QJ's note: No offense is intended to the authors of the articles mentioned below. They are cited here because their articles were representative of the points of view of many players of the game.
Quite some time ago, there was an article on monnok.com written by Imperial Mike criticizing the Jabba's Palace expansion. After reading that article, I was motivated to write part one of my response to critics of Jabba's Palace. Over a month went by, and just as I'd almost forgotten about writing part two, I saw the article posted on grimtaash.com. So a few more weeks went by, and with summer ending and school starting I almost forgot about it again. A part of me felt as if it had been too long since JP was released and the articles came out. But yet another article with some of the same themes has popped up on Dagobah Clouds, making it a fine time for me to publish part two of my response to critics of Jabba's Palace.
First of all, I'd like to say that I don't have any special attachment to the Jabba's Palace expansion. It's not my favorite expansion, but I don't think it's the worst either. I think that there were a lot of good cards, good characters, and nifty strategies. I also think that some of the strategies that resulted from JP were not what the designers had intended and were so strong that designing a light side deck became a lot tougher. But before I get any further into this particular article, I would recommend that you read part one in this little series. For those of you who don't want to read the whole thing, here's the bottom line: SW:CCG should stay true to the movies, but as a game, it will have gaming functions that do not allow it to be a reenactment of the trilogy.
In his article entitled "Jabba's Palace...More Powerful than the Death Star," Imperial Mike asserts that "NEVER in my hundreds of viewings of the Star Wars Trilogy did I consider those ugly and slimy hooligans on Tatooine a serious threat to the Rebellion." Well, I assume that I'm watching the same trilogy that he's been watching, and I would also estimate that I've seen each of the movies fifty times or so. So it is my observation that although aliens did not necessarily pose a serious threat to the Rebellion, they did indeed pose a serious, fundamental threat to the existence of Han, Leia, Chewie, Luke, and our favorite droids. Am I the only one who noticed Luke fight for his life in Jabba's Rancor Pit? Maybe some viewers were so distracted by Leia's gold bikini that they didn't notice that while she was wearing that thing, she was chained to an obese and repulsive hutt. Perhaps no one noticed Han hanging from the wall in the Audience Chamber, Lando captured in the sarlaac's tentacles, or the droids upside down and buried after the terrific explosion of the sail barge. All of these were things that posed a serious threat to the characters who are central to the story, and the threats were caused by those very same ugly and slimy hooligans on Tatooine. [As a bit of a side note, where the hell was the Rebellion during the final two-thirds of Empire Strikes Back. Sure we see Vader and his henchmen stomping around Cloud City, but that didn't have jack to do with the Rebellion versus the Empire.]
This leads me to one of my central contentions - that the focus of the first 40 minutes or so of Return of the Jedi is not the Rebellion; it's the main characters and their fight for survival and escape. All of the gangsters, bounty hunters, thieves, and aliens who had dealings in Jabba's Palace were able to exert tremendous influence - an influence that nearly destroyed our heros. In designing the Jabba's Palace expansion, I believe that, in general, Decipher simulated what happened on the screen. The handful of characters that we had watched during the first two movies were completely distracted from their fight against the Empire as they fought against the aliens who lived on Tatooine.
There is some merit to the argument that some of the aliens have game text that appears to be very strong. I liked the fact that Decipher acknowledged that not all aliens were at their most powerful on Tatooine by creating characters such as Ortolans, Whipids, and Devaronians, who get their power or ability bonuses while at other system locations. As a gaming function, the development of unique aliens that act as representatives of their species at the Audience Chamber is an interesting one that has spurred some truly innovative thinking in deck design. It is also something that has caused some serious laziness in deck design. Gailid and his force drain bonus has become a default option for many dark side decks. But wasn't it that way when inserts first came out? It seemed as if everyone who wanted to be competative copied the first insert deck they saw on the Internet and dug out Toryn Faar, Tech M'or, R2D2, Wioslea, and Garindan. It's true that there are some strategies that have become serious roadblocks to original deck design, but if we are the versatile and creative players that we think ourselves to be, I think we can handle it. Some of the most innovative deck ideas that I have seen in the year that I have been serious about the game are a result of looking for ways to side-step those roadblocks.
Without beating around the bush any longer, let's address the issue of the combination of Expand the Empire and the Tatooine: Jabba's Palace game text. This combo allows the dark side to generate nine force by turn two, as well as have six locations deployed. I don't think that anyone would dispute the fact that this is a strategy that no light side player can currently ignore. Any player who thinks he can design any deck he wants to without being prepared to deal with a JP manipulator or a Gailid-spread-out-and-drain deck is coo-coo for Coco Puffs.
I'll admit to the fact that I've had Artoo and A Gift in my last several light decks to try to keep Gailid in check. I have a feeling that Decipher will do a little something to limit this combo or make it more difficult to pull off, but in the mean time, I think it would be of great benefit to the players (and the game as a whole) if they would stop all of the whining and use the tools that already exist in the game to defeat this strategy. Imperial Mike's article says that the JP/EtE strategy virtually dictates what the light side's starting location will be (Massassi Throne Room). So while I disagree that starting with the throne room is the only alternative, I also want to say that as I remember it, I never really *wanted* to play with Wioslea, but I had to if I didn't want a whooping of the insert kind. In essence, inserts dictated what characters I played with. There's no denying that JP/EtE is a fast, powerful strategy that has made building a light side deck even more difficult. However, to the best of my recollection, in the movies, the dark side (Imperial and slimy hooligan alike) was fast and powerful - forcing the Rebellion and our heros to change the way that they operated if they intended to survive, not to mention overcome. But rather than working with the game, it seems to me that many players have chosen to stop playing and howl at the manufacturer.
To borrow a phrase from Lando, I have no love for Jabba's Palace; but I don't think that it was the worst thing to happen to this game either. I realize that there were some cards that changed the game in a way that was not necessarily positive. I also realize that every expansion brings a new and powerful strategy that changes the way that the game is played (which is probably part of the theory behind releasing expansions and not making us play with the same old stuff). When asteroid sanctuary came out in Dagobah, inserts came out in Dagobah, and Jedi training came out in Dagobah (does anyone see a pattern here?), we had to change the way that we played the game. It was a simple fact that we all complained about, but played our way through. For some reason, a vocal number of players have decided that almost four months after the JP expansion, we are still hollering to Decipher that the set was ill-made. Let's hope that Decipher has been paying attention to the things that have caused real problems so they can avoid them in the future. Let's also hope that the players suck it up and play the game - it could be worse - we could be playing Magic.
Queen Jawa