James Heaney (BCSWowbagger) |
Tournament Report - 1E - Andoria Regional |
2014-06-01 - 12:00 PM |
Echoes From The Past (or: Day of the Draw Engine) v1.2 |
Introduction |
One of these days, I’m going to learn not to write tournament reports right in the browser. Because if you accidentally, say, close the tab – as I have now done on not less than three tournament reports – you’ve just lost everything you’ve written. And the rewrite is never quite as good. Oh, well.
Regionals! I showed up at Regionals 2013 feeling cocky. I finished 3rd. I should have finished 6th, but for a very lucky oversight in my game against Kevin O’Neill and the magic of CVPs. This year, I was determined to do better. Win? Probably not – Regionals are big events and unpredictable. But “not going home embarrassed” was a big item on my list. My number one goal, however, was “Defeat Kris Sonsteby.” I don’t have anything against Kris, of course; I’ve just never beaten him before, and possibly never scored on him. I’d like to show that I’ve learned something during our previous games.
I brought an updated version of a deck I played in March, which uses the Enterprise-E and a Klingon treaty to harvest lots of free plays (and a few bonus points) from various Time Locations. Our local group generally frowns upon playing the same (or similar) decks twice, but there is no honor in Regionals. There is only victory. Victory is life!
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Round 1 | | Kris Sonsteby | FW (+70)View opponent's ReportView original Report |
Kris and I were paired randomly for the very first game. As Justin said when he handed us the cards, “Well, let’s get this match out of the way.” It was an uncharacteristically quiet game on both sides of the spaceline. We both had a lot of moving parts to track, we both wanted to win the first round of regionals, and we were both concentrating very hard, because takebacks aren’t a thing at this level of play.
Kris was not running the TNG Romulan / What Does God Need With A Starship? hacker deck I’d expected (and teched against), but a fairly straightforward TNG Federation solver deck, a variation on a deck he played – to some success – in the Rousseauian state-of-nature that is an online tournament. This presented an early dilemma: my deck plan called for me to solve Protect Historic Encounter early, then move on to other missions having Launched The Phoenix. But Kris also seeded Earth, effectively locking the mission out simply because nobody wants to deal with shared dilemmas. (We also shared Test Mission II.) I then decided to seal the deal by deploying Homefront, shutting down Office of the President for much of the game. Kris had (correctly, in my opinion) removed Scientific Diplomacy from this particular build, but, reduced to two play engines, he struggled to get personnel out while ambassadors choked his hand.
Meanwhile, lucky early draws allowed me to Launch the Phoenix early, so I hopped straight to attempting my amped-up Fed-icon missions. Geordi’s Ocular Implants revealed only a The Arsenal: Separated at Observe Stellar Rebirth so, not knowing what that could forebode, I sent in a redshirt team of 7 personnel on the I.K.C. Gr’oth. They bit right into a tasty Ankari Spirits and that was that. Fortunately, Captain Koloth was unharmed, so I used Picard’s Make It So to unstop them. We then beamed over reinforcements from the Enterprise-E (docked at the outpost) and, hurray, Ankari Spirits cured. Geordi’s eyes then told us of a Cytherians beneath; we transferred everyone off the Gr’oth but Daval (required for staffing) and he ship-shirted into it. It just occurred to me now – the second time writing this report – that this was illegal because of Q’s Tent Civil War, though I’m sure we could have scared up three other unneeded personnel to join Daval on his doomed quest. The Enterprise-E then tried to undock and solve the mission, since the dilemmas were all gone, but Docking Procedures bought Kris an extra turn. Eventually, I was able to solve for 45 points (+5 Launch the Phoenix and +5 mission specialists).
Kris was doing alright on his side of the spaceline, though his play engines were still frazzled. He raised the four needed SECURITY to turn on Homefront, and as soon as I solved Observe Stellar, the Edo Probe that had been sitting on his outpost mission went away. He hit The Higher The Fewer with a big group, though (-10), and got stopped by a Ferengi Bug at the bottom. He was more successful a bit down the spaceline, where he was able to pass The Vengeance Factor + The Gatherers (with 75 Integrity! So close!), but got hit by a Microvirus because his SECURITY was mostly on Earth. The Executive Authorization at the bottom of the combo was easy, though, so I knew I didn’t have much time to solve a second mission and win. (45+15 whales + 10 Phoenix = 70). As I recall, I attempted Historical Research. The first dilemma there was Dead End, which had already stopped an earlier attempt, and I passed the other two or three dilemmas underneath – Ferengi Infestation, Unscientific Method, and possibly an Edo Probe somewhere in there, but I don’t remember clearly.
And that was the game. Full win, 30-point differential if I recall correctly. That Kris was able to keep it that close without his favorite toolset (explosions) and down a play engine is impressive. I was able to contain my glee long enough that he was out of sight ordering food before I did my little victory dance. I still have much to learn from Kris, though. Until next time!
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Heavy Metal was co-chairing Federation / Klingon, and locked out one of my primary play engines for several turns via Homefront. With a bevy of bonus points and a pair of implants to scout missions before attempting, his temporal centric brood took the win in this latest installment of our good natured rivalry. FL 100-30. |
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Round 2 | | Jason Tang | FW (+44)View opponent's ReportView original Report |
Pants was back from Norway, and will be back all month, which is great. He was rocking a Cardie Central Command deck with New Arrivals and Assign Support Personnel. I thought I had him dead to rights with Homefront when I saw Central Command as his only report location, but I was pretty much wrong about that. It barely touched him, since he usually had an Arrivals report, a Support Peep download, and could put guls out on his regular card play. I think I played this game a bit dumb; seeing Pants roll out three personnel per turn, knowing how thin my dilemmas were, I should have been attempting right away, but I really wanted to solve Earth – which was way down at the end of my end of the spaceline, mostly out of my reach – and wasn’t getting the fact that, logistically, it was just not easy for me to get there. I also forgot to early-download Bareil, made some dumb choices in my deck cycling, and left Kathy Tonnell on Guardian for a turn because I just plum forgot to move her back to 2063 with the whales.
Jason had no such silliness, and jumped out to solve stuff, which he did with aplomb because I had so few dilemmas. Edo Probe / Higher The Fewer hit pretty well, giving me a small 15 point advantage, and Jason mistakenly thought Ferengi Bug locked out the mission, so went to solve another mission instead. It was nice to be up 15 to -15, but it was foolish to let that lull me into a false sense of security. The next turn, he kicked the butt of my proud Kelvan / God combo because “For Cardassia” is awesome and tied it up. Ferengi Ingenuity bought me a couple turns at Cardassia itself because it caught Bareil (who was the attempter), but ugh. Now Jason’s got TWO missions with practically no dilemmas ‘neath ‘em. He might nab the 140 point win if I don’t hurry my butt up.
So I hurried my butt up. Geordi eyeballed Historical Research. I accidentally saw the first TWO seeds – Edo Probe and In the Pale Moonlight. Felt terrible. But, for once, we were able to fix my rules violation: I beamed down a small team, triggered Edo Probe, abandoned the mission, then had Geordi do his eyes again the next turn, so I got to legally peek at In The Pale Moonlight. Yay. Meanwhile, the gang busted up Observe Stellar Whatnot. I don’t think the Phoenix was in the air at that point, but I took both mission specialists to make it 45 anyway. Sure, I took an Interphasic Plasma Creatures in the face, followed by Maglock, but Klingons were about, and so was Lightner’s big gun. We passed.
Jason goes for Search For Weapons, apparently not planning on a space mission after all, but The Gatherers hits and steals his weapons. Yay! I just wanted to block Exec Authorization, but the hand weapons were actually on the mission requirements, so he’d need at least a couple card plays to make the mission attemptable again. I don’t think we ever got around to the Microvirus, which would have targeted Damar if it’d had the chance.
So the game ended – again – on Historical Research, without me completing Earth as my deck plan called on me to do – again – and it was quick. Arne Darvin passed In The Pale Moonlight, and Lightner’s gun got us past Chula: The Game despite Interphasic Plasma Creatures. I was thinking Denevan was coming. Phew. Didn’t even need the mission specialist points, in the end.
Hopefully Jason can make one more event before he flies back to Norway.
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James was playing his Fed/Kling EE multi-time location deck. He seeded non-missions during the mission phase in order to get his missions next to each other, and for some reason I thought it would be equally good for me to have all my missions next to each other. James seeded Homefront on Cardassia, which was a minor inconvenience, but not paralyzing because I still had all of my New Arrivals free plays. This is where one of my missing cards (Jerax) would have helped.
== James' turns were as usual a flurry of plays and draws, and I downloaded from my draw deck every turn, so time was precious. I felt optimistic, because most of my combos relied on the attributes of individual personnel, so the sheer quantity of James' personnel was not relevant.
== I made the first attempt, at Search For Survivors. Edo Probe/THTF/Ferengi Bug put me at -16. Then I thought the bug prevented me from passing while it was in play (it doesn't), so I moved on to Bioweapon Ruse, where I passed a Kelvan/"God" combo thanks to Lower Decks and For Cardassia! I had at least two hand weapons, so I considered jumping through The Guardian to attack some Klingons or some whales, but I decided that I would be slowing myself down more than I would slow down James.
== Now for some reason I attempted more planet missions. Maybe I was too cautious about my one ship? I was at Find Hidden Base because that was on the way to James' missions, so I attempted it. I took two hand weapons with to pass Lack of Prep, which was silly, because I knew James was more likely to play The Gatherers. I thought I was in the clear because James had no hidden agendas, but I forgot that The Gatherers are doubled by The Vengeance Factor and not a Shade of Gray. I went back to Cardassia and DH'ed Bareil to get some guns back and had Bareil attempt Cardassia, but he got stopped with Ferengi Ingenuity, leaving me without a way to attempt it for a few turns. A select crew returned to Search for Survivors to solve.
== By now James caught some IP Creatures, but then played Lightner, whose phaser rifle made everything moot. My dilemmas did little to slow him down, and he solved three missions (Agg Assess, Observe Stellar, Protect Historic with AMS bonus) for the win, without even needing the points from his whales. |
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Round 3 | | Robert Petersen | ML (-30) |
As I told Robert at the outset, I love playing him. He’s funny. Of course, when I said that, I was undefeated against him (1-0). But it’s still true today.
As is typical when I report on games I lost, most of the following is dedicated to me beating myself up and explaining (to myself) how I could have done better. But I don’t want my narcicissm to take away from the central fact of the game: Robert’s deck was excellent, he played it very well, and he did not hesitate to take advantage of my errors. Full kudos to him on a well-earned win.
With that out of the way, let’s proceed to the self-flagellation.
Petersen was playing a TNG Fed solver build very similar to Kris’s, but with the essential distinction that he wasn’t depending too heavily on Office of the President for free plays, so he mostly shrugged off Homefront. Whatevs.
To me, the central fact of this game was that, once again, we were sharing Earth. Once again, that placed Earth way at the end of my side of the spaceline. Having realized my error in the game with Jason, I was ready to modify my plan and just attempt Agricultural Assessment instead of Earth… but then Hobie decided not to seed any dilemmas at Earth, which completely wigged me out, and ultimately cost me the game. Ironically, I later learned that not seeding anything at Earth was just a mistake, not part of a nefarious plan to destroy my mental game.
So let me walk you through this: I’ve got Edo Probe / The Higher The Fewer / Ferengi Bug seeded at Earth. The way I figure it, this plus whatever Robert seeds will really slow him down and make it tough for him to get the 40 points from Secure Homeworld, even if it’s not that strong a combo on its own. But then he doesn’t seed anything. This means: (1) I’ve left a relatively easy combo at Earth (stronger, perhaps, than the Ferengi Ingenuity / Howard Heirloom Candle hey Niall / Dejaren I originally was going to put there, but not by a lot) and (2) I know the combo and can solve it myself if I just get there first! This makes me pretty obsessed with solving Earth -- way unhealthily obsessed, in fact.
Of course, one problem with this is that I really need to solve it in one go, because otherwise Robert will just throw his Secure Homeworld on the table and steal the mission from me. So I have to have a minimum-sized team (to avoid The Higher The Fewer) with just enough to pass both Ferengi Bug and the mission requirements. (Also Homefront, but I forgot.) PROBLEM: I don’t have my tricorder out. It’s usually Crusher’s job to download it. So I settled in to wait a couple turns while I tried to draw out Crusher. Meanwhile, I set up a caravan along the spaceline so I could get my team there in one turn when the time came. Now, you may be wondering: James, why didn’t you just download Bareil and use his equipment download to get the tricorder, instead of waiting for Crusher? ANSWER: Because I am an idiot. I had it in my mind that Bareil could download Inhibitor and Ablative Armor, and wasn’t flexible enough to think of just getting the tricorder instead. Could’ve had this thing squared away right away. Not my last mistake, though! But let’s check on the other side of the table.
Actually, pretty boring over there. Hobie is a bit cautious with his mission attempts, sending in relatively small teams, and does get hit by Friendly Fire. I believe he also fell prey to “God” with a miniteam, but had a shuttle back at home base ready to go come back and solve. I’d killed a mission specialist with Kelvan Show of Force, but the Benzite (Mordock?) still scores 5 points for him, so he’s pretty much got a lotta points, or is about to.
As in the Jason game, I take this as my cue to start solving myself. The Phoenix launched, huzzah huzzah, and – with help from Make It So, I believe – we were able to pass Gomtuu Shock Wave at Observe Stellar Rebirth, but still took a 5-point hit from Hazardous Duty because (I think?) A Fast Ship Would Be Nice killed some nice person who didn’t deserve to die, alas. I end turn with a buncha points myself, good prospects for the next two turns, and feeling pretty good about myself, even though I’m a dope. And, boom! That’s when I draw into Beverly Crusher. I’m finally going to solve Earth!
Or not. Stupidity #2: in my race to draw out Beverly, I’ve forgotten to use Tribunal of Q to keep Q the Referee on the table, which is something I drilled myself on endlessly in test games and I still can’t believe I did it. This is a really big problem, because it looks like Robert might well score 70 points this turn and win the game, and where’s my In The Zone? But then it compounds: Robert attempts the mission with Ferengi Ingenuity / Dejaren underneath it. No Q = no Access Denied = dead combo. Data walks through it. Rob scores big. For whatever reason – I think a countdown on Friendly Fire is still going – Robert can’t solve his space mission this turn, and ends turn... but suddenly I have to win, and I have to win THIS TURN, and I particularly need to stop kicking myself about that missing Q the Ref because HOW COULD I BE SO STUPID? To add pressure to pressure, time is running out. Fortunately, I went second this game, so Robert won’t get another turn if I time out, but I want a Full Win, not a Modified Loss, because I want to win the 2014 regional!
Whatever. Breathe deep, James. You’ve got Beverly. You’ve got ships in place. You can reach Earth. Now, can you solve it? Yes. You’ve got both mission specialists handy. Thanks to Hazardous Duty, you’re only at 65 points (40 Stellar +15 Whales +10 Phoenix -5 Hazardous), but that’s okay, because Earth’s 30 points + 10 specialists. All you have to do is go over there, ignore the Edo Probe, bring a small team (5 max) to avoid taking too many hits from Higher The Fewer (65 +30 +10 -5 = 100), and bob’s your uncle you’ve won the game. I found my specialists, I found my 3 SECURITY for Ferengi Bug, I played Bev, I downloaded her tricorder.
Then I put them all on the wrong ships. I have no idea how I did this, but somehow I brought Beverly to the mission and not her tricorder, and I don’t even know where I left the third SECURITY. I attempted without realizing this, and so lost 15 points to Edo Probe and The Higher The Fewer, the Away Team was stopped, and now I’m at 50 points with no way to reach or solve Earth and no other missions examined. Stupidity on stupidity: I later realized that I couldn’t have even attempted Earth to begin with. You need 4 SECURITY with Homefront, not just 3, and – even if I’d realized that in advance and brought a fourth SECURITy – bringing along a fourth SECURITY would have made my point loss from Higher The Fewer too high (65 +30 +10 -6 =99). So now I’ve stranded several of my best personnel way down the spaceline, and all I’ve accomplished is increasing my points deficit from one mission to two – I can’t make Historical Research a 50-point mission because I just sent my mission specialists to Earth! So now… what, I’m going to solve Historical Research AND Ag Assessment in one turn? Okay, sure, let’s do that.
Or, let’s not. Robert hits me with an Arsenal: Divided on Historical Research. While examining my personnel for that, trying to put together a team that can still pass the mission once half of them are eliminated, I have a crucial realization: I don’t have the mission requirements. My specialists are way down the other end of the spaceline! Deanna Troi’s not out yet, so I’m not going to be able to unstop this team and reattempt with the B-Team / try Test Mission II (even if I had the range), so I’ve lost, no two ways about it. At this moment, I began agonizing: should I end the mission attempt – and the turn – as quickly as possible so Robert can still get the Full Win? Or should I play it out normally, taking the Modified Loss in hopes I can still make second place on victory points? My ethics class never covered this! This lasts about ten seconds, because time is called before the mission attempt is over. (Shaka When The Walls Fell seals the deal.) Phew. Ethical bullet dodged.
But game also over. I flail for another minute or two, trying to find some way to skill share an Archaeology onto George & Gracie so I can use a B-team to solve Historical Research, but there’s nothing. I eventually end turn and Robert makes our record 1-1. Again, kudos to him on a game well-played. For my part, I can only repeat something I wrote last year after another regionals game played stupidly: my deck didn’t fail me; I failed my deck. That’s a considerable measure of comfort to me.
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Round 4 | | Matthew Hayes | FW (+100) |
As it turned out, Matt was playing the deck I’d expected from Kris: Romulans with What Does God Need? hacking. For some reason, he was also using Earth, though, so – for the fourth time today – my “main mission” was out of reach. (Look for future builds of this deck to avoid attempting Earth at all, because SHEESH.) But I was determined not to screw this game up like the last one, so I went into full solver mode – no tricks, no nothing. Kathy put the Whales in 2063. Then she came back and we immediately attempted Historical Research, because it was there. (It was also a considerable distance from Matt’s increasingly-aggressive outpost. That helped.) Important Guests / Lethean Telepathic Attack / A Fast Ship Would Be Nice / Friendly Fire, if I recall correctly. Kor’choth jumped into Fast Ship’s bullet and we were able to pass the mission that turn. We had both mission specialists, so 50 points. Next turn, we went over to Observe Stellar Rebirth – and we took Kathy with, because I figured I didn’t need the draws at this point – and passed Strict Dress Code / maybe a Gomtuu (?) / possible with a Dead End on the front. (Sorry.) Never got the Phoenix launched, but still took home the full win in 5 turns flat.
Which was kinda lucky, actually, because Matt had a Fesarius that was about to have a Kurlan Naiskos on it and some sneaky trick to lift its attack restrictions. It could have blown my gang out of the stars before I realized they were coming, and I would have had few defenses beyond Chang’s To Be Or Not To Be. As it played out, though, my record against my Archnemesis continues to grow. That dastardly dastard will have to try again in a few weeks!
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Closing Thoughts |
It was nice to see Kevin Jager at the event. I saw him as an interloper from 2E, but, as he proved throughout the day, 1E was a game he knew and loved as much as any of us. I wish I’d had a chance to play against his capture/interference deck, which sounded like a real beast, just for the learning experience it would have provided. Congratulations to him on the win, and thank you as ever to Justin for running a smooth and very fun event! |
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