Win, Lose, but Draw!
By - Jett

Let me get this off my chest before I begin: I miss Decipher's departure from the world of Star Wars card games. Getting into TCG is like replacing that beloved family pet that passed away; at first there's rejection, then begrudging acceptance, and finally, welcomed presence. I mean, after all, how many times can you look into the innocent, unknowing eyes of the substitute and be nonplussed?

So, are we talking about a strategy or what? Absolutely. In my initial fumbling that could loosely be called playing the game, I learned that refreshing your hand with deck draws during the game was of utmost importance. Sure, you get to go through cards during the setup, but after that, there's no guarantee that you'll get to draw more than one during each cycle. Remember, there's no destiny draw here, so you'll need to find other ways to get new cards into your hand. The best way to do this is to 1) tap cards that have this action in their game text, or 2) use mission cards that allow this.

Look at Coruscant Freighter AA-9 as a great card to use. First, it's uncommon, so if you don't have any yet, they are easy to acquire. Second, it's independent, so either deck can use them. Third, it's a behemoth with health of 8. Sure it's slow and doesn't have a lot of power, but you're not going to use it to chase down bulk cruisers or participate in time trials on Kessel; you're going to tap it during your build step so you can get more cards.
Other examples of good cards include Jawa Sandcrawler (which is also an independent uncommon), C-3P0 (as if you needed a reason to have C-3P0 in your deck!), Jedi Patrol, Shu Mai, Reek, Trade Federation C-9979 (which doesn't require a discard), or Corellian Star Shuttle (a common!).

So what about the mission cards? Well, if you're playing the light side and you don't have "Wedding of Destiny" in your deck, you need to stop reading this right now until you've done so. It's uncommon and has a middle-of-the-road cost of 2, but you'll be getting 3 cards (without having to discard anything) and you gain 1 Force. Jedi can always use more Force.

Finally, and this probably goes without mention but I'll do it anyway, do these things at the beginning of your build step. Stock up on your inventory before you figure out how to spend your build points.

14 September 2002