Star Trek Adversaries, from developer Puppet Master Games, is a card-based ship battles game with “dream team” Federation and Klingon ships and crew that range from the Original Series through Discovery. (Everything except the Kelvin movies, in other words.) These starships and their iconic passengers face off against one another in battles of up to five ships on each side.
Adding to a growing field of Hearthstone-like card games on Steam and mobile platforms, Star Trek Adversaries features a ruleset that’s very familiar for anyone who’s played that game, Shadowverse, The Elder Scrolls: Legends or The Horus Heresy: Legions, with more clones likely on the way.
What separates Star Trek Adversaries from the others, frankly, is the license: each persona comes with their own voiced quote from an episode or movie they were in, and it’s neat to see wildly different ship designs between Klingon or Federation eras spanning hundreds of years.
But wait: isn’t Star Trek built on the philosophy of peace and exploration? Never mind that; it’s time to fire phasers and photon torpedoes at ships until they explode!
In-Game Credits
New players get a boatload of in-game currency (Latinum) to start with, which they can immediately use to purchase a stack of packs (which come in Federation, Klingon or Standard, the latter which contains a mixture).
A second in-game currency, Command Points, can be purchased with real-world money and can also be used to craft specific cards you’ll need for your decks through the use of the Replicator feature. (CP can also purchase many packs at a time.)
Adversarial Gameplay Modes
The backbone of a player’s game is the Flagship; there are several named ships one can choose on the Federation or Klingon side. Each has an allotment of Auxiliary Power that it gains each turn, which can be used for a Special or an Ultimate ability, depending on how much power you build up. These special abilities not only affect the board in a significant way, they also give you a choice of a key catch-up card that can massively swing the tide of battle.
After constructing a deck, a player can take it for a spin in the practice mode, or even try ranked gameplay (though Epic and Legendary cards abound in player’s decks).
There’s also a fun mode called Quark’s Draft. Pick cards until you have a whole deck, then take it for a spin against a succession of computer-controlled bosses. Each win gets you a point until you lose three times, then you must spend it all on either Latinum, rare replicator patterns or booster packs. Most bosses are entirely beatable with a decent draft deck, except the hated Borg Queen, which requires a combination of extreme luck and skill to get past. Needless to say, most players don’t get to the 10 points to win the pack.
There’s a ton of daily missions that involve winning in the various formats, and each gives you a pack or a significant amount of Latinum.
It’s pretty easy to grind your way to enough cards to make a good constructed deck, and even a very good deck stuffed with Epics and Legendaries after enough time. It’s definitely more fun to deploy Jean-Luc Picard than some Romulan that was in a single episode and then never seen again.
Star Trek Adversaries is Free to Play
Overall, though the power level in ranked constructed is sky high, the other modes are much more reasonable for new players until enough skill and cards are collected. Star Trek Adversaries is free to play and a lot of fun. Give it a try.
Star Trek Adversaries is available now on Android, iOS and Steam.
What’s your favourite ship in Star Trek? Tell us in the comments!
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Image Credits: GameSparks