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. TNG's first Romulan is played by a familiar face, but this will have to be an all-new review because I didn't get to it (nor the next two cards) back in the day!
PICTURE: I mean, I love Marc Alaimo even when he's not playing Gul Dukat, and here is his first Star Trek appearance, as one of the first two TNG Romulans. He looks smug and self-satisfied in his unusual pose. I don't really mind the sickly background, seeing as our hearts are supposed to drop if we're Federation citizens. I'll give it a 3.6.
LORE: It teases matching commander status without specifying the name of the warbird, so he DOESN'T get to benefit from later matching commander cards. Obviously, they didn't yet know they'd do this, but it's still annoying. These bare bones only score a 2.
TREK SENSE: Yes, Tebok is a Command-level Officer. He parlayed with Picard, so Diplomacy. He's in command, so Leadership. Without additional information, he's known to have ventured into the Neutral Zone, ergo Navigation. Pretty basic, but I think the implied war footing might have invoked something like SECURITY. Nah, he's just a "generic Romulan commander". As such, his Integrity is middling, his Cunning above average, and his Vulcanoid Strength high. It's really hard to make me enthusiastic about him, and therefore, a 3.
STOCKABILITY: I feel bad for 3-skill personnel. The 1 and 2 dot cards got to be mission specialists and support personnel, but 3 dots is at once too many to need a special mechanic, and too few to be interesting as is. All depends on the exact skills, I guess, and these are about as common as they come. At least for Feds. But Roms? Yeah, naw, still pretty dull. He's got the skills for Covert Rescue, but still needs a lot of Integrity with him, but generally, Romulans missions are more focused on Treachery and the sciences. He'll be useful at Investigate Coup, but Tomalak doesn't need him. New Contact, Pegasus Search, and whatever dilemmas are relevant, but as with Trek Sense, I'm not very excited. He's okay, but kind of deserved to be a universal. I'll go as high as 2.9.
TOTAL: 11.5 (57.5%) I've got the Basic Set blues.
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