PNZ x6 in a very old school deck concept with new age cards (Chess Game Romulans + Androids). I reshuffle my combos so I have no more than 1 misseed at any mission. When I seed Obsession, James interestingly enough chooses to start the Planet Killer in the Alpha Quadrant instead of the Gamma like all of my other opponents have. I soon see why, as he gets the Devoras and a D'Deridex out early and as the Planet Killer flies to his Outpost location he opens fire on it, but the PK damages the D'Deridex in the process and I take out Tallus and Data and Picard with two tactic flips. End of turn the Planet Killer attacks again and finishes off the D'Deridex, though James does have enough weapons to get through the reduced shields and score 10 for blowing up the PK. This setback helps me out, as I didn't get a great opening draw, but once I get a couple of Captain's Orders out, I Masaka myself with Obelisk and finally draw into some people. I also find my Quantum Slipstream Drive early, so I put a Rinnak Pire on a Bajoran Freighter and QSD him to the far end of the Neutral Zone, a good 20 span from James's outpost. This also buys me additional time since it means that James can't solve any of his missions. Next turn I Ops download the Defiant since I have both Worf and Sisko in play. I send some randos on a Bajoran interceptor over to Refuse Immigration and they promptly get stopped by Thasian Powers. Next turn James plays and draws more people setting up for his first mission attempt but decides to wait one more turn. On my turn I play some more people, including Leeta to get the Dabo party started, and send my random crew over to Relocate Settlers to attempt where they promptly get stopped by Deliberate Tactical Error (no casualties though, fortunately). Next turn James plays another unique Warbird (Haakona?) and attempts with a decent sized crew. He runs into Space Amoeba -> Scout Encounter and Rinnak Pire and Rano Dake show up and shoot, but since unlike my previous three opponents, James is actually running a battle bridge, he draws tactics and is able to escape with just a hit instead of a direct hit for the moment. Not wanting to risk his other ship with the Space Amoeba there, he decides to sit tight on a second attempt and ends his turn, sending the Amoeba to the PNZ next door. On my turn I play more people, including Weyoin 6, who's a second leader to go with Jaro Essa who's in my rando crew. I fly back to DS9, pick up some backup and reattempt Relocate Settlers. I clear the DTE but then lose 3 of my 6 people to a Denevan Neural Parasites, and then two more to a Jol'Yichu, which I was prepared for until Vedek Dax got eaten by a flying flapjack. Bummer. So Jaro and Weyoun 6 die and Rom ends up all by himself wondering where everybody else went. Not wanting to be the only one taking casualties, my Bajoran Scout Vessel opens fire on the damaged Devoras and finishes it off, though James does manage to hit me back in the process and kill my two guys. Oh well, that's what they're there for. I then send the Defiant with both of its commanders into the neutral zone and attack the Space Amoeba, damaging it in the process. On James's turn he plays and draws and uses his last ship to finish off my now-empty scout vessel. At the end of his turn the Space Amoeba moves to Bajor. On my turn I play Paulson to DS9 for free and card play Disrupted Continuum as a Hidden Agenda, and decide to fly the Defiant to Bajor to finish off the Space Amoeba. I've been counting tactics and I didn't remember seeing too many copies of It Must Be Destroyed come off the top so I roll the dice and take a shot. My gamble pays off as I draw a IMBD and play it, which allows me to finish off the Space Amoeba (scoring 14 points from Obsession) and not get stopped from the battle. Since my crew is still active I pick up Ranjen Koral from the Chamber of Ministers and fly to DS9 and grab Paulson, then fly to Relocate Settlers and rescue Rom. Zayra is still aboard the Interceptor so I beam down and attempt and Zayra in orbit + Ranjen Koral in the away team clear the Jol'Yichu, but the team can't solve. When I announce that I can't solve with this away team James tries to claim that I'm stopped by Mission Debriefing, which I downloaded early in the game. However, I point out that since I haven't flipped Mission Debriefing, it's text actually isn't active yet. ;-) So after we have a laugh about it being that kind of game, I beam down Zayra to join the others and re-attempt, solving with Sisko and Worf providing Security and Zayra providing Treachery. As an added bonus, I hit a Dabo probe this turn taking me to 50 points even so I can pass Dead End (turns out there was no Dead End in James's dilemma stack).

Round 5	Missed Game	MG (0)
I now realized that my last round was going to be spent with me on vacation, making online play difficult to impossible. Already well out of contention for the title, I settled for the MG. But I'm not sure I'm totally done with this deck!


Closing Thoughts
All-PNZ in 2020! Who'd'a thunk it? (Apparently: Niall Matthew!)