Welcome back to the continuing previews for Star Trek Attack Wing’s Wave 4. Today we will be taking a look at the first release for the Borg faction: the Borg Sphere 4270 Expansion Pack. Coming with a base cost of 40 points, player can see the Borg are going to make their presence known in the game. The Borg faction also brings several new mechanics to the game which we will explore in more detail. As we discussed in our last preview, the Borg Sphere 4270 also has the new Regenerate action on its action bar. The movement of the ship is also different than the movement of other ships in the game as it introduces the new Spin Maneuver. As you can see, the Sphere can move straight forward and full astern with varying difficulty. It can also perform a spin maneuver at distance 1 to four.
The Spin Maneuver uses the same maneuver template as a Straight Maneuver. However, before executing a Spin Maneuver, the player rotates their ship 90 degrees using the 1 straight Maneuver Template as a guide (see below). After rotating the ship, a player will complete the selected maneuver as normal using the appropriate maneuver template.
Like all ships in Star Trek Attack Wing, the Borg Sphere 4270 has to have a captain assigned to it. However, the Captain’s skill level is tied to the number of Drone Tokens on the Captain Card of your ship. These drone tokens can also be spent in varying ways, as can be witnessed on the Tactical Drone’s special ability to spend a Drone Token to reroll attack dice. While spending Drone Tokens will cause your Captain Skill to decrease, adding Seven of Nine to a ship as a Crew upgrade should help mitigate this by replenishing your Drone Tokens two at a time.
Players will also note a new symbol in the Upgrade bar of the Borg Sphere 4270. No Borg ship would be complete without a few new Borg Upgrades. Borg Assimilation Tubules allows a player to steal a Crew, Tech, or Weapon Upgrade from an opponent’s ship at range 1-2 (unless you happen to be facing a fleet of Species 8472 ships). Player can toughen up their Borg Sphere by using the Borg Ablative Hull Armor which will effectively cancel the first four points of damage the Sphere would suffer. The final piece of the Borg Upgrades is the Borg Tractor Beam. When an opponent’s ship is caught by the Borg Tractor Beam, several things occur. First, the targeted ship must disable two Active Shields. If the ship is cloaked, the cloak token is removed and all but two shields are raised. While the ship is caught in the tractor beam, it cannot cloak or raise its shields. It also may not choose a Maneuver that is greater than 2. If, at the end of the Activation phase, the ship is no longer within range 1 of the Borg ship, the ship has successful broken free and you remove both Borg Tractor Beam Tokens from the corresponding ships.
If you are using the Borg Tractor Beam, you might also wish to include the Weapon Upgrade appearing in this expansion: the Cutting Beam. With an amazing attack potential of 10 dice, this is the most powerful secondary weapon introduced to date. The Borg also have an amazing Tech upgrade in the unique Feedback Pulse that combines some incredible defensive capabilities with offensive ones as well.
With all of the materials in the Borg Sphere 4270 expansion pack, players will have fun building a 70 point fleet to try out the Operation Fort Knox mission enclosed within. Perhaps the Federation will have something good to run against them in this wave. Come back when we look at the final expansion for Wave 4, the U.S.S. Voyager expansion pack to see if they have what it takes to stand up to the Borg or if it will be the Endgame for our wayfaring Federation crew.
Star Trek: Attack Wing is a tactical space combat HeroClix miniatures game that features collectible pre-painted ships from the Star Trek Universe. It utilizes the FlightPath maneuver system, allowing players to command their fleet in space combat and to customize their ship with a captain, crew, weapons and tech upgrades.
Visit WizKids.com for additional details and keep an eye on StarTrek.com for special guest blogs about the Borg Sphere and U.S.S. Voyager expansion packs for Star Trek: Attack Wing.
