http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=3856

I'm just wondering when we'll get to see the first pack. It's still sitting under "In Development". I'm hoping this won't be like a repeat of the Lord of the Rings situation where the first Adventure Pack was delayed well beyond when it was expected to release.

FFG always posts up product announcements 3 months in advance to allow time for retailers and distributors to place orders for product. So most likely we will see 1st pack in February, placing this pack in April. It is common for FFG to take a break after a major release like a core set or deluxe expansion.

Anzati Elite, want that in my Sith deck for the two tactics icons. And glad to see a Smugglers and Spies objective set. For this pack Imperial, Sith, Smugglers all get sets with most likely Rebels as well. Not sure on the 5th one, possibly a LS neutral.

Really pumped for this pack!

Colonel Starck looks extremely impressive.

I'm not sure how I feel about Battle of Hoth yet. In or against a Hoth deck, it's almost a strictly superior Target of Opportunity.

I'm kinda shocked, in an extremely good way, we're seeing Anzati assassins and Gotal survivors - not to mention Colonel Starck as well - in such an early release. I know there were the odd characters etc in the core set, but to have such blatant EU stuff so soon has really impressed me!

spalanzani said:

Let's just hope General Veers makes it into the Hoth Cycle somewhere.

The Anzati seems slightly fragile to commit 4 resources to.

cleardave said:

I predict he'll be in pack 5 or 6, towards the end of the cycle. I think that would be fitting since his AT-AT destroyed the shield generator and that was toward the end of the battle. Then again, Vader didn't show up until the shield was down and we're already getting him in the first Force pack, so who knows. I'm confident we'll see him this cycle.

On the Veers subject, I'd like to see some kind of Dark Side Enhancement comparable to the Trench Run that allows the Dark Side to blow the power generators and either win the game, or cause some other kind of global problem for the Light Side.

D.Knight Sevus said:

Not if you're attacking a non-Hoth player…

MarthWMaster said:

Which is why I said almost. Even then, you still get to heal 1 damage from one of your Hoth objectives, and have both an extra Force icon and priority over Target of Opportunity.

Very excited for this and glad they have got some EU stuff in early. Gives me hopes that we will see an expansion set placed between the films, during the "shadows of the empire" EU material if I am not mistaken.

I'm confused…this desc. says "The Force Pack’s five new objective sets permit players to tighten the focus……" while the desc for the first Force Packs, while talking about the general distribution in Force Packs says " you’ll gain ten complete objective sets, including one copy of each “Limit 1” objective set and two copies of each other objective set." Does that mean this set really only had 5 unique objective sets? I'm OK with that, I just want to understand what the sets will look like before I get too invested in this and "bait and switched". I like the way they describe the distribution plan, just looking for clafification.

OlorinGrayhame said:

5 sets x 2 copies of each = 10 sets.

OlorinGrayhame said:

The individual distribution of Objectives in Force Packs still remains unknown in a sense. By that I mean, "how many" unique Objectives. Any one Force Pack of 60 cards (which is 10 Objective sets, of six cards each; 6x10=60 cards) could be organized in a variety of ways.

The key thing to remember is that FFG's plan is to give you a complete set of playable cards, so every Objective set will be included in a Force Pack twice, with the exception of "Limit one per deck" Objectives, which will only be included once.

Firstly, the easiest distribution would be 2 copies of 5 unique Objectives, which gives you the 10 Objective total.

But it could also be 2x4 unique Objectives, with one copy each of 2 "Limit One Per Deck" Objectives, or any other permutation you can imagine, as long as all Objectives are included in duplicate, with the exception of the "Limit 1" Objectives.

2+2+2+1+1+1+1, or even theoretically 10 Limit 1 Objectives if they felt so inclined.

In any case, I'm not sure what sort of bait and switch you're worried about. From what I understand historically, the earlier LCG's (Cthulhu, Thrones, Warhammer) didn't provide a "complete" card loadout in the earlier packs, but every game system since (Rings, Netrunner, Star Wars) offers complete play sets in each expansion pack.

So with that in mind, let's go back to your first point, about the new Force Pack providing "five new objective sets." You can infer from that quote that this particular Force Pack will contain 5 unique objectives, each in duplicate, to allow the maximum number of legal deck construction options. So regardless of Limit 1's or not, you will, in fact, recieve 10 complete objective sets in each Force Pack, its just a matter of how many will be doubles of normals, or singles of Limit 1's.

D.Knight Sevus said:

True. You may be right in saying it's a better card overall. This must be one of those examples of design acting out in favor of set-based balance, rather than individual card balance.

cleardave said:

If you go look and the product page for each Force Pack, it tells you exactly how many Objectives are in each pack.

Desolation of Hoth: sets 37-42

Search for Skywalker: 43-47

A Dark Time: 48-52

crackerbox said:

Desolation will have 4 objectives sets that come in two copies, and 2 Limit 1 objective sets. Skywalker and Dark Time should have 2 copies of 5 objective sets. Like I was saying above, any one Force Pack (not these specifically, but any pack produced in the future) could have any kind of possible distribution of objective sets allowable in a 60 card format.

There doesn't have to be a consistent distribution, in terms of Limit 1's vs Doubles in each Force Pack, and by looking at the 3 Force Packs already revealed, you can see that already taking place.

cleardave said:

It would be combination, since the order does not matter, just the constituency of the pack with respect to limit-1-per-deck objectives or non-limited objectives.

divinityofnumber said:

…and I just got dictionary'ed. At least I'm not running around confusing irony for coincidence.

Although, if I may grasp at straws for a moment, the "order" could matter, with respect to how those objectives are allocated between the 6 factions, and growing their respective card pools and I'm just going to drop this now before we spend a day nitpicking each other on the Internet.

I wonder if the cycle will include elements of the Rebels' dispersion after the Battle of Hoth? Including the Falcon's daring escape into the Hoth asteroid field.

MarthWMaster said:

The asteroid chase is what I was hoping would be the theme behind a Force Pack, and would have that Smugglers objective set that contains a Millenium Falcon.

One thing that has left me wondering, theme-wise, with this game is the named unique starships, and not being able to "pilot" them with their respective owners. Currently, I'm thinking of Vader and Vader's TIE and Luke and Red 5. Sure, the ship is able to do its thing on its own, but its just as powerful even if the matching pilot is on the board.

I suppose that on a single engagement, I could strike with Luke and Red 5, and that all the damage they cause is because Luke was just owning the Dark Side in his X-Wing, but what if they're engaging two different objectives?

I'm hoping we see some kind of variant of Vader, Luke, and Han in the future that act as Units, but have some kind of attachment text, like the Black Squadron Pilot, to drop them in their respective ships and do some serious damage, or some other interesting effects.

I can't imagine why that wouldn't happen down the line, and I look forward to having a similar presenation as the Decipher game, where main characters exist in different "personas" of themselves, that focus on one particular aspect of the character, and you build your deck around that.

For instance, right now I see Luke and Vader represented as "the warrior", but it would be interesting to see, for instance, a "leader" type Vader, possibly with some "You've Failed Me for the Last Time" style effects, or event cards for support.

cleardave said:

Maybe some kind of enhancement that allows you to attach a character to a vehicle to act as a pilot, granting its icons to the vehicle?