Matt Kirk (CaptMDKirk) Tournament Report - 1E 2012-11-03 - 03:00 PM Super-PAGH (Political Action Group Hug) Introduction So I have to give credit for this twist of a previous deck to Ben Hosp… after seeing him combine Officer Exchange Program with Ferengi Military Operations, I was hooked on the idea and easily ported it into my existing TNG Ferengi build after dropping some of the dead weight. I ended up with a fast, fun deck that drew cards effectively and went the distance. The main conceit of the deck is that FMO asks for a TNG DaiMon, which Bok (from Premiere) qualifies as. Since the Ferengi Trading Post lets everyone mix aboard, the Pagh can show up and you can throw him aboard, then go hunting for your opponent's ships to score 10 and draw 2 cards per fight as long as you win. Round 1 Rogue Shindler MW (+10) Rogue set up for a Federation free-for-all with his Finest Crew, while I guessed incorrectly where he would establish his base of operations. There was a lot of set-up in this game, and we were both kind of surprised when it was over. It could have gone either way, we both had one mission down… but I managed to score 10 more points for the modified win. Strangely, this ended up being the closest game pointwise I would play all day. Round 2 Charlie Plaine FW (+20) Starfleet in full OTF is something I've been meaning to try, and Charlie was going for the full abuse of Fitting In as Ken Tufts displayed at Worlds this year. I was fairly confident I would be okay on the board if I could tag a couple of his ships for early points, and I was set up to do that with the Pagh/Bok combo. I rolled my guys out at about the same pace Charlie was, and I bided my time until the Enterprise jumped through the Temporal Vortex. Unfortunately, I knew Straight and Steady was going to keep Enterprise out of my reach as long as hey stayed docked at either his Neutral Outpost or my Ferengi Trading Post. He finally decided to undock from my outpost to go try a mission or two, but those sneaky Ferengi had some Docking Procedures to stop him there and gave me a clean shot. I scored 10, and managed to even steal his Phaser Pistol thanks to Determined Assault. I started organizing teams to go after my missions, and had finished up just ahead of Charlie at the end 100-80. Round 3 Johnny Holeva MW (+35) More Finest Crew shenanigans, this time with two Outpost II missions *and* a seeded outpost on Reunion from the Art Director. I started scheming how I was going to catch one of his ships alone, but I was coming up short, so I decided to just barrel through and see if I could out-speed him. Luckily, Johnny smelled battle coming and spent a turn or two turtling up and building his fleet after I had decided to largely ignore him. I pulled 34th Rule out and sent the Pagh to ping his Outpost II nearest me for two draws each turn. Johnny ran short on cards and couldn't find a CIVILIAN to pass Primitive Culture at his Earth. I played greedily after finishing two missions up, and threw everyone at the last dilemma at Study Cometary Cloud, only to find his second Cytherians, sending most of my folks down the spaceline for the rest of the game. I finally got Get It Done on the table and managed to shuffle Vekor back into the deck, but I needed to find her before Johnny found a CIVILIAN. Time was called, and I was ahead 90-55. Round 4 Thomas V FW (+70) Thomas is perhaps the most imaginative deckbuilder in our San Diego community, and I was intrigued as I saw several classic missions hit the table unseen in a good long while. Dilemma placement was key in this game as I managed to guess correctly and tagged Orb Negotations with Lack of Prep/Dead End. He dropped Central Command and a Husnock Outpost, opting to skip seeding his Mercenary Ship at our duplicated Raid Ancient Burial Site. Perhaps the most entertaining exchange of the game involved the Pagh defending against his Mercenary Ship. I scored 5 as we traded damage markers, and then Thomas had Baran activate the Merc Ship's Auto-Destruct Sequence! I returned the Pagh and a few crew members to my hand, and Thomas ended up doing the same. My dilemmas held out long enough for me to plow through his 5-card combo at Revenge Plot (including a Temporal Micro-Wormholed B'Somgh for a second Biology to pass Medical Crisis). I started working on the 6-dilemma duplicated Burial Site, and got through all but two dilemmas when Thomas' eyes lit up, and he started scheming to come over and do it himself. But he was on the other side of the spaceline, and he needed to play two Transwarp Conduits on different ships just to make it down to where I was. Luckily, my Docking Procedures once again came through and held him up for a turn while I finished up the mission for a win. Closing Thoughts 10 points plus an equipment download and 2 cards (with 34th RoA) for winning a ship battle is hard to pass up. I enjoyed playing this deck thoroughly, as TNG Ferengi have decent skill availability and attributes with a little help from Lower Decks and an easily obtained Disruptor Rifle (Morta's Prepare Assault Teams hit the table every game). Thanks for the idea Ben; I am really worried someone is going to break this combo completely and encourage 1E Design to water these cards down.