Siskoid's Rolodex #156 ... Siskoid ... [4/20/99 06:19]

[Siskoid's Rolodex offers spot reviews of all the cards judging them by their less tangible qualities, searching for the elusive perfect card: their picture/graphics, lore, Trek sense and stockability. Each on 5 points (so on a total of 20). Mondays, I do Premiere. Tuesdays, AU. Wednesdays, Q-Continuum. Thursdays, First Contact. Fridays, DS9. Saturdays, The Dominion. And Sundays, Premium cards. Comments always welcome.]

#156-Dead in Bed, Interrupt, AU
"Astronaut Colonel Stephen Richey was found 283 years after his death on Theta 116 VIII. He was caught in an unchanging eternal trap created by well-meaning aliens."
-Kills any one personnel currently in stasis.

PICTURE: Love it. Sufficiently creepy, as creepy as TNG ever allowed itself to get anyway. And there's something so absurd about the picture that it's practically comical. A strong 4.

LORE: Nice story, well told, but aside from explaining the picture, it doesn't do a very good job of explaining how such an event (well... interrupt... you know what I mean) can happen in any other situation. Great title, I don't know how they came up with it. Bumps the score up to 3.2.

TREK SENSE: A lot of odd readings. First, I object to everything in "The Royale" being categorized as AU. The episode was surreal, but never took place in an alternate universe, dream or whatnot. Then, we have to look at what stasis means in Trek sense. "Stopped" personnel are busy or have their hands full. Disabled personnel are in some sort of coma and can be transported even though they are useless. Personnel in stasis however, cannot be moved. They just can't interract with the real world. Colonel Richey qualifies as a personnel in stasis I would think. He was cut off from the world, lost. Dead in Bed supposes that a personnel in stasis would age rapidly in that stasis. NOT what happened to Richey, but really works for any time anomaly-type effect (like Quantum Singularity Lifeforms) and maybe could be explained by some sort of cellular degradation (we've seen this on the show), maybe after being made Frigid. In most cases though, there's no justification for dying while in stasis. Vulcan pinched you a bit hard? Just doesn't work too well. A 1.4.

STOCKABILITY: I've said before that it wasn't worth it to Dead in Bed personnel under DNA Metamorphosis's effects (the reason being that such a personnel has no way to get out of stasis, wheras there are ways to get it out of the discard pile), but other cards that put personnel in stasis do so for very short lengths of time. That means you can double-whamy a player who thought he was just going to lose his personnel until the beginning of his next turn, by turning a light sleep into a nightmare. Taking advantage of Vulcan Nerve Pinches and Off Switches is one idea, but that's two cards for one death. Worth it? A better idea is to include copies of Frigid and You Will in Time in your Q-Continuum side-deck. They don't cost much and could make the usually weaker Q-cards deadlier. Other uses include picking off the best crewmembers under Quantum Singularity Lifeform, that kind of thing. Unfortunate that you need an AU Doorway open to use it. Seems killer, but is actually somewhat limited: a 3.9.

TOTAL: 12.5 (62.5%) Dead in Bed not dead in the water.

COMPARISON CHART

Adapt: Negate Obstruction - 18.4 (92%)
[...]
Albert Einstein - 12.7 (63.5%)
Anti-Matter Pod - 12.7 (63.5%)
Archer - 12.7 (63.5%)
Cargo Rendezvous - 12.7 (63.5%)
Drought Tree - 12.7 (63.5%)
Antique Machine Gun - 12.6 (63%)
Auto-Destruct Sequence - 12.6 (63%)
Alien Groupie - 12.5 (62.5%)
Assimilate This! - 12.5 (62.5%)
Dead in Bed - 12.5 (62.5%)
Vekma - 12.5 (62.5%)
Admiral Riker - 12.4 (62%)
Avert Danger - 12.4 (62%)
Bajoran Civil War - 12.4 (62%)
D'Tan - 12.4 (62%)
[...]
Zibalian Transport - 7.1 (35.5%)
Door to the Fajo Collection - 3.47 (17.35%)

Siskoid (zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz---ack!)