For a while now, I have been slogging through match after match against the dreaded Jango/eBala/Trooper deck, or the ever present Blue Villain pick-a-character decks. While I have found some of these decks to be something I enjoy playing, I wanted to branch out a bit from my comfort zone. This has given rise to me going back and tweaking one of my first decks which was focused around Qui-Gon Jinn (AW37), whose ability can be rather frustrating to play against. Anytime you are able to gain a two-for-one benefit from a characters ability, you are setting yourself up nicely to come out ahead in a game. In my opinion, Qui-Gon Jinn does a good job of doing this by converting defensive staying power into damage-dealing potential with his ability to convert shields into damage pings. So before we get too far into the thoughts behind the deck, let’s take a look at the current version of the deck I have been running with good success.
The Deck
BATTLEFIELD
Echo Base, Hoth (AW166)
CHARACTER
2x Qui-Gon Jinn, Ataru Master (AW37)
2x Rey, Force Prodigy (AW38)
UPGRADE
2x Force Protection (AW39)
2x Jedi Robes (AW40)
1x Luke Skywalker’s Lightsaber (AW41)
1x One With The Force (AW42)
2x Force Throw (AW57)
2x Force Training (AW58)
2x Lightsaber (AW59)
1x Mind Probe (AW60)
2x Datapad (AW62)
SUPPORT
2x It Binds All Things (AW150)
EVENT
2x Defensive Stance (AW115)
2x Riposte (AW121)
1x Willpower (AW122)
2x Deflect (AW145)
1x The Power of the Force (AW148)
2x Use The Force (AW149)
1x Dodge (AW155)
2x Take Cover (AW157)
Shields
Instead of going over the deck card-for-card, I figured I would break down the key concepts for the deck, and the place to start is Shield generation. In total, there are potentially 21 different ways to get a Shield onto Qui-Gon Jinn in this deck. These include dice sides, specials, card effects, and your battlefield. As opposed to most decks where Shields are there solely for their defensive potential, in this deck, because of Qui-Gon and Riposte, they are also a major source of damage. In most games, stacking 2-3 shields reliably on both characters is easily achieved, which helps with the staying power of both of your characters. At 21 health, this deck appears to be a bit fragile.
By running Echo Base, your opponent has a rough decision right off the bat if they win the roll. They can either fuel your Shield-generating storm by picking your Battlefield, or they can start Qui-Gon off with two shields and the ability to start triggering his ability right away. If the choice is in your court, you are sitting pretty. You have the option to either start the game off with Qui-Gon loaded and ready to start firing shields off, or you can choose your own Battlefield and pressure your opponent each turn to try and claim before you do in order to avoid some potential damage from Qui-Gon or letting you keep your characters alive longer. Also remember that the Datapad’s special can be used to turn your dice to a side showing Shields, allowing for even more ways to power up Qui-Gon. All in all, you have a solid little damage engine based on playing a defensive game.
Damage
While the majority of the deck’s offensive firepower comes from abusing Shields in various ways, there is also quite a bit of good old-fashioned melee damage in the deck as well. Qui-Gon has solid melee sides on his dice that compliment Rey’s modifier sides nicely, and once you add a few Lightsabers into the mix, the deck can quickly and efficiently pump out some pain. You also have some Blue staples in Force Throw and Mind Probe, to punish an opponent for keeping dice in the pool or too many cards in their hands. What makes much of the damage potential scary is that a number of them have Redeploy or, in the case of One With The Force, become a Support if they are attached to a character when it dies. This usually means your opponent decides that Rey will be the easier of the two characters to burn down. That means that you can load her down with Lightsabers and One With The Force, knowing that if/when she dies, you will not be losing your investments. Instead they will stick around and continue to be lethal.
Control
Sadly, Blue Hero decks don’t have quite the oppressive control that their Villain counterparts do, but they do still have some very good options. Force Throw, Use the Force, and Deflect are your biggest damage mitigation abilities, allowing you to either stop a deck cold because they cannot re-roll, or slow them down enough to be able to trigger your effects first. You also have enough Discard effects from Rey, Force Protection, and Mind Probe to impact your opponent enough that they will start to feel the pressure if you start trying to mill them out. Additionally, later in a game you will have some upgrades out that have Disrupt, so if needed, you can starve your opponent of resources. Overall, you have a solid package in the deck for control, but realistically, you are relying on your Shields to take the brunt of keeping you alive.
The Final Word
This is a deck that I have been very high on lately because of the reliability that it offers, both in offense and defense. Where most decks have to sacrifice one for the other, this deck uses one to fuel the other, which makes for a potentially explosive strategy. With the coming release of Spirit of Rebellion, we also have at least one auto-include in the deck with Your Eyes Can Deceive You (SR107). With the amount of Shield dice already in this deck, this will allow you extra control over your opponents dice without sacrificing anything the deck is trying to do already. We may also see some other cards from this set that help bolster the deck as well. Only time will tell. There are already a few cards that are easy to switch out in the deck. Willpower, Dodge, Deflect, and It Binds All Things all have a spot in the deck, but with potentially better options, could be removed for something that fits the style of the deck better.
As always, thanks for reading. If you have had success with Qui-Gon Jinn, I would love to hear your comments on this deck type. And as always, May the Force be with you.
event, my testing partner Chase and I had been going back and forth on a few different decks. I was high on Villain Blue deck variations while Chase had been having a lot of success with Hero Red. I think in the two weeks leading up to the event, we put in about 10-15 games throwing our best takes on both decks against each other. We kept finding that the Hero Red (more about this later) was winning at a high percentage against non-melee decks but had a somewhat unfavorable match up against Blue Villains. 
