Back in May, I had the pleasure of playing in a local 1k, which was our first big tournament for Star Wars Unlimited. It was a blast to play the game on a more competitive level, while enjoying some quality time catching up with friends between rounds.

After about the 4th or 5th round, someone came up to me and bragged about winning the game after their opponent had forgot to draw from force choke or some similar effect. I put my hand on their shoulder and said “Congratulations, you cheated!”

While that may have been a little overdramatic, it is important to understand how the rules of the game work. It is both player’s responsibilites to ensure that the game state is being maintained and accurate. The Master Event Doc actually outlines some instances where you can get a game loss if your opponent missed a mandatory trigger (like drawing off of Force Choke).

What’s Important

As competitive players, we should all be looking to win a clean and fair match. We shouldn’t be angle shooting or causing our opponent to fumble because we aren’t representing our side of the table well. It is important to know the rules of the game, what your responsibility as a player at the table is, and maintain as clear a game state as we can. All of the above will help ensure you and your opponent can focus on what matters most, the gameplay itself.

Roger Roger.

DO: Communicate with your opponent

The first step to maintaining a clean game state is communicating with your opponent at each step. Sure, we think everyone knows what all the cards do, and swinging our card in hand in the general direction of the base is clear, but saying simply “3 to base” as you exhaust your unit can help a lot. This especially can be the case when you’re attacking with a modified power unit. Making sure both players agree with the damage being dealt and where it is being dealt is incredibly helpful.

This is incredibly helpful when adding or removing damage from your board. When your opponent says “3 to base,” simply stating what the hp currently sits at and whats its going to can ensure the math you did is correct, the tokens you’re putting on are correct, and that your opponent agrees the board state is correct. I’ve come to enjoy when both my opponent and I are using notepads at a tournament, because we can instantly check that we agree on damage each time it is dealt.

One thing I always like to do for Sentinels is follow the guidance of the Star Wars Unlimited Quickstart Rules and place Sentinels above the rest of my units in the battle line to help communicate that they must be attacked first if the opponents unit does not have Saboteur.

DON’T: Let your opponent miss mandatory triggers

As I mentioned in the opening paragraphs, it is important that both players are maintaining the game state. This means that you are also responsible for making sure your opponent carries out mandatory actions and vice versa. Getting a game loss because your opponent forgot to draw a card off Force Choke would be a silly way to lose!

DO: Get a hand marker or find a routine place to set your hand down

There’s been many reports of players accidently mixing their hand with their resources. It’s pretty easy to mix up piles of face down cards, so the easy solution is to distinguish the hand! Some people prefer to use a metal coin or marker to set on top of their hand when they set it down. My go to since the early days of the game has been to set my hand on top of my leader/base area to make sure it is not near my resources. Just keep your hand away from your resources at all costs!

Shoutout to the people who recognize the Bendu token..

DON’T: Leave a pile of tokens on your base

Do what you can to keep the smallest amount of tokens or easiest multiple possible to keep base damage clear at a glance. Unless you’re married to the Gamegenic tokens, getting a set that has 1/3/5/10 demoninations does a great job of guaranteeing you never need to have more than 5 tokens on your base (10,10,5,3,1 for 29 damage). No one needs to look over and see 9 1’s on your base and have to take 10 seconds to count through them. I especially recommend double sided damage tokens if you’re looking to buy a set, that way you can clean up the damage quicker.

DO: Use Reminder tokens for delayed effects!

We’re looking at you Han Solo and No Good to me Dead players! Forgetting a unit can’t ready, or that you need to defeat resources from Han Solo’s ability has been a common mistake. It even happened in the grand finals of a TTI tournament and one of the days at Gencon! Using tokens to remind yourself of important abilities that need to be taken care of later so your mind can continue to focus on gameplay decisions is vital.

DON’T: Be scared to call a Judge!

Judges are at tournaments to help ensure games are played correctly and give a fair experience for all players. If you ever aren’t sure about a ruling or that a card is being played correctly, don’t be scared to call a judge! Calling a judge is not calling your opponent a terrible person, you’re merely pausing the game for a moment to ensure the game is being played correctly. Calling a judge in the moment allows for any issues to be resolved cleanly, whereas if you decide after the fact it will likely be too late to clean up anything if it was done incorrectly.

DO: Practice good habits!

All of this will be very difficult to do if you don’t turn it into habit. BobbySapphire of KTOD always encourages players to use a notepad with token tracking at locals, so when they do it at big tournaments it is second nature. The same goes for all aspects of maintaining clear game states, do it every game of Star Wars Unlimited you play!

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I hope as a community we can all do our best to maintain clean and clear game states! What do you struggle with the most?