Major Rakal's Romulan Review #73
03/28/99
Aefvadh! When I first started playing Romulans, my lunchtime opponent could almost always "stop" me with Female's Love Interest + Matriarchal Society, leaving me scrambling for another female in a predominantly male deck. The distaff side of the affiliation has come a long way since, with such strong female personnel as (ahem) Major Rakal, Taris, Vakis, and the Sisters of Duras. The latest addition has a top-notch selection of skills, for an uncommon card, no less...
T'RUL
Romulan Personnel, unique, uncommon
Integrity 6, Cunning 7, Strength 6, Staff star
ENGINEER: Physics, SECURITY, Exobiology, Ship she is aboard is RANGE +1 when cloaked.
"Romulan female assigned to install, safeguard and operate the cloaking device loaned to Starfleet for use aboard the U.S.S. Defiant."
The premiere Romulan selection of ENGINEERS left a lot to be desired. A universal with only Computer Skill, a hologram (and no holodecks), plus Mirok with ENGINEER skill (easily lost to dilemmas). The SECURITY situation was even worse, with two universal SECURITY personnel, two skills each (and Jaron's Geology and Youth were pretty useless at the time). Small wonder that my Roga Danar shows a lot of scuff marks, as that was the best source of a good SECURITY + ENGINEER plus other useful skills in one package, highly important in the days of a fixed 60-card deck. Later expansions provided a couple more ENGINEER skills on excellent personnel (Sirol and Dr. Telek R'Mor), and some better SECURITY appeared (Telak and Tallera), but the demand for both personnel types has increased too, with many dilemmas requiring multiples of one or the other.
Now we have the ENGINEER-SECURITY combination on a green card, with the ENGINEER in the almost-impossible-to-lose classification box. Put her at Roga Danar's side with one other SECURITY and ENGINEER for a compact way to pass or cure lots of dilemmas like Security Precautions and Birth of "Junior." Her Physics is a mission-solving skill of moderate importance, while her Exobiology is vital for any number of nasty dilemmas. INTEGRITY of 6 is quite satisfactory for a Romulan.
Her last skill is a modest boost to her ship's RANGE, but only while cloaked. Since all warbirds have cloaking devices, you can use her to help out the RANGE of any one warbird that you don't happen to have a matching commander aboard (and thus can't benefit from Defiant Dedication Plaque). Since she has a staff star she'll do double duty by helping to staff the ship.
How does she compare to the other female Romulan ENGINEER, Selveth (from DS9)? Selveth's Stellar Cartography is a good mission-solving skill (about on par with T'Rul's Physics), while Geology is rapidly approaching Exobiology's importance for dilemmas. Selveth lacks a secondpersonnel type, but her Navigation x2 is important enough to compensate for that. All in all, they're quite comparable, with T'Rul's special skill giving her an edge. You'll probably want both, especially in a space-oriented deck.
At this rate, I see an all-female Romulan deck not too far down the road...
The Major's Combos:
- T'Rul + Roga Danar + Dr. Telek R'Mor + Tallera: 3 ENGINEER + 3 SECURITY + 2 SCIENCE from just four personnel.
- T'Rul + [univ] D'Deridex Advanced + Test Propulsion Systems: T'Rul and the ship provide three of the four requirements. When you're done, cloak the warbird (with Tal Shiar aboard) for a RANGE of 12 to quickly get to your next mission.
Jolan tru,
Major Rakal
(Kathy McCracken)
Star Trek CCG Intelligence Officer and Tal Shiar Agent
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Major Rakal's Romulan Review #73: T'Rul ... Major Rakal ... [3/28/99 22:30]
