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Building A Bajoran Deck by Jade Monkey Hello all. Way back when I began a series of Bajoran reviews. I stopped because, at the time, their strengths seemed pretty well known. Its comes to my attention however that nowadays, people seem to regard my favorite affiliation as weak. So today, I dispel that myth and explore in depth the Bajoran deck that I know so well and that has convinced me of their power. Good deck building starts at home and there's no better example of this than the Bajorans. The Bajor Region provides them with access to their two best facilities, a place to return their orbs, a good place to use their best ship, and a plethora of easy missions, and it is where I usually base my Bajoran decks. First things first, let's talk missions: Inside the region we have: Acquire Illicit Explosives, which can be beaten by Tahna Los alone Relocate Settlers, one for Miss Nerys to knock down Refuse Immigration, Vedek Winn provides all the skills at once or you can get them with Bareil and Kira or Krim Alter Records, Bajor itself, Kira provides most everything and with a little backup from Krim, you're there. A little further away from home, the non-Bajor Region missions: Orb Negotiations, Kira, Bareil, The Emissary, Vedek Dax, or Opaka can nail this one on their own. Investigate Coup, General Krim can take it down as can Kira with a little support. So there you have the mission selection. A handful of personnel able to beat all six missions. They're all fairly low point-wise so you'll probably have to do 3, but that's okay because the other thing this deck excels at is busting through dilemmas. To elaborate: Founder Secret: Odo's got you covered. Berserk Changeling: Take your pick, Kira and Odo together will nail it, as will Mora Pol by himself. Scientific Method: Mora and his buddy Surmak have you covered here. Aphasia Device: Surmak nukes it. Odo's Cousin: Mora + the Geo from Shakaar or Li Nalas. Gravimetric Distortion: Kira. 'Nuff said. Primitve Culture: Prylar Mond'll do or if you want to use people who also help with other stuff, Bareil and Tahna In the Pale Moonlight: Vedek Winn all the way I believe we are, perhaps, starting to get the point. Bajorans slice through dilemmas like a hot knife through butter and the beautiful thing is, the ones that kill the walls, are the same ones who beat your missions, meaning you cut down on the personnel you cannot afford to lose. In fact, I'll let you in on a little something I discovered. Eight Bajorans, count 'em 8, can get you through virtually every wall dilemma in the game and beat all six of your missions. Here for your use, is The List, the virtually invincible Bajorans. Bareil Antos Odo Kira Nerys General Krim Tahna Los Surmak Ren Mora Pol Li Nalas There you have it. Those eight make a strong nucleus to a deck. Of course, eight personnel won't make a deck for you. You don't want them to die tragic deaths at the hands of pointless killer dilemmas which is why we redshirt like crazy. A few key things supplement our redshirting: Orbs and Headquarters. Orbs... ah, orbs. The one thing non-Bajoran players fixate on when they try to play Bajoran. While very nice, they are not essential to all Bajoran decks. They are, however, fun in this one. Get the HQ: Return Orbs to Bajor out of the Tent early, preferably Turn 1 or 2; make sure there are enough Tents to get one that early: trust me, its important. Turn 1, grab Kira with Ops. Turn 2 drop the HQ for free and grab the Orb of Wisdom from under Bajor, seeding a Sarjenka behind it to stop you so you won't have to face actual dilemmas. Basically this gives you 15 points, three card draws and a free card play every turn. You won't be using it every turn because you won't be able to draw cards most of the time due to the Ops downloading but you should have a good number of Bajorans in your hand by now and this'll help you get them out a bit quicker, giving you that edge in speed. Of course, it'd be dumb to use one free reporting method and not two, so why not add the Chamber of Minister. But wait, you say, there's only seven (soon eight) people that play for free there! Ah, but what a group they are. First, your two universals, Vedek Sorad and Minister Rozahn. These two make truly great redshirts with Leadership, Diplomacy, Stellar Cartography, MEDICAL and SCIENCE between, what more could you ask. Then we have Bareil Antos, one of the Magic Eight, he'll be in anyway, Vedek Winn, very useful for Refuse Immigration and a number of other little things, Kai Opaka to protect your orb and with enough useful skills to be a fun redshirt, and Jaro Essa who I find a bit extraneous but who you might throw in to further justify the HQ. A useful group of support personnel to die gloriously in place of your important personnel. Some other support personnel I favor but who don't play for free unless the Orb's around: Rom, Shakaar, Lenaris Holem, Jabara, Colonel Day, Suna, Razka Karn. Feel free to play around with this bit of the deck and figure out which personnel are best tailored to local dilemma combos and to your particular needs. The last main element of the deck is, indeed, the most important yet. If you don't have it, you've probably wasted your time reading this review as I don't think the Bajorans are for you right now. I speak of course of their stronghold, the great and mighty Deep Space Nine. Sure its great to have such a compact amount of important people in the deck but what if they don't come up early on, I'll have to dilute my deck with card drawing engines, worry about the old Rakal Shuffle, generally put up with a lot of hassle. Friend, your problems are solved. DS9 and most especially Ops are integral to the Bajorans; they provide instant access to all the important personnel we've discussed and they are the reason this deck works as well as it does. Basically, any wall you hit can be adapted to with almost Borg-like ease next turn just by downloading the personnel to beat it. Founder Secret just popped up its ugly head? Looks like it's time to grab Odo. That Berserk Changeling giving you trouble? Time for Mora to make an appearance. Its uses are unbelievable and most certainly should not be overlooked. Basically the way I play the deck is this: Get out the Orb and a few free card plays early. Spend the rest of the game downloading one personnel you need every turn. You essentially lose card drawing abilities but since you have access to almost every personnel and ship in your deck, it shouldn't be much of a problem. The numerous dual classifications of the Bajorans provide access to at least a little of every classification while still using only your six seeded sites. I know Ops is fairly commonly seen and its unusual to rant this much about it but it is especially effective in this deck since most dilemmas and missions can be taken down with only one or two people, meaning you don't need lots of personnel, just very specific ones that you can get to them exactly when you need them. It's the heart of the deck. Those are the essentials on how the deck runs. I'll just add one or two more things and then let you get back to your busy lives. Ships. Freighters, whether Bajoran or the Xepolite variety can be dropped for free at the ports, I don't usually include one, for sure no more than one but it depends on your style and your need for ships. Assault Vessels will provide the Tractor Beam to get you by scows, so one should probably be in the Tent. The ship for this deck though, is the Interceptor. Since you rarely leave your region, its RANGE is a huge boon and its ability to land will keep you safe and sound from armadas. You can even get the Emissary out and keep reporting people after they've taken out DS9 and the Chamber and you can even use Ops to download the Emissary, making this plan nearly impossible to stop. You see how it all begins to come together. If its personnel battle you're worried about instead, Shakaar and Neela will make your opponent think twice about boarding your station and might buy you the time you need to win. I'd say that about covers it. Hopefully I've dispelled some of the anti-Bajoran sentiment. It's a fairly simple deck actually, when built right and it can be very fast and very powerful. Play around and see what you can do with our purple friends, have fun, and astonish opponents with your prowess with this 'weak' affiliation. Happy hunting and may the Prophets walk with you. Jade Monkey Beware the Empire in Y2K