Obligation and Duty and Morality (Oh My)

[Andor]

I've played a fair amount of the various FFG 40k games. This is a series of 5 RPGs which, in spite of portraying the same universe and using what is ostensibly the same system are not particularly compatible. In fact they have a lot of compatibility traps and weird differences between them.

So when I saw the FFG Star Wars game (leaving aside the money hungry structure of the releases) I was non-plused by the splitting of the game into 3 segments. Taking a closer look however I'm not sure my trepidation is justified. Yes, it's a bit stupid that if you want Han, Luke and Obi-Wan in the same party you need 3 separate books, but the bigger question is: Can you have Han, Luke and Obi-Wan in the same party?

Mechanically the big differences between the 3 flavors of PCs come down to the one sub-system that is unique to each book.

Obligation, from Edge of the Empire is a source of trouble, essentially some sort of underworld tied debt which haunts the PC. The cannon example would be Han's debt to Jabba the Hutt. You generally want to try to decrease it in play, although you can gain more (at char gen and in play)as an alternative to paying cash for items or services.

Duty, from Age of Rebellion is a measure of ones standing with the Rebel Alliance. You generally want to increase it in play. No real examples from cannon save that everyone tied to the Rebellion has some.

Morality, from Force and Destiny is a general indicator of how in tune a character is to the Light or Dark sides of the force. At certain thresholds you fall to the Dark side (with mechanical implications) or rise to Jedihood. It differs from Obligation and Duty in that it is unique to force users and has no meaning or bearing on non-force sensitive characters.

So looking at it I don't see a real problem with having all 3 in the same party. In fact I don't see why you couldn't have all 3 apply to the same character. Luke, by the end of Return of the Jedi certainly has both a Duty and Morality score and might well have an Obligation in the form of having ticked off the Hutts by dropping Jabba's dinner party down the Sarlacc's gullet. Likewise both Han and Lando will have both Duty and Obligation scores, but not morality as the are not force users.

So has anyone tried this in practice? Had good results? Bad results?

 

[aramis erak]

Yes, I've run with all three in the party. The only issue is remembering to make the needed rolls...

Obligation and duty don't really overlap - one's a push, the other a pull. Morality really isn't an overlap either.

My advice for a "full mash up" - only track morality on those who have opened a force using tree. Use Duty as the baseline if they're part of an organization, but allow taking up to 15 extra points for taking an obligation of same value... and suddenly, your duty based group has a good chunk of obligation.

THe rules are slightly tweaked between Edge and Age, but I've found no changes between Age and F&D. The tweaks are clarifications... on a half dozen talents.

 

[KahlessNestor]

It's designed to be usable together. We tend to focus on one or the other, depending on the nature of the campaign and when we remember, but there's no reason why the mission for the Rebellion that gains you duty can't also earn Obligation from the Hutt you just crossed, or affect your Morality for the dirty deeds you did on the mission.

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[aramis erak]

It's designed to be usable together. We tend to focus on one or the other, depending on the nature of the campaign and when we remember, but there's no reason why the mission for the Rebellion that gains you duty can't also earn Obligation from the Hutt you just crossed, or affect your Morality for the dirty deeds you did on the mission.

Sent from my SM-G900P using EN World mobile app

You do NOT want to gain obligation; it's a punishment, not a boon.

 

[KahlessNestor]

You do NOT want to gain obligation; it's a punishment, not a boon.

Yes, your point...?

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[Andor]

You do NOT want to gain obligation; it's a punishment, not a boon.

That's not entirely true though. Yes, Obligation is a source of trouble but it does (in part) reflect your reputation in the underworld. The threshold system reflects this by showing how reactions to your party will change based on the degree of that reputation. High Obligation makes life harder when dealing with aboveboard officials but easier when dealing with the criminal and corrupt elements of society, in which case it does act as a boon.

Likewise high Duty is good, when dealing with the Rebel alliance, but the higher your Duty, the more likely it is that any given Imperial official has heard of you and will respond accordingly.

 

[Quickleaf]

I've played a fair amount of the various FFG 40k games. This is a series of 5 RPGs which, in spite of portraying the same universe and using what is ostensibly the same system are not particularly compatible. In fact they have a lot of compatibility traps and weird differences between them.

So when I saw the FFG Star Wars game (leaving aside the money hungry structure of the releases) I was non-plused by the splitting of the game into 3 segments. Taking a closer look however I'm not sure my trepidation is justified. Yes, it's a bit stupid that if you want Han, Luke and Obi-Wan in the same party you need 3 separate books, but the bigger question is: Can you have Han, Luke and Obi-Wan in the same party?

Mechanically the big differences between the 3 flavors of PCs come down to the one sub-system that is unique to each book.

Obligation, from Edge of the Empire is a source of trouble, essentially some sort of underworld tied debt which haunts the PC. The cannon example would be Han's debt to Jabba the Hutt. You generally want to try to decrease it in play, although you can gain more (at char gen and in play)as an alternative to paying cash for items or services.

Duty, from Age of Rebellion is a measure of ones standing with the Rebel Alliance. You generally want to increase it in play. No real examples from cannon save that everyone tied to the Rebellion has some.

Morality, from Force and Destiny is a general indicator of how in tune a character is to the Light or Dark sides of the force. At certain thresholds you fall to the Dark side (with mechanical implications) or rise to Jedihood. It differs from Obligation and Duty in that it is unique to force users and has no meaning or bearing on non-force sensitive characters.

So looking at it I don't see a real problem with having all 3 in the same party. In fact I don't see why you couldn't have all 3 apply to the same character. Luke, by the end of Return of the Jedi certainly has both a Duty and Morality score and might well have an Obligation in the form of having ticked off the Hutts by dropping Jabba's dinner party down the Sarlacc's gullet. Likewise both Han and Lando will have both Duty and Obligation scores, but not morality as the are not force users.

So has anyone tried this in practice? Had good results? Bad results?

I'm just starting to run a game which [MENTION=6801311]KahlessNestor[/MENTION] is in, and here's the approach I've taken.

Since I (and others) are just learning the system, I've requested that we start with just one of Obligation, Duty, or Morality for each character. Very open to incorporating more down the line, just keeping it simple to start.

I've completely cut out the wound threshold references in Obligation and Duty - just seems unnecessarily fiddly.

Then on the GM side of the screen, I created this little %d100 chart that merges all the characters choices. I interpolated the Jedi PC's "Morality" (which usually has an entirely different rolling system than Obligation & Duty) so it fit into the chart.

EDIT: and I made a boo-boo, the parentheses next to Morality should be (15).

Later on, assuming the game holds together, if we decide to include multiple options for each PC I found a GoogleSpreadsheet which I copied and plan to use down the line: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...VEQ774w8zBj5aG4YYc8UjxkxY/edit#gid=1429760446

EDIT: If I had a Force-user not select Morality, or a non-Force-user select Morality, then I'd need to think some more about how to handle that. My gut instinct was...

If you're a Force-user who doesn't take Morality, then you are operating in the "grey Jedi" zone... there may be rules implications for this that we'll need to figure out... I haven't gotten there yet.

If you're a non-Force-user who takes Morality, we may want to devise a way to generate Conflict through heroic actions (or anti-heroic actions) instead of through Force powers for your character...I haven't gotten there yet.

 

[Andor]

EDIT: If I had a Force-user not select Morality, or a non-Force-user select Morality, then I'd need to think some more about how to handle that. My gut instinct was...

If you're a Force-user who doesn't take Morality, then you are operating in the "grey Jedi" zone... there may be rules implications for this that we'll need to figure out... I haven't gotten there yet.

If you're a non-Force-user who takes Morality, we may want to devise a way to generate Conflict through heroic actions (or anti-heroic actions) instead of through Force powers for your character...I haven't gotten there yet.

I like what you're doing, but I don't think I would let a force user ignore the Morality system. The whole light side/ dark side dichotomy is just too much a part of the universe to be ignored. Now you could have views on it which may or may not be correct, frex I had a character in an (unfortunately stillborn) Star wars game who came from an order of mercenary force users who thought the path to the dark-side was selfish ends and henceforth would use any force power on a clients behalf but never use the force at all (even for self defense) when 'off the clock'. Now whether that was correct or not I left entirely in the hands of the GM.

Contriwise I think tying a non-force using character to the morality system is ... odd given that force use is the only thing that gives that scale meaning. I think if I were to allow that as a GM it would mean that the character was strong enough with the force to track even of they haven't awoken to the force enough to have a force rating. NPC force users would recognize his potential however. In fact I think I would actually treat it has an obligation with the result (has attracted attention from force users.) I don't think I would ever allow a droid PC to use the morality scale however.

 

[Wednesday Boy]

My group is starting a campaign in the theme of the Rebels cartoon. Most of us are from the fringe and have Obligations but one or two have a relationship with the Rebel Alliance and have Duties. The GM envisions all of the characters gaining Duty throughout the campaign as our faction becomes closer knit to the Rebellion. Tomorrow is the first session, so we'll see how it goes!

 

[aramis erak]

The Stress Threshold penalties for obligation are there for a reason - to encourage the player to actually deal with it. Likewise, the "Total Obligation exceeds 100" penalty is there to prevent PC's from accepting too much obligation - as that way leads to too much to handle.

Dropping them is not good. Just like letting Force Users ignore morality - those are genre enforcement rules in both cases, and serve to enhance the feel. In the case of obligation, the urge to get it over with. In the case of Morality, to avoid doing the bad deeds.