What is the key to every deck? Getting your Ore Processing going quickly? Getting your armada up and running? Quickly setting up a Colony? Well, that's the easy part. That's what everyone focuses on in a deck, too. But you're not done yet. Far from it. Your deck will fail miserably if you don't pay any attention to...

The Seed Phase

Various Seeding Strategies

A lot of the newer players, and a few of the intermediate ones, seem to overlook this phase, which is the most critical one. Most of the advanced players spend more of their time on the seed phase than their draw deck.

Why, though? A bad seed phase is far worse than a bad draw deck, in my experience. All decks, even the most elementary, can complete their missions in a couple of turns max. Essentially, your dilemmas are your first and last line of defense. Not only that, but it can often tell your opponent just what kind of deck you're using. Or, at least, it will make your opponent think you're using a certain kind of deck...

• Missions - Obviously, if a player seeds all Federation missions, then they're be playing Federation, right? Not always. And this in itself can completely change the way a game is played. However, bluffing has some risks to it too - most forms of bluffing makes your deck a little less efficient. However, when the bluff works, the benefit more than makes up for the slight loss. But how do you go about this?
  • Treaties and "Useless" Missions - So, you start off by seeding a Federation / Bajoran treaty. Then you seed a number of Gamma Quadrant missions, including a few Survey Star Systems and Colony Preparations, and perhaps a Bajoran mission in the Alpha Quadrant. Then, after the dilemma phase, you just plunk down a Transwarp Network Gateway at a spaceline end. Yup, you're playing Borg.

    Why do this? For one thing, it makes a Borg Swarm deck a lot easier, in general. Sure, you give up a seed slot for the treaty, and you can't touch the Colony Preparations. However, your opponent normally won't suspect that you're playing Borg (especially if you're known to play Bajorans, like me ;-) ). When people play against Borg opponents, they usually self-seed a few dilemmas under their own missions to slow down the Swarm mission stealing efficiency. However, using this method, you'll almost always have your opponent's missions cleared of their dilemmas, making things much easier for you.

  • "Odd" Missions - Obviously, seeding Tarchannen Study and Deliver Supplies means that you're playing the Borg, right? Not necessarily. Both are attemptable by the Federation, with the usual Non-Aligned help. Both are worth 40 points. And both are very easy, if you are prepared to solve them. They're great anti-stealing missions because your opponent is not likely to include an IP Scanner or a Freighter. But you can, and you can profit on this.

    Best of all, you'll probably have less dilemmas to punch through. Remember, people often self-seed a few dilemmas when playing against the Borg. Since they'll think that you're playing the Borg, they will likely pull a card off of their combos and send them over to their own missions.

    Also, people have the tendency to seed their two space / planet combos under the two dual missions, leaving them with two space and two planet combos. However, you can include three space and one planet (or vice versa), messing up their dilemma strategy, and still be safe from Balancing Act. They'll probably swith one of their space / planet combos over to your "extra" mission, making one of the dual missions slightly easier, as they will only affect half of your personnel.

  • Regions - So, if you see someone seeding a load of Bajor region locations, they're playing Bajoran, right? Not necessarily. three of the five Bajoran missions are attemptable by the Cardassians, plus the other two can easily be espionaged with Plans of the Obsidian Order (though Refuse Immigration will take slightly more effort), which is convienent because Obsidian Order helps you solve Alter Records. Plus, you could even set up Terok Nor to Process Ore over Bajor itself! And while you're at it, why not include Orb Negotiations so that you can play Central Command and use Borad to Return Orbs to Bajor?

    True, this doesn't give you as much of an advantage as it would if you were comparing Borg to non-Borg affiliations, along with other methods that lead one to believe that they were playing a different affiliation. But it does have its advantages. For example, your opponent will almost definitely seed their Sheliak/Q combo at Relocate Settlers, leaving your Nor free to Process Ore. Also, Bajoran opponents might even self-seed dilemmas under a few of their own missions to prevent stealing, and the two Bajoran missions will help prevent your Cardassian opponent from stealing yours missions.

  • Mission-Solving Misdirection - So, you seed three Patrol Neutral Zones, Investigate "Shattered Space", Covert Installation, and Iconia Investigation. They're out to quickly solve the Neutral Zone, right? Better seed your most difficult walls at the PNZ's! Also, you'd better get your AU Door from your Tent quickly, or rush over and land a ship on a planet, or staff one of your ships and leave it cloaked in the Neutral Zone all game...

    What if you have no intention of solving the PNZ's? Shattered Space can be toppled with R'Mor and Galen. Covert Installation can be won over with Sirol alone. Throw in another Computer Skill to help out Galen and Iconia is yours. And in the meantime, your opponent will be scrambling to stop you from attempting any PNZ's. Take advantage of the few extra turns you have, but don't be afraid to take advantage of the PNZ's if your opponent doesn't do anything about them.

• Artifacts - Obviously, a self-seeded card or two will always be an artifact or a Q, right? Not so. Seeding an artifact under an opponent's mission will keep him from figuring out that you're out for a quick artifact grab. This can be risky, though, and it might not work against every opponent. However, if you both are playing the same affiliation, or if your opponent has a lack of Hidden Agendas, or even if you're playing an espionage deck, this might make things a lot easier for you. Keep in mind, though, that things can get a little less peachy if your plan backfires...

  Oh yeah, and while we're on this subject, everyone seeds orbs at their own Characterize Neutrino Emissions, right? So those one or two seeded cards are harmless, no? Your greedy opponent might purposely seed an easy combo under the mission, and then run over and try to steal your mission and your orbs. But imagine his surprise when the first seed card is not the Orb of Prophecy and Change, but a big mean Borg Ship instead...

• Hidden Agendas - Having a number of Hidden Agendas often gives away your strategy - usually you're playing Borg, or you're going for a sort of espionage deck or something similar. By holding off your Hidden Agendas until the facility phase, you might not give away to your opponent what kind of deck you're playing, even though you'll give him the opportunity to seed his dilemmas last. Or, if you're going to seed a number of Computer Crashes or The Line Must Be Drawn Here's, seed them early. They might then think that you're playing a Borg deck, allowing you to benefit from their altered dilemma-seeding patterns.

• What You Don't Seed Can Still Daze Them... - I've played against a number of Federation battle decks, but none of them were all that successful. But I played one once, and it was very successful. Why? Simple - I didn't seed the treaty. If you seed the treaty, you're basically advertizing to your opponent that you're going to chase him down with your Defiant and Enterprises. However, that tells your opponent to be cautious around his ships, or to avoid them altogether.

  But what if you're playing Federation, and you didn't seed the treaty? They'll go about their normal business as if your ships aren't even there. After all, you can't attack him, right? When his guard is down, play the treaty from your hand and catch him off-guard. The look on your opponent's face is often worth it, even if you lose - right, Puff? :-) Surprise is key in this deck, and it often works rather nicely.

So the seed phase can be useful for purposes other than seeding dilemmas. It can have a profound impact on how and where your opponent seeds his dilemmas, and even how he plays the game. That's what I like about this game - sometimes you can win by doing virtually nothing. :-)

Jolan tru,
Alidar Jarok