Tell me about d20 Star Wars.

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

I've been playing SWd20 since its release, and I'm with d4 on this one.

I find that in SW, its HARDER to kill the PCs than in other d20 games. Which is a good thing IMO. Since I've GMed a lot of games since its release, I've gotten a good hold of what PCs can handle. Which is...unless the dice are rolling bad...a lot. Especially Jedi. Jedi aren't more POWERFUL per se, but when you have them as a melee oriented class with nearly everyone else focussed on range, they end up with an advantage with thier Deflects.

Sure, grenades can't be deflected...but even stormtroopers aren't dumb enough to throw grenades in thier base. I think the MOST deadly part of SW is ship to ship combat. I've seen damage fly and take out ships really quickly in that...in fact, my ONLY TPK in SW was a poor group of PCs that went up in a ball of flames from a pair of TIE Interceptors.

 

[irdeggman]

So I recently played my first session of a d20 Star Wars (Revised) game. I'm a Jedi Guardian, in a group of several Jedi and a Soldier. Things I've noticed so far:

* Star Wars is a lot more deadly than D&D, which was itself deadly. We started the game as 5th-level characters, and even so a single critical hit could kill most of us. My own character did 3d8+9 (after Enhance Abilities) with his lightsaber. High enough to kill any party member on a crit. A foe with the same level of saber-skill = ouch.

Unless I'm mistaken, and I don't have my book in front of me - Str modifer is not added to a lightsaber's damage, one of the peculiarities of the weapon. But lightsabers do ignore DR of personal armor so on a critical the damage goes straight to wounds directly.

Some other things that are keep the SW d20 from being too deadly:

Characters (not minor non-classed NPCs) gain wound points. These are in addition to their vitality points (D&D hit points) and they go to -10 wounds before dying.

A Jedi's Heal Self ability is a must have. Taking 10 when not in combat will restore the VP expended to use any Force Abilities previously. Awsome skill, and may actually be too powerful - but what the hey if they let me use it for my PC then I will.


In our campaign a friend and I play brothers. We are from a fringe type world - my PC started as a finger (2 levels) then became a Jedi Guardian while his started as a Force Adept and then picked up levels of Fringer. His has more Forces Skills and uses them extremely effectively. Move Object and Affect Mind are just plain wicked - just like the movies. My low level Jedi ( I think he was 3rd level 2- Fringer 3- Jedi Guardian, regardless it was the level that he gained deflect - attack class ability) managed to use it in his first attempt an killed an opponent who shot at him. Wonderful scene and imagery.

 

[GoodKingJayIII]

I'm curious how some of you have used Force Adepts in the game. Our GM believes that the Force Adept is really a class to be taken by a character who wants to be a Jedi, but can't (way on the Outer Rim, Rebellion Era, etc). I looked at the class and I remember agreeing with him, but it was a very cursory glance. Since I don't own the book I can't really take a closer look at the moment. We have no Jedi in our party, and I doubt we'll get an opportunity to have them, because we're playing in the Rebellion era. How have your Force Adepts faired when matched against Jedi? Are they on par, weaker, perhaps stronger in some ways? Or does it not matter all that much. I'm just curious what others' experiences have been.

Sorry to diverge from the topic a little. But it's one of the things I remember when I started playing d20 SW but haven't been able to test.

 

[d4]

Unless I'm mistaken, and I don't have my book in front of me - Str modifer is not added to a lightsaber's damage, one of the peculiarities of the weapon.

you are mistaken. lightsabers get Str damage. you are correct about lightsabers ignoring hardness and DR, though.

Characters (not minor non-classed NPCs) gain wound points. These are in addition to their vitality points (D&D hit points) and they go to -10 wounds before dying.

a little correction: minor NPCs do get Wound points. they don't get Vitality points per level. this makes them much more fragile at higher levels.

A Jedi's Heal Self ability is a must have.

very true. note though that you can use it only once per "healing period" -- once per day for Wounds or once per hour for Vitality. even so, it can be a lifesaver. a Jedi can easily regain all his Vitality if given a few hours of rest after a combat.

My low level Jedi ( I think he was 3rd level 2- Fringer 3- Jedi Guardian, regardless it was the level that he gained deflect - attack class ability) managed to use it in his first attempt an killed an opponent who shot at him. Wonderful scene and imagery.

yes, it's a great ability. one of the Jedi PCs in my campaign found himself alone in a long hallway with no cover against three soldier with blasters... he thought he was a goner at first, but he managed to reflect all the blaster bolts coming at him and killed all three guards before he even reached melee range!

 

[Lord Pendragon]

very true. note though that you can use it only once per "healing period" -- once per day for Wounds or once per hour for Vitality. even so, it can be a lifesaver. a Jedi can easily regain all his Vitality if given a few hours of rest after a combat.

Yes, my Jedi is combat (specifically lightsaber) oriented, and has max ranks in Heal Self. It's a nice skill, but the fact that it can only be used once per hour limits it. In our opening session, my Jedi used it once during combat after a particularly nasty volley of blasterfire. Would have liked to use it again, but alas no.

In a D&D campaign, Heal Self would be very, very powerful. But in a game without clerics, it becomes more of a necessity. It's pretty much the only in-combat healing a character is likely to see. This may be more of a quirk of our game, though, since I could easily see a healing-oriented Jedi helping out greatly. (There is even, I believe, a Jedi Healer in one of the splatbooks...)

yes, it's a great ability. one of the Jedi PCs in my campaign found himself alone in a long hallway with no cover against three soldier with blasters... he thought he was a goner at first, but he managed to reflect all the blaster bolts coming at him and killed all three guards before he even reached melee range!

I love blaster deflection, and it's very useful. In our session, the Soldier actually taking cover was still in a better defensive position, but the skill does allow Jedi to enter into melee range more safely.

Jedi aren't more POWERFUL per se, but when you have them as a melee oriented class with nearly everyone else focussed on range, they end up with an advantage with thier Deflects.

I'm not so sure about this. Deflect only works if the ranged attacker misses. And then, the Jedi has to make his own attack roll, versus a target that is probably behind cover. In our session, we were up against a half-dozen thugs with blaster rifles and a couple battle droids firing blasters, and the Jedi's melee nature seemed more disadvantageous. Particularly since apparently ranged weapons don't provoke AoOs either.

For the second point there I assume that you just mean none ahs been introduced in your game as there is indeed armor in the mainbook, well at least in the 1st Ed book. I don't own the Revised so I can't comment for sure on it. 1E SW d20 wa son page 121.

I meant that the PCs haven't acquired any, not that it doesn't exist in the game world. However, looking at the prices of the various armors, I'm not sure we will see any armor in future games. Particularly since Jedi don't typically wear armor anyway.

Never got the chance to play any d20 SW sadly enough so I never spent to time with the blaster rules for things like Multifire. I'm sure it's pretty nasty tho

Yes. Yes it is. In fact, it was at the point that our soldier fired three times in a single round, hit three times and dropped two thugs at once, that I realized Jedi were not the end-all be-all of the game. (At least mechanically. )

Thanks for all the comments, guys. Keep 'em coming!

 

[Shades of Eternity]

I personally like it, but feel it needs a few of the classes revised (especially the tech specialist) and are missing a few fun races and some of the races aren't done properly in the anthology.

Glad they fixed ship to ship combat though