Star wars - which version?

[TarionzCousin]

No way. The number of players in the 1e/2e era outstrips today's numbers. The numbers have been discussed quite a bit, especially in the early 3e era, but it would surprise me if the number of D&D players today even comes close to the number in the '80s.

Yeah, D&D was played by nearly every teenager who could roll a die in the 80's. My girl cousins played D&D and they didn't like SciFi, Fantasy, or Dragons.

Imagine if all of today's WoW and Boardgame players were playing D&D. That's comparable to what it was like "Back in The Day."

 

[kitsune9]

- The Dark Side point system is a joke, my players treat them as a badge of honour when they get them because they have absolutely NO game effect until you get enough to make you an NPC. Get a DSP in d6 and you'll know it.

When you say this, this reminded me of the d20 Star Wars I played in the RPGA at a con. This one guy ran the game was making it really boring, so we all started doing stupid stuff to earn dark side points. We had stopped caring for the game.

 

[minitrue]

Getting back to the topic. . .

If you use d6 Star Wars (which to be honest, I am tempted to do, because it was a very good system and very flexible), the only downside is having to write up crunch for eras other than the about 13 year period between the creation of the Rebel Alliance and the founding of the Jedi Academy (or any holdovers from other eras you'd like to use, or any races introduced in the prequels or later EU, like Neimodians, Zabrak, Caamasi, Yuuzhan Vong, and Cerean).

Are there good versions of this material already out there? Are there versions that people prefer to others?

Try here: 4shared - My 4shared - shared folder - free file sharing and storage, haven't had a chance to play any of this stuff, but the guys who created it have done a lot of work.

 

[wingsandsword]

When you say this, this reminded me of the d20 Star Wars I played in the RPGA at a con. This one guy ran the game was making it really boring, so we all started doing stupid stuff to earn dark side points. We had stopped caring for the game.

The problem here is, that the prequels showed us it takes quite a while to fall to the dark side, not just one or two acts (which it is quite possible to fall to the dark side from only two mildly evil acts in d6 by the RAW)

The Saga Edition version of requiring Dark Side points equal to your Wisdom to be completely fallen, and start to take penalties and be affected at half your Wisdom score means you take a lot longer, and it's a lot more obvious you're falling. Anakin slaughtered an entire village of Sand People, and that was before the entire Clone Wars and killing a helpless prisoner. It wasn't until he struck down Mace Windu that he finally fell. By strict old D6 standards he probably would have been Dark Side by the end of AotC, much less everything between then and the duel in Palpatine's Office.

On second thought, if I go back to d6 SWRPG I'd do something to make DSP's less painful.

The only official rule I know of to make DSPs less painful in d6 is out of the Tales of the Jedi Companion which says you only go dark at 6 DSPs, but at 1 through 5 you take small roleplaying quirks or negative personality traits to show a slower fall.

 

[pukunui]

The Saga Edition version of requiring Dark Side points equal to your Wisdom to be completely fallen, and start to take penalties and be affected at half your Wisdom score means you take a lot longer, and it's a lot more obvious you're falling.

Where'd you get the bolded bit from? There's nothing like that in Saga.

On the subject of it taking a lot longer, though, there were some fun optional rules published in a Jedi Counseling article whereby you could gain a random number of DSPs per evil act.

For my campaign, I've tried to make things a bit more interesting by doing the following:

1) For starters, you can't get rid of your last DSP merely by spending a FP to atone. You've got to commit a truly selfless, heroic act in order to become "pure" again.

2) Depending on the situation, I tempt my players with free d20 rerolls and maxed out FP values at the cost of a DSP. My plan is that as they accrue DSPs, eventually I'll start offering those power-ups at the cost of two DSPs, and then eventually I'll stop offering them altogether ... but at the same time, I'll start offering free uses of dark rage and hatred and Force powers like that. The idea is to represent, on the one hand, that the dark side is like a drug: when you first start using it, you can get a nice high, but once you become addicted, you've got to use more and more to get the same effect, and on the other hand that once you become steeped in the dark side, you can "unlock" various dark side abilities.

Anakin slaughtered an entire village of Sand People, and that was before the entire Clone Wars and killing a helpless prisoner. It wasn't until he struck down Mace Windu that he finally fell.

Personally, I think Anakin's fall is rather pathetic. He's such a lousy character in the prequels that he really hasn't got very far to fall to begin with. But anyway ...

 

[Water Bob]

I'm a 4e fan, but it's simply untrue that "no one" likes 1e/2e (and I suppose OD&D) anymore. Plenty of people still play those editions.

Yeppers. The dude lost me when he replied to me saying "none of this means anything to (him)". If he's going to start off like that, he's only worth ignoring. I didn't even finish reading the rest of his post.

AD&D 2E is still a very popular edition of the game. There are still new products being published for it today by niche-focused and small time publishers. If you look at over at the Dragonsfoot forums, you'll find a huge, world-wide community still using AD&D 2E (and OD&D, and AD&D 1E) as their favorite D&D system of choice.

 

[Water Bob]

Getting back to the topic. . .

If you use d6 Star Wars (which to be honest, I am tempted to do, because it was a very good system and very flexible), the only downside is having to write up crunch for eras other than the about 13 year period between the creation of the Rebel Alliance and the founding of the Jedi Academy (or any holdovers from other eras you'd like to use, or any races introduced in the prequels or later EU, like Neimodians, Zabrak, Caamasi, Yuuzhan Vong, and Cerean).

Are there good versions of this material already out there? Are there versions that people prefer to others?

Yes. Do a search. There are tons of Star Wars RPG sites, and many of them feature all the versions of the game (while some are still focussed on D6 Star Wars only).

You can find D6 versions of many of the supplements that came out for the d20 Star Wars game. You still have to have a copy of the d20 supplement in question, but the conversion rules for D6 are online for many of the books.

And, that will save you a ton of work.




EDIT:

A quick google turned up this: http://www.4shared.com/dir/9688168/f35baae0/sharing.html , and this: http://home.arcor.de/starwarsd6/d6books/Star%20Wars%20D6%20-%20Galaxy%20Guide%2000%20-%20The%20Phantom%20Menace.pdf

There's much more on the net if you do a little looking around.

 

[Wik]

The problem here is, that the prequels showed us it takes quite a while to fall to the dark side, not just one or two acts (which it is quite possible to fall to the dark side from only two mildly evil acts in d6 by the RAW)

The Saga Edition version of requiring Dark Side points equal to your Wisdom to be completely fallen, and start to take penalties and be affected at half your Wisdom score means you take a lot longer, and it's a lot more obvious you're falling. Anakin slaughtered an entire village of Sand People, and that was before the entire Clone Wars and killing a helpless prisoner. It wasn't until he struck down Mace Windu that he finally fell. By strict old D6 standards he probably would have been Dark Side by the end of AotC, much less everything between then and the duel in Palpatine's Office.

On second thought, if I go back to d6 SWRPG I'd do something to make DSP's less painful.

The only official rule I know of to make DSPs less painful in d6 is out of the Tales of the Jedi Companion which says you only go dark at 6 DSPs, but at 1 through 5 you take small roleplaying quirks or negative personality traits to show a slower fall.

Whle I don't want to be one of those "always defend the edition of choice" people, I do think you may be a touch mistaken. While, by the rules, you are exactly right - you rolled a d6 every time you got a Dark Side Point, and thus had relatively few points available as you "slid" into darkness... isn't there a way to lose Dark Side Points through heroic/selfless acts? Thus, while Anakin did some bad things, didn't he also do good things to allow him to offset those Dark Side Points?

It's been ten+ years since I've played d6 SW, but I seem to recall rules to that effect.

 

[Dave0047]

Apology accepted, no worries. That said, I'm not sure I agree with you, at least with the respect of the balance pertaining to older editions. I might put forward the suggestion that older editions (I'll use 1st as my example) were still balanced... just not balanced in the same way as a 3rd or 4th ed game.

Lets look at the Fighter and Wizard since they are really diametric opposites. IME at low level (say up to 4th) the fighter does do a lot of the heavy lifting. A wizard is extremely limited in what he can do on a given day and needs a lot of support to do it. In my group however it's the Wizard to tends to take over the role of managing the 'supplementary' party members. At first level everyone, even the fighter is pretty squishy so most parties gravitate towards multiple hirelings, or charmed men at arms if the wizard has that spell. This bulks out their battle line and gives the wizard something to do after he's fired off his sleep spell for the day.

In the middling levels (say 5th to 9th) the two classes are pretty well balanced with each other on a 1-1 basis. The wizard starts getting some of his really nice damage spells and the fighter starts to develop a sizable chunk of hitpoints.

After "name level" the roles change. Fighters begin to concern themselves with stronghold management, thieves start running their guilds, priests found churches, and wizards lock themselves in towers and research spells. The wizard might be able to cast cloudkill at 12th level, but the fighter can lead a few thousand followers into battle. In the end, particularly if the campaign has built up to this point from low levels it really does balance out. Both classes still rely on each other... the wizard can't defend his tower all alone and the fighters army is vulnerable to magical attacks, it's just the scale has changed.

Very true. Good points. However, in 4th Ed, the classes are balanced at all levels.

That said there are some horrendously imbalanced systems out there. That do have dedicated (albeit small) followings. RIFTS springs to mind as the picture perfect example of this. With a good GM and some sort of a 'table contract' regarding power level then even RIFTS can be a lot of fun despite (and in some ways because of) how imbalanced it is.

RIFTS doesn't sell at all at my LGS, and no one that I know plays (or has played) it with the exception of one REALLY REALLY old guy, who makes it a point to play old, washed-up RPG's. I don't think I'd quite consider RIFTS or GURPS a contender with D&D 4e, Saga Edition, or the Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader/Deathwatch stuff.

Just because they don't have the numbers of players as, say, 4e (and whether 4e has the numbers as, say, 3e, or even older editions, is debatable) doesn't mean they're not good or that nobody likes them

I never said that, directly. I said that the newer editions of these RPG's very directly have a larger player base and better reputation because they are simply better games. Better quality of games means more sales which means more players.

I like watching boxing, even if MMA has come to eclipse it in popularity. Is boxing somehow inferior to MMA because of that? That would be a silly argument for me to try to make (and I wouldn't try to make it; I think boxing is better ).

No, Boxing is just inferior to MMA because Boxing is boring. MMA has boxing in it, but is not limited to it. Boxing as a fighting style is still prominent and important in MMA though, as one of the latest UFC's had a guy named George St-Pierre jab his way to a victory in a sport where nearly any fighting style goes. UFC is much cooler.

As for "balance," I like how 4e balanced the classes and races. That doesn't mean that such balance makes for an inherently better gaming experience.

Really? So you and your gaming buddies prefer that one of you be the center of attention and the only competent party member because "that's more fun"? I'm confused at why you're saying balance isn't fun...

D&D hit the height of its popularity right when it was as unbalanced as it ever would be, and it's arguable that those numbers were recovered with the advent of 3e. At the least, D&D is nowhere near the cultural phenomenon it was back then - I know, because I was playing during that era, and there is nowhere near the excitement now amongst players, non-players, and the media over the game, of any edition, as there was then. Doesn't mean 4e is not a good game, just as "balance" doesn't mean it's a better game somehow.

Okay, you're quite wrong here. Go and watch the PAX 2010 D&D game that WotC's Chris Perkins DM'd, and read the dozens of pages of comments on each video. There was likely more press and advertising of the hobby in that one event than 2nd ed ever had. There are conventions held world-wide where tens of thousands of geeks pour out of the wood-work to get their game on over a weekend at a convention center, and this phenomenon has really only been popular over the last decade or two, growing and almost doubling in the last 10 years alone.

Besides, just because something is the flavor du jour doesn't mean everything that came before is somehow deficient.

Again, never said that, just saying again that the current systems have a much larger player base because they're better and I'm sorry, but better means more popular (see my above comment on the same thing).

In the end, it's whether a game is enjoyable to play that makes it "superior," which is a word I would hesitate to use for something as subjective as a game.

And I have not had the extremely high level of enjoyment with the older crap than I've had with 4e and Saga. I can't wait for 5th Ed and FFG's SWRPG (I bet they are the ones that bought the license) as they will be from competent companies who are dedicated to playtesting, finding balance, and making the game as enjoyable as possible.

And "led" is the past tense of "lead." One of my pet peeves.

Well that's nice, but you mis-read my post if you read "lead" as "led" and not "lead" as a title, as in "the LEADING designers" as in "head designers".

No way. The number of players in the 1e/2e era outstrips today's numbers. The numbers have been discussed quite a bit, especially in the early 3e era, but it would surprise me if the number of D&D players today even comes close to the number in the '80s.

I don't have the numbers myself, but I seriously doubt that's even remotely true. D&D Insider accounts alone probably rival sales of D&D books in the 80's, and that's not including stuff bought at hobby retailers, online, or at conventions...

Yeppers. The dude lost me when he replied to me saying "none of this means anything to (him)". If he's going to start off like that, he's only worth ignoring. I didn't even finish reading the rest of his post.

lol. None of those names meant anything to me. Did I hurt your feelings over that statement? Well that's a shame, because I don't care about some guy who wrote some stat-blocks for a pre-established game, and helped write a horribly imbalanced game system, sorry.

AD&D 2E is still a very popular edition of the game. There are still new products being published for it today by niche-focused and small time publishers. If you look at over at the Dragonsfoot forums, you'll find a huge, world-wide community still using AD&D 2E (and OD&D, and AD&D 1E) as their favorite D&D system of choice.

Niche-focused and small time publishers? Well, there are thousands of hobbies that still have a small group of people dedicated to them, but that doesn't make them popular or better hobbies does it? The fact that there are less people dedicated to 1st and 2nd ed (as you have admitted here) specifically means that people are playing the new stuff and not the old stuff. Hmmm... I wonder why that is...

Wizards is the monster it is today (no pun intended) because each edition has gotten better and better in the areas of balance, fun, ease of play, and ability to draw in new players.

Sure, the game might have been the only thing in town 25 years ago, but that doesn't mean it is indefinitely the most interesting and fun edition. There's always a better game, there's always a better system, and Wizards (and other companies) will continue to release better versions of what we're playing.

 

[Wik]

Dude, this is about star wars, and more specifically, which version of the game players prefer. So far, almost everyone in this thread has been polite and civil. even the disagreements have been mostly civil - whether one prefers d20, saga, or d6.

This thread is NOT an edition war about 4e. You seem to love 4e. Good for you. I'm rather keen on it myself (although I do houserule it). But that doesn't matter, since this thread has nothing to do with that.

You've been here long enough to know we don't use this tone on the threads. This is a happy place, not a place where we fight. Lighten up - this isn't a topic to get worked up over.