Fast, faster, Voyager

This Strategy-Note article was written by openCards user Chairman Nilva.

"Dropping the Voyager at Caretaker's Array with Janeway and Chakotay aboard". A phrase heard at every other tourney since the appearance of Captain's Log and - thus - the Voyager affiliation.

The older players among us will remember the time when Voyager came out in First Edition and the whole game was turned upside down - all the elder Alpha powers becomming unplayable seemingly over night. This mistake has not been repeated in Second Edition.

Despite being one of the most powerful affiliations in the game besides TNG-Fed, DS9-Fed, Starfleet, the Borg and since the recent expansion the Romulans with their mass discard via Gal Gath' thong, the Voyager affiliation can be defeated by any other affiliation. At least if the dilemma pile can compensate the Voyager speed advantage.

There are two different Voyager deck types raging through the tournament scene. There's the Voyager-all-space-deck and the "3 planets + Caretaker"-version. Both versions share some general advantages. With the Voyager and their mobile headquarters out, it is very improbable to be stranded. Finding Our Way on the other hand lets you download a Voyager each round, which supports dilemma strategies around Gorgan or Tactical Disadvantage.

Some popular dilemmas cannot reach their full potential or simply do not work due to the fact that the Voyager Affiliation does not possess a headquarters mission (A Royal Hunt, Agonizing Encounter, etc.). The competetiveness of an affiliation can be measured by the quality of its personnel (cost-use-calculation, skillpool, attributes fitting to the missions), their cheaters (prevent stops or kills, generate skills) and available easy missions. If you check those three points, you must draw the conclusion that Voyager is by any means competitive.

The personnel available covers a wide variety of skills, and reaches acceptable numbers in cunning and integrity, including personnel like Cavit or Carey which can enhance their attributes. Cavit is one of the best uncommon personnel besides Chakotay in the game. Janeway could defuse every Trabe Grenade she encounters or calm down every rogue Gomtuu-being in the galaxy. Add some helpful Non-Aligneds (depending on your design Lore or Vic Fontaine) and the missions become solvable with 4-5 personnel.

The Voyager affiliation has also access to all kinds of cheating. Cluttering Irrelevancies could add skills and attributes to the Doctor and each Non-Aligned Hologram. The Doc also helps with serious, grave injuries but is too vain for minor injuries (2- and 1-cost-dilemmas).

Preventing stopping with Chakotay-BbtC is no problem, smashing each TT-stopper pile. Additionally each dilemma manipulator in your core has an extra purpose which counteracts the speed disadvantage when you didn't draw the Voyager in your opening hand and have to play events. In both deck versions surplus points can be scored and used for At What Cost?, Endangered, Kevin Uxbridge or Amanda Rogers.

Let's take a look at those two deck types.

The Long Journey Home

With the event The Long Journey Home this deck type doesn't need to complete space missions. In general this makes about a third of the opponent's dilemma pile plain unusable. On the other hand you have to complete four missions. It is notable that those space missions are not easy to solve (cunning >36 on Collect Omicron Paticles, high span) and show contradicting attribute requirements (Battle Reconnaissance0 = strength, Explore Micro-Wormhole = cunning, Instruct Advanced Drone = integrity). Shuttles are important to prevent mass attempts on the overcrowded Voyager (the picture on Crowd Control is no coincidence). And The Long Journey Home is an event which can be easily destroyed if played out early. But even keeping it in hand till the completion of the last mission is risky with Amandas, Grav-Plating Traps and the Gal Gath'thong around. I regard the three-Planet-plus-Caretaker-version to be much more effective.

Exploring Delta Planets

The second deck type solves the Caretaker first. Attempts can be expected in the third or fourth round. After solving the Caretaker parts of the points are invested in At What Cost? with the result that about 12 people are played out, including guys like Vic or Chakotay. The Integrity-Planets are easy solvable with 4-5 persons and so can be attempted with two teams. So after solving the Caretaker (a very easy mission) the deck is able to speed up very fast. After solving another mission you are able to play the Tox Uthat and start an additional attempt with Vic reducing opponent's chances of a good dilemma draw. So solving four missions isn't actually a disadvantage after all. Flanked with the dilemma manipulating events this solver is one of the fastest on the interstellar market. The best version of this decktype I saw in action was played by Marc Schütze and the decklist can be found on stccg-turnier.de.

Countermeasures?

I lost the last two matches against Voyager decks in Bremen and Magdeburg. So I'm quite helpless on this point, too. In Bremen I lost because my good old TT-low-cost-stopper-pile could not resist Chukky the supercheater. Besides that my deck was far too slow. In Magdeburg I tried to compensate and improve. So I teched my dilemma pile and build a very fast TNG-Cadet-Kirk deck and felt quite secure. But what is the best dilemma pile good for when you can't play dilemmas? So I miscounted the cost of Agonizing Encounter, thought that An Issue of Trust would suffice till Chakotay lectured me on that one, did not take Cluttering into Calculation and underestimated the medical knowledge of the Doctor. So I can only give hints no prescription.

Take all Voyager cheaters into calculation!

Keep in mind that the Doctor prevents kills of high cost dilemmas without being stopped.
Play safe and always assume the Voyager player is holding a Cluttering in his or her hand.
If you are using a stopper dilemma pile try to take Chakotay out of the attempt early (An Issue of Trust, The Caretaker's Guests).

Play as few Dilemmas as possible

A golden rule for the whole game, which has to be taken into calculation especially for the Voyager Affiliation with their easy planets and the Caretaker. It's essential to stall the Caretaker attempt as long as possible to avoid the speed offensive after the Voyager deck first scores points. Include Manipulators like Unexpected or Machinations. Caretak's Guests, Fesarius Bluff and Tactical Disadvantage with big ships are excellent choices. Vault of Tomorrow combined with Timescape, Excalbian Drama and Skeleton Crew could slow the planet attempts down.

Kill them all!

If you finally have enough of this grab the Klingons, Call to Arms will be out soon! I did once observe an online game of two American top players in which a Klingon player flew by in round four or five and killed four with All-out-War plus Ferocity. The Voyager player conceded, totally frustrated (Greetings to Thomas). The mobile headquarters could also cheer up Infiltrators and Borg Assimilation decks. But with those decks you always have to keep in mind that against a normal speed solver in a tourney you would lose and so despite beating the Voyager deck you'll end up several places below those Voyager decks. But sending Janeway to the discard pile is always a good deed.

When is the Voyager completely helpless? Destaffed in the Alpha Quadrant. Just find a way to carry the ship there's possible.

I hope you enjoyed reading this. Critique can always be send to sepp_kirstein@freenet.de.