Though it’s far from the first Star Wars Trading Card Game (or TCG; see our history of Star Wars card games for more insight), Star Wars Unlimited has certainly been one of the biggest successes for the franchise on the tabletop in some time.
Of course, it’s been released at a perfect time, when TCGs are arguably as big as they’ve ever been; Magic: The Gathering celebrated its 30th anniversary and drew massive mainstream attention with their Lord of the Rings set and its The One Ring card (which Post Malone bought for a massive $2m) in 2023, Pokémon went back to its roots with the incredibly nostalgic 151 set and Yu-Gi-Oh! celebrated its own quarter of a century anniversary recently too. Disney’s first ever TCG, Lorcana, also launched to massive critical and commercial success in 2023, and continues to shake up the TCG scene with innovative products and mechanics.
Despite this, Star Wars Unlimited isn’t just fortuitously timed; it’s also a genuinely excellent game that’s accessible, well designed and has a minimal product range, to allow players to get up and running cheaply, quickly and to play however they want.
The first two sets, Spark of Rebellion and Shadows of the Galaxy, have been very well received by players, and the game has been an undeniable critical and commercial success. So of course, the third set expands and builds on that very solid foundation; let’s take a look at the Star Wars Unlimited Twilight of the Republic card list!
Twilight of the Republic Card Gallery
What’s New in the Twilight Of The Republic Set?
First up, you’ll notice that the theme of the set is The Clone Wars; this follows on from the settings of the first Star Wars Unlimited set being the original trilogy, and the Shadows of the Galaxy set focusing on The Mandalorian, along with other bounty hunters and shady characters in the post-Return of the Jedi era of Star Wars, between the original and sequel trilogies.
Above, you’ll see images of an entirely new type of card, that’s being introduced in the Twilight of the Republic set: Token Units. Though of course we’ve had Shield and Experience Token Upgrades, this marks the first time that Tokens have also been units; in the examples above, both are units that can be deployed to a player’s Ground Arena.
Two examples of how these Token Units can enter play are shown above; on the left you’ll see that, when the General’s Guardian unit is attacked, it can create a Battle Droid token, which immediately enters play in the Ground Arena. On the right, you’ll see that Captain Rex creates two Clone Trooper tokens as soon as he enters play. Again, these go straight into the Ground Arena, alongside Captain Rex.
There are also two new keywords that’ll make their debut in the Twilight of the Republic set: Exploit and Coordinate. Let’s take a look at them!
Exploit is a keyword that’ll have a number alongside it, much like numerous other keywords in Star Wars Unlimited. So in the example above, we have a Hailfire Tank card, with the Exploit 2 keyword. This means that, when playing the Hailfire Tank, you can defeat up to 2 units under your control. If you do, the cost to play Hailfire Tank reduces by 2 resources per unit you defeated in this way, reducing its cost to play by up to 4 resources. Given that it’s an 8 cost unit with 7 Power and 6 HP, getting this into play for just 4 resources is a very big deal indeed. Of course, the units you choose to defeat can be cheap, weak or already on their way out in terms of their HP, so played strategically, the Exploit keyword is sure to prove its usefulness.
The second new keyword is Coordinate, and this is a really interesting one that lends itself well to getting units into play as quickly as possible. Coordinate is simple: if you have 3 or more units in play on your side (combining the number of Space and Ground units you have to get the total), you’ll get the bonus shown on the card. In the case of the Clone Trooper card above, the 332nd Stalwart, he gets +1 to his Power and +1 to his HP as long as you control 3 or more units.
As you can see from the above Anakin Skywalker unit card, the bonus for Coordinate does differ between different cards; when you have 3 or more units in play as Anakin, you can draw a card whenever he attacks. Note that you can have multiple Coordinate units in play, and if you have 3 or more units in play across your whole play area (remember to combine your Space and Ground Arena units to get that total), if each one has Coordinate, they’ll all get their keyword bonus!
The Two Player Starter Set will be contain decks with Ahsoka Tano and General Grievous as Leaders, pictured above on their Leader sides. Ahsoka can deploy slightly faster than Grievous, with her only needing 5 resources in play to move to the Ground Arena, and the General himself requiring at least 6 resources in play.
Ahsoka can exhaust and give +1 Power to a unit for a specific attack, but note that this needs for you to have at least 3 units in play, given that it uses the Coordinate keyword. Grievous can exhaust at any time to give a Droid unit the Sentinel keyword.
When deployed, Ahsoka is a 3 Power, 6 HP unit; however, she gets a +2 Power bonus using the Coordinate keyword (which of course triggers when you have 3 or more units under your control). Greivous is a 4 Power, 8 HP unit and gives a Droid unit the Sentinel keyword and +1 Power for the duration of the current phase, whenever he attacks.
When Will Twilight of the Republic Be Released?
Twilight of the Republic launches on November 8th, 2024. It’s the third and final set of 2024 for Star Wars Unlimited; we here at Card Gamer are looking forward to what’s in store for Fantasy Flight’s excellent trading card game in 2025!
Have you played the open world video game, Star Wars Outlaws? We’ve put together a guide to help you play its addictive card game, Sabacc.
We were also fortunate enough to speak to Star Wars Unlimited artist, Axel Hutt, so take a look at our interview if you’d like to find out more about how the game’s artwork is created.
