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DECIPHER.com > Star Trek CCG
> Tenth Anniversary > Timeline
> 1999
The History of Star Trek CCG: Rules of Acquisition
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Updated May 28, 2004
One hundred and thirty cards. The Ferengi affiliation, Rules of Acquisition
cards, arms dealers, commercial exploitation, vacuum-desiccated Ferengi
remains, treachery, greed, bribery, extortion... "Deep down, everyone's
a Ferengi" (the 284th Rule of Acquisition)
– Rules Supplement
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Released
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December 1, 1999
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Design Team
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Tim Ellington, Sandy Wible, Bill Martinson
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Product Configuration
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130 cards (50 R/R+ - 40 U - 40 C)
9-card expansion packs (1 R - 3 U - 5C)
30 expansion packs per display
Rules supplement/collector's card list in display
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Press Sheets
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11 x 11 press sheets
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New Mechanics
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Phasing
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New Rules
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Jem'Hadar suicide rule cancelled. S/P dilemmas no longer applied to both
crew and Away Team at dual-icon mission.
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New Features
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 New
affiliation: Ferengi.
Variable attributes. Cargo runs.
 New
icon: Rule of Acquisition.
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Highlights
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Rules of Acquisition implemented as Event cards.
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Packaging
Expansion Icon
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Factoids
- After four sets printed on 80- and 100-card press sheets, with Rules
of Acquisition the game returned to 121-card sheets for all rarities.
Because 50 rare cards can't be evenly distributed on a 121-card sheet,
the rares were split into R and R+ (also known as R3 and R2), though the
designation was not indicated on the card list as it was for later sets
configured similarly.
- Among the design team, so-called verb cards had previously been split
into "3-line verbs" (events, interrupts, and dilemmas) and "7-line
verbs" (doorways, objectives, and incidents) for the number of lines
of game text available in the standard card templates. The Rules of Acquisition
cards seemed to require a bit more text than the usual event, but not
enough to consider making them incidents, and thus became the only "4-line
verb" events.
- The dilemma Center of Attention evolved from a rough design created
in a convention design seminar earlier in the year.
- The Breen CRM114, a piece of heavy armament designed as a defense against
Rogue Borg slaughter and a way to destroy landed ships and planet facilities
such as those pesky Colonies, was promptly dubbed the "Breenzooka"
by playtesters.
Notable Cards
With Rules of Acquisition, the Romulans became the first affiliation to
be able to field two headquarters facilities at once: the Continuing Committee
could coexist on Romulus with the Office of the Proconsul, and afforded
the possibility of two free reports per turn.
 
One of the most controversial cards in Rules of Acquisition – or,
indeed, in any set before or since – was Writ of Accountability. The
counter-card to end all counter-cards, the Writ took a hard line against
eight abusive strategies, from Anti-Time Anomalies to Black Holes to Q-bypass,
with a harsh penalty for overuse (or in some cases, any use): a 100-0
game loss. Although its full impact would not be felt until its Referee
icon was activated by the release of Q the Referee some eight months later
in The Trouble With Tribbles, the Writ put players on notice that killing
all personnel in play, sucking up the spaceline into a black hole, or evading
dilemmas through self-seeded Qs was done at your own extreme peril.
Links
Rules of Acquisition
expansion page
Card list HTML
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Spoiler list PDF
Rules supplement PDF | HTML
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