Star Wars Unlimited - Set 2 and Beyond!

A Brief overview of Star Wars Unlimited

Star Wars Unlimited, a new TCG with high expectations

A short intro to Set 1, Spark of Rebellion

Star Wars Unlimited (SWU) is a trading card game that was launched in March 2024 with its “Spark of Rebellion” set and it has been a worldwide success. This triumph is mainly due to two reasons, the first and most important, the support and lore of one of the most important film franchises in history, spanning across multiple generations; and the second, a dynamic and easy to understand game format.

Regarding the lore, the Spark of Rebellion set is mainly based on the original trilogy (Episodes IV, V and VI) and the Star Wars Rebels and Andor series, with Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader being the main characters, and with the presence of characters like Palpatine, Boba Fett, Thrawn, Jyn Erso, Han Solo, Chewie, among many more.

Source: Star Wars Unlimited Data Base

Even though SWU is a new game, Fantasy Flight Games, SWU's developer, has already planned the next eight sets of this game, releasing three sets per year, with Shadows of the Galaxy arriving in July of this year, where the main characters will be Mando and Moff Gideon, from the Mandalorian series, and Twilight of the Republic in November of this year.

Source: Star Wars Unlimited Data Base

A bit of the gameplay

As for the gameplay, SWU follows the main theme of many TCGs: two players battle one another with armies to bring their life points to zero, or in this case to destroy their base, using a Leader Unit, which is the main theme of a player’s deck -similar to Commander/EDH in Magic The Gathering. However, Star Wars Unlimited separates itself from franchises like Magic and Yu-Gi-Oh in gameplay, as both players take sequenced turns within a round, instead of casting every possible spell or monster cards within a turn to try combo out and win the game. 

In addition, having sequenced turns eliminates the possibility of reacting to the opponent's moves -like with counterspells or trap cards, which means that players must have multiple win cons and strategies to defeat their opponents. 

Another factor that differentiates SWU from other games is the existence of two battlefields. Games like Magic, Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh, have a main battlefield, where creatures share a single plane; in SWU there are two arenas, separating the units into ground units and space units, where ground units can only fight ground units and space units can only battle space units (unless their ability says otherwise, like having a creature with “flying” or “reach” in Magic). 

This adds more weight to the planning and design of a deck since it is necessary to have units for both arenas to ensure victory.

Source: IGN Entertainment Inc.

Shadows of the Galaxy, new mechanics, leaders and predictions

Shadows of the Galaxy (SotG) introduces three new mechanics: smuggling, bounties and capturing units. The “smuggle” mechanic focuses on trying to recover/reuse cards that were used as resources for later plays. This change is important as it makes it easier to decide which cards to keep in hand and which to resource, some of them generating interesting combos such as the “Privateer crew”, granting buffs to units when smuggled into play,

Source: Star Wars Unlimited Data Base

The bounty mechanic focuses on putting bounties on units, and to collect the bounty, that unit must be defeated or captured by an opponent. When a unit is captured, it is taken out of play and the card is placed below the one that captured it. The only ways to recover the captured unit is through card effects that state that the captured card is rescues or by defeating the unit that captured it. This mechanic has important implications for the rules of the game, since there will now be changes to zones that weren’t clear before the release of Set 2.

When it comes to new leaders and sets’ lore, Shadows of the Galaxy focuses primarily on the Star Wars Franchise sequels (Episodes VII, VIII and IX), the Mandalorian, Bad Batch, and Book of Boba series, the Han Solo movie. It features leaders like Mando and Gideon (shown above), Rey, Finn, Jabba the Hutt, Kylo Ren, Bo-Katan Kryze, Cad Bane, Qi’ra, Hunter, and more. My prediction is that, despite having great leaders like Han Solo and The Mandalorian, this set will act more as an upgrade for Set 1, adding value cards to current leaders already in the meta -Boba Fett, Sabine, Palpatine, and Luke Skywalker. Nevertheless, if we’re just talking about leaders from Shadows of the Galaxy, Rey, Han Solo, Bossk and The Mandalorian, are the best ones.

Source: Star Wars Unlimited Data Base

The potential of these leaders lies in new combos or synergies with the same cards from set 2, such as Rey and Sundari Peacekeeper - a new staple for aggro and midrange decks due to its abilities, or Bossk and Jango Fett, partnering to demolish units with bounties.

Source: Star Wars Unlimited Data Base

Building towards competitions and casual play

When it comes to competitive play, the current meta can be separated into aggro, aggro-tempo, midrange, and control. Within aggro decks, the best two leaders are Sabine Wren (both in yellow and green) and Leia Organa (in red). Aggro tempo decks are a combination of aggro and midrange decks, where it can beat an opponent in turn 5 or 6, but still manages to play well if the game stalls out. The main leaders for this type of deck are Chirrut Inew (in red), Grand Inquisitor, and Boba Fett (in yellow). Midrange is dominating the charts, focusing on the ability to close the game in its mid to late stages. The most hyped deck in the current meta is Boba Fett in green, which plays with the two most expensive cards in the game: Boba Fett, Desintegrator, and Darth Vader, Commanding the First Legion. 

Two other decks in this archetype are Luke Skywalker (in green) and Han Solo (in green), and just like Boba Fett, their gameplay is about dominating the early game and closing quick with big units. The last archetype is control with three prominent leaders: Iden Versio, Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine. The decks these leaders star in contain a lot of removal tools, gain life, and slowly deplete the opponents; the intention behind them is to slowly gain terrain and overwhelm their rivals. 

In our Dunedin store, Stuart Jack won the SWU Showdown with Luke Skywalker (midrange deck), followed by Leo Lee with Emperor Palpatine and Hamish Morgan with Grand Admiral Thrawn (both with control decks). This does not mean that one type of deck is better than another, or that one leader is better than another, simply saying that in our local games shop (LGS), the gameplay is focused on the late stages of the game, midrange and control decks.

Regarding casual play, I believe that players should play any leader, even if they are not competitive. Every deck, even jank decks (not super competitive, sometimes inconsistent, or simply designed in quirky ways or with weird win cons) are fun to play against, because they keep every player on their toes and give nice surprises. That’s why I encourage people to not have one or two super-tuned up decks, but have a three or four that you like, tweak them with your own idea and then, by trial and error, make them a bit better every time. 

So whats stopping you? Get into Star Wars Unlimited today!

Jorge Soto

Store Manager

Hobby Lords