A BEGINNERS GUIDE TO PLAYING
CHAMPIONSHIP TREK

With the territorial open season drawing to a close, many players are now looking forward to the summer conventions and continental championships, and ultimately to DecipherCon. This article can't tell you definitively how to win a big tournament. However, it will give you some tips on how to prepare for, conduct yourself at, and follow up on a big tournament to maximize your possibilities of having a good experience. Please note that, for the most part, this article isn't about deckbuilding, but about other aspects of championship play in Star Trek CCG (or, for that matter, in any CCG).

Preparation Tip 1: Scout the Metagame

The term "metagame" refers to the play environment larger than a single game or tournament. Becoming aware of your national, continental, and global metagame can help you perform better at big tournaments. Scout the metagame by reading tournament reports from all areas that might be represented at the tournament. Players and tournament directors regularly post tournament reports on Decipher's Star Trek CCG gameplay message board, and some are published in the online magazine Where No One Has Gone Before and at Game Players Network. Reading these reports will help you know what kinds of decks are popular in various parts of the state, country or continent in which you will be playing. They can also clue you in to more subtle aspects of the game, such as which [Ref] cards see the most play, which dilemma combos are popular, and so on.

You can also scout the metagame by monitoring the types of rules questions asked on the gameplay message board and by chatting with other players in venues like Kedanya Station. Reading Decipher's Star Trek CCG Deck Design message board and the deck designs (and the reviews thereof) posted at Game Players Network (www.gameplayersnetwork.com) can also be very revealing. Participating in these types of discussions will help you know what's on other players minds.

Preparation Tip 2: Make Deckbuilding a Team Effort

Perhaps you've heard the adage, "Two heads are better than one." That's as true in Star Trek CCG deckbuilding as in other pursuits. Find yourself two or three good, trusted friends with whom you can correspond as you build your decks. This is especially effective if your deckbuilding partners live in different parts of the world from you. Your friends might see holes in your deck design that you might overlook, and vice versa.

Preparation Tip 3: Know Your Deck

We've all gone to tournaments, and perhaps even won, with decks built late the night before or even the morning of the tournament. I'm not saying you can never succeed with a last-minute deck. However, the better you know your deck, the more likely it is that you can adapt to whatever your opponent shows across the table. Spend enough time with your deck that you can write out the deck list from memory. Make sure you know what skills and attributes your personnel and skills have. Know how many copies of any given card you have in your deck, so that you can keep up with your resource usage. And test your deck as many times as possible before you actually sit down at the tournament table. The more often you play your deck before a big tournament, the better you will know it at the big tournament.

Preparation Tip 4: Pack a Lunch

No, this isn't a joke, and yes, it is relevant to gameplay. Playing a CCG for seven or more hours at a stretch taxes your body and brain. Most players are going to need some nutrition in there somewhere. Plan ahead for food. If you know that the venue hosting the tournament has vending machines, you might simply take along change for drinks and snacks. If you don't know whether the venue hosting the tournament has vending machines, or if you have special dietary restrictions (like diabetes or hypoglycemia) that most vending machines can't accommodate, pack drinks and snacks. Some tournaments will allow a brief break at some point for lunch or dinner; others will not. Try to anticipate which you will encounter and plan accordingly. Lack of nutrition can lead to fatigue, which in turn can contribute to poor gameplay. And be wise about your caffeine intake. A small soda or coffee an hour before round 1, and another between rounds 4 and 5, can give you a little boost that you might find useful, but sipping on caffeinated beverages all day can actually put you into a downward spiral. Finally, since a long day of CCG play can be mentally taxing, you might want to carry along a small bottle of aspirin, acetaminophen, or ibuprofen tablets in case you feel a headache coming on mid-tourney.

Preparation Tip 5: Choose Your Luggage Carefully

Some people like to travel light, just carrying their deck to the tournament. That's perfectly fine, of course. But if you are not one of those people, be sure you pack your things in appropriate luggage. If you are carrying along trade binders, multiple decks, tokens or counters, a stopwatch, rules documents, and so on, pack these items into an appropriate case or backpack. You'll find this far less annoying than trying to pile everything in your arms.

Conduct Tip 1: Arrive Early

Get to the tournament venue at least half an hour before the first pairings are set to be announced. This will give you time to get to know the layout of the venue (if you don't already), go to the restroom, fill out your deck list (if you haven't already), go to the restroom, get a soda, meet the tournament director and other players (if you haven't already), go to the restroom, fill in the player information on your PADD card, and so on. Delays in starting are a chronic problem at tournaments of all sizes and levels of play. Don't be the cause of one.

Conduct Tip 2: Be Friendly

Mix and mingle a little bit. Meet some people you don't know. But more importantly, be friendly to your opponent in each round. Introduce yourself. Shake hands and wish your opponent good luck. It's really not hypocritical to wish your opponent good luck when you're planning to blow up their outpost on turn one; it's just basic courtesy. After the game, shake hands again and thank your opponent for playing with you. Oh, and be sure to shower and use deodorant the morning of the tournament.

Conduct Tip 3: Relax

Using whatever legal, nondestructive method you choose, free yourself from as much tension as possible before you begin playing the first round of a big tournament. Stress causes mistakes. If nothing else, take three deep breaths and count backwards from ten. There are also all sorts of breathing exercises and tension-relieving exercises that you can do almost imperceptibly as you wait for each round to begin. During each round, take your time. Don't stall, of course, or otherwise delay the game in an unsportsmanlike fashion. But don't get in a rush, either, and don't rush your opponent unduly.

Conduct Tip 4: Narrate Your Game

During the course of an actual game, announce every action that you are taking and state what allows you to take that action. Don't just flip over your Spacedoor, pick up your draw deck, and start hunting for a ship. Instead, say, "In place of my normal card play, I'm going to flip my Spacedoor to download a universal ship. It's going to be a universal Intrepid, from my draw deck." If anything you plan to do will take more than a few seconds, tell your opponent what you're doing. Don't just pick up your ship and start leafing through the personnel cards aboard. Instead, say, "I'm going to need just a moment to examine my personnel aboard this ship" or "Give me just a moment while I total up some personnel attributes." If you're using a card in play to get some special function like multiple card draws (Ancestral Vision, The Traveler: Transcendence) or converting card draws to downloads (Borg Queen, Hirogen Hunt), be sure to tell your opponent what mechanisms you're using, especially if they chain together. Be explicit and complete. This adds at most a few seconds to each turn, and in fact probably saves time because your opponent need not stop you and ask, "Wait, how did you get to do that?"

Follow-Up Tip 1: Buy Something

If your tournament was hosted by a retail venue, especially one that did not charge an entry fee or that charged an entry fee that was clearly less than the retail value of any prizes distributed, buy something from them. It doesn't have to be an entire display box of booster packs. It might not even be something related to the game you played. No matter how small your purchase, reward your host retailer by spending money in their store. This will both show your gratitude for the retailer's hospitality and encourage them to continue hosting big tournament events. Be aware that there are hidden costs to hosting big tournaments, costs that are invisible to you on tournament day, and your purchases help the retailers meet these costs.

Follow-Up Tip 2: Write a Report

After the tournament is over, write a report and post it to Decipher's gameplay message board and/or Game Players Network, or submit it to Where No One Has Gone Before. In doing so, you come full circle with this article, enabling other players to scout the metagame as described in Preparation Tip 1 of this article.

These few tips will not, of course, guarantee you the world championship this season. Following them will, however, improve your chances of doing well at a big tournament and will help you give other players good play experiences even while you are giving them a crushing 100-0 defeat. Play smart, play nice, and have a good time. And don't forget the deodorant.

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