Star Wars Saga Edition - Where should I start?

[weem]

Hello all,

I am currently running a 4e campaign that is nearing it's conclusion (we have played 20 sessions or so now) and since I like to plan early, I have been considering what to run next.

4e has been great, but I play in a few other 4e campaigns as do my players, so I thought we could try something new (to us).

I'm thinking I might try SWSE, but was curious... what books should I get/do I need. I have looked and I'm a little confused as some seem to update others, etc.

Thanks for your help!

[3d6]

You only really need the Star Wars Saga Edition Core Rulebook. The supplements are nice enough, but the core book is pretty complete. I think I would describe the Core Rulebook as the source book for the films, and then the rest tend to focus on EU material.

[Ao the Overkitty]

Yeah, you only NEED the Corebook. I've only run oneshots with Saga so far, so your mileage may vary.

The other books are rather shiny, but not absolutely necessary.

The only book beyond that that'd I'd suggest you look into is Scum and Villany. It's got some good ideas for seadier campaigns and rules for modifying equipment beyond the base models.

Starships of the Galaxy is good if you want more starships than what the corebook provides. It also gives rules for modifying starships beyond the base models.
Threats of the Galaxy is good if you want a book full of pregenerated NPCs. That's all it is.
The campaign setting books do a good job of setting you up, should you want to run in that setting.

[Michael Dean]

I'm REALLY pleased with the new Jedi Training Academy sourcebook that recently came out. It's got some great crunch and fluff on Jedi and other force traditions. I'd kind of put SW Saga aside over a year ago because I just wasn't that inspired, until I was browsing through the Jedi book at the bookstore.

[Donovan Morningfire]

Saga Edition is great in that the core rulebook really is all you need to run the game; everything else is just gravy.

That said, my recommendations on the other books would be as follows:

Starships of the Galaxy - If you are doing anything involving space combat, this book is almost mandatory. It gives you a much wider range of ships than the corebook does, as well as ways to use those big honkin' capital ships without too great a risk of inadvertently blowing your PCs' smaller ships into bits. The fun crunch that is the Tech Specialist feat and the Outlaw Tech talent tree can be found for free on WotC's Star Wars homepage (check the archives for web enhancements, it's the 1st or 2nd one for the corebook)

Campaign Setting Guide - If you are planning on doing a campaign within a certain setting (Knights of the Old Republic, Dark Times, Clone Wars, Legacy Era, etc), I strongly suggest picking up the relevant campaign guide (with Rebellion Era due in little over a month) as they all provide a great background resource on the setting they cover, with the KOTOR book being my favorite of the bunch and the Legacy Era a close second. Also, The Force Unleashed guide (aka Dark Times sourcebook) has a lot of great information on the Empire just prior to the timeframe of the Rebellion.

Scum & Villainy - Don't get me wrong, this is a really cool book, especially if you're running a fringe/outlaw campaign (ala Firefly/Serenity), but the Upgrade rules can open a very serious can of worms. This is a book that can wait a while before you pick it up.

Jedi Academy Training Manual - There's some great advice for how to best play a Jedi and avoid "lightsaber syndrome," but unless you're doing an all-Jedi campaign, this can definitely wait until later, as most of the crunch is a bit esoteric.

Threats of the Galaxy - hate to say it, but this one is largely a pass. The only thing that it really provides is a lot of NPCs, and you can find NPC builds for free all over the net, particularly on the Holonet Forums and WotC's message boards. Heck, click the link in my sig and download the Big Frakin' List of NPCs I compiled (over a 150 of them as of v1.2) if you really need a lot of pre-made NPCs in one easy reference.