Characters' Starships

But any potential enemy is going to have a gun of his own! As to the money, your characters have time to stop in the middle of the game, collect a bunch of heavy firearms, sling them about their persons, and then go somewhere to sell them all? Blasters aren't small or light, I imahgine it would be quite unweildy to carry more than two stormtrooper guns (where the hell Kyle Katarn carries his stash, I'll never know)

And children in the star wars universe... well, they aren't dumb enough to do it, in a modern ganster movie it would be a theme, but not in star wars.

Name me one western with an accidental child shooting in it, where a child picks up a guns and accidentally (or purposefully) fires it.

As to the borrowing stormtrooper blasters for disguise, there I agree, but sure enough in ESB, Solo was back to his truster blaster pistol.

 

Just think, if you did happen to pick up a bunch of sooped up weapons or a tricked out ship, someone that knew the owner may recognise the looted property. Nothing is better than sitting in a crowed cantina and having someone point at you and shout "Oh my god! He's got Sarrn's blaster. [face_shocked] You killed him!" Then all the thugs that knew Sarrn open fire on the heros.

 

I take care of looting in two ways. The first is to have throwaway NPCs like Stormtroopers and basic thugs carry only the crappiest of weaponry. Not only will the characters have a hard time selling the weapons, when they do sell them they aren't going to get much. Carrying multiple weapons doesn't usually turn out to be that useful either. Looting a body for powerpacks I usually conedone because I like running battles with little time for advance preparation.

The second is to crowd the characters away from the weapons by reinforcements or by a timetable that needs to be kept to. A bunch of thugs in a cantina look like easy pickings until their friends show up and start blasting you.

I have had caseswhere looting was warranted and encouraged. In a game with a poorly equipped rebel cell was trying to beef up their supplies looting was definitely encouraged. Every Stormtrooper or Army trooper they killed meant another blast helmet and blaster rifle for their cause.

 

It's been a while, but if I remember correctly the kid in Shane wanted to be a gunslinger just like Shane. Had that kid had a shot of swiping some dead mans gun, he probably would've jumped at it. After all, the most important thing to a gunfighter is the gun. Lets face it, kids may not be stupid, but they are impulsive. Even in SW.
As for blasters being bulky, they invented this great thing ages ago called a backpack. Even if people say screw the rifles, there's plenty of room in one for pistols. If that doesn't work there's always the inner pocket of a trenchcoat. Now you do have a point, only pistols would really fit, but concealable and portable usually sell for more on the black market anyway.

 

If the guns are for your character you really only need to snatch the power packs. Carrying more than one gun around can be more trouble than its worth. Getting something out of a backpack is a full round action. Changing a blaster pack is an attack action. In a firefight I'd rather be able to move and recharge my blaster than try to dig out a second blaster.

I think looting is entirely up to how your players want to role play. If they want to loot dead Stormtroopers and you'd rather than not its your job as GM to make them unable to. If they are in dire need of some firepower a Stormtrooper's blaster and fragmentation grenade work very well.

 

The idea is that the weapon is only stored in the pack long enough for you to get it someplace more ideal for storage while you wait to sell it.

 

Selling traceable items like Imperial issue blasters shouldn't be something you can do at the corner gun store. A government issue gun would have a dozen identifying security numbers on it.

Party member caps Stormtrooper and steals his gun. Party member finds a gun runner to buy it. Gun runner buys the gun for well below cost upon successful Bluff vs Appraise check. Gun runner sells gun to rebel/pirate/thug. Imperials cap rebel/pirate/thug and trace gun back to gun runner. Gun runner wakes up to a blaster with a Stormtrooper behind it standing over him. Boom.

 

I had a rule that you cannon carry more of a given item than your strength or lifting d.

2d str=you can carry 2 blasters. Carry more than that, and your character is encumbered (1d penalty). That made life fairly interesting.

As for ships... What the heck is a turbolaser doing on a freighter? ANY security personnel are going to immediately investigate, report, and possiblly confiscate a ship with that kind of armament. In the books by Brian Daley, Han Solo had to bribe for a special permit because the Falcon had too much weaponry on it.

Fighter pilots get a fighter. Smugglers get a freighter. And their characters pay for that priviledge. No reason for anyone else to have/need a ship.

 

If I can get my friend to scan the deckplans of the Ice Blaze, the worst light freighter ever to jump across the stars, you guys will know what a real starship looks like...

 

Nobles, scouts and Jedi also regularly need and use (or own) starships for missions, and simple transport from system to system. It's not only scoundrels and fighter-jocks that use starships. Jedi Master Arca Jeth from TotJ had his own personal transport, as did Ulic and Cay Qel-Droma, and Nomi Sunrider; all of whom were Jedi. Padme Amidala had her own transport for her duties as both Queen abd Senator. Gav and Jori Dargon from Golen age of the Sith were scouts who mapped out hyperspace lanes, not something you can do without a ship. There is not a single class that can't make use of a personal ship. It's not limited to fighter-jocks and smugglers.

 

Remember though -- the Jedi of the old Republic, in the Rise of the Empire Era, had VERY few Jedi with their own starships.

Obi-Wan and Anakin booked passage on a transport ship who's captain was friendly with the Jedi in Rogue Planet. Obi-Wan was assigned an Aethersprite out of the Jedi Temple's POOL of ships -- it wasn't his own -- in AOTC. We know that the Jedi didn't have their own transportation in The Approaching Storm.

 

Yes, but this was only during the Rise of the Empire era when Jedi were more akin to medieval monks. During the other eras this isn't the case. Most of the Jedi I mentioned were ancient Old Republic era Jedi, when they were much more like Texas Rangers and less monastic. Other classes, like Nobles, Scouts, and Fringers would still have use for starships of their own, especially the Scouts and Nobles. Jedi in all eras, with the possible exception of the RotE era would have reason to own their own ships.

 

Bottom line, if the ship doesn't advance the story it isn't usable in the game. This goes double if the ship has the ability to remove good old fashioned role playing from the game.

Example of a ship being useful:

RotE era noble is being threatened by Separatist friendly terrorists and the Jedi Council assigns two Jedi knights to the noble as protection. The noble has a yacht belonging to her father available to her. Having no decent piloting skills of her own she hires a scout pilot. The noble, Jedi, and pilot are all player characters. The noble's yacht is fast with little in the way of armaments and decent enough accommodations for the four players.

En route to somewhere the ship is attacked by the terrorists and manages to make a single hyperspace jump before the hyperdrive cuts out. The party ends up in some system they have passing knowlege of.

When the terrorists attack the ship serves as the scene of the action. Each party member ends up performing duties on the ship, repairing the shield generator, piloting, manning the guns, and plotting a hyperspace route. On the ground the ship serves as the point of contention the crew needs to repair the hyperdrive or at least the subspace transceiver to get a distress call out. On the ground the ship also acts as the home base for the characters, maybe even a scene of a ground battle.

The ship progresses the story but never gives the characters an easy out.

Bad use of a ship:

A trio of smugglers are blackmailed by a Hutt to retrieve some priceless artifact from the jungle moon of some gas giant. The smugglers have a YT-2400 named Pure Sabacc. The ship has been modified to the nines with extremely powerful sublight engines powerful shields.

En route to the jungle moon nothing goes wrong. Upon landing nothing goes wrong. The smugglers (trio of players) fly around on the moon looking for a scan profile of the temple the artifact is in. When they find the temple they do a scan around it for life forms. They see several lifeforms but none too big a blaster won't stop it. As they land next to the temple aliens riding on the backs of reptilian creatures charge out of the forest. The characters raise the ship's shields and float above the angry natives. When the reptilian mounts start spitting some sort of electrically active venom at the players' ship they lay out the natives with the ship's blasters.

Two of the smugglers trek off into the temple armed to the teeth and the third stays outside in the ship watching for trouble. With little difficulty the two smugglers return with the artifact and the crew is off to meet the Hutt.

In the first part of the story the ship was too kept up. There were no interesting errors nor any chance to role play in transit. Once they got to the planet the lack of any tribulation meant they could use the ship's sensors and shields to keep from having to role play. A simple ship scale blaster was able to deck all of the primitive natives. Leaving the ship outside made the trek into the temple far less dangerous and gave little oppertunity for ingenuity on the part of the players.

In the first example the ship was merely a backdrop against which exciting things happened. The space battle against the terrorists allowed ample opertunity for role playing among the players. The subsequent problems of them being stuck on planet while being hunted by terrorist mercenaries added all the more adventure. In the second example the ship acted like a forth entirely too powerful character. The players didn't have to do much more than roll a couple simple checks to find the temple and take out the native guardians.

The first example probably would have seen at least one of the characters advance a level at the end of play with the others being close. It also could have led to more adventures in the campaign. Being on the ground gave the characters more chances to interact with the universe. The characters in the second example were content to hang out in a protective bubble. It'd take several crappy "adventures" li

 

A ship should be more than just a plot device though. It's also a main base and the primary form of transport for the players to get from system to system. It's a necessity.

 

A professional is more than just someone skilled in his field. He/she will also have the proper weapons and equipment to accompany them in thier fieldcraft. If that means a solid ship without reliability problems, that's part of being ahead in the game. Truthfully, had my players thought to use a ship that easily I'd reward them for it. They aren't some D&D gonk who goes into battle with a suit of platemail, a backpack full of mundane eq, and a sword. A StarWars adventurer should be looking for a quick and easy way to solve things.

 

{Yoda}Quick and easy... quick and easy you say?

The Dark Side, Quicker, easier it is.

The Light side, harder, more fun, many obstacles. The best gear, you never have. Stealth tech, space armour, efficient star ships, things of technology are they.

Star Wars is about heart, about looking to the horizon, mmmmmm. Broken machines have heroes, useless protocol droids are they, but the heart, the living spirit... success it bring them, yes.

Luminous game is this, not this crude matter (pokes stick at stormtrooper blaster and shiny starship). Size matters not, judge me by my credit balance do you? And well should you not, for my ally is adventure, and a powerful ally it is.

Obstacles make it, fighting a mechanic without your gun whilst the burning plane rotates towards you and your companion, trapped she is, excitement makes it grow.

Seek not the quick and expedient solution, seek the heroic path. That is the path of the Jedi {/yoda}

 

ROFLMAO

 

!!!! !!!!!!! !!!!!!! !!!!!!! !!!

And you forget, if a ship is modified in any wasy (without spend astronomical amounts on liscensed parts and 'proffesional' instillation) it devolops quirks! Weee, the circuit breaker fused roll a d% to find out what ship component just blew to heck! Or maybe the lifesupport wires crossed the cables with the ejector pods and blaster turrets. Whoops, I hope the senator doesn't get mad about the scorch on his ship. Lol!

 

my players have zero interest in looting or having kewl stuff, thankfully.

however, i think it's my job as a GM to provide some kind of reasonably unique ship for the party. it's just not SW if you don't have access to some kind of ship with personality. it could be their ship, it could be stolen, it could be loaned to them by a patron, whatever. i figure it out depending on the group.

 

Great, so let the jedi worry about what Yoda says. The guy who flies a ship for a living needs to start thinking for himself, and not about what a grammatically challenged puppet has to say.

 

What I was trying to say is... that an essence of star wars is that problems are solved by technology or money, they are solved by people.

A theme of star wars is people vs technology. The bad guys reduce life to technology, everyone in the empire is essentially an automaton, the Empire's greatest warrior is "more machine that man". The empire solves things by buying a battlefleet and a deathstar, and using them.

The good guys improve technolgy to life, droids have a soul and serve loyally, they are treated as equals (possibly more so than Chewie). They solve problems with their minds, the force and if neccesary a bit of "aggressive negotiation" one on one.

The Death star run wasn't performed with a tricked out super fighter. Sure the Falcon may be the fastest ship in the fleet, but only Han or Lando could actually fly the damn thing.

Money also equates to evil somewhat. The rich, powerful figures are loathesome and corrupt, the Princess only becomes lovable once she's off her high-horse and trucking around in garbage with the rest of them. When players start buying their way through things and solving it with the 'best tech' they are becoming part of the problem, not the solution.

 

Ultimately problems are solved by people. I can agree with that. The key is to remember that cash and equipment are tools, to be used as a means to an end. To lump sum them up on the whole and slap a People vs. Technology label on them is to also forget that the StarWars universe is a place of fantastic technology. There's more to the galaxy than that, but the tech certainly is part of it.
As for your tricked out super fighter, the X Wing is in almost every way shape and form a superior fighter than a standard Imperial TIE. The only advantage the TIE has is speed, which is also the only advantage even the Interceptor has on an X Wing.
As for money equating to evil, again, the point that in the StarWars galaxy is that a hero should see money as a means to an end, not the end itself. Sure there are going to be beings out there that use money as a means of keeping score. However, being heroes means that life shouldn't be about money, but a strong desire to make change. If it means blowing a personal fortune to do so, then so be it.
If your heroes are "hoarding" a small fortune in weapons, spice, cash, and armor, they aren't really heroes are they? After all, there's plenty of people in the galaxy that have died precisely because they didn't have a good blaster at thier side. Make sure your players know that, and hit them with the moral and ethical questioning to test thier mettle.

 

I think it depends mostly on the story being told. I've seen equally great games where alternately a starship was just basic transportation and games where a starship was almost a character in its own right.

One of my favorite games involved the race to find the starship of a legendary pirate. We as players had to fight off the other factions looking for the ship and then deal with the defenses guarding the ship itself. Once we finally got our hands on the ship and thought ourselves badasses the game brought up some moral questions surrounding the origins of the ship and it's legacy. Along the way our prize was actually completely destroyed, giving us the opportunity to redeem that legacy and start fresh on our own legacy by building a better ship.

Again, it depends on the story. While Han Solo had to work and gamble and bribe to get the Falcon up to where it is, Luke has almost always used stock ships loaned to him by the republic.