With today’s deck, we’re halfway through previews for Galactic Battles: Legacy. For the mid-season finale, we’re bringing out the big guns: The Mandalorian and The Child!
The Mandalorian is a renowned bounty hunter hired by former Imperial officers to track down The Child. Rather than leave the defenseless creature in the hands of The Empire, Mando rescued him and the pair became a clan of two.
The Mandalorian is a heavily armored shooter who wears down opposing resources. The Child is a gifted Force-sensitive who unleashes powerful abilities when well-rested. If attacked, the two defend one another fiercely.
"Take care of this little one."
"Or maybe, it'll take care of you."
The Mandalorian – HP 18 – Yellow+ Deck – Ranged
The Child – HP 8 – Weak Deck – Melee
The Mandalorian
Hover Pram
Special
Remove The Child from the board. He is not considered destroyed. At the beginning of your turn, you may place him back on the board on any empty space. Any time all friendly characters except The Child have been destroyed, immediately place him back on the board on any empty space.
Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle
A4
Choose a character The Mandalorian could only attack if he could attack through the defender. That character is also attacked with this card. Opponents that control at least one defender must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
Whistling Birds
Special
All characters within 2 spaces of The Mandalorian receive 2 damage. Opponents that control at least one of these characters must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
Beskar Armor
D5
If The Mandalorian is still alive, The Child may play this card as if it were his own. Opponents that control at least one character that can attack the defender must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
The Darksaber
A5
Opponents that control at least one character adjacent to The Mandalorian must choose and discard a card. If you destroy the defending character with this card, return it to your hand instead of discarding it.
The Child
Instinctive Lift
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time an opponent draws a card, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to any character that opponent controls. Turn that character on its side. That character cannot move, attack, or defend. At any time, any player may discard 3 cards to stand that character back up.
Instinctive Push
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time a friendly major character receives at least 3 damage, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to the damaging character. Move that character to any empty space. That character receives 3 damage.
Instinctive Rebound
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time an attack card is facedown, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to the attacker. The defender receives no damage from the attack. Instead, the attacker receives damage equal to the attack value on the attacker’s card.
1x Hover Pram
2x Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle
2x Whistling Birds
2x Beskar Armor
1x The Darksaber
2x Instinctive Lift
1x Instinctive Push
1x Instinctive Rebound
Since we get to spend so much time with The Mandalorian and The Child in their eponymous series, watching the show actually gives us a sense of their combat loop. When the duo gets in a scrape, Mando protects his young Foundling by putting him in a hovering pram while he fights. When the battle inevitably reaches its nadir, The Child emerges and uses the Force to save his surrogate father. For this deck, I wanted to capture that dramatic flow.
The first card, Hover Pram, is the key. Much like Maris Brood’s Force Cloak, it takes The Child off the board entirely. While in the pram, no one can get into attack position with him, so he’s only vulnerable to damage from abilities that don’t require line of sight. Unlike with Force Cloak, the Child can stay off the board as long as desired. Typically, this will mean keeping him in the pram until you can trigger one of his abilities. To understand the value of Hover Pram, we need to look at The Child’s cards.
The Child’s talents are all defense cards with a value of 1. This reinforces the idea that The Child is rather helpless on his own, but hopefully you’ll never be defending with these cards anyway. While Instinctive Lift, Instinctive Push, and Instinctive Rebound are in your hand, you can discard them at opportune times to get powerful effects– specifically ones introduced in Hasbro’s original Yoda deck. This allows Baby Yoda to dramatically turn the tide of an engagement by reflecting a big attack or throwing an aggressive enemy into a kill-box. These abilities are typically out of scope for the Galactic Set, but since they’re telegraphed and gated by Hover Pram, my hope is that they’ll be appropriately balanced.
While Instinctive Push and Instinctive Rebound can be game-winning reversals, it would feel wrong to exclude Hasbro Yoda’s other signature ability Force Lift. This one presented the opposite problem. Since Force Lift’s payment can be made by either opponent, it is often lackluster in multiplayer matches. While I could change the effect, I thought it would be more interesting to lean in to its limitation and give Mando abilities that would support the discards coming from either opponent.
Since The Mandalorian’s kit needs to support The Child’s, it revolves around two things:
With the right board positioning, every weapon in Mando’s arsenal can make both opponents discard a card. This is important because for these discards to matter (along with any from Instinctive Lift), they need to stack up. Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle can pierce the first target and hit a second, Whistling Birds rains damage in a large area, Beskar Armor punishes multiple attackers, and The Darksaber rewards Mando for getting into melee.
Since it’s the activator for all of The Child’s reactions, Mando’s other focus is in finding the Hover Pram. All told, Mando has 6 copies of cards that fetch the pram (The Darksaber does not because it represents the other great obligation in Mando’s life). This means if you want to use all of The Child’s tricks before cycling your deck, you want to maintain an ideal cadence of using a Mando talent to find the pram, putting Baby Yoda in the pram, using one of the baby’s talents, then rinsing and repeating.
Compared to many other decks, this one has a precarious but potent path to victory. If you can land the talents with the right timing and positioning, you can apply consistent pressure while soaking an unprecedented amount of damage for a shooter. Really, this deck manages to break just about every rule in Galactic Battles. It’s a Yellow+ Deck, but it has 18 health and a Weak Deck minor. It’s a shooter, but instead of relying on long-range attacks and reliable movement, it gets up close and relies on power defense. It’s essentially a shooter-bruiser hybrid.
Since this deck’s got a lot of disruption, other discard-centric characters like Aayla Secura, Cad Bane, IG-88, Jabba the Hutt, Jango Fett, and Luminara Unduli can make for solid teammates. Disruptive characters that also have strong generic minors like Emperor Palpatine, Lando Calrissian, and Nute Gunray may prove to be even better choices since you can’t exactly rely on The Child to tank early aggression.
Unless you get very lucky, the deck will probably shine in the mid to late game. Characters that can get hits in early or play around your discard effects like Mace Windu or Durge may prove difficult to beat.
I’ve written before how my favorite Epic Duels decks have a strong unifying theme that fits the character. The Mandalorian and The Child are a Character Deck in the truest sense. Their suite of cards would be nonsensical attached to anyone else.
I hope you enjoyed the first half of the Legacy deck reveals! No deck next week, but I should be back the following week to kick off the last five characters.
Galactic Trivia! – Before evolving into the card you see today, Hover Pram turned The Child on his side and allowed him to share spaces with The Mandalorian. This proved way too unwieldy as it required messy die roll and attack targeting rules to keep the baby safe.
The Mandalorian is a renowned bounty hunter hired by former Imperial officers to track down The Child. Rather than leave the defenseless creature in the hands of The Empire, Mando rescued him and the pair became a clan of two.
The Mandalorian is a heavily armored shooter who wears down opposing resources. The Child is a gifted Force-sensitive who unleashes powerful abilities when well-rested. If attacked, the two defend one another fiercely.
"Take care of this little one."
"Or maybe, it'll take care of you."
The Mandalorian – HP 18 – Yellow+ Deck – Ranged
The Child – HP 8 – Weak Deck – Melee
The Mandalorian
Hover Pram
Special
Remove The Child from the board. He is not considered destroyed. At the beginning of your turn, you may place him back on the board on any empty space. Any time all friendly characters except The Child have been destroyed, immediately place him back on the board on any empty space.
Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle
A4
Choose a character The Mandalorian could only attack if he could attack through the defender. That character is also attacked with this card. Opponents that control at least one defender must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
Whistling Birds
Special
All characters within 2 spaces of The Mandalorian receive 2 damage. Opponents that control at least one of these characters must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
Beskar Armor
D5
If The Mandalorian is still alive, The Child may play this card as if it were his own. Opponents that control at least one character that can attack the defender must choose and discard a card. Search your draw pile or discard pile for the Hover Pram card and put it in your hand. Then shuffle your draw pile if it was searched.
The Darksaber
A5
Opponents that control at least one character adjacent to The Mandalorian must choose and discard a card. If you destroy the defending character with this card, return it to your hand instead of discarding it.
The Child
Instinctive Lift
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time an opponent draws a card, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to any character that opponent controls. Turn that character on its side. That character cannot move, attack, or defend. At any time, any player may discard 3 cards to stand that character back up.
Instinctive Push
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time a friendly major character receives at least 3 damage, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to the damaging character. Move that character to any empty space. That character receives 3 damage.
Instinctive Rebound
D1
While The Child is removed from the board, any time an attack card is facedown, you may discard this card. If you do, place The Child back on the board adjacent to the attacker. The defender receives no damage from the attack. Instead, the attacker receives damage equal to the attack value on the attacker’s card.
1x Hover Pram
2x Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle
2x Whistling Birds
2x Beskar Armor
1x The Darksaber
2x Instinctive Lift
1x Instinctive Push
1x Instinctive Rebound
Since we get to spend so much time with The Mandalorian and The Child in their eponymous series, watching the show actually gives us a sense of their combat loop. When the duo gets in a scrape, Mando protects his young Foundling by putting him in a hovering pram while he fights. When the battle inevitably reaches its nadir, The Child emerges and uses the Force to save his surrogate father. For this deck, I wanted to capture that dramatic flow.
The first card, Hover Pram, is the key. Much like Maris Brood’s Force Cloak, it takes The Child off the board entirely. While in the pram, no one can get into attack position with him, so he’s only vulnerable to damage from abilities that don’t require line of sight. Unlike with Force Cloak, the Child can stay off the board as long as desired. Typically, this will mean keeping him in the pram until you can trigger one of his abilities. To understand the value of Hover Pram, we need to look at The Child’s cards.
The Child’s talents are all defense cards with a value of 1. This reinforces the idea that The Child is rather helpless on his own, but hopefully you’ll never be defending with these cards anyway. While Instinctive Lift, Instinctive Push, and Instinctive Rebound are in your hand, you can discard them at opportune times to get powerful effects– specifically ones introduced in Hasbro’s original Yoda deck. This allows Baby Yoda to dramatically turn the tide of an engagement by reflecting a big attack or throwing an aggressive enemy into a kill-box. These abilities are typically out of scope for the Galactic Set, but since they’re telegraphed and gated by Hover Pram, my hope is that they’ll be appropriately balanced.
While Instinctive Push and Instinctive Rebound can be game-winning reversals, it would feel wrong to exclude Hasbro Yoda’s other signature ability Force Lift. This one presented the opposite problem. Since Force Lift’s payment can be made by either opponent, it is often lackluster in multiplayer matches. While I could change the effect, I thought it would be more interesting to lean in to its limitation and give Mando abilities that would support the discards coming from either opponent.
Since The Mandalorian’s kit needs to support The Child’s, it revolves around two things:
- Forcing a discard from both opponents.
- Searching and recycling Hover Pram.
With the right board positioning, every weapon in Mando’s arsenal can make both opponents discard a card. This is important because for these discards to matter (along with any from Instinctive Lift), they need to stack up. Amban Phase-Pulse Rifle can pierce the first target and hit a second, Whistling Birds rains damage in a large area, Beskar Armor punishes multiple attackers, and The Darksaber rewards Mando for getting into melee.
Since it’s the activator for all of The Child’s reactions, Mando’s other focus is in finding the Hover Pram. All told, Mando has 6 copies of cards that fetch the pram (The Darksaber does not because it represents the other great obligation in Mando’s life). This means if you want to use all of The Child’s tricks before cycling your deck, you want to maintain an ideal cadence of using a Mando talent to find the pram, putting Baby Yoda in the pram, using one of the baby’s talents, then rinsing and repeating.
Compared to many other decks, this one has a precarious but potent path to victory. If you can land the talents with the right timing and positioning, you can apply consistent pressure while soaking an unprecedented amount of damage for a shooter. Really, this deck manages to break just about every rule in Galactic Battles. It’s a Yellow+ Deck, but it has 18 health and a Weak Deck minor. It’s a shooter, but instead of relying on long-range attacks and reliable movement, it gets up close and relies on power defense. It’s essentially a shooter-bruiser hybrid.
Since this deck’s got a lot of disruption, other discard-centric characters like Aayla Secura, Cad Bane, IG-88, Jabba the Hutt, Jango Fett, and Luminara Unduli can make for solid teammates. Disruptive characters that also have strong generic minors like Emperor Palpatine, Lando Calrissian, and Nute Gunray may prove to be even better choices since you can’t exactly rely on The Child to tank early aggression.
Unless you get very lucky, the deck will probably shine in the mid to late game. Characters that can get hits in early or play around your discard effects like Mace Windu or Durge may prove difficult to beat.
I’ve written before how my favorite Epic Duels decks have a strong unifying theme that fits the character. The Mandalorian and The Child are a Character Deck in the truest sense. Their suite of cards would be nonsensical attached to anyone else.
I hope you enjoyed the first half of the Legacy deck reveals! No deck next week, but I should be back the following week to kick off the last five characters.
Galactic Trivia! – Before evolving into the card you see today, Hover Pram turned The Child on his side and allowed him to share spaces with The Mandalorian. This proved way too unwieldy as it required messy die roll and attack targeting rules to keep the baby safe.