It’s time to jump into an X-Wing and head off to a galaxy far, far away – as we take a look at the Star Wars Unlimited card rarities!
Star Wars is no stranger to the world of tabletop gaming, with multiple CCGs (as well as an LCG and deck building game) using the licence to varying degrees of popularity and success.
The newest game to use the license is upcoming CCG, Star Wars Unlimited.
In a year when CCGs have arguably never been more popular – thanks to various, impressive anniversary milestones, as well as products such as Magic: The Gathering’s Lord of the Rings set and Disney Lorcana hitting store shelves – capitalising on the growing audience in the sector with a new Star Wars collectable card game does make a lot of sense.
Naturally, with the ‘collectable’ part of the game, there’s going to be varying levels of rarity for each card.
What are they – and how often can you expect to find each type of card?
Let’s find out, as we get all of the Star Wars Unlimited card rarities explained!
What Rarity Levels Are There On Star Wars Unlimited Cards?
Alongside the expected Commons, Uncommons and Rares, there’s also Legendary cards, cards found only in Starter decks, plus Showcase and Hyperspace variants too.
It’s worth knowing what you may find – as well as what you’re looking at (and for!) with specific card rarities.
Here’s the full list of Here’s the full list of rarity codes on Star Wars Unlimited cards:
- C: Common
- U: Uncommon
- R: Rare
- L: Legendary
- S: Starter Deck Exclusive
Other rarities, such as the aforementioned Showcase and Hyperspace variants – which are alternative art versions of more commonly found cards – are identifiable not just from their unique, extended art look, but also from the set number on the card.
Where Can I Find The Rarity On Cards In Star Wars Unlimited?
You’ll find the rarity abbreviation in the bottom right corner of each Star Wars Unlimited card, displayed to the left of the card’s set number.
They’re colour coded too – so you’ll note a silver U for Uncommon cards, a gold R for Rare and so on.
In the images we’ve used in each section, we’ve highlighted the card’s designation with a purple circle – so you should be able to see its rarity level pretty clearly!
What Do The Star Wars Unlimited Card Rarity Classifications Mean?
This will be pretty obvious to anyone who’s played a CCG or TCG before (and it’s worth checking out our guide to the difference between TCG and CCG for more information!), but with games such as the aforementioned Disney Lorcana and even Magic’s Lord of the Rings bringing countless new fans to the tabletop, it’s definitely worth knowing what to expect from your Star Wars Unlimited booster packs.
1. Common Cards
Star Wars Unlimited booster packs contain 16 cards, which is actually pretty generous in comparison to standard packs in other CCGs/TCGs.
Each booster pack will contain 9 common cards.
In any CCG, common cards tend to be the least powerful from a brute force perspective, but they’re intended to form the bulk of a deck’s cards.
You’ll often find lower cost character, item or ability cards denoted as Common – cards that’ll be useful earlier in the game, before you get your ‘engine’ moving in-game and work your way towards getting your more powerful, higher cost cards into play.
2. Uncommon Cards
Next up in our Star Wars Unlimited card rarities article are Uncommon cards.
More powerful than Commons, Uncommon cards can be found at the rate of 3 per booster pack in Star Wars Unlimited.
Uncommon cards tend to be ones that’ll yield interesting combo opportunities for the rarer cards in your deck – or characters who have higher costs, but interesting abilities, for example.
Though by nature they’re less available in boosters than Common cards, you’ll typically find that they don’t cost much more than Common cards if you’re looking to buy them individually from specialist stores or websites such as eBay.
3. Rare Cards
Once past the ‘fixed’ number of Common and Uncommon cards in a Star Wars Unlimited booster pack, there’s a ‘slot’ in which you can expect either one Rare or one Legendary card.
Meaning that, if you don’t get a Rare in your booster pack, you’ll get a potentially much better Legendary card instead!
However, when it comes to Rares, it’s definitely worth paying attention – because it’s these cards that’ll often be what you base your deck’s entire strategy around.
Rare cards can vary in value – sometimes they’ll be relatively cheap to get hold of on the secondary market and other times, you’ll find that their value, usually dictated by how useful they are in game terms, absolutely skyrockets.
You’ll find Rare cards in most booster packs, with the rate of finding a Legendary in place of a Rare being pretty low!
Note that in every pack of Star Wars Unlimited cards, there’ll be a foil card included too; this foil card can be of any rarity, so it’s possible (if unlikely) that you may get two Rare cards, with one of them being a foil variant!
4. Legendary Cards
So, knowing that you might be lucky enough to find a Legendary card in place of a Rare, what are the odds?
Legendary cards are included in 1 in 8 booster packs in place of a Rare card, so they’re definitely much thinner on the ground!
However, at this rarity level, you can pretty much guarantee that Legendary cards will be an incredibly useful addition to most decks – as well as the fact that (thanks to their scarcity and practical use in-game) they’ll hold significant value for both collectors and players!
Note that the foil ‘slot’ in a Star Wars Unlimited booster pack could also contain a Legendary card; though extremely unlikely that you’d get a Legendary card instead of a Rare and also your foil card as a Legendary, it is possible!
5. Starter Deck Exclusive Cards
Some characters or other card types may have a specific variant that’s included in Starter Decks, but won’t be found in booster packs at all.
Starter Decks tend to be the best point of entry for players new to the game; not only will they introduce players to how the game works, but they’ll usually do so without resorting to any complicated combos or mechanics, so even newbies can have a competitive game against another player’s Starter Deck.
Naturally, once you’re familiar with how the game works, there’s nothing quite like building your own deck to take advantage of a wider pool of cards and much more interesting, perhaps more convoluted, abilities and combos.
6. Showcase Cards
A special, very rare card type, Showcase cards are specific, alternate art variants that you’ll only find as Leader cards.
Showcase cards have the aforementioned alternate art image, but also a unique frame – along with a special foil treatment as well.
As Showcase cards can be of any rarity, you’ll notice in the image above that we haven’t highlighted the rarity symbol (in this case, a C for Common), but instead the set number.
That’s because a Showcase card is what’s normally known as a ‘Secret’ rare in other games; these go beyond the numbering of the set.
So, in the case of Star Wars Unlimited’s first set, it’s composed of 204 cards.
Yet the Showcase card is numbered 260 – which also demonstrates that there are lots more alternate art, secret rare cards in the set!
Additionally, that ‘C’ rarity symbol is very misleading; Showcase rare cards maintain the rarity level of their non-Showcase variants, but they are much scarcer than any other card type in the game.
So far, we’ve discussed the chances of finding each card on a per pack basis, but Showcase cards are so rare that you’ll only find them in 1 in 12 booster boxes, not packs.
With 24 booster packs to a box, that’s roughly 1 Showcase card in every 288 packs – so if you do find one of these, make sure to keep it in tip top condition, as it’ll no doubt be a collector’s piece that ends up commanding huge prices on the secondary market!
7. Hyperspace Cards
Another type of alternate art card, Hyperspace Cards will be surprisingly easy to find, if we go by the official distribution guide.
Which tells us that there should be around 2 Hyperspace Cards per 3 packs – making them fairly common.
So what differentiates a Hyperspace Card from a Showcase Card or even just a normal card?
Well, Hyperspace Cards are basically extended, alternate art variants – and, excitingly, any card in a pack can be a Hyperspace card.
Which means you may see one of your Commons being a Hyperspace Card; equally, the Rare or foil card in your pack could be a Hyperspace Card.
As you can see in the image above, with the card on the left being a foil Hyperspace variant and the card on the right being a non-foil Hyperspace version.
Though, admittedly, around 1 in 15 cards may contain a Hyperspace Card that’s also of the Rare or Legendary rarity, making those ones a bit harder to find.
If you want to find a Rare or Legendary Hyperspace Card that’s foil treated – well, prepare to open lots of packs (or your wallet, once these start hitting the secondary market).
That’s because the chances of finding a foil Rare or Legendary Hyperspace Card is 1 in 50 packs!
8. Base and Leader Cards
So with 9 Commons, 3 Uncommons, 1 Rare (or Legendary) and 1 foil card, there’s still two card types that’ll appear in a Star Wars Unlimited booster pack.
However, these aren’t rarities, per se – you’ll get one Base (pictured above) and one Leader card (which are double sided, which you can see in the image below) per pack, but these can be Common, Uncommon, Rare, Legendary or foil themselves!
We thought it was worth pointing out that you can also expect to find one of each of the Base and Leader cards in every booster, as it also brings us to our next question.
Why Are Star Wars Unlimited Booster Packs Designed This Way?
The booster packs in Star Wars Unlimited, with their specific mix of card rarities, along with one guaranteed Leader and one guaranteed Base too, are designed with a specific purpose in mind: drafting.
There’s plenty of different ways to play TCGs and CCGs; one of the most fun is drafting, which – when done right – levels the playing field and ensures that players must skillfully craft their deck from a random selection of cards, rather than simply buying their way to victory and purchasing each individual card they want.
We’ve covered how to draft in Magic: The Gathering – it’s well worth checking that article out to learn more about the process.
it’ll work in a similar way in Star Wars Unlimited, though the deck building rules in Star Wars Unlimited are set to be much looser – according to the game’s publishers, as long as you have a Leader and a Base, you can include any card you want in your deck.
When Will Star Wars Unlimited Be Available?
Star Wars Unlimited is available now!
You can find further details for the game’s first set, Spark of Rebellion, on our Star Wars Unlimited: Sparks of Rebellion product list guide.
Check out what cards have been revealed so far in our Star Wars Unlimited card list.
You can also find out our thoughts on the game overall, in our Star Wars Unlimited review!
Finally, it’s not just these Star Wars Unlimited card rarities that we’ve covered; we’ve also explained rarities for other games! Take a look at our One Piece Card Game Rarities and Disney Lorcana Card Rarity articles if you’re curious as to how the rarity issue is handled in those games too!
