Brief Summary of deck: Primary goals - prevent easy victories, preserve the balance of power, foment unrest.
Secondary goal - victory through Intrigue.

Section 1: The Cards:

Aftermaths: Consumed by Shadows, Public Outcry, Exploit Opportunities,  Protests, Into Their Own, Secondary Experience, Crisis of Self, Personal Involvement, Public Outcry x3, Successful Manipulation, Inevitable Destiny, It Will Be His Undoing, Debt of Gratitude, Learning Experience
Total # of aftermaths: 16

Agendas: Knowledge is Power, Infiltrate and Exploit, Rise of the Republic
Total # of agendas: 3

Characters: Londo Mollari, Vir Cotto, Emperor Turhan, Minister Malachi, Urza Jaddo, Lord Kiro, Lord Refa, Drigo, Ambitious Captain, Adira Tyree, Centauri Agent x2
Total # of Characters: 12

Diplomacy Conflicts: Euphrates Treaty
Total # of Diplomacy Conflicts: 1

Intrigue Conflicts: Attacking Pawns, Hate Crime, Forced Impairment x2, Removed from Power x2, Prey on the Weak, Loss of Support, Sowing Unrest x2
Total # of Intrigue Conflicts: 10

Military Conflicts: None
Total # of Military Conflicts: 0

Enhancements: Power Posturing, Salvage Yard, Stagnation, The Eye, Government Aid, To Stand Alone, Heavy Resistance, Obstacles to Victory, Commerce Raiding, Reluctant Allies, Babylon 5 Unrest, Government Hostility, Damaged from Within, PPG Rifle, No Alternatives, Uncertain Followers, Overworked, Prove Your Worth
Total # of Enhancements: 18

Events: Meditation x3, Level the Playing Field x3, Internal Strife x2 Universe Today Feature x2, Internal Opposition x2, Seduction, Lack of Subtlety, Diplomatic Blunder, Unrecognized Data,  Cut Supply Lines, Armistice, The Price of Power, Block Progress Liberating Resources, Emergency Military Aid, Accident,  Short Term Goals, Hollow Victory, We Can't Allow That, Hire Raiders, Trivial Gains, Not Meant to Be, The Opposition Rises
Total # of Events: 30

Fleets: Third Battle Fleet, Second Battle Fleet, First Battle Fleet, Expeditionary Fleet, Homeworld Fleet, Deep Space Fleet,  Utility Fleet x2, Garrison Fleet x2, Colonial Fleet, Picket Fleet
Total # of Fleets: 12

Groups: Imperial Telepaths, Influential Lords
Total # of Groups: 2

Locations: Centauri Prime, Centauri Beta I
Total # of Locations: 2

Total # of cards in deck: 106

Section 2: Strategy

Opening Hand: Londo Mollari, Vir Cotto, Infiltrate and Exploit, Successful Manipulation

Opening Strategy: Build to 6, then sponsor Vir on Turn 3.  Then build to 7, promote Vir on Turn 5 and use him to sponsor Infiltrate & Exploit.  Use Londo and Vir on Turn 6 to build to 9.  On turn 7,  initiate an I&E conflict with the goal of increasing Londo's Intrigue while supporting conflicts.  Build to 10 with Vir unless he's needed to win the conflict (unlikely).  Play Successful Manipulation as an aftermath on Londo, giving him 6 Intrigue, 7 while supporting his own conflicts and setting him up well for later conflicts.

Midgame Strategy: The first few turns after you reach 10 Influence will probably be your best opportunity for gaining Influence.  Exploit this as much as possible, before the other players get enough Intrigue out to seriously hinder you.

At this point, it's probably time to lay back a bit and build  infrastructure while throwing up minor roadblocks and hostile  Enhancements and unrest-increasers.

Then, it's time to get serious about identifying victory threats and finding ways to scuttle them.  I&E "Lose 1 Influence" conflicts are often good to play against the leader.  With a little luck and  personal diplomacy, you'll be able to push these through without too much difficulty.  Continue to increase opposing Unrest levels whenever possible.

Endgame Strategy: At this point, virtually all of your efforts should be directed at foiling opposition victory strategies.  With luck,  some will have high Unrest ratings to make this easier.  "To Stand Alone" is particularly nasty in this context.

Chances are, you won't be able to scuttle 3 fast-win decks, but if you do, you're probably in decent shape to make a bid for victory in a longer game.  Go for "Increase Centauri Influence" Intrigue  conflicts.  Play Rise of the Republic for a boost over the top.

Weaknesses: There are a lot of them.  First and foremost is that this deck isn't really designed to win.  Rather, it's designed to make it more difficult for *other* players to win.  Really,  my meta-strategic goal with this deck is to encourage players to use bigger, more diverse decks by emphasizing the sorts of cards that put small, tightly-focused decks at risk.

It's a big deck, overly ambitious, and not terribly efficient.  Imperial Telepaths can help out here, but it's still likely you'll draw cards that turn out not to be very useful.  On the plus side, though,  there are no particular cards that are absolutely essential to the strategy.

I try to put in some countermeasures, but this deck isn't well-suited to fight off a hyper-aggressive Narn Military deck.

I've been experimenting with this sort of deck for a while.  I think Shadows might finally make it viable.  In a recent tournament, I played a deck like this one, finishing in second place in all three games (usually to aggressive Narn decks), but wrecking at least one enemy strategy per game.

Section 3: Variations

Opening Hand: I always use Vir and I&E in my opening hand with this strategy, but I vary the fourth card a lot.  I like the above hand since it can give Londo an quick, effective 7 Intrigue with little  chance of opposition, but there are a lot of other possibilities:

- Centauri Prime: Very conventional, but looking more and more attractive the more I think about this deck.  Your best shots at gaining influence are in the early stages of the midgame, and the homeworld will help capitalize on this.

- Overworked: One of my favorite "nuisance" cards to play early in the game.  It's usually easy to spot who didn't put an assistant in their opening hand (e.g. a quick Sheridan or Delenn Transformed). Overworked can make them pay a price for that.

- A fleet to stave off aggressive Narns: never a terrible idea for the Centauri.

Other less general-purpose cards may be good, depending on your knowledge of opponents' personal tendencies.  For instance,  "It Will Be His Undoing" if you suspect a Doom deck, "B5 Unrest"  if you know the Human player likes Alliance of Races, etc.

The deck as a whole can also be customized based on your intelligence reports on enemy strategy, mainly to cut out stuff you don't think is likely.  For instance, if you're pretty sure AoR or Doom decks *won't* be played, take out the two cards named above.

Other variants: I'm not sure yet whether the "fomenting unrest"  aspect of this deck works well.  It might work better if the unrest-dependent cards were taken out (or, alternatively, if  non-unrest cards were removed to make a *tighter* unrest focus.)

Giving this deck a bit of Shadow flavoring is tempting, since the expansion has a number of good cards that use the Shadows for intrigue-related purposes.  I decided that trying to work in the Shadows here would either make the deck too damn big or dilute its current focus too much, though.

Another idea is to try this general strategy with another race. I'm thinking something along these lines might work fairly well for the Humans.
 
 
Deck Commentaries:

by Stephen Kittel

>Aftermaths: Consumed by Shadows, Public Outcry, Exploit Opportunities, Protests, Into Their Own, Secondary Experience, Crisis of  Self, Personal Involvement, Public Outcry x3, Successful Manipulation, Inevitable Destiny, It Will Be His Undoing, Debt of Gratitude,  Learning Experience
>Total # of aftermaths: 16

I'd have to argue that this is a little too much precaution. You could probably get rid of some of these, especially Into Their Own and Debt of Gratitude.

>Agendas: Knowledge is Power, Infiltrate and Exploit, Rise of the Republic
>Total # of agendas: 3

If you're worried about toying with unrest, throw in Meddling with Others for its Intrigue conflicts.

>Diplomacy Conflicts: Euphrates Treaty
>Total # of Diplomacy Conflicts: 1
Not highly useful in a non-diplomacy deck. I'd leave it out.

>Intrigue Conflicts: Attacking Pawns, Hate Crime, Forced Impairment x2, Removed from Power x2, Prey on the Weak, Loss of Support, Sowing Unrest x2
>Total # of Intrigue Conflicts: 10

An extra FI might be good, and would help remove the paranoia effect generated from those extra aftermaths. Consider Looking Ahead for card sorting purposes.

>Military Conflicts: None
>Total # of Military Conflicts: 0
With 12 fleets, at least throw in a Border Raid. Never know when somebody might try Maintain the Peace.

>Events: Meditation x3, Level the Playing Field x3, Internal Strife x2
>Universe Today Feature x2, Internal Opposition x2, Seduction, Lack of
>Subtlety, Diplomatic Blunder, Unrecognized Data,  Cut Supply Lines,
>Armistice, The Price of Power, Block Progress, Liberating Resources,
>Emergency Military Aid, Accident,  Short Term Goals, Hollow Victory, We
>Can't Allow That, Hire Raiders, Trivial Gains, Not Meant to Be, The
Opposition Rises
>Total # of Events: 30

A lot of useful but not highly important cards, but then again, that's what you're going for. With this big a deck and only a few characters, you'll need a few more personal precautionary measures. Use more than one Lack of Subtlety, and definitely 3 Not Meant To Be's if you've got them. Also, if you aren't going to use both, replace Internal Strife with Political Realignment as it can protect you from an unrest deck, if
necessary. You may also want Intrigues Mature. Lastly, throw in a Secret Strike or two to surprise opponents with an FI.

>Groups: Imperial Telepaths, Influential Lords
>Total # of Groups: 2

Extended Contacts? At least to keep someone else from playing it...

>Locations: Centauri Prime, Centauri Beta I
>Total # of Locations: 2

Leave out Beta I unless you really need that leadership. IMHO, it's just  another DiD influence.

>Opening Hand: Londo Mollari, Vir Cotto, Infiltrate and Exploit, Successful Manipulation

Rather than Successful Manipulation, start with something that can cycle cards, such as Imperial Telepaths or Looking Ahead. Another possible card would be Not Meant to Be, as it could nullify an opponent's Declaration of War.

Not a whole lot to deal with concerning strategy, just a little curious concerning the delay in promoting Vir, but it has its merits in card drawing, I suppose.
Alternative: Sponsor and promote Vir on 1 and 2. Vir sponsors I&E upon promotion. Build influence with Vir on 3 while Londo supports Looking Ahead. Both build on 4 and 5. Start with I&E on turn 6 or 7.

>my meta-strategic goal with
>this deck is to encourage players to use bigger, more diverse decks by
>emphasizing the sorts of cards that put small, tightly-focused decks at
>risk.
An interesting idea, but I think a bit too extreme--there does come a point when there are simply too many cards. (Although I agree that drawing the game out with a good stop deck can eliminate the quick threats.) Personally, I think there needs to be a middle ground of 65-85 cards. Enough meat to get by, with a little variety in the form of Plans B and C, and some fat for opponents to chew on. This deck is a bit TOO fatty, what my friends call a gnat deck--nothing but annoyance.  Out of fairness, I'd have to say I like the concept of this deck, and you did a good job with it, but Imperial Teeps can keep you safe indefinitely, so consider cutting back to things that are likely and/or safe bets, because you will never be out of options unless Imp Teeps gets FIed, which it shouldn't because you are the great Centauri
Republic...Bottom line: cut back about 20 cards or cycle your cards better, other than that, this deck, strangely enough, might actually have a shot.