The Summer is almost and so is Way of the Force is not. (Edit 6/19/2018: It seems that Way of the Force will be out on July 5th. This article is still relevant for those who have store champs coming up before July 5th but for those going to North American Champs you will have less than a month to figure out the format with cards IRL. The article has been updated to reflect this announcement. May the Force have Mercy on your soul.) The North American Championships at Gen Con is only 6 weeks away (Aug 2) and Store champs are fast approaching as well, check out the stores that will be participating for that here. If your Store champs is before July 16 you’ll be dealing with the current format. Luckily there are plenty of decks to choose from. If you have the means I suggest at least practicing with two decks that way when you get close to the event you’ll have some flexibility in choice.

We’ve been slightly lazy about updating the Gauntlet since we were hopeful the next set would arrive before store champ season but since this isn’t the case we wanted to update it. You can see the full Gauntlet here but in this article wanted to highlight the top 3 decks I will be looking at going into the beginning of Store Champ Season. There’s a chance this will all change but this is my starting point.

Obi/Maz

This is the list that did really well at worlds in the hands of Luke from the Destiny Council. An alternate take on the deck made top 4 of Euros but I chose to highlight this one because it is more in line with what I have been testing. I’m not sure I love Running Interference, we kind of thought it wasn’t necessary with Force Speed. Frozen Wastes is cool tech battlefield which should be seriously looked into but you are leaning really hard on Maz’s Vault for money and if you don’t draw it your deck is going to be worse off. Still, this probably doesn’t matter if you slow the game down since more turns with Obi will probably bring you to the promise land.

The surprise deck of Worlds, which made top 4 in the hands of The Hyperloops own HonestlySarcastc, is still very good but it is harder to play than many of the other tier one decks which will keep it from being dominant. This deck will be more popular at GenCon than it has been and that should be cause for concern if you haven’t played against it. This is kind of a good test for your deck – can you beat this consistently? If the answer is no then you should reconsider your choice… or your plan could be to dodge it which is always an option in a tournament. It’s weaker to things like Bala-Tik, and aggressive decks with Force Illusion. That’s not to say you can’t win those match ups but it just means you have to test them out to see the right ordering of plays and who to go for first in order to gain some percentage points.

5 Die Villain

I like this deck in theory but whenever I see it in action it just doesn’t perform as well as I think it should. I think this version needs like 1 or 2 redeploy guns since it always seems to miss a little umph. I can just hear JMags head shaking in the wind but any change would not be at the expense of the previously thought dubious Free-For-All. I do need to test this more but that’s just been my experience of the half a dozen games I’ve played. When the deck rolls hot you won’t need the extra firepower but when you don’t… the jury’s still out.

That’s it for me today. Make sure to check out the updated Gauntlet and keep it in the back of your mind when deciding on a deck for the beginning of Store Champ Season. Let us know what you think of the metagame in the comments. Are you tired of this format or are you still having fun? And as always…

May the Rolls be with You…

@NJCuenca

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