In a few days, the first people outside the "circle" of volunteers who worked on the Destiny of the Force project are going to have a chance to delve into the fruits of our labor. That's really what it was, too - a labor of love for the entire community. Many people worked hard on this project, and while it is not perfect, it is the very best we could make it, and we did it out of a desire to continue to give everyone who loves this game some new stat cards to play with, whether that be at the competitive table at next year's GenCon or just at the kitchen table.

When Wizards of the Coast announced their intention to not renew the license with LFL, several of us already knew it was coming and had been discussing what we were going to do about it. The discussion ranged from finding a way to acquire the license ourselves (pipe dream, I know) to creating an official committee that could keep the game alive. Kudos to Dean for picking up the torch and running with it, and for picking people he knew that he could not only count on but who would be level-headed enough to work together for the common good. Most people who know me on these boards know that I can be a hot-head sometimes but I am very humbled to have been part of this process, and have really appreciated the chance to work with guys like fingers&teeth and billiv15 and lobostele on something that we all wanted to see succeed. Honestly, I can say this may be the first topic of conversation in which we were all on the same page about, and we worked together amazingly well.

But enough of the "touchy-feely" stuff, lol. I want to talk about my perspective on this set. We set out to do three things when we began working on this: 1. To make the minor factions competitive against the major factions without supplanting those factions. 2. To encourage the use of poorly-designed WotC characters, such as Darth Revan (which you've already seen) and Mandalore the Preserver (which you are about to see). 3. To open up game play by combatting the "stigma" elements and characters. Among these are the Lancer, Yobuck, and Dodonna. People who continue to play using this new 60-set of cards will hopefully feel encouraged about the fact that they can still play these characters if they choose, and still have a fair chance of winning a game with those pieces, but not as assuredly as before. Likewise, a player who chooses to combat those traditional elements with something new - or more to the point, by combining something new with something from the WotC-produced elements of the game - can do so with just as equal of a chance.

There is a fourth thing we set out to do, and that is to make the characters people want to see. We pored over the pages of requests for weeks before settling on a final set list. Is every requested figure on it? No, but many of the characters on the list made the cut because it's what you asked for. We put the top choices on the list, as many as we could. And we intend to follow that practice as more sets of cards are produced. In fact, I will tell you that the second set is already under development, and I think if you like Destiny of the Force, then you are going to LOVE V-Set 2.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how the community plays this set and what squads you guys come up with. Thanks for your support of this project, and in a smaller way, of me as a designer. I hope that you have as much fun playing with this stuff as I did designing it, and I'm sure everyone else involved with this endeavor feels the same way!

--Boris

Thanks for all your work, Boris and crew! I can't wait for my cards to arrive!

I really can't wait to share some of the builds that people like TINT, Echo, and Myself have put together with these figs. It's really exciting to see all of this finally be seen by everyone.

We need to be sure and thank Dean for even getting this thing going as well as everyone who had a hand in the card design and playtesting. I don't think i can name everyone who was involved nor will i even try lol. I hope everyone likes what the designers have come up with, its all very interesting stuff that really got me excited about the game again after the "Gencon High" as i call it wore off.

Thanks again to everyone involved in Destiny of the Force. I can't wait to begin work on V-set part duex.

And if the rest of the set is even half as good and balanced as the previewed pieces are, I'd say you succeeded. You managed to maintain the flavor of the different factions while enhancing their options, balancing them, and you even brought back melee to a degree (still hoping there is a huge booster in this set). So great work, if you guys ever need help with donations or support you have me and my crew to back you up. Good job.

(Also Mandalore the Preserver! Awesome.)

Many, many thanks to all of you who worked on this set. I know there have been some in the community who have turned a sour nose up at the idea of the V-Sets, but there are many others who love it and appreciate it. Once again thank you very much to all.

I echo the thanks to everyone who helped to make this thing happen. I'm incredibly excited to see the new cards, and to start fiddling around with new builds.

I have to say thank you as well to Dean, the design team, the playtesters, the donors, and anyone else who had a hand in this set. Just like most of you, I have spent way too much money on this game over the years to let my cards and figures collect dust because the game got boring. And that's exactly what would happen if there wasn't someone who took the initiative to keep this game interesting for all of us. I think anyone who chooses not to play with the DotF cards is losing out. I have not seen the whole set yet, but I am already more excited about it that I ever was about anything that WotC put out. So thank you to everyone for giving the SWM community an early Christmas present!

I think I have never played Vong when I wanted to win. Even if the only Vong piece in the set is the Yammosk, that will change. I hope anyone who still thinks the Vong should never have been brought into the game will change their minds about it when they see the cards, and from what I've seen so far, there's a pretty good chance.

Now we just need to make the case for Vong being in Star Wars at all!

If you are serious about that, make a thread in the non-minis area and we can chat it up.

+1 Thanks to all involved. Can't wait to get the cards.

Not too serious. I liked the NJO, and think Star Wars is at least .001% better with the vong in it, but had they never existed Star Wars wouldn't suck. Not worth a whole thread for me, sorry. I think my statement might have looked like I was saying they shouldn't be; I was trying to say that this will show that Vong belong in SWM, to convince some that Vong are "true" SW is harder.

But since the Vong are now a significant part of SW, it's good to see that they are also now significant (to me, although some would say they already were) in the game as well.

In some ways, I'm glad the Yammosk didn't come out at the height of the game. I am sure many, many would be upset with Jedi being hurt by them being a viable option, if most now are still playable.

I'm not I wish the Vong could have been competitive, because that would mean there would have been more of them.

Well, I can see a group being highly upset having to face Vong because they will generally beat Jedi squads. Remember, we had someone upset over NTMTO because it "ruined" Revan. I would've loved more Vong, but I don't doubt many would've hated it.

People seem to forget that just because you get a bad matchup doesn't mean you won't win. I'd of loved to see more Vong from WOTC but the fact remains that after Yomin Carr they didn't even try and make a cool or interesting unique.

These Vong uniques in DotF (there are 3 of them) are all very cool and all bring some interesting flavor and playablilty to the faction. WOTC seems to hate its fanbase, the Design team doesn't, and for that I'm very thankful.

Love the stats that have come out so far. I just want to say a big thank you to all who effort into this project. I can't wait for my set to arrive. Mandalore the Preserver will probably be my favorite peice of the set, just cause I love the Mandalorian faction and the new peices introduced into the game in this set so far. Another Mandalore is always welcome.

For Mandalore!

WOTC had some sort of approval to go through for sets from what I recall, or we'd have gotten more support on smaller factions. but hey even if they under represented a lot of the factions or didn't balance them out strong enough, at least we got a lot of character diversity otherwise. But that diversity was a double edge sword to me... lots of characters.. but handled strangely. Way too many Kyle Katarns or.. Djas Phur cantina stuff instead of like.. a Pellaeon or other important character.

So hey, thankfully to everyones hard work we have the V-set now to fix a lot of this =)

Blasphemy. I loved the character selections in BHs, all those random figs that had SWCCG cards, I wish they had made more of them. I would be more upset at the A&E and TFUs of the game. Seriously, I like my OT guys, but they had way, way too many that year.

Back on topic, from what I've seen, the designers have done a bang up job with what they wanted to do with this set. They have a good balance on designing fun pieces as well as competitive pieces. Bring on more.

well don't get me wrong about my previous comment. I love all the background stuff in SW in general, and at the time and maybe even now BH was my favorite set. I liked that we weren't getting battle droids and clones again lol. I just wish we had gotten more actual characters non-unique rares hurt us more than what I suggested as poor selection.

oh and the other reason BH set was great. we were playing the RPG at the time then in college and it gave us a lot more to work with. =)

Prior to getting my set I would like to thank everyone involved for all of their time and effort to get things done the right way. I am sure once I see and play it my gratitude will be magnified.

One point I'd like to touch on is that Boris noted that a few of those on the team had spent time on the boards not always in agreement like they were for this set. I would say that, for my own growth in the game, it was good to see those divergent points of view expressed. Your 'hot-headedness' (And others') wasn't always a bad thing. But now back on point...thank you everyone involved!