If you recall, I’d previously struggled with how big I’d like my Star Wars Unlimited Year One cube to be. I have been bouncing back and forth between a very manageable number, around 350, and a more ambitious number, closer to 550. After making adjustments and taking into consideration the additional non-draft cards, I’m looking at a cube kit (leaders, bases, draft deck cards) of well over 600. At this point, I am having to re-evaluate my vision for the cube.
As I am debating the merits of a smaller and more manageable set of cards versus those of a larger, more unwieldy collection, I’ve realized I have to ask myself exactly what I want to get out of the experience. This train of thought had come up in previous articles, but more as an aside. Now, I’m looking at how I envision the draft and play experience of this cube, moreso than just how many cards I want to include. Spurring this introspection was, as mentioned at the end of the last article, when I went onto the official SWU website’s card database and set the parameters for Spark, Shadows, and Twilight, with only Uncommons, Rares, and Special cards included. This search yielded me a single card count from amongst Units, Upgrades, and Events of 367. Removing the Commons brought me very closely back to my original goal! Without commons, though, what would the draft process look like? What sorts of decks would we wind up with? How many strategies that rely on commons for early plays, aristocrats themes, or combos would be nullified? Therein lies our conundrum and the need to examine the goals and how we want the final execution to look
Goal number one: we want this cube to give a relatively full scope view of the first year of the game. All three sets are included and all three draft environments and their archetypes are present, although diluted by each other.
Goal number two: I had wanted to only include one copy of each card, with no duplication of the same card across sets. This allows for a different experience each time a draft or sealed session fires. Also reduces recurrence of painful cards (looking at you Overwhelming Barrage).
Goal number three: no Legendaries and reduced recurrence of Commons to focus play in the medium power band. This prevents big power swings, but also gets more sign post cards onto the field more quickly.
Goal number four: a manageable card count. Over 600 is not unmanageable, but closer to 350-400 is more manageable. I also need to remember I’m bringing 30+ Bases and 50+ Leaders, besides enough token cards to go around. More cards also means more sleeves.
Goal number five: maybe the most lofty goal is to have a limited experience that other people, as well as myself, want to revisit. If the cube doesn’t provide a fun environment, a play group might as well do constructed.
One aspect I don’t think I’ve talked about much prior is the idea of curation. It’s already implied by the very nature of the cube being built by me, rather than buying a box of boosters, but there is a degree of control over what is included that I have only briefly touched upon. For example, when I was limiting the number of Leaders, and which ones specifically, I wasn’t including Luke and Vader, just for the sake of focusing on the common leaders. And since no Legendary versions of them would be included (the only non-leader versions from year one), I wasn’t going to include their lightsabers. That’s the kind of curation I’m looking at now: not just count or rarity, but how the included cards fit together. I have brought all the leaders in at this point and, thusly, brought those two lightsaber cards in, as well.
This approach to curation is much more granular than I’d previously been applying to this first SWU cube. If I was building this with a focus on unit types or eras of Star Wars, that’s more when I’d look at each individual card for inclusion or exclusion. Since the theme is explicitly “year one,” my only exclusion parameters are trying to hit the most manageable card count and if there are cards that only care about non-included cards (like the Luke/Vader example above). Inclusion is different; all the cards are viable for inclusion, but are there some that SHOULD be duplicated so that draft archetypes don’t get messed up? Then again, how much do we need to care about draft archetypes since we’re already bucking the rarity ratios present in a booster pack? These are the kinds of questions that keep me up at night.
Thankfully, I’m not under any deadline to have this cube finished and ready for play. Obviously, I’d like to have it done so that I can bring it along to the next gathering of Jodo Casters and we can fire off a draft immediately. The 550+ count gives variety for every draft and keeping it singleton amplifies the variety. The very last thing I need to remind myself of, and mention here as I may not have already done so, is that a cube never has to be finished. If I manage to get several uses out of this first version and I find myself wanting to change it up, there is no cube police that is going to stop me from making whatever changes I feel like. For example, I’d previously mentioned how much I enjoy Jump To Lightspeed and not including it felt like I was leaving out a big component of the game. It’s not a year one set, but being only set number four, it goes with those earlier sets exceedingly well. Maybe a future iteration would exclude Twilight of the Republic and include JTL, turning it into an Empire vs Rebellion themed cube.
I may leave it there for the time being, and start sleeving up cards. I will definitely need more sleeves and tokens, but then I will be ready for future iterations. I hope this series was helpful, informative, or at least entertaining as you got to see my constant internal debate. I have other ideas for different SWU formats, so, the series won’t end entirely, just this chapter of it. I’ll let you know how the cube plays once we get there!