Nice To Have You Back, Despite The Subject: "To Boldly Go!"

The Good: Decent foils, A complete set, Good images, Easy playability
The Bad: Somewhat overproduced, Dull subject matter (Enterprise!).
The Basics: In possibly Decipher's last perfectly assembled Star Trek Second Edition set, players are given a lot of Enterprise to play with!


I'll be pretty up front in saying that Star Trek: Enterprise was my least favorite element of the Star Trek franchise. From the beginning, I knew it would be problematic as they put Brannon Braga in charge of it, a man who is on record frequently saying he hated the original Star Trek. Why they put the prequel in his hands is one of the great mysteries of business and art. So, when Decipher, the Star Trek Customizable Card Game company decided to pull itself out of its severe financial problems using Star Trek: Enterprise as the focus of its new Star Trek set, I groaned a little and wondered how bad it was going to get and if it was ever going to get better.

After almost a year of struggling, Decipher released "To Boldly Go," a 140 card set that mostly celebrated Star Trek: Enterprise and to be fair to Decipher, it's a pretty decent set. Despite the subject matter, this might well be the last set where all of the pieces are includes (i.e. no missing or misnumbered cards) and there is a full set up to and including the two Ultra Rare Archive Portrait Foils, something that the final set "What You Leave Behind" lacked.

"To Boldly Go" hit the market relatively quite a bit of time after the prior release, so anticipation for the product was high. The "To Boldly Go" cards were only released in boxes of thirty packs, with packs possessing eleven cards each. Each pack included 11 cards: 1 rare (or foil), 3 uncommon and 7 common cards.

Basics/Set Composition

"To Boldly Go" is a 140 card set of gaming cards, mostly focusing on characters and events from Star Trek: Enterprise. The set consists of 40 Common, 40 Uncommon, 40 Rare, 18 Archive Foils and 2 Archive Portrait foil cards. The Archive foils are reprints of popular rares from the "To Boldly Go" set and the 2 Archive Portrait foils are unique foils that foreshadow future cards.

The 120 non-foil cards consist of: 20 Dilemma (cards that feature obstacles from the series', like the Bre'Nan Ritual and a Telepathic Invasion), 3 Equipment (cards featuring mass-produced objects in the Star Trek universe, like a Phase pistol or a Vulcan tricorder), 25 Event (cards that feature extended circumstances for the ships or crews, like a Continuing Committee Hearing or Reman Subterfuge), 3 Interrupt (cards featuring quick turns of fate in the game, like a Disinterested Visitant making an appearance or Temporal Delineation), 11 Missions (cards that act as the "board" for the game), 52 Personnel (1 Bajoran, 4 Borg, 2 Cardassian, 1 Dominion, 6 Federation, 2 Ferengi, 1 Klingon, 11 Non-Aligned, 2 Romulan and 22 StarFleet characters), and 6 Ship (2 Federation and 4 StarFleet) cards.

The cards truly do manage to focus on Star Trek: Enterprise and taking their cue from such releases as the The Lord Of The Rings Trading Card Game, some of the most popular characters and ships, like T'Pol and the Sarajevo are released as common cards (in fact, there are two T'Pols in this deck, neither one a rare!).

Playability

The Star Trek Second Edition CCG is essentially a cross between a role playing game and a board game with cards being set down to create the board and players assembling a ship and crew to then travel the "board" and earn points. This set follows the same basic rules as they were laid out in "Second Edition Premiere" (reviewed here!).

By this point, there is some complexity in terms of dealing with time periods for some of the cards (i.e. Enterprise characters are not, technically, supposed to interact in the game with the 24th Century Federation characters), but most of the cards designed for playing, like the Event and Interrupts include the necessary text to understand how they are appropriately played. Anyone who has been playing the game will find this game easy to play and the "To Boldly Go" expansion does not offer any changes to game play, it just restores adds a new time period into play in the game.

Rule Changes

There are no changes to the rules in this expansion. One need only be attentive that the icons indicating which quadrant of space and time the card may be played in. As a result, Missions that are specific to the 22nd Century crew must be paid attention to.

Highlights

Being that this is a Star Trek: Enterprise set, it is odd that some of the best commons and uncommons in the set are from other series' in the franchise. There is an uncommon Sisko card, which is decent, as well as a common Borg Queen, allowing players an easy way to get some powerful and popular cards. And how Daniels managed to be included as only an uncommon will thrill players who like the "Enterprise" time period for play.

But the grails are all in the rares. It is in the rares that one finds Zephram Cochrane, a Romulan Picard, Silik, Shran. Main bridge crew members from Enterprise that get rare treatment include Reed and Phlox. The rares make for the best highlights, but here some of the characters are represented as Uncommons or even common cards!

The highlight of "To Boldly Go," objectively might well be the U.S.S. Enterprise NX-01 or the Jonathan Archer card. 8R117 is the Enterprise, Finally Ready To Swim card and it is a decent ship card that makes for an ideal "home base" for the crew. The NX-01 might not have the most powerful weapons or shields, but it does dominate the Enterprise time period ships and when Jonathan Archer is added to it, there are bonuses.

The two Archive Portraits: Janeway and Captain Kirk make for excellent foil cards and their rarity gives them special value.

Collectibility

The "To Boldly Go" cards were released by the box, but they also ended up in the "Dangerous Mission" set, somewhat diluting their value. The Archive Portraits, though, being of two different Captains helps to keep the value on this set high. The Archive Portraits have the potential to turn an average set into something truly extraordinary and here they do that. Despite being slightly overproduced, this set remains one of the most popular and valuable because it is the only full set to focus on Star Trek: Enterprise. Even though it doesn't grab me as a television series, it works as a card set and game.

Overview

Magically retaining value by the master set and in the secondary market, "To Boldly Go" illustrated that when Decipher, Inc. wanted to bounce back, it could to that with style and substance, pleasing collectors, players and investors.

This set culls images mostly from Star Trek: Enterprise, reviewed here!

This set was preceded by "Strange New Worlds" (reviewed here!) and followed by "Dangerous Missions" (review pending!).

This is a set of card I proudly sell in my online store! Please visit my To Boldly Go Inventory Page for my current inventory!

7/10

For other Star Trek CCG reviews, please visit my Star Trek Gaming Card Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2013, 2008 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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