The new expansion consists of 9 completely new battle cards. The plastic pieces that come along with it allow you to build a brand new AT-ST or upgrade yours from the core set into a fully fleshed-out one. In addition to the terrain and walker, there are three copies each of four different objectives and three copies of each of four different deployment maps.
What Does This Mean For Blue Players?
With the full release of Vital Assets, you must consider what cards in your deck may become obsolete with the release of these new battle cards. Blue players will now have to "cut" 12 possible selections for their decks instead of just 3 (4 copies of each card in the core set and 1 copy of a Priority Supplies expansion).
What Does This Mean For Rebels?
In almost every case, you don't have any real battle cards from the core set to "cut," so you can expect a general increase of four battle cards in your deck pool. With the added AT-ST and terrain, I'd be more inclined to play a list that includes some heavy-hitting units like Darth Vader or Ciena Ree with the expectation of placing objectives close together behind an Imperial barricade. This would make it difficult for speeder bikes and troopers on foot to get across the map quickly without getting trapped by the vehicle behind them. In theory, this could make for a very interesting mono-faction list!
What Does This Mean For Imperials?
With the release of Vital Assets comes two new deployment maps, which means each time you play someone who doesn't own the expansion, you can expect to play one of these maps instead. Luckily for us, Luke Skywalker, with his natural reroll, is still legal with this expansion release!
It will take some time for most players to fully adapt their lists and figure out what cards are obsolete with the release of Vital Assets. We recommend not swapping out your Objective cards until possible opponents have adjusted accordingly. This means that an Imperial player should keep objective cards like Power of the Dark Side or New Ways To Motivate Them in their deck until they've had a chance to see how people will change up their lists forward.