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Security Drills

by Geoffery Peterson

Are you one of the envious Federation players who wishes that William T. Riker, Exchange Officer had been printed for use with the blue affiliation? Well, how about an Event that makes all of your personnel just as useful? Too good to be true, you say? Well, there is a slight catch, but it's a small one, and we'll get to that in a bit.

Security Drills is a 0 cost Event with a Decay of 5. Aside from subtracting 1 from the cost of Whispers in the Dark and the like, it's got a nice little skill sharing effect as well. While your personnel is facing a dilemma, you may place a Federation card on Security Drills to make that personnel gain any skill he or she already has until the end of that dilemma. While you must have a Federation card in hand to gain the skill (unlike any card for use with Riker), Security Drills can make dilemma busting Next Generation teams superb, and nearly unstoppable Deep Space Nine crews when used with Confessions in the Pale Moonlight and The Rite of Emergence.

One of the more interesting, though a bit wasteful of resource while pulling off, uses for Security Drills is to include it in a Non-Federation deck. You do not have to spot any Federation cards for Security Drills to enter play, and it does not have any affiliation limits when using its ability. The only drawback to this is that the Federation cards you must stock in your deck to pay for the skills Security Drills will gain you will be otherwise useless. Other than as a passing fancy, I really wouldn't recommend any "serious" decks try to incorporate this tactic, but it's interesting nonetheless.

The last thing to mention is that Security Drills is not unique, so you can keep any in play at a Decay level of 4 for reducing the cost of some dilemmas, and in emergency situations, you will have extras available if one is going to Decay away.

September 14, 2004