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To Boldly Go
54 Plays1 month ago
In the last of our introductory episodes, we talk Federation fleet building, and also decide, on a whim, to discuss some Rising Tensions reveals!
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Transcript
Episode Introduction: Federation and Fleet Buildings
00:00:38
Truthiness
Welcome back to the Big Unknown, everybody. With you, as always, is your fearless Captain Truthiness, and I am joined by our art medical hologram, Biggs. Biggs, say hi. All right, we're finally getting into our last of our evergreen episodes, and we are finally talking Federation and Fleet Buildings.
00:00:48
Biggs
Hi.
00:01:21
Truthiness
Can't do a Trek episode without, you know, that.
00:01:24
Biggs
no
00:01:24
Truthiness
its You've all been waiting
Exploring Star Trek Ships and Characters
00:01:26
Truthiness
for it. We're all getting into the ships that everyone has that that horrible, horrible nostalgia for. We're talking Galaxy class.
00:01:35
Truthiness
We're talking Defiant class. Yeah, Starcazer's there too. But then we're also talking all your favorite characters. It's going be a good time. You ready to get going, bigs?
00:01:43
Biggs
you know it this is why you bought into this game
00:01:53
Truthiness
All we're done with Eclipse now, I swear. All right, so tonight we're going to talk over the big named officers, do our usual, now usual, ah lower decks and MVP, talk a little bit about the the ship some more, um and then really focus in on those those strengths, weaknesses, um and just some incident fleet ideas.
Jean-Luc Picard: Skills and Strategic Impact
00:02:12
Truthiness
So, Biggs, you want to kick us off with ah the man, the myth, the legend himself?
00:02:17
Biggs
Jean-Luc Picard. um He is hard to leave behind. Real hard.
00:02:24
Truthiness
So hard.
00:02:25
Biggs
ah but But he is also very pricey. He's 14 points, so he's taken up quite a bit of your budget.
00:02:33
Truthiness
That's what? Like, not even, that's, that's what, I'm terrible percentages. What is that?
00:02:38
Biggs
That's um a little more than a little more than...
00:02:39
Truthiness
and my God, it's over 25%. It's 28%. God.
00:02:43
Biggs
Yeah, a little bit more than a quarter of your budget. going to just the one guy. ah With that in mind, oh he makes ah he makes your ship sing.
00:02:54
Biggs
you've got You've got Diplomacy 3. you're just If you decide you want to win the hail, you win the hail. You just do.
00:03:05
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:03:06
Biggs
um Culture 1. Discipline 1. ah For security, you've got Fieldcraft 1. ah For engineering, you've got biology one and logic two.
00:03:20
Biggs
He is inspiring in every way possible.
00:03:23
Truthiness
Every single category.
00:03:25
Biggs
Every single category. If he's in his captain's chair as a reaction after an opposing unit at sensor range performs an aggressive or hostile act, increase this ship's alert status from any green to any yellow.
00:03:43
Truthiness
So that let's let's break this down here. So you already talked about the diplomacy thing. He has the best diplomacy in the game. You cannot beat him. and And it makes for a a three social skill. So he is just he is fantastic in that category. There's just no beating him.
00:04:00
Truthiness
um And so if you want to win the hail, you will win the hail with John Luke Bacardi. Just throw down that four. He wins. you Tie break goes to him. So if you absolutely have to,
00:04:09
Biggs
Mm-hmm. No one can compete.
00:04:12
Truthiness
No, no. Everybody else highest right now in the game is two. um So there's no competing with him at all, um which, you know, you can probably play some games with that. You know, maybe try and pull out that four knowing you're going to lose no matter what.
00:04:25
Truthiness
So you're like, yeah, I'm not going to play game. I'll throw out my my two, ah you know, if you or or even the one if you initiate the hail or something like that rather than refuse it.
00:04:34
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:04:35
Truthiness
But I mean,
00:04:35
Biggs
I mean, you're not going to win you're not going to win if you throw out the one. That's the that's the thing, because...
00:04:40
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. But you can make the, the, the resulting test from the hail harder to accomplish if you're just kind of low balling Picard knowing you're going to lose.
00:04:42
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:04:49
Truthiness
So and yeah there's ways around them, but like, you absolutely have to win a hail Jean-Luc will win the hail.
00:04:51
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:04:55
Truthiness
um And yeah, just like he's, he's not just at home in that captain's chair. You want him for the Commodore chair because good God, inspiring on everything
00:05:07
Biggs
on everything, every test that he leads.
00:05:07
Truthiness
That's you can, you can, yeah. So he leads a test with another ship at comms range and well, Hey, look, he inspired them just, Oh my goodness. He's just, he's so good in a common worse chair.
00:05:19
Truthiness
Um, and don't sleep on that reaction either. Cause, um, if you really dig into the galaxy quest dial, you'll notice that it takes quest.
00:05:27
Biggs
the galy Did you say the Galaxy Quest dial?
00:05:28
Truthiness
I did. I did say quest. Oh my God. well Never give up. Never surrender. Oh boy.
00:05:35
Biggs
ah But yeah...
00:05:35
Truthiness
um The Galaxy Class dial. um You'll notice that that yellow takes a long time to scale through to where you want it for combat.
00:05:47
Truthiness
So, know...
00:05:47
Biggs
And you want you want that yellow three.
00:05:50
Truthiness
Yeah, you really do.
00:05:50
Biggs
That yellow three is look that yellow three looks real nice.
00:05:54
Truthiness
ah yellow 3 is fantastic, and the Galaxy Class largely comfortable sitting at that 3, but... but Oh my goodness, it takes a long time with standby orders just to cycle through that thing.
00:06:07
Truthiness
And it even takes a good while to do it with dedicated orders. So, you know, if you're willing to take, you know, deal with the aggressive or hostile act first, you can react and get everything back up to working on in that cloud on that galaxy class.
00:06:21
Truthiness
um But, you know, it's just critical. Yeah.
00:06:25
Biggs
So good.
00:06:25
Truthiness
Oh, man. He's so good.
00:06:26
Biggs
So good.
00:06:27
Truthiness
He's so good. He should never leave that captain's chair. um So, like, even, you know, field craft, he's leaving a field craft test. Do it from the Commodore chair. Like, he just, he lives in that Commodore chair.
00:06:38
Truthiness
There's really just no other way about it. Like, I can't, he is so good in that chair, and I have a really, really hard time leaving him alone at home.
Benjamin Sisko: Development and Gameplay
00:06:47
Biggs
Exactly. Well, given how good he is, let's take a look at, uh, The person most likely to also be sitting in a captain's chair, Benjamin Siskoe.
00:06:59
Truthiness
Yeah, so Ben Sisko, and I have a feeling with his title here, Reluctant Emissary, i suspect we're probably going to end up seeing another version of him. um ah like It almost just feels ready and raring to have you know whatever you know Dominion War era Ben Sisko with another, because yeah I think this is supposed to represent even his commander, because it's only what, three pips on him?
00:07:24
Biggs
ah three and a Three and a half.
00:07:27
Biggs
So you've got... I've been calling it Commander Plus.
00:07:27
Truthiness
Three and half, yeah.
00:07:30
Truthiness
Yeah. So, yeah, he I think this is like early DS9 Cisco um before he's fully embraced the emissary role in Dominion War. So I would not be surprised at all to see him come again in another package. All right, so.
00:07:47
Truthiness
He's 11 points. He can hit your command and ops roles. um He has Culture 2, Diplomacy 2, I'm sorry, Diplomacy 1, Discipline 2, Mysticism 1.
00:07:55
Biggs
Diplomacy one.
00:08:00
Truthiness
yeah I'll get to that in a second. and ah Ordnance 1, Skirmish 1, and Navigation 1. He is inspiring on command. And while another officer in the same unit leads a test, you may spend...
00:08:12
Truthiness
one advantage, or commit Cisco to add a blue die. um So, this is a one straight up. um No, you're not missing anything. it doesn't do anything right now. um Unless you found something I haven't, Biggs.
00:08:25
Truthiness
a
00:08:25
Biggs
No.
00:08:26
Truthiness
Yeah. So, hey, future thing. Cool. um But, you know, he's not the diplomacy guy. he is much more... he's yeah He's... Honestly, he's just kind of the discount commander. i don't...
00:08:41
Biggs
With that in mind, there are some gimmicks that you can do with him to add more die. with the With the spend an advantage or commit him to add a dice...
00:08:53
Truthiness
Yes, that is true. Especially if you can get your advantage token rocking and you don't have to commit him. um that that can be That can be real good.
00:08:58
Biggs
yeah If you can win some Federation baseline hails, get some extra...
00:09:06
Truthiness
Advantage tokens, yeah. Yeah, so that's that can be pretty nice. Especially when you know it comes weapons time, adding another blue die to an attack or adding another blue tie to you know a test, if you got those advantage tokens, you throw an extra
Kira and Dax: Dual Roles and Versatility
00:09:21
Truthiness
dice around.
00:09:21
Truthiness
That's, that's solid. That's really not a, yeah, that's really not a bad ah bad thing.
00:09:23
Biggs
It's pretty good.
00:09:26
Truthiness
It's got to be in his own unit. So he's either got to be, you know, with an away team or on his own ship to do it. um But overall, he's still an overall um improvement over, you know your average generic captain.
00:09:40
Truthiness
ah But he's still not Picard, which, you know, it really,
00:09:42
Biggs
with the amusing with the amusing fact that he does not outrank the generic captain.
00:09:48
Truthiness
That's true, he doesn't. All the more reason, I think we'll see another version of Cisco down the road at some point. I feel like we gotta have Dominion War Cisco at some point.
00:09:59
Truthiness
Alright, so um since we're on the DS9 crew, actually DS9 crew is the bulk of this release, isn't it?
00:10:05
Biggs
Very well represented.
00:10:07
Truthiness
Yeah, so why don't we head to Cisco's First Officer?
00:10:12
Biggs
So Kira, she comes in at a score of at a cost of 10. And she is the first card that we see that is dual faction.
00:10:27
Biggs
Doesn't mean much yet, but we've got...
00:10:31
Truthiness
Not mean much for a while. Who knows when we're going to get to the Bajorans.
00:10:34
Biggs
Who who knows? But we've got the dual Bajoran... she we've got the dual bajoran and Federation, and we've got an awful lot of sway in the bottom.
00:10:45
Biggs
So we've got Bajoran and Federation sway. Again, doesn't mean much at the moment. um But with that in mind, she can do command, she can do ops.
00:10:56
Biggs
She's got your discipline one, empathy two, fieldcraft two, and skirmish one. She's inspiring on operations.
00:11:09
Biggs
And when she leads a hail, if you're persuasive, you can inspire a unit at comms range.
00:11:16
Truthiness
That's not bad, especially the inspiring ops.
00:11:17
Biggs
Not too bad.
00:11:18
Truthiness
Yeah, you she she seems like you're, you know, kind what you expect from a first officer. And what she does in the show is she's, you know, leading the away teams. um She's leading pretty much any kind of like ops test um with that inspiring.
00:11:32
Truthiness
The hail thing is interesting. And I'm not entirely, you know, you just she's not the greatest diplomat. So, you know, you don't want to get her into a tiebreak situation.
00:11:40
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:11:43
Truthiness
But, you know, inspiring is worth something.
00:11:44
Biggs
But if you know you're going to win the
00:11:47
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. Like you already pulled, drew out the four and you know, you're up next and there's no way you can, you know you still got your four in, I suppose you can, yeah, it's a, it's an easy way to get inspiring. You don't have to take a test. You don't have to roll any criticals. Like it's, it's really reliable.
00:12:03
Biggs
And you don't always necessarily want the diplomatic one to be taking the hail if you're trying to do like a mutual, avoid a mutual loss or something like that.
00:12:04
Truthiness
um
00:12:10
Truthiness
No, no. Yeah.
00:12:14
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah, and then Fieldcraft 2 and Skirmish 1, she definitely integrates well with away teams. um I can't really remember if there's much with empathy, but discipline tends to come up every so often.
00:12:28
Biggs
ah Empathy can still work with like, ah there's, There's some things that say like ah use the highest personnel or you know use the highest, ah ah what's what's the thing called? That that category, use the highest ah
00:12:49
Biggs
personnel category.
00:12:51
Truthiness
Okay.
00:12:52
Biggs
Is it personnel? I'm drawing a blank here. I know it's, maybe it's command or,
00:12:56
Truthiness
I got not sure. Sorry. I'm drawing a blank too. Yeah.
00:13:00
Biggs
ah Too many new, so many terminologies to remember.
00:13:04
Truthiness
There is the little thingy with the stuff.
00:13:10
Biggs
the The top symbol that looks like a person in a box on a view screen.
00:13:12
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. That thing. Social. Did we call it social before?
00:13:16
Biggs
Social. Yeah, that's it. The top social.
00:13:17
Truthiness
yeah There we go. Yeah.
00:13:19
Biggs
The top social level.
00:13:20
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:13:20
Biggs
Yeah.
00:13:21
Truthiness
Yeah. All right. So going into yet more of the DS9 crew, let's talk Jed Z and Dax. She comes at 10 points, can do an ops or a science role.
00:13:33
Truthiness
She has Klingon and Ferengi away. So that's, that's a thing. um She has no social skills, which is a bit odd for, for Dax, but,
00:13:47
Truthiness
um She's got Fieldcraft 1 and Skirmish 2, Biology 1, Mechanics 2, Navigation 1, and then the real money, I think, is ah that whole representing her past lives, which is just so cool.
00:14:00
Truthiness
um I really think they nailed this card. So while Jadzia Dax leads a test for which she has no skill levels, if her unit has no disadvantage tokens, she counts as having that skill at level 1.
00:14:12
Truthiness
She is really stinking flexible.
00:14:14
Biggs
That's not too bad.
00:14:15
Truthiness
That is really stinking flexible. yeah you
00:14:19
Biggs
That's not too bad at all
00:14:21
Truthiness
Especially for someone who specializes in in science already, something that the Federation does well, you can, any random category science, I mean, she's got biology already, but If there's something else that comes out that she doesn't happen to have, or even a social test. like She doesn't have social skills on her card, but she has a level of it.
00:14:43
Truthiness
um you know and I think that goes for... I wouldn't really go for hails, because that's on not a test yet. um But like anything that tests in the social category, she she has a level 1 skill in it.
00:14:56
Truthiness
Really flexible card.
00:14:56
Biggs
Assuming, assuming no peril.
00:14:59
Truthiness
Assuming no perils. So keep yourself peril free.
00:15:04
Biggs
And you know, at four, at four points, she's a good candidate to like take as a flex officer.
00:15:04
Truthiness
But I,
00:15:09
Truthiness
yeah, she's not a bad in the transfer pool. She's just so flexible to have period. um You know, absolutely deserves to be in your, your flex pile if you don't have her
Bashir and Worf: Medical and Combat Abilities
00:15:19
Truthiness
in your primary list. And i really, i really hate leaving her home just because of the flexibility, but,
00:15:25
Truthiness
So 10 points is a lot to ask for, especially in a faction where it's... Man, I feel like half these cards are at least 10. Yeah, every single every single name card is at least 10 points except for Julian.
00:15:38
Biggs
Speaking of Julian, I think he's who we're talking about next.
00:15:39
Truthiness
It's me, Julian.
00:15:43
Biggs
So as as a fellow medical officer, ah Julian comes in at merely nine points. He can fit the science role.
00:15:54
Biggs
um And ironically is maybe one of the characters that you want to have sitting in engineering for some reason, because his biology three
00:16:05
Truthiness
Biology and logic apparently makes the power go.
00:16:08
Biggs
technically counts. Mm-hmm.
00:16:09
Truthiness
but Makes the power go.
00:16:11
Biggs
Well, what I think of it is he's he's in there, you know, ah passing out stims or whatnot to keep the engineers ah well ah well attentive.
00:16:12
Truthiness
with There you go. That sounds like it. There we go.
00:16:22
Truthiness
I'll do it. I like that.
00:16:23
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:16:23
Truthiness
you know, keep them on their feet.
00:16:25
Biggs
Keep them on their feet. So, whoo. So, Biology 3 and Logic 2, a rare source of logic in the game.
00:16:36
Biggs
Um... Augmented one, so you when he leads a test, you can replace one intuition die with an expertise die.
00:16:48
Truthiness
e
00:16:49
Biggs
So that that's kind of neat. It's not amazing, but it's neat. um He's got medic one, so you can test science plus biology with a difficulty two
00:17:05
Truthiness
During your ready phase.
00:17:06
Biggs
during your ready phase. ah to To heal a grand total of one trauma from personnel. ah so that So that's trauma from officers or team units on your team or in your area.
00:17:21
Truthiness
I mean, that's that's basically getting an incapacitated officer back. So, like, it may not sound like much, but it's it's the difference between, you know, Cisco on his feet and not, or, you know, Picard on his feet or not.
00:17:24
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:17:31
Biggs
Mm-hmm. And there's there's not a lot of officers that can take a that can take a hit here. um
00:17:43
Truthiness
And, you know, what the way team...
00:17:43
Biggs
In fact, there's only there's only two officers that can take a hit and stay on their feet.
00:17:48
Truthiness
Well, in a way, teams only like scary teams only have three health anyway. um
00:17:52
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:17:53
Truthiness
you know the The survey teams are only two health, so you like getting you know even a health back is pretty dang important.
00:18:01
Biggs
Yeah. And that biology three, if you're doing if you're doing mission tests that require biology, whoo-hoo! Mm-hmm.
00:18:10
Truthiness
Oh yeah, he's good. Did we read through his special text?
00:18:13
Biggs
Oh, no, his special text. when While another officer in the same unit leads a test, if Julian Bashir has no levels in that skill used, and he probably doesn't, you can change one blank result to a um ah What's that?
00:18:34
Biggs
and in Oh, ah shoot. i right so one that moves the the one that moves the um
00:18:40
Truthiness
ah observed um Observe. the observ The observation thing. ah moon.
00:18:45
Biggs
yeah The one that moves the complication track result.
00:18:48
Truthiness
yeah yeah
00:18:51
Biggs
So here's the thing. That combines really well with Inspiring. Because when you have...
00:19:00
Truthiness
It's true.
00:19:01
Biggs
With Inspiring... He gets you half of the way there. Oh, it's analysis results.
00:19:06
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:19:06
Biggs
He gets you half of the way there if you roll a blank. So if you roll one more analysis result, you're inspired.
00:19:14
Truthiness
Yeah, that's true. That's an excellent point. ooh
00:19:17
Biggs
And he just it just has to be the same unit. So he just has to be sitting on that galaxy class.
00:19:23
Truthiness
That's nice. o
00:19:24
Biggs
And you're partway there.
00:19:28
Truthiness
and that's that sense That's not too bad at all.
00:19:28
Biggs
Not too bad.
00:19:32
Truthiness
Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, um I'm going to skip over the one we have next the list because I want to talk about... the one and only Klingon the game right now.
00:19:44
Biggs
all right.
00:19:45
Truthiness
Worf, son of Moog. ah The only Federation officer with Oh no, holy crap, I just noticed that. Okay, um one of two Federation officers with two health.
00:19:57
Truthiness
um He is both Klingon and Federation aligned, and he has Sway, one of each for Klingon and Federation. He comes in 11 points, can do command and ops roles.
00:20:08
Truthiness
ah He has Culture 1, Discipline 1, Fieldcraft 1, Ordnance 1, Skirmish 2, and the big thing to take away is Kapla.
00:20:17
Biggs
Ka-plah!
00:20:17
Truthiness
i I this is ah love this mechanic and I cannot wait for more Klingons because you know this is coming. um So after this officer leads an action that scores one or more victory tokens, you may bank up to one of those tokens on the card.
00:20:34
Truthiness
While that officer has one or more banked victory tokens on their card, they gain the bracketed abilities, skills, or other gain techs in the bracket. At the end of the game, en unless this officer is captured, scored all banked victory tokens on them.
00:20:47
Truthiness
His Kapla is plus one Ordnance, plus one Skirmish. So he, as long as he has led a test that got a victory point, Worf suddenly becomes Ordnance 2 and Skirmish 3.
00:20:59
Biggs
Kapla!
00:21:00
Truthiness
Kapla! And then his special text, when Worf leads an attack, you can resolve the following during the post-outcome effects ah analysis in Spire Worf's unit.
00:21:11
Truthiness
So, good lord...
00:21:12
Biggs
Kapla indeed.
00:21:14
Truthiness
Worf is here to fight and to win and be inspiring while doing so. here e is a powerhouse. at I feel like 11 points is a steal for him. like You put him at a weapon station and you don't look back.
00:21:29
Truthiness
Maybe you send him on an away team, um especially if it's early the game, you're not ready to shoot yet. um You send him with the away team or have him test that ops, ah lead that ops test so that you know he can get the Kapla and then...
00:21:44
Truthiness
Oh, man. as soon as it gets to be go time, just inspiring as he leads these these weapons attacks. Like, oh, so good.
00:21:53
Biggs
So you'll notice that it's, he leads a test that score, he leads an action that scores one or more victory points, right?
00:22:06
Biggs
um Remind me for a bit what the ah Federation's
00:22:16
Biggs
exploration card says explore strange new worlds
00:22:23
Truthiness
Let's see here. Explore a strange new worlds. um
00:22:28
Biggs
f it's after one of your um
00:22:32
Truthiness
Auxiliary teams or probes ah succeeds and an objective test or exposes a anomaly score a victory token for a maximum of two this way.
00:22:46
Biggs
That is a way to do an action
00:22:49
Biggs
and score a victory token.
00:22:52
Truthiness
Mm-hmm.
00:22:53
Biggs
Worf can, uh, you can, you can set Worf on one of your, ah
00:23:00
Truthiness
Got to be an auxiliary and away team, though. It can't be on the ship.
00:23:01
Biggs
yeah, you can, you can, you can send him off on a roundabout, uh, go exploring some strange new world, ah You know, scan scan yourself an anomaly.
00:23:18
Truthiness
it
00:23:18
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:23:18
Truthiness
I mean, to be completely honest, there are so many ways to get Kapla on Worf. I don't think I've played a game without him where he doesn't.
00:23:27
Biggs
Yeah.
00:23:27
Truthiness
ah he
00:23:28
Biggs
the point is The point is, you can comply yourself somehow, and you should very early.
00:23:32
Truthiness
And in in in fact, in fact, and this is going to go, we can't talk about the details of it yet, but it has been spoiled that we're getting Gowron.
00:23:43
Truthiness
And when earlier episodes, you heard me talking about a character I am dying to talk about. It's Gowron.
00:23:50
Biggs
oh
00:23:50
Truthiness
Galron is so good. I cannot wait to talk about him um and how how he interacts with with you know other Klingons.
00:24:00
Truthiness
And I feel like because Worf can complace so easily, ah feel like he feeds off of Worf really easily. So Galron and Worf together works really stupidly well.
Odo and O'Brien: Operations and Mechanics
00:24:12
Biggs
Excellent.
00:24:13
Truthiness
And I love it. And I cannot wait talk about Galarion's ability because good God, did Gerns nail this character. said that throughout testing. He was like, you got this guy perfect.
00:24:26
Truthiness
And I'm sorry if i'm I'm overhyping it for everybody, but i I really love this character. I told Gerns, like, you got him perfect, man. He's like, thanks. Like, I watched Way of the Warrior and bunch of other episodes just to make it look right. Yeah.
00:24:39
Truthiness
So good to hear. what Yes, yes. Oh, so Galron's coming.
00:24:41
Biggs
Well, I am very excited.
00:24:42
Truthiness
Great. We were talking about another Klingon though, right?
00:24:45
Biggs
Yeah. um Unfortunately, no more Klingons to talk about, but we're moving on to the we're moving on to the next best thing, which is Odo.
00:24:56
Truthiness
right.
00:24:57
Biggs
He's going to be your ah So,
00:24:59
Truthiness
What does the stern constable do?
00:25:03
Biggs
he is ten points
00:25:06
Biggs
He comes in with only being able to go in the Ops role. has Has a little sway to him. But more importantly, you've got your Discipline 2.
00:25:17
Truthiness
Cardassian sway, that's interesting.
00:25:17
Biggs
yeah h You've got your Fieldcraft 2 and Skirmish 1. You've got Logic 1. You've got Changeling 1.
00:25:29
Truthiness
Which is already, ooh.
00:25:31
Biggs
hu
00:25:32
Truthiness
Mm.
00:25:33
Biggs
So he's adding Peril.
00:25:34
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:25:35
Biggs
when he leads a test. and a oppossing team in Opposing teams in Odo's location increase all their the difficulty of all the tests they make by one.
00:25:46
Truthiness
which combined with Changeling is just it just mean.
00:25:49
Biggs
Mm-hmm. It's very mean.
00:25:51
Truthiness
to
00:25:51
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:25:52
Truthiness
Big old stern meanie head. yeah He's got some great levels on on social and and ops.
00:25:55
Biggs
He's...
00:25:59
Truthiness
Just 2-2-1 is really solid. um Makes him not great in the flex pool ah because he's five points flex pool. That's...
00:26:11
Biggs
But still, he can do he can do quite a few things, but he really shines being on a team, being down on a ah down on a planet, just making everyone's life there difficult.
00:26:11
Truthiness
o
00:26:30
Truthiness
Yeah, that's that's sort of for you.
00:26:31
Biggs
and And if you're fighting the Dominion, remember, if he gets injured, they lose a victory point.
00:26:37
Truthiness
Oh my god, you're right. I never count i never thought about that. I love it! um I love it!
00:26:44
Biggs
Yep.
00:26:44
Truthiness
That's perfect interaction.
00:26:47
Truthiness
yeah God, the more we talk about it, the more I just love the layers we peel back and just showing how well that the the game designers just get these characters. I mean, I don't even know if the Odo interaction was intentional, but you know what?
00:27:00
Truthiness
It works. It's perfect.
00:27:02
Biggs
It's got to be intentional because it says you or your opponent.
00:27:02
Truthiness
I don't care if it's intentional or not.
00:27:06
Truthiness
You're right. Yeah. Oh, I love it. All right. I think our last name character... ah Lower Decks described as the most important person in Starfleet history, Chief Miles O'Brien.
00:27:20
Truthiness
So he is coming in at a lovely 12 points. The only other Federation character besides Worf to have two health, which, um okay, um that was a choice. This is the guy who, you know, tore his rotator cuff picking up but a mug of ale.
00:27:38
Truthiness
ah But sure. um But anyway, yeah um you're bringing him for, let's see, we got culture one, empathy one, ordnance one, skirmish one. So the chief can fight. Chief's got pretty in okay social skills, but you're really bringing him for that mechanics three and handy three.
00:27:56
Truthiness
Why am I...
00:27:56
Biggs
Woo!
00:27:58
Truthiness
So while this officer leads a repair test, you may re roll up to three dice. That's, oh man, there's there's no better mechanic. Which, you know, considering the man cobbled together a Cardassian junk and Federation technology together for for years on end...
00:28:14
Truthiness
Best engineer in Starfleet. Works perfectly here. And then a special text leading back to his next-gen days. While Miles O'Brien leads a test to transport personnel, reduce the difficulty by two to a minimum of one, which is pretty nice if you want to try and get an a away team and kind of get your dominion on and do some boarding actions ah through some shields.
00:28:35
Biggs
And his title, his title even tells you what you're supposed to do with him, which is take him as your chief of operations.
00:28:43
Truthiness
Yeah, because that's his only role. So he's your ops officer. I suppose he'd be your specialist too, but, know, he's the chief. He's the chief. He should do that.
00:28:54
Biggs
And the only the only non-officer, or the the only non-commissioned officer we have so far.
00:29:00
Truthiness
Yeah, so he's not he's not commanding anything, but that's okay. All right, I think it's time.
00:29:10
Truthiness
All right, who's our Lower Decks MVP? Who is our our favorite generic out of all the Federation generics?
00:29:16
Biggs
that is yeah This is going to be a little surprise here.
00:29:22
Truthiness
Little hot tank, little hot tank?
00:29:22
Biggs
cause you might yeah You might think are our intrepid captain is a honorable mention here.
00:29:26
Truthiness
We've lost our minds.
Galaxy Class: Strengths and Weaknesses
00:29:31
Biggs
Because yes, our intrepid captain is inspiring.
00:29:31
Truthiness
Yes.
00:29:35
Biggs
But know our true lower decks champion is our line officer, the reliable commander.
00:29:45
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:29:45
Biggs
Yes, that's right, the line officer.
00:29:46
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. you You really can't ask for much more in a totally free card. Like, you know got one discipline, one field graph, one one navigation.
00:29:58
Truthiness
So it doesn't matter.
00:29:58
Biggs
Doesn't even matter what the skills are.
00:30:00
Truthiness
It's one, one, one. It's one, one, one. It can do anything.
00:30:03
Biggs
You can do anything that you need them to do.
00:30:05
Truthiness
You need to be a commander a ship? Boom. They're good in the captain's chair. need them at the helm? Great at the helm. You need them to lead in action? You know what? They got some decent stuff to to lead to discipline, field graft.
00:30:17
Truthiness
You got one. It's good. You know, get an extra.
00:30:18
Biggs
probably Probably shouldn't be leading a team, but hey, you're not taking the...
00:30:22
Truthiness
But get in.
00:30:23
Biggs
They're supposed to stay with the ship. They're they're not supposed to be leading teams. It's fine.
00:30:28
Truthiness
Yeah, yeah. I just, you can't ask for something better in the freebie card. lay it I think we debated this one a lot longer than we did the the Dominion one. I think we just looked each other and went, Gemidar second?
00:30:41
Truthiness
Gemidar second. And that was the end. But this one, like it took us a while. I mean, the Entrepid Captain is is excellent. Definitely a good honorable mention. you know, inspiring out of a generic officer, um, especially with diplomacy to, you know, leading those tests really, really good, uh, especially for seven points, but man, ain't nothing's going to beat free.
00:31:03
Truthiness
Um, and it's just so head and shoulders, so head and shoulders above the board of supervisor, uh, that it's just hard to, to pass over.
00:31:04
Biggs
No, no it is not.
00:31:12
Truthiness
man. All right. So let's talk about the ships a little bit. Um, You know, we we've we've talked over the stats and all that for the gout for all these ships, but what about the Galaxy class really stands out to you?
00:31:29
Biggs
the board presence of the Galaxy class, the The Federation's whole gimmick is board presence, and nothing exemplifies it more than the Galaxy class.
00:31:41
Biggs
Because you've you've got probes.
00:31:42
Truthiness
So what do you mean by that?
00:31:46
Biggs
You've got shuttles. You've got the ability to inspire other units nearby you. You've got really...
00:31:59
Biggs
really ah I mean, really good sensor range, admittedly ah in a cone in front of you, but again, in a pinch, you can even ah separate the saucer section and have two different ships, effectively, covering two different areas. You can exert your influence in a large
00:32:26
Truthiness
Yeah, yeah like yeah.
00:32:26
Biggs
part of the board.
00:32:27
Truthiness
They don't even need to take the probes upgrade. That's a huge bonus to not have to spend points on that. just has it. The detachment, I mean, think it's something that you don't really play with early on.
00:32:39
Truthiness
um Just, you know, it's an extra bit of complication. you know, you're starting to learn the game. It's not really something you want to you want to mess with, but it really is a very big advantage to be able to, um you know, detach that saucer and the saucer stops draining energy.
00:32:55
Truthiness
When it takes hits, it starts just, you know, taking those so shields per turn, um really making it very effective. And then at, you know, combat stuff, you're adding an extra thing that can shoot. Like, ah think you really nailed it. as it Between the shuttles and the probes and the saucer section and the star drive, you can have up to...
00:33:18
Truthiness
geez uh five units on the board just from the galaxy class and you can throw a probe out there to you know extend your range
00:33:26
Biggs
You can throw up to two probes from the Galaxy class.
00:33:30
Truthiness
oh god that's right again man it's just yeah you can have such a huge swath around the board any do you see any weaknesses in particular i think we already talked about one of them but
00:33:41
Biggs
I mean, the biggest weakness ah is how long it takes to spin up that um alert dial and get it
00:33:51
Truthiness
Yeah, it's just snow so, so...
00:33:52
Biggs
and get it to the point where it's effective in a fight. Again, Picard can help mitigate that, but, um,
00:33:58
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:34:01
Truthiness
Yeah, and I'm not even sure what to... You know, you but what do you start the game on, even? Like, do you start on green, too? Then you got some some weapons power, so you can actually shoot a little bit initially, but you're limiting yourself on your impulse speed significantly, and you get no recharge power. You know, and...
00:34:22
Truthiness
yeah i just Yeah, that dial is is the roughest part of this thing by far. Because once combat starts, you want to be at yellow three. You're not shooting torpedoes until you get there. um your're really your Your weapons power is not great. Your recharge is at its best at that yellow three. like It's the best recharge rate, and you really want that for when you start taking shield damage.
00:34:45
Truthiness
um So yeah, like that...
00:34:48
Biggs
it's It's also officer hungry in a faction that is officer hungry.
00:34:51
Truthiness
Oh, yes.
00:34:55
Truthiness
Yes. I mean, yeah all these actions we've talked about, like launching the probe, ah making those shuttles, um you got to either spend some energy on them or, you know, with your standby action or you got to dedicate an officer to it.
00:35:09
Truthiness
um So it's. um It's yeah, it is. it wants all of your officers. You can, you can put all freaking five. You can put six officers on this dang thing.
00:35:20
Truthiness
And I think you'd be using every single one of them in every opportunity. Hmm. Man. Yeah, man, I like its it's crew dial is really good too. Like once you hit inspire, oh man, that first step up plus one to every single category.
00:35:38
Truthiness
i mean, another inspiring doesn't do quite as much, but that first inspire taking you up to five command, four ops, and three so are four science. So five, four, four.
00:35:48
Truthiness
Yeah,
00:35:49
Biggs
that's That's real nice.
00:35:52
Truthiness
yeah. yeah You know, its resilience ain't bad either. You know, it takes three criticals to, you know, force a card on it beyond its step dial. You know, it's got eight haul. It's got eight starting energy. You know, it's really solid. I think it pales
Constellation and Defiant Class: Combat Readiness
00:36:07
Truthiness
in comparison to the Dominion Battlecruiser as far as pure combat ability.
00:36:13
Truthiness
um It just, but it should be.
00:36:14
Biggs
But it's it's the Federation. You're not built for pure combat.
00:36:16
Truthiness
Yeah. It is so flexible, and it really is, yeah, but like you said, I think you covered it best your opening statement. It's all about, you know, reach on the board. All right, well, let's take a look at the Constellation class next.
00:36:34
Truthiness
um I think I have had the least amount of board time with this ship out of everything in the Federation lineup, so I'm curious what your thoughts are on it.
00:36:44
Biggs
So my primary thought on this guy is that
00:36:49
Biggs
it can fight. It doesn't want to, but it can.
00:36:52
Truthiness
Yeah, he's not horrible at it.
00:36:54
Biggs
And it and it fights better if it's launching shuttles to to to use the shuttles to add a little extra punch. Strip some extra energy, strip some extra shields so that it can do what it needs to do.
00:37:08
Biggs
It has some dead zones for its phaser emitters.
00:37:12
Truthiness
Yeah, that's not good.
00:37:13
Biggs
in the in the rear right and rear left. there's There's places where its phaser emitters can't see you.
00:37:20
Truthiness
Mm-hmm.
00:37:21
Biggs
With that in mind, it's it's self-sufficient.
00:37:21
Truthiness
Yeah, don like
00:37:26
Biggs
you can You can inspire yourself,
00:37:30
Truthiness
yeah it's got that same address action that the Galaxy class has.
00:37:34
Biggs
except that you can't inspire other units with the with the address, which isn't terrible.
00:37:38
Truthiness
Yeah,
00:37:41
Truthiness
yeah it's self-sufficient.
00:37:41
Biggs
So... Yeah, this guy can go off by itself, accomplish objectives on its own, doesn't want to be threatened while it's doing that, but it can, again, this ah this fits in with the Federation's ah reach across the board, where it can contest things
00:38:05
Truthiness
and
00:38:08
Biggs
pretty effectively all over the place. It's got Science 4 at its baseline.
00:38:13
Truthiness
That's the big one. like It doesn't really care about inspiring. Well, it really gets a huge step at the second step of inspiring.
00:38:20
Biggs
Yeah, if you can if you can double inspire, that's real nice for your command and your op stats.
00:38:25
Truthiness
Yeah. But man, if you just need to...
00:38:27
Biggs
You you can't really improve your Science stat, but Base 4 Science is pretty good.
00:38:35
Truthiness
And to be honest, that's probably why you're bringing it anyway. So, you know, inspiring is nice, but not really needed on this guy.
00:38:37
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
00:38:41
Truthiness
ah You're bringing him for, you're bringing it for the the science of it all. You know, that's the best science.
00:38:45
Biggs
bringing it for the science, you're bringing it to launch some probes and use your good comm range to let the to let the probes use your science stat.
00:38:52
Truthiness
Yep.
00:38:56
Truthiness
Yeah, I mean, especially since it gives you three extra points for for your your officer list. You know, it's... or Wait, I'm getting this out of the order.
00:39:05
Biggs
Yeah.
00:39:06
Truthiness
Yeah, so it gets you three extra points for upgrades.
00:39:06
Biggs
Yeah, it's it's giving you... hu
00:39:10
Truthiness
Yeah, so it...
00:39:10
Biggs
Those upgrades can be your flex pool for for officers.
00:39:15
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:39:16
Biggs
your transfer pool.
00:39:17
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah, and what does it look like when it starts reducing? um Yeah, it starts getting hit pretty hard on the crew dial with each step.
00:39:25
Biggs
It does not have a lot of steps on its crew dial.
00:39:28
Truthiness
No, like immediately it immediately gets.
00:39:28
Biggs
So if it starts taking damage, you can still recover from one lost crew member. By the time you've lost that second crew member, your medical care is looking a little iffy unless you've got a doctor on board.
00:39:42
Truthiness
Yeah. know
00:39:43
Biggs
And any lower than that, and And you're, yeah, you're 011 and then you're incapacitated.
00:39:53
Truthiness
Yeah. Alright, on to the best ship in Starfleet, the Defiant Class Escort.
00:40:01
Biggs
a weird way to pronounce Cerritos.
00:40:04
Truthiness
Look, most awesome ship in Starfleet will go to Cerritos. Best ship is going to go to Defiant. Can we agree to that?
00:40:12
Biggs
Okay, fair.
00:40:12
Truthiness
No? Yeah. yeah yeah is This ship is, as you know you expect, it's an escort. It comes to fight. It's what it does best. um It's the lowest science value of the Federation at starting at two.
00:40:27
Truthiness
um Even inspiring, it doesn't get past three. um It definitely likes that first step of and inspiring, getting plus one to command and ops and science.
00:40:38
Truthiness
um But on the other hand, If it loses crew, it actually keeps the same ops value and science values. The only thing gets hit on that first crew dial is command. And it keeps a pretty healthy ops value um down to two steps down, like that 131.
00:40:56
Biggs
who
00:40:57
Truthiness
You know, you still got decent ops value there. um i mean, this is a ship that's meant to fight. Just plain and simple. It's here to fight. It's here to have a good time. um And good lord, it is just packed with weapons.
00:41:11
Biggs
It is loaded for bear.
00:41:13
Truthiness
Oh, man. So, yeah, you really want to get this sucker. I think you're you're comfortable At yellow and you can get to yellow fast. That's the big advantage it has over the galaxy class in particular.
00:41:26
Truthiness
um You can you can go up one step with a standby action be on yellow alert and then you've got yourself, you know, two shields, either directions, three weapons power, three regen. You're fine there.
00:41:38
Truthiness
Um, if you want to step up to red alert, uh, one, you know, that increases your weapons power at the cost of your recharge, um, by one a piece. And then got three on your shields.
00:41:49
Truthiness
I feel like, um, unless I have an officer in the engineering section, i probably stay on yellow. Um, cause weapons power three is, is enough, especially if I have an officer, you know, leading the attacks and, you know, we can dump some energy into it.
00:42:05
Biggs
with that in mind With that in mind, it is it can be, with ah with officers dedicated to it, a very efficient ship to letting you dump more ah energy into into the shots.
00:42:06
Truthiness
Uh,
00:42:17
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah.
00:42:20
Truthiness
Yeah, that's true. Yeah, it does really well with three three officers. You just got one in engineering, one at tactical, one in the captain's chair that can hop over to the helm, um depending on on where you are.
00:42:34
Truthiness
It's, yeah, you get a lot out of it with just those three officers. But honestly, you get a lot out of it with just two. um If you don't have space for engineering, I feel like it does well with just that, you know, helm slash captain's chair and then tactical.
00:42:48
Truthiness
Yeah. because yeah, it, it packs such a.
00:42:52
Biggs
Maybe it's the place that you park your emergency repair team. ah emergency repair team
00:42:59
Truthiness
Yeah, exactly. That's actually my, my first thought for that engineering section is like the emergency repair team, you know, you don't lose much taking that first step down.
00:43:09
Truthiness
so you know, if you can't inspire, do that real quick, you know, and, then you know maybe you do your your medical care test. um you know It's a little tough, um but maybe you try and heal yourself on standby action or something like that to get the crew dial back up. But
Federation Fleet: Board Control and Strategy
00:43:28
Truthiness
even if you don't, just having that repair crew and engineering and just being 242, that's a nasty combat ship.
00:43:36
Biggs
And you can always fold that engineering team back into the ship if you if you drop too far.
00:43:39
Truthiness
Yep. Yep.
00:43:43
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, it's got the, Let's see. What does it have unique? It's got that evasive maneuvers. That's not bad. Removing sensor lock. But yeah again, you're... Oh, it can launch shuttles too, man.
00:43:57
Truthiness
Everything is launch shuttles.
00:43:57
Biggs
Yeah, it can launch shuttles, but it can't do probes natively.
00:44:01
Truthiness
No, no, it can't. but That's fine. That's not what here for. um It's here for those three friggin' phaser emitters, the two phaser cannon batteries, the three quantum torpedo tubes, natively bringing quantum torpedoes.
00:44:15
Biggs
wo
00:44:15
Truthiness
Right now, the only one in the in the game that does that. And man, when those hit home, oh my goodness, they hurt. So that's why you're bringing the Defiant. you know it's just It costs you three points, but like it's kind of nice.
00:44:29
Biggs
You've decided... You're bringing it because you've decided that you want to fight.
00:44:32
Truthiness
Yeah, it's time it's a go time. And it balances with the the Constellation class. um you know Minus three, plus three. Galaxy class is zero. Yay, you're even.
00:44:45
Truthiness
It's the starter set.
00:44:47
Biggs
Yeah.
00:44:48
Truthiness
Woo!
00:44:49
Biggs
Well done.
00:44:50
Truthiness
All right. So what's your overall thoughts on the fleet here? What are the what are strengths? What are weaknesses? um you know What's your idea for some of your incident fleet's
00:45:01
Biggs
So the big, like I said before, the, the idea with the Federation is that it is there to play the game the way the game heres designed from the box. like It's there to play the objectives, succeed at the objectives, especially if those objectives are science.
00:45:27
Biggs
It's there to be able to influence those objectives in various ways by getting ah shuttles out, getting probes out, um just having that board presence everywhere.
00:45:45
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:45:45
Biggs
And to transition into a weakness, it sacrifices having a...
00:45:46
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:45:57
Biggs
sacrifices having that big punch somewhere.
00:46:03
Truthiness
Wow. That's what the device for.
00:46:03
Biggs
because Because you're choosing instead to spread out everywhere.
00:46:10
Truthiness
Yeah, yeah. Well, and you've got a lot of flexibility in those officers, a lot of versatility, you know, that just like you already said, like tons of options for objectives and just completely schools the dominion in science.
00:46:23
Truthiness
um Best Commodore in the game in Picard, by far.
00:46:27
Biggs
My goodness, not even a question.
00:46:28
Truthiness
Not even a question.
00:46:29
Biggs
I mean, the only way that you could have a better Commodore than Picard is to make the mistake of putting Picard somewhere where the female changeling can get to him.
00:46:30
Truthiness
um
00:46:39
Truthiness
Yes, that's actually an excellent point. like The only way to beat Picard is to be Picard. um Repair teams, just hanging out in engineering, just you know that's a pretty nice advantage. But ah on the weakness side, like what stands to me is like that peaceful side of the combat directive.
00:46:57
Truthiness
It is very unforgiving, especially compared to the Dominion. that just you know All they have to do to be hostile is just be a little behind and a disadvantage, and then they can just go ham on you.
00:47:06
Biggs
who if you're but If you're behind, you can't do anything about it but not be behind anymore.
00:47:13
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. So like yeah they have to wait for hostilities to be initiated by the, by the opposing faction more or less, unless there's something in the objective ah that flips some of them hostile for some reason.
00:47:25
Truthiness
um Security teams, you know, are noticeably weaker than their Dominion counterparts. It's what one health difference um shrouded for the, the, the gem in our teams is, is pretty good.
00:47:36
Truthiness
ah So, you know, veterans is just not as good at fighting with the with the glaring exception of the Defiant, which is just the the offensive powerhouse that it is in the background.
World Cup and Tournament Strategies
00:47:50
Truthiness
All right, so what's what's your prefer... what's What's your idea for a fleet here, Biggs?
00:47:55
Biggs
Okay, so I have a fleet that I've been considering for ah shameless self-plug here, but we are hosting
00:48:04
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah.
00:48:06
Biggs
a ah star Trek Into the Unknown World Cup, hereafter known as the Unknown World Cup. ah This is going to take place using the Star Trek Into the Unknown Discord or our own Blissfully Ignorant Discord.
00:48:25
Biggs
as well as tabletop simulator that was, um, tabletop simulator that was created by crazy Vulcan.
00:48:35
Truthiness
Yeah, mad shout out to Crazy Vulcan. He dove into this TTS module before the game was even released. You it was just pulling clues from all over the internet, just trying to figure out how to get everything set up. He did a massive amount of work.
00:48:50
Truthiness
And if you haven't seen the module yet, it's great. It really is fantastic. Very easy to use. um And then while we're we're plugging the Unreal World Cup, we're also goingnna I'll also talk about what our plans are for content past these inner green episodes uh so biggs and i are gonna yeah so just yes exactly that's why i'm bringing it up now um so biggs and i are gonna uh stream a playthrough stream playthroughs each week of campaign missions so we're gonna play through the campaign on tts uh we'll be streaming it on our youtube channel yes we have a youtube channel that doesn't really get used much but
00:49:06
Biggs
Here's a hint We're using tabletop simulator for it. pacific
00:49:28
Truthiness
hey that's what it's there for to stream things um and then we'll kind of do a one week on one week off thing where we do the live stream um and then we'll come on the podcast and talk about it talk about the you know what what happened during the the the scenario yeah what our thoughts are on the scenario what we're you know what we're thinking going forward in the next part of the campaign um So that's what we'll do next as we walk through. So that'll give us a good amount of content for you all ah going forward.
00:49:57
Truthiness
So yes, back to the rest to the unknown World Cup. If you are unfamiliar with Star Wars Romana, the first online play with that was with a free program known as Vassal.
00:50:10
Truthiness
So Biggs, I think this was like the first year of the game's life, maybe the second
00:50:15
Biggs
ah it was It was just after the very first year of the game. So was 2015, believe.
00:50:23
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:50:25
Biggs
January 2015. Last year. Last year.
00:50:26
Truthiness
Yeah. So big story.
00:50:27
Biggs
was january twenty fifteen
00:50:29
Truthiness
started that uh the vassal world cup for armada huge tournament for many many years uh he just handed over the reins to the community um last year ah so you know plenty of experience and he's come up with a great some great ideas on how to score especially um mutual losses and mutual victories which i think i i gotta say you you really i think
00:50:37
Biggs
last last year
00:50:55
Truthiness
took a great direction there with with that. So we're going be spinning that up soon. um And hopefully you'll join us. No, I'm going to be playing. Biggs, you're going to be playing and running, right?
00:51:05
Biggs
Yep, playing and running. This is this is all for fun.
00:51:09
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:51:09
Biggs
So ah it's the inaugural year. I'd hate myself if I didn't take the opportunity to play.
00:51:14
Truthiness
Darn right.
00:51:15
Biggs
maybe and later Maybe in later years I'll just sit back and TO it like I did with the World Cup once the once the Armada World Cup got big. But the Unknown World Cup is still in its infancy and i want to get ah ships on the virtual tabletop such as it is.
00:51:30
Truthiness
All right, so what are you thinking about Federation for that tournament?
00:51:34
Biggs
So... For that tournament, because you're using the same task force throughout, I wanted something that would be tactically flexible.
00:51:45
Biggs
Something where, yes, my task force, my my five core officers are set, but where I could spend the flex points in ways that would benefit um whatever I'm up against at that time.
00:52:06
Biggs
ah whatever the actual objectives would be. And to that effect, I have for my ah command liaison, an intrepid captain.
00:52:18
Biggs
I have Miles O'Brien, chief of operations, as my chief of operations. I've got the scholarly doctor as my science officer. I've got Worf, son of Moog, as my ah first specialist officer.
00:52:34
Biggs
and I've got the daring first officer as my second specialist, and then I've got Picard, Sisko, Bashir, and Odo in my ah flex pool with two vigilant security chiefs that I'm calling the... ah Oops, I'm not taking a... um I'm not taking a transfer pool this turn if I draw them.
00:53:01
Truthiness
Okay.
00:53:01
Biggs
That gives me
00:53:02
Truthiness
Old move, putting John Luke in the prancer pool.
00:53:05
Biggs
Yeah, but that gives me eight flex points available. So that's enough to take Jean-Luc if I need to take Jean-Luc. If I take two Constellation classes, I can even take Jean-Luc and Benjamin Sisko and replace those old reliable commanders, which admittedly are really good, but you've got to admit you'd rather have Jean-Luc Picard and Benjamin Sisko than two reliable commanders.
00:53:33
Truthiness
Fair. Fair.
00:53:35
Biggs
So... This gives me a lot of flexibility to play what i need ah what I need to play.
00:53:45
Biggs
I can take two Defiance if I need to take two Defiance because I got the eight points available to me. I can take two Constellation classes and some upgrades if I need to if i need Constellation classes. I can take a Defiant and a Constellation if...
00:54:05
Biggs
um I want exactly eight points for, say, Odo and Bashir, or just Picard and maybe the Enterprise title.
00:54:20
Biggs
But it it really keeps that flexibility open to decide what the heck I actually want to do when the mission when the missions actually get started.
00:54:29
Truthiness
yeah Okay. That's
00:54:35
Truthiness
interesting. That's an interesting approach. like that's ah That's a large but transfer pool. yeah and It kind of shows off the flexibility you could we could potentially have in a tournament scene. is you know you You set your core officers, but you flex your ships and your upgrades ah depending on the scenario. Sorry for the buzzing in the background.
00:54:57
Truthiness
The laundry's going off. Sorry.
00:55:01
Truthiness
I will not be cutting that. Just, you know, I'm too lazy. Okay. um Yeah, just so much flexibility there, man. i dig it. I dig it.
00:55:13
Truthiness
All right. So mine, i kind of went the opposite direction. i started with the ships. And ah love me my Defiant. So i basically started with, I want two Defiants.
00:55:24
Truthiness
I don't care. i'm i'm ready to fight if I need to. And I'm going to lean hard on the Galaxy class. and and just the na native federation advantage and a lot of these a lot of these um yeah objectives.
Rising Tensions Expansion: New Ships and Officers
00:55:39
Truthiness
ah So for my crew, i went with John Luke. I just I cannot leave him at home, especially with just so good in that galaxy class captain's chair. um I also took Worf is because Worf is just Excellent at objective play and weapon stages. He's all around.
00:55:58
Truthiness
hard to leave Hard for me to leave him around. But unfortunately, because I'm planning on spending six points on Defiance, that leaves me with nothing but generics for the rest of it. So I got a redoubtable engineer.
00:56:09
Truthiness
He's going to join Worf and Jean-Luc and a reliable commander on the Galaxy class. And then I've got two vigilant security chiefs, ah which will each go over to the Defiant classes to fill those weapons slots. And then I'll lean on the reliable commanders for those ships as the the helm and and captain's chair officer.
00:56:29
Truthiness
So, you know, it's all about, honestly, all about acting like the Dominion. I feel like I accidentally made a Federation configuration. ah i guess that's the advantage of having, know, a demo kit where I can do this with the second Defiant class.
00:56:45
Truthiness
ah But I did, I did, I flew this fleet a couple of times and I just, I really like Defiance, especially, you know, I was doing a lot of testing against Klingons since we, you know, now I can say that.
00:56:59
Truthiness
um And yeah, there's some fighting that happens and the Defiance are, or you know, you need them.
00:57:04
Biggs
I imagine there is against the Klingons.
00:57:07
Truthiness
Yeah, yeah. So, you know, it's really, it's fun. i gets the It leans into the combat aspect of the game, um but the galaxy class, especially his ability to split off,
00:57:17
Truthiness
um and just kind of be that you know that home base for a lot of those auxiliaries, I feel like covers enough of the objective play that I can lean into a little bit more of an aggressive approach.
00:57:26
Truthiness
All
00:57:29
Biggs
Very good.
00:57:30
Truthiness
right. Well, let's see. We've already plugged the Unknown World Cup. We've already plugged our plans for the future. um So I think that's it for the night.
00:57:39
Biggs
Yeah, come come and join us on the Blissfully Ignorant Gaming Discord, or ah hop on into the Star Trek Into the Unknown Discord, which also has stuff for TTS and its own channel for the World Cup.
00:57:49
Truthiness
It's been very active.
00:57:53
Truthiness
Which, I mean, hey, I know this is supposed to be an evergreen thing, but hey, why don't we talk about some of the stuff that got spoiled the other day?
00:58:03
Biggs
Yes.
00:58:04
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah.
00:58:05
Biggs
Yes.
00:58:05
Truthiness
Yeah, let's do it.
00:58:06
Biggs
Let's do it.
00:58:07
Truthiness
Let's do it. Hey, it's over're already in hour. Who cares? you know, they'll stick around.
00:58:12
Biggs
I mean, it's for spoilers. Let's do it
00:58:15
Truthiness
It is. It is. Let's do it. Spoilers. All right. So if you are not aware, there is a, in addition to the core, WizKids has now announced that there is also ah a new, i forget forgot what they're calling these things, campaign pack, narrative expansion,
00:58:32
Biggs
I think it's like campaign. Hold on. Let me let me find the actual thing here. ah Rising Tensions Expansion is what it's called, and they are calling it
00:58:45
Truthiness
Yeah.
00:58:50
Biggs
um A exciting follow up to the core set brings the Klingon Empire into the conflict playable as a standalone faction or as allies for Federation or Dominion forces.
00:59:02
Truthiness
Yeah, so we'll probably finally get to see that sway option in action because we still know what that does. ah but Because, you know, it's there, you know, it's a stat.
00:59:14
Truthiness
But no one has any idea what it does. So we'll we'll definitely see that in there. um Man, and then we get the Klingons. We get the Klingons, man. we get the Klingons.
00:59:24
Truthiness
We get a bird of prey.
00:59:25
Biggs
We get the Klingons.
00:59:26
Truthiness
get a Vortia.
00:59:28
Biggs
ah So yeah, there there is quite a bit... ah There's quite a bit spoiled. You've got your... You've got your Vorta-class attack cruiser.
00:59:42
Truthiness
That looks so...
00:59:43
Biggs
You've got your Burel-class bird of prey.
00:59:45
Truthiness
Critical question for you, what size base does that look like to you?
00:59:49
Biggs
um That looks...
00:59:51
Truthiness
For the Vorja.
00:59:53
Biggs
So... That looks suspiciously not like a large to me.
01:00:00
Truthiness
Yeah, that's that's what my eyes look like too.
01:00:01
Biggs
that looks that looks That looks like it's a medium size. So when they... ah My hope, knowing nothing else, is the... As allies for Federation or Dominion forces, my hope is that there's either new...
01:00:18
Biggs
um new ah conflict cards that let you that that have you not taking capital ships in or there's a way to get one of the two existing two existing capital ships as ah with like sway but still keep your Klingon primary
01:00:48
Truthiness
Yeah, that'd be nice. And then we obviously got that...
01:00:50
Biggs
But we will have to see what the rules are before we know more on that.
01:00:54
Truthiness
Yeah, so we also got a Borel Bird of Prey. and then Federation's the other half of this. So we got a Miranda-class cruiser, which is definitely on a small. And then we get another Defiant class. The close-up pictures have the old Defiant, but if you look at the big box, it's zoom in real good.
01:01:15
Truthiness
That looks like the Valiant to me. And I think they confirmed that on Facebook, um that this is the USS Valiant.
01:01:21
Biggs
i I believe so. if you If you zoom in real close, you can kind of make out USS Valiant, or as I joked around, the Uevalio.
01:01:33
Truthiness
Yeah.
01:01:36
Biggs
ah But yeah, no, they did they did confirm on Facebook that it is that the Defiant Class ship and Rising Tensions is the USS Valiant with a different name, with a different whole number. So you'll finally be able to have two Defiant classes that don't look exactly the same.
01:01:56
Truthiness
yeah Man, I think I'm ordering two of these anyway because I want two birds of prey and two vortia just to have.
01:02:03
Biggs
Yeah.
01:02:04
Truthiness
i
01:02:04
Biggs
Yeah, I mean, why wouldn't you?
01:02:06
Truthiness
Whatever, I'm to have four Defiant classes.
New Cards and Klingon Strategies
01:02:08
Truthiness
No big deal. it Just, you know, whatever. yeah
01:02:11
Biggs
i mean, i'm ah I'm a Klingon at heart.
01:02:14
Truthiness
Oh, God.
01:02:14
Biggs
I...
01:02:15
Truthiness
So, yeah, officers. um We see Galron. He's got two health, ah diplomacy two, ordnance one, skirmish one, nav one. And then he's got something to do in the ready action.
01:02:26
Biggs
Something ready. You may blank your calm directive to, I'm guessing, hostile in this blah, blah, blah, blah blah combat.
01:02:28
Truthiness
Hostile.
01:02:33
Truthiness
hostile
01:02:36
Truthiness
So he's got some kind of ready action. I've got a total line here because I know what this actually is. But he's got some kind of action that allows your calm directive to be hostile.
01:02:50
Biggs
But which calm directive Mm-hmm.
01:02:53
Truthiness
and yeah, it looks like yeah you there's the combat one's definitely there. and You can see that one front and center.
01:02:58
Biggs
And then Gowron, and then there's Gowron, Leeds, Persuasive, Friendly, Unit, and Them.
01:03:02
Truthiness
So yeah, yeah.
01:03:07
Truthiness
It's in them.
01:03:09
Biggs
ah
01:03:10
Truthiness
We're reading like one line. this This is like a five line paragraph.
01:03:13
Biggs
m
01:03:14
Truthiness
Crazy eyes needs to.
01:03:14
Biggs
Dear God, we won he's oh i want...
01:03:15
Truthiness
Oh, we need
01:03:19
Biggs
I want Crazy Eyes so bad.
01:03:20
Truthiness
crazy eyes. needs to oh we need crazy. eyes
01:03:23
Biggs
And we've got our first Romulan.
01:03:23
Truthiness
but need Yeah, who's got Federation and Rombulant allegiance, so sub-commander to roll. We've got her completely spoiled at eight points. She's a science officer, discipline one, fieldcraft one, mechanics two, and she's got remodulate cloak, which tells me that there is going to be some way to get cloaking in the Federation.
01:03:47
Truthiness
so yeah um I think the Defiant...
01:03:48
Biggs
There wouldn't be much much a point of her being Federation if there wasn't.
01:03:52
Truthiness
Yeah, right. um So yeah, I think the Defiant's getting his cloaking device it's some in some way, shape, or form. And then we've got at least an extra situation and an extra complication.
01:04:03
Truthiness
Klingons have their shuttle fully spoiled. I won't really go over that. um We also have...
01:04:09
Biggs
Yeah, it's it's it's a shuttle. It's a more shooty shuttle than the previous shuttles, which is neat.
01:04:14
Truthiness
yeah And then we got Riker, um who is hilariously somehow better in engineering than Geordi.
01:04:20
Biggs
to
01:04:22
Truthiness
Because of his navigation three in in the the the the science skill. He's got Fieldcraft 1, Skirmish 2. He is inspiring on ops.
01:04:34
Truthiness
um I can't really make out what his stuff is in the special text.
01:04:39
Biggs
Something about auxiliary units.
01:04:41
Truthiness
Yeah, and then another action of some kind. It's Cowan. Defonacy 1, Dispin 1. So he seems like kind of almost like Kira in that he one still he's a first officer that wants to lead away teams.
01:04:54
Truthiness
um Very good. it It looks like it's Skirmish. ah Decent Fieldcraft. Navigation 3.
01:04:59
Biggs
Really good at navigation.
01:05:01
Truthiness
Yeah, Navigation 3. And then we got Geordi fully fully spoiled. So he's 11 points. He is doing empathy one, craft one, mechanics two, nav two.
01:05:12
Truthiness
He's perceptive two, ah which is yeah while he is leading a test, ah treat their unit's instruments stat power as increased by two. Yeah.
01:05:23
Biggs
But here's the thing. Here's the thing. Yes, you're increasing unit stats by two with perceptive, but look at his free text.
01:05:32
Truthiness
yeah So reaction, when Geordi LaForge's unit takes an action, choose one of its alert stats, treat the value of that stat as one higher while resolving that action.
01:05:33
Biggs
When he...
01:05:42
Biggs
So yes, he can art he's already with perceptive two raising that value, ah that instrument power stat by two. but you can also use his free text ability to raise the value by one more to three.
01:06:01
Biggs
that's that's a lot of That's a lot of reach out and scan something.
01:06:06
Truthiness
Yeah. Yeah. Or just, you know, it adds to comms too. Like it's just an, it's an extra three inches, which ain't nothing.
01:06:12
Biggs
But the the other thing is, it's ah it's a reaction and it happens when his unit takes an action. He doesn't have to be the one doing it.
01:06:21
Truthiness
That's true.
01:06:22
Biggs
So, yes, when you're using sensors, the sensors are increased by one. When you're shooting weapons, your weapon value is increased by one.
01:06:35
Biggs
When you're... um
01:06:38
Biggs
When you're using impulse, your impulse value is increased by one. Maybe even your turning radius... Or, yeah, that that's pretty much what you're doing.
01:06:53
Truthiness
All right. And so the final thing that's been spoiled is most of the directive cards. And I'm sure this is going to disappoint some folks, but guess what's still very much there on the Calm Combat Directive?
01:07:07
Truthiness
A big giant penalty if you are the first one to shoot. well yeah Sorry, Klingons. You're going to get negative two victory points if you shoot first. ah Oops.
01:07:20
Biggs
That's okay.
01:07:20
Truthiness
Demons looks like the same thing after opposing unit performs a hostile act. Looks like you can set it. Boisterous demeanor. That one's interesting. You are read that one?
01:07:30
Biggs
Yeah, so Exchange boasts.
01:07:32
Truthiness
Yeah, that's going to be Klingon.
01:07:33
Biggs
um The persuasive unit tests three difficulty ah with trust and the highest ah combat or the highest security stat of its leading officer And minus one if all the hailing units are at the same location.
01:07:50
Biggs
So if you're down on the ground yelling at each other, it's just easier.
01:07:55
Truthiness
Klingons are loud.
01:07:57
Biggs
inspire if On a success, inspire the persuasive player's unit and each other hailing unit whose player's trust value was three or higher.
01:08:07
Truthiness
I mean, i kind of encourages you to get along with Klingons for for a hail, because you get it.
01:08:07
Biggs
So... Mm-hmm.
01:08:13
Truthiness
um Inspiring is not a bad result from losing a hail.
01:08:16
Biggs
No, not too bad at all. You, you kind of, yeah, you kind of want them to succeed. And then, ah for two breakthrough successes, in addition to the success, instead of inspiring the unit, the persuasive player scores victory point.
01:08:31
Biggs
And then, ah you can also, ah the persuasive player can set, uh, with a analysis, the persuasive player can set their exploration,
01:08:45
Biggs
um
01:08:46
Truthiness
to hostile and then there's might be something after that but that sentence alone um cool cool cool yeah then that gets you into
01:08:46
Biggs
To hostile.
01:08:53
Biggs
That's pretty fun. That is pretty fun. i'm guessing I'm guessing what is behind it is that ah if you refuse a hail, set your thing to hostile.
01:09:04
Truthiness
oh yeah good point Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's that right there starts getting into more Klingon-y type stuff. Very easy way to get yourself into
01:09:12
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
01:09:16
Truthiness
a a hostile... yeah What's the one below this? I'm forgetting the names. um
01:09:23
Biggs
ah
01:09:24
Truthiness
The Star?
01:09:24
Biggs
there's Exploration.
01:09:26
Truthiness
Is that exploration that's next? The Glory Awaits?
01:09:27
Biggs
Yeah, The Glory Awaits.
01:09:29
Truthiness
Yeah, so glory awaits. Let's see. After one of your auxiliary team or probe units succeeds as an objective, there is an opposing unit within four inches.
01:09:39
Truthiness
Score victory token. You can score maximum two this way. You get an honor guard or boarding party, an honor guard, and repair team for your basic teams. But like we just talked about with the hail, um this is the directive that can flip hostile with just an analysis result on that hail.
01:09:57
Truthiness
um And that gets you to boarding party, boarding party, under guard or repair team. um So, and
01:10:04
Biggs
Deeds worthy of song.
01:10:06
Truthiness
deeds worthy of song. After one of your units team units destroys an opposing team unit or disables an opposing ship, score victory token.
01:10:17
Truthiness
If a capital ship is disabled this way, score two victory tokens and you get a maximum of two. um After an opposing unit performs a hostile an aggressive act, if one of your ships a common range of that opposing unit sets your combat directive to hostile. So let's go over this.
01:10:34
Truthiness
Forster's demeanor, open the hill, get an analysis result, turn this one hostile. Start attacking sir said opponent with deeds worthy of song, and when they retaliate, you now have It's a Good Day to Die.
01:10:40
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
01:10:48
Biggs
Mm-hmm.
01:10:48
Truthiness
So, after opposing ship, kapla.
01:10:49
Biggs
ah
01:10:51
Truthiness
After your opposing ship is destroyed by your hostile axe, score a victory token, and then if it was a capital, get two. And then the last one, which is the what is that that's the diplomacy objective or directive, ah you can't open hails, you can answer hails.
01:11:06
Truthiness
If one of your units incapacitates an opposing officer, score a victory token. Maximum one victory token.
01:11:11
Biggs
no no longer No longer do you need to capture officers. All you need to do is incapacitate them.
01:11:15
Truthiness
and Yep, yep. Dominion wants capture. Klingon's good with just maiming.
01:11:19
Biggs
Mm-hmm. We don't want to take prisoners.
01:11:21
Truthiness
And after you refuse a hail, your opponent who opened it may set their combat directive to hostile.
01:11:22
Biggs
You crazy?
01:11:27
Truthiness
So that's pretty normal text. um So you gotta jump through a few hoops to get there with Klingons. to To be aggressive and do the full good day to die. But you start with taunting.
01:11:40
Truthiness
Seems very Klingon. That gets you to... Shooting on the ground and with you know, hitting people with bat lifts a a a bet a bet a bet God damn it. I don't have that damn cue from lower decks Cued up. Oh damn it. I missed my cue.
01:11:57
Truthiness
oh well Oh God, I missed it. I missed it bigs. I'm so sad at myself.
01:12:03
Biggs
Shameful.
01:12:03
Truthiness
No.
01:12:04
Biggs
Shameful. you have
01:12:04
Truthiness
Oh God Yeah, yeah, what can I say?
01:12:05
Biggs
You have multiple jobs, but that's one of them.
01:12:10
Truthiness
right, well better late than never
01:12:17
Truthiness
There we go I got it.
01:12:17
Biggs
Oh, it's so good.
01:12:18
Truthiness
I got the cue eventually.
01:12:23
Truthiness
All right. So, yeah.
01:12:23
Biggs
it's so good
01:12:25
Truthiness
So then you do that and you, you know, they're your opponents, you know, responses, they're going to be shoot back with their teams, in which case you get to go full aggressive or don't. And they just take a pounding from what I'm guessing are going to be some very good teams.
01:12:43
Biggs
Hmm.
01:12:44
Truthiness
Oh, Klingons. They need to get here.
01:12:46
Biggs
Oh, Klingons.
01:12:47
Truthiness
They need to get here soon. i need crazy eyes, man. and need the crazy eyes in my life.
01:12:55
Biggs
ah
01:12:55
Truthiness
ah
01:12:56
Biggs
So excited for Klingons. that i've been waiting I've been waiting for Klingons since the game was announced.
01:12:58
Truthiness
It's going to be.
01:13:02
Truthiness
i know we all want to.
01:13:03
Biggs
its
01:13:03
Truthiness
we We all want it
01:13:07
Truthiness
Did that even come through? Let's try it again.
01:13:08
Biggs
Yeah, it came through. A little soft.
01:13:16
Biggs
Glory to you and your house indeed.
01:13:18
Truthiness
You know what? that's Let's just cycle through all the Klingons. Let's just, let's do it all.
01:13:26
Truthiness
Okay. I'm going to stop playing with the soundboard and let you new people go on with your merry night. Thank you for joining us. We're looking forward to having you in the Vassal World Cup or geez, Unknown World Cup switching games now.
01:13:40
Truthiness
um And please join us on stream.
01:13:40
Biggs
who
01:13:43
Truthiness
It'll probably be somewhere around 8, 8.30 Wednesdays, Eastern that time. um I'll be sure to have the chat up so you can tell us how much we're screwing everything up. And then we'll be back on this podcast every other week to talk about it.
01:13:57
Truthiness
Until next time, have a good night.