Lit WEG: West End books by rarity

When the reboot was announced back in 2014, I figured it was a good time to finally get the last few EU books, and in particular WEG books, that I didn't already have. Now that "Legends" was complete, so too could my collection be. Most were easily obtained, but a few proved to be more elusive, or expensive, than I'd initially figured. Below is a list I typed up around the time, and I'm posting it now just out of curiosity as to if others here who've gone for all the WEG books would agree. If not, what would you say are the toughest WEG books to find, affordably or at all?

From rarest to merely uncommon and/or stupidly expensive (several times original retail price), here's the rarest/toughest to obtain WEG books:

• Crisis on Cloud City with all Sabacc cards. This is an uncommon one to start with, but a copy with all the cards is truly rare and expensive, unless you get a good deal. There was even a claim in a issue of Insider that no sabacc cards were ever officially released, only for the next issue to run a Correction from embarrassed Editors that they had forgotten this book and the included cards existed, after numerous fans wrote in about it.
• Stock Ships: a later release, I actually got mine in a larger lot on Ebay.
• Campaign Pack: the rarest first-gen WEG release.
• Kathol Outback: not many of these out there, and most listings are way high.
• Wretched Hives of Scum and Villainy: another late release.
• Galaxy Guide 6 1st Edition (with the starscape background cover)
• Death in the Undercity: seems to be readily available, but that is only due to low demand. A lot rarer than it's average price would suggest. It never turned up in any of the lots I saw when I was hunting, and is mostly forgettable in terms of lore.
• Game Master Screen Revised
• Tapani Sector Instant Adventures
• Pirates and Privateers: you'd think that this would be at least as common as its supplement The Far Orbit Project seems to be, but it is not. This was actually the most expensive title for me to get, as the only listing for the longest time was a way overpriced listing from Noble Knight Games. Was also the most annoying to obtain.
• Hideouts and Strongholds: another expensive late release, but slightly more available than most other late releases.

If this is in the wrong section, please move, but I posted it here for visibility since most of the WEG fans post here.

 

This thread suddenly made me realize that it has been now 20 years since WEG lost the Star Wars license. 20 years! And yet their work is still relevant and people still remember them fondly. That's awesome.

 

Awesome, and a bit sobering. It doesn't seem as though 20 years have gone by. And now I'll soon enough be enjoying the 30th Anniversary Edition re-releases from FFG. Which is also a part of why I posted the list above- I think that the 30th Anniversary books will spark a renewal of interest in the other WEG titles and it can only be good for there to be current info out there on which ones to look out for.

 

Your list looks pretty accurate to me. Some I mostly overlooked as being difficult, as I purchased them while they were still in print (e.g. Pirates and Privateers and Gamemaster Screen Revised), though I've occasionally noticed their high prices while doing general searches. Some are still vexing me after years of looking for a copy at a price that wasn't outlandish (especially Crisis on Cloud City - I just got outbid a few weeks ago on a complete copy yet again).

The only standout book missing to my eye is Rules of Engagment: The Rebel SpecForce Handbook. That one was always going for an exorbitant sum until I managed to find a deal on it after a year or so of looking.

ETA: Alien Encounters and Gundark's Fantastic Technology: Personal Gear were also challenging.

 

I actually have the opposite problem - I still have my unpunched, unused sabacc cards from my long-gone copy of CoCC...

 

Yeah, there outlandish prices on a few of these titles- outlandish being more than twice the original retail price.

Crisis on Cloud City is usually the most expensive because of the sabacc cards, but loose copies don't go for too much. I would also recommend checking Amazon often, especially for copies listed as new, as I managed to score a copy that was still shrinkwrapped (as many of the earlier Adventures were) for around $30 shipped. There still seems to be a surprising amount of NOS WEG Adventures out there. Nobody would care much for this title if it weren't for the cards.

That actually reminds me of Starfall- which I own a spare copy of entirely because of the map/poster of the Victory Star Destroyer it comes with. It's cool enough that I had it framed, and I would not be surprised if I'm not alone in having done so. That map alone is worth buying a copy for!

Rules of Engagement: Oh wow, you're right. I got that one long ago, and when I put the list together the spot prices online were not what they are now. That's a good book, too- one I can easily see both collectors and casual readers holding on to.

Gundark's Fantastic Technology: Personal Gear just seems to be slightly uncommon, I checked just now on Alien Encounters' availability and there are not many copies online at all. Search results also returned a bunch of unrelated and other stuff, as the title is a bit generic. I wish Amazon had a way to show prices for sold items, but on Ebay they don't seem to sell for all that much.

I also found a note that I should have included in the original post: the Gamemaster Kit (the one with the orange cover) is very uncommon. Not the easiest title to search for, and almost no copies at all available for sale.

 

I'd personally recommend holding on to those and simply buying a book-only copy for cheap if you can so as to make a complete copy. Keep them unpunched- most others no longer are, and at the very least you've got a great collector's item. How did you come to have a loose set of unused cards? I'm really interested in hearing this

 

Indeed. I'm still kicking myself for passing up a shrinkwrapped copy at Celebration IV in order to afford Strike Force Shantipole and Tatooine Manhunt, all of which were identically marked down from their cover price. As someone who hadn't put much effort in looking for 1E adventures on eBay at that point, I thought I'd made the better choice since both of the latter adventures were more interesting for me as a canonista. Oh, how wrong I learned I was when I started looking for CCC online!

That it is! And is pretty much what I bought my copy for. Fortunately, it was pretty reasonably priced, as I recall.

Indeed. And as one of the late arrivals to the product line, it, like Stock Ships and Hideouts and Strongholds, was never in great supply to begin with. I never saw it during the original run of the game, or I would have snapped it up right quick. The expansion of brawling: martial arts is almost worth the cover price by itself.

I was surprised about what you had to say about Gundark's, surprised enough to dig back through my old emails to see what I paid for it, and sure enough, it wasn't as bad as I remembered. While I was at it, I dug up a couple more eBay emails and checked dates and prices for historical interest:

Star Wars Gundark's FANTASTIC Technology RPG WEG BOOK
August 28, 2008
Sale price: $19.99
USPS Priority Mail International: US $8.50
Sales tax: 7.500% CA Sales tax (applies to subtotal + S&H)
(I think it was the extra S&H and sales tax that made me think this one was particularly bad)

Star Wars - The Rebel SpecForce Handbook
April 13, 2004
Sale price:$30.00
(I seem to recall this being about half of what other auctions were going for at the time)

Star Wars RPG Stock Ships Supplement
July 11, 2011
Sale price: $14.09
(I don't know how many years I waited for this book to come along at a price point like this)

This one has long eluded me, as well, though it hasn't been a huge priority since I have Classic Campaigns.

 

I just never ran the module. That's pretty much it. Back in the day I bought every RPG book WEG put out between 1987 and 1996 or so, and loved them to death but rarely ran the modules themselves (Strike Force Shantipole, Starfall, and Otherspace were the exceptions). Later in life I gave my first edition books to a friend (who no longer owns them so sadly, no reunions), and discovered some time later that the cards had been separated from the module and were just sitting in a box at my parents' house, along with the strip of counters that were supposed to allow the big battle scene of "Otherspace II: Invasion" to be ran with the Battle of Hoth board game. This thread is making me think I need to go rescue those cards and incorporate them into my current collection...

 

If anyone wants their own sabacc deck, someone designed a whole deck based off the cards Lando and Zeb are playing with in Rebels, with PDFs that can be inputted on makeplayingcards.com to print your own deck. And of course, the game was designed to be able to play with two decks of tarot cards.

Also, the Solo movie release would be a great opportunity for a tie-in card deck.

 

They are releasing the first edition core rule and sourebook only.

"Now Fantasy Flight Games is proud to offer faithful recreations of this influential rulebook and The Star Wars™ Sourcebook. Our Star Wars™: The Roleplaying Game 30th Anniversary Edition is a limited edition set of both books, printed with higher quality than the originals and packaged in a stylized slipcase."

And given FFG's product is an exponentially better RPG experience I am not sure that the WEG-surgence you hope for will ever happen.

 

Tatooine Manhunt isn't the easiest book to obtain these days. For something that was cross-referenced as much as any other WEG book (mostly Adar Tallon) it sure doesn't seem to turn up as often. Nowhere near as tough as Crisis, but you could have opted for worse. Crisis, even without the cards, doesn't seem to be as common in various online lots, though. I can only assume that it must have had a smaller print run .

 

Those are the only ones for now- if these sell well they could easily re-release a few other titles, or at least adapt some of the various Adventures and lore to the newer game. Everyone I know who plays has these pre-ordered, as do quite a few folks who don't even do any Roleplaying.

 

What? Why would FFG release a competing product line? That's wishful thinking coupled with zero business acumen. It's a re-release at the 30th anniversary because roleplaying fans might think it's cool and they owe a lot to WEG's foundations (lol @ WOTC).

 

Poppycock. FFG's system is a wonky, gimmicky joke. I'd almost rather use Third Edition Shadowrun. (Not second edition, mind you. I do have limits.)

Besides Tallon, it also had the first appearances of Jodo Kast, IG-72, Zardra, and Space Station Kwenn; I definitely made the right choice as far as gleaning continuity goes. But I could have snapped it up off of eBay a half dozen times by now for half of the low-end selling price of a complete CCC.

A smaller print run seems likely, though I suppose it could just be a matter of people choosing to hang on to the book that their sabacc cards came with long after they've otherwise decided to move on from the WEG RPG.

 

@jSarek, you are amongst the minority there sorry. The reviews from the playerbase would be "certified fresh" on any fruit-based scales. You should listen to Episode 101 of the Order 66 podcast, as it explains to people trapped in the woeful view of d20/crunch based systems (which aren't roleplay) how to adapt to the new system.

 

I don't have a problem with non-crunch-based systems; hell, WEG D6 is less crunchy than FFG is. In fact, I'd call a system like FFG that forces narrative circumstance (beyond success/failure) on the basis of die rolls, rather than on GM/Player interaction, as crunchier than D20 (and less conducive to actual roleplaying). I'd also call it a terrible gimmick that will keep me from ever choosing that game system when passable alternatives are available.

 

It sounds like you could benefit from playing. Because the overwhelming praise is aimed at the system having a non-binary axis of resolution - success with threat, failure with advantage, success with threat, triumph and despair. I've run sessions where entire sideplots organically evolved based on the outcomes from the rolls, based on player and NPC decisions.

In short, you're doing it wrong.

 

I have played it. I've played in games run by Keith Kappel, one of the writers for FFG, surrounded by experienced players who knew the system as well as I know WEG D6 or D20. And while I enjoyed myself, Keith's GMing, and my fellow players, that was in spite of the wonky system, not in any way stemming from it.

The non-binary axis of resolution is the gimmick that I dislike. It's a bad mechanic that forces narrative circumstance on the game that neither GM nor players necessarily want to include. The dice should be there to facilitate storytelling and roleplaying, not contort it.

If the way one of the game's writers was doing it was "wrong," I'm not sure what I could do differently to make it "right" ... other than just use a better system.

 

Has anyone heard news about the re-print? I heard rumors that there is some kind of delay; but at this point the actual 30th anniversary moment has passed. Not that I'm counting, as long as they are able to eventually be distributed to everyone who ordered it. I wish they would try just a little harder, to give us info or light a fire under the chair of whoever is holding things up.

 

Amazon has March 18th as the current release date.

 

It's a common occurrence with FFG, if the book is printed overseas. Hence:

Again, though, I think the issue is you and your expectations. You've been playing since WEG, so you likely remember the days of things like AD&D with that iconic PHb featuring the mounted knight riding at the reader. Where the blue sidebars explained characters roleplaying, not rollplaying. Where you didn't need the 1pt traits in GURPS to flesh out your character - you knew exactly how your Brash Pilot or Gambler would behave in any situation.

But the sad reality is, since D&D 3.0 and World of Warcraft, that RPGs became about crunch and stats and min-maxing and combat and power creep and gear and <insert things>. WEG was not really a good min-max system, as FFG isn't. That's a compliment, not criticism; but also unrelated to the fact that gamers and the games industry was infiltrated by, and influenced heavily by crunch and a lack of depth.

The FFG mechanic has widespread praise, and from older RPG'ers too, for good reason. You may think the choices are inorganic but after 5 years of playing the system, the amount of side adventures a single despair can generate means that as a GM I can prepare and railroad less, and deliver more to my players.

The sheer weight of public opinion is in favour of that narrative system, not against it. It may not align to your views of roleplaying, but with respect, your views of roleplaying have likely been out of alignment for some time. It's not a fault in your approach; I hate d20 based games for the fact it has killed of actual roleplaying. But as a realist and a person whose WEG groups live in different corners of the country and globe, I have to find new players and break the d20 mindset. This system does that, and then lets them go further and deeper than even WEG did.

 

Ender, that's pretty much the same sort of nonsense that enthusiastic LARPers pushed in the mid 90s... somehow, they didn't end up dominating the RPG market like they seemed to think they would.
Taking a look at the Top 5 Selling RPGs in spring 2017. Star Wars is certainly on there... as number three, behind Pathfinder and Dungeons and Dragons. Shadowrun is ranked as number five. And Adventures in Middle-Earth is number four - the D&D version of the "narrative RPG" The One Ring.
And this is speaking as someone who hasn't been interested in playing D&D for years - and actually likes The One Ring RPG very much.

 

I thought I'd give this a bump, especially since the topic of rare WEG books came up again recently. For completion's sake, I'll repost here what I had put in the "Share your Headcanon!" thread.

After looking over my RPG bookshelf (which honestly rarely gets perused these days) and going over notes from what my WEG collection used to consist of, prior to a later-regretted (and thankfully partially-aborted) purging over a decade ago, here is where I stand... (Some books may still be in my storage unit. Also, if all lore of a 1st edition book was contained in its 2nd edition counterpart, I generally skipped owning the 1st edition books, exceptions notwithstanding.)

(WEG books/collections that I still need...)
Gamemaster Kit
Gamemaster Toolkit - Live Action Adventures
Planets of the Galaxy - Volume One
Pirates & Privateers
Imperial Double-Cross
Gundark's Fantastic Technology: Personal Gear
Rules of Engagement - The Rebel SpecForces Handbook
Classic Adventures Vol. 4
Classic Adventures Vol. 5

(Sets that I need after previously owning and selling on eBay in 2011...)
Star Wars Rules Companion
Twin Stars of Kira
Star Wars Miniatures Battles Starter Set boxed set
The DarkStryder Campaign boxed set
Lords of the Expanse boxed set
Tapani Sector Instant Adventures
Player's Guide To Tapani
Stock Ships
Hideouts & Strongholds

So it looks like I need (about) 18 WEG books/modules out of the approximately 116 (according to Google) that were published. I own roughly 90-95+.

According to a text-file in 2011, I do/did own Death In The Undercity, but it's not on my shelf alongside the other 1st and early 2nd edition adventure modules (Graveyard of Alderaan etc.), so I am literally unaware as to whether I still do own it. A huge portion of my collection came from a massive eBay lot of about 50 WEG books in 2000-2001 that me and my buddy split the winnings (and cost) of, 50/50, so a lot of those books didn't get used, read, or stuck in my memory like the early ones in my fandom did, which I had absorbed and pored over hundreds of times, so my brain tended to gloss over a lot of my collection, both before and after the 2011 purging. Hell, probably 2/3rds of my RPG books I've only skimmed over two or three times since obtaining them over the last two decades. And since I mostly bought them for the lore (after 1996), I wasn't busy using them for actual tabletop gameplay.

Speaking of things mentioned above...Tatooine Manhunt was my second 1st edition adventure module purchased (after Strike Force: Shantipole) in the summer of '95, as my local comic shop still had a fairly plentiful supply of 1st edition supplements that were no longer otherwise available at Barnes & Noble or Walden Books. I also have copies of Crisis On Cloud City and Starfall, but as is oft-mentioned, I don't have the sabacc cards, nor the Victory-class deckplan poster.

Platt's Smuggler's Guide is another book that goes for exhorbitant prices on eBay (usually $40-50), although I did snag a rather worn copy for $20 a few years ago. (And which particularly bugs me, since I sold my pristine copy back in 2011. See above.)

 

My big score in recent years - when FFG was going to release their reprint of the original 1st Ed WEG rulebook for like $60, a friend of mine just gave me a copy of the original! The timing couldn't have been better.