GoodKingJayIII said:
Would you mind giving a few examples of what you think has been dumbed down?
Diagonal movement is now 2-2-2-2 and not 1-2-1-2-1-2;
A natural 20 is a automatic critical;
No more 5 ft. step;
I haven't read this section of the book, but I'd argue that being a PC automatically makes you "better" than most of the riff-raff in the galaxy.
yes, but the difference in saga between pc and npc classes is too steep for my taste. But that's not the main problem, the main problem is concept. I like games where actions defines the character, and not the contrary. I understand saga is the contrary. I think PCs must be "potentially" better than ordinary people because they go on adventures, do incredible stuff, face all kinds of dangers and by making their choices they can become heroes or not. That's how I like to play, how I like to feel it, even if the Fighter gets more feats than the Warrior (so the rules ARE enforcing PCs to be better than NPCs). But in saga, when you get 3 HD in first level, get a bonus on damage based on level, better defenses based on level, etc, all that feeling that the character is becoming powerful by the player's choices go away. The overall feeling of the book, when i read it, was that your character is much more powerfull than other people because he is a Hero. hey! but why he is a Hero??
Or just unfamiliar with RPGs and/or the d20 system? Even if this is the case, I don't understand why it's a bad thing. If it's easier to make bad characters, is that a sign of a better RPG?
I don't quite understand this statement. Do you mean that the paternalism of the rules guides people towards combat, or that the rules themselves are too focused on combat? In either case, I'd argue that combat is a huge part of the movies, so I'm personally ok with that being a major focus of an RPG with a design goal of specifically modeling the movies. But I also don't that as very different from 3.5.
Don't get me wrong, i did not say being easy is a bad thing. And i did not even say it was easy or hard to make a powerful character.
I think one of the fun elements of any RPG is character creation and customization. I've seen hundreds of characters being made in my gaming life, while playing D&D for example. I saw crappy combat-oriented characters, and unbeatble ones, i've seen character useless in combat but good in anything else, and the contrary also. I've seen people creating all kinds of characters for all kinds of playing styles. For me, all that is fun, and making an overall bad character is also funny, because the game is not only about the character creation. But the Saga edition had a design phylosophy to ensure every character created should be useful in any situation, and they really enforced it with most of the changes from the previous edition. And also if not worse, they mainly preocupation was to ensure all characters to be useful in combat. That bothers me. Combat IS a huge part in the movies, but maybe I don't want to create a Star Wars game that mimics the movie. Maybe I want to play a game with very little combat.
It looks like to me they made so much effort to create a game that could "simulate" all we saw in the movies, created so many rules that it doesn't matter what choices you make your character IS gonna be as "heroic" as those in the movies, that all you can do with it is to play games with the same "feel" of the movies. Maybe I don't want to play a "fast-paced-action-game" with a "cinematic-combat-feel". Star Wars is more than that, it can be more than that. But the book is ALL about that, and i feel it is ONLY about that. And this sucks.
Well I gotta agree that that is a pretty huge oversight. Space travel has always been an important part of the movies. Unfortunately, it's always moved at the ever-cliche "speed of plot" so I guess one could argue "Hey, in the movies, they got there when they got there," so hard and fast rules aren't that necessary at the moment. I'm personally with you and feel that's something we should have in the core book. Hopefully there will be some alternate rules for astrogation down the road.
That's a matter of personal taste. As I said before, I don't like to play games that mimics the movies, with these "plot tools". I like to play it real, to feel it is real. I don't like to play star wars as if I was in one of the movies, i like to feel I'm inside the star wars galaxy. I enjoy this "immersion" in the game. It's just playing style.
Unfortunately, the game is for people that has the "game-is-a-movie" playing style, as if they were creating a movie with their characters' actions. That's why they think it is funny to choose their PCs destiny, to decide, for example, their characters are gonna fall to the dark side, than maybe come back, etc.
I don't like it, i like to play as if I WAS the character himself. I personally want to feel the desire to search for power quicker and tap the dark side. To not fall to the dark side must be a challenge to me alos. That's why I don't like the DS rules, because they are made for the "game-script" style of playing. Just search for Rodney's reasoning to why no more Dark side points etc, he says basically falling to the dark side must be a player's choice for his character. That's not bad, just not my cup of tea. I don't enjoy playing like that.
Back to the lack of travelling rules, the game gives me that feeling that the story only "happens" when combat is occuring. All that happens between combats are just "irrelevant" story plots that lead to another combat. "Irrelevant" because we don't need to actually play them, just consider that they happened. Than a little talking, more plot device and finally what the game is about: "fast-paced-heroic-combat". That's why I made the comparison to Final Fantasy Tactics.
Almost all the rules in the game are about combat. There are few possible situations that are not combat oriented. To explain that, think about D&D. Nobody out there has the guts to say D&D is not combat oriented, and it gladly is. But there are lots of situations in D&D that occur outside combat, and they are as fun and important as the combat itself. Situations like, travelling, buyings/selling stuff, creating stuff, exploring places, searching/disarming traps, resting/healing, city duties, etc. There are many rules and powers, many spells too, that are meant to be used outside combat. And all that, the situations and the rules, creates that "roleplaying" atmosphere that we all love and differs the game from CRPGS, card games, etc. But SAGA also lacks that. They took away the craft skill. Why? To create the "cinematic feel" of the game. And of course, spending days crafting a weapon is not "cinematic"... well, but it IS RPG, at least for my taste.
SAGA is a great game, and a very successful edition, because it reached its purpose. Unfortunately, for me, it does not create the kind of atmosphere and feeling I enjoy in my games. Of course, anyone can say "it's not about the rules, the GM and players play the way they like". Yeah, but the kind of playing style the book enforces is unquestionable, and thats what we are talking about.
