Yeah, I skipped a card again, and forget to tell you guys last time.  Thot Gor was originally on deck for Review 12, until I realized that the Breen/Jem'Hadar thingy is really key to his stockability, so he gets to wait along with a good number of other cards.

So, today we get another one of those "Wow!" cards that made a really big fist impression:

One of the more powerful magic bullets to date.  Decipher's definitely been laying down some powerful magic bullets in these past few expansions, and it's amazing how much fewer abuses seem.  Sure, there's still plenty out there, but after Blaze and (especially) Rules, many of the most powerful abuses have been severely limited and are rarely seen.

First, this card seeds or plays on the table, which is always a good thing. It's a hidden agenda, so even if your opponent isn't using a strategy that can be hurt by revealing it, it still provides a large psychological advantage.  I'll temporarily stray away from the Obelisk to discuss this. That's one of the things I really like about hidden agendas.  Seed four or five of these, and your opponent will be wary of using any strategy that can be countered by hiddens, or even think more about using troika cards (Kevin, Mandy, Q2) to nullify your cards -- I still see The Line Must Be Drawn Here used in multiple.  In almost all decks, I try to at least seed a few hiddens: otherwise, there's nothing to stop your opponent from going about his abuse of choice bullet-free -- he'll know when you play the bullet, and can adjust accordingly.  Case in point: Ore Processing.  In the last tournament I went to, my deck employed Process Ore as a deck manipulation method.  I only counted on drawing one card from it (thanks to Reactor Overload), but two of my five opponents seeded no hidden agendas whatsoever.   Big mistake: I was able to double-process against both of those, leading to a much quicker victory.  Even if the others only seeded two or three hiddens, I'd only Process for one, because I needed the ENGINEER download and Processing even for one provided my deck with a significant advantage.

But back to today's card.  Again, like many recent bullets (Examine Singularity, It's Only a Game, Writ, etc.) this card counters several strategies.  It can also be downloaded by Q the Referee, so there's a great deal of flexibility here as well.  So, what can this card do that's impressed so many players?

First, whenever a player draws more than one card, only one of those can be converted to a download.  The obvious target here is Borg Queen/Ooby Dooby, a favorite of players for getting a second cube out easily.  This restriction was also necessary because of the last line on this card -- without this, a Borg player could download Masaka to download X drones (X = hand size).  It also stops Borg players from Mirror Imaging a Kivas to download three drones... they can still download one drone, but it doesn't completely overwhelm the poor KFC player, as it did before, with the ability to either choose three cards or download three personnel into play, giving the Borg Mirror Imager a great deal of freedom and a resulting huge advantage against Kivas players.   It also slows down Blood Oath, rarely seen, but quite potent in a Captured/Prisoner Exchange/Fajo's Gallery deck to download multiple personnel, Bat'leths, and a ship with a minimum of Captureds and PEs.  With the Obelisk out, they'll need to expend more of those cards to get the same benefit.  Alone, this wouldn't be worth seeding it for.  I can guarantee you won't see much Borg Ooby Dooby after the Obelisk releases, because the benefit provided is so small that it's hardly worth it.  (A seed card and "stopping" an entire hive to download one drone, which I can do at the end of the turn or in place of my card play (think Seven) anyway?)  This is so harsh on Borg Ooby Dooby that you'll probably see it just as much as you do unbalanced spacelines -- you see them from time to time, maybe one or two in two tournaments, but not nearly as much as you did before.

The next use is the big kicker.  All ships with a staffing icon (plus the Bajoran Interceptor) now require two personnel to move or initiate battle. Ouch!  This virtually kills the small (i.e., one staffing icon) ship armada, meaning that two of the most prominent armadas -- Martok Nor and Pire for Hire -- are little threat anymore.  These decks took advantage of the quick staffing of those ships, aided by Hidden Fighter, Bajoran Civil War, Ready Room Door, and several other cards.  The intent was to get the WEAPONS to destroy facilities on turn four or earlier.   This much speed is almost a necessity in the current game environment.  As I've stated several times in this series, a serious tournament deck absolutely has to be close to winning by turn five or be able to stall an opponent long enough to win.  Between Cargo Runs, free reports (Devidian Door, STA, HQ, STP-drop), PNZ, AMS, and other armadas, you have to either be fast at winning or good at delaying your opponent.  Armadas in particular have to strike early, before the opponent starts attempting missions.  If nothing else, it'll force your opponent to expend time and resources in evading or defending against your attack force instead of going after missions.  This card nearly doubles the time it takes for an armada to get going.  You'll need twice as many Devidian Doors, two turns for Ops-downloads, etc. to get a ship staffed.  You can Hidden Fighter-AMS once per turn; and Headquarters still speed this up (as they always did), but regardless your armada has been slowed down a *lot*.  Not being able to attack the opponent's outpost until turn seven instead of turn four means there's a good chance you've already lost the game by then.

// Editor's Note - This card doesn't hurt Romulan armadas too much, though, since aside from Interceptors it doesn't affect no-staffing ships :-) //

There are some other side effects from this function, but they're mostly nominal.  If you're shuttling one personnel around on a ship, unless playing Klingon there's a good chance it doesn't have a staffing icon, because there's good no-staffing high-RANGE ships available to all affiliations. However, Klingon days of spreading out K'vorts to transport personnel from one end of the spaceline to the other extremely quickly are over unless you keep a personnel on each ship or are transporting multiple personnel.

The biggest effect is that attack decks will shift their focus to larger ships to get going.  I predict Cybernetics/STA will grow more popular as players try to find ways to play personnel for free to staff the D'deridexes for battle.  And attack decks as a whole will find a much smaller niche in the tournament scene, with all the different (effective) counters in Tribbles: the Obelisk, HQ: Orbital Weapons Platform, Chain Reaction Ricochet, Defend Homeworld, and Q the Referee to download a number of these cards.

There's one other function on this card that's quite powerful: unless opponent has Mask of Korgano in play (yeah, right, even with the Obelisk it's still quite weak) you may download Masaka Transformations.  You can only do it on your turn (due to the phrase "Once *each* turn" (emphasis added)), so there's no waiting for your opponent to forfeit card draws (Q's Tent, Ops-download, etc.) then force them to dump their hand.  It is useful though, to both aid yourself and hinder certain strategies of the opponent's.  Of course, you can always use it on yourself if you're having a poor run of cards or need to get a certain card soon.  Against your opponent, it will provide a sort of counter to the Betazoid Gift Box. Although Interrupts and Doorways could be played, most of the time you'll at least put one or two cards your opponent wanted on the bottom of his deck. More significantly, it can limit Devidian Door abuses.  You can't avoid the Masaka vs. D-Door strategy anymore by waiting to Devidian Door until after the opponent has made a card play (but still on your opponent's turn).  The Obelisk works at any time.  How effective this will be in stopping Devidian Door abuse depends on your opponent's deck.  If there's only one or two D-Doors in the deck, there's a good chance you'll make him lose the game, although it is a popular strategy to put a Devidian Door in Q's Tent, where it's always accessible with QIR seeded.  Against decks loaded with Devidian Doors, such as Ooby Dooby or Cargo Run decks, its effectiveness will vary. Remember, these decks potentially draw 15+ cards each turn between Distortions and what have you, and your opponent has until the end of the turn to show the Doors.  If you can also stop the card drawing on your turn, such as by tripping the last Ooby Dooby yourself, Disruptor Overloading an Equipment waiting to be Cargo Run'd, etc. then you have much better chances of forcing your opponent to lose.  If your opponent doesn't have a huge card drawing engine established and Devidian Doors several personnel, you're got good chances to win if you Masaka him.  A concrete example shows this quite well.  Say, for instance, that 1 in 5 cards in your opponent's deck is a Devidian Door.  With a ten-card hand, he probably has two Devidian Doors (well, not "probably" but it's the most likely number).  He calls "Devidian Door" twice, so he only has eight cards left in his hand; nine at the end of the turn.  With a nine-card hand, the odds he'll have two Devidian Doors is slightly less.  With only two Devidian Door callings, the improvement isn't much.  If he calls three or more Devidian Doors (a fluke in what cards he's drawn, for instance) with a ten-card hand, there's very little chance in getting 3+ Devidian Doors in drawing six or seven cards.

You can also use it with your own Devidian Doors in a last-ditch scenario. Opponent about to win?   If you have even one unused D-Door in your deck, regardless of whether or not you have one in your hand, call "Devidian Door" and report a personnel if you think it'll stop them from winning immediately (e.g., Colony).  On your next turn, use this to draw lots of cards and hope you'll find it.  It's got much more power than a Kivas if you're fishing for a card.

Of course, neither of these works if the player you want to target has only a few (or no) cards in the draw deck. :-)

And as for that Mask of Korgano thing, I wouldn't count on it.  Because the Mask was virtually useless before, its card text might as well say "Plays on a personnel.  Prevents Obelisk of Masaka from download Masaka Transformations."  That's not much better.  You're expending a card play for a card that might stop your opponent from using a card that may not even be in his deck (you have to play the Mask before your opponent tries the download); and can be Kevin-ed to boot.  No, it's much better to just include a Kevin of your own to try to stop Masaka.  Yeah, your Kevin can be countered (but so can the Mask), and there's a risk of losing points off it, but it's so much more versatile and doesn't cost a card play.  Mask of Korgano's still not a very good card.

The final verdict: One of the more potent bullets shown thus far. Defensively, it'll stall small ship armadas long enough for you to start solving missions in most cases.  It'll stop Borg Ooby Dooby.   It gives you a chance against heavy Devidian Door decks, and severely limits casual Door-ing.  However, it's also got a number of uses for you as well.  Not just with your Devidian Doors, but there's a number of games where you've said "if only I had [insert card name here] in my hand now."  An extra Scan?   An AMS?  A ship?  A certain personnel?  Masaka will either get it into your hand or get you a heck of a lot closer to drawing it.  Q the Referee makes it downloadable for all of these uses.  So, is it going in a deck or not?  It's a definite inclusion for a Paranoid deck.  For other decks, I'd go along with my regular plan for choosing bullets: (a) are the strategies it counters commonly seen in your area?  (b) how well will your deck do normally against the strategies it counters?  If it's a common strategy and could do serious damage to your deck, I'd include it.  If it's neither common nor threatening, I wouldn't include it, even if playing a paranoid deck.  (If it doesn't harm my deck much, why reduce my deck's efficiency any more than necessary?)  Regardless, my Klingon armada's definitely shelved for the time being.

Next: Stolen Attack Ship

Steve "Sergei Rachmaninoff" Boyles