Hello everybody. It was time for Texas states this year, and it was near where I live, so I went. It turned out to be a good idea, as I won :) I played a modified version of my old Bareil/Dual-Mission Borg deck, with the main changes being the addition of Tarchannen Study and changing my main counterpart to the Locutus I got in the Fajo Collection which I acquired for my birthday :). At the last minute, I tossed Tomalak of Borg and Bareil of Borg in my tent in case I felt like stealing some planets and homeworlds. Bareil never moved out of the tent (neither did most of my cards), but Tomalak got more use then Locutus. Over the course of the day, I assimilated Earth twice, Romulus three times, a Ferengi Trading Post once, and I got both Palteth and Takket as drones. People were badmouthing my deck after the second round. I decided to take that as a good sign :) I traded for a Seven right before the tourney, and she is MUCH more useful then I had originally though. I got Seven and Boheeka for my second WB Sela and my second copy of Quark's Bar :D Anyway, on to the games!

Round 1: Gregory Claudy: Ferengi w/o DS9

He was playing with all three dual types, also, so I got several replacement missions. I especially liked seeing my one PNZ at the end of the spaceline :-) He thought that you could attempt S/P missions using only a crew while you used Establish Trade Route, but a quick call for the TD stopped that :-) I mean, come on, S/P missions without an away team? That's for Borg only! He couldn't draw enough MEDICAL to steal the Runabout Search I had scouted, and he didn't have the SCIENCE to pass my many, many Scientific Methods. He seeded his Trading Post at Deliver Supplies with hopes of stealing it, but I assimilated that mission as my first Objective :) He loaded everyone on the Krayton and tried to complete Tarhcannen Study with ETR, but I used Seven to change my card play to a card draw to A Change Of Plans with the Queen to a download of Eliminate Starship :) He couldn't rebuild, and I had time to Assimialte Earth and pass both Objectives at Tarchannen Study for the win. So far, I'm at 2(+100)

Round 2: Peter Latshaw: Federation w/ one BIG ship

I thought he was playing Fed AMS and I was unsure about my chances, but then he played Bynars Weapons Enhancement on his first turn. I got Earth seeded at the end of the spaceline and got Locutus out early, so he was forced to battle me with a Sao Paulo with stats of 8-21-26 or something like that (He had out Metaphasic Shields, 3 BWE, Captain's Log with Ross, and a TACTICAL CONSOLE (I've never seen that card played. It was amusing to see it :-))) With Locutus, obviously, that wasn't enough, even if Crimson Forcefield did stop my tactic. I took Earth soon after that, and he was forced to send people on suicide runs at my drones on planets. He had out ~6 people and one ship when I assimilated Earth, so he really didn't have much of a chance. Full win. I'm now up to 4(+200) Not bad :)

Round 3: Christopher Briesch: Romulan Armada (The two words I most feared)

This was a TENSE game. He had both HQs out, and Creetak was, unfortunately, in his opening hand :-( He had 2 staffed D'Deridex orbiting his homeworld when I got to the AQ, and I was scared away from Assimilating his homeworld. In retrospect, I should have assimilated it, died to the Warbirds, Tented for Regenerate, use LLTQ to get a new Queen, and slowly won. Instead, I flew to the end of the spaceline and did nothing for 4 turns. I don't know why! I forgot about Tomalak's cloak, too. That would've been helpful :-P In the end, he solved Study Lonka Pulsar for 45 points and Quash Conspiracy for 40, while I had 75 from a dual-type and some random mission I took. On his last turn, he sent over 2 SCIENCE and 2 SECURITY to pass my Dangerous Liaisons, lost someone to UnMethod (I swapped a 4th one of those in for my Borg Ship right before the tourney. If I hadn't, He would have won right then), and was stopped by Scientific Method. He had 2 SCIENCE on another ship there, and would've won if he had all 4 on one ship (he wasn't sure if I had Borg Ship or UnMethod, and he planned for Borg Ship). On my last turn, I noticed that Romulus was within my 8 RANGE. I went over, blew through my New Essentialists/Borg Servo/Dead End combo, flipped Service the Collective, and probed. Awaken. I win, 100-85. I would've won by more if I had noticed he AMSed to his HQ (he had no outpost). Sigh. Oh, well, a win's a win. I'm now at 6(215) I was told that, if I won the next round, I would've been guaranteed the tournament win. That's a nice thing to hear :)

Round 4: Jerry Jackson: Romulan mission solver, no Office

This was my deck at its best. Turn 6, I had Romulus assimilated. It would've been 5 if he didn't have a Distortion Field :) He had Vakis, Lovok, the Apnex, and (I think) R'Mor out before Romulus was gone. He was then locked out of the game. He reported his few NAs, and I went through a Dual-type and a planet for the win. He never had a chance :) I'm at 8(315) I'm pretty much guaranteed the win now. People were asking which prize I would choose :)

Round 5: Simon Gao: Romulan mission solver armada...I think

He didn't get enough out for me to really tell what he was playing. Simon wasn't too happy about playing me. Apparently homeworld assimilation is "unfun" ;-) It's easy to avoid if you don't have any HQs, so it must be balanced ;-) Romulus was gone soon, and he got 40 points at Covert Installation with Parem and Sirol. Note to self: change easily stolen planet combo to a different combo. He sent some Romulans aboard the cube on kamikaze runs, and I won the same way I always did: Assimilate Homeworld, Dual-Type, and Assimilate Planet. 10(375) He would've passed another mission if he hadn't sent Galen over to my cube. Never waste SCIENCE like that :)

Round 6: Geoff Midler: Ferengi bonus points

I went through a dual-type REALLY quickly, and could've won even faster, but I wasted a few turns trying to tent for an Intermix Ratio to up my differential. He was swearing a good bit at this, but 'twas all in good fun. This was the only game where I didn't use my Assimilate Homeworld. 12(475)

I won by a LOT! I believe the second place was at least 100 behind me :) Second place was Jerry Jackson, he took the Locutus of Borg that I passed up. I took the mint FE and my $10 gift certificate. Bought a Reflections pack and 2 DS9, got a foil Devastator AGAIN, Pallra (YES!!!!!!!!) And Yeto (Double-YES!!!!!!!!!!!). The only prize not taken was DNA Metamorphosis. We had 21 people show up, and about half of them were Romulan. Tomalak of Borg is now a fixture in my Tent :) All in all, it was fun. Still not sure if I can make it to continentals, but I might. Now where's that trophy? ;-)

by Yoda's Evil Twin