Happy Monday! Let’s go through the cards spoiled in the prior week and share our first impressions!

FFG posted the first spoiler on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram to conclude the Aggression Month poll.

Justin – A 1/1 upgrade for 1 is exactly what we expect to see from the cost curve, with Saboteur potentially adding pretty big value. Outside of a competitive meta with dominated by Luke or similar deckstyles, I fully expect this to find deck slots within the sideboard. Nothing wrong with a good meta call card!

Tyler – The saboteur keyword will give this value in aggro decks that want to bypass opposing sentinels. Aggro also benefits from being able to use the power conferred by the upgrade the round it’s played rather than having to wait for a unit to ready next round. In other decks, this probably isn’t enough value to be worth drawing.

Jayson – Good stuff. Math is solid and Saboteur has nowhere to go but up. It seems like it passes the bar based on that, but I have to confess that I’m more interested in good cheap math on units than I am on events or upgrades. I’m guessing we’ll only be able to justify ~10 non-unit cards in most decks, and at that point, you have to wonder if this fancy experience token is doing enough to earn it’s slot.

BrettBallet revealed the next 2 spoilers on their German YouTube Channel.

Justin – At first glance, I expected the When Played ability to act like an Overwhelming Barrage, so I was fairly disappointed that wasn’t the case. The “when played” however does mean you will generally wipe out whatever unit on the other side of the board you want. With Sentinel and Overwhelm as well at 10/10, this is a fairly big bomb. The biggest downside being we generally play few games where we make it to 10 resources where this would be playable without the game being decided. Maybe this is Step 1 of making Galactic Ambition playable?

Tyler – This certainly checks all the boxes to be a playable bomb, but the questions was never going to be: “Is Devastator good enough?” It was always going to be: “Can we make it to 10 resources?” For now, I’m not sure the rampiest of ramp decks, Tarkin Green, has the tools to make it there. Aggro has proved very strong thus far… Finally, a unit this big looks like an awfully tasty target for removal from Waylay to Vanquish.

Jayson – I still don’t quite believe this is actually an intended target for Galactic Ambition, but I do love how much fun all the Timmys out there are having giving that particular slot machine a tug. This does nearly all the things you want a big ol’ boat to do. Inherently greedy, Devastator’s fate will be the same as ramp in general. If this archetype has legs, Devastator will serve you admirably as your bomb. If it doesn’t get all the tools it needs to reliably win vs. aggro, however, this card will be way too cute to see play. But the best part about Devastator? So, so many of you don’t even care about any of that high-minded mumbo jumbo. You just want to play the big cool spaceship and watch it go BRRRR.

I was like you once. I was free.

Justin – I personally love the design space of cards that get stronger with the initiative. This introduces some funny plays where I might take the initiative to prevent 2 extra damage from this guy coming my way. A 3/3 at 3 resources is exactly average, so you want to be going pretty fast to maximize the value of this guy. The downside being plenty of villain units can trade up to this guy at 3 health. I don’t expect to see the Symp much outside of limited play come March.

Tyler – SWU’s action sequencing is a little odd in that control decks, that might make 1-2 big plays a round (like dropping a Sentinel) tend to take the initiative easier than aggro decks with lots of chumps that have to attack sequentially. I wonder if that’s going to create a natural tension in the Symps usability. Maybe there will be enough Trooper synergy on full release that he’s still a staple of those decks. For now, we’re testing him in Tarkin Aggro.

Jayson – We stan a short angry boi. I love the art, and the card itself is fine! It does have some cool potential to steal value trades later in a round when played late on the curve, but overall I doubt it’s a major factor for red. Tagge waves hello though. This guy and the Homestead Militia can hang out at the cantina and swap war stories, pending manager approval. They’ve seen some stuff.

Scrawl posted the next 2 spoilers as a YouTube Short

Justin – Well there it is Malcolm.gif! The first true tutor we see that searches your entire deck. At 4 cost, I doubt I will ever run this outside of a super combo deck. Paying 4 to find one card is a big ask early game. We’ll have to keep searching our feelings for the desire to run this competitively anytime soon.

Tyler – This card asks me to pay 4 resources to swap this card with one of my choice from the deck. Uh… no thanks. I understand that effects like these make designers nervous because of the combo potential, but 4 is a very conservative cost point. I have trouble imagining playing this at 3.

Jayson – If you’re spending 4 bucks on something that doesn’t impact the battlefield at all, you better have a darn good reason. And you don’t. Not yet anyway.

Justin – This card is super intriguing to me. A 1 cost 1/2 is perfectly fine, with an ability that can be pretty fun in certain situations (looking at you Boba Fett who always seems to have resources to work with and no cards). I’m curious to see if this is something Han could desire just to get some extra cards in hand. I won’t be surprised if this is another card that never sees competitive play though. It should be a fun unit in limited play though!

Tyler – There are a few decks that could use the card draw, but it’s not costed efficiently here. This combined with the recently released Mission Briefing makes me think card draw effects were priced too high- at least on neutral cards. With draw options like C3P0 and I Am Your Father at lower cost points, I doubt this sees play in constructed.

Jayson – It’s fine, huh? 2 cost is not what I’d call highway robbery for drawing a card, and little space units tend to do okay and contribute meaningfully to races. Don’t look now, but this Fringe deck is really coming together! Wedge can even give it Ambush, which means you can…it means you can…uhhhhh. Huh. Hmm. Mayb-? No. Probably not. No.

This last card was spoiled by our friends from ‘Stralia, Spice Squadron!

Justin – Easily my favorite card of the week! From the first reactions I’ve seen on discord, a lot of people were getting hung up on the ability. Ignore it and just look at a solid Rebel unit that is 3/2 for 2 resources. This is exactly the type of card I was looking for to start replacing the droid pair in hero aggro decks. The ability is generally gonna be RNG good/bad, but you are happy if you get it off early game when the opponent’s hand is generally full of cards they have chosen not to resource and are likely looking to play. Love this card!

Tyler – This definitely has the look of a staple card. The Rebel trait is really what pushes him over the top. Will go in several hero aggro decks immediately. Personally, I can’t wait to hear the RNG stories about what the ability does in tournament play. He will rob people of the key out they need, or let them topdeck it- either way it’s going to be awesome.

Jayson – This is another entry in my favorite card series so far in SWU- “Strong Early Plays With Abilities That Keep Them Relevant Late”. The name will catch on, promise. Like Sabine and Shoretrooper, this is a guy you’re happy to draw and play pretty much anytime. The stat to cost ratio is brilliant, and the ability can be disruptive both early (when your opponent just got done curating their opening hand via the mulligan and first resource buries) and late (when they’re holding onto their timing plays). This looks to me like the kind of card that will only get pushed out of decks when truly crazy stuff starts coming out. It’s a genuine 10/10 based on what we’ve seen so far.

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That’s it for last week’s spoilers! What cards are you most excited about? Are there any specific archetypes you’ve been enjoying in the cards revealed?