Tier list are trendy, and we don’t think these will be too different from one another… so we’re lumping all 3 in one article! On to the hot (cold?) takes! Shoutout to Thorrk from the discord for creating this template.

Justin & Tyler’s List

Editor’s Note: Tyler came to the same conclusions as Justin below, so he chose to simply say “I second that stuff.”

A tier – I don’t think anyone will disagree that Energy Conversion lab has the strongest base ability in the game currently. Ambush is a keyword that typically requires devaluing the stats of a unit that has it. With ECL, we get to jam Ambush on a unit that doesn’t have that cost defenciency and can come in and clear more targets than a unit normally could at that resource cost. Add in the tempo gains of attacking with a unit a round early, and you can easily take control of the board where you would normally have trouble in a matchup. In Star Wars Unlimited, winning the board often leads to winning the game, and I have yet to see a scenario I wouldn’t want to give up 5 hp for this.

B tier – Jedha City is in a weird between A and B tier for me. It has a ridiculously high ceiling of impact, and the absolute worst case floor is likely saving you 2-3 damage to base (which is obviously not as good as a 30 hp base, but also no terrible when those moments hit). I think there’s a world where Jedha City ends up beating ECL as the best base, but I’m not ready to go that far yet.

Tarkintown is another strong candidate to basically always run over the 30 hp base, but there are goofy times where its not helpful. If you’re an aggro build, you’re typically not doing much damage to your opponents units, so this may not even get an opportunity to trigger on your terms. This base does direct a lot of threat towards Krennic decks though, and a free extra tool always available to help out with board control is never bad (unless your opponent only has a leader deployed).

C tier – Security Complex finds its way to C tier with the other 30 hp bases that you can consider (not green). While a shield on a stick is a fairly strong, there are plenty of popular meta decks, like the Sabine and Leia aggro builds, that run lots of Saboteur units making this base effectively blank. For that reason, blue is the one color I think you will have to be cautious the most of when choosing Rare vs Common bases.

Not much else to say about the 30 hp Blue, Red, and Yellow Bases other than they’re the only ones I’d ever consider running as opposed to the Rare base. 

D tier – Green 30 hp bases are here for one reason, you should never run them. Energy Conversion Lab is just that much better 90%+ of the time, that this base is fundamentally unplayable.

I’m not quite in the “Nobody should ever run a 30 hp base ever” camp that Jayson lives in, but I do think those cases will be few and far between. 

Jayson’s List

Justin pretty much nailed a lot of my feelings about the specifics below, so this will be pretty short and sweet!

S tier – I do agree that ECL is ahead of the pack by a slight margin. It just feels really noticeable when you’re running it versus when you’re not. An extra turn of value for a critical unit (and/or a guaranteed trigger of an effect you’d otherwise need to wait on) is pretty special.

A tier – Tarkintown has really grown on me and I think it’s right behind ECL in terms of value. Jedha is probably the hardest of the rare bases to really maximize, but it’s especially clutch against opposing Sentinels and has the highest floor. Security Complex gets an unfair rap- shields are super strong and a free one is pretty great.

D tier – I’ve said it a lot, and still haven’t found a lot of compelling evidence to back down on it- in SWU, the battlefield matters more than anything, and I’d always rather have an extra tool to win on the battlefield than an extra 5 health. Think of it like an extra card in your hand that costs 0.

No amount of aggro or “X Leader wants extra room to heal up” (a ridiculous concept to me personally) has convinced me otherwise. Of course I could be wrong. But if the evidence for that is out there, I ain’t seen it yet.

Why Did We Do This Again?

Tier lists get the people going!

It’s too early. The meta is a long way from being solved, but it never hurts to do a little guestimation of how we see things shaking out!

May the force be with you!