Tell me about Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

[The Soloist]

Notorious is an amazing solo RPG that does the Star Wars bounty hunter thing incredibly well.

Yes, too many games, not enough time (or money)!

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Force and Destiny sort of work better as a Prequel type era or before type game, while Edge and Rebellion work well together (IMO).

I feel at the heart of it, once you understand the core of the game, the core is a bit simpler than D&D and other games.

It's a narrative type game in which the dice drive the narrative deeply (once again, IMO). Even the Gamemaster doesn't know what will happen, and due to how the dice work (for example, you suceed but something really bad happens, or you miss/fail but something works in your favor really well) it takes a quick GM who is innovative and imaginative to keep up with narrating what happens.

I just have never enjpyed SW games that are all 1 type nearly as much as mixed games. if the whole group is Rebels, someone needs to be a scumbag or a Jedi or Force Adept. All Jedi...meh, more fun in theory than in play, someone play Padme, please.

So for me amd amyone like me, its three hefty core books that are each half reprint of the other two, all to get one game where my Force Adept outlaw tech with her extemsively modified cybernetic arm can run alongside my wife's dashing rebel who is a rogue aristocrat who stole her husband's prototype ship, and our friend's reformed sit witch turned light side force adept and our other friend's jedi sentinel.

Because other SW games do that in one book, it bothers me that this one cannot.

 

[aramis erak]

So for me amd amyone like me, its three hefty core books that are each half reprint of the other two,

by page count, it's between 1/4 and 1/3. the lore dumps are fully 1/5 of the text, and don't overlap much. the vehicles have about 1/5 to 1/4 overlap, the NPC templates 1/4 to 1/3.
It's FAR less than half.

 

[JConstantine]

I do wonder if the narrative nature might be tricky to DM, for me anyways, as I’m not particularly good at improv in the moment. Be curious to hear people’s experience of that.

I have several thoughts on this.

Firstly, as I mentioned previously, it doesn't have to fall to the GM alone; players are encouraged to pitch suggestions for the dice results, so don't be afraid to draw on them (it's not to the taste of every group, but it's an option). Secondly, as also mentioned, the book has preset examples of what the results can be used for, so feel free to use them - they're not as narratively satisfying, but they're a decent fallback, and can be dramatic in the right situation. eg. 3 threat to cause "out of ammo" isn't terribly exciting by itself, but if it occurs in the middle of a firefight where the group are pinned down in a cantina, surrounded by Stormtroopers? Well, now they have to get a bit more creative.

Next, remember that improv is a skill like any other and the only way to improve is practice, which means failing sometimes; but also, the best improvisers have a deep well to draw from, so immersing yourself in as much Star Wars media as possible should help deepen the well you draw from for the game (read: liberally copy from). Once I became familiar with FFGSW, I found it difficult to not see how certain scenes could be translated into mechanics. Let's take the rescue of Leia scene:

After clearing the control room of Imperials, Han tries to deal with the alarm by radioing in that the situation is under control and rolls a failure, causing the Imps to send a squad of Stormtroopers. Luke, Leia, Han and Chewy are subsequently pinned down in the cell banks as the Stormtroopers block the only way out. Leia borrows Luke's blaster to shoot open a vent (her player hoping it opens a duct to escape through); it's an easy check, but Leia doesn't have much in the way of a Ranged dice pool as she was built as a diplomat. The GM spends a dark side Destiny point to upgrade the difficulty from a single purple difficulty die, to a single red challenge die. Leia rolls success, but also Despair: the vent is open, and the characters now have a way out (the success), but it leads to a trash compactor and oh, no, it's operational (the Despair)!​

So once you're familiar with both the mechanics and the media touchstones, it becomes easier to reverse engineer one to the other.

Lastly, a rule of thumb: success should give the players what they the aiming for, failure should deny them their goal, advantage should give them a benefit separate from their goal (though, ideally, related to it), and threat should cause a problem distinct from failure. For example, success with threat shouldn't deny the character what they achieved, but could introduce a new problem to resolve; meanwhile, failure with advantage might prevent the characters achieving their goal but provide an alternate route to it, or alleviate the current pressure to give them breathing room to come up with a change of plan.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

by page count, it's between 1/4 and 1/3. the lore dumps are fully 1/5 of the text, and don't overlap much. the vehicles have about 1/5 to 1/4 overlap, the NPC templates 1/4 to 1/3.
It's FAR less than half.

I mean, ita called hyperbole my dude. i do not care what specific percentage it is, it is a lot. Too much for a game i am only interested in using the entire game. Like my group has no desire to play a star wars campaign without Jedi, outer rim scoundrel/scout types, core worlds nobles/rebel alliance (depending on era), etc.

And like, you can kinda do it with just EoTE, but your force user will feel like an afterthought and your core worlds type characters wont really feel distinct.