Should you collect Star Wars: Unlimited Trading Cards?

Written by Charlie Pettit for Tabletop Gaming magazine

Anyone who lived through the heartbreak of trading away a shiny Charizard in their youth has probably thought about what they should probably collect in future. The early stage of the set is often the best time to do so, so we’ve got everything you need to know…

Related article: Everything you need to know to play Star Wars: Unlimited

Star Wars: Unlimited Card Types

First we'll need to know what we're looking for in a Star Wars: Unlimited Card, so we'll talk about the types of card you may find, and how easy they are to find. 

There are four rarities of cards specifically. These are Common, Uncommon, Rare, and Legendary. For every booster pack you may open, you should find nine common cards, three uncommon cards, and a rare or legendary card. Those refer to how likely the card is to appear in its standard form – but of course, that’s not where it ends.

For a legendary card, you can expect to find one in around every eight packs.

There’s one final card within a booster pack that you’ll get on top of the above, which is a foil card. These are basically nicer versions of cards within the set. In even rarer occasions, you’ll find a hyperspace card instead – which are a different version of the same card. Whilst they still function and play the same way, instead of the artwork being within a frame, it fills the entire card.

Hyperspace cards might appear in one in three packs, but hyperspace rare or legendary packs will only appear in every fifteen, and for the foil versions of the hyperspace or legendary cards, you’ll likely see one every fifty packs. The odds don’t look good, but never tell me the odds!

The “chase cards” for the set though are the Showcase cards. These are alternative art cards that are exclusive to the leader cards, that have also received the foil treatment. The likelihood of pulling one is slim, let alone completing the collection. If you had a perfect pull rate, you’d get one in every twelve BOXES. There are 24 booster packs to a box – so you’d better like Star Wars!

How much are Star Wars: Unlimited Cards Worth?

Values for the cards are difficult to ascribe at this stage, as the game hasn’t been out for long enough, and admittedly fluctuate. Collectors are scrambling to figure out the best option for valuing– suggestions at this stage are that the immediate value could be just less than the cost to find one if you did it organically (eg, a showcase card could cost just less than the value of 12 boxes), but this is always skewed by card popularity, and what appears on the market.

It’s also marked by when you sell. Sometimes keeping a valuable card can increase its value for when the set is no longer available. Sometimes, the cult of the new takes over and it depreciates the original set’s value. Other times, like in the case of Disney Lorcana, a reprint makes it easier to find the rarer cards, and again, the value drops.

These also vary site to site and country to country. The most expensive cards at the likes of Total Cards at the time of writing are the Emperor Palpatine Showcase at around £600, and the Boba Fett Disintegrator Hyperspace at £248, but TCG Player's marketplace has the market values listed as $448 for Emperor Palpatine, and $107 for the same Boba Fett Card – though the Boba Fett Showcase, Collecting the Bounty, is at market price $765. 

Often in trading card markets, having your card graded by the likes of PSA will increase its value, as it is then authenticated, protected, and graded. Given how new Star Wars: Unlimited currently is, only 316 cards at the time of writing have been graded by PSA, meaning their impact is less well known on the value of doing so at the moment. 

If you think you've got a card of value, the best thing to do is to check its current sale rates and conditions on the likes of eBay (who now offer authentication on trading cards in the US) and Facebook. 

Should you collect Star Wars: Unlimited Trading Cards?

Should you bother? We asked Tom Barker, the trading cards, memorabilia and pop culture specialist at Excalibur Auctions, a UK-based auction house whether it was worth it. “In short, yes!” Barker answered.  “If you look at the likes of Pokémon which is relatively recent – from the late 1990s, the cards have become very collectable with rare cards achieving some eye watering prices at auction. However, this can’t be guaranteed! Some things go up, others go down – unfortunately, no one can predict what will appeal to people both now and in the future.”

“Star Wars continues to hold a huge appeal across many genres of collecting – we regularly sell memorabilia from the movies, as well as Star Wars comics and toys – all of which achieve high prices at auction. I think the trading card game will appeal to fans of the franchise of all ages due to its popularity, but also the ability to collect something from the series whatever your budget. The fact that new art is being developed for the cards will appeal to those who love the art of the film posters and comics, and we can see them being collected to display as well as play with.”

Whether you choose to collect, play, or a mixture of both, Star Wars: Unlimited represents an opportunity for fans of Star Wars, of TCGs, and of collecting alike.

Looking for more TCGs? Here are some the best trading card games out now!