Revised SW nobles - do you like it?

[Plane Sailing]

The next sneak preview is here http://www.wizards.com/starwars/article.asp?x=sw20020228bnobles&c=rpg

I've read it and I hate it.

I think that the existing "inspire confidence" is far better than the stupid translation of the bardic ability from D&D. Now, it may be that at high levels the 1e SW version (can I say that *already*?) gives too big a bonus... but at least a noble can spend a long time giving a stirring speech to bolster the troops morale before they go off into battle. I imagine it like Leia inspiring the fighters on Yavin before they fly off to the death star... an hour of pep talk etc. to sustain them and their motivation for most of the fight, because the KNOW what they are FIGHTING FOR. Not some stupid 30 second bonus.

Emasculates the entire point of inspiring confidence to my mind.

The call in a favour is better defined in the new version, and it reflects an increasing network of "supporters" and the resources ability works OK.

Personally, I think they could have toned down the extent of the benefits from inspire confidence and coordinate, changed the way contact works to the new one and perhaps added the bonus feats and resources ability to counter the toned down nature of inspire and coordinate. But as it is, they have hamstrung the class.

Fixing stuff that is broken is OK, improving things that didn't work well is OK, but to my mind they have gutted the class, destroying one of the main team benefits they could bring along.

End of rant.

(OK, I play a noble in SW at the moment. I just love giving the stirring speeches before a mission to get everyone going - and the other characters respond well to it because their players know they get a decent benefit from listening!

Cheers

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I didn`t like the noble in the old version, because of the boring "+2, +4, +6" increasement. I prefered the "old" version of the bard.
But I think in the current version the special abilities seem to be to weak, and especially there are to few.
There should be no problems to add "Fascinating Speech". Well, at least Frightful Presence is now very easy available to a noble...

 

[Kaptain_Kantrip]

Check out my alt.noble (meshing the 3e DMG aristocrat with the new SW noble class from the revised rules):

http://www.enworld.org/messageboards/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6419

 

[Skywalker]

This may not be helpful but another possible fix is to use the noble class in Fading Suns d20 which grants extra social feats like a fighter. The social feats are things like connections, resources, title, various things like inspire confidence etc. I find this allows you to make a noble PC as you want them (a great orator, a being the throne schemer, a strong warrior noble) and adds lots of depth to the PC without necessarily new funky powers.

 

[Corinth]

I'm down with it.

They fixed the favor ability, spread out the benefits and made it a workable social monster class. I can't wait to see more previews.

 

[Kwalish Kid]

I'm with Corinth. The old favour ability was not to my liking.

 

[Plane Sailing]

I agree that the old "Favour" ability was rubbish, and it is much better defined now - but I don't think that it justifies the terrible reduction in the inspire ability - both in terms of benefit and duration/implementation. That just sounds like D&D bard stuff grafted in. The original had benefits nicely spaced out anyway - and it was already a workable social monster class. I think it is far less usable in that role now than it used to be.

I'm likely to use the new "contact" rules and just ditch the rest.

I will have to take a look at Fading Suns (although my local game store keeps everything in sealed bags - grrrr). I like the idea of social feats.

The "Wealth" feat from the WoT web-enhancement would also make a good option for nobles to take.

Thanks for all the input.