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Major Rakal's Romulan Review #54: Abandon Ship! (06/07/1998) |
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Aefvadh! Finally, we come to the last of the five sealed deck dilemmas. Unlike the other four, this one does not kill or take away one of your best (strongest or most CUNNING) personnel; it takes away all but your senior staff, when the captain is forced to give the order to... ABANDON SHIP!
Now that space missions may no longer be attempted from aboard an outpost, such a dilemma is a lot more viable. But because this dilemma has a required "trigger" - the ship must be damaged or its RANGE reduced, otherwise the dilemma will simply be discarded with no effect - a setup is absolutely necessary, and for once, the setup does not have to be another dilemma. What can damage a ship?
How about RANGE reduction?
(A couple of notes on RANGE reduction: "Ship can't move" dilemmas don't count as RANGE reduction. The ship still has its full RANGE; it just isn't allowed to use it until the dilemma is cured. "RANGE reduced" means that any card or condition which reduces RANGE is affecting the ship, even if the reduction is compensated for by a RANGE enhancer.) The dilemma-based setups (and Plasma Fire) are generally a little weak, as most reasonably well-equipped ships will meet those requirements (unless of course you start off with Make Us Go or Unscientific Method).The Borg Ship dilemma tends to destroy rather than damage, which is fine, too, but doesn't give you any captives. Battle is pretty much out of the question if you're Federation, and chancy for other non-Klingons in case you get a same-affiliation opponent. While the Anti-Matter Pod has potential (most crews won't have 3 Navigation), there's enough Transporter Skill around to make it less than a sure thing. And Baryon Buildup can be Uxbridged. So for non-Borg players (Borg can certainly use the Sabotage Drone to good effect), my money is on Calamarain. It's a little slow, but you can couple it with Explore Interstellar Matter to force your opponent to start it at a specific (and with luck, central) location, and it's immune to Kevin Uxbridge. The only thing that nullifies it is Data Laughing, or Immortal Again if Mortal Q is in play to be nullified. Once you get this dilemma to take hold, the victim must remove all personnel not required for staffing. The owner makes the choice of who will cover each staffing requirement, and can cover a staff star requirement with a command star personnel. Note that technically there is no such thing as a ship with "no staffing requirements." At least one personnel is required to fly any ship. Also, an affiliated personnel is required for an affiliated ship; if I have the T’Pau (one staff star) with D’Tan (no stars) and Vekor (command star), both get to stay because I need Vekor for the star and D'Tan for his green border. But on the Pi (no stars), I can only leave D'Tan. Finally, with any luck you will draw a really well-equipped ship to the mission where you have placed this. One way to assure that is with a wall dilemma, and the very best is Lack of Preparation. He will be forced to bring in the mission-solvers, many of which may end up abandoning ship. Then you move in and capture them on your turn. A few Interrogations, Madred at your outpost, and maybe some Parallax Arguers to let you play more than one Interrogation on a turn (or score 5 points, just as good or better). Stir well, and start scoring points... The Major's Combos:
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