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Didn't see a thread yet so I figured I'd make one. Star Wars: Edge of the Empire is Fantasy Flight Game's first book in their new Star Wars RPG line-up. This version seems to attempt to try to fit in more with the movie's style of storytelling and action, namely by removing almost all instances of number bloat and focusing on action, options, and more intuitive play. Also unlike the previous versions, this RPG will actually focus more on a single setting of the game: the Rebellion Era. Whereas previous editions have left it open, much of the content in this one will be tailored to the setting shown in episodes 4, 5, and 6. They're attempting to go with the feel of the movies by releasing multiple books. You could just think of them in 4e terms as PHBs 1 through 3. The first, Edge of the Empire, focuses on fringe exploration and more 'at-home' characters like explorers and more scum characters like smugglers. It should feel right for almost any Star Wars fan really. The second book, Age of the Rebellion, will focus more on the war and conflict, and will involve more career soldier characters such as soldiers (duh), pilots, and spies. The characters will deal more with the Empire than criminals and bounty hunters like they would in Edge of the Empire. The third and final book is Force and Destiny. As the name implies, characters in this will be dealing more with their own morality and surviving while being hunted by the Empire. More importantly, it will have Jedi characters and force adepts in it. The first two books of course have force powers and the ability to give your character force sensitivity, but no Jedi. FFG's Star Wars RPGs main feature is its dice.  Shown above are stickers that you use to convert existing dice (it's hard to see but there are also blank stickers, like 1 side of the green is left blank). Each color is a different type of die, and some are 'opposed' by other types of dice. Essentially, they are mirror opposites: when one is used against the other 1:1, the chances of success/failure are almost 50/50. Also worth noting is some of the dice are 'upgrades' to other dice. Meaning they're basically like the ones below them, but more powerful. Duh. White- Force Dice. These are used to generate the "Destiny pool", one of the RPG's gimmicks that are kind of like force points from older editions, and they are also used when manifesting force powers. Red- Challenge Dice. In particularly difficult checks, or when the GM 'upgrades' the difficulty of something (another feature of the system is upgrading, which I'll talk about later), challenge dice are used to oppose players. Challenge dice are the only dice that feature the player-devastating Despair symbol. Opposed by the Proficiency Dice, Upgrade from the Difficulty Dice. Yellow- Proficiency Dice. When a character is both skilled and naturally talented at something (ie, they possess the Skill and have points in the Characteristic governing that skill), they can use proficiency dice. Proficiency dice are basically what players want to be rolling as much as possible of when performing actions. Proficiency dice are the only dice that feature the GM-devastating Triumph dymbol. Opposed by the Challenge Dice, Upgrade from the Ability Dice. Green- Ability Dice. These dice are what players will likely be rolling most of early on when performing actions. They represent natural talent and ability, hence the name. They are the 'worst' dice alone you can roll to perform an action, but thankfully one is usually rolling 3-5 of them. Opposed by the Difficulty Dice, get Upgraded to Proficiency Dice. Purple- Difficulty Dice. The GM puts these dice into a player's dice pool when he makes a check. They represent the challenge of performing something. 2 dice is the "average" difficulty, much in the same way 2 dice is the "average" ability of a character. Opposed by the Ability Dice, get Upgraded to Challenge Dice. Blue- Boost Dice. Boost dice are thrown into a character's dice pool when there are favorable circumstances or other effects allow a character to add one or more. Think of them as SWRPG's version of a "+2 circumstance bonus". Opposed by the Setback Dice. Black- Setback Dice. These are thrown into a dice pool when unfavorable circumstances or other effects provide a penalty to a check. Opposed by the Boost Dice. D100s- Percentile. Not shown. These are used for critical effects, but that's about it. The icons are obviously not numbers. Circles on the Force Die. These are "Force Points". White-filled ones are light-side points, dark ones are, unsurprisingly, dark side points.    are "Successes". The more of these you roll on a check or attack, the better.   are "Failures". You want less failures than successes when you make a check.   are "Advantages". The more the better. They generally can be spent to do extra things, such as critically hit, or make your successes better (or your failures less devastating!).   are "Threats". These are the opposite of Advantages. They generally gently caress with you by giving complications, even if your roll actually succeeds. The fewer the better. The GM can spend them to do things like make you run out of ammo or fall down. is "Triumph". It only appears on the Proficiency die. They count as a success to start, and they also let you do spectacular things in addition to success or even in spite of failure! Think of them as rolling a 20. is "Despair". It's basically the exact opposite of Triumph, and as a result it counts as a Failure to start with. Various things can happen to you if you roll a Despair, but it is always Bad. Thankfully it only appears on the Challenge die, which isn't used often. Depending.Other than the symbols, the game is fairly easy to understand. You have a dice pool, you try to roll more successes than failures to get something done. The phrase "dice pool" might make you worry, but don't be alarmed: dice pools of one type never go above 6, barring extra effects. In fact, the average skill dice pool will be 3-5 dice. Difficulty pools range from 1-5, and to save rolling a ton of dice by one person, the GM can simply roll the difficulty dice himself. Difficulty is determined by GM, with "Average" difficulty being 2 difficulty dice. A quick look at the image of the dice above and you'll see that there is 1 more success on the Ability die than there are failures on the Difficulty die. Meaning a person with 2 in an ability (thus giving him 2 ability dice) doing an average task will more often than not succeed (ties result in failure though). However, there are more Threats on the difficulty die than Advantages on the Ability dice. How the RPG prevents dice pools from getting out of control is their concept of "upgrading". Rather than taking your skill and characteristic and adding them together, they instead make common points "upgrade" dice. In other words, if you possess points in a skill AND its key characteristic, you get better dice, not more dice. For example, say you want to find out your dice pool for hitting somebody with a sword. Your melee is 2, and your Brawn is 3. You first take the higher number, 3, and you add put number of ability dice to your attack pool. You then take the lower number, 2, and upgrade that many ability dice. So your pool would be 2 Proficiency, 1 Ability. One of the advantages of the dice system is also that in combat, your actions will rarely be wasted, even if you fail to hit somebody. For example, if you manage to get a good amount of Advantages on your dice, but completely fail to hit your opponent, you can spend your Advantages to give somebody else a Boost die on their next attack, or to disarm the enemy. The beginner set for the game is out at the moment. It includes a pre-made adventure, pre-made characters, a rulebook, and other stuff. Links below. In any case there's more to the rules but I'm kind of rambling now. I spent some time reading my friend's copy from GenCon but I don't possess my own yet. I really like Fantasy Flight, especially their 40k RPGs, and I'm happy to at least see a Star Wars RPG that isn't d20 again. Links Beginner Game this troper fucked around with this message at 18:41 on Jan 2, 2013 |
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Aug 27, 2012 23:51
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I'm not crazy with how they're splitting up the games. I get divvying up the eras of play, but I'm not sure why it needs to be further divided so that smuggling is one game and being a Rebel is another and so on. It doesn't seem like they're that different, especially when the movies have an aspiring Jedi, a Rebel leader, a smuggler and his alien co-pilot, etc.
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Aug 28, 2012 01:38
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Oh they've said that they'll all be compatible with eachother, like I said it's basically like PHB1-3. Each will be standalone-capable as well. I'm fine with Jedi being last at least, I'm not a fan.
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Aug 28, 2012 01:51
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I wasn't a huge fan of Saga Edition, so I'm excited to see a new developer in charge and the game taking a different direction. However, I'm not sure why they're splitting up the books in that manner. Three books covering only one era seems like overkill, even if it is the most popular era. It seems like the types of characters described aren't really different enough to warrant being spread across three books.
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Aug 28, 2012 10:18
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this troper posted:Oh they've said that they'll all be compatible with eachother, like I said it's basically like PHB1-3. Each will be standalone-capable as well. I'm fine with Jedi being last at least, I'm not a fan. Yeah, but you'd still have to get all three in order to have anything like the original movie's cast.
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Aug 28, 2012 15:29
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Yeah, if I was going to break it down in some way, I'd kind of go more by what classes we see in the movies. Episode 1 we see mostly stormtroopers, farmboys, smugglers, droids, wookies, officers, jedi and fighter pilots. Episode 2 introduces snow troopers (if these have to be a separate career), bounty hunters, mobile walkers (and their pilots), and administrators or governors (whichever you'd call Lando) Episode 3 gives us scout troopers, rebel admirals (and the frigates they command), ewoks hunters, rancor trainers, imperial guard. This isn't exactly perfect either but I think it would provide a variety of classes in each book while still having stuff in all the books that you would want.
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Aug 28, 2012 19:00
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Color interested. Looks like they are using thier dice system from their Warhammer fantasy line to change things up. I'll wait until it comes out and check out a copy when it comes to the local game store.
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Aug 28, 2012 19:18
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I'm interested as well, especially since they're keeping it in the only interesting era of Star Wars. Even the "good" parts of the EU, including the Old Republic era, don't interest me. They just come off as pale "me too" shades of the actual good trilogy. The prequels were boring poo poo and there's not a single thing that was added to the franchise that stirred my imagination in the least. And I really don't mind them choosing to divide up each Topic of Gameplay into three separate parts. Smugglers, bounty hunters, crime and punishment can be its own book, you could easily build an entire microcosm on that topic alone. Likewise for the Empire and Rebellion, and similarly for the Force. Each of the three factions are equally interesting, and having them all have their own stand-alone book will hopefully ensure none overshadows the others. Think Han Solo, Boba Fett, and Jabba the Hutt are the coolest? Just buy the first book and forget the War and the Force. Just want to play space wizards? Get the third book. Think being a trooper in the trenches hunting down the rebel scum is the bees knees? You won't need to worry about books 1 and 2. I like what they're doing.
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Aug 28, 2012 19:40
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Yeah, that'd work, so long as all three books are available simultaneously and each has all the essential rules. I remember with DnD 3rd edition you had to wait months for the DMG to come out, so you had to make do with a little mini-dmg packet they slipped in the back of the PHB.
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Aug 28, 2012 20:06
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I think its a good idea to completely separate the three basic kinds of game at first and give people the tools to run them all independently before mixing them all together. I'm sure its a lesson they learned when planning the 40k roleplaying game. You run into the same kinds of fundamental concerns about campaign focus and narrative control and so forth when you try to run a game similarly to how the movies worked. Rushing it all out at once just doesn't work as well. Let's have a big fat manual talking about Profit Factor and running a spaceship and so on for smugglers and scoundrels before we have to worry about all that Force nonsense.
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Aug 28, 2012 20:17
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Maxwell Lord posted:Yeah, but you'd still have to get all three in order to have anything like the original movie's cast. From what I've heard, you could make the main cast of ANH pretty easily.
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Aug 28, 2012 20:29
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Lotish posted:Yeah, that'd work, so long as all three books are available simultaneously and each has all the essential rules. I remember with DnD 3rd edition you had to wait months for the DMG to come out, so you had to make do with a little mini-dmg packet they slipped in the back of the PHB. Oh yeah, that was assumed by me in my post. I mean, if all three are interchangeable and compatible, I really hope they have the core rules in each book. They shouldn't have to obligate Star Wars fans into buying merchandise, especially when that merchandise has real value to them. Most people will probably wanna play any and all of it, so if they enjoy one book, they'll buy the rest.
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Aug 28, 2012 20:34
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DOCTOR ZIMBARDO posted:Let's have a big fat manual talking about Profit Factor and running a spaceship and so on for smugglers and scoundrels before we have to worry about all that Force nonsense. That level of detail doesn't really scream "Star Wars" to me, though. The whole universe runs on movie logic- we don't need to know what ".5 past light speed" means or the profit margin on the Kessel Run, that's just handwaving to establish that Han is a space pirate with a fast ship. The system itself looks like it'll be fairly good and cinematic, but even d6 kinda got bogged down with grenade scatter diagrams and hyperspace travel times and other things that a sci-fi game was expected to deal with, so I hope the games will be simpler. Also it seems like they're missing an opportunity to do a Clone Wars set targeted at younger players- they may get around to it eventually but by then the show could be over.
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Aug 28, 2012 20:45
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Still want a Republic Commando RPG here. 
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Aug 28, 2012 20:54
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I'm less enthused about this consider that the dice system is almost identical to Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 3rd Ed, and from what I've seen of that -- been running it a good while now -- under all the ease of use and the simple conflict resolution there's really not a lot of replay value and the structure doesn't support campaigns well. I would like to add, though, that the idea of a Star Wars RPG that isn't 90% reused artwork and has more thought put into the presentation and layout than coloring the borders is really great. The 40k lines really bring great visual design to the table and I'm hoping that's the same for this. ellbent fucked around with this message at 23:48 on Aug 28, 2012 |
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Aug 28, 2012 23:43
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How would you define "replay value" in regards to an RPG? I mean, it seems each game is going to be different just by the nature of the medium.
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Aug 29, 2012 01:36
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Maxwell Lord posted:How would you define "replay value" in regards to an RPG? I mean, it seems each game is going to be different just by the nature of the medium. My guess is in the development of skills and abilities. For most people, part of the fun of playing an RPG is that their character grows not just in terms of narrative experience, but in their ability to mechanically affect things. Certain RPG systems make for great one off games, but get boring playing the same character week in and out if the abilities never change. So while the system can be fun and enjoyable, it's going to be a fresh start every time you play (like Fiasco). A game with good replay value is going to provide new things for players to mechanically do with the same characters.
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Aug 29, 2012 03:17
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I picked up the Beginner Game. It's really, really nice, probably the nicest intro game I've ever seen. I really want to run this for my guys now, I just can't see a way of doing it online 
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Dec 15, 2012 16:30
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I'm a huge fan of the Warhammer system that this one seems to emulate, so if any of you guys pick it up and have time, could you post a little review for me? I'm thinking of shelling out some bucks for this.
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Dec 18, 2012 19:31
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Unzip and Attack posted:I'm a huge fan of the Warhammer system that this one seems to emulate, so if any of you guys pick it up and have time, could you post a little review for me? I'm thinking of shelling out some bucks for this. I'm waiting for the full version to come out. The beginner game seems nice but it seems... incomplete. Plus it's kind of tailored to people new to RPGs in general so oh well. I'll definitely be purchasing the full version, and with Only War out of the way hopefully they can focus on finishing Edge of the Empire. If it's anything like WFRP (production-wise, we obviously know the dice system is similar), all the supplements will have really high value and production qualities, so I'm looking forward to it still.
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Dec 18, 2012 19:36
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Maxwell Lord posted:I'm not crazy with how they're splitting up the games. I get divvying up the eras of play, but I'm not sure why it needs to be further divided so that smuggling is one game and being a Rebel is another and so on. It doesn't seem like they're that different, especially when the movies have an aspiring Jedi, a Rebel leader, a smuggler and his alien co-pilot, etc. I agree. My wallet would prefer they did a core book for the system and have non-core classes, races, and time periods be separated out into various books. Though I'm sure their wallets very much like reprinting the same 300 pages and selling them to people 3 to 5 times.
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Dec 18, 2012 19:56
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TookyG posted:I agree. My wallet would prefer they did a core book for the system and have non-core classes, races, and time periods be separated out into various books. Though I'm sure their wallets very much like reprinting the same 300 pages and selling them to people 3 to 5 times. I'm surprised they aren't doing an approach like they did with WFRP 3e, where they had the core set, then they sold supplements in packs (like the warrior and military sourcebook came with the Khorne sourcebook too). It would make sense too. They could sell a Criminals/Fringers set, a Rebels/Imperials set, and a Light Side/Dark Side (and maybe some other stuff) set.
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Dec 18, 2012 20:17
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this troper posted:I'm surprised they aren't doing an approach like they did with WFRP 3e, where they had the core set, then they sold supplements in packs (like the warrior and military sourcebook came with the Khorne sourcebook too). I think they're following the route that's been more profitable for them. The WH40K line is clearly out performing WFRP3 so why not go the same route with Star Wars? Plus, the Star Wars line lacks all the fiddly bits that WFRP3 so I'm sure that was taken into account when they made their decision.
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Dec 18, 2012 20:42
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Well, I picked up the Beginner Game from the Fantasy Flight website last night in hopes of giving this a shot. I didn't get into the beta, I've never tried the Warhammer one, but this looks interesting to me. My gaming group is pretty gung ho to give this a try, so I'll see about doing a trip report once we've given it a shot.
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Dec 20, 2012 00:03
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Mine arrived today and will be trying it out this Saturday hopefully with my usual boardgame group (we have done 4e DnD on the side). We'll have six PCs so I'm thankful that FFG provided two additional pre-generated character folios on their site.
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Dec 20, 2012 00:26
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Just picked up the starter box today, and I'm impressed. It looks like a pretty good product and the starter characters are well put together.
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Dec 20, 2012 02:26
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alg posted:I picked up the Beginner Game. It's really, really nice, probably the nicest intro game I've ever seen. I really want to run this for my guys now, I just can't see a way of doing it online There IS a MapTool framework for playing WFRP3e online, and it also uses custom dice. So it can happen.
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Dec 20, 2012 04:43
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Got the beginners box also. The tokens/dice/maps make it worth picking up even if you will eventually get the core book. With the online material (characters/adventure) to supplement it you should be able to get a solid gaming experience out of it. Then you can jump into the full version with gusto! Now, to find time to play this and every other Star Wars game FFG is releasing...
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Dec 20, 2012 05:47
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homullus posted:There IS a MapTool framework for playing WFRP3e online, and it also uses custom dice. So it can happen. Is there any other online roller? Skypegaming is my probable venue for this and the dice are sort of a deal breaker.
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Dec 20, 2012 06:01
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Winson_Paine posted:Is there any other online roller? Skypegaming is my probable venue for this and the dice are sort of a deal breaker. Certainly it won't take long for someone to make a web-based roller. WFRP3E has several, so if this game catches on there will very likely be options in short order.
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Dec 20, 2012 06:15
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Winson_Paine posted:Is there any other online roller? Skypegaming is my probable venue for this and the dice are sort of a deal breaker. If you mean just to roll dice, they have official apps with the dice for Android and iOS. You could also use the Dicenomicon app to create your own with images. If you mean for logged rolls (like orokos or invisible castle), I don't know of any yet.
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Dec 20, 2012 07:06
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This looks pretty cool so far. I like that they're keeping WHFRP3's neat dice, but dropping all its other fiddly props. However, I'm not so sure what I think about splitting it into three sub-games. That makes sense for 40K with its wildly varying power levels, but doesn't seem necessary for Rebellion Era Star Wars.
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Dec 20, 2012 07:26
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PeterWeller posted:This looks pretty cool so far. I like that they're keeping WHFRP3's neat dice, but dropping all its other fiddly props. However, I'm not so sure what I think about splitting it into three sub-games. That makes sense for 40K with its wildly varying power levels, but doesn't seem necessary for Rebellion Era Star Wars. If nothing else there is a pretty drat big disparity between Jedi and everyone else, thematically. Guy with gun vs. guy with laser sword that blocks gunshots, mind reading, enhanced strength and speed, telekinesis and premonitions (and that's just the Light Side!) doesn't seen like a fair fight.
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Dec 20, 2012 07:40
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Well, the thing with the 40k sub-games was that they had a lot of discrete, in-depth systems in place to evoke a certain kind of feel. Even discounting the power level difference, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, and Dark Heresy focused on very different things.
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Dec 20, 2012 07:59
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The thing that interests/puzzles me the most is the pregen character folios, with their upgrade trees baked-in. Even though the game's in three tiers, I could certainly see the possibility of their releasing more with actual modules (as happened with WFRP3e -- some careers came with modules rather than core rules expansions). In terms of Jedi vs. everybody else, Jedi got annihilated by everybody else in Revenge of the Sith, so.... I am not too worried about game balance. The other thing I like is the force points (or whatever they're called) for the session -- they start out black or white (for GM and players respectively) and get flipped to the other color when expended, rather than discarded. A session with two out all the time will have more swing, more people modifying rolls on both sides of the screen (not included). homullus fucked around with this message at 20:28 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 19:56
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Sodomy Non Sapiens posted:If nothing else there is a pretty drat big disparity between Jedi and everyone else, thematically. The power disparity between Jedi and everyone else isn't so readily apparent in the Rebellion Era. The only "adventuring" Jedi we see is Luke, and one never gets the impression he could just effortlessly slice his way through enemies any more than Han could effortlessly blast his way through enemies. Most of what you point to doesn't become such a huge deal until you get to EU/prequel crap. Der Waffle Mous posted:Well, the thing with the 40k sub-games was that they had a lot of discrete, in-depth systems in place to evoke a certain kind of feel. Oh for sure. There's a lot more than just power disparity separating the three 40K games. Rogue Trader adventures have little or nothing in common with Dark Heresy ones. Death Watch adventures have some superficial similarities with Dark Heresy ones. But fundamentally, they're split apart because a Space Marine is on a totally different level than some hive scummer, and to include the two in the same game would require compromising them to a greater deal than would be fun for the players. I don't see that being necessary with Rebellion Era SW.
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Dec 20, 2012 20:10
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I assume there will be mechanical differences between the tiers here too, although not as drastic ones. I wouldn't be surprised to see alternate character generation mechanics, as obligations don't make much sense in a standard Rebellion or Jedi game. Edit: the introduction to the Beta book also the other games, Age of Rebellion and Force and Destiny being standalone titles with an integrated system so I have to assume they're just going full 40k style and using XP bumps in between "tiers". long-ass nips Diane fucked around with this message at 21:41 on Dec 20, 2012 |
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Dec 20, 2012 21:33
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Picked up the beginners box today. Super stoked to get into this!
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Dec 21, 2012 00:43
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So I see the dice are d6s, d8s and d12s with funky symbols on them. Couldn't you write a simple table to allow game to proceed with regular dice, i.e. for ability dice, you would have something like "1 - nothing, 2-3 one success, 4-5 one advantage, 6 two successes, 7 two advantages, 8 one success and one advantage"? Agree on something like that and you could play by post, IRC or what have you.
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Dec 21, 2012 16:39
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Traveller posted:So I see the dice are d6s, d8s and d12s with funky symbols on them. Couldn't you write a simple table to allow game to proceed with regular dice, i.e. for ability dice, you would have something like "1 - nothing, 2-3 one success, 4-5 one advantage, 6 two successes, 7 two advantages, 8 one success and one advantage"? Agree on something like that and you could play by post, IRC or what have you. Sure you could. But that would be incredibly tedious.
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Dec 21, 2012 17:16
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