Navigating the Galaxy: Our Star Wars Unlimited Journey

A self-intro post

Oct 09, 2024

Table of Contents:

Hello There

Hey everyone! I’m Jerry Shen from Southern California, and I’ve been playing Star Wars Unlimited since the game launched (shout out to my main LGS - Cardboard Games!). Since the game’s release, I’ve been diving into everything from casual games to competitive events. Alongside me at these events is my girlfriend, Alyssa, who is doing pretty well in the competitive scene herself!

While these posts will focus on my own experiences, strategies, and progress with SWU, you may see Alyssa pop up in our SWU adventures since we’ve attended almost every event together. But for the most part, this space will be about my thoughts on the decks I’m testing, the matches I’ve played, tournament experience, etc. Going to keep these posts super informal; we’ll see how this goes.

Our SWU competitive record so far:

Set 1 Store Showdown:

Our Haul (enough Mace Windus to run our own Store Showdown lol):

1x Champion - Alyssa
2x Finalist - Alyssa
5x Top 4
10x Top 8
13x Takedowns (Dice House gave out an extra Takedown to Top 4 iirc)

Stores:

Emerald Knights: 5/18
Kingslayer Games Fountain Valley: 5/19
Pyscho Turtle: 5/25 (Alyssa couldn’t participate)
Dice House Games: 5/26 (Alyssa made it to Finals)
Cardboard Games: 6/1 (Alyssa missed Top Cut)
Diamond 9 - 6/2 (Alyssa got Champion)

Diamond 9:

(Diamond 9: Alyssa beating Jason 2-1 in the Finals; Sabine Yellow vs Luke Green)

Overall, Alyssa ultimately got us both the two Finalists and one Champion Maces. I made Top Cut at every event, but never went beyond Top 4. I like to think that I’m a very consistent player (copium haha).

Throughout Set 1 Store Showdowns, Alyssa was playing Sabine Yellow. I was playing Luke Green at Emerald Knights and Kingslayer, Palp ECL at Pyscho Turtle, Palp Blue at Dice House and Cardboard Games, and Boba Yellow at Diamond 9.

Set 2 Store Showdowns (so far):

Stores:

Pyscho Turtle 9/19 (https://melee.gg/Tournament/View/154209)
(upcoming) Kingslayer Lake Forest 10/26

Pyscho Turtle:

(Pyscho Turtle: Lady Proxima promo not shown)
Alyssa made Top 4 (technically #3; Swiss only, no Top Cut). I didn’t make Top 8 (was #11).

Alyssa was playing Sabine ECL, I was playing Bossk Blue.

(Pyscho Turtle: This pic was taken during the last game)

Set 2 Planetary Qualifiers (so far):

Stores:

Pasadena 10/6 (https://melee.gg/Tournament/View/152902)
(upcoming) Las Vegas 10/12

Pasadena PQ:

(Pasadena: taken before the PQ had started; there was ~¼ of the play space behind me)

(Pasadena: Legal Authority promos, a few extra packs, and initiative token not shown)

I made Top 8, Alyssa didn’t. Alyssa was playing Sabine ECL, I was playing Boba1 Tarkintown. Will make a post about this event’s experience in the near future. This is the event that spurred the creation of this Substack as it personally confirms for me that “huh, maybe I am decent at this game?”

Our/Mostly my background:

Even though we don’t have extensive or note-worthy TCG experience (I did reach Hearthstone Legends once; we’ve played MTG super casually, and never went beyond the locals level in Yu-Gi-Oh in the few months we were playing it), I do come from a competitive Go background (the board game that AlphaGo plays). I started learning Go at age six and played until around high school. I peaked at AGA 4 Dan.

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_ranks_and_ratings)

My highest achievement was winning the Redmond Cup Junior Division (12 years old age cap) in 2009 (https://www.usgo-archive.org/redmond-cup) at Go Congress.