Starter Set Deck Tech: Moff Gideon

It’s release weekend for Shadows of the Galaxy, the highly-anticipated second set for Star Wars: Unlimited! For those of you who were out playing in prerelease events this past weekend, you got your hands on some super-sweet promos of The Mandalorian and Moff Gideon, and you may be wanting to get those on the table when the new 2-Player Starter hits the shelves!

But how best to expand on the pre-constructed Mando and Gideon decks included in that product? Last week, the venerable JustJack from Golden Dice Podcast wrote about ways to improve The Mandalorian starter deck - check that out here!

This week, I’ll be taking you through my thoughts on how to make the Moff Gideon starter a bit more advantageous in casual and competitive play alike.

If you previously read our walkthroughs on the Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader starter decks, this will be similar, but with one addition: I will be providing a list that ONLY includes the contents of the 2-Player Starter alongside Shadows of the Galaxy cards. Spark of Rebellion product is currently hard to come by, so for those of you just getting into the game, feel free to peruse that list!

In the meantime, let’s take a look at what comes in the Moff Gideon, Formidable Commander (SHD 7) deck included in the 2-Player Starter!

Formidable Beginnings

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Right away you’ll notice a lot more reprinted cards from Spark of Rebellion than there were in The Mandalorian deck. With Moff Gideon’s ability to boost the power of your low-cost units when they attack into opposing units, cards like Superlaser Technician (SHD 85), Seasoned Shoretrooper (SHD 83) and Death Trooper (SHD 30) can now make more favorable trades than they could previously.

Additionally, the list features a large number of units with the Trooper synergy, so when you draw that copy of General Tagge, Concerned Commander (SHD 81), it may be worth hanging onto!

As for the Special rarity cards that aren’t reprints:

• The Incinerator Trooper (SHD 234) may seem underpowered as a 2-cost 2/2, but when combined with either Moff Gideon’s ability or an added power boost from cards like Outland TIE Vanguard (SHD 82) or our personal favorite Snowtrooper Lieutenant (SHD 236), it can punch a unit without being punched back, similar to SOR’s Han Solo unit (SOR 198). This can prove very useful in controlling your opponent’s board in the early game!
• Calculated Lethality (SHD 39) is the only Vigilance/Villainy removal card in the set, and it’s only found in the 2-Player Starter! This card will be crucial for you with the amount of upgrades you will face in the Mandalorian deck, but keep in mind the 3-or-less cost restriction in the ability. Also, if you find your opponent has loaded up one of your own units with a Bounty or two, you can make the cheeky play to defeat your unit and transfer that upgrade to another unit in the form of an experience - especially if you’re defeating your own Superlaser Technician!
• The tandem of Phase-III Dark Trooper (SHD 84) and Gideon’s Light Cruiser, Dark Troopers’ Station (SHD 242) is the engine that makes Moff Gideon especially dangerous. Throw the Dark Troopers in front of your opponent to protect your base with Sentinel, then return them to the field later with the Light Cruiser, and bring a powerful ship to bear in Space along with it. What’s not to love about that?

The rest of the Moff Gideon list is a bit of a Swiss Army knife, or attempting to be. You are provided with more Troopers, though not amazing ones in Warzone Lieutenant (SHD 110) and Privateer Crew (SHD 113).

There are some Capture mechanics involved with the single copies of Discerning Veteran (SHD 120) and Legal Authority (SHD 124). And, in order to survive until you can play your big ships, there are healing cards in the form of The Client, Dictated by Discretion (SHD 31) and Top Target (71).

If you can be flexible in your gameplay, any one of these scenarios may prove useful to you in your early games, depending on how your opponent proceeds.

Reinforcements Have Arrived

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Wait, is this Iden Versio and the Inferno Squad, or Moff Gideon and his Imperial Remnant? While adding in some additional rare cards and looking for other ways to complement Gideon’s strengths, I realized that the Inferno Squad cards really suited Gideon.

Inferno Four, Unforgetting (SOR 31) and Del Meeko, Providing Overwatch (SOR 34) both gain a much-needed power boost from the Moff. Having the ability for your Inferno TIE to trade into a Space unit with 3 health is fairly clutch. The deck also needs some added top-end power, which the other Gideon - Gideon Hask, Ruthless Loyalist (SOR 36) - provides nicely, since trading into units is a focal point of your strategy.

Fortunately, the removal package mostly builds itself. All the familiar favorites are in here, while still maintaining two copies of Calculated Lethality to protect against what may be a heavy-upgrade environment early on in Set 2.

However, with Gideon’s Leader ability becoming static on his Unit side, I felt it was important to add more Timely Interventions (SHD 129) to threaten additional Overwhelm damage right away!

Finally, I want to shout out Lom Pyke, Dealer in Truths (SHD 32). It may not always pan out this way, but with the amount of trading your lower-cost units are looking to do, Pyke’s ability to dole out shields to your friendly units can help keep them alive longer to provide you with 2-for-1 opportunities or better. If you’re able to pass shields onto your opponent’s smaller units, and then follow it up with a Calculated Lethality, you’ll feel like a combo master!

It doesn’t escape me, however, that this build features 18 cards in the full 50 that hail from Spark of Rebellion. As previously stated, it may not be a foregone conclusion that SOR cards are readily available in all areas, especially if you are just getting into the game and looking to start from scratch.

With that in mind, how would we build around Moff Gideon while keeping the decklist limited to cards that can be found ONLY in Shadows of the Galaxy, including the 2-Player Starter? Let’s investigate, shall we?

From The Shadows

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The star addition to this deck is unquestionably at the top-end, with Maul, Shadow Collective Visionary (SHD 90) providing a sizable Ambush and Overwhelm threat when he enters play.

In order to maximize his survivability, I sprinkled in more Underworld units than we had in the previous build – cards that still fit our overall strategy, like Mercenary Gunship (SHD 256), Gamorrean Retainer (SHD 112) and Black Sun Starfighter (SHD 237). These low-cost units will be a worthwhile tradeoff to keep your heavy hitter undamaged after a big swing!

It may be worth adding Toro Calican, Ambitious Upstart (SHD 239) to any version of a Moff Gideon deck, simply due to the chance to attack as a 4/5 and also to be grabbed by the Light Cruiser in the late game.

To increase our chances slightly of making use of Toro’s ability, we found a home for Embo, Stoic and Resolute (SHD 59) with the added bonus of potentially healing those units that have been making trades with your opponents.

While the event package doesn’t inspire the most confidence in terms of straight removal, having so many low-to-the-ground units in our deck means we can strengthen our late game even further with a spicy addition in Choose Sides (SHD 132).

In this way, we can give up something small for something that has a higher presence on the board, forcing the opponent to deal with something they thought would be an asset to their victory. Imagine stealing a Poe Dameron, Quick to Improvise (SHD 153) for the price of an Outland TIE Vanguard, and the look on your opponent’s face when you do it. Sure seems like a fun exchange to me!

You Have Something I Want

Now that we’ve explored a couple different ways to build with Moff Gideon, let’s put it all together and see what a version with every card at our disposal could look like.

Click here to view this deck on SWUDB.com

Holy Legendaries, Batman! Yes, we’ve added six of them, but really, only three are absolutely vital in my opinion when constructing a Premier deck with our friendly Moff: the three copies of Darth Vader, Commanding The First Legion (SOR 87).

Maul is a great Ambush option that swings for more power, but with the sheer number of 3-cost-or-less Villainy units that Gideon wants to field anyway, having Vader around to bring one in on 7 resources and the Light Cruiser to do the SAME THING the following round is an incredibly strong 1-2 punch.

Also, you’ll note the Death Trooper returns to this build - when pulling it with Vader’s ability, Vader’s reach increases to the same damage output as Maul’s!

Command/Vigilance Villainy is an elite aspect combination when it comes to removal, and with both full sets at our disposal you can afford to be choosy. In this case, I added Rival’s Fall (SHD 79) to the tried-and-true meta staples because of its insane flexibility.

You never know when you might need to defeat a leader or another unit that’s out of your reach, and Rival’s Fall can tackle any task as long as you have the 6 resources to pay for it.

I’m not usually a fan of including only one copy of a card in the deck, just because it’s hard to rely on drawing them, especially in a world where we are going to continue to get more incredible cards, and have still more difficult deckbuilding decisions to make. But The Darksaber (SHD 126) is just SO STRONG – and thematic when it comes to Moff Gideon – that it felt worth the include.

For even more shenanigans, put the saber on your Dark Troopers or Toro and add an even scarier Overwhelm unit to the board immediately!

If You’re Asking If You Can Trust Me… You Cannot

With so many avenues to take with Moff Gideon – as well as all the Leaders of Star Wars: Unlimited, both new and familiar – I won’t pretend that my ways are the best ways in which to achieve success.

Gideon presents a strategy that relies on his units being on the board and available to help control the battlefield. Having units on the board may not always be a luxury, with the presence of Control decks and damaging/bouncing effects very prevalent in the current environment.

With that said, I think the tools are there to provide you with a solid opportunity to make Gideon as impactful in the meta as the 2-Player starter leaders from Set 1.

My best advice would be not to take my word for it: build around with Gideon and see for yourself!

The beauty of a new set release is that every Leader has an opportunity to shine, or at least for someone to dream about them shining, and those dreams are the catalyst of innovation. I will always encourage the investigative approach, and when it comes to established tenets of what qualifies as a “good” Leader, Gideon has several of them:

1. He deploys on 5 resources
2. He has an ability that does not cost any additional resources
3. He is a Command Villain (access to previously-established staples)
4. He has a constant/static ability on his Leader Unit side
5. He has more than 5 health

With that in mind, I predict there will be an effective Moff Gideon deck that surprises people at some point in the near future! Time will tell if Gideon is best supplemented by Vigilance, or if there are ways to increase his efficiency in Aggression, Cunning or mono Command.

The possibilities are endless (I purposely chose not to say Unlimited here), but whether you chose to play with Gideon in your prerelease events, want to make him work because you like the character, or you are lucky enough to find a showcase version in a booster pack – yes, this can happen in Set 2! – I hope this article was at least able to get the gears turning for those who want to try him out.

Best of luck on your journey, and thanks to those who made it this far!

Kevin
Roll On Gaming
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