Okay, a bit of an exaggeration, but the new description page really opened my eyes to just how thematic this dial was with a simple phrase: "just like in the movies." I hadn't really thought about the Rebels racing against the clock until I read that part of the description. Let's look at some examples of the Rebels racing against time in the movies.

A New Hope:
Rescue the princess before she's executed.
Destroy the death star before it clears the planet.

The Empire Strikes Back:
Evacuate Echo Base before the Imperials overrun it.
Get the hyperdrive fixed before getting captured.
Rescue Han from the Bounty Hunter before he gets away.

Return of the Jedi:
Destroy the death star before it's operational.
Destroy the shield generator before the fleet arrives.

That's not really as extensive of a list as I was expecting, but the point is that they made it sound much more thematic than I ever gave it credit for, and I think it could really work if I just gave it a chance . . . if.

Don't be too proud of this technological terror FFG have constructed…

But seriously, I don't mind it at all, I just had to get the joke in

I agree. While I initially felt that the dial mechanic was a bit tacked-on (I still do somewhat), the concept of the light side racing against time fits perfectly with the theme. With this aspect of the game, at least, I have no complaints.

But the DS dial could've easily been "just another" objective(card).

It's not a make or break thing for me but i'm still in the less-dials-more-cards/objectives-corner.

It's just an excuse for FFG put another dial in their games….

I'm not usually a fan of the purposeful misquote, but this thread has quite possibly just made my day

Cool, there's a theme for Rebels vs. Imperials… but what about Jedi vs Sith? Or Smugglers and Spies vs Scum and Villany? Or anything prequel era? Or anything New Republic era? It's a cool theme, but the theme is too narrow for the scope of the card game.

(Note: my main worry about the dial is the difficulty keeping the sides balanced, not the theme… but the theme isn't great. In general, the strength of the game seems to be in game play more than Star Wars feel)

dbmeboy said:

It's not actually representing a Death Star being built though. It just happens to be Death Star shaped. It more represents the Dark Side gathering enough strength to crush the galaxy, or the Rebellion, or to pull off something so horrible like a planet blowing up that the Light Side takes a morale loss. I think that general theme can be equated to the other eras or factions easily enough.

Speaking of which, I really hope we do see deluxe big box expansions down the road with New Republic and Prequel era factions. I don't see why they wouldn't. That'd be so freaking cool to see General Grievous, Maul, Dooku, Mace Windu, Jacen and Jaina, etc, etc done up with this fantastic art. The mixing of eras would maybe be a bit off thematically but who cares, I say. It'd be awesome and fun, and if a Rancor can destroy a capital starship in this game then who cares if the eras get a little wacky. Bring on GRIEVOUS!

I vote for no prequel material.

Bolfa Fluffbelly said:

*waves hand*

"You want to go home and rethink your life."

dbmeboy said:

While it's true that the death star being constructed is completely superfluous to many factions, the fact that the light side is racing against the clock seems to be pretty consistent across factions to me.

Mattr0polis said:

Nah man, i like Star Wars not **** Wars.

And Jedi mind tricks only work on the weak minded.

Bolfa Fluffbelly said:

Why? Just because the movies didn't stand up to the originals doesn't mean the story and the characters aren't worth using.

EU characters are one of the main reasons I'm excited that FFG went with original art.

ScottieATF said:

This. I'm imagining all kinds of awesome pods, like a 'Wipe Them Out, All Of Them' objective with Maul, his double-bladed lightsaber, his Sith speeder, a dueling event, etc. Or Grievous and his Droid Army, or same kind of themey things with Jaina, or Corran Horn, or Grand Admiral Thrawn with his ysalamiri, etc. etc.

Including the prequels and EU opens up unlimited cool possibilities for diehard Star Wars fans.

ScottieATF said:

I didn't say no EU (there's plenty of EU in the core by the look of some of the art), i said no prequel ****.

EU-stuff that existed before, hmm let's say May 19th 1999' is okay in my book. Not saying all EU is great or even good, but i like Zahn's books and alot of the old Star Wars videogames eu (Dark Forces series, X-wing series etc). There is really no need to go prequel for a loooong long time either.

But hey, my wishes rarely materialize. Maybe you'll get lucky and get Jar-jar in the first expansion.

Bolfa Fluffbelly said:

No one has said anything about Jar-Jar, but my not even going near the Prequels you are cutting out a lot of good characters. But we get it, you're "Old School".

The idea of this game growing to encompass the prequels and more is something I've been chewing over, both silently and on these here forums, since the game was announced back in August last year. The fact that it calls itself "Star Wars: The Card Game" strongly suggests, to me, that we will see pretty much everything that has been sold under the Star Wars brand represented, should the game grow legs enough to support it. Which I hope it does. But the particular style of marketing FFG is going with does strongly contradict this, by having images from the classic-trilogy only on the core box.

I've been thinking of this game in terms of the WotC miniatures game for a while now, mainly because that was the one game I got heavily into as an adult SW fan. So I've been kinda expecting this factions thing for a long time. But selling the game in this way just makes it so much easier to add in stuff from multiple eras at later stages by just slipping in another faction - and FFG are no strangers to this, looking at the way Cthulhu was sold as the strongest point of reference, having seven factions right out of the box and an eighth join them almost halfway through the game's development. While currently all the evidence points to the SW LCG following the release pattern of Warhammer, with four factions right out of the box and two more coming in a subsequent deluxe box, I suppose it wouldn't really be outside of the realms of possibility for them to say, maybe a year or so down the line, that they'll be adding two more - Republic and Separatists, most likely. As the WotC miniatures game showed, "Sith" as a faction can be used to stable folks from multiple eras without any major problems arising.

So, feasably, we could get an expansion into TOR territory, through the already-established Jedi and Sith factions, and why not use the Smugglers and the Scum factions for the extra bits. We can get Dooku and Sidious through the Sith faction too, and Mace and all the other folks through the Jedi faction. Swap out Rebels and Imperials for Republic and Separatists, as mentioned, and we have a prequel-era game. Maybe the New Republic will develop as a faction subtheme within the Rebels, much like the lesser Houses and Bannermen are seen in A Game of Thrones - the Empire that the NR fights for most of its history can remain within the Imperial Navy, with maybe appearances by Joruus C'baoth and Kueller, maybe even the ghost of Exar Kun, in the Sith faction.

The all-encompassing title of the game suggests it will include everything, and as a LCG I suppose it could almost be said that the model is designed for that. But I just feel somewhere that they are only intending to cover the period of the classic trilogy with this game. While there is a wealth of material out there that can be converted into this game, thanks to folks from West End Games and Bantam, largely it seems to be unnaturally stunting to limit what is supposed to be a living card game to just four and a half years of in-universe history (at the very shortest guess).

I seem to have completely derailed this thread here. Sorry about that…

Yikes, this place is crawling with prequel-fans… I have a bad feeling about this.

If they had prequel stuff from the beginning, I could take it. I accept it all as Star Wars. However, they have explicitly stated that this game is based on the original trilogy. I can't imagine they would say that if they had plans to expand in the future. I'm confident we'll get much more than one year of OT before the prequels get introduced.

As a counter point, however, LotR was supposed to take place between The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, and then they released a Hobbit expansion that reimagines the events from the book. So they could decide to throw in prequel stuff. I just really think it's gonna be a while before it happens. I hope it takes a while.

Budgernaut said:

Have they said this since the re-development though? I don't think I've heard this since then.

Mattr0polis said:

From the "It Is Your Destiny" article:

"With its layered resourcing, tactical combat, and exciting edge battles, Star Wars: The Card Game immerses players in fast-paced confrontations set during the timeline of the original trilogy."

Yeah, but that's an article just talking about the core set. Hard to take that as 100% never Prequel or New Republic stuff.

I would be shocked if we don't have a deluxe big box expansion with Republic/Separatist or like New Republic/Yuuzhan Vong within a year of this releasing.

Mattr0polis said:

I would be shocked if we DID see anything outside of the era of the Original Trilogy. If they stick to one pack every month, with 6 to a cycle, and a box between cycles, if we get to the end of 2013 with a Core Set, 6 packs and a box, I'll be impressed.

Within that, I'd imagine that there will be a slow trickling of cards to support the Smugglers/Scum factions, as well as fluff out the rest of the existing factions with more support and flavour.

What are the chances that we'd get Luke (as a pilot), Wedge, and Biggs, all in the Core Set, PLUS their matching X-Wings? We know Red Five is in there, from there demo. Also, Red Leader and his X-Wing. Then there's a Rogue Squadron deal with Luke and the guys and Speeders. Han, Chewie, the Falcon.

Cards for a Rebel Strike Team kind of deal. Lando for the Falcon, Lando as a traditional combat guy, various Rebel capital ships, and then you have to flesh out the Dark Side accordingly.

There's plenty of material to work with without going out of the original trilogy up to the first box. The only thing outside of that I can see being in the Core, or early on, is Mara Jade, since there's a card title that references her; Blessing of the Hand if I'm remembering right.

Anyways, I'm not knocking plundering the EU to keep the game fresh and full of content; there's certainly enough to work with. I just wouldn't want anyone to get their hopes up while the collective FFG nerdgasms are still happening.

Mattr0polis said:

I'm not trying to be snarky when I say this, but what about the description on the upcoming page?

"The characters, starships, and situations of the original Star Wars trilogy come to life in Star Wars: The Card Game™, a head-to-head Living Card Game® of tactical combat and strategic planning that allows two players to wage cinematic combats between the light and dark sides of the Force."

It doesn't sound to me like this is talking about just the core set, even though that's the product it's describing. It sounds like the whole Star Wars LCG is set in the original trilogy. Though, as I said before, I could see them expanding in the future. But like Cleardave, I just don't see it happening in the first year.

EDIT: And from the Description page of Star Wars: The Card Game:

"The characters, starships, and situations of the original Star Wars trilogy come to life in Star Wars: The Card Game™. A game by award-winning designer Eric M. Lang, Star Wars: The Card Game is a head-to-head Living Card Game® of tactical combat, and strategic planning that allows two players to wage cinematic battles between the light and dark sides of the Force."

Now I'm not saying I prefer it this way. In fact, I'd love to see Dooku eventually, if the game went that way. I'm just saying that it seems like they're really trying to keep it to the OT at this point.

Ok, those are all pretty good points. I'll still be really surprised if we never see them dip into these other eras, but they definitely could draw out the OT era for a while if they choose to do so.