SW:CCG Intro Game Materials

[tge.damen]

I would like to share with you a package of materials the Dutch crew have developed to provide interested gamers with a 10/40 minute experience of the game and its defining features. Based on the epic events on Cloud City in the Empire Strikes back, we developed a scenario in which a number of locations, and starship and character cards had already been deployed to table. Each player’s deck consists of 30 cards, and both DS and LS are given guidelines on how to proceed on their first turns. The pitch, basic instructions, and the T1’s take about 10 minutes. After, that an interested player can choose to continue and resolve the game (+30 minutes) or leave.

We keep the intro game materials at our local game store, and display them when a passerby shows interest in the game. It consists of four components:

#1 The ‘board’: Contains an intro to the game, its rules, and sets up the Cloud City intro scenario. We printed this once on an A2 format to play on, and printed it on A3 for distribution. You can find the pdf-file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/jug7etjhapckd ... e.pdf?dl=0; it is about 30 mb and may not load in your browser >> click the download button. Give your pdf-reader some time to load the layers.

#2 The decks:
Dark Side:

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1. Darth Vader With Lightsaber
2. Boba Fett (CC)
3. Admiral Ozzel
4. Lieutenant Sheckil
5. Captain Bewill
6. Elite Squadron Stormtrooper
7. Stormtrooper
8. Stormtrooper Cadet
9. Sergeant Wallen
10. Lando Calrissian
11. Lobot
12. Cloud City Trooper
13. Trooper Jerrol Blendin
14. Ugloste
15. Ugnaught
16. Commander Brandei

17. Obsidian 7
18. Obsidian 8
19. OS-71-1 in Obsidian 1
20. OS-71-2 in Obsidian 2
21. Slave I, Symbol of fear
22. Tie Interceptor

23. Blaster Rifle
24. Cloud City Blaster

25. Cloud City Occupation

26. Trooper Assault
27. Ghhhk
28. All power to weapons
29. Imperial Barrier
30. Dark Maneuvers

Light Side:

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1. Captain Han Solo
2. Son Of Skywalker
3. Lando With Blaster Pistol
4. Chewbacca With Blaster Rifle
5. Lobot
6. Princess Leia
7. Kebyc
8. Trooper Utris M'Toc
9. Cloud City Trooper
10. Sergeant Edian
11. Harc Seff
12. Pucumir Thrys
13. Leesub Sirin (v)
14. Yoxgit

15. Millennium Falcon
16. Z-95 Bespin Defense Fighter
17. Red Leader in Red 1
18. Gold Leader in Gold 1
19. X-wing
20. X-wing

21. Lift Tube

22. Anakin’s Lightsaber
23. Cloud City Blaster

24. Cloud City Celebration

25. Dodge
26. Lift Tube Escape
27. Houjix
28. It’s A Trap!
29. Organized Attack
30. Rebel Barrier

#3 The goodie-bag: Packages of cheap but flavourful cards (e.g., stormtrooper, x-wing) to give away after the intro.

#4 The email signup list: After they have received some goodies, ask them whether they would be interested in the local newsletter (we have a Dutch one) and get them to sign up.

Before going to the frequently asked questions: It cost a lot of work to develop this but we hope you'll find it useful. Thanks for any feedback in advance.

FAQS:

Q: Why don’t you use the existing demo-decks?

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A: The demodecks are great but can be overwhelming if you are new to the game. That’s why this intro does without an objective (typically the most complex cards), starts with cards on table, limits the number of cards starting in hand to 2 (reducing the need for comprehension), and provides T1 instructions. We hope that when players take a first step of learning the cards and the game's basic mechanics through this intro they will proceed to the demo-decks.

Q: Is this fun for someone who knows the game?

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A: Surprisingly, it is! Many cards that otherwise don’t see play are featured here (and no need to worry for a Maul & Dr.E blowout), and at the same time, the decks are more balanced than a sealed game (the deck-lists will be updated the more we play). It is great fun to play both sides in 60 minutes to see who manages better overall.

Q: Why does LS start?

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A: Thematically, it seemed appropriate to allow the LS player to move to the dining room on the first turn of the game. DS player has to verbally respond with “we would be honoured if you would join us”.

Q: The sizes of locations aren’t accurate.

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A: The A2-format isn’t large enough to display the accurate sizes. The width of a site matches the width of a character-card.

Q: That T1 strategy is not optimal.

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A: It’s not meant to be, but we don’t want to overload a new player with the intricacies immediately.

Q: Recirculation is not a separate phase, it’s part of the draw phase!

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A: We know. But it is a mandatory event that is markedly different from drawing cards. For purposes of instruction, it is much clearer to mark it as a separate phase (just as ‘untapping’ in MtG). We would update the rules as such if we were SWCCG Czar.

Q: Great! Lets give this intro at event Y..

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A: Take it easy flyboy. Remember, being non-licensed this community has to tread softly. For now, this package of materials is shared by the Dutch crew (not the PC) for your local convenience. We don't want to be seen competing with licensed companies as that may have bad consequenses for the game. You can find the marketing guidelines here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/x529cp4ydvvoy ... 7.pdf?dl=0

[Sagnet]

This is pretty neat. What are your experiences with this so far? Have you managed to create any interest with potential new players?

[tge.damen]

This is pretty neat. What are your experiences with this so far? Have you managed to create any interest with potential new players?

Yes it is effective and fun!

Effective considering that the big "board" draws attention more strongly than just card piles, and having a setup saves time, big-time. The setup allows you to show a few quick turns so anybody who has interest but not much time can nevertheless have a feel for what the game is like.

For experienced players it is cube-like fun with a bunch of thematic cards. Even better to switch sides afterwards and go-again.

[Munchanka]

We just hosted a 'Demo Deck Day' in Alameda, CA. We brought both these decks and the PC Demo Decks. Player response was unanimous that this was the easier, more fun, more Star Wars-y way to learn the game. Five stars. Highly recommended. Thanks for putting this together and making it available!

[tge.damen]

We just hosted a 'Demo Deck Day' in Alameda, CA. We brought both these decks and the PC Demo Decks. Player response was unanimous that this was the easier, more fun, more Star Wars-y way to learn the game. Five stars. Highly recommended. Thanks for putting this together and making it available!

Very happy to hear about this. Thanks for letting me know that you enjoyed it!!

[Weyoun9846135]

#1 The ‘board’: Contains an intro to the game, its rules, and sets up the Cloud City intro scenario. We printed this once on an A2 format to play on, and printed it on A3 for distribution. You can find the pdf-file at https://www.dropbox.com/s/jug7etjhapckd ... e.pdf?dl=0; it is about 30 mb and may not load in your browser >> click the download button. Give your pdf-reader some time to load the layers.

I gotta say: This looks really impressive! Maybe I even get my girlfriend to give SWCCG a second try with this. I'll report!

[tge.damen]

I gotta say: This looks really impressive! Maybe I even get my girlfriend to give SWCCG a second try with this. I'll report!

Thanks for letting me know! Hope she enjoys it!

[Nutritious]

Hey, just wanted to chime in that I used this to teach a friend who is brand-new to the game and it was very effective. Thanks for creating it!

I was able to get Adobe PDF reader to print it to the correct scale on 6 photo sheets, cut them out, then run them through a laminating machine so they last longer. It came out as two halves that interlock (this took some planning on which borders to cut to get them to overlap). I attached a picture in case you're curious of how it looks.

[tge.damen]

Hey, just wanted to chime in that I used this to teach a friend who is brand-new to the game and it was very effective. Thanks for creating it!

I was able to get Adobe PDF reader to print it to the correct scale on 6 photo sheets, cut them out, then run them through a laminating machine so they last longer. It came out as two halves that interlock (this took some planning on which borders to cut to get them to overlap). I attached a picture in case you're curious of how it looks.

That looks really nice! Great to hear this was useful, and thanks for sharing!

[gossuii]

ping!

just building this to try and teach my niece (7y). Going over the lists, I swapped out Sheckil for Sgt Merril, he seems to have more synergy with the DS troopers (and is a semi mirror of Edian).

Not sure why we chose Leesub back when we created these? Any non-v suggestions to swap for her? Could even see R2-D2 (ANH) in her place

[Gunner]

Just wanted to pop in and say that my 7yo son and I have had a great time learning and playing with these decks. They do a nice job getting you into the action right from the start with some recognizable characters that make it really fun. Thanks for the effort putting them together and sharing!

[gossuii]

Just wanted to pop in and say that my 7yo son and I have had a great time learning and playing with these decks. They do a nice job getting you into the action right from the start with some recognizable characters that make it really fun. Thanks for the effort putting them together and sharing!

Good to hear! Thanks for letting us know

[gossuii]

Hey, just wanted to chime in that I used this to teach a friend who is brand-new to the game and it was very effective. Thanks for creating it!

I was able to get Adobe PDF reader to print it to the correct scale on 6 photo sheets, cut them out, then run them through a laminating machine so they last longer. It came out as two halves that interlock (this took some planning on which borders to cut to get them to overlap). I attached a picture in case you're curious of how it looks.

Very cool. Can you share or mail the Adobe PDF files? Thinking about doing the same myself, and if you have the files available, that will save me some time

[Nutritious]

Very cool. Can you share or mail the Adobe PDF files? Thinking about doing the same myself, and if you have the files available, that will save me some time

I’m not sure I still have them, but I’ll take a look and let you know!

[gossuii]

Very cool. Can you share or mail the Adobe PDF files? Thinking about doing the same myself, and if you have the files available, that will save me some time

I’m not sure I still have them, but I’ll take a look and let you know!

Great! I'll pm you my email

[Jnapolit31]

Under normal circumstances, utilizing these great materials in live get-togethers would be good growth for the game.

But for the time being, and since Gemp recently implemented a 40-card deck format, I wonder if it'd be valuable for the team to expand the decklists to 40 cards and perhaps family members not living in the same house or close friends who are very new to the game can play each other on Gemp using them...

@ Dutch team, does that sound plausible?

[gossuii]

Under normal circumstances, utilizing these great materials in live get-togethers would be good growth for the game.

But for the time being, and since Gemp recently implemented a 40-card deck format, I wonder if it'd be valuable for the team to expand the decklists to 40 cards and perhaps family members not living in the same house or close friends who are very new to the game can play each other on Gemp using them...

@ Dutch team, does that sound plausible?

That's a great suggestion - we'll get on it. I assume it has to be a standard 40 card deck, and we can't "set up the board" and adjust hand size as we did in our example?

[Jnapolit31]

Under normal circumstances, utilizing these great materials in live get-togethers would be good growth for the game.

But for the time being, and since Gemp recently implemented a 40-card deck format, I wonder if it'd be valuable for the team to expand the decklists to 40 cards and perhaps family members not living in the same house or close friends who are very new to the game can play each other on Gemp using them...

@ Dutch team, does that sound plausible?

That's a great suggestion - we'll get on it. I assume it has to be a standard 40 card deck, and we can't "set up the board" and adjust hand size as we did in our example?

correct, it'd be more of an organic build-up of the game/game state

[Blarg]

Someone could probably program a special starting interrupt that would deploy all the stuff you want and set up the hands a certain way?