That's No Moon! A Wrap Up of the first Star Wars: Unlimited Planetary Qualifiers in Queensland

The first Star Wars Unlimited Planetary Qualifier event in Queensland happened over the weekend, and despite the long day, everyone enjoyed the great event. So let’s run through what happened, who won, and how the day played out.

The Main Event

There was a palpable tension in the air as the doors opened at 9am for check-in. Everyone was ready to play some Star Wars: Unlimited and claim the championship title for the first time in Queensland. After an hour of checking-in, frantically correcting decklists, talking tactics with other players, and jovial trash-talking between friends, it all kicked off, with swiss-rounds finishing around 6.00pm and the Top 8 cut finishing with a concession prior to the final match at 9.30pm.

In total, there were 68 players in attendance, with a wide range of decks represented. 26 different leaders were played at the event, just shy of half of all currently released leaders for the game so far. Jango Fett, Concealing the Conspiracy (TWI#016) had the largest showing with ten decks in total, followed by Han Solo, Audacious Smuggler (SOR#017) at eight, and Emperor Palpatine, Galactic Ruler (SOR#006) and Quinlan Vos, Sticking the Landing (TWI#018) tying the third spot with six decks each.

When we add in the Base combination, the top three decks were Jango Fett, Concealing the Conspiracy (TWI#016) + Tarkintown (SOR#025) at nine, Han Solo, Audacious Smuggler (SOR#017) + Yellow at six, and Quinlan Vos, Sticking the Landing (TWI#018) + Tarkintown (SOR#025) five, showing that Cunning is quite a dominant aspect in the meta at the moment, though the classic Sabine Wren, Galvanized Revolutionary (SOR#014) + Energy Conversion Lab (SOR#022) still showing up with a 40% win rate.

After the seven gruelling swiss-rounds, the event moved into the top 8 cut with the following players:

• Jason Di Maria (Han Solo, Audacious Smuggler + Yellow)
• Wayne M. (Director Krennic, Aspiring to Authority + Energy Conversion Lab)
• Braydon Walker (Iden Versio, Inferno Squad Commander + Yellow)
• Mitchell R. (Cad Bane, He Who Needs No Introduction + Yellow)
• Nobbie N. (Quinlan Vos, Sticking the Landing + Tarkintown)
• James B. (Obi-Wan Kenobi, Patient Mentor + Blue)
• Jackson M. (Gar Saxon, Viceroy of Mandalore + Yellow)
• Jacob M. (Quinlan Vos, Sticking the Landing + Blue)

After two rounds of elimination, an undefeated Jason Di Maria was facing Braydon Walker for the Planetary Qualifier title. The stage was set for a control showdown; Han Solo Yellow VS Iden Versio Yellow; Waylays, Restocks, Cunnings and Vigilances ready to discard hands and mill decks. But, with Braydon unable to make it to America personally, he graciously conceded the match, crowning Jason the first ever QLD Planetary Qualifier Champion.

The Top Two Decklists

Below are Jason’s Han Yellow Champion Decklist, and Braydon’s Iden Yellow Runner-Up Decklist.

The Standings

The Side Events

That wasn’t all that happened on Saturday; the excitement continued as a range of side events were available for players to participate in over the course of the whole day. While the Twilight of the Republic sealed events didn’t fire, the Chaos Draft after the dinner break was a breakout hit. Players drafted a booster each of Spark of Rebellion, Shadows of the Galaxy, and Twilight of the Republic, before playing five best-of-one rounds. It was the perfect way to cap off an awesome day of Star Wars: Unlimited.

The Team

I want to say a big thank you to the judging team who worked with me on the day. Tim, Nick, and Piper put in a long day and were unparalleled in their ability to organise and adjudicate the event in a fun and fair way for players and upholding the integrity and friendliness we strive to exhibit at each and every event we run here at Vault Games. And thanks to Cassie for hanging out all day at the event counter to ensure there were plenty of snacks and drinks available for the players.

Our Assessment Overall

This was an amazing day of Star Wars: Unlimited. The community came together to enjoy the game, and pour over each other's deck builds and strategies, coming away with some new ideas to improve their gameplay, their decks, and their local community. After going through all of the costs involved against the sales both before and during the event, we can confidently say that we will be running an event like this in the future. Our friends upstairs, The Little Laneway, really came to the table with the venue hire, ensuring this event could run close by without breaking the bank.

In terms of what we would do in the future:

• A streamed or recorded feature table. For this specific event, we ran out of time to get it sorted from a third-party, and the costs of having someone run the stream at the event would have pushed the event into the negatives, so we decided to give it a miss to ensure we could run the event successfully first, then focus on streaming/recording at later events.
• More Side Events! The Side Events are what really made the event a success for the store. Without these, the event barely broke even, so having a few more side events, and more space in those side events, will ensure the event can be worthwhile for the store and give you plenty of more chances to play some Star Wars Unlimited!
• A 2-Day Event? This one is something we’re discussing. We would love to turn the PQ’s into a full-blown Star Wars: Unlimited celebration event, and give the Top 8 players an overnight break before entering into the elimination rounds, but doubling the cost of venue hire and the increased judge wages may push the event beyond what we can handle so it would really depend on what side events can run, and what the size of the community looks like at that time.