Abel
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Collective Month Three: The Battle of Sector 001 (oh, how ego centric the Federation is claiming that "Earth" is the center of the Galaxy... but I digress)
Tactics
According to the instructions, this is a 90 point fleet build with up to a 30 point blind pick ship. It's a cooperative event- so you can't directly damage your opponent's ships. Conversely, and I'm sure someone will pipe in if I'm wrong, you can't use things like minefields, energy webs, etc. that could damage your opponent's ships.
The gist of the scenario is that you and your "allied" opponent have to destroy the Borg Cube Token (BCT), which will then spit out a Borg Sphere Token (BST) with the Borg Queen on board. If you don't destroy the Sphere, she manages to go back in time and ravage the Earth.
Each turn, a player is given control of the BCT, and it must move and it MUST attack. It's still an enemy ship, and therefor can attack either fleet. The BCT can take 25 damage (it has no shields), but gains more and more defense dice as the damage stacks up (at 20 damage, the BCT has 8 defense dice). When the last point of damage blows up the BCT, the BST squirts out on the edge of the BCT closest to a table edge. It then has to fly using a straight 4 to the farthest table edge. It takes 15 damage to destroy the BST.
The victory conditions are a bit convoluted, but basically break down to who has the most fleet points left, with bonus points for who ever destroys the BCT, and the BST.
With that being said, you are going to want to look at ships with a high defensive value, or staying power, but can also throw out some damage. The BCT has the ability to throw out a 12 dice attack with rerolls of blanks and battle stations. The game does not end if one player's fleet is destroyed. It only ends when the BST is destroyed, gets off the table, or both player's fleets are destroyed. Each player has control over the BCT on alternating rounds, so you could use it to destroy your opponent's fleet, and hope that he rolls badly and can't destroy your fleet, but... if you and your opponent destroy each others fleet, then you will both have low scores going into successive rounds of the OP (and thus, will probably NOT finish in the top placements for prizes). Your best bet is to come to a Gentleman's Agreement with your opponent about how the BCT and BST will shoot.
It would be a good idea to move the BCT to the opposite end of the playing field to maximize your maneuvers and field of fire. When the BST pops out, it will then have to run the gauntlet of you and your allied opponent's ships. Remember, you want to destroy the BST, and the winner is based off Fleet Points, with bonus Fleet Points for destroying the BCT and BST. These means you are going to want to be able to come about very quickly or have a 360 degree firing weapons (or maybe an aft firing Photon Torpedo).
Strategy
On first blush, a "Dreadnaught" style build seems like the way to go. However, that means your opponent will be throwing 12 attack dice at you each time he controls the cube (what, you didn't think he was going to attack his own ships, did you?). So your dreadnaught build will have to be able to survive 12 attack dice with rerolls (something like an average of 7 hits and 2 crits every other turn). The BCT can shoot with less dice, but it has to spread them out over multiple ships. If you have a dread, and your allied opponent has a dread, then expect 7 attack dice every turn (unless your opponent decided to hit you with 12 dice...). The problem with some of these dreadnaught builds is that they throw only 6-8 attack dice with conversions. The BCT has 25 damage and gets harder and harder to hit, and the BST is easer to damage, and only takes 15 to destroy, but it's moving at a straight 4 to the furthest table edge.
If you are a newer player, I would recommend a dreadnaught style build. With pwnsummer's list of ships, I'd personally go with the Voyager and pack it full of every card I could to maximize it's agility. Then, I'd look at converting cards (free battle stations, target locks, rerolls, etc. ). Finally, I'd definitely add Transphasic Photon Torps. Option two would be to use the Borg Cube as the Dread, and again, pack it full of cards. Make the best build you can with your blind ship, and use it as a "throwaway" ship that soaks up hits for your dread, while you pound away at the BCT/BST.
Good luck!
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2500 pts
1850 pts