“Cut to the left, I’ll take the leader.”

–Wedge Antilles, Star Wars: Return of the Jedi

In the war against the galaxy-spanning Galactic Empire, the Rebel Alliance is unquestionably outgunned. Their resources, fleets, and recruitment all dwindle in comparison to the might of the Imperial military machine. Yet against all odds, the Rebellion has won victories—by striking quickly and fading away, by sabotaging Imperial emplacements, and by following the commands of some of the galaxy’s greatest tacticians.

With the Galactic Ambitions deluxe expansion for Star Wars™: The Card Game, you’re invited to take the part of the Rebel Alliance or the Sith Lords who rule the Galactic Empire. Five new objective sets for both of these affiliations offer plenty of new strategies, and the other four affiliations each receive a single new objective set to supplement their own decks.

Today, we’ll fly with Rebel Alliance and preview one of the Rebel objective sets from Galactic Ambitions!

The Alliance’s Elite

Across the Star Wars saga, ace pilots and the ships they fly have formed a key part of the action, starting with the trench run on the Death Star in A New Hope and continuing throughout the movies. The Rogue Squadron cycle brought these ships and their pilots to the forefront of the game, and now, you can continue to bring your Fighters into thrilling space battles with one of the Rebel objective sets in Galactic Ambitions.

This objective set centers on the Rebel Alliance’s most honored starfighter squadron: Rogue Squadron (Galactic Ambitions, 1104). This Fighter unit offers a formidable spread of combat icons, alongside the elite keyword to keep it from being locked down by enemy tactics. What’s more, whenever any Fighter unit is enhanced, Rogue Squadron allows you to immediately draw a card! The ability to refill your hand as you play Pilots and other enhancements onto your Fighters can quickly prove invaluable.

With such a potent ability on Rogue Squadron, you would expect this objective set to offer several powerful enhancements—and you wouldn’t be disappointed! The first enhancement is R3-A2 (Galactic Ambitions, 1106), an astromech droid who may prove extremely useful in combat. R3-A2 can enhance any friendly Fighter unit, and after the enhanced unit is focused to strike, you can focus R3-A2 to place a focus token on any enemy unit! Essentially acting as an additional tactics icon, R3-A2 can help you lock down your opponent’s units—an aspect of conflict where Fighters have historically struggled.

You can also boost the edge potential of your Fighter or Speeder units with Kill Marker (Galactic Ambitions, 1107). This enhancement simply give the enhanced unit the edge (1) keyword, helping you win edge battles, whether you’re attacking or defending. That, combined with the extra card draw from Rogue Squadron, can make your Rebel Fighters much more dangerous in the edge battle than they would first appear.

Your enhancements make your Fighters more dangerous, so it’s obviously best to get as much use as you can out of those enhancements. This objective set also contains a single copy of the Alliance X-Wing (Galactic Ambitions, 1105). This unit can engage in combat, potentially even swinging in for the game-winning objective damage, but you can also focus it to move an enhancement from one unit to another unit controlled by the same player. Of course, you can use this to reassign your own enhancements, but you may also use it to push powerful Pilots like Darth Vader (Attack Run, 784) onto an exhausted or ineffective unit.

Your Fighters may be powerful, but they won’t do you much good if they’re covered in focus tokens. The Alliance's Elite (Galactic Ambitions, 1103) is this set’s objective, and it allows you to remove an extra focus token from a Fighter or Speeder unit after you refresh. By keeping your own units free from focus tokens, you ensure that you’re always ready to engage your opponent on your own terms.

As focus tokens are removed from your units, you may even find time to pull a little Corellian Slip (Galactic Ambitions, 1108) on your opponent. This event can be played after a focus token is removed from any Vehicle unit, and it allows you to immediately place a focus token on any Vehicle unit! Of course, one of the most powerful uses of Corellian Slip is to focus one of your opponent’s Vehicles after your own Vehicle refreshes, but you can also use it to make sure one of your opponent’s units stays focused after his refresh phase.

Pilots, Get to Your Ships

Imperial fighters have been sighted approaching the Rebel base! Get your leaders to safety and take the fight to the enemy with the Rebel objective sets included in this deluxe expansion. Pre-order your copy of Galactic Ambitions today, and join us for our next preview to take a look at the other affiliations included in this expansion!