I saw the new card there as well, and I'm really hoping the transition cards DON'T come to fruition on the earlier figures, though they very well might. This is now giving us FOUR different cardbacks in the same calendar year - 3 for Saga alone!
Those new Saga cards are due to hit when the Clone Wars line gets released which is supposed to happen sometime around the beginning of Fall. Hopefully they'll just keep the previous stuff on the 2nd Saga card version as those figures continue to ship, and keep the later, newer figures just on the 3rd Saga card versions, and continue to ship both.
Hasbro did report at the show today that both the Ephant Mon and the Imperial Officers would continue to ship throughout 2003, so therein lies your best examples to see what happens, I'm sure. Oh, the woes of carded collecting...
Some more good news coming out of the show today from Hasbro is that they are supposedly NOT going to be making ANYTHING different about the rehash figures like Leia, Han, Maul, etc., and that includes any fancy new bases. All they said that would be different is the inclusion of a clear, oval plastic figure stand just like the ones that recently came out in the POTJ Sandtrooper 4-packs. That's it. Loose collectors can breathe a sigh of relief there... They did intimate that more rehashes were on the way though, and that they'd try to hit some of the harder to find figures too!