Star Wars Saga, the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

[Henry]

Another thing I'm noticing is that there is no real "smart hero" class. If I were to try and create a brainiac character--say an engineer or doctor--I don't think any of the classes would be a good fit. The only class that's really educated is the Noble, and the class skill list is oriented towards social skills, not technical ones. I guess nerdy smart heroes aren't very Star-Warsy.

If you look closely, the Noble is the most kick-butt doctor in the Core Saga rules. They get Treat Injury as a Skill, as well as all the Knowledges (life sciences for example), AND cybernetic Surgery and Sugical Expertise as bonus feats. Short of some kind of talent tree that raises the dead (which the Treat Injury already does within 1 round), then they ARE the doctors of this new Star Wars.

Does SAGA still have a 5' step?

Nope - dead and gone. Do, however, check out "Withdraw" action.

 

[Dragonhelm]

The Good - Square book, streamlined rules, condensed classes and skills and feats and force powers, complete versatility in character design.

I really like the streamlining and condensing going on in this book. I know a lot of people aren't the happiest with skills, but I like it. I think the preview for the skills was dead on about min/maxing ranks or being a jack-of-all-trades. Plus, for all intents and purposes, all skills are available.

The square book, IMO, is something I'm indifferent on. It's nifty, perhaps gimmicky. I'm not inspired by it, but I don't hate it by any means.

The Bad - Reliant on the miniatures rules for the new combat rules and having speeds listed as squares instead of meters or feet.

I have to agree with this too. Miniatures, IMO, should be optional, not required.

 

[The Green Adam]

As a long time Star Wars fan and gamer I thought the book was...nice. Better then the previous attempts but still not enough to shake my love of the WEG D6 game. I just don't feel class and level fit the Star Wars universe. I never think of Han as a X level Scoundrel or Scout or whatever. He's a Smuggler. Chewbacca is a Wookiee Mechanic. My players are a Vigilante Jedi, an Alien Space Pirate, A Twi'lek Pod Racer, a Renegade Stormtrooper and a Piloting Droid. It's just easier to 'feel' the atmosphere that way IMHO.

AD

 

[SteveC]

Nope - dead and gone. Do, however, check out "Withdraw" action.

(On the 5' step). Thanks! I imagine the reference under cleave is a remnant from an earlier edition of the rules then. I like it.

--Steve

 

[DethStryke]

I have to agree with this too. Miniatures, IMO, should be optional, not required.

This whole miniatures/squares complain seems like a very fickle one to me.

First, as long as you know how big the square is (1.5m), you know their movement anyway. In that respect, either squares or meters is six and one-half-dozen kind of complaint; People on both sides can argue the same.

Second, the rules clarify how to measure the important details on a board (from where to where, burst always targets the "cross-hairs" of the squares, etc.), which is good. That's not something that many new players are familiar with. If they WANT to use miniatures, they should know how. If you don't want to, then ignore and skip to the next paragraph.

Third, Any group who decides to not use miniatures would decide those line-of-sight and grid related details on the fly anyway ("You see the trooper, and can take a shot from where you are"). The largest problem you've presented is that you have to mentally double the movement in squares to get distance. Determining what anything is x1.5 to get Meters is easy-peasy.

Fourth, miniatures are cool.
No one is forcing you buy them, but if it gives a boost to RPG sales because the miniatures are cool and they make more money, we get more support as a SW RPG community and more potential players to play RPGs with. Everyone wins.

Fifth, I like lists.

I'm just not seeing a down side enough to make it even worth complaining about, unless that was just your way of saying "You whipper snappers should stay off my lawn with your crazy miniature people!"

 

[DethStryke]

As a long time Star Wars fan and gamer I thought the book was...nice. Better then the previous attempts but still not enough to shake my love of the WEG D6 game. I just don't feel class and level fit the Star Wars universe. I never think of Han as a X level Scoundrel or Scout or whatever. He's a Smuggler. Chewbacca is a Wookiee Mechanic. My players are a Vigilante Jedi, an Alien Space Pirate, A Twi'lek Pod Racer, a Renegade Stormtrooper and a Piloting Droid. It's just easier to 'feel' the atmosphere that way IMHO.

I'm on the fence with and against this concept. Part of me says that is very true just as you wrote it. Another part of me says that class is a mechanic tool for balancing the game which has benefits beyond flavor text... level is a guide for how good/dangerous anything is, quick reference at best.

Do you think that you could still get the same description for any character - Smuggler or Wookiee Mechanic - if you just introduce your character to everyone else that way? I mean, who cares what combination of skills, feats and classes you put together to make it. The important part is how you relate that through Role Playing at the table...

Thoughts?

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Actually, aren't miniatures people technically MORE old skool, rather than less? Dang 2e AD&D whippersnappers, get off my minis-festooned lawn!

Anyway, even if I wasn't using miniatures, why does the squares/meters distinction matter? Maybe in the Star Wars universe, they refer to their ranges by their unit of measurement - the square! (Note: I'm sure in some EU source, or maybe even in the movies, someone references the ACTUAL units of measurement they use, but I don't remember it, so... ) It's actually not a bad unit of measurement even for an abstract system, being 'the space occupied by an average human' and whatnot.

Certainly 'Move 6' is easier to remember/adjudicate on the fly than 'Move 30 but 5 is the smallest relevant distance' - the end result is exactly the same, with or without minis.

 

[Felon]

Since there was playtesting done, maybe you should, heck I dunno... PLAY IT AWHILE before you decide it needs an official "excuse"?

Eyeballing balance is a skill almost no one has, in my experience. I'll see how it plays before declaring anything broken.

This is the same obligatory commentary we see in any such discussion. Though it's kind of a jejune sentiment, sometimes it has value and sometimes it doesn't. This is the latter, because it's not a matter of "eyeballing" some elusive abstraction. The discrepencies we're talking about are straightforward quantifiables, and measuring how they balance out isn't all that tricky. Not only is it in fact possible to discuss and analyze data without implementing it, but heck, sometimes it's even a good idea. And the number of people adept at doing so is in excess of "almost nobody". This isn't rocket science, or rocket art for that matter.

"Seeing how it plays" is not going to reveal that the scoundrel's ratio of quantifiable bonuses (skills, hit dice, BAB) aren't any different than what they appear to be in the book. Moreover, playing it "awhile" just amounts to dismissing an objective analysis for a subjective one that's diluted by external factors. A scoundrel PC might limp along for the entire campaign, and he might be the star of the game, and either way neither are likely to cause the universe to implode, but all that could be said of a commoner PC in D&D. But that doesn't make the commoner a well-designed, well-balanced addition to a party.

No, if analyzing the class without playing it is no good for you--if it MUST be played in order to draw any conclusions--well then, it must be played more than "awhile". It's got to played exhaustively by a diverse group of players testing a vast array of different scoundrel builds for at least several years. Only then can you have a satisfactory conclusion. Let us know how it works out. My bet is that everyone who thought the class got a bum deal before playing it will have their opinions reinforced, while those who thought the other guys were a bunch of Chicken Littles will wind up satisfied that their assessments were confirmed.

 

[Felon]

Scoundrel does seem like the weakest of the five core classes, but with that said, it *does* seem to have probably the best talents.

Fortune's Favor is absolutely brutal. Since combat seems to be geared toward 'less time per round, more rounds per combat' with the increased hit points and streamlined system, I wouldn't be surprised if it averages out to an extra action every other combat.

Well, this is a good example of a quantifiable game element. If you have only one attack per round, and it only scores a crit on a 20, then you may indeed see one every other combat. I don't know how good a sell that is, though, because folks tend to want their abilities to work when they want them to.

Also, why is sneak attack not defining in this system? At 1st level, a sneak attacking scoundrel's average damage with a blaster pistol (14) is better than a jedi's with a lightsaber and 15 Str (13) or a soldier's with a blaster rifle (13.5). If the scoundrel sticks with sneak attack, he should be able to consistently stay ahead of the damage curve of all other characters (unless the party force user discovers the power of the dark side and starts busting out force lightning ).

Well, he's going to stay ahead of the damage curve in those situations where he actually get his sneak attack benefit, but that's not going to be one surprise round attack followed by a pumped-up initiative roll and then, assuming he beats the mooks' initiatives, he unleashes a full round of blitzkrieg attacks followed a by a flanking maneuver and then another blitzkrieg. Fewer attacks and a tightened-up definition of "flat-footed" makes it harder to milk that damage-dealing ability.

D&D's sneak attack was the 3.0 designers' clever way of transitioning the thief's backstab ability from a maneuver that required a lot of slow skulking n' stalking into one that connoted sudden action and acrobatics. Star Wars' sneak attack is more akin to....well, a sneak attack. You're back to having to set up actual ambushes rather than just rolling well on initiative.

I don't see an Improved Feint feat. Perhaps I missed it masquerading under a different name? A sneak-attacking scoundrel really needs stuff like that.

Also, unlike D&D's version of sneak attack with its list of 'does not works,' Star Wars sneak attack works against EVERYTHING - including, unless I missed a reference somewhere, droids and vehicles. The tradeoff being it doesn't work on flanking, which is, admittedly, a big minus, but I could certainly see a damage-oriented scoundrel taking sneak attack and dastardly strike being competitive with other damage-dealers.

I was a little disappointed that the skirmish talent just provides a +1 to attack. It could've provided a nice vehicle for flattening your enemies' feet.

 

[Felon]

If you look closely, the Noble is the most kick-butt doctor in the Core Saga rules. They get Treat Injury as a Skill, as well as all the Knowledges (life sciences for example), AND cybernetic Surgery and Sugical Expertise as bonus feats. Short of some kind of talent tree that raises the dead (which the Treat Injury already does within 1 round), then they ARE the doctors of this new Star Wars.

Indeed, not only do nobles make good doctors, but all doctors must be noble, for it is the only class that can be trained in Treat Injury.

Or is there some way in SWSE to train a skill that's not on your class list? If not, I suspect I will favor a house rule that allows the extra trained skills gained from Int. modifier to be chosen freely, heedless of class list restrictions.