Lovok Founder: The Real Phantom Menace

Since Call to Arms was released in September 2003, Dominion players have been able to mess with their opponent by using Founders with the Infiltrator keyword and a number of Infiltration events. The easiest way to deal with this problem has always been to remove the Founders somehow. Whether it is Borg taking command of them, Cardassians capturing them, or any affiliation assassinating/killing them, there has always been an easy way to remove the threat of Infiltrators. Until now.

While your opponent's Lovok Founder, Effective Changeling is not present with any of his or her personnel, you can not take command of, capture, or kill him. That doesn't leave many ways of removing the Infiltrator problem, does it? While I discuss the benefits of playing this version of Lovok Founder, try to think of any cards that might help you get rid of his particular threat. Two solutions can be found at the end of this article.

Lovok Founder, Effective Changeling is a perfect addition to any infiltration deck. Having used cards like Enemy in Your Midst, Anything or Anyone or Seeing Double to get him alone with an opponent's personnel, there are any number of ways to mess with that opponent's strategy. You could damage the opponent's ship using Changeling Sabotage. You could spend one additional counter each turn using Undercover Resource. You could draw one extra dilemma and spend one extra in total cost on dilemmas using Under Suspicion. You could reduce by one the attributes of the opponent's personnel using Misdirection. You could fix a random selection using Set Up. You could add his skills to the mission requirements using Founder Trap. You could give your Founder attempting a mission any skill using Clandestine Agent. The list goes on, but you should have some idea by now of the mischief that an infiltration deck can cause.

Even if you decide to not infiltrate with Lovok Founder, Effective Changeling, he would still be worth adding to any Dominion deck. A three-cost personnel with cunning seven and strength seven is never a bad thing. He even provides all the skills required to complete Traverse Ion Storm. If you couple him with Leyton Founder, Hostile Operative, then you will have all the skills you need to complete both Archanis Dispute and Investigate Stalled Ship. Add in Odo Founder, Adept Imposter to help complete Political Intrigue, and you have yourself a deck right there.

So, just how do you deal with the infiltration threat caused by Lovok Founder, Effective Changeling? His ability says you may not take command of, capture, or kill him. It does not say, however, that you may not return him to his owner's hand or deck. A Maquis player could use Stalling for Time to do just that, or any other deck could use One-Upsmanship to achieve the same result. The latter requires adding copies of Lovok Founder to your own deck for this purpose, but that is a small price to pay if it means you can then complete a mission without your opponent interfering.