I really do enjoy this game, but the friends I play with locally are starting to get very Magic: The Gathering like with the game. Is this normal for most of you, or do most of you feel like this should just be a competition all the time or can it just be a casual game.

On the flip side I am truly looking forward to the multiplayer but no one around me is, it lacks the competition and you have to rely on other players.

Do I quit playing or keep spending my money on a game I am losing interest with?

Some competition is never bad thing but nothing says it cannot be casual and competitive at the same time.

It is hard for anyone else to answer whether or not you should keep playing the game. Maybe take a short break and play some other stuff and come back and play and see if you still feel the same way or if you missed the game.

i play ANR and SW i bounce between the two playing what most people are playing but i always drop my ANR deck in favor of SW. Just because i like it more.

Magni

Ditto Magni. I have stopped buying AGoT and maybe even Netrunner soon for just Star Wars.

Yeah, I basically only play SW now... and now that Lacky seems to have picked up steam, I have even enjoyed that...

With the new expansions, there seems to be a ton of deckbuilding options that have really made the game invigorating...

I guess you will need to decide for yourself what is worth playing...

Jeeps, LMK the next time you are on and we should play!

I think that it is fair to loose interest in a play experience that is too competitive and not social enough. I think that if you love the game find a group that plays at the speed that you are comfortable with and then stick to that

at our local SW regional, people were laughing as joking screaming and having a good time as they played, go to a magic tourney and people are playing like they hate each other.

Every play group is different. FFG has been obsessive in the casualization of their OP structure (even going so far as to officially change "League Night" to "Game Night") for just this reason- they want the local level to be super casual. I suggest you stick with it- as the game continues to attract new players, you'll get a wider spread of competitive and casual folks.

I'd certainly like to get more competitive, but I also have a couple of totally noncompetitive decks that I like to mess around with. No reason you can't have your cake and eat it too.

I really do enjoy this game, but the friends I play with locally are starting to get very Magic: The Gathering like with the game. Is this normal for most of you, or do most of you feel like this should just be a competition all the time or can it just be a casual game.

On the flip side I am truly looking forward to the multiplayer but no one around me is, it lacks the competition and you have to rely on other players.

Do I quit playing or keep spending my money on a game I am losing interest with?

I have seen a lot of this as well. I think the game suffers from two problems. The first is that it came out as a two player game and the sense becomes more like competitive dueling than theming and casual play. The second is the way the force packs are coming out. By this I mean, if you don't have the latest and greatest pack out, your deck doesn't stand a chance. As an example, when EoD came out I could not get it right away. Played against a player who had it and was pummelled five games to zero. Couple that with the organized play and it seems like this game is going to be cutthroat competitive.

And if that be the case, I wonder if like chess, the game is dead. The concept originally put forth by I think Bobby Fischer is that if you are an outsider and know just a little bit about each opponent (like are they aggressive or whatnot) and know their opening move, the game end can be predicted within a high degree of accuracy (something like 85%). Applied to this game, if you know that player A is using SITH CONTROL and player B is using SPEEDERS, then the game end can be predicted with a high degree of accuracy. I have not seen enough to predict that number but I guess that this can be applied and that it would turn out to be at least 75% of the time that the end could be predicted.

I love the concept of the game and love Star Wars, but I must admit I was hoping for less of the "Kill them in two turns" (which I have seen many times) style of play.

PRA

The second is the way the force packs are coming out. By this I mean, if you don't have the latest and greatest pack out, your deck doesn't stand a chance. As an example, when EoD came out I could not get it right away. Played against a player who had it and was pummelled five games to zero. Couple that with the organized play and it seems like this game is going to be cutthroat competitive.

strange how the national winner at gencon won with a CORE only DS deck against a field of over 100 participants that was destroying every LS deck it came across, including those EoD decks. I believe nearly every deck in the top 8 of the nationals at gencon ran 6 of their 10 sets as core sith, then sprinkled in 2 other sets.

honestly, i wasn't super impressed with EoD other than a few smugglers sets, and as far as the force packs go, you can forgo most of them and still make very competitive decks.

there is really only a single consistent deck that can win in 2-3 turns and thats the sleuth scout deck, and honestly, once you know how to play against it, its really not that great, which is likely the reason very few were in the top 16 at nationals.

I have seen a lot of this as well. I think the game suffers from two problems. The first is that it came out as a two player game and the sense becomes more like competitive dueling than theming and casual play. The second is the way the force packs are coming out. By this I mean, if you don't have the latest and greatest pack out, your deck doesn't stand a chance. As an example, when EoD came out I could not get it right away. Played against a player who had it and was pummelled five games to zero. Couple that with the organized play and it seems like this game is going to be cutthroat competitive.

interest with?

PRA

I just cannot agree with this. Core set cards are still very competitive and relevant and you can build a great deck that can be competitive with two core sets. It sounds like you had some bad luck against a Smugglers Run deck but once you figure them out they really are a glass cannon deck.

It helps to use random decks when you play casually, especially against other people who are also competitive. Not random in composition, but random in which deck you end up playing.

Build some decks that are good, and then randomly choose who will play LS and who will play DS, and then you each randomly select a deck.

This tends to take the pressure off to be competitive, and lets you really playtest in a more casual way.

Casual play can start to seem competitive if you say, "Hey, I want to test out this new Navy build", and then the other person says, "Oh, then I want to play this deck [insert some deck that is obviously a bad match-up for you]." If the other person is choosing their deck based on what you are testing, it becomes boring. Throw randomness in there; it gets you playing decks that you normally don't like, and takes some of the competitive feel out of a play session.