As our History of Star Wars CCGs shows, Star Wars Unlimited is the latest in a long line of card games set in a galaxy far, far away.
The first set, Spark of Rebellion, which has been a huge success for studio Fantasy Flight Games, is set during the era of the Original Trilogy, with the Rebel Alliance vs the Galactic Empire as its overall theme.
Shadows of the Galaxy is taking players to the Outer Rim of the Star Wars universe, with a focus on the seedier underbelly of the post-Return of the Jedi status quo.
The new Two Player Starter Set features The Mandalorian and Moff Gideon as its Leaders, with new keywords and mechanics that thematically evoke the bounty hunting theme even further.
So let’s take a look at the card list that you’ll be able to find in Star Wars Unlimited: Shadows of the Galaxy!
Shadows of the Galaxy Card Gallery
What’s New In The Shadows Of The Galaxy Set?
In terms of the cards themselves, as you can see from the above gallery, a much wider range of source material has been used to bring the Shadows of the Galaxy set to tabletops. Whereas Spark of Rebellion almost exclusively featured cards from the Rebels, Rogue One and Original Trilogy era (which all take place in roughly the same time period, just a few years before and after the Battle of Yavin that marks the climax of the first Star Wars film), Shadows of the Galaxy casts its net much wider.
Clone Wars era characters and settings feature alongside those from Solo, Rebels, The Mandalorian and the sequel trilogy, with reprints from Spark of Rebellion returning and more original trilogy cards also further expanding the scope of this new set.
There are three new mechanics in Shadows of the Galaxy; though initially only two were revealed, the details on all three are now available.
The first is the Bounty keyword, which allows players to ‘cash in’ a card for resources when it’s defeated.
As you can see from the Wanted card above, it can be added to a unit at zero cost, then when the unit it’s attached to is defeated, the player who defeated the unit can immediately ready two resources.
It can also be triggered when the unit it’s attached to is captured; an example of a card which can capture another is shown above, with The Mandalorian’s Rifle.
Capturing takes an exhausted non-leader unit and places it face down under the unit which can capture, removing it from its arena entirely; it stays there until the capturing unit is defeated!
Next, we have the Smuggle keyword, which brings an incredibly exciting new element to Star Wars Unlimited.
One of the most painful elements of Star Wars Unlimited is losing valuable or powerful cards as resources; it often makes sense to use high cost cards as resources when you begin, but this means that you don’t have access to that card for the rest of the game.
Smuggle helps to alleviate that problem, as you can bring cards back into play directly from your resources.
The Privateer Crew card is a great example of this; if it’s a resource, you can bring it into play for a resource cost of 6, along with the potential extra cost of the Cunning Aspect (or paying the Aspect Penalty if needed!).
Paying the Smuggle cost and then replacing this card in the resource row with the top card of your deck will bring it into play; there’s also an extra bonus in that Privateer Crew gains a massive 3 Experience tokens, thus giving it +1/+1 Power and HP when it’s Smuggled!
With the top card of your deck being used as a replacement resource, it’s not as if you will be missing out in terms of the resources you’ll have available either, though of course this is risky, as you may lose access to another potentially powerful card!
We also have the new Experience and Shield token cards for Shadows of the Galaxy.
In Spark of Rebellion, the Experience token card featured Luke training with Yoda on Dagobah, and a B-Wing in space combat on the Shield token.
In Shadows of the Galaxy, both token cards feature Mandalorians, with Din Djarin featuring on the Experience token and a Mandalorian using a Personal Combat Shield to deflect blaster bolts on the Shield token card.
Though the illustrations have changed, these do, of course, work in exactly the same way as the Experience and Shield tokens in Spark of Rebellion; indeed, the token cards from the first set will naturally be compatible with Shadows of the Galaxy.
We’d highly recommend checking out the deluxe, custom tokens, which you can pick up from Buy The Same Token; though unofficial, they are designed to fit within the very specific iconography of Star Wars Unlimited, and add a touch of clarity to card bonuses, as well as much clearer and damage tracking for Leaders, Bases and Units.
When Will Shadows Of The Galaxy Be Released?
The Star Wars Unlimited: Shadows of the Galaxy set’s pre-release events are beginning on the 5th of July, prior to the set’s full release on the 12th of July. Dates and times for pre-release events will vary, so it’s worth checking what’s in your local area using the event locator on the official Star Wars Unlimited website, which you can find here; just enter your location and it’ll let you know what events are being held locally to you, and when!
We’re expecting a similar product range to the one seen with Spark of Rebellion; we’ve already seen some of the accessories that’ll be accompanying the set’s release, for example.
We expect pull rates to be the same in Shadows of the Galaxy for the various card rarities too, so take a look at our guide to Star Wars Unlimited Pull Rates to see what you can expect to find in booster packs.
Finally, if you’re here because you’re curious about Star Wars Unlimited but haven’t actually taken the plunge and tried it yet, check out our Star Wars Unlimited review to see why it’s become one of our favourite new TCGs in a very long time!
