DECIPHER.com > Star Trek > Expansions > Reflections 2.0

Guinan of Borg

by Matt "Captain" Kirk

The main complaint of many Borg players for the past year has been that the Borg have no way to score fast points, a la Prejudice and Politics. While possible with Deploy the Fleet to score early, the Borg matching commander/ship pairs cost almost two turns worth of counters. Without early points, cards like Reborn and Targeted for Assimilation become hard to justify for inclusion in a heavy assimilation deck... until now.

Annexation Drone brings the Reflections 2.0 theme of mission diversity to the Collective in a very tempting fashion. All the Unicomplex player must do is to play four Alpha Quadrant (hereinafter AQ) missions. An all-AQ deck was definitely possible for the enterprising Borg player when Call to Arms released last year, and it's even more plausible after Reflections 2.0, thanks mostly to Transwarp Conduit and Fractured Time's Sphere 634. Borg AQ decks are also typically better suited for assimilation than their Delta Quadrant cousins.

However, the Annexation Drone serves more simple purposes for the Borg player, like enabling a turn-one At What Cost?, which is readily available as a foil reprint in Reflections. Getting a "one-turn advantage" in this way is even more airtight than using Guinan since you won't be handing ammunition to your opponent(s) for an Amanda Rogers. In addition, you could use Annexation to build a Borg permission deck with your own Amandas, Kevins, and Parting Shots. There's also Indomitable, a Borg "cheater" of sorts, for mission solving; use it to unstop all your personnel in a given attempt to wreak havoc elsewhere.

With only a semi-decent skill set and the average Borg attributes of 5-5-5, Annexation Drone is a great target for the Guardian Queen to replace with a more important Drone, like Computation or Opposition. And don't forget to stock copies of Quintessence to Annex as early as possible. In any case, the Annexation Drone looks to become a staple of all-AQ Borg decks for many months to come.

December 6, 2004