Various Character Questions

[hoopsjvl]

So, you think that the Federation Character Worf cannot be the target of Wesley Crusher's upgrade "to a Federation Character" ability? I guess my initial question of whether Worf would also qualify as a Klingon hasn't totally been answered, since he obviously qualifies as a Federation Character. I believe Alex's definition regarding Commander Characteristic (in the post you linked) was poorly worded, but only he can clarify this. The Commander card is clearly a Federation Character with only a characteristic of Basic. The cards that target Basic characters do so because this is the only thing on the card that can be used. I can see how this can potentially go either way, so I have no serious qualms with your logic, I would just like a final ruling from BANDAI. BANDAI, you are my only hope!

[Jan Horinek]

Let's see what Alex thinks about this. Once you hired Toral, promoting her to other Klingon - either Worf or a Klingon with Klingon affiliation sounds good to me.

[Alex_Bandai]

Sorry, just saw this debate.

The Federation Symbol is their primary Characteristic/Allegiance but it is a Characteristic and so are the ones written in the Characteristic line just below the image. This Worf is Primary Federation BUT ALSO Klingon. So he could be upgraded to with Toral.

[hoopsjvl]

Awesome thanks!

[qurgh]

Sorry, just saw this debate.

The Federation Symbol is their primary Characteristic/Allegiance but it is a Characteristic and so are the ones written in the Characteristic line just below the image. This Worf is Primary Federation BUT ALSO Klingon. So he could be upgraded to with Toral.

To me this un-balances the game. In the first set, as I originally played it, there is one Character per Allegiance that lets you upgrade to another card of the same Allegiance (obviously this is what the designers planned). Now, however, Toral lets you get Worf or K'Ehleyr (so Toral is now better than all the other upgraders because you have an increased probability of upgrading him...).

The thing that makes this even worse, is that in the new set there is a Human Romulan Empire character (Stefan DeSeve) who, following the rules around Toral, should be upgradeable to using Wesley but since the Federation is the only Allegiance that's isn't named after a race you can't. If Wesley can't become a non-Federation Human, then no upgrading characters should be able to upgrade to a character from a different Allegiance.

Who's idea was it in the first place to use the same word for both an Allegiance and a race? (this was a BAD IDEA!!)

Personally, I would have preferred the Allegiances to use the names in the show, like "Klingon Empire", "Romulan Empire", "Federation of Planets", "Ferengi Alliance", etc, instead of simply using the race name, then the upgrading cards would say "Upgrade to a Klingon Empire character", "Upgrade to a Romulan Empire character", "Upgrade to a Federation of Planets character", etc and we wouldn't have these un-balancing issues that have to be house-ruled around to restore balance.

[hoopsjvl]

Great point qurgh. I think this simply means that the luck of the draw comes into play. Hence, life isn't fair.

[Sprenger]

Let's see what Alex thinks about this. Once you hired Toral, promoting her to other Klingon - either Worf or a Klingon with Klingon affiliation sounds good to me.

People do realize that Toral is a guy right? I have to remind my friends every time his card is in star base....

[Mr. Domino]

Yeah, I have that problem as well.

As far as the imbalance issues, I think the way I'm going to rule it for my play group is thus (since I'm an old Decipher CCG player): There are dual-affiliation characters, and the "youth"s from a faction can upgrade to any character who shares a faction with them. So Wesley and Bochra can both upgrade to Stefan Deseve, Toral and Wesley can both upgrade to K'Ehlyr and Worf. I can see where some groups would want to play it straight like it is on the card, though.

[Jan Horinek]

Guys do you seriously think that the fact Toral and Wesley can promote to an extra character is that imbalancing? Really? Then what about early Deana ... or early Lwaxana "Five" Troi? Not talking about early 50p ship. Is that imbalancing? I just don't believe Toral and Wesley are that powerfull now.

[qurgh]

Guys do you seriously think that the fact Toral and Wesley can promote to an extra character is that imbalancing? Really? Then what about early Deana ... or early Lwaxana "Five" Troi? Not talking about early 50p ship. Is that imbalancing? I just don't believe Toral and Wesley are that powerfull now.

No, I think the fact that ONLY Toral can be upgraded to TWO extra characters that used to be ONLY Wesley's domain is unbalancing because it makes Toral BETTER than all the other upgrading characters as he can cross Allegiances but no other 4 point upgrading character can. I don't believe the game designers had that in mind while creating those cards.

Basically my issue is: The same effect is used differently on cards that should be identical. This is un-balancing. It's like the difference between "Lightning bolt" and "Shock" in Magic and is why Wizards only allow one of those two spells to be in Standard at anyone time (and why everyone uses Lightning Bolt and not Shock out of Standard).

If Toral cost 5, then I wouldn't complain, but since he has the same cost as Wesley (and all the others), and appears to be identical, it makes it un-balanced. He has the same wording as Wesley, but because the game designers picked the same word for both Race and Allegiance for SOME of the Allegiances Wesley get's the shaft. This is also un-balanced. Races are different from Allegiances and should not cross over.