New Star Wars RPG Core Rulebook Coming!

while not beingthat experianced of a player, i'mnot sure how i feel about the skill system changes and the vp/wp change, but the arguements for the changes make sense. The class chnages were exactly what i was hoping for. While it sounds like the book is going to be light on EU content, it does sound like the designers did a lot of research and that the book will be Eu friendly.

 

The VP/WP change is quite silly, in my opinion. I mean, we finally get a system that makes sense, and now we're going back to hit points? Puhleeease.

 

I hope that space combat is sorted, it's daft that a 20 level soldier (for example) with a +23 pilot skill is just as easy to shoot down as a 1st level whatever.

Why doesn't pilotting ability apply to dodging? tis silly

 

I am looking forward to the revamp of some of the game mechanics. I think that by elementating a few of the classes, it will give the player more flexability in the direction he wants to go with his character.

I also enjoy the fact that they have removed the gaurdian/consolur spilt. I didn't like the division the game made between the Jedi were the movies and books did not.

Plus with a new release comes new matrial, which unfortantly has been very hard to come by latly.

 

There's really no guarantee of new rules, unless the SE does really well in sales.

 

True but how many expert pilots are there in the sw galaxy that have been statted with 9 levels of starship ace?

I say 9 levels because the EU sources always refer to dodging attacks through piloting skill, and the only way to avoid all damage is to be level 9, yet still that isn't being missed it's being hit yet avoiding the damage

 

How is piloting a vehicle like dodging a punch?

 

Because when you're piloting in combat the goal is probably to avoid being hit, meaning that it is logical for good pilots to be able to avoid being hit.

Han Solo is probably one of the top 5 pilots in the Galaxy. He, at the start of the NJO has only 5 levels in the Starship Ace Class. And in A new Hope when he is already great (Pilot +18) he has no levels in that class.

Ergo, great pilots shouldn't need the SA class, and they should be harder to hit!

 

There's a cognitive disconnect there. Avoiding a punch take an entirely different skillset than avoiding gunfire while piloting a vehicle of any sort. Han is a good pilot but hardly invincible. Despite his best efforts there's quite a few instances where the Heroes of Yavin barely escape their Imperial pursuers in the OT. Han can't simply will so many tons of Millennium Falcon to move where he wants it to. It standsthen that despite Han's piloting skill his defense in the MF can only be so good because there's a lot more involved in piloting it than moving his hands around.

However a good GM will take into account a pilot's skill and let them attempt maneuvers that can reduce an attacker's attack bonus or minimize the damage done by a successful attack. Entirely avoiding damage is extremely difficult in either hand to hand or vehicular combat. Minimizing damage taken from attacks however is far easier and far more practical. This is a more likely occurance anyways, otherwise starships wouldn't have shields or armor plating. They would simply use super advanced droid brains to pilot ships that could simply dodge everything.

In a dogfight a better pilot won't necessarily be impossible to hit but simply hard to draw a bead on. If your character is an outstanding pilot they can fly the whole battle at ramming speed since their piloting skills can make up for any penalties accrued from flying at such high speeds. In the movies and books this tends to be the common tactic of better pilots, keep the enemy from being able to take a shot at you. If your character on the defense they had better be using their two movement actions every round to pull some crazy stunts. Flying in a straight line wishing you could pit their pilot skill against their opponent's in an opposed check because they're "better" is silly.

That being said I think the current spaceship combat rules are a bit broken. A ship's Defense rating makes sense but could definitely be improved. Too often strict adherence to the space combat rules makes for boring space combat for most people. It's not nearly as quick or exciting as the books or movies. The escape from the Death Star sequence in ANH for instance would be tedious and boring under the current space combat rules and nothing like what was seen in the film. The same goes for the attack on the second Death Star in RotJ, the current rules are a D20 version of the WEG D6 rules which weren't very good to begin with.

 

In all of our campaigns we avoid starship battles because we don' like the rules.So we agreed that all space travel and battles are GM tales of what happened.
We concentrate on ground battles.

 

Space battles can be fun and work well with better rules from WOTC which is what I hope will happen here.

 

I was re-exploring my d6 books recently, and it made me think that the condition slide bar thing that is going to come into play is going to be so much more suitable for the star wars game.

As it is, you have batteries, once they run out, you're gone.

The way to recharge them quickly?

Heal Self/Heal Another which are ridiculously ridiculously overpowered, I mean seriously. Look at the alternative, in which case is the D6 universe, the ability there only gives you an additional healing roll or something, it's not that much at all.

Look at Mara Jade in the Hand of Thrawn duology, and Anakin Solo in star by star. Healing of the magnitude permitted by Jedi in the d20 game is unrealistic and unseen in the star wars universe.

The only mad healing I can think of is Luke in a book I haven't read, either Truce at Bakura or one of Barbara Hamley's books; but because I haven't read it I can't comment on it.

 

I like the sound of that. I really do.

 

It's still on track for march, which is sweet. I heard some where that it got pushed back.

The system sounds more versetile. I think both Jacen and the Imperial Knights could easily modeled with this system. Ppeaking of the EU, the books seems to focus mainly on the movies, which while i'm a big EU fan, i can still understand. I would love to see a clone wars source book (which they had some work done on for the old system) and a comrehensive book on the NJ) and post NJO era.

I don't own any of the mini's, so i don't know how i feel about their inclusion.

 

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I really don't like that. I'm pro-d20, love it or hate it, make it all the same basic system. Here, they are changing one of the basics. No skill ranks?

I snipped out the comment on "Use the Force" Skill because there isn't enough info.

Good. From my experience, autofire and stun were broken or too confusing

I really don't like miniatures, and I don't like being told miniatures aren't going to be required when all the examples in the books are going to use them (see D&D)

Hit points is cool, I'd actually rather see the whole d20 system go to VP/WP. But if they are going with a standard then I support it.

Huh? A Prestige class? I thought the whole point of a Force Adept was that they were brought up in a different tradition, one the player and GM could work together to create? A lot of the most memorable characters in my campaigns have been such characters. Now they have to qualify to be different?

Is New Republic an "Era of Play?" "Tales of the Jedi?" The basic 3 are just too constraining.

See DMG. Put a dozen pages of tables for the basic classes from level 1-20. Really useful.

 

Yeah, it's a little more work, but I think the VP/WP system works much better in most D20 settings.

 

This comes out in two months, seems to be a lack of interest.

Any new info in the past 5 months? I haven't been keeping up and the Wizard's boards down

 

Not much. They've got a pretty tight NDA. The next big thing should be out sometime this month with Jedi Counseling 101. I think that Gary Sarling has said that he's done a final proofread of the book and it's going to meet it's new publishing deadline.

Asside from that, there hasn't been much news. We're waiting for the next update any day now.

 

OK, and for everyone who just happens to have uber Pilot skill but hasn't taken levels in a prestige class?

 

I think simple will be better.

 

I want to know if the new book will include something to the effect that force flight can be accomplished.