SW saga edition problems and gotchas?

[Michael Silverbane]

I've run about four sessions with the current setup, including a couple of starship combats (using a weapon proficiency bonus instead of a nonweapon proficiency penalty really makes starship combats more interesting for the players of characters who are not starhip focused).

It seems to be working out pretty well, so far. At least none of the players feel that they are at an unfair disadvantage, and it has not been difficult to challenge them by just tossing half a dozen or so mooks at them. They've only faced off with one heroic NPC, and that ended up being resolved without combat.

I'll be running again this Sunday (the upcoming scenario will likely include both a starship combat and one or two combats at the character scale). If I run into any wierdness, I'll be sure to post about it here.

 

[Donovan Morningfire]

Originally I was using a flat add to the raw Reflex Defense of the armor (i.e. adding two to the value to get the DR). After a bit, I decided that I wanted stromtrooper armor to have DR 10 (enough to pretty much stop a sporting blaster from a low-level punk, but not enough to stop any serious firepower), so I rearranged things, using that number as my baseline and just counting up or down from there.

The one problem I see with the Armor as DR approach is that can make PCs even tougher to kill than they are already. The RCR had this problem to an extent where you had to be off your rocker to not want to at least where a blast vest for some added insurance against a critical hit. If using the inflated values you've listed, then it could get even worse as players scrambling to pick up at least AP (light), or might even decide they can live with the armor check penalties in exchange for a viable hit point shield.

Assuming the medium and heavy armors scale up the DR value from the base 10 for stormtrooper armor, I can very easily see Soldiers and Elite Troopers that can easily reenact the Mark I vs. Ten Rings scene from Iron Man, as the bad guys are just simply unable to do enough damage to the PC for it to matter

 

[Michael Silverbane]

I haven't seen that as a problem so far... Mainly because attacks hit so much with this system. The Noble in the group started out with a Reflex Defense of 12, so even a stormtrooper was hitting him with two out of three attacks. Granted, that noble is absolutely not well-suited to combat and he's got the worse Reflex Defense of any of the party, but he was a contributing factor to my decision to inrease the protective value of all the armors.

Its possible that this might become an issue later on, but as the group reaches higher levels, they're more likely to run into heroic opponents, so the extra damage may compensate for their use of armor.

 

[drothgery]

I haven't seen that as a problem so far... Mainly because attacks hit so much with this system. The Noble in the group started out with a Reflex Defense of 12, so even a stormtrooper was hitting him with two out of three attacks.

... at 1st level. But for everyone except for soldiers and Jedi that don't take armor talents, defense improves much faster than offense.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

... at 1st level. But for everyone except for soldiers and Jedi that don't take armor talents, defense improves much faster than offense.

Except that, in the set of house rules that we're discussing (which must've gotten lost along the way), defenses increase at the same rate as everything else, at the rate of one per two character levels. So the percentage of attacks that hit will remain pretty consistent, assuming that they face adversaries of close to their level or ability.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

In case anyone's interested, I've attached the character sheet that I made that incorporates my rules changes. I use a slightly different skill list, as well as using the one-half level progression for attacks, defenses, and skills Also, I grant feats and talents on a set schedule, based on your character level, rather than your class levels (every character gains one feat at each level and one talent at every odd level).

 

[Plane Sailing]

Thanks Michael!

 

[Donovan Morningfire]

Except that, in the set of house rules that we're discussing (which must've gotten lost along the way), defenses increase at the same rate as everything else, at the rate of one per two character levels. So the percentage of attacks that hit will remain pretty consistent, assuming that they face adversaries of close to their level or ability.

Which makes the ability to negate a portion of the damage (since you really can't really on having a high defense score to save your bacon) all the more valuable, especially at the higher levels.

If PC Andy and PC Bob have identical Defense values and Attack scores, but Bob is wearing armor that gives him DR 5, the clear advantage here goes to Bob, who on average is going to take less damage from Andy's attacks than Andy would from Bob's. Of course that's not counting things like critical hits and/or really high damage rolls, but wearing armor is a huge advantage, to the point you'd have to be really devoted to staying within concept (or being a colossal moron) to not want to wear any sort of armor.

That was the problem that the RCR ran into, was that it made little to no sense for a character to be wearing at least a blast vest (especially if using the equipment modification rules in Arms & Equipment Guide, enabling you to waive the ACP on the lighter armors), since it meant that an attack that did Wound damage was less likely to kill you outright.

 

[Plane Sailing]

If PC Andy and PC Bob have identical Defense values and Attack scores, but Bob is wearing armor that gives him DR 5, the clear advantage here goes to Bob, who on average is going to take less damage from Andy's attacks than Andy would from Bob's.

Well, that would be a problem but it's not going to be a problem for me, since I'm capping the defence benefit you can get if you're wearing armour.

For low level grunts wearing armour is always better than not wearing armour. As people get to higher level you are much more likely to be better served by not wearing armour and getting your full defence... because that way it can emulate the films that bit better.

Cheers

 

[pukunui]

This is something I'm very interested in doing. While I like 4e a lot more than I liked 3.5, lately the whole powers structure has started rubbing me the wrong way. It's just coming across as too artificial for my taste, particularly with the Martial exploits.

I've only played SWSE, whereas I've only DMed 4e, but I'm finding more and more that I prefer SWSE's talent tree class structure to 4e's powers structure. This is the biggest issue between the two for me. If WotC had stuck with talents for 4e, I'd be a very happy chappy indeed.

I wonder which would be easier:

1) Converting SWSE to a fantasy game, or
2) Ripping out the 4e class powers/features and replacing them with a more open-ended talent tree system that works for 30 levels.

Right now I'm waiting for The Gneech to finish v2 of his S&S Saga conversion. I really like his original conversion, but I think I might like the new one even more, and I don't really want to try doing my own conversion or whatever until I've seen his new one.

Anyway, I'll be watching this thread with interest to see what other developments come up and see what other issues with the original SWSE rules there are.

As a player (and a powergamer at that), having Skill Focus grant +5 is fantastic, but I can see how it might be an issue from the GM's point of view.