Star Wars Coalition


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ARTICLES - InQuest #84: by Andrew Lupp Return of the Garfield \| Magic designer strikes again with all new Star Wars TCG		\|Go Back\| \|Homepage\| \|Affiliation\| \|Articles\| \|Contact Us\| \|Downloads\| \|Dream Cards\| \|For the Fans\| ~~\|Forums\|~~
What the Frag? For those who missed last month's IQ News: Lucasfilm has opted not to renew Decipher's license for their Star Wars Customizable Card Game, though it was one of the best selling CCGs ever. Decipher has only until the end of April to sell off its existing inventory. The license was instead awarded to WotC. According to a statement from Lucasfilm, it believed that Wizards could develop a CCG that included a "mutli-layered experience within a single game," compared to Decipher's approach of having multiple games for different audiences-Star Wars, Young Jedi, Jedi Knights. WotC reportedly lobbied hard to get the license and used the huge success of Pokemon to illustrate how high sales could go. The end result is that an all-new game has been designed and is being printed as you read this. It will be in stores in April. What's It Like? The Star Wars TCG is two-player combat-based game depicting a battle between the Dark side and Light side of the Force. Ultimate victory goes to the player who can prevail on three seperate fields of battle... The side that destroys the other players forces on two of these three battlefields wins. The Force plays an important part in the game just as it does in the Star Wars universe. Each player draws from their own "Force Pool" during the game, using force points to power the unique abilities and characteristics on their character cards. The more Force you use, the better the benefit for your characters. However, use your power wisely; if you use too many force points in offense you may not have enough for defense. Taking two out of three battlegrounds to win may sound simple, but it's not as easy as all that.	What Kinda Cards? There are five card types in the Star Wars TCG: characters, ground and space cards are collectively referred to as "units"; there are also missions and events. Each unit has three attributes. Speed sets the order of attack for all the units involved; power denotes the number of six-siders it uses to attack, and health determines the number of hits a unit can take before it is destroyed and plummets to the discard pile. Character units may also have special abilities as granted to them by the Force, which will need the use of the "Force Pool" to activated. The mission and event cards add that extra bit of strategy, providing bonuses ad penalties to a variety of play situations. Considering Wizards of the Coast has rights to all the content in the Star WArs universe-even the comic books and novels-there'll be no shortage of card possiblities. What About Episode 2? The premier release of the Star Wars TCG will be only images and characters taken directly from "Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones." The game will contain never-before-seen images of the new film a few weeks before the premier of the movie itself. The initial set will contain 180 cards in the standard rare, uncommon and common mix, as well as a complete parallel set of premium foil cards. It will be sold in a two-player starter set that contains two 30-card decks-one Light side, one Dark side-a playmat with quick-start rules, Force counters, damage counters and a rulebook. WotC will put the weight of its DCI tournament structure behind the game, and soon after the game's release, you'll be able to earn a DCI rating and compete in sanctioned events to boost your rating and win prizes.
© InQuest Gamer - Article written by Andrew Lupp. I take no credit for this article and some of the content has been edited. For full article, please refer to InQuest Gamer Issue #84 April 2002.