REPORTING FOR DUTY THROUGHOUT THE GALAXY

In the beginning, building and using a Star Trek CCG spaceline was easy: you lined up your missions and moved around in a fairly linear way (though with Where No One Has Gone Before, Wormholes, and so on to spice it up). The introduction of the Gamma Quadrant in the Deep Space Nine expansion, the Mirror Quadrant in the Mirror, Mirror expansion, and the Delta Quadrant in the Voyager expansion have complicated matters significantly. Star Trek CCG players now have four quadrants with which to cope. One of the concepts that has proven to be the most confusing for some players is the relationship of “native quadrant” designations to the ability of personnel, ships, and equipment to report for duty in various places throughout the galaxy. This directive attempts to lay out clearly and thoroughly the rules that govern where cards may report for duty.

QUADRANT NATIVITY

Every personnel, ship, and facility card is “native” to a particular quadrant. A personnel, ship, or facility card’s quadrant nativity is indicated by an icon (or lack of same) along the right-hand edge of the card, just beneath the expansion set icon (where present). Cards native to the Alpha Quadrant have no special icon here. All other cards have a quadrant icon consisting of a black box containing a blue letter from the Greek alphabet. The Greek letter gamma, corresponding of course to the Gamma Quadrant, looks like an upside-down English capital L. The Greek letter delta, corresponding of course to the Delta Quadrant, looks like a triangle. The Greek letter mu looks just like an English capital M, and corresponds to the Mirror Quadrant.

THE KEY RULES

In order to come into play, a personnel or ship card must “report for duty.” While there are a wide variety of mechanisms for reporting for duty in the Star Trek CCG, every report-for-duty action requires two components: permission to report and a destination at which to report. This way of putting things is not official Decipher terminology, but using it helps to clarify exactly what any given card allows or requires you to do.

Permission to report is granted both by rule and by card text. By rule, one of your options for your normal card play each turn (or one of your two normal card plays in Warp Speed) is to report a personnel, ship, or equipment card for duty. Note that this rule gives you permission to report, but does not specify a destination to report. Thus you must combine this permission with an otherwise valid destination-granting mechanism.

Destinations for reporting are specified by rule and by card text. The only cards that provide reporting destinations but do not say so explicitly in their game text are outposts and headquarters. By rule, both outposts and headquarters serve as reporting destinations for compatible cards. Outposts may be used only by their controllers unless otherwise specified; headquarters may be used by both players unless otherwise specified.

All of the above would still be true even if there were only one quadrant available in the Star Trek CCG. As it is, there is one more very important rule that players must learn, remember, and apply properly: “When a facility (or its site) allows you to report a card for duty, you may do so only if the card to be reported is compatible with the facility, and that card and the facility are both in their native quadrant.” (Rulebook 1.7, p. 3) Note that in official Decipher terminology, “allows you to report” is a bit ambiguous. In the terminology used in this directive, “allows you to report for duty” is equivalent to “specifies a destination where you may report cards for duty.” Facilities, sites, and time locations normally do not give permission to report cards for duty (though sites may); rather, that permission is granted by the normal card play rule. Facilities, sites, and time locations work in tandem with the normal card play rule to provide destinations for reported cards. Remembering this rule will allow Star Trek CCG players to correctly determine in almost all cases whether or not quadrant nativity is at all relevant to reporting a particular card for duty.

This latter rule provides a test that is conceptually very simple. When you wish to report a card for duty, ask: “Is a facility or site providing me with the destination to report this card?” If the answer is “yes,” then both the facility or site and the card to be reported there must be in their native quadrants.

THE WRINKLES

There are really only a couple of wrinkles in this situation that complicate matters. Being careful to apply the rule quoted above takes care of these, but some explanation here might prove helpful.

Downloading. When you download a card, you must immediately put that card into play (unless the downloading mechanism specifies that the card may or must download into your hand, or replaces a card draw). Since many cards download personnel or ships, the question naturally arises whether quadrant nativity is relevant to downloaded cards. The most important thing to realize is that when you download a personnel or ship card, you are (except under the conditions noted above) required (that is, granted permission, which you must accept) to report it for duty. That is only half of the downloading equation; you also need a valid destination. Some cards that allow you to download cards also specify the destination. In such cases, the relevance of quadrant nativity is determined by the card type granting the download capability; if a facility or site, quadrant nativity is relevant (otherwise it is not). Some cards that allow you to download cards do not specify a destination. In such cases, those cards must be used in tandem with a that provides a reporting destination. The destination-providing card determines whether or not quadrant nativity is relevant. Note that use of a special download icon to download a personnel, ship, or equipment card implies a destination for the downloaded card (anywhere at the same spaceline location as the special download icon).

Special card texts. Some cards give you reporting destinations that are independent of facilities, but those cards might themselves be colocated with facilities. The important thing is that you are clear about what card is specifying the reporting destination as distinct from the card granting reporting permission. For example, The Emissary has a special skill allowing Bajorans to report where he is present. Since The Emissary is not a facility or site, quadrant nativity is irrelevant when he provides the reporting destination. Bajorans may report to The Emmissary no matter where he is. Alpha Quadrant native Bajorans could not report to a Bajoran Outpost that had been built in the Gamma Quadrant by combining the reporting permission granted by the normal card play rule with the reporting destination provided by the outpost, because of quadrant nativity mismatches. They could, however, report to The Emissary if he is in the Gamma Quadrant, because quadrant nativity is irrelevant since he is not a facility (even if he happens to be aboard a facility). The key is distinguishing the mechanism granting reporting permission and the mechanism granting the reporting destination.

INDIVIDUAL CARDS

The rules described above are straightforward in their application, but some individual cases continue to prove confusing to many players. The table below provides is a digest of card reporting mechanisms with information about the relevance of quadrant nativity. Note that equipment has no quadrant nativity, so equipment cards are not discussed below unless they relate to reporting personnel or ships. Also, sites and facilities are not listed here, because quadrant nativity is always relevant for their reporting functions. This table is complete through the Voyager expansion.

The Star Trek Customizable Card Game is published by Decipher Inc. and is based on the Star Trek series and films produced by Paramount Pictures. All copyrights and trademarks remain the property of their respective holders. Neither Decipher nor Paramount has endorsed this web site. Christopher Heard a.k.a. Unimatrix Zero One is solely responsible for the contents of this site.