One booth to rule them all
Once again this year Decipher was well represented at the Ra-Con science fiction, fantasy, and gaming convention. There were sanctioned tournaments, demonstrations, and roleplaying going on all weekend. It was a blast for everyone who attended.
This year I had help planning and running the Decipher from fellow Lord of the Rings Trading Card Game (LotR TCG) Product Champion Kaleb Michaud. For those of you that don't know a Product Champion is a volunteer who supports the local retail and gaming community in the name of a game company. Many companies have these types of volunteers and they're usually rewarded for their efforts with product or exclusive items. Kaleb and I are two of about five LotR TCG Product Champions in Kansas.
Determined to make Ra-Con 2k2 better than Ra-Con 2k1 we set out to find the best mix of games. Luckily the LotR TCG just happens to be one of the hot, new games on the market. While gaming usually slows down over the summer months we were confident that the fact Ra-Con was so close to school starting would help ensure that many players would be in town.
As it turns out many players were in town. We scheduled five LotR TCG tournaments with plans to run three of them (The extras were there to in case we had an impromptu tournament, or if we had quite a few players and wanted to split them up to offer more prizes). We were able to get the three we wanted to run sanctioned-meaning we had at least eight players, Decipher would send foil cards to first, second, and third, and the results would be entered into their worldwide ranking system.
One of the tournaments we were able to run was a format what we could never before get enough people to sanction in Wichita. For the first time a LotR TCG Multiplayer tournament was played in Wichita. In this format you play not one, but two to three opponents at the same time. It changes the way you play the game, and adds a level of strategy. Instead of throwing everything out to try to beat down or corrupt you opponent's Ring Bearer or march your fellowship from site 1 to site 9 you have to take into account the fact that you have other opponents. Which one is the greater threat? Do you play that really fearsome card now or hold it over to use it on someone else? These are the types of things that were running through players' minds as they competed.
Players who played in the multiplayer game were also able to stick around and play in a standard tournament afterwards. Many did and it, like almost all Wichita tournaments, turned out to be just as fun and successful.
Sunday we held a sealed deck tournament that garnered 12 players. Many were from Wichita and the surrounding areas, but we snagged two from as far away as Emporia! A sealed deck tournament is a great way for players to get into the game. At Ra-Con players were able to purchase one of four starters-Aragorn or Gandalf from the Fellowship of the Ring expansion or Gimli or Gandalf from the Mines of Moria expansion. We then provided them with a booster pack from the Realms of the Elf-Lords and Mines of Moria expansions. The players had 30 minutes to make a deck from these cards. We had several new and old players who enjoyed this format.
Lord of the Rings was not the only Decipher game supported at Ra-Con, however. While the Star Trek CCG Voyager Warp Speed Sealed deck didn't make it off the ground one of the Star Trek Roleplaying Game sessions did. Our own XO Roman helped me out by writing this episode and narrating it. I was on hand to help with game mechanics and run the players through a character generation.
The adventure was set onboard the U.S.S. Jeannette Maddox, and we had an interesting mix of characters. Your standard human officer, a Bajoran engineer, a Klingon security officer, a Trill scientist, a Vulcan, and one other I can't remember. I won't be revealing any tidbits of the adventure, because I there may be some readers interested in playing it some time, but we had a lot of action, intrigue, and humor. While we didn't get a chance to finish the adventure, we did tell the players what would have happened. They were upset once they heard how fun the game would have been. Oh well, I'm hoping Roman gets a chance to run this event some time soon.
All in all I left Ra-Con feeling both tired and happy. Which is actually how I'd hoped I would have felt. As I said before it was a blast, and I hope to do it again next year.
The Winner's Circle
How people placed in the Ra-Con events. Players marked as * were either new to the game or had never played in a sanctioned tournament for the Lord of the Rings TCG before Ra-Con.
Saturday's Multiplayer
1. Kaleb Michaud
2. Kenneth Aviles*
3. Ronald Glanzer
4. Jim Purkey*
5. Tony Snider
6. Kyle Martin
7. Philip Nielsen*
8. Sam Parisi
9. Corwin Purkey*
Saturday's Constructed Deck
1. Ronald Glanzer
2. Kaleb Michaud
3. Sam Parisi
4. Tony Snider
5. Philip Nielsen*
6. David Burns*
7. Kyle Martin
8. Corwin Purkey*
Sunday's Sealed Deck
1. David Oswald
2. Kaleb Michaud
3. Darren Martin
4. Kenneth Aviles*
5. Barry DeRennaux (Emporia)
6. Kyle Martin
7. Jim Purkey*
8. David Burns*
9. Bryan Stuck (Emporia)*
10. Sam Parisi
11. Corwin Purkey*
12. Jennifer Burns*
Darren's Game Clinic: First Edition!
Welcome to Darren's Game Clinic. I hope to make this a regular column in the newsletter. If you have any gaming questions, especially regarding any Decipher games, I'll be more than happy to answer them. E-mail them to me at xanixc@yahoo.com. If you have a better name for this column e-mail that to me too. In fact let's make that my first official contest. The best name (as judged by me) will get the winner a booster pack from either the Lord of the Rings or Star Trek card games. Enter as many times as you want and the contest will end November 3rd. The winner will be notified the following Saturday at the monthly meeting. All entries should be marked as such in the subject line and include your name, e-mail address, suggested name, and what prize (i.e. from which game and/or expansion) you would like. Prizes will be subject to local availability.
For the first column I've decided to take a small look back on the eight years of the Star Trek Customizable Card Game and into its future. Some of you may know that Decipher has decided to release a second edition of this game with updated rules and card designs. The new edition will be somewhat compatible with the old, but will look and play dramatically differently.
The Star Trek Customizable Card Game (STCCG) has been around since 1994. It was one of the pioneers, and the first card game produced by Decipher, Inc. The idea was to make a deck centering around one or two of three affiliations in the game-Federation, Klingon, and Romulan-and travel the galaxy trying to solve missions and overcome your opponent's Dilemmas. The game consisted of two main phases-a seed phase and a play phase-which each had their own subphases.
During the seed phase you would set up the spaceline. The "game board" that you moved your ships down. Each location on the spaceline was a different mission to try to solve. Then you and your opponent each took turns seeding dilemmas under missions. You would have to overcome these later when you tried to solve the missions. The final step was to establish where your outpost, your base of operations, would be. In the play phase each player took turns playing a card, executing orders, and drawing a card.
Then the first expansion, Alternate Universe, came out. This set introduced events and things from other times or realities. It also introduced a new card type, the doorway and added a new phase to the seed phase where you seed your doorways and open them. This was a pretty simple adjustment, but from there many more changes would complicate gameplay.
Q-Continuum would introduce side decks. First Contact brought us downloading, probing, objective cards, and the Borg affiliation (complete with an entirely different set of rules in order to play them). Deep Space Nine added sites, regions, headquarters, and the Bajoran and Cardassian affiliations. The list goes on and on. Except for the most recent sets almost every new expansion for the game brought a new rule, affiliation, or card type. While that isn't really a good thing for players of the game, for fans of the show it made the game feel more real. There was a type of science to the Alternate Universe door. It had to be there in order for things from other times and universes to exist. The show didn't always explain fully why things were the way they were, but in the game there always was a reason.
But it was that level of complexity that ultimately was the downfall. While the base rules remained at 12 pages the expanded rules, explanations, and changes to cards and rules ballooned to over 70 pages! And of course the only place this was all available was on the net. This made it nearly impossible for new players to enter the game. And the fact that there were 2000-3000 different cards didn't help either.
That's where Second Edition comes in. I wholeheartedly believe that Decipher loves the Star Trek license. I don't think they purchased the fan club and fought to retain the card game and acquire the roleplaying game licenses just because they thought it would make them some money. Every one of their seven game designers played either the Star Trek or Star Wars games. The ones usually assigned to Star Trek development are avid fans. You'd have to be to sit through hours upon hours of episodes playing frame by frame in order to find the perfect image. Wouldn't that be you're dream job, to be paid for watching Star Trek? Second Edition will be the game they way it should have been. The designers are taking their love for the game and reinventing it they way they wished it always was.
No longer will there be a seed phase. Now you start with the homeworld of your choosing. There are no actual treaty cards. If you want to play with a Klingon in your Romulan deck then all you have to do is figure out how to get him out there. No Alternate Universe Door will be needed to explain why Kirk is helping Picard handle a Borg invasion. Dilemmas will no longer seed under missions. Instead they will be played during the game when attempting missions.
There are a host of other changes. Many of which haven't been discussed by Decipher yet. Soon demonstration decks and rules will be released free of charge on Decipher's web site. Unlike pretty much every other gaming company out there Decipher had decided that this game redesign should have the input of the fans. They've been gathering feedback from day one, and have been more that willing to scrap an idea if it looked like it wouldn't be well received. Help Decipher make the Star Trek Customizable Card Game what it should be. Keep watching their website (www.decipher.com) for more information on Second Edition.
Don't forget about the contest and submitting any questions you may have about any Decipher game. Until next time keep your decks shuffled and don't forget to stock an extra outpost or two. You never know just when yours will be spacedust.
Photo Captions
RPGSession.jpg
XO Fleet Captain Roman Gheesling leads the Star Trek Roleplaying Game session at Ra-Con. Earlier players had created characters to adventure aboard the U.S.S. Jeannette Maddox.
KalebInThought.jpg
Decipher Product Champion Kaleb Michaud is deep in thought. He must select which of the five minions will go up against each of his three badly injured companions. Somehow Frodo must survive or he will loose this Multiplayer game.
KyleInThought.jpg
Cadet Kyle Martin must unfortunately choose one of his companions to sacrifice to the RARE Balrog. Even after this decision is made he will have to make it once again since the Balrog's "Fierce" ability allows him to battle twice.
DecipherBooth.jpg
The Decipher booth had many freebies for interested people to take. The display board was made by Petty Officer 3rd Class Darren Martin and showcased cards from both the Lord of the Rings and Star Trek card games. It also contained sample pages from the Lord of the Rings and Star Trek Roleplaying games, as well as a list of the weekend's events.
Worf2e.jpg
Worf is one of six cards for the new Second Edition of the Star Trek Customizable Card Game previewed on Decipher's website (www.decipher.com). This image showcases the new design template, updated icons, and revised and additional game text. Decipher hopes to get sample decks posted sometime in the near future.
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