[Star Wars] SECR Preview #5 is up

[Reaper Steve]

JohnSnow, I see your point and agree: it lets Aid Another be helpful in both melee and ranged combat.

My statement was actually geared towards my proposed change of making a near miss or a hit with an actual attack (not a dedicated suppression) create a subsequent ttack penalty. If I were to invoke this houserule, then it would stand to reason that I would need to apply it to melee as well. This would get cumbersome and unfun, so I quickly trashed the idea in the name of fun and playability. My apologies for the confusion.

Back to Aid Another...will this really be used? I think I'd rather try to take the target out than just give him a -2 to his next attack. I'll have to try it to see.

Another one: Running Attack...this looks crazy powerful! I think any system that lets a player (or NPC) move and attack and then move off to an unassailable position needs to have rules for overwatch/readied shots/etc. Can I assume that the SWSE will let someone hold their and use it when 'an enemy exposes himself from cover?' I'm pretty sure that a legal use in current d20 rules.

 

[Victim]

I'm not sure why they bothered changing Aid, since it still pretty much sucks.

 

[Reaper Steve]

I'm not sure why they bothered changing Aid, since it still pretty much sucks.

Maybe that's what I was trying to say. As written, I don't see much use, and any alternative I can think of will be more cumbersome that I want to use, so why have it? Well, that's easy enough...I won't use it (as a GM). But I won't houserule it away, either...if one of my player's thinks his best action is to Aid Another, I'll let him do it.

 

[Loincloth of Armour]

I think Aid Another will work well. I've seen characters in my D&D games use it to either help hit the target or attempt to save their hp, so I'm certainly someone who will use it.

The fact that it works now with ranged weapons is reasonable if for no other reason than ranged weapons are a lot more prevelant in SW than in general D&D.

Although... since anyone with a ranged weapon and line of sight on the target can provide suppressive fire, your five friends can give that one Sith Master -10 on his attack rolls... or that Clone battalion of 60 troops executing Order 66 can give that one Jedi master -120.

(Good thing natural 20's always provide the path to 'urting.)

Setting up a reasonable cap (like -10 or such) so that players don't try to have 30 small hovering droids with blasters following them around providing insane Aid Another checks is something that will probably hit the table pretty quickly.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Aid Another is good because it's a non-typed bonus. In other words, it stacks with itself.

Aid Another is what allows nine ewoks, each with a -4 Grapple modifier, to reliably beat a stormtrooper with a Grapple modifier of +5. One ewok grapples (-4) and eight others Aid Another (+16). Of course, at that level, ewoks could be missing their aid another rolls, but even if many of them do, they're still going to even out or get the edge.

Not too fond of a rule that helps ewoks? Here's another example: A squad of ten stormtroopers firing on a Jedi might have no chance of hitting, but if they Aid Another to lower his attack bonus, he's going to have a tough time connecting at -20! Which actually does a good job of modelling the 'PCs never in serious danger of death but have to flee anyway' scenes in Star Wars.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

Setting up a reasonable cap (like -10 or such) so that players don't try to have 30 small hovering droids with blasters following them around providing insane Aid Another checks is something that will probably hit the table pretty quickly.

For 'reasonable cap,' read 'thermal detonator.' In other words, anyone who tries to do that deserves to have area of effect attacks blasted in the direction of his droids on a regular basis.

 

[Reaper Steve]

To the previous two posters...thanks for the examples!

I totally failed to think about multiple aid anothers. I'm sold.

 

[Loincloth of Armour]

To the previous two posters...thanks for the examples!

I totally failed to think about multiple aid anothers. I'm sold.

"Fear... anger... rules abuse... the path to the Dark Side are they."

 

[Stalker0]

The autofire is interesting, and seems to add another feather in the cap for armor. If you have squads of stormtroopers raining autofire on you, the best thing to have is some good strong armor.

Also, I think in Jedi Counseling II they eluded to the question of how multiclassing and skills will work. You can take a feat to gain any "class" skill as a trained one. If you multiclass, you have access to more class skills for purposes of this feat.

 

[RangerWickett]

I get a mental image of a guy with a grenade, who wants to hurl the grenade from behind cover to kill the dozens of storm troopers who are laying down suppressive fire at him. However, because he has a -20 penalty to his attack roll, the grenade misses completely and hits the guy in the head.