The New Metagame
Dr. Telek R'Mor
 

Well, lookie, lookie. The meta-game has certainly changed in the past month, when the
Enhanced First Contact Packs and the Dominion expansion were released, bringing loads of
new strategies to the meta-game environment. While Borg decks have started to become
much more present in the meta-game scenario, players are struggling to try out the new,
fully playable affiliation of the Dominion. And most old strategies got a boost. So much to
prepare for, which is the fun of the meta-game.

Before jumping into all the new strategies and how to prepare for them, a glimpse of how
each affiliation turned out after these two sets perhaps should be in order. The rank in
which they are reviewed in below does not only translate their over all power, but how
popular they are with players, which should give you an idea of which affiliation has
strategies you should prepare for in your deck.
 

Klingon: Ah, the days of battling glory are still yet unsung. The Klingons have rarely
shown their head in the tournament environment, but this does not stop them from being a
popular fan favorite. And, with the advance of Dominion, they may have a few strategies
they could bring in for a few winning games. Martok gives armada decks a large boost.
Players should be weary of a single staffed Rotarron with Martok aboard. Captain’s Log
and a single Bynar’s Weapon Enhancement (downloadable thanks to 10 and 01) brings up
to a WEAPONS 14. A Klingon player looking to create a fleet can do this nicely. All they
need out is a ship which has a matching commander and then download the commander
with Ready Room Door, already having out Captain’s Log with RRD, which goes back on
top of the deck. If you bring out the Hegah’ta, you can have a two ship fleet with 28
WEAPONS in total.

Unfortunately, Klingons still did not get a major boost in the skills
department with Dominion. Martok’s skills are found in better place (like Governor
Worf or Mogh) and Ch’Pok has nothing else new to offer, except Law, which is not
needed much. Atul’s single Klingon Intelligence makes him barely worthy even with a
seeded Assign Mission Specialists. However, one thing the Klingons did get that they can
take good advantage of is Empok Nor. The personnel who they do have with good skills
(Kitrik, Governor Worf, etc...) can be gotten out much faster and allow you to get to
missions that much faster, and Ore Processing will let you cycle through your deck nicely.
The Empok Nor dilemmas should not be too much of a problem for Klingons (except
getting 2 Exobiology for the rarely seen Garak Has Some Issues). Problem is, against a
Romulan player (who can commander it first turn with their affiliated Computer Skill
mission specialist, Patelh) or another Klingon, keeping control of Empok Nor could be
hard...

Oh, and for the missions the Klingons got in Dominion, they are fair overall.
Archanis Dispute is the best one, it appears, with good points and easy requirements.
Quest for the Sword is the easiest and best, point wise, but making the side trip to the
Gamma Quadrant, unless using Colony Preparations, just doesn’t seem worth it. One last
saving grace, however, for the Klingons in Dominion is The Great Hall. The Great Hall
allows more personnel to report to it for free then any other headquarters, and is most
likely to be seen in most Klingon decks, especially since HQ: Secure Homeworld is fairly
easy for the Klingons.
 

Federation: The Feddies, to some players' surprise, are in the bottom overall ranking, even
though the series revolves around them. The Federation’s main problem seems to be the
fact that even though they have a large group of good personnel, they don’t seem to be
able to spread out and use other strategies too well. And their big name personnel, such as
Picard and Sisko, are seemingly outclassed by other personnel, such as Rachel Garret. One
major problem with the Federation is classifications don’t seem to overlap as much along
with skills, with certain skills or classifications being confined to certain groups of
personnel. On the upside, in certain areas, such as Medical, they have easily the best
personnel of that group. However, other affiliations usually have Medicals with other
classification (such as Science) or they fit in with other skills already needed in the deck
(like Tal Shiar). It doesn’t matter if one personnel has three Medical on them or not: on
Hippocratic Oath or Tarrelian Plague Ship takes them out, regardless of the quantity of
Medical they have on them.

The Federation has also lost a lot of speed without the lack of  much of any main
strategies beside straight mission solving. This, however, makes the Federation key
for non-affiliation based strategies like Compensater/Schism or Thought Fire/Nightmare
decks. The Feds have the good personnel to do the missions when the time
comes, but most of the deck is so bent on destroying your opponent’s resources that it will
be a while before things happen, hence all the time to slowly drop the crew. Scans of all
types, though, are mostly needed in Fed decks, unless you go for self-seeded Q, which is a
particularly big thing for Feds with their high Integrity. Hide And Seek doesn’t help much
because their huge mega-crew will be able to blow by those dilemmas, making Q-Flash the
easiest way to stop them.

With Dominion, the Feds got some goodies, though not enough
to bring them back up into the great realm of power they had pre-QC. Jaresh-Inyo gives
the Federation a few fair skills, though the download of HQ: Secure Homeworld is not
that good because it can already be seeded. Office Of The President lets a few good
personnel report to Earth, but not nearly enough to make it too worthwhile. In the
Meta-Game, one must deeply consider using Earth because it is easily stealable by most
affiliations, and the Borg can hurt you badly with Stop First Contact, if they use it with
Population 9 Billion--All Borg. Though they’ll seed Earth anyways and SFC is not much
of a viable strategy as it is, having the Borg face their own dilemmas at the mission you
seeded for them is not good, especially with Service the Collective allowing them to scout
and probe in one turn, no effort really involved, beside getting Locutus out. Eddington is a
nice Security classification personnel, something the Federation has been in need of lately,
like an affiliated Roga Danar. The Defiant, Admiral Riker, and Kirk, however, open up the
possibly of an interesting Fed battle deck. While seeding the Three Way Treaty does make you
lose the ability to make use the Tent, the Feds can get a large fleet out fairly quickly.
Download Enterprises with Wall Of Ships and Riker (or you can use Space/Time Portal to
get them out) and downloading the matching commander with Ready Room Door. The
basic ships in this deck would be the Odyssey, Defiant, all the Enterprises except E, and
the Pasteur. The crew is the Federation’s big heavy hitters for classifications would be
there, but they could take their merry time getting them out while they blow away your
ships and personnel. Crew Reassignments help alot because there will be several AU
personnel in this deck. The draw backs are still a factor of speed (you need, on average,
two more personnel beside the matching commander on the ships, so while you can get
the ship, matching commander, Captain’s Log, and Defiant Dedication Plaque out easily,
you still need more crew to command), easily spotted (by seeding a Three Way, you give
away your deck design, so your opponent can prepare more for it), and of course, the lack
of a Tent.
 

Dominion: Ah, the new affiliation. Expect to see the Dominion a lot at tournies just like
the Borg right after the release of First Contact; players will be trying out different
strategies with the Dominion, and trying to get a feel for them, which means if you use a
deck that has already gotten some good testing pre-Dominion and just add a few goodies
to it from Dominion, it should be able to hold up against a Dominion deck.

Several players have already noted the weakness of Dominion decks, ranging from the lack
of some major classifications in quantity (only two Medical), Ketracel-White addiction, starting
off in the Gamma Quadrant, only having two ships, etc... Some of those weaknesses aren’t
that bad. The Universal Medical, Eris, isn’t that bad, and is worthy enough to use two or
three of in a  deck. The problem of two ships isn’t anything, you only really needed the
universal Jem’Hadar Attack Ship; its range is easily increased with one seeded
Plasmadane Relay. Unfortunately, right now an Alpha Quadrant Dominion deck has some
problems of its own. Unless you seed a Neutral Outpost so you can use 10 and 01,
Crashes will stop your Bajoran Wormhole from coming out fast. (Unless you're smart
enough to use Operate Wormhole Relays.) Construct Depot is extremely easy for the
Dominion, and with Establish Dominion Foothold, they can make is a good 35 point
mission and a good way to get White to the Alpha Quadrant. The problem, however, with
Alpha Quadrant decks, is they are still somewhat slow. Unless you scan your Construct
Depot before attempting it (which is highly advised) you may run into trouble, like Lack
Of Preparation/Borg Ship, causing you to lose some good personnel and a ship.  Also,
after a few missions, you could find yourself low on personnel.  Making the side trip back
to the Gamma Quadrant is time consuming.

This makes Alpha Quadrant Jem’Hadar decks rather slow in the end. However,
Gamma Quadrant decks seem to be fairing better.  White is never a problem in the
Gamma Quadrant and you can get personnel out when you need them. What has
made Gamma Dominion even more popular, though, is Black  Hole. While you sit
back in the Gamma Quadrant, your opponent’s missions are quickly
vanishing, making it very hard for them to do much. Also, a Gamma Dominion deck has
one big advantage: Colony Preparations. After Securing the Intelligence
Operation and completing Colony Preps, you’ll have about 70 points. That means around
3-4 turns of the Colony, and you can have a win. Meanwhile, your opponent’s missions
are vanishing and your tough dilemma combos are keeping them stuck.

This Dominion deck type is very viable, something that should be looked out for. Revolving
Doors on the Black Hole don’t help much because your opponent will obviously be
prepared for them with Wrong Doors (having your Tent closed is very bad) and AU Doors,
downloaded thanks to Space/Time Portal. Perhaps the easiest way is to use Crashes to stop the
Tent from grabbing a Black Hole early on, and perhaps stopping the download of a Colony.
(Though that it can just be played from hand.) It is doubtful they’ll seed a Neutral Outpost
just to get out 10 and 01, so stalling with Crashes should give you ample time to at least
get out your crew and get a mission or two done before Black Hole is out. If you use
self-seeded dilemmas for points, you could grab a second mission and maybe have enough
points to win. A sneaky way to get points if Black Hole comes out is to use Wormholes
and Space/Time Portal to move one of your ships to an opponent’s mission and steal.
Most Dominion players will seed Survey Star System just so they are safe from Balancing
Act. Well, Fair Play can’t stop you from stealing that, so after you get one or two missions
done, move over to SSS and steal it. Maybe putting a Cosmic String Fragment or
Barclays’ there for points, if you considered using one. Ah, the fun of the meta-game, to
decide whether or not to use Cosmic String Fragment in a rare case (though Dominion
Gamma decks may become more popular). Well, at the very least, you can always
self-seed it at your own space mission for the easy points.
 

Cardassian: The Cardassians seemed to have lost a bit of their edge with Dominion, even
though they got several personnel and a ship with it. Stealing had always been one of the
Cardassian’s bigger traits, with their wide variety of skills and the ability to Espionage
anyone except the Romulans. Plans Of The Obsidian Order, along with all the fine
Obsidian Order personnel, made the bulk of this deck, until Dominion came along. Fair
Play absolutely puts this deck back into the binder, making over 75% of the missions out
there unstealable. Sure, the Plans can be used to attempt your own missions, which is
great because the Cardassians can do nearly any mission with their personnel selection, but
the versatility and pure speed of doing your opponent’s is gone. Dominion attempts to
make up for this by giving the Cardies a lot of new personnel. Damar is a good addition if
you know you’ll be using Dukat, but his skills beyond that are only partially fair. Prin is a
very good uncommon, though, and his skill of killing two of the best Bajoran personnel
makes him at least a note worthy addition to most Cardassian decks. Garak is a good
personnel over all, and can save you from tough dilemmas such as Yuta, Flaxian Assassin,
Berserk Changeling, etc... only problem is the fact he is a one shot deal, unless you stock
multiples of him. The remaining personnel fill in gaps of classifications that were missing
from the Cardassians in Dominion. Engineering classification personnel are really only
needed for downloading directly to the Ore Processing Unit, compared to simply
getting them out to the Security Office or downloading them to other sites if they have a
different classification or skill. (Like the Tailor Shop.) The fact the Cardassians got a few
good Medical personnel, mixed in with other skills, is nice though. The Trager is just
another ship, not much of anything with Macet, while the Keldon Advance can see some
good use with an Obsidian Order personnel, who will still be in most Cardie decks,
regardless of the Plans or not. Missions in Dominion, however, are a good thing for the
Cardassians. Bioweapon Ruse and Security Briefing are easy missions for the Cardassians,
especially Bioweapon Reuse, which maybe the easiest 40 pointer out there, beside Quash
Conspiracy. In the end, expect to see a few heavy hitter Cardassian decks, looking for
good speed with Ore Processing and Scans to breeze through their easy missions with a
good mix of skills. (Like Bioweapon Ruse and Alter Records.)
 

Bajoran: The Bajorans, like the Cardassians, got many new personnel in this set, but
unlike the Cardassians, the Bajoran’s main strategy, pre-Dominion, was not affected
much. The Bajoran’s bigger strategies have always seemed to revolve around Deep Space
Nine and also seeding Chamber Of Ministers, both at Bajor. Secure Homeworld is an easy
mission for the Bajor, and the DS9/Chamber combo gave them a great versatility boost to
begin off with. Some of the more successful Bajoran strategies have been a Rinnak Pire
armada or an odd Arguers/Orb deck. With HQ: Return Orb To Bajor and Renewal Scrolls
(and to a lesser extent, Duranja), Bajorans have always had a good scope of versatility.
Dominion adds a little more to that. Kai Winn has a fairly good mix of skills, however, her
download is not that good, with Open Diplomatic Relations already allowing Treaties
to be seeded.

//Editor's Note: This is one of the places where I disagree with R'Mor.  Saving a seed slot is nice; being able to get another treaty if the first one is killed is good (remember, Fed/Baj treaty is seedable without ODR), and she lets you get out a treaty when you need it without the opponent knowing you are using that treaty until then.  //

Orta and Keeve Falar, while not that great skills wise, are huge for attributes
enhancing, just as The Earring Of Li Nalas makes already great personnel attribute wise,
even better. Watch out for Q decks for Bajorans to grow more popular with Keeve Falar,
along with the Emissary. A +4 of Integrity to all Bajoran Civilians and a normal two to
everyone else will make Q very easy for Bajorans to pass. Oh, and the Earring gives you
more points for an already easy mission. Zyree is fair, but will require a let of set up to
make his special skill work (though it can kill a Dominion deck). General Hazar boosts a
fair card, though I would rather put a Tactical Console on an Interceptor myself. The
missions for the Bajoran player in Dominion are only fair, over all. Which is really what
the Bajorans get, fair cards. But with all the strengths that they've had since DS9, not much
can knock them out of the tourney scene.
 

Romulan: Ah, my personnel favorite affiliation. The Rommies are just so versatile, and
have always had a great deal of power and speed since Q-Continuum. They got a lot more
in Dominion, which, well is a great thing. Many could argue (myself included a bit) that
they are coming on the verge of being unbalanced. The most popular pre-Dominion
Romulan strategy in the tourney environment, by far, was a Plans deck. The Romulans
have always had a large mix of personnel, and Plans allowed them to steal your missions
before you even had a good crew out and going. Then, comes along Fair Play and
Romulan stealers are brought back down to the bare minimum.

However, unlike the Cardassians in some ways, the Romulans have always had the speed
and versatility to do their own missions. Covert Installation and Investigate Raid are two of
the easiest missions, with a simple skill requirement on each (Covert being able to be done by only
one personnel, Sirol), attributes, and 35 points, these missions have always been a great
advantage in Romulan decks. Of course, the most well known Romulan mission is Quash
Conspiracy, which can be done by one of six personnel and is worth 40 points! Dominion
has added even more to the versatility of the Romulan speed solver. Lovok and Senator
Vreenak both have a wide assortment of skills and the needed Tal Shiar to make them
both good mission solvers (they join the ranks of personnel such as Vakis and Sirol who
also have a good variety of skills and are great mission solvers), the D’Deridex Advance,
which is an easily staffed ship for the Romulans, T’Rul, who also has a good variety of
skills and an interesting (though not that powerful) special skill, making her a superb
support perosnnel, and Engage Cloak, which allows the D’Deridexs to move almost
anywhere on the spaceline.

However, the biggest boost which the Romulans got with
Dominion was Empok Nor. The Romulans can commander Empok Nor on turn one
(presuming neither player seeds dilemmas at it) with Patelh. The Feds can, too, but they
can’t use Empok Nor to their best advantage because they can not Process Ore. The
dilemmas at Empok Nor are fairly easy, the most common one likely to be Friendly Fire,
which is easily passable with Lore and Roga, or a large mix of other personnel. Garak Has
Some Issues is rare, and you can easily abandon the personnel selected. (Though with the
high Cunning of the Romulans, you may not even have many personnel killed.) Sleeper
Trap is a pain, yes, but Smoke Bombs can get you through that. Once a Romulan player
takes control of Empok Nor, expect pure speed to ensure from there on, with Ore
Processing being a deadly tool in the hands of a Romulan player, who can cycle through
their small decks (Romulans normally have no more then 35 cards in their typical speed
deck) very quickly to get out what they need. All in all, with Empok Nor, a large amount
of multi-skilled and classification personnel, and several non-aligneds and other personnel
(Lore, Lorcano, Galen, Sister’s Of Duras, Tallera, etc...) working best with the Romulans,
it is no wonder why some players consider them a bit overpowered. One wonders what
Blaze Of Glory will give them...
 

Borg: Much controversy has arisen over the Borg with the release of Enhanced First
Contact and Seven Of Nine, with several players believing they are now too powerful, which is
ironic since right after First Contact, everyone was convinced that the Borg were too
weak.

// Well, most people were... ;-)  -Ed //

Well, lets look at how the Borg were pre-EFC. The most popular, and really only,
Borg deck in the tournament environment is the Borg Scout Vessel stealer. I won’t go
into details about it, everyone reading this article I am sure knows how it works, but the
real fact was Cube decks were dead. Enhanced First Contact revived them. But did it
really make them too powerful? The number one problem of Cube decks was Computer
Crash always stopping them from getting much out. (BTW, do not I don’t plan to rehash
everything said about EFC again, just quickly overview it.) The Complink Drone prevents
that, now making it so that at least a Cube deck can get off the ground reasonably. Barriel
and Dukat offer very little to a Borg player, with skills already commonly seen on the
drones (except Dukat’s Treachery, which is good for saving your Queen from Unscientific
Method). Gowron Of Borg is powerful, yes, but seems to be a bit of a one shot deal with
him, after he uses his special skill to destroy a ship (which most smart players will either
cloak and get far away with Engage Cloak or use an STP to escape from), his skills are
nothing special. Tomalak Of Borg may be the best of the counterparts, with the three skills
that you want from Locutus, and a great special skill. However, his special skill is best in
the BSV Stealer, where his skills are of no use, so it balances out a bit. Service The
Collective is a good speed addition to a Cube deck, but nothing too powerful (simply
probing the turn you scout isn’t a broken ability at all, and requires some planning with the
Borg). The Reassimlation Drone is extremely specific and specialized, and Sphere
Encounter is pure defense. Assimilate Distictiveness's first function is purely for battle
orientated decks with Assimilate Counterpart; the second part is fairly weak. Population 9
Billion requires a deck to be built around it before its effects are out and going, which
gives you time to get crew out. We Are The Borg, yes, is powerful, I do not deny that, but
it has draw backs in the long run of slowly dwindling you out. Seven Of Nine, well,
everyone knows she is the key of making a second Cube deck come out, and her card
drawing power will help you a bit, but she is not essential, a Cube can be out be out by the
fourth or fifth turn without her. In the end, IMHO, EFC balances out Cube decks, but
look out for Borg decks, they are by far the most popular affiliation out there. Look below
for some tips on dealing with them.
 
 

Well, that was a long section above, and we aren’t finished yet. ;-) This next section briefly
looks over a few of the more powerful and popular stratergies, and how to prepare agianst
them:

--Q: Even with Hide And Seek as a threat, Q decks are still seeing some good use.
Actually, to some decks, Hide And Seek isn’t sufficient enough. It only works against one
self-seeded Q and, more importantly, it takes up a seed space. Several players have
stopped using Hide And Seek because Q is not popular enough to warrant it in often
enough, it seems, it is doubtful Q will ever be that popular with Hide And Seek hanging
around. But this bring up the problem: to use Hide And Seek in your deck, possibly
wasting the seed space, or not? Actually, Hide And Seek is not that powerful. After
Assign Mission Specialist’s errata, Q decks have become mega-crew thing. This basically
means that even if Hide And Seek ends up hitting them, they are still likely to breeze past
the dilemmas, which isn’t a good thing. Other ways to stop Qs are to use a Q-Flash,
which, for sure, has been noted by now. The effects of the Flash are damaging, but are very
rarely a permanent nuisance. (e.g. Penalty Box is one that sticks.) That, and more Q decks
are preparing for Flashes with the likes of Guinan and other Flash nullifier. One of the
more sneaky ways to get rid of the Q is trigger it your self with your personnel. Sure, you
opponent will re-arrange the spaceline, but it is worth it to get rid of the Q. Of course, if
your opponent’s missions don’t have the same icons as your affiliation, no help there.
Also, note that not all Q decks look so. Most players expect to see high point Bajoran and
Federation missions, but in fact, I’ve seen several Borg Cube/Establish Gateway decks use
Q, especially with their Counterpart and Service The Collective, to allow a lot of speed.
Just be on the look out for it.

--Rouge Borg Mercenaries: Rouge Borg didn’t get much of a hit with the
release of Dominion, except Enhanced First Contact, which only helps the Borg, but I
have always been surprised to seem them out and about pre-Dominion. Intruder Force
Field makes them much harder to use, and Goddess Of Empathy saves you for a couple of
turns against them. So why have they always been so powerful? The simple reason is
because all of those cards were commonly seen in the Tent, and Crashes (or Kevin
Uxbridge) would stop them from coming out and working. Some players believe
Dominion will take care of that problem, with 10 and 01. One should not get too cocky,
because until 10 and 01 do come into play, Rouge Borg are a serious stalling problem, and
it does take time to get back on your feet after so many turns wasted to them. Distortion
Of The Space/Time Continuum makes them have to really use two Rouge Borg to catch you,
which could save you a turn later on. (DOSTC is a suggested card for most Tents, it just
can save you at a pivotal moment.) Of course, getting 10 and 01 one out early will take
care of Rouge Borg all together.

--10 and 01 and Computer Crash: 10 and 01 one offers a simple solution to a problem
that has been plaguing several decks: you’ll need to have an important download or Tent
to get the game rolling, but then your opponent Crashes you. Other decks use
Crashes as defense, like in a Cytherians/Cosmic String or Rouge Borg deck, to stop you
from getting the counter card (e.g. Intermix Ratio or Intruder Force Field) from out of
your Tent. With the release of 10 and 01, and its counterpart from EFC, the Complink
Drone, Crashes are becoming harder to use. However, this does not mean they will fade
from the tournament scene entirely, just as Oof! and The Line Must Be Drawn Here did
not ruin the countering trio. While the Complink Drone can be seeded, 10 and 01 one can
not be, which means to get them out you’ll have to draw them from your deck. (Having
them in your Tent does no good at all if your trying to get rid of Crashes, now does it? ;-))
Presuming you have a 35 cards draw deck and 2 Bynars in it, you have less then a 20%
chance of getting them in your opening hand or your next three card draws. The Bynars,
beside nullifying Crashes, are only good in armada type decks looking to use the download
of Bynars Weapon Enhancement. In other terms, this makes the Bynars more of a
threatening card. Players who used several Crashes (like 8 or 9, which was common in
defensive strategy decks like Borg Scout Vessel Swarm Stealer, which still do use that
much) will likely lay back a little on the number that they use, in case 10 and 01 come out
(or the Complink was seeded) and a bunch of their seed spots become wasted. Of course
if they Bynars or the Complink later are killed, lose their skills from a Brain Drain, etc...
then you can Crash freely, but it is doubtful that they will do much more then sit around at
your Outpost (unless a Borg player is doing the two turn staffed Cube strategy with Seven
Of Nine) to avoid dilemmas and Brain Drain is a one turn fix. In the end, plan to see a few
Crashes in decks (like 3 or 4) if opponent tries a big download and Bynars or the
Complink aren’t out, but expect them to decrease in usage a bit later on. (Of course, some
players may presume they Bynars will become like Balancing Act, more of a threat card.
Well, that works good for saving space in your deck, but if you get hit by a heavy Crasher
or a Balancing Act in the Tent with Q’s Planet, you’ll feel pretty bad, but that is the fun of
the meta-game, trying to relize if people will use Bynars and/or Crashes at all.)

--Empok Nor: Empok Nor is a great boon for Romulan, Klingon, and to a lesser extent,
Federation players. If a Romulan or Klingon player can be doing Ore Processing and Ops
download by Turn 1 (which the Romulans can do with a simple seeded AMS),
things could easily sway in their direction. This is different from the Cardassians, who
desperately need the speed boost, compared to the Romulans whoa already have great
speed, and Empok Nor just makes it ridiculous. The easiest way to stop Empok Nor from
becoming your opponent’s, of course, is dilemmas. But exactly how efficient are Empok
Nor dilemmas? Friendly Fire is likely to be the most common one, but its requirements are
fairly easy (of the top of my head, I can think of about six personnel who have
SECURITY/Leadership on them, and getting two isn’t hard in a Rommie deck with
Tallera, Lore, and Roga), but would take a few turns to build up, making it a good stall.
Garak Has Some Issues is difficult to complete, however, the Romulans and Klingons
have several of their Cunning personnel around the same level (6-7 for Klingons, around 8
for Romulans) that most players can avoid GHSI on an Empok Nor by using around the
same Cunning level, saving personnel from deaths, making GHSI a simple one turn
stopper. (At the worst, after a couple die, you can just move the infected person away
from , abandoning the person infected at another site, and then attempt again.) Sleeper
Trap could cause you to lose some personnel, however, if you bring along some of the
higher Strength personnel, including Sister’s Of Duars and Lore (or just use Smoke
Bombs to get of to the entire thing), there won’t be much of a problem, if you run into
that dilemma (which I doubt you will). Also, another big problem with Empok Nor, is the
delimmas are harder to work into normal dilemma combos outside of Empok Nor itself. Once
your opponent commandeers the station, you’ll never get it for your own, unless you can kill
his crew.  So, in the end, the easiest way to prevent your opponent from
taking control of Empok Nor is to at least consider GHSI and/or Friendly Fire, and make
sure they can be worked into your other dilemma combos. This will buy you some time
before they get out their personnel and do Ore Processing, which is plenty of time for you
to get going. (Of course, they could also be going by then, too, but without their Empok
Nor advantage.)

--Black Hole: Black Hole has returned with a vengeance with the release of the Dominion,
an affiliation that, if needed, can stay just in the Gamma Quadrant and let a Black Hole suck
away at your missions in the Alpha Quadrant. Not fun. Revolving Door is not that
effective, either, because they are well prepared for it with an AU Door and Wrong Doors
to take you out. However, the other strategies to stop Black Hole are good because they
work somewhat efficient even if Black Hole isn’t out. A few Wormholes and a seeded
STP or two will get you into the Gamma Quadrant. As noted in the Dominion affiliation
balance above, there are always at least one or two missions in the Gamma Quadrant
(normally a Survey Star System, though if you do it early on you can take their all valuable
Colony Preparations). After you complete a mission or two of yours before Black Hole
comes out (you’ll have time to hopefully get a crew and Scan out), Wormhole out of there
and do your opponent’s mission, maybe seeding a Barclays’ or two there. Also, Crashes
work very well, if you seeded some, because it is doubtful they’ll add a Neutral Outpost
just to get the Bynars out, and this will give you sometime to get things rolling. A more,
um, aggressive way is to seed two universal Spaces of your own and Tent for your own
Black Hole. Now your opponent in the Gamma Quadrant, whether Borg or Dominion,
will be facing down the barrel of their own Black Hole, and they’ll be in serious trouble.
The two Spaces, if they aren’t using the Gamma Quadrant, can be used to twindle down
the Alpha Quadrant, killing both you and your opponent slowly, or just to use as a road
block right after where you think their Outpost will be.

--Nightmare: Ah, yes, Nightmare. We all have seen Nightmare/Thought Fire decks, which
build up your hand very quickly with a Traveler and then make you run into Thought Fire,
using Brian Drains to get rid of your Empathy, or having Nightmare do that. The easiest
way to deal with this deck is to stock a Kev in the Tent (or better yet, a Mercy Kill), and
take out Traveler, but it will be back, so try to empty your hand out quickly if possible
before you next card draw, keeping yourself down to a minimum against Nightmare. Red
Alert! will help, if you can get it from your Tent (no Bynars for you, they’ll take it out of
your hand if they see, and Crash everything in sight.
 
Slow seeding, however, will give you an advantage by letting you
possibly seed over your opponent’s Borg Ship dilemma before they seed theirs. If not, you
can seed some of your own dilemmas over the Thought Fire, maybe a Barclays’ just for
the points. (Or if using a Beware Of Q, definitely seed a Pla-Net at your Outpost mission.)
Plexing also works, if you can get it out, though, that is the problem. In the end, the
various strategies of emptying your hand (especially with stuff like Remodulation) works
the best.

--Borg: Admit it, everyone is trying the Borg in the tourney environment, and they are
likely to be the most used. A simple way to prepare against the mega Cube decks is by
preparing dilemmas that may hurt them a bit, but work in normal dilemma combos at the
same time. Cytherians work great, by making them travel rather far for no points.
Anything that stops for a turn before they can Adapt (and isn’t too easy to pass with skill
sharing) works nicely. Also, a Brain Drain in the Tent can be used at crucial moment to
help you against them. Say they are about to hit your Unscientific Method/Yuta/Barclays’
combo, but have Dukat present. Simple solution: on your turn before, get the Brain Drain
from out of the tent and Brian Drain Dukat after they announce scouting. Now, if the
Queen is aboard, she will become victim of Unscientific Method. Oh, and while I mention it,
Yuta is a great anti-Borg dilemma, with the Queen, Counterpart, and Seven’s number being
easy to pick out. Assimilate Homeworld is very time consuming for your opponent
(getting the pre-made Counterpart out, if one exists for your affiliation, and then having to
scout a planet, harder then space, and getting a perfect probe) that you’ll probably have
time to get a crew out before it happens. What one should be worried about, however, is
BSV Stealer. Everyone knows how is works, with taking your mission with an
Radioactive Garbage Scow/Cryo/Horga’hn/Tommie combo, then snatching another with
RGB/Cryo/Betazed Gift Box in it, then going to the Gamma Quadrant with Adapts and
Countermeasure Drones if you have no more missions to steal. This type of stealing isn’t
stopped by Fair Play, either. The easiest way is to try to get a Bynars out from your deck
and stop their Crashes, getting your Devil from the Tent and getting rid of the Horga’hn.
Typically, they’ll have one Amanda Rogers in the deck to get out with the BGB to guard
their Horga’hn, but if you get The Devil before the BGB, they are in trouble. (Unless, of
course they get the BGB first, but that will give you some extra turns early on that way.)
You can easily do your missions which they stole, however, Mission Debriefing will slow
you down a bit. (Don’t be fooled by a Sphere Encounter, most of the time it is just to
scare you off.) Also, BSV dilemma combos are usually only two dilemmas, which means
red-shirts can normally breeze by unless they use something like Flaxian Assassin/Odo’s
Cousin). Meanwhile, they’ll be in the Gamma Quadrant, it will only take tow turns to
scout, one to probe. The real advantage for you is they will have to try to keep you from getting
The Devil from your Tent. (Another strategy beside Bynars is just keep Tenting or
downloading like with Spacedoor every turn, see if they’ll waste the Crash or not, which
will give you a few more turns of speed compared to them in the long run.)
 

Well, this article has certainly covered alot, but there is one more thing I would like to
look at. There are several cards which I find very useful in almost any deck (several of my
Borg decks are the ones without most of these cards, but even then they use several of
them). Each is followed by a very short comment:

--Space/Time Portal: Ah, most of my decks seed at least two of this card. It is so
incredibly versatile, from getting out an AU Door (which can be used for many situations)
and the return to ship to hand has saved me many times over.

Empok Nor: If your playing Romulan or Klingon, this is a must, but read the above of this
article for more on that.

Scans: Nearly essential in now-a-day mission solving with all those difficult dilemma
combos in existence.

Crashes: Expect to see a downpour in the use of the Bynars in the next month or so.

10 and 01: Expect to see more Crashes in the next month, so take your opponent off
guard.

Tent: Ugh, it would take me 20 pages to explain that alone. ;-)

Six Missions: Geez, wonder why ? ;-)

If you would like to contact me regarding this article (and I would appreciate comments
and questions) E-mail me at lichten1@ix.netcom.com.