Does Saga Edition make anyone else jones for Star Wars in general?

[Insight]

I guess you have to decide whether you feel bound by canon...

1. YES. In this case, you should probably play in another era than the Rebellion or Rise of the Empire eras, unless your players are willing to either not be involved at all in canonical events, or to be minor players in said events. You could, for example, play bounty hunters working for Jabba the Hutt who know something of the Rebellion, but are not directly involved with the Rebellion or the Empire.

2. NO. In this case, you obviously have a lot more freedom, but you may have to scramble to create situations to unfold in a similar fashion to canon (such that, as one poster suggested, one of the PCs destroys the Death Star, or something along those lines). After all, you are playing STAR WARS, and not generic space wars, so it's assumed that you and your players have a certain set of expectations. This is, of course, only if you and your players even care about canon, or are playing in an era with a significant amount of canon.

A lot of the above hinges on what you and your players want to do in the Star Wars universe. I think you should decide this simple matter before moving on to questions of canon and things of that nature.

 

[Angel Tarragon]

Okay, why the heck did this get moved to the media lounge?

 

[Insight]

Okay, why the heck did this get moved to the media lounge?

No clue. It really belongs in the OGL/Modern/Future/Mismash gaming sub-forum.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I guess you have to decide whether you feel bound by canon...

1. YES. In this case, you should probably play in another era than the Rebellion or Rise of the Empire eras, unless your players are willing to either not be involved at all in canonical events, or to be minor players in said events. You could, for example, play bounty hunters working for Jabba the Hutt who know something of the Rebellion, but are not directly involved with the Rebellion or the Empire.

While I agree with a choice about following canon needs to be made...this is just plain wrong.

For the Rise of the Empire era, there is a huge, galaxy spanning Clone War going on. Hundreds of planets are involved, with even more battles. The main players of the time are NOT at all of these battles and are NOT involved in all of the 'major' battles, either.

The Rebellion era is even more true to this than the Rise of the Empire time period. The Rebellion is huge, spread out across the galaxy and very decentralized for a great deal of the era. We know, very clearly, where all of the main players are during the conflict, and there is a TON of open space in the galaxy with major conflicts going on that has nothing at all to do with them.

The hard part for some, I believe, is simply accepting that there ARE important things for the PCs to do in all eras, no matter what a Skywalker is doing. Every single era has their major players in the huge events, but that doesn't mean there aren't other major events going on for the PCs to be involved in.

 

[Insight]

While I agree with a choice about following canon needs to be made...this is just plain wrong.

For the Rise of the Empire era, there is a huge, galaxy spanning Clone War going on. Hundreds of planets are involved, with even more battles. The main players of the time are NOT at all of these battles and are NOT involved in all of the 'major' battles, either.

The Rebellion era is even more true to this than the Rise of the Empire time period. The Rebellion is huge, spread out across the galaxy and very decentralized for a great deal of the era. We know, very clearly, where all of the main players are during the conflict, and there is a TON of open space in the galaxy with major conflicts going on that has nothing at all to do with them.

The hard part for some, I believe, is simply accepting that there ARE important things for the PCs to do in all eras, no matter what a Skywalker is doing. Every single era has their major players in the huge events, but that doesn't mean there aren't other major events going on for the PCs to be involved in.

But... canon = movies (and I guess, to a lesser extent, novels). The things you're talking about obviously must be happening, but we don't hear about them or see them in canonical sources.

So of course, during the Rebellion era, you could be a member of the Rebellion working underground on Coruscant or Corellia, or whatever, but whatever you're doing isn't touching canon. And that's fine.

When I speak of canon, I'm talking about one of your PCs rescuing Luke from the Wampa cave on Hoth, or stopping Boba Fett from getting to Han during Empire Strikes Back, or freeing the gang on Tattooine during RotJ. Those are canonical events because they happen on screen during the movies.

There's nothing wrong with any of that. But it's a question that you probably want to answer before doing anything else in planning for a game, because you're using a setting that's a licensed work.

 

[Remus Lupin]

There is of course a whole other era that we haven't even discussed the "Dark Times" era, taking place right after the Jedi Purge. Here we would have a rising Darth Vader and Emperor, the Jedi dead or in hiding, glactic repression beginning, stormtroopers all over the place, and very little cannon to go by, and plenty of non-canonical space to fill. Heck, you've got 20 years worth of game space to play in before Luke is old enough to whine about going to Tashi station for his blessed power converters.

That said, I still think that Legacy grabs my imagination more than the others. And as for wanting to play an Imperial Knight, I understand that the official sources are loosening up on their numbers a bit, raising the possibility that there may be many more, but heck, in a party of 4-6 players, having one or even two Imperial Knights won't interfere with whatever those canonical numbers are supposed to be anyway,

 

[Plane Sailing]

Okay, why the heck did this get moved to the media lounge?

I've got no idea, but it's clearly the wrong place for it.

Off to the d20 system forum you go!


hhhnnnnnnnnnAARRRRRRRRRRRR

 

[Plane Sailing]

There is of course a whole other era that we haven't even discussed the "Dark Times" era, taking place right after the Jedi Purge. Here we would have a rising Darth Vader and Emperor, the Jedi dead or in hiding, glactic repression beginning, stormtroopers all over the place

This is the very time period I'd be running a campaign in (I call it "Empire Ascendant")

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

This happen to anyone else?

Yes.

When I was around 11 or 12, I got a real hankering for the movies and bought the THX remastered trilogy on VHS... I must've watched each of those 30 or 40 times. Then I started gobbling up all the stuff in the EU at the time, good or bad. I read every Star Wars novel I could find, grabbed all the encyclopedias, blah blah blah. I was really into it. That phase passed into a much more objective appreciation, but there are still so many things I love about Star Wars.

With Saga, I've gotten a real hankering to watch all this stuff again. This weekend I'll probably sit down and watch the Clone Wars series, and follow it up with a little ESB.

 

[Ace32]

The problem with Star Wars as a setting is that the super-important, universe-shaking events have nothing to do with your player characters. Unless you are willing to make major changes to canonical events, the closest you can come to bringing your PCs into the action in the movies is allow them to meet and possibly aid the characters from the movies.

Of course, this has been quoted to death by now, but I do think this is an important issue.

However, I have absolutely no problem with it. My current campaign focuses on a group of Imperial commandos who have been involved in some major canon events. Granted, I haven't read *every* piece of the EU, but I'm familiar with a lot of it and try my best to research what I don't know before I stage a canon event. So perhaps some of the things my players do were done by other non-important characters in the Star Wars mythos (since these days everybody who is even mentioned or glimpsed on screen has an elaborate backstory), but that doesn't mean we can't substitute in.

For example, my players were the guys that checked out the 'rebel base on Dantooine' named by Leia in ep IV. They staged a commando assault on the main temples of Yavin IV after the Death Star was destroyed during the following Imperial invasion - and crippled the escape ships that led to General Dodonna being captured. They've been personally inspected by Lord Vader prior to a major mission. They helped Crix Madine and his StormCommandos release the plague on Dentaal. These little things add up for my group.

And yeah, I will probably change a few things here and there - but who cares, the big details are still there. (like the 'rule of two' being strictly followed - just to open up more force paths for dark siders - and even that is in a grey area for strict canon AFAIK).

They still feel very much involved in the setting, even if they have never met Luke Skywalker or the Emperor.