Working Together

I've always felt that Star Trek Second Edition needed more copies of James T. Kirk. Now, don't get me wrong, James T. Kirk, Living Legend is a phenomenal card. But, wouldn't it be great to have a version of Kirk with more skills? Well, look no further than the Dangerous Missions set. If I were heading off on a dangerous mission, I'd certainly want Kirk by my side, so here's the new one.

Well, the irrational Kirk is certainly about working together, as his lore implies, but he's also pretty good at doing some things on his own. It has been eratta'd, but Tampering With Time is still a great card. And thanks to his past icon, Kirk can be stopped for it. That past icon also makes him useful for Fitting In and those situations where you just need that one more Security or Leadership. The Federation has plenty of supplies of Leadership, Security, Honor, and yes, even has an abundance of Anthropology. Kirk's going to fit right in with that crowd of personnel, and really his skills should be redundancy in most decks that will use him. But, that redundancy compliments his game text.

If you've got those skills covered by someone else, you won't mind so terribly having to stop Kirk to use his ability. Did Jean-Luc Picard, Argo Pilot just get selected by Trabe Grenade again? Out of Escapes? Stop Kirk to make him attributes +3 and now his Cunning of 9 allows him to avoid death by the grenade. Have you run into Armus Roulette and the black tar is getting on your nerves? Well, as long as one of the personnel selected has Leadership, you can probably use Kirk to crank their Cunning up above 7. If not, maybe they can push the total over 22. How many times have you been hit by Chula: Echoes only to have your highest Cunning personnel be 6 or 8? If one of the three has Leadership, Kirk can get the job done once more, adding +3 to that even number, making it odd.

You may even decide to get really tricky at some point and stop Kirk when attributes aren't important. Let's say you've got Katherine Janeway, Wry Admiral selected by Temptation along with two other Honor Personnel. You know that if Janeway gets through, you'll complete the mission, so you stop Kirk to make his Honor transferable with Mission Briefing. Voila! Janeway gains Honor, is not stopped, and the team completes the mission.

These are just a few of the ways the new Kirk compliments his Federation brothers and sisters. Countless other ways exist for him to help out various other factions in the game, and he's got a high Integrity and good skills to boot.

Not bad for an irrational human being, eh?