Design Log: Stardate 06.04.2002

Interlude

So where do we stand now with this (still potential) game? Quite a few people are wondering when they'll get to see the next round of test decks, so I catch up with Evan Lorentz today and ask him this very question. "Based on the playtesting results so far, we're working through some major revisions now. New gameplay means we need to get Paramount's approval again before we can post new PDF decks."

Which translates to? "Maybe one to two weeks from now."

Naturally, I'm curious about what kind of changes might be in the works. "Well, we cut an affiliation yesterday." There are several reasons – for one, the design team feels it would be better to have multiple strategies available for each of six affiliations than to use up card slots for a seventh affiliation and end up with some of them having only one viable archetype. For another, with six affiliations one can be focused on each of the three skills areas – Military, Diplomacy, and Science – with another three having strengths in each of the possible mixes of two skills (Military/Science, Science/Diplomacy, and Diplomacy/Military). Rather neatly symmetrical diversification, and it so happened that the Cardassians and Romulans both had the same focus mix, so one of them had to be pulled.

"Not the Romulans!?" I gasp. No, I can breathe easy on that count – it turns out the Cardies got the axe. Cardassian fans shouldn't panic, however; there's plenty of potential for them in a future set as a natural adversary to the Bajorans, who also didn't make the first cut. (Deep Space Nine fans likewise shouldn't panic; a lot of the Ferengi and Klingons would come from that series.) So the current lineup is Next Generation Feds, Enterprise Feds, Borg, Klingon, Ferengi, and Romulan.

Another area that is being worked on is ship battle. Amid concerns that the Federation and Ferengi seem to be equally ready and able to battle as much as the Klingons or Borg (not very storyline-ish), the designers are looking at ways to shift battle into something driven by Military crew, rather than by the "energy" that anyone can generate. In this way, battle would become a natural focus for those affiliations who have more Military-oriented crew (like Klingons), while being less advantageous for the more diplomatic Next Gen crew.

So look for some significant revisions to the first set of decks in a couple of weeks, if all goes well. We probably won't see any Romulan or Enterprise decks yet – just the four affiliations you've seen already – in order to keep the Paramount approval process as streamlined as possible. The same consideration means you still won't see any potential "new" card images yet: getting such images approved would seriously delay our ability to keep you up to date on progress. Although you might be tired of the same ol', same ol' faces on the cards, we feel that you'd rather see the gameplay earlier. Rest assured that any eventual new game will have a brand-new set of fresh images.

And there'd better be Romulans in it, too. ;-)

Kathy McCracken
Major Rakal
Star Trek Intelligence Officer

June 4, 2002

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