Just curious, do you need both to play long term? It seems like the core rulebook doesn't have the dice. Could you get by with just the beginner game, or do you need the rulebook for future leveling with skills and what not?

You need the rule book for the careers, character generation and development, stats on equipment, ships, etc. The beginner game is really just that, an adventure with pre-generated characters that you can't really use to enhance them further.

The previous two beginner games have been well worth the price IMHO. You get dice, plus a free PDF followup adventure that is longer and more intricate than the one in the box. I'd have to assume they will do the same with this game.

You don't need the Beginner Game for long-term play (the dice are available for separate purchase, and there's also the dice app for iOS & Android devices, as well as some decent free dice rollers online), but I'll agree with whafrog that it is a good value for money.

Also worth mentioning, the Beginner game for EotE (and I assume AoR as well) had additional adversaries and such in the back so you could get at least another 3-5 adventures out of it before your started hitting a bit of a wall. Also there's usually a 2-3 adventure free to download supplement that comes out a little after release.The beginner games comes with abbreviated character pre-gen characters for the players, and no instructions on new character creation, so after a while they start to just run out of snazzy options for advancement.

As others have said, though, the Beginner game as a really good intro, but if you're willing to man up and teach your players yourself, as long as you have the core book and the dice app, or a pair of dice sets, you'll be good to go for a long time (or until you see a supplement you just can't live without... which for me is all of them...)

DICES! MORE DICES!... oh yes, and the book XD

I really like that the adventures in the previous Beginner sets are not just one-offs, but potential campaign starting points which introduce the shared party resource.

The Beginner Box is nice if you and your group are on the fence about whether you want to buy into a particular branch of FFG's "Star Wars Total Role Playing Experience." The 30 bucks (or less if you go through various online retailers) gets a you a ready-to-run adventure, a sample of pre-made PCs, enough dice to run the adventure, and a summary of the rules (a few things get simplified for the sake of being meant to introduce players and GMs unfamiliar with the system to the game).

Plus, as Lorne noted each of the Beginner Box adventures are geared to serve not just as a one-shot adventure but also as a launching point for a campaign. I've played in one campaign that was kicked off by Escape from Mos Shutta in the EotE Beginner Box, and had a GM make use of the Whisper Base raid from the AoR Beginner Box as an adventure for our AoR group. I may well use the Force and Destiny Beginner Box adventure as a "launch point" for a new campaign, using the inevitable "follow-up" adventure modules that FFG will release on their website (they've done one for each of the other Beginner Box sets, so safe bet they'll do the same for FaD).

Also the background stories of the beginner boxs premade chars are (at least speaking from eoe and aor) quite inspiring to read through and give a good idea on what backgroundstories you can use/have