Introduction

Star Chamber is many different types of games rolled into one. It has a board game element as well as a card game element. Importantly, these elements interact synergistically such that one has to adept their strategic board play moves to consider their card plays and their opponent card plays. To paraphrase the infamous words of Donald Rumsfeld, Star Chamber combines known knowns and known unknowns. If your opponent has 10 build points at their Home World, you know that they can build a cruiser or a scout and a citizen. However, with their four tech you don't know exactly what card they will deploy from their hand (the known unkown). This combination of knowns and unkowns is what makes Star Chamber such a complex, and strategic game. Today's article is about the interaction between build points and the cards played from hand. In the early game, build points dominate, but in the mid-to-late game cards become more important. As such, it's very important to include the most powerful cards in your deck. Most of you have been playing for some time, and you know which cards are better than others. Yet, there are probably many cards you are not sure about, or races you haven't fully explored yet. In this article I will try to provide some tips to evaluate the power of cards by comparing them using a common currency - the almighty build point.

Establishing the Build Point Index

Cards cost tech to play. The more tech a card costs, the better it should be. Have you ever wondered how many build points (BPs) each point of tech is worth? There is no simple answer to this question. For one, tech comes sporadically. It's pretty easy to get 4 tech early in the game on most maps. However, you are often at 5 or 6 tech for a few turns. Instead of a simple formula, I view the relation as three discrete functions. Cards, are worth at least one BP in my index, meaning that 0 tech cards translate into 1 BP of currency. Each tech point, up to 4 tech, is worth an additional BP. Each tech point between 5-8 is worth 1.5 bps. Values above that are worth at least 2 bps, since tech is harder to get at that stage. Below is a simple conversion chart.

Tech	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
BPs	1	2	3	4	5	6.5	8	9.5	11	13	15

The Ant and the Grasshopper

It's important to stress what I mean by build points. I mean things in the here and now, not things that can be saved for later. Value for cards like Metropolis that give bonuses over time are harder to calculate. The simple rule is, the sooner the value hits the floor, the more difference it makes. Star Chamber is a game of position, and it is much easier to hold a position that to take one. So while in truth Metropolis can dole out 10 bps or more, this is misleading.

Using the Build Point Index

Now that we have our index, its time to put it to use. By comparing the value of cards to entities that can be built at industrial planets, we can see how the cards match up, and more importantly, which cards match up better. There does seem to be established precedence for 3-4 tech equaling a persona with influence. Landing Party sets a high standard here - it's a 1 influence persona with special deployment. I'd rate Landing Party as being worth 4 build points. Note that most persona with influence are 3-4 tech. Any four tech citizen with 1 influence should have a cool ability to make up for the extra BP cost. Field Delegates has a great ability and can also be used to fortify a planet. On the other hand, Grunt has an ability that's not always useful and has no political influence. According to this analysis, not only is Field Delegates judged to be better than Grunt, but more abstractly, the former is judged to be above the build point curve and the latter below.

It's important to stress that the build point index does not do everything for you. One has to assign subjective values to cards after weighing things like special deployment, the value of extra abilities, and race specific weaknesses and strengths. However, this method does allow one to compare different types of cards more simply once one has made these decisions.

It is also possible to assign values for ships. I will give a few examples. One way to judge ships is to consider how many build points you would pay to build a ship if this were an option. Consider how many build points a Bushwacker is worth. It is a ship with defense and speed similar to a normal scout, but has 3 cannon instead of 4 beam. Overall these stats are worse than a normal scout. However, the ship gains + 1 (or 3) to weapons when it is at a non-friendly planet. This is not quite enough to justify the cost of the Bushwacker. However, with a beam or missile mod (e.g. Mounted Laser) this ship gets a big boost at unfriendly planets. In a deck that is offensive and has a lot of ship mods (and conquerors) I think Bushwacker is worth 7 BPs, otherwise I would rate him as worth 5-6 BPs. This is why it's important to consider the effect that potential combinations of cards have on the card values.

If you could build heroes with leadership, how many build points should a standard leader run? In my opinion the answer is 3 (ignoring potential craziness with Thrall Chamber). I value odd increments of leadership as less essential than even values. Each even value is worth only 1 BP to me, where as each even value is worth 2 BPs (rates may vary with race). Converting from the build point index, here is my leadership to BP comparison.

Leadership	1	2	3	4
BPs	1	3	4	6

This tells us that standard 1 leadership heroes are not as useful as standard 2 leadership heroes (e.g. Tactic Bot and Thrass Daughter) because the extra tech to deploy the 2 leadership hero pays off an extra BP. However, it is always important to consider potential combos that could raise the value of leaders.

Conclusion

Your mileage may vary using this method of comparing cards. It is primarily useful for comparing cards that are very different from each other by 'normalizing' their value to a common currency. I find it useful to think about, but it's no substitute for seeing a card in action and fine tuning your deck. To get a flavor for how this method works, perhaps you could try to evaluate one or more of the following cards for fun, perhaps with a comment attached here.

Card list

• Corona Runner
• Deflector Scout
• Loyal Patriot
• Viceroy
• Mitosilica
• The Supreme Legacy