Being a look back at cards from the Star Trek CCG, and what I thought of them back when they were fresh and new... in EPISODE order. Well, here's a classic event that was errataed along the way (twice!)...
PICTURE: I don't much care for this rendition of the concept. The hologram is so unformed as to look like someone being vaporized by a weapon, and the projector itself is occluded by branches. It has some ok colors, but falls in the hopeless category. Only a 1.
LORE: And so it goes with the lore, I'm afraid. It's pretty barren (plenty of room for more). A 0.6.
TREK SENSE: Holo-Projectors as a technology is wider than what's described here, like their use on ships and facilities, but in the sense that this is a planet-bound Holo-Projector as seen in "The Arsenal of Freedom" (was the salesman mobile and "solid" though?) and "Shadowplay", it works as is. You have the big Projector on a planet, and hey, holograms can exist there. Simple as that. One puzzling change from the original's game text is that Kevin Uxbridge is now ready to wipe it off the face of the planet. The way I've worked out the puzzle is that the card no longer represents a technological development, but an actual thing, a thing holograms can use to invade a planet. So that change works out, and the card gets a 4.
STOCKABILITY: When this card came out in Premiere, it allowed you to beam your holograms down if a ship with Holodeck was in orbit (don't ask me how, we're out of Trek Sense now). Later, it was errataed to simply give all ships a Holodeck. With Holodeck Adventures, Holodeck Door now did this (and more), so they needed to errata the card again. To make sure the Children of Light could use it in the Voyager-only environment, they re-issued the card, which is where this game text was solidified, now playing on planet missions and allowing holograms to exist there. Errata isn't the word exactly - the card was completely rewritten twice. How does it stack up in its ultimate form? Well, not as good as the original, but better than after the first errata. Obviously, a hologram-based deck would need these to attempt planet missions, and since you wouldn't want to get caught by The Big Picture, you'd need to do so. Don't overdo it, stick to space missions as much as you can, but still stock some Holo-Projectors to get you to those missions. The Cardassian/Hirogen/Child of Light hologram Kejal can download the card, so it should be easy to get out once you have her. She can even be downloaded herself for quick access through a discarded Holodeck Door. The game slows down when you need to play more than one Projector during the game though, so its frequent use, say to cut-and-switch on a mission, or to use your holograms as an assault team, could be harder. Still, with some of the special skills that have come out of Holodeck Adventures, it might be worth it to force your opponent into the corner of the holodeck, as it were. And between Children of Light and the large number of new Non-Aligned holograms, all non-Borg affiliations can now rationalize the use of this support card. Ends up at 3.5 after a long journey.
TOTAL: 9.1 (46%) After all the errata, this should be a final score.
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