The Final Frontier 9/Final Frontier 9 (Disk 2 of 3).adf/LCARS/TextFile/TNG_Game/Alternate_Universe_Notes.pp/Alternate_Universe_Notes

Text File | 1995-11-09 | 19KB | 367 lines

TF01
3,Alternate Universe Designers Notes
4,by Tom Braunlich

                  Star Trek: Customizable Card Game
                 -----------------------------------
                         Alternate Universe
                        --------------------
                          Designer's Notes
                         ------------------


            INFORMATION ABOUT THE UPCOMING EXPANSION SET
                       (A FEW SPOILERS BELOW)
                          by Tom Braunlich


Hi everyone it's Tom Braunlich  here  one  of the designers of ST:CCG
with some notes of interest about what's coming up next with the Star
Trek:TNG: Customizable Card  Game  including  some  details about the
Alternate Universe expansion.

We know everyone is very anxious  to  see  more  cards. I am too! The
Warp Pack cards which you should by  now have in your possession help
a bit but are just  the  tip  of  the  iceberg and really are nothing
compared to the new stuff that is coming!

We are trying very hard to get the  next set out as soon as possible.
But it is going to be late.  Our  original goal was to have the first
expansion set out this month but  as  you can obviously see we missed
that deadline. Also the  printer  Carta  Mundi  takes  off the entire
month of July which delays  us  somewhat  further. The bottom line is
that the cards will be about two months late.

But there's lots of good news to go with that bad news!

First of all in August and September a whole cargo bay load of ST:CCG
stuff will hit the market  including  not only the Alternate Universe
set but also  the  Introductory  Two-Player  Game (the pre-customized
120-card set which  has  20  new  cards  in  it  including Spock) the
Collector's Tin Set (which is  absolutely  beautiful) and the Players
Guide Strategy Book for ST:CCG  (by  Brady  Publishing) which I think
most of you  will  find  interesting  and  which  contains  our first
premium  card called Data Laughing.


            *** ALTERNATE UNIVERSE:  GENERAL COMMENTS ***

Our email right now  contains  many  messages  every  day from people
curious about what is going to  be  in Alternate Universe and when it
will be out. Since it is late I  wanted to write this document to let
people know about it  and  about  some  of  the  cool things that are
coming. I won't ruin the surprise by being too specific with spoilers
but I do discuss a lot of the overall details below.

First why is it so late?

The main reason for the delays has been our desire to do the highest-
quality follow-up we can. We have done  everything we can to speed up
the process -- Rollie Tesh and  I even moved permanently from Seattle
to Norfolk to be nearer  to  Decipher  (the  move itself causing some
delays).

But although  the  desire  to  make  Alternate  Universe  as  good as
possible did require us to  take  some  steps  that ended up delaying
things for now these steps  should  make  future  sets more timely as
well as better-integrated and more accurate in the long run.

Two major new steps  we  took  in  the  design involved (1) long-term
planning for ST:CCG and (2) careful response to player feedback.

Long-Term Planning --  When we completed  the initial 363-card set of
ST:CCG we of course had in mind  the expansions sets and designed the
game from that point of view. We  did such things as  introduce  in a
small  way  certain  card  types  like  holographic  characters  Borg
characters Soong-type androids etc.  all  of  which  we knew we would
develop much more fully in  future  expansion  sets.  But at the time
what those expansion sets would be and  how they would work was still
somewhat unclear especially since a  lot  depended  upon what kind of
feedback we received.

During the development  of  Alternate  Universe  therefore  we had to
first plan out the entire series  of  expansion sets for ST:CCG  what
they would contain and when they  would  come what their themes would
be and as  many  details  as  we  could  on  their  new  elements. We
announced the first three and also  have been working out the others.
This planning allowed us to from  the  beginning put card concepts in
with the expansion set they are  best  suited for. I have currently a
database of over 1300 card concepts  I've developed (and really there
is much more than that  possible  within  the  TNG series which is so
rich in concepts). Drawing on this  we  were able to design Alternate
Universe as well as get a  head  start  on the next expansion sets as
well.  Thus  many  cards  we  worked  on  during  Alternate  Universe
development were set aside for the Q-Continuum or Holodeck Adventures
sets or  one  of  the  other  sets  (which  haven't  been  officially
announced yet). Hopefully this will  mean  that  with this head start
future sets will be more  timely  as  well  as  effective in terms of
their thematic strength. I believe  the  time  spent doing this long-
term planning has been very  helpful  to  the overall quality of what
will eventually become the ST:CCG series.

Integrating Player Feedback -- The second  cause  for delay is also a
positive one. We really tried very  hard  to respond in the Alternate
Universe set to the comments  criticisms  and suggestions we received
from players and collectors. This process was something we planned to
do from the beginning but it also  took  longer than I thought due to
the sheer volume of response we  received  from people as well as the
way these responses seemed to  flow   or  evolve  over time as people
delved deeper into the game's secrets.

For all of you who  sent  in  suggestions  or criticisms (positive or
negative) thank you very much  for  this  feedback. We compiled these
comments which helped us see where  people  thought the game could be
improved. And then we  responded  by  integrating  into the Alternate
Universe set a myriad  of  cards  aimed  at  improving the game along
those general lines. Keep the suggestions coming!

Of course not every single suggestion  was used. Not everything could
be crammed into one set (although I do think that the set responds to
90% of the suggestions for improvement we  received including all the
major ones). And sometimes criticism of the game was contradictory.

For example some said the Federation was too strong while others said
the  advantages  of  the   Klingons   and   Romulans  in  battle  was
unbalanced. I believe you will  see  that the Alternate Universe  set
finds ways to   balance   such  elements  while  still  maintaining a
dynamic equilibrium  of  these forces allowing players the ability to
find ways to strengthen any  one  such  element depending on how they
stack their decks.

In general we spent a lot  of  time fine-tuning Alternate Universe to
respond to player feedback.

Note by the way that  our  philosophy  on  this is a little different
than that of other  similar  games  such  as  for  example Magic: The
Gathering. My belief is that ST:CCG  is like a living  ecosystem that
evolves  as new cards are  added.  (I  discuss  this at length in the
upcoming Strategy Book). Whenever certain  cards  are found to be too
strong or lead  to  possibilities  for  tactics  which  aren't in the
spirit of the  game  or  are  not  well  liked  for  some reason; our
intention is to create new cards  in  expansion sets which remedy the
imbalance in a  natural   way   (instead  of  totally rewriting those
cards or simply  dropping  them  out  of  existence  during  the next
printing as Magic has often done).

The idea here is to remedy the  problem by taking advantage of it and
turning the problem into an  opportunity  to  grow  the game. The new
card that comes out will hopefully  fix the problem without going too
far by simply making the  initial  problem card obsolete or impotent.
The goal is to rebalance  the  situation  so that the initial problem
card still has its uses but also now has its balancing drawbacks. (So
far we  have  only  rewritten  one  card  the  Emergency  Transporter
Armbands as discussed in a previous FAQ on the beta set changes.)

The card COUNTERMANDA in the Warp Packs  is an example of this. It is
aimed at the problem of abusing  the  ability  to RES-Q or PALOR TOFF
artifacts from the discard pile and reuse them. Ways were found to do
this which were too powerful. So instead of simply making a rule that
You can't  do  that  anymore  we  made  a  card  that  mitigates  the
situation. Now if a player has a deck strategy based on doing lots of
RES-Q or PALOR TOFF play this  strategy will be vulnerable to failure
if  the  opponent  has   taken   the   precaution  of  stocking  some
COUNTERMANDAS. But  the  point  is  that  COUNTERMANDA  doesn't  just
totally stop the RES-Q strategy it  just makes such a strategy risky.
Just the threat  that  your  opponent  might  have some COUNTERMANDAS
makes it harder to stock an effective deck using that strategy.

Actually although COUNTERMANDA is an  example  of this type of remedy
card I don t think it is  a  particularly good example. I expect that
there might be clever  ways  to   get  around COUNTERMANDA. But never
fear as there are  additional  cards  coming  out  which affect these
interactions and the use of Artifacts in the game.

I think you will also see that  the cards in Alternate Universe which
respond to player feedback are not  just pure remedy cards. They have
a remedy effect but they also have  there own positive uses so that a
player using them is not just  playing defensively but offensively as
well.


            *** ALTERNATE UNIVERSE:  SPECIFIC DETAILS ***

So how about some specifics?

Okay here are some  details  on  some  of  the  main  features of the
Alternate Universe set. The purpose of  telling you this at this time
is so that people curious and  concerned  about  the set will see how
cool it is! -- how it is  both  responsive to player feedback as well
aseven more importantly evolutionary for  the  game itself. There are
many new elements introduced in this set.

The main theme of the set of course is Alternate Universe. All ST:CCG
expansion sets will have  a  theme  like  this  (the  next two are Q-
Continuum and Holodeck Adventures) and each  set will contain a large
portion (say about one-third or so) of cards aimed at developing that
theme. The other cards in  the  set  are  aimed at deepening existing
elements in the game or  perhaps  remedying an existing element which
feedback says needs improvement. (And the new theme introduced in the
set will also be developed further in succeeding sets -- they are not
limited to one set). This is so for Alternate Universe.

Over one third of the set  deals with Alternate Universe things which
appeared in  Star  Trek:  The  Next  Generation.  There  are numerous
alternate  universe  personnel  ships  and   artifacts;  as  well  as
alternate universe events, interrupts, dilemmas and even missions.

Alternate Universe cards are identified by  an icon on the card. What
makes something alternate universe essentially  is  that it refers to
people or things  which  traveled  through  time  come from alternate
timelines  or  alternate   universes   parallel  universes  different
subspace domains different  phases  of  existence,  etc.  It  also is
defined to include people  and  things  which  are illusionary unreal
surreal or visionary.

Such things of course tend to  be  cool;  which is why we picked this
theme to kick off the expansion sets.  They  are fun and allow you to
mix  into  play  combinations  of   personnel   that  lead  to  great
storylines!

Using Alternate Universe cards  is  also  very easy. (Q-Continuum and
Holodeck  Adventures  will  be  somewhat   more  elaborate).  To  get
Alternate Universe cards in play simply  requires opening the door to
alternate universes so that  people  and  things from those universes
can come in and  intermix  with  people  here  in  the real Star Trek
universe just as they do in  episodes  in the show which involve time
travel etc.

To achieve this effect there is a card called Alternate Universe Door
which has this use. It symbolizes  the  myriad  of ways we've seen in
Star Trek for people and things  to  come  to this universe. When you
have the card in play the door  is  open  and you can bring into play
Alternate Universe cards.

Now... don't panic. I know what  you  are thinking! We are well aware
that if you had to stock  Alternate  Universe  Doors in your deck and
wait for them to come up in  play  that it would be very difficult to
effectively use Alternate Universe cards...

What we did was design a new  category of cards called Doorways which
serve as this type of  linking  card.  The  Doorway card in this case
plays during the SEED  phase  of  the  game.  So  you  are assured of
getting it out into play from the  very beginning. It does count as a
card in your deck so there is  a  cost  to  using it but this cost is
minimal and  is  amortized  across  the  entire  amount  of alternate
universe cards in your deck so it  is practically nothing. By the way
the Alternate Universe Door card also has  other uses and can be used
in multiple in a deck so even though it is a common card it will have
many uses for you.

Now Doorway cards will have  as  their  main  function in ST:CCG this
kind of linking between expansions  sets.  There  will  be one for Q-
Continuum and Holodeck Adventures for  example  though they will work
slightly differently. Each Doorway will  have its own specific quirks
as written on the  card.  But  in  developing  the  game we liked the
Doorway concept so much that  we  added  another  Doorway card in the
game. It is a Doorway  linking  now  (in  the game) with the  future!
Wait till you see it it's cool!

Of course I  can't  give  you  any  specific  Alternate Universe card
names. But I bet you could guess  a  lot of them if you thought about
the time-travel or  parallel  universe  episodes.  I  really like the
images  used  on  these  cards  also  by  the  way.  They  have  that
surrealistic quality to them. And when combined with normal  cards in
play the effects are interesting!

The expansion set also introduces many other new concepts.

First of all several new game terms are defined. These include stasis
captured personnel and various kinds of  new skills for personnel and
special skills for personnel (things  they  can  do such as the skill
the Exocomps have. There are  several  new personnel with those kinds
of special skills as many players requested).

These definitions are provided on an  INSERT SHEET that comes in each
box of card packs. It is not in  the pack itself (since you only need
one) but in the box; so it  has  the  room  to not only give some new
definitions but to also discuss a  few  of  the more complex cards or
give some other info. There  will  be  several  sheets in each box so
that you can get a copy from  your  retailer... as well as from other
sources like Decipher's internet site or fax-back systems etc.

Also defined  is  the  term   unique   personnel  --  which  are  the
personnel who do not have a  universal   icon. We simply got tired of
calling them  non-universal  personnel which  was  taking up too much
room on the cards. As you can  surmise  by this we have several cards
in the game which  affect  the  balance  between universal and unique
(non-universal) personnel -- something else  from our feedback. There
are cards which enhance  universals  and  which  at times can detract
from unique personnel. From now on  if  you  have an all  bridge crew
deck you will be vulnerable to  certain effects brought into play via
the cards. Again  this  is  an  example  of  subtle  changes  to such
balances. The unique personnel will  still  prove to be stronger than
universal personnel in general but  overdoing  it  with them can lead
you into trouble at times and involves a risk.

Another thing  the  Alternate  Universe  set  does  is  introduce the
concept of Side Games to ST:CCG  (which  will be developed further in
future expansions). Unlike previous side  games  in other games which
tended to be too long or  too  slow;  the  use  of side games here in
ST:CCG is done in such a way that  it is simple and very FAST as well
as fun. It also makes good  sense  relative  to the theme. (I will be
interested in player feedback  on  this  as  we  have  many ideas for
enhancing Side Games in the future).

The Alternate Universe set  will  also  feature  unusual kinds of new
Mission cards. These are cards  which have strange features including
such  things  as   variable   numbers   and   highly   unusual  skill
requirements. Many of the Dilemma cards are unusual in this way also.

The Event and Interrupt cards  in  the  set perform lots of functions
but many of them have  been  aimed  at adding more player interaction
and more battle elements  to  the  game.  This  was  one  of the main
criticisms of  the  game  that  sometimes  the  players  go  off  and
concentrate on  their  own  missions  without  interacting  with  the
opponent except in a roundabout  way  by  throwing obstacles in their
path. Several cards are aimed at  making this interaction more direct
including many cards  that  encourage  battle.  There  are also cards
which make battle more unpredictable, another feedback request.

So for those who want to utilize  battle  more in the play there is a
lot here for that -- although  there  are  also ways for defenders to
make the results of such  battles  unclear. The balance is maintained
but the possibilities are deeper.

Red Shirting -- Another controversial  feature  of the basic game was
the possibility of red shirting  (beaming  down just one personnel to
test the dilemmas at a location). There is now no need to argue about
whether or not such a strategy should be allowed. There are now going
to be several cards that  make  such  a  strategy  very risky and not
advisable (although still allow it if you want to take the chance).

Conversely there are also some cards  which work against the opposite
strategy that of overcrowded ships  which  attempt to bully their way
through every dilemma with mega-sized  away  teams. Such tactics will
now also involved some risk.

There are many other cool things  in the Alternate Universe set; Dual
Affiliation cards, unusual ships, shuttle operations (carrying aboard
ships) capturing and interrogating captives,  ways  to seed artifacts
in space... just to name a few.

I could go on... but I  feel  I've  already  let out too much info! I
just wanted everyone to know that the  set  is coming that it is well
thought out and that it evolves the game in fun and interesting ways.
I hope you like it and again look forward to your feedback.

                            Tom Braunlich


(See also  some  soon  upcoming  rules  FAQs  and  a  new President's
Letter).



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