Dark Siege Scenario Deck Competition

[predfang]

Things tend to get a little slow around here so I decided to have a little fun with the Dark Siege Scenario.

Pretend you are entering a Dark Siege tourney choosing the species of your choice. What would your deck look like? Remember your draw deck must be only 25 cards and must have Operations and some type of Engineering. The cards included must come only from an official starter. For simplicity, just ignore the 10 random cards also included. Here is the link to the cards included in the typical starters:

accessspace.110mb.com/starterdeckcontents.html

Let's see who can build the best Dark Siege deck for each species.

[predfang]

Here is my attempt for the Pred Starter:

Starting:

Predator Shuttle
Airlock
Young Tusk
Mask
Melee Claws
Camouflage Suit

Draw Deck:

Engineering
Infirmary
Mess Hall
Operations


Ceremonial Armor
Medkit
Scattergun

Security Guard
Staff Worker x3

Adrenaline Rush x2
Dodge x2
Flesh Wound x2
Good Shot
It's Just The Cat
Malfunction
Medical Assistance x2
Takedown Strike x2
The Hunt

[predfang]

My attempt at an Alien Starter:

Starting:

Breeding Chamber
Hived Engineering
Young Queen
Alien Warrior x3
Chest Burster

Draw Deck:

Alien Warrior x2

Engineering x2
Mess Hall x2
Operations

Engineer x3
Staff Worker x3

Acid Splash
Adrenaline Rush
Alien Wave
Rend
Instinctive Escape
Malfunction
Perfect Organism
Protect The Queen x2
Takedown Strike
Where There's One x2

[predfang]

My attempt at the Marines:

Starting:

Docking Bay
Weapons Locker
Cpl Ackles
Pvt McIntyre
Pvt Rogers
Pvt Von Gries
M41A Pulse Rifle x2
M240 Flame Thrower

Draw Deck:

Engineering
Infirmary
Operations
Equipment Warehouse

Garrison Pack x4
Medikit
Shotgun

Engineer x2
Security Guard
Company Official


Adrenaline Rush x2
Crossfire
Dodge and Roll
Dodge
Good Shot
Marines, We Are Leaving
Medical Assistance
Overwatch
Take Him With You
You Want Some Of This?

[cruehitman]

I'm surprised this didn't get any responses. Does everyone out there just avoid this scenario? I haven't gotten a chance to try it yet (we always seem to play Contact). I'm curious to see what decks you all would put together for this scenario as well. Also, how well does it play?

[predfang]

I've playtested the above decks with Lackey, and it seems to level the playing field for all species. For someone who doesn't have all the cards, it was a nice way to have three decent/balanced decks to play against each other with each having a chance of winning.

[Iceman]

Oct 11, 2011 0:17:04 GMT -5 cruehitman said:

I'm surprised this didn't get any responses. Does everyone out there just avoid this scenario?

Actually, yeah, we do.

But our local group has been playing the game for Years, so maybe we should take a look at something with a limited card pool... Hmmm.

-VIC

[Shaolin Yautja]

After constant analysis and re-analysis of the outline, I realized that at one point I didn't play it correctly, end up using more Rares and Uncommons than that I had been allowed, but like always, we were all beginners and realize whoops, we made mistakes. At one point I didn't have too many cards and end up using Distephano as a starting marine, which I didn't realize at the time that Dark Siege and Dark Siege: Aftermatch only permits cards from the Premiere Edition set to be used and there was nothing specific or clear that cards from the expansions can be used.

So before anybody else makes the same mistake as I had, and end up creating a broken and unbalanced deck for playing Dark Siege scenarios, here are the things I wanted to clear up:

By default, any "Long-Ranged" weapons are automatically banned for standard Dark Siege, the only exceptions are the "Siege Guns" (2 Pulse Rifles and a Flame Thrower that the Marines are permitted and required to start with), however, in Dark Siege: Aftermath, Long-Ranged Weapons are permitted.

In other words, the following cards cannot be used at all in regular Dark Siege:

Crude Explosives
Experimental Rifle
Field Pack
Grenade Launcher
M42A Scope Rifle
M56 Smart Gun
Plasma Caster
Sentry Gun Control
UA 571C Sentry Gun

For both Dark Siege scenarios, when it comes to cards of the "Rare" rarity category, you are only allowed to use up to a maximum of 2 Rares with no exceptions, and IIRC correctly, it counts for both the Starting Cards and the Deck itself.

Duplicate copies of Rare cards are also not permitted, essentially treat all of the Rares the same as "Unique", where only one copy per Rare card is allowed in a deck.

So an example of this is if an Aliens Dark Siege Deck has Warrior Queen and Egg Sack Detachment, then no further Rares can be added or used in the deck.

In other words, pick and choose your 2 Rares wisely, should you decide to add any Rare Cards to your Siege deck, the same goes for cards that are "Uncommon".

Basically with these restrictions in place and effect, cards that are "Rare" or "Uncommon" cannot be spammed and abused repeatedly in the same turn. This is crucial, especially for broken cards like "Hull Breach" because it is a "Rare".

These are the following cards from Premiere Edition that are "Rare":

2 by 2 Formation
A Bad Feeling
Adapt and Overcome
Alien Birth
Ambush Point
Ash
At Any Price
At the Limit
Bishop
Black Marketeer
Booby Trap
Burst Pipe
Camouflage
Carter Burke
CN-20 Nerve Gas
Cocooned Victim
Combat Mastery
Committed Posture
Cpl Hicks
Dallas
Dead End
Death from Above
Display of Skill
Egg Sack Detachment
Emergency Escape Vessel
End of the Line
Extremely Agitated
Facing Bad Luck
Field Promotion
Fire Alarm
Fortify
Frenzy
Friendly Fire
Hardpoint
Heroic Stand
Hidden
Hidey Hole
Honored Elder
Hull Breach
Huntmaster
I Work Best Alone
Juggernaut
Kane
Know Your Enemy
Lambert
Lay of the Land
Learning Experience
Lucky Break
Marine Short Course
Masterful Shot
Mk 50 Compression Suit
Naginata
Natural Selection
New Era in Science
Nobody's Home
Not So Fast
On a Roll
Outcast
Parker
Personal Data Locator
Power Outage
Predator Hybrid
Predator Mothership
Prepare Yourself
Primal Force
Pvt Hudson
Quartermaster
Ravaged Chamber
Regroup
Right to the Wall
Ripley
Rivalry
Sacrifice
Second Chance
Security Chief
Security Station
Self Destruct Sequence
Snapshot
Somebody Wake Up Hicks
Standoff
Structural Damage
Success Breeds Success
Tail Lash
The Area Is Secure
The Will to Live
There's Something in Here
This Changes Everything
Throwing Disk
Tighten the Perimeter
Trick of the Light?
Twice As Deadly
Twitchy Artificial Person
Warrior Queen
Welcome to the War


When it comes to cards of the "Uncommon" rarity category, you are only allowed to use up to a maximum of 8 Uncommons with no exceptions, and IIRC correctly, it counts for both the Starting Cards and the Deck itself.

Duplicate copies of Uncommon cards are also not permitted, essentially treat all of the Uncommons the same as cards that are "Unique".

These are the following cards from Premiere Edition that are "Uncommon":

Access Space
Access Tunnel
Acid Resistant Claws
Acid Spray
Activate Self Destruct
Aggravated Wound
Alien Hunter
Armory
Baptism of Fire
Battlefield Chaos
Blaze the Path
Breakthrough
Bug Hunt
Carpe Corpus
Ceiling Highway
Collapsible Spear
Combat Knife
Communications Array
Counter
Covering Fire
Cpl Myler
Crazed Civilian
Demolition Charge
Deteriorating Situation
Dire Straits
Disarmament
Dissection
Dockworker
Dwindling Options
Elevator
Empty
Fast Claw
Fiery Defense
Fog of War
From Behind
Ghost Image
Hacker
Hand Welder
Have Me Some Fun
Head Shot
Heat Exchanger
Heat of Battle
Hived Airlock
Hived Corridor
Hunter's Mask
I Can Take It
Isolated Corridor
Lab Worker
Let's Rock
Like a Ghost
Limb from Limb
Loose Formation
Loss of Command
Lt Campbell
M240 Flame Thrower
March of Time
Mk 35 Pressure Suit
Nowhere to Hide
Observe the Prey
P-5000 Powerloader
Passed By
Pet Hybrid
Physician
Pincer Grab
Pour It On
Power Plant
Predator Ship
Programmer
Pvt Hewitt
Quarantine
Ransack
Rapid Fire
Recon
Reflexive Action
Rip Asunder
Roll with It
Royal Guard
Saturation Fire
Science Lab
Security Checkpoint
Self Destruct
Settle the Score
Sgt Hart
Sharp Eye
Sleeper
Slow Motion
Stairwell
Superior Analysis
Superior Species
Take Aim
Take Names
Take the Initiative
Tavern
Tight Formation
Trip
Water Processing

Although the P-5000 Power Loader had not been errata'd at the time Dark Siege was introduced, I wonder how things would play out if it was being played using the Planetfall or Atmosphere's Supplement's Errata?

I presume that the loader should be played as it's original default Item version of the card rather than the revised errata and updated "Vehicle" version from the Atmosphere and Planetfall supplement.

Promos are also allowed IIRC, but duplicate copies of them are not permitted, at least according to the Dark Siege: Aftermath's outline.

E.G. Running more than 1 copy of Battle Standard or Infrared Binoculars.

But there are no cap limits of how many Promos are permitted, the same goes for all the cards of the "Fixed" rarity category.

[Shaolin Yautja]

Essentially these are all of the cards that are available from the 3 starter decks in the entire deck building pool of Dark Siege and are considered "Fixed" rarity.

Some of these "Fixed" cards are also "Common", there are no mentions of cards of the "Common" rarity category in either outlines of Dark Siege or Dark Siege: Aftermath, so at this point, I presume that they are not permitted at all and cannot be used at all in any Siege Decks. But the "Common" cards that are in the Starter Decks are exempt from this.

Meaning all of these cards below in this list are the only cards that can have duplicates of up to 3 copies each per Siege Deck, with the only exceptions to any cards that are "Unique" and items:

Please note that I've excluded the Starting cards, but check the bottom.

In general, no deck is ever permitted to have any opponents' starting locations in their decks and all starting locations are automatically distinct by default at the start of the game.

Please Note that all of the starter deck cards below with an asterisk denotes that these cards are also found in Premiere booster packs and are of the Common rarity. So all this means is that those cards are the only "Common" rarity cards that are permitted and are part of the limited card pool.

Acid Splash*
Adrenaline Rush
Alien Pursuit
Alien Queen
Alien Wave
Barracks
Body Slam*
Calculated Risk
Camouflage Suit
Captured
Ceremonial Armor
Child
Company Official
Concentrated Fire*
Corporate Office
Crossfire*
Defend The Hive
Disengaging Attack*
Dodge*
Dodge And Roll*
Eat This
Engineer
Engineering
Equipment Warehouse
Evacuation
Extra Ammo
Face Hugger Attack
Flesh Wound
Garrison Pack
Good Shot*
Grapple
Hived Cryonics*
Hived Main Corridor
Hived Processor
Hived Shop
If It Bleeds*
Infirmary*
Instinctive Escape*
It's Just The Cat*
Kill And Kill Again
Kitchen
Long Range Shot
Main Corridor*
Malfunction
Marines, We Are Leaving
Mask
Medical Assistance
Medikit*
Melee Claws
Mess Hall
Motion Scanner*
On The Move
Operations
Overwatch*
Perfect Organism
Predator Medikit*
Protect The Queen
Rend
Scattergun
Secure Position*
Security Guard
Shotgun*
Sprint*
Staff Worker
Study The Enemy
Take Him With You
Takedown Strike
The Hunt
Weapon Cache
Where There's One
You Want Some Of This?*

Starting Cards from Starter Decks: (these cards aren't put into a deck in general, with only exceptions to the Alien Main Character cards)

Cpl Ackles
Pvt McIntyre
Pvt Rogers
Pvt Von Gries
Docking Bay
Weapons Locker

Young Tusk
Predator Shuttle
Airlock

Alien Warrior
Chest Burster
Young Queen
Breeding Chamber
Hived Engineering

The "Siege Guns" are also part of the starting cards for the Marines and part of the pool of cards permitted in Dark Siege:

M41A Pulse Rifle x2
M240 Flame Thrower

The "Promos" of Premiere Edition:

Air Control Fans
Battle Standard
Berserk
Conestoga Class (Marines may also use this in place of the Weapons Locker for their choice of starting location)
Corporate Agent
Critical Hit
Infrared Binoculars
Small Arms
Under Its Gaze

According to Dark Siege: Aftermath, you can run all 9 of these Premiere Promos in your Siege Deck if you'd like to, however, duplicate copies of any of them aren't permitted, standard regular Dark Siege isn't very clear about whether duplicate copies of them are permitted or not permitted, I presume they also aren't just for consistency with Aftermath.

In the case of standard Dark Siege, "Any Premiere Promo cards may also be used (with one exception: Promos are not permitted in an area's first Dark Siege tournament, but are allowed in every subsequent tournament)."

[Shaolin Yautja]

The following cards below are all the cards from the Premiere Edition set that are part of the "Common" rarity category:

My best guess is that, if any of these cards aren't part of the Starter Decks, they are not permitted to be used in any way in either Dark Siege or Dark Siege: Aftermath scenarios. However, some of the Commons are also part of the Starter Decks' Card Pool thus they are permitted without any restrictions, unless if they are a "Unique" card (Only 1 copy allowed in a deck) or if they are items (no limits on copies of items).


None of the following "Commons" are part of the Starter Decks' Card Pool, and therefore are probably not permitted to be added or used in any Siege Decks:

A Kill with No Honor
Advantageous Terrain
Alien Stealth
Ambush
Atmosphere Processor
Block
Bottled Courage
Cargo Bay
Chemical Base
Close Quarters
Communications Center
Computer Center
Corridor
Cover Formation
Cower
Cpl Brown
Crude Explosives
Cryonics Chamber
Cunning Hunter
Darts
Desperate Leap
Desperate Shot
Dishonor
Double-Packed Ammo
Eager Youth
Eat Vacuum
Electronics Tech
Flanking
Found 'Em
Get Away from Her
Got It
Gray Stripe
Hive Construction
Hived Hall
Hived Lounge
Hived Passage
Hived Plant
Hived Quarters
Hived Storage
Hunting Kit
I Can't Lock In
It Was a Bad Call
Landing Pad
Laser Sight
Living Quarters
Look Sharp
M3 Body Armor
M41A Pulse Rifle
Machine Shop
Makeshift Weapon
Marine Private
Mechanic
Meditation
Meeting Hall
Oops
Overconfidence
Overkill
Panic
Pet
Pvt Masters
Ready for Trouble
Remote Sensors
Repair
Rescue
Retreat
Royal Jelly
Security Doors
Sensing Weakness
Sgt Bass
Short, Controlled Bursts
Situational Awareness
Stalking the Queen
Structural Repairs
Sweep the Area
Tail Spear
Take Cover
The Strong Survive
WO Kraver


All of the following "Commons" are also part of the Starter Decks Card Pool, these are permitted and OK to use and add into any Siege Deck:

Acid Splash
Body Slam
Concentrated Fire
Crossfire
Disengaging Attack
Dodge
Dodge and Roll
Good Shot
Hived Cryonics
If It Bleeds
Infirmary
Instinctive Escape
It's Just the Cat
Main Corridor
Medikit
Motion Scanner
Overwatch
Predator Medikit
Secure Position
Shotgun
Sprint
You Want Some of This?

Please check the following official sources here to confirm and verify:

web.archive.org/web/20030928101333/http://www.alienspredator.com:80/Inventory/Pre_Rarity.html

web.archive.org/web/20030928101551/http://www.alienspredator.com:80/Inventory/Pre_Type.html

web.archive.org/web/20030928101433/http://www.alienspredator.com:80/Inventory/Pre_Alpha.html

[Shaolin Yautja]

For the common rarity cards being restricted for use in Dark Siege scenarios, the only other exception would be the M41A Pulse Rifle as that is part of the Marines starting cards and are mandatory. Have to have 2 Pulse Rifles and 1 Flame Thrower for marines to start with which helps address balancing issues as the Marines starter deck is very weak by default. All of the starter deck Marines have awful stats. Poor Speed stats make them have low defense and are highly vulnerable to getting killed in combat and thus you need to have some defense cards for support and protection.

I'm unsure if Common rarity main character cards are permitted or allowed for Dark Siege Aftermath or not though.

Maybe it's fine if the rarity of starting cards aren't counted and that as long as the 25 card siege decks don't have any common rarity cards that didn't come with the starter decks then it is fine?

[Shaolin Yautja]

Preliminary Dark Siege Aliens Deck with Rares and Uncommons

Starting:

Breeding Chamber x1
Hived Engineering x1
Young Queen x1
Alien Warrior x3
Chest Burster x1

Draw Deck:

Alien Warrior x2

Engineering x2
Hived Cryonics x1
Mess Hall x2
Operations x1

Engineer x3
Cocooned Victim x1 (Rare)
Sleeper x1 (Uncommon)

Disarmament x1 (Uncommon)
Heat Of Battle x1 (Unique and Uncommon)
Malfunction x2
Protect The Queen x3
Takedown Strike x3
Where There's One x2

SideBar of 25 cards: (Work In Progress)

Alien Birth x1 (Rare)
Acid Splash x3
Battlefield Chaos x1 (Uncommon)
Captured x2
Defend The Hive x3
Dire Straits x1 (Uncommon)
Dodge and Roll x2
Malfunction x1
Instinctive Escape x3
Overwatch x2
Heat Exchanger x1 (Uncommon)
Ransack x1 (Uncommon)
Superior Species x1 (Uncommon)
Weapon Cache x2
Where There's One x1


Uncommons used: 8, maximum of 8 allowed, no duplicates allowed

-Battlefield Chaos
-Dire Straits
-Disarmament
-Heat Exchanger
-Heat Of Battle
-Ransack
-Sleeper
-Superior Species

Rares used: 2, maximum of 2 allowed, no duplicates allowed

-Alien Birth
-Cocooned Victim

Promos used: 0, no maximum but duplicates also aren't allowed

Commons aren't allowed in the deck so there are no Commons.

A combo such as It Was A Bad Call and Malfunction cannot be used in Dark Siege or Dark Siege Aftermath scenarios since It Was A Bad Call is a Common card.

[Shaolin Yautja]

Preliminary Dark Siege Marines Deck with Rares and Uncommons

Starting:

Docking Bay x1
Weapons Locker x1
Cpl Ackles x1
Pvt McIntyre x1
Pvt Rogers x1
Pvt Von Gries x1
M41A Pulse Rifle x2
M240 Flame Thrower x1

Draw Deck:

Engineering x1
Corporate Office x1
Operations x1
Tavern x1 (Uncommon)

Shotgun x3

Staff Worker x1
Security Guard x3
Company Official x1

Dodge and Roll x2
Emergency Escape Vessel x1 (Rare)
Evacuation x3
Good Shot x3
Overwatch x3
The Area Is Secure x1 (Rare)

Sidebar: Work In Progress and Incomplete

Armory x1 (Unique and Uncommon)
Disarmament x1 (Uncommon)
Eat This x3
Rapid Fire x1 (Uncommon)
Motion Scanner x1
Shotgun x1
Heat of Battle x1 (Unique and Uncommon)
Saturation Fire x1 (Uncommon)
Take Him With You x2
Tight Formation x1 (Uncommon)
You Want Some Of This? X3
Weapon Cache x3
Demolition Charge x1 (Uncommon)