The Rest of the Galaxy - Preparation for Battle!

Welcome back to The Rest of the Galaxy, where we take a look at the neutral objective sets on both sides of the force for Star Wars: The Card Game. These weekly articles are a discussion of the wonderful neutral faction cards that often support the rest of your deck. So read on and be sure to add your own thoughts and opinions in the comments section!

Last week I hinted at an article examining the idea of “Limit 1 per objective deck” and how that affects the use and usefulness of neutral objectives. This is not that article.
Instead, I thought I’d take a detour and talk about the brand new neutral objective from Search for Skywalker while it’s still hot off the press! When I first saw this objective I was thrilled and impressed: it combined some unique and unexpected design choices with useful, playable cards. While I’ve gone back and forth on my actual opinion, let’s dive in and take a look, starting with the non-objective cards!

Hoth Scout, 2x AAC-1 Speeder Tank, Tauntaun:
All these units are pretty solid, providing a resource and three ways to shield your units. The Speeder Tanks are especially good, as they not only combine well with Hoth Operations but provide more tactics icons for threatening to shut down your opponent’s defenses. I’ve also already been having trouble against Speeder Tanks keeping the force for the LS with their two force pips, so use them wisely to control the game.

Shelter from the Storm:
This card is pretty incredible, if you can time it for maximum protection (and remember that it is for Characters only). Because it is an action itself, make sure you preempt any other nasty actions that could potential ruin your plans.
Keep in mind, that a “card effect” is defined in the FAQ as, “any effect that comes from the resolution of text printed on a card.” So even after Sheltering from the Storm, your unit can still be focused out via tactics icons. As well, you cannot use Protect with a unit that “cannot be damaged,” so make sure you don’t put yourself into a bind with that.

Preparation for Battle:

Part 1: Can’t Touch This
“Your shielded units cannot be damaged while the Death Star dial is 4 or lower.”
This portion of the ability can give you an aggressive start to your game. This ability can last for 1-4 LS turns, depending on how the balance of the force goes.
You can almost assume that you will have 2-3 turns of opportunity to fully shield your units.
If you can get early shielding on units with non-edge dependent icons you can make some major threats and force your opponent into some tough choices early game. Also consider the advantage this gives against cards like Force Choke and Defense Protocol, even on your opponent’s turn.

Part 2: Bringing the Pain
“Your shielded units gain Blast Damage while the Death Star dial is 8 or higher.”
This force pack seems to have a lot of icon manipulation and this ability only adds to it. This ability can last for 0-4 LS turns, but I’d normally only count on having 1-2 turns to make it count.
While shielding can often be used to protect and escort your big hitter, this ability can make even normally lackluster attackers into real threats. Often the LS needs to make as many different threats as they can to break up a concentrated defense and force some unopposed attacks; this helps immensely with that. Just keep in mind: if you lose your shield before you strike you also lose the icon, so it can sometimes be beneficial to not use the shield if that 1 damage won’t kill you.

Part 3: How to Prepare for Battle
When I first saw this card I immediately wanted to build an entire shielding deck. It would be great: aggressive early starts where you take no damage, build up in the middle, and then a final push to blow up all the objectives! But there’s a problem:
There’s no guarantee that you will see this objective in play during a game.
Unlike something like A Game of Thrones or Netrunner where you know for a fact your Agenda or Identity will start in play and be there the entire game, you have to hope you get this objective as one of your four opening choices. It’s just not something you can depend on.


Overall, this is a pretty amazing support objective. It gives a lot of new options for defending your units and adding extra value to cards that existed before. With the Hoth keyword, it will also go into many decks using that theme, especially with how strong it’s becoming for the LS. I’m personally only running one copy in my deck right now and I caution people from going overboard with shielding, but I certainly think it’s a competitive set that will see a lot of play.

Thanks for reading and come back next week when I actually talk about “Limit one per objective deck”!