Official Tournament Sealed Deck, 20 cards (fixed) + 4 Premiere booster pack and 1 Alternate Universe booster pack
Average Picture Score: 3.57
Average Lore Score: 3.39
Average Trek Sense Score: 3.45
Average Seedability/Stockability Score: 3.88

PRODUCT CONCEPT: The idea of creating some 20 cards that could be used to make any random Premiere/AU booster packs playable right out of a box is an excellent one (all the more because it works). You get a Treaty that includes all the original affiliations, an all-purpose Outpost, enough missions and dilemmas to cover your bases, a way to get the AU cards out without repeating AU Door, a way to get any skill needed, and even a way to include those holograms you'd have drawn. All this while also making cards that are playable (usually very playable in the non-sealed deck environment). The cards come from all over the place (all three modern series!), so there really isn't any kind of thematic link between them beyond game play mechanics. Still, it's a deft Sealed Deck product - the best jumping-on-point Decipher ever made in my opinion. A 4.3.

PACKAGING/LOOK: 20 fixed cards goes against the collectability of the card game? Enter the collectable box! I only have Federation and Borg boxes to my name, but all 6 (adding Cardassian, Bajoran, Klingon and Romulan) are of the same quality. Handsome and sturdy, they feature a very large affiliation icon on top and the basic color of that affiliation on the rest of the cover. That color is supplemented by a roiling clouds texture which is visually far superior to what looked like an opaque textureless one in the ads. The STCCG logo is also featured on the sides, which is fine, and with the lightning going through that logo, I think it's well linked to the rest of the box. The only thing I don't so much like is the large gray circle from the affiliation icon. At this size, it's a bit thick and doesn't always go with the color scheme. The boxes are good for bringing your decks along to tournaments or friends' houses without having to lug around entire collections (they are still said to hold 300 cards or 150 in sleeves). You can either advertize your affiliation, or mislead your opponent by bringing Borg, but playing Bajorans for example. Or if that's expected, mislead by bringing the matching box after all. (Ahh... the meta-games people play!) To cover which collectable box is which, the product is also packaged inside a very flimsy "box", which I still use the store duplicate commons or home-made graphical dream cards, that kind of thing. I wouldn't take it out of the house, but it's still an extra STCCG box. And that sticky seal "signed" by Warren Holland? It's still sticky after a great many years, so you can re-seal that Sealed Deck ;-). Funny nitpick: Look at the underside of the flimsy box, and you'll see a picture of all six collector boxes. The photographer must not have been a big DS9 fan: the Bajoran box is upside down. :-)

The OTSD also comes with a thin booklet, mostly filled with rather handsome ads for past products. The cover is a blurry shot of some card backs, but I'm reminded of the Bat-signal in the sky over Gotham City. Among the ads, you would also find a couple of coupon offers (since past due) for the 2-player game (20$ off if you get both boxes - and I only find out about this now?!?) and a set of uncut sheets (5$ off, cumulative up to 30$, for a 100$ product). Not bad, but these are not must-have products by any means. There's also a short rule sheet in minuscule type that acts as a current rulings or glossary for the new cards. Certainly welcome. And card quality being very high also: a definite 4.1 here.

DISTRIBUTION: 20 fixed (and useful!) cards for a very low price (retailed around 20$ Canadian, so I can only imagine no more than 15$ in the States). We won't be seeing that kind of thing again anytime soon. The collector boxes aren't that interesting to collect for most players, but there is some fun involved in getting your favorite affiliation's, and at such a low price, you can afford to try your luck more than once. And unlike the Enhanced products, you only need to buy one to get every new card. There's collecting on the inside of the box too, since you'll find 4 Premiere packs and 1 AU pack. That's a pretty low price for a sturdy box, 20 premium cards and 75 Premiere/AU cards (only 5 rares of course). The Sealed Deck format thankfully gives a use for the extra packs, as there are way too many ways to get Premiere packs as it is. Superlative, and we're still waiting for OTSD II Decipher ;-). As good as it gets: 5.

NEW ICONS, CARD TYPES & MECHANICS: Having to work with Premiere and AU cards, this product couldn't really include new card types and mechanics, but it did manage to bring a couple new graphic design features to the game. I will not count the first appearance of the Dominion icon though, prefering to only do so when the actual affiliated cards are covered, rather than the smaller, less interesting, attemptability icon.

Premium icon
Graphics: Though the OTSD isn't the first premium product, this is the first time such cards were given an icon (not counting the separately iconed Fajo Collection). And what a great icon!!! It's basically a miniature Distortion of Space/Time Continuum, which isn't an obvious choice (that'll up its points, believe me), but is a particularly appropriate one. Just like Distortion gets your ship a move "in-between moves" if you will, Premium products are a release "in-between releases". Decipher's extra moves! Visually, it's also very nice, having a central, colorful fireworks-like composition. Don't know who the genius is, but taking the road less traveled earns them a full 5. [Average total: 5.]

Two-sided cards
Graphics: Spacedoor is the first two-sided card ever offered, and it made for a number of "oohs" and "ahhs" when it was first released. It's a cool concept, and the realities of the rules will keep it at a minimum "event" level. Obviously, the pics of each will make or break the cards, but the idea itself is worth a graphic 3.5.
Trek Sense: The idea that a card becomes another related card is very Trek Sensical, on par with personae, but usually better rationalized (FC Picard shouldn't really become the earlier Premiere Picard, but a Spacedoor can open and close any number of times). It's a simple mechanic, but works very well. Unfortunate that the game won't support non-seed cards in this format: A 4.5.
Usefulness: The design more or less gives you two cards in one, though with the disadvantage that you can't have the two sides face up at the same time. In fact, one side usually balances the other in a sense, so that using those cards isn't paramount to breaking the game. Deep Space 9, for example, should fear from becoming Terok Nor; Spacedoor limits SHIELDS on one side, etc. The main problem with the design is that, having no anonymous card back, it tips your hand. They always seed, but that card is exposed to your opponent before the game even starts - part of the cost of playing such cards - not that they can go back to their collection to revise their decks or anything. A great way to put more game text on a card for a total of 3.4. [Average total: 3.8.]

(Average score for new designs: 4.4.)

OVERALL USEFULNESS: Wow. For Sealed Deck play, this is a great product, managing to give you everything you need and that you might not have gotten via the cards themselves: an outpost, a ship, a treaty, a way to get that treaty on the table during the seed phase, 6 missions, 6 dilemmas, and various ways to plug in the holes left by the random draws of the booster packs. As a stand-alone product, it WORKS. The 20 cards then translate as excellent cards in normal play as well! Make Us Go, Hippocratic Oath and Unscientific Method are all much-seen dilemmas (especially the last one) because they hit hard and make for great combos. Space-Time Portal is a great alternative to Alternate Universe Door (pun not intended for once), and sees a LOT of action. Hide and Seek provided the first Q-bypass counter, though it has since been supplanted by the overkill of counters, Writ of Accountability. Open Diplomatic Relations has a great Treaty-seeding function. Reflection Therapy is often used in Espionage decks. Even the missions, all universal, have little special functions that may make them attractive: card draws, downloads and RANGE boosts being only the best sampling. There really isn't a bad card here, and only the Darmok and tri-Treaty are really limited enough (among the non-seeds) to warrant less frequent inclusion. A superior 4.7. Hey, people just don't do without the STP these days.

TOTAL: 22.5 on 25 (90%) Is it any wonder we'd all like to see an OTSD II? Possible boxes could include Ferengi, Dominion, Original Series, Terran Empire, Alliance and Maquis and have a mix of DS9 series expansion boosters. Not likely, but we can dream, can't we?

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