In almost all tourney games now, there are two basic decks, not archetypes, but
more in general.  Speed decks or delay decks.  It is my belief that a great
delay deck can beat a good speed deck, but a great speed deck can beat a great
delay deck.  Which is why I present (Yeah, a Mot intro):
Taris' Deck Building Tips #1:  Speed Decks
        With that said, it is on to the bulk of my review...  What exactly is a
speed deck, how is one built?  Well in the past the basic speed deck was
playing four or five Kivas Fajo-Collector's, then playing a Red Alert!, which
would be well protected by the three or four Q2s in your hand, and then on
turn 6, dropping all your personnel, then solving all the missions, from
attempting from your outpost to clear out the harsher dilemma's, such as
Cytherians and other dilemma's which specifically targeted ships.
        Then came the speed decks variations.  Playing 12 space missions, playing a
Revolving Door on your opponent's Q's Tent and then getting a Q's Planet from
yours, playing it on the far end of the spaceline, and perhaps playing the
armada of Civilian STAs and scoring points from a Colony.  Then came the
Cyber-Q deck, which in it's day reigned king.  The player would play three or
four Kivas Fajo-Collectors, as above, play or Devidian Door in a person with
cybernetics, usually Kitrik, then play 6 STAs for free, tent for Gowron, play
him and then pass the Q Dilemma to beat the missions.
        But what is speed now?  How can you not only be fast but beat all those other
delay decks out there that rely on multiple Computer Crashes, Yellow Alerts,
Mirror Images, Scorched Hands, Oof!, The Line Must Be Drawn Here, the new AMS
errata, etc.  Well, in the metagame of today, it would appear the person who
wins is the one who is not most prepared for everything, since at a 6 round
tourney you can lose to the one outlier deck and still make the final, but you
must beat the majority of the field.  But how is this done.
        The first is to pick out the major problem in your deck, whether it's
vulnerable to Computer Crashes, or Yellow Alerts, if you can stop your opponent
from playing or getting them, then you can go quicker.  Lets look at the
biggest problem to most of my speed decks:
        Computer Crash:  A lot of my speed decks now a days don't rely on Kivas Fajo-
Collector, since Mirror Image is too much of a threat to use them, but rather
on downloading.  My most recent speed deck, which is a Cardi/Fed Visit Cochrane
Memorial POTOO deck, relied extensively on downloading, even from turn 1.  How
to you neutralize this threat, how do you stop it.  Well first off most Borg
decks use computer crashes, and they can swarm the spaceline without download
anything, so if they did reveal a Computer Crash they will be un-effected.  I
would try to flip over my spacedoor to grab my ship to get Reg to VCM so I
could start probing immediately.  Instead of trying to stop my opponent from
seeding them, which there is no way you can, I would instead try to stall my
opponent from running away from me, but getting out a ship with weapons of 4.
The USS Danube is a great choice.  I choose this ship since I can battle with
the Borg and not damage their ship, but since they battled, they will not be
able to probe.  So I just ride out the Computer Crashes.
        But what the worse threat to your great speed deck, are the dilemma crap™
decks.  These decks are as cheap as they get folks.  They rely on 5 or 6
seeded computer crashes, and my granny could run quite well.  Against seed
decks, this is where the game will be won and lost.  Never, and I repeat
never, seed in this way:  (Lets see if I can describe it on the computer)
        Lets say his missions are the even numbers.  Don't do:
        1@2, 1@2, 1@2, due to the fact that you will move to another mission, then
when he drops his self seeds there he will get last seed, since you have nice
dilemma combo's set from the rest of his missions, rather seed like this:
        1@2, 1@4, 1@6, 1@8, etc...  That way he has a lot less likely chance at
seeding there.  And if he does pass early on, then just seed one at each of
his missions and then pass after you have them covered, your opponent will
most likely then seed one at each of your missions and you will be on the same
foot.
        I guess the moral of the story when building a speed deck, is that you must
take a risk, which I wouldn't deem as unnecessary.  The game has gotten to a
point where you have to take the risk to win, one can see this by the deck
choice of the World Champion.  In a tourney you don't need to win all 4 or 6
or 8 games, you just need to win 3 of the 4 or 5 of the 6 or 7 of the 8.  The
one fluke loss won't matter.  Every time I think up a new deck, I always chat
about it with R'Mor.  He gladly always points out the flaws, weather it's too
vulnerable to Computer Crash, or Rouge Borg, or other degenerate strategies.
But I have come to the point where I have decided no deck will win 100% of
games, anyone can beat anyone.
        My last word will prove this, and provide a memorial to Sela's Consort.  Back
almost two years ago, Sela's Consort had his little Q deck, and one could not
beat it till they made their deck completely turned to his deck.  Elim made a
deck, or 10/30 Q2s, to beat SC.  He did so with an easy victory, but all that
it proved is that you can't win 100% of games.  You will lose some, but as
long as you win more, you will do well.