"And now, Your Highness, we will discuss the location of your hidden Rebel base."

–Darth Vader

This is a good year to be a Star Wars fan.

Star Wars is bigger than ever. New chapters are being added to the Star Wars universe. And Star Wars™: Rebellion will soon allow gamers to return in full-force to the characters and events that made the original Star Wars trilogy a worldwide phenomenon.

As we mentioned in the game's announcement, Star Wars: Rebellion is simultaneously personal and epic. It allows you to command such iconic heroes and villains as Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader, Princess Leia, Han Solo, and Emperor Palpatine, and the actions they take will directly influence the course of your Galactic Civil War. You can launch strikes against Imperial build yards or construct the Death Star and blow up planets. You can train your hero in the Jedi path, or you can capture Rebel heroes and freeze them in carbonite.

In short, Star Wars: Rebellion provides you an entry to the Galactic Civil War and the entire Star Wars universe that is entirely unprecedented in board game form… This is the game you're looking for!

Today, we begin our previews with a closer look at the different victory conditions for the Galactic Empire and the fledgling Rebel Alliance. Then, next week is Rebellion Week, and Rebel leaders are prepared to unveil five new previews!

Scour the Galaxy

"I think we’ve got something, sir. The report is only a fragment from a probe droid in the Hoth system, but it’s the best lead we’ve had."

–Captain Piett

As the Imperial player in Star Wars: Rebellion, you need to find and destroy the Rebel base. Do this and you win. The Imperial victory condition leaves no room for confusion, but it opens a whole galaxy's worth of gameplay.

First, you have hidden information. There are thirty-two systems represented on the Star Wars: Rebellion game board, and all of them, apart from Coruscant, are represented within the game's probe deck. Over the course of the game, as your probe droids scour the galaxy, you draw cards from this deck, eliminating the systems they represent as possible locations of the Rebel base.

The probe deck first comes into play during setup. As the Imperial player, you gain control of Coruscant and five other systems, two of which your Imperial forces have subjugated and three more that are loyal to your cause. The cards for each of these systems are removed from the probe deck, and you take them into your hand. Then you can load the associated systems with Star Destroyers, AT-AT Walkers, Stormtroopers, TIE fighters, transport vessels, and a fully operational Death Star.

Next, the Rebel player gains control of three systems and shuffles their cards back into the probe deck. Then the Rebel player chooses one system to house the Rebel base, pulls its card out of the probe deck, slots it under the game board, and reshuffles the probe deck.

Accordingly, the Rebel player conceals a critical piece of information—the location of his Rebel base—from the game's very outset. This can lead to all manner of bluffing as the Rebels may choose the unlikeliest of places, like a system in close proximity to Coruscant, or feint by defending other systems to draw your attention and your fleets away from the base's actual location.

The Rebels are not the only ones with hidden information, however. You hold all the cards for the systems you have already probed and, therefore, you know which systems your Galactic Empire has eliminated as possible locations for the Rebel base. Since the Rebels never know which probe cards you hold, you may very well be able to use the information to see through any of their deceptions or even to snare them in a trap.

Once you have identified the location of the Rebels' hidden base, you must still destroy it, and this leads to another satisfying layer of gameplay—combat. We will look more closely at combat in future previews, but it is worth noting at this point that combat incorporates the game's more than 150 plastic miniatures along with both custom dice and tactic cards.

Each unit is associated with a pool of dice, and when you descend upon the Rebels' hidden base, you will want to do so with enough starships, troops, and vehicles to leave the Rebels no chance of survival. All of this means that your destruction of the Rebel base is likely to start several rounds earlier. You need to maneuver your fleet carefully throughout the adjoining regions of space so that your forces all converge in the correct position at the appropriate time.

Restore Freedom to the Galaxy

"The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers."

–Princess Leia

As the Rebel player, your victory condition is a little more abstracted. After all, the Galactic Empire oversees countless systems, which are ruled by regional governors spread far across the galaxy. Its fleets consist of myriad Star Destroyers, each wielding enough firepower to keep an entire system in line through fear. A single key victory against a military such as the Empire's will not win a war. There is no one Imperial base that can be destroyed that will cause the Empire to collapse.

And yet, the Rebels have hope. The Galactic Empire's tyrannical rule works against it in the minds and hearts of those that stand oppressed. If the fledgling Rebel Alliance can rally enough support, demonstrate enough leadership, and land enough critical blows against the Empire, it may be able to inspire the galaxy's citizens to rise up and revolt against the evil regime that keeps them down. The Empire may be able to stop a small military, but it cannot suppress a full-scale galactic rebellion.

Accordingly, in Star Wars: Rebellion, the Rebel player seeks to advance the Rebel reputation marker until it meets the game's time marker. This means, in effect, that the Rebels must survive long enough and succeed often enough to inspire others to action.

They do this by completing various objectives, each of which is worth a set number of points, and which you draw from your objective deck. Notably, this deck is created in three stages, numbered I, II, and III. First, you shuffle all the III objectives and place them facedown. Then you shuffle all the II objectives and place them facedown on top of the III objectives. Finally, you shuffle all the I objectives and place them facedown on top of the II objectives.

Throughout the game, you draw from this deck of objectives at the end of each round, and just as there are ways for the Imperial player to draw additional probe cards, there are ways for your Rebels to gain additional objectives. This is important because some objectives will be decidedly more difficult than others to score, depending upon the circumstances of your game. Also, if you can draw into objectives like Death Star Plans or Return of the Jedi , you can potentially use your objectives to interfere with the Empire's plans in a more tangible fashion.

Of course, your survival is also a crucial component of your victory, so you can't throw your forces at your objectives too recklessly. Just like in the movies, the Rebel Alliance needs to consider its actions carefully and build for them in secrecy. And should the Empire ever expose itself, the Rebel Alliance needs to capitalize upon the error.

Join Us for Rebellion Week

"You know of the Rebellion against the Empire?"

–Luke Skywalker

There has never been another board game quite like Star Wars: Rebellion. More than thirty years after Return of the Jedi first resolved the conflicts between the Galactic Empire and the heroes of the Rebel Alliance, Star Wars: Rebellion allows you to engage in the Galactic Civil War more fully and more heroically than ever before.

If you are a longtime Star Wars fan and a gamer, this is the game you're looking for, and we intend to prove it. Next week is Rebellion Week. Each day, we will post a new preview, starting with a look at your heroes and their importance within your strategy, then continuing through battles, the production of troops, the array of available missions, and all the highlights of a full game round. Additionally, you can visit our Facebook and Twitter pages to engage even more fully in the emerging Star Wars: Rebellion experience.

Join us Monday as we fire the first shots in the Galactic Civil War!