My Star Trek Attack Wing (STAW) card hacking is done. There is literally nothing left to cut, past or discard.
The idea was to make every redundant card useful, flesh out my sometimes thin factions (I only play series aligned, so no illogical* cross overs of timelines or factions), no power builds of bizarre non-canon mixes.
This meant that after my small purge a few years ago, some periods like The Original Series or Movies or Enterprise, were uneven or just plain……plain.
My rebuild into the STAW universe, a product of holding on to just enough of some periods and basically all of the less popular ones, kept the fires burning and then came some clearance and new releases. It has been a dramatic revival to say the least.
My TNG Fed “battle” fleet for example had about four ships (one Galaxy, One Akira, One Excelsior and one Nebula), which has now expanded to about 20!
There were more ships out there, but at post STAW high tide, they had become scarce and expensive, some of which I had sold for little only recently! What is out there is the same old range of unwanted ships, usually DS9, Enterprise or Mirror universe options. I just bought another clutch of them for $10 a pop, because, well, you will see below.
Ok, too many useless cards, too many holes in my collections and some imbalance has crept in over time in points values specifically.
Scissors and glue, a little black pen run along cut lines and some self imposed rules;
no repeats in the same time line,
all changes need to feel right,
balance needs to be retained, which with AW is not that hard as the system is quite “soft”. Doing this in X-Wing could seriously break the game,
time moves (mostly) in one direction, meaning you can use old tech in a later period, but not the other way around.
The TNG period is split into DS9 (small ships), TNG (large ships) and Voyager. This helps spread some repeats without change, DS9 in particular getting some young Picard and Riker cards, then TOS and TNG are split, finally the separate Kelvin timeline and Enterprise are sets.
What did not need changing?
Many cards can be split over timelines, meaning duplicate TNG period personalities can appear in TNG, DS9 or even Voyager sets and some long lived races like Vulcans or Romulans might appear one time line earlier or later (Tuvok already does).
Weapon and other non named upgrades are fine with multiples, but some are unbalanced with others (like Photon or Plasma torpedoes at different costs to effect), so care has been taken to split these into different periods like dearer ones into DS9 or an earlier period, cheaper into TNG “battle” for example.
What hacks well?
First up, STAW hacks well because the components are consistent for the most part and the game is a lot less rigid and tight in its approach than X-Wing or Armada. Many mods and abilities are repeated over the range already, most effects are far from game changing and there are fewer “power builds” available.
No Soontir + Palpatine + PTL for example or “Fortress Han”. The game, especially if limited to series aligned sets, feels more like a story telling platform than an alpha strike brawler. I know there was a competitive circuit out there and favourite card combos, but when the game is faction limited, many of the auto builds simply evaporate.
Basically, mistakes in play and Wizkids in design, can be absorbed into the game dynamic and the tidal wave of options tends to drown out lone beacons.
Points values are an easy and often necessary fix. I have run out of usable numbers, one of the things stopping any more changes (but more cheap buys will address that).
Wizkids have not been kind here, changing to much lower values in later ships, splitting some periods into the early and late groups. This is especially annoying with generic ships (see another solution below).
Upgrade bars can be changed. This can help minor point discrepancies and other annoyances, like the Tholian Patrol ship with a single weapon slot, meaning it can be either a web spinner or an attack ship (WTF?) or 1-2 point differences in generic ships, where the dearer one can be expanded or made “special” with upgrade options. Generics on the whole can also be spiced up with more variety, making some of them genuinely attractive.
Captains, Crew and Ship cards are generally easy enough. Some can be a melding of two halves, the “fake” laid over the base, which the Romulan and Klingon fleets benefitted from most. Sometimes just the image changes, sometimes just the card text.
Ship stats are a mix of ideas. I dislike the generic ships having 1 less shield value. It makes no sense and the often 1-2 point cheaper costing seems of little benefit when you lose both 1 shield and an ability as well as the inconsistency of “0” value ships having nothing to reduce.
In some periods (TOM and earlier), I have made these consistent, in TNG and DS9, generic and named ships are treated as two separate games (and their point costs support this also), Voyager is the exception, things left as they are, seeing as most ships are named and the ones not are lesser “filler ships” only.
Sometimes things that just bug me are fixed.
The Tholians have had their agility changed to 3 from 2, which seemed off for their small and nimble design as well as adding a single Agility 3 ship in TOS.
The Xindi Insectoid is now 3-3-3-0 for similar reasons, as they “popped” reasonably easily, but should be at least as agile as the NX series.
The NX series were problematic, being relatively small and nimble, but slower and tougher than the bulk of the Xindi and the Romulan Drone ships. I toyed with the idea of changing them from 2-3-3-0 to 2-2-4-0, but will sit on that a while as it makes them quite a bit weaker (Hull points are less effective than either Agility or Shields) and they have several other ways of being a little more robust.
I had fun with my assimilated fleet, boosting Hull and Primary stats and point costs across the board, pretty much every later faction getting a representative (except the Kazon of course).
I have little use for Mirror universe ships and generally don’t even watch the episodes, their cards being absorbed into main stream sets or the two Mirror periods I have retained, the Kelvin and TOS original. Both of these have benefitted greatly with some genuine options (the Kelvin did not even come with any elite talents). This gives me a TOS Chekov, a second Yarr and some others like Captain Black appear in the Enterprise era.
A few others had their abilities re-homed. Captains like the famous but anonymous Romulan Commander (TOS), Picard, Kirk, Archer, Sisco all have alternates from captains of other periods.
I especially like the “desperate” Kirk or “undercover” Sisco from the mirror sets and “Xindi war focussed” Archer (a re-used skill 7 Hirogen). These allow you some surprise value while fielding favourite commanders meaning just because you are facing Kirk, does not mean it has to be the same Kirk as you encountered before.
A few generic Captains got promoted as mid to low end leaders with abilities because often in limited period sets, Captains are either skill 6-9 or 1, with not much between. This is not unprecedented (Somraw Commander, Romulan Commander, Xindi Councillor etc), allowing all those generics to be a little more interesting. This re-homed the huge redundancy of Kazon, Vulcan, Klingon and Romulan leader abilities.
Obviously if there are going to be clashes like Mirror Kirk v Re-purposed Kirk, the original takes precedence (or maybe they should be the same?).
The Borg, a little weaker than most overall, now have a fleet of assimilated TNG re-paints, mostly ships that did not match the later paint schemes anyway.
Ship names were fun.
The USS Ni’Var which means “of two worlds” now appears in TOM (ex-Pegasus) and DS9 (ex-Sabre class) and USS Soval (ex-Intrepid) in TOS as a homage to probably the most influential Vulcan of the early Federation.
For exotics, there is a bioship Delta and Theta and a couple of Borg scout cubes extra.
The Enterprise era gets the Voyager NX-4, Federation NX-10, a dawn of the Federation flagship, The Xindi get Insectoid Xindus Prime, Reptilian Dometus, lots of Vulcans (including a rebel faction), more of the Andorians, Romulans and Klingons, bulked up with excess ship names. Captains for the Terrans include Black and Soval from the mirror pack, both late call-ups for a Romulan or Klingon war scenario.
I probably had the most fun with the DS9 small ship fleet. A surplus Sao Paulo with a printing error became the Independent, I added ships to most factions like the Romulan scout Ra, Bajoran scouts Rassin and Bajor, Interceptors 2, 3, 4, 7 and 11, Marquis raider Hiro Kyan, USS Hunter (Sabre class).
These all got points adjustments to the older levels for consistency and as they are in an enclosed space, balance is retained.
The TNG or “battle” fleets are played as either generics or named ships.
In generics, they have been either point adjusted or in some cases their upgrade bars changed for balance and variety.
In unique ships I have added as many as I can justify, USS Dominion (Galaxy), , Dreadnaught (Promethius), IKS Mulan, Gath’Oth, Gornar, Ves Batlh (Enterprise era), Reman Shinzon (Scimitar class), Ferengi Lurins Raider, Cardassian Pringor, the mirror universe ship Prakesh, Dominion Gor Nistas.
The TOS period, always a favourite has increased somewhat. The Intrepid is represented twice, the second newer one has been renamed USS Soval, better fitting its Vulcan-centric role. I also made a Dauntless, a Romulan Praetus, Klingon Kronos One (new K’Tinga flagship with the only 4 Primary but no cloak) and Somraw, Gorn Gos’Orass, the modified Tholians (see above) and ISS Avenger meaning I can easily make 100 pt fleets from any of these factions in named or logically used generic ships. I was tempted to make the Avenger the Spectre, but the process was already done and strong glue fought me changing it.
Kuvak
The TOM period was pretty sparce, being the favourite of the guy I sold some to, but not mine, but thanks in part to the 10th anniversary pack, it got a good fleshing out and is probably stronger now than before. The Enterprise refit now has a sister ship the Spectre, a heavily armed Klingon war variant like the USS Vengeance from Into Darkness (I toyed with the idea of using one of the Kelvin ships renamed).
I thought a war-like Defiant/Vengeance option could be fun, especially as a Khan option (tough enough to take on the Enterprise head to head, no sneakiness needed). I also added the Cerberus and Vulcan to the Excelsior class, Ni’Var to the Oberth, and Federation to the Miranda.
The Klingons, being the main protagonist in this period have a huge fleet, as many ships from this period as I could find, some duplicates from the last Klingon boxed set, but minus Chang’s BoP (had it, sold it, but I have managed to replace the bulk of the cards), so 2 Bop, 2 D7, and no less than 7 K’Tinka class.
This period can now easily field up to 250pts a side.
Voyager series, basically intact as the buyer was not a fan is decent in both Federation and hypothetical allied fleet. I can play a true mixed fleet of options from the Val Jean surviving, two Delta Flyers, the Dauntless becoming a friend and asset, the Prometheus as an alternate or possible an ally sent to help, or the Raven or Equinox surviving their encounters.
Lots of Hirogens, Kazon, Vidiian, Krenim, Sp 8472, Borg and through a curious Adversaries of the Delta Quadrant incorrect boxing incident with duplication of one card board panel, but missing the other, then Wizkids sending me a replacement half set, I managed to make two Nasari and Numiri ships and captains.
This set was a little annoying with not even a generic captain for these factions.
So, by my calculations, about 50 more named ships, the same in useful captains and by splitting the game into sub-games, more uses for my many other duplicates. Probably 200 cards put to use and more options in more periods for more factions with many minor quibbles resolved.
I do not play tournament, usually supply the entire game as it goes and nothing was done to deliberately break the game. If someone has an issue with this, I can just field official cards.
An example;
The Mirror timeline, when played time and faction limited is thin, basically most slots are set, there is some choice in captain (2 + a generic), weapons are Photon torps and Phaser Barrage etc. It is really only crew that has some depth.
So, what could I do?
First up, three ships, the basis of a decent 100pt+ fleet.
The ISS Avenger from Enterprise (I only used the original and Kelvin mirror sets, the rest were raided for parts) and a generic with a shield bump.
The generic is changed from an all too squeaky clean Pike to the slovenly Decker (also fixes duplication). Quite a bunch, cold, sweaty, mean and apathetic.
Now they need captains, so the three are increased to four with a stray Gardner with a suitable snarl on his face. I also have a Tellarite generic, but I do not think he would be tolerated in that empire.
More captains need more Elite talents so I got creative.
The ISS bought with it Sabotage, to go with Tantalus Field and a special making use of a spare Marlena Moreau card.
Moreau is a crew card but there is a synergy here and as Kirks wife, she could be considered to be an edge for his ambitions.
All suitably thematic and the Moreau plays to her “power behind the throne” role.
A symbiotic triple. Moreau Crew can make her own Elite card cheaper, then the Elite card can help reactivate two Crew cards disabled by Kirk’s Talent. neither Moreau card effects the other, so no harm, even though it is a new precedent.
The Moreau Elite is the homeless “Intendants Orders” from the Regents Flagship.
There is a short fall in Weapon upgrades with 6 slots and only 5 upgrades (might need to go looking).
Crew are also a little thin, just a full fleet, but with the Orion Tac Officer (likely serving under duress), and a very dead Red Shirt that I forgot to photograph (the healthy one gets a Star Fleet birth), I have fitting additions.
One option could be to change the upgrade bar on the generic ship?
Maybe only a devious Orion could find a place in this twisted reality.
Finally Tech, where I am over supplied.
Two of the above came from the ISS Avenger (I had two, the other cards went to the Kelvin set).
So, from a single ship with a limited choice in Captains and Crew, but little else, I now have a triple ship fleet, almost completely loaded out and capable of even fighting within it’s only ranks with some substance.
*logical being Borg, Species 8742, Tholians etc who did cross time lines.