There have been plenty of Star Trek games over the years, but Deep Space Nine doesn’t get a lot of love specifically — which is why I’ve been so excited about the latest edition of the card game Fluxx: it’s entirely dedicated to Deep Space Nine!

You may already have Star Trek Fluxx, and its 24th century companion Star Trek: TNG Fluxx — both of which we reviewed last summer when they first arrived from Looney Labs.

But if you’re a newcomer to the card game “with ever-changing rules,” here’s a basic rundown of how it works. It starts out simply enough, with the premise that each player will draw one card and play one card. You will be seeking out “Keeper” cards, in an attempt to fulfill the current goal card on the table.

Along the way, rules will change, Keepers will be traded, stolen, or discarded, and “Creeper” cards will try and stop you from — or help you succeed in — winning the game. A good game of Fluxx can take anywhere from 10 to 40 minutes to play, which makes it perfect for taking along to a Star Trek convention to play in line, or when you have a little downtime with some friends.

The new Deep Space Nine edition has some unique cards that help it stand out from the previous Trek versions, and one of my favorites is a “New Rule” card appropriately titled “Rule of Acquisition.” This allows you to take one of your opponent’s Keepers or Creepers, but only if you also allow that opponent to take one card randomly from your own hand to add to theirs. And since this is a rule change and not just an Action card, it means all players can do this on their turn, provided the rule remains in play. “Rule of Acquisition” has the potential to really shake up the game!

There are two action cards that I thought were themed nicely: “Beam Us Back!” and “Dabo!” The first says to return all Starfleet Officers, along with Visitors and Other Personnel, to the hands of their owners, unless there’s a Transporter in play (in which case, the player with the Transporter takes all of those cards and add them to their hand). The second, “Dabo!” lets you draw 3 extra cards. If you also have the Keeper “Gold-Pressed Lantinum,” you can draw another 3 cards.

Speaking of “Gold-Pressed Latinum,” that card lets you steal a Keeper from another player if you discard the Latinum. Two of my other favorite Keepers: “Weyoun” and “Morn.” I won’t tell you the specifics on the Morn card, because I think there should be at least one fun surprise when you play for the first time, but trust me when I say that the Morn card alone is worth purchasing the game for. The “Weyoun” card says that if it is discarded, you can instead place it on top of the Draw pile to be picked up again… you know, since he’s a clone!

There are a number of Goal cards that are interesting, in that they allow you to win by having certain combinations of Keepers. “The Dominion” goal requires any two Keepers from among the “Jem’Hadar,” “Weyoun,” or “The Founders.” Similarly, “Visitors and Other Station Personnel” is a goal requiring any 3 Keepers with the station symbol on them (such as “Morn,” “Jake Sisko,” “Garak,” etc.). There’s a similar goal for collecting any 3 of the Starfleet Officers.

And finally, it wouldn’t be a Fluxx game without Creepers! The “Jem’Hadar” and “The Founders” were natural candidates for these cards. The “Jem’Hadar” card lets you move it to another player if you discard a Keeper. “The Founders” card works the same way. I think it would have been nice to see different mechanisms for these two Creepers, but it’s a small critique in what is otherwise a well themed edition.

The new Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Fluxx card game is available now, but don’t expect this to be the last entry in the series. When we visited the Looney Labs team at Toy Fair back in February, the team expressed their hope to visit additional parts of the Star Trek franchise for future Fluxx editions — so hopefully we’ll get a full range of Star Trek series options in the coming years.

In addition, the company continues to grow their Star Trek game library in an upcoming release called Chrono-Trek, which infuses card gameplay with pretty much every temporal event ever seen in the prime Trek universe — to stay tuned for our coverage of that once we get our hands on the time travel-themed set!