Mot's Useless Card Review #72: Honor Challenge

In short: ouch! This is an excellent card to stock in the Q’s Tent of a battle oriented deck. If you can get in this card on just one personnel battle, you can cut deeply into many Away Teams and make short work of the survivors. That, of course, is if you can pull it off. How about breaking this down by the affiliation?

Federation. These folks tend not to have much Treachery, but then they are far weaker on average than Klingons. Honor Challenge will probably stay in the Tent against a Fed opponent.

Klingons. Against other Klingons, you aren't likely to get much mileage out of an Honor Challenge, either, but then there are other great Tent cards you can include for a such a contingency - Klingon Civil War, Arbiter of Succession, and more.

Romulans. Now we're talking. Romulans are potent adversaries for Klingon battle decks. Quite often, a Romulan personnel card has just as much STRENGTH as a Klingon. But also, 1/3 to 1/2 of the personnel in the average Romulan deck have Treachery, making them easy meat for a Klingon issuing an Honor Challenge.

Borg. With the skill sharing ability of the Interlink Drone, Honor Challenge becomes every bit as good as an Alas, Poor Queen. All you have to do is get Treachery into the hive somehow. Frame of Mind is a good bet. The dilemma takes 3 Empathy to cure, and unless the Queen is present, that's not likely to happen. Even if the Queen is guiding the Collective, she is in "Diplomatic" mode most of the time, and there will be a one-turn lag before a Borg player can switch her skill to Empathy to cure a "Framed" drone. That's one turn where you can fly over, beam aboard your opponent's Borg ship, and play Honor Challenge to utterly wipe them out.

Honor Challenge is likely to grow even more potent as the game evolves. Several of the craftier Ferengi may possess Treachery. Cardassians strike me as a rather treacherous bunch. And the likelihood of a Dominion Vorta without Treachery seems remote indeed.

So make ready to throw your bat'telh into the ring and claim your prize!