Friday, September 21st, 2007
  
   

Dark Side Force Drain
By Marc McNeill

I love force drain. The strategy enables you to take the initiative in games and forces your opponent to react.

Now, I usually follow a philosophy that says that there are three kinds of Force drain: Force Lock, Force Drain and a Mild Drain.

A ForceLlock is a gamble deck which attempts to get certain key cards in play. These key cards lock down your opponent, eventually giving you the victory. The nice thing about this strategy is that your opponent usually can't do much to stop you. If you get the right cards, you will win virtually every time. The downside is that if you get a bad draw, the game is over.

A Force Drain is your basic Force Drain deck (hence the name). You use the drain as the centerpiece of your strategy. However, your deck does not depend on the drain entirely. While you can usually win with a good draw, it is not guaranteed. Likewise, with bad draws you can still win. Such a deck is more versatile and more consistent. A good example would be a Maul's Strategy deck.

A mild Force Drain basically runs Force drain as a sub-strategy. The deck will usually play without the Force drain, but if the conditions are right you can use Force drain to win. A good card in such a deck are Kouhun's. Often times, you don't even realize a deck has a mild Force drain when you see it on paper. Only when you play either against it or with it, do you realize that the deck often uses Force (or lack of) to win.

This deck is a Force Lock.

 
 
Dark Side Force Lock
 
     
       
     
 



     
     
 

      Totals:
13 Character
12 Ground
12 Space
0 Battle
13 Mission
9 Location
0 Equipment
60 Total Cards		  
     
 

Download these decks and other deck articles for LackeyCCG here.

Now for a closer look.

    
   
   
   

Character: (13)
4x Imperial Banker
2x Mas Amedda (A)
1x Nute Gunray (B)
4x Probot
1x R2-Q5 (A)
1x San Hill (A)

I actually intend to win the Character arena within this deck via Carbon Freezing Chamber. If I'm facing a swarm in Character, I will try to retreat my Characters. In such cases my opponent will probably have a small force in Ground and/or Space. I'll allow Carbon Freezing Chamber to slowly knock out his units. If he is running a tank or two then that's great as well. This deck is designed to beat tanks. Chewie with Chewie's Bowcaster is dead in a turn and the same goes for Luke (S), Yoda (J) or any others.

If you have never used the Mas Amedda (A) and Probot combo you should try it.

    
   
   
   

Ground: (12)
2x Jabba's Sail Barge (A)
4x Jawa Sandcrawler
2x Patrol Mode Vulture Droid
4x Pirate Swoop

I also want to win the Ground arena; however, I don't need to do it quickly. So I want to avoid building the Patrol Mode Vulture Droid in setup. My draw units and Pirate Swoops are what I want to build in setup. They (1) help me draw and build my Locations and (2) they help stall the game till I can build a PMVD. With all the draw and build units, it's not difficult to get out a PMVD on the 2nd or 3rd turn.

Also, I recommend tapping your draw and build units each turn even if you don't need too. In this deck, you want to end your turns by building your Force Drain Missions and new Locations. That way, if your opponent discards one of your Locations, you can get them back in place next turn. This gives your opponent very little chance to break the lock. And always tap your Pirate Swoops.

    
   
   
   

Space: (13)
1x Death Star II (A)
4x Death Star II (D)
4x Kessel Runner
4x YV-664 Light Freighter

Space is pretty basic. The 12 main units help me gain build. Combined with Mas Amedda (A) they are quite cost efficient. The Death Star II (A) is included to place atop the Death Star II (D). Simply retreat the Death Star II (D) before it dies and place (A) on top. This should give you two attacks in the Ground arena before it dies.

Also, I recommend building the Death Star II (D) as late in setup as possible. When you do this, you opponent often times can't respond quickly enough and you can (1) really rack in the build gain or (2) you can win Space because you opponent can't retreat his Space units due to the fact that Carbon Freezing Chamber will return his Character to his hand.

    
   
   
   

Mission: (9)
1x Alter the Deal
4x Dark Rendezvous
4x Insignificant Power
4x Quicker, Easier, More Seductive

The Missions are almost as important as your Locations. Dark Rendezvous, Insignificant Power, and Quicker, Easier, More Seductive are what you will use to continue the lock. Don't be afraid to mulligan them though. You have 12 Force Drain Missions and lots of draw cards.

Alter the Deal helps you draw in more cards. Also, you can use it to run through your deck faster if you have already built all of your Insignificant Power cards.

Location: (4)
4x Carbon-Freezing Chamber
4x Forests of Endor
1x Occupied Tatooine

These Locations are what will win the game for you. Carbon Freezing Chamber is absolutely devastating and, in my opinion, the best Location the DS has. In this deck, your opponent will never have the three Force needed to keep their Character out. Goodbye Chewie's Bowcaster.

Unless your opponent is running Ewoks, Forests of Endor is almost as devastating as Carbon Freezing Chamber. Most turns, your opponent will have zero Force and won't be able to damage your units. At the same time, you sit there and attack with a PMVD each turn.

Occupied Tatooine is a bit of a gamble, but it has great potential too. With all the draw units: Probot, Jawa Sandcrawler, Jabba Sailbarge and Alter the Deal; it isn't uncommon for you to run out of your deck. Especially, if your opponent keeps pumping out Ground units. Occupied Tatooine, which you will need to place in the Space arena, allows you to bring back Insignificant Power each turn. Now, the lock is secured for quite some time, if not for every turn.

If I draw Occupied Tatooine in my initial draw, I will often mulligan it. It's a tough call and it depends on what cards you have in your hand, but it's more important to get the lock started than it is to have to Occupied Tatooine.

    
   
   
   

Conclusion:
If you are having trouble with the new LS tanks, then this is a deck to consider. This deck is Chewie's Bowcaster's worst nightmare. Of course, it has its own nemesis in Ewok decks. Ultimately, it's a fun deck and a nice change of pace. Just don't play it too much or your opponent might get tired of being able to do absolutely nothing for turns on end.

Other Possiblities:
Twilight of the Republic is a very intriguing option. This stops your opponent from discarding your Locations. Also, Blockade (TPM) is a nice option. Additionally, you might try to get really fancy and run Imperial Blockade. Such a deck certainly has a lot more potential, but your main objective (of creating a Force Lock) will be harder to pull off.

If you want to add some fighting Characters, Darth Vader (C), Darth Sidious (E) and Aurra Sing (B) are my favorites. Vader helps keep your build gain alive, Sidious helps in either Character or Ground and Aurra has a great "bang for the buck" in this deck.

Thoughts or comments? Visit the message board thread for this article here.
    
   
About the Author
Marc is a student in Boulder, Colorado and starting playing around the time RotS came out.		    
     
         
 
 
 


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