"Clash of the Titans" is a series of tournament reports from Titan, our gaming venue overlooking scenic Elk Avenue in downtown Elizabethton, Tennessee.

Eight players participated in the Clash of the Titans for April 6, 2002; seven finished the tournament. I was playing a Kazon/NA armada deck designed to get out a staffed Kazon Warship and two Olarras by turn two (unenhanced WEAPONS of 29 + Bynars Weapon Enhancement = 35; my Battle Bridge side deck was filled with Attack Wings for another +4 ATTACK bonus). There was also a U.S.S. Dauntless in the deck — I should’ve left the U.S.S. Equinox in as I had originally planned, because the Dauntless can’t be carried aboard the Kazon Warship. In any case, my goal was to destroy opponent’s facilities, then solve missions at my leisure. I seeded three Alpha Quadrant missions (Covert Installation II, Excavation II, Search and Rescue) and two Space-Time Portals to supplement my stock of Wormholes and make round-tripping through the Alpha and Delta Quadrants nice and easy.

In our local metagame I associate Nick with Romulans, and he didn’t disappoint me this day. Nick was playing a Federation/Romulan treaty deck with Empok Nor, two mission IIs with outposts, Office of the Proconsul, Continuing Committee, and Office of the President — six facilities, three of them headquarters. What’s an armada to do?

My first move was to destroy Empok Nor (turn 2). Then I used personnel battle to kill Reginald Barclay and Ambassador Krajensky on Earth (turn 3), to shut down Visit Cochrane Memorial (Nick had already used his seeded Defend Homeworld, and I gambled that he didn’t have a second one stashed somewhere). For most of his first four turns, Nick was just reporting personnel and trying to keep them hidden from my armada; the Future Enterprise came out on his fourth turn. By turn 5 I had destroyed the built-in outpost at Investigate Anomaly II. On turn 6 I reported the U.S.S. Dauntless with crew to Caretaker’s Array and moved it to the Alpha Quadrant to assist. Nick had decloaked the Future Enterprise on his fifth turn, and my ships blew it up with a nice complement of personnel aboard. On turn 8 I finished off Nick’s other mission II outpost. By turn 11 the Office of the President was gone; on turns 12 and 13 I damaged each of the Romulan headquarters. Once Nick dephased the Apnex to pick up his personnel, my ships destroyed it. On the next two turns I went ahead and destroyed the other two headquarters. Tripping back to the DQ courtesy of the Badlands, I completed Liberation (30 + 5 AMS), then back to the AQ for Covert Installation II (30 + 5 Alien Parasites/REM Fatigue), then back to the DQ for Corner Enemy Ship (40) — all in two turns. A long, slow game, but my opponent got to do little but run. 2 (+100)

I can’t remember the last time Jimmy played anything other than Federation, if ever. Again I was facing an opponent with multiple reporting mechanisms: two mission IIs with built-in Federation outposts, Office of the President, and the Halkan Council.

I started the game with an Olarra and Wormhole in hand, enabling me to start attacking his Investigate Anomaly outpost on turn 1. I destroyed it the next turn, and spent my third through fifth turns killing earthlings in personnel battle (like Nick, Jimmy had discarded a seeded Defend Homeworld and I doubted he was stocking another). On turn 6, I moved to the Mirror Quadrant and destroyed Jimmy’s I.S.S. Enterprise with a couple of personnel (First Officer Spock and Bareil) aboard. Jimmy used Construct Starship to download a Spacedock to his Test Mission II outpost, which I destroyed by turn 10. On turn 11 I destroyed the Starship Enterprise with a couple of personnel aboard. The next few turns were fairly uneventful as I chased Jimmy’s cloaked ship around the spaceline. On his fifteenth turn, Jimmy reported U.S.S. Voyager (to Admiral J.P. Hanson’s location, Earth) and landed (Blue Alert) stocked with the personnel he’d been accumulating. On his turn 16, Jimmy actually rebuilt the Test Mission II outpost using a Federation ENGINEER (Benjamin Sisko), and then reported Ablative Armor the next turn to protect it. He also attempted Test Mission II, getting stopped by Dejaren. I sent one ship back to the Caretaker’s Array through the Badlands so that I’d have some transporters there to get my personnel down to attempt Liberation; I solved it for 30 + 5 AMS. My other ships moved to blow up Jimmy’s ships — but I picked the wrong one (Defiant instead of Voyager) and on his eighteenth turn he completed Test Mission II for 20 points. On turn 19, I finished Corner Enemy Ship for 40 and Ambush Ship for 30 to win 100-20. 4 (+180)

One never knows what Joey will play. He’s always experimenting with different deck types. In this tournament Joey was playing Romulan with both headquarters and no other facilities. He seeded Investigate "Shattered Space" and Study Lonka Pulsar, both of which just screamed "Steal Me!" all through the mission phase (especially since they were side-by-side, at one end of the spaceline, several missions away from Romulus but adjacent to one of my mission IIs with wormholes). I seeded Investigate "Shattered Space" with my Shaka/Maglock combo and slipped a Dead End under Study Lonka Pulsar. Joey also seeded one of his dilemmas under Study Lonka Pulsar, which made me a bit nervous about stealing it — Joey loves Your Galaxy Is Impure.

Due to my opening hand, I wasn’t able to get out many extra personnel on turn 1. By turn 3 I had the personnel I needed to complete Investigate "Shattered Space" for 45 + 5 AMS (Ayala). On turn 3 Joey attempted Cloaked Mission with three personnel, but these were unable to pass Friendly Fire. Joey had not discarded a Defend Homeworld yet to download any personnel, although he usually uses that card as a first-turn personnel jumpstart. I suspected that one of his hidden agendas was Defend Homeworld, so I decided to go for mission-solving instead. On turn 4 I attempted Corner Enemy Ship; I lost 13 points to Lack of Preparation, then to The Higher … the Fewer with a second ship. The third dilemma was Dead End, and I was standing at 37 points. Joey staffed the Decius and finally left Romulus. On turn 5 I destroyed the Decius, but Joey still had enough people aboard his Apnex to solve Explore Typhone Expanse for 35 on his fifth turn. I wormholed my warship to Explore Typhone Expanse to try to blow away the Apnex, but Joey brought it back to his hand by discarding a Space-Time Portal. On his own turn, Joey attempted Cloaked Mission again, losing a personnel to Hanonian Land Eel. On turn 7 I attempted Liberation but couldn’t get past Joey’s Common Thief + Your Galaxy Is Impure + Dejaren combo, especially with Cyrus Redblock in play. Another ship attempted Ambush Ship and lost 10 points to Lack of Preparation. Getting through those dilemmas was slow going. By turn 9, Joey had re-reported enough people to get through Hanonian Land Eel and score Cloaked Mission using HQ: Secure Homeworld, putting him in the lead 27-65. On turn 10 I solved both Ambush Ship and Liberation, but as I expected Joey used Q the Referee to download In the Zone so I only got to count 50 of those points toward winning. I was now leading, 77-65. Joey attempted another mission, but couldn’t get through the Unscientific Method + Scientific Method combo. I now had enough points to return to Corner Enemy Ship and solve for the win. 6 (+215)

Well, my battle deck was slow — I took an average of 16 turns per game — but reasonably effective today. Rampant mission II and headquarters usage did slow me down considerably. But I got the satisfaction of blowing up lots of enemy stuff and pulling three full wins in the process. The second prize foil went to the randomly-selected Jimmy Rouse. Too bad I didn’t get a chance to destroy T.J.’s Deep Space Nine, though. I guess there’s always next time …