1) How many advantages are required to regain this 1 system strain? I'm not against this idea.

2) I think that is a tad too powerful, and unnecessary.

3) That is pretty nifty, but it would make Punch It! an action rather than a manoeuvre - as skill checks are actions and not manoeuvres, and should be modified by terrain if applicable, at least in my opinion and see below.

4) Spending two manoeuvres to increase speed has a cost of 2 system strain as it is two pilot only manoeuvres, an option for any vehicle up to silhouette 4.

5) Again, for silhouettes up to 4 you can accelerate or decelerate twice in a round for 2 system strain.

I've been asking Sam Stewart some questions concerning this, but I'm waiting to hear back from him on some clarifications, but it seems that rules on navigational hazards "upgrades" manoeuvres to Actions, and it also seems that when accelerating, punching it and performing similar pilot only manoeuvres that involve movement (even if its not changing range band) in an area with terrain it activates the "skill check upgrade", turning the manoeuvre into an action, adding setback dice and, if applicable, using silhouette/speed as difficulty. For instance one should also add terrain setback dice to Gain the Advantage.

Although I do like the notion of having checks potentially decrease system strain taken.

Just an FYI, the idea that FFG was going for was to break the paradigm of "you must roll piloting every turn or else you fall out of the sky" and instead go with a "what do you want to do other then 'not crash'?" mentality. So in EotE, a "good" pilot is a lot more then a piloting roll, it's someone that can make really good piloting decisions as far as actions and narrative choices. Try talking this through with your pilot player. Maybe the problem is he's just used to the old ways of rolling his piloting skill over and over until he wins.

All that said, have you tried running a chase scene yet?

Are your encounters happening in open space? (because they shouldn't be.)

Did you read the piloting skill description and see there's other stuff the pilot can do beyond the special moves in the vehicles chapter?

I ask because I've noticed that for every person with a legit complaint about the vehicle system, there's about ten others that just aren't running the system right in the first place.

1) How many advantages are required to regain this 1 system strain? I'm not against this idea.

2) I think that is a tad too powerful, and unnecessary.

3) That is pretty nifty, but it would make Punch It! an action rather than a manoeuvre - as skill checks are actions and not manoeuvres, and should be modified by terrain if applicable, at least in my opinion and see below.

4) Spending two manoeuvres to increase speed has a cost of 2 system strain as it is two pilot only manoeuvres, an option for any vehicle up to silhouette 4.

5) Again, for silhouettes up to 4 you can accelerate or decelerate twice in a round for 2 system strain.

I've been asking Sam Stewart some questions concerning this, but I'm waiting to hear back from him on some clarifications, but it seems that rules on navigational hazards "upgrades" manoeuvres to Actions, and it also seems that when accelerating, punching it and performing similar pilot only manoeuvres that involve movement (even if its not changing range band) in an area with terrain it activates the "skill check upgrade", turning the manoeuvre into an action, adding setback dice and, if applicable, using silhouette/speed as difficulty. For instance one should also add terrain setback dice to Gain the Advantage.

Although I do like the notion of having checks potentially decrease system strain taken.

1) at least one advantage to recover a max of one per round - on another forum it was suggested TWO advantage, and of course only the pilot may "activate" this

2) the backstory is that the players commented on how much more important Gunnery was that Pilot when flying a snub fighter. I pointed out "gain the advantage" and "traversing the asteroids they were in," but the bottom line was that they weren't "using" pilot skill...

On the other forum it was recommended to instead allow a boost die if there was any ranks in Pilot and not have it be one boost die per rank.

3) This was a direct answer to a player asking to negate Punch It strain as well as #4 for accelerating "not quite" punch it. They said a better pilot should be able to do these things.

4) True, but again they counted with, "but a good pilot..." etc.

5) Same as number 4. :-)

Thanks for the reply!

Just an FYI, the idea that FFG was going for was to break the paradigm of "you must roll piloting every turn or else you fall out of the sky" and instead go with a "what do you want to do other then 'not crash'?" mentality. So in EotE, a "good" pilot is a lot more then a piloting roll, it's someone that can make really good piloting decisions as far as actions and narrative choices. Try talking this through with your pilot player. Maybe the problem is he's just used to the old ways of rolling his piloting skill over and over until he wins.

All that said, have you tried running a chase scene yet?

Are your encounters happening in open space? (because they shouldn't be.)

Did you read the piloting skill description and see there's other stuff the pilot can do beyond the special moves in the vehicles chapter?

I ask because I've noticed that for every person with a legit complaint about the vehicle system, there's about ten others that just aren't running the system right in the first place.

He hasn't played the old system, so it's not that. And what you seem to be describing is a "player skill" of being a pilot and not using the ranks of Piloting (Space) that he has...

Chase - no. This is our second space combat. The first was aboard the Krayt Fang as they escaped in the beginner game. I had them fight TIE's until they could make the jump (escape).

This time they are taking some modified Y-Wings from Tatooine to Geonosis (something I came up with). They are single pilot versions - modified with better engines, so a max speed of 5 but a lower SS threshold. They encounter pirates much like the modular encounter from Suns of Fortune. They encounter two of the cloak shapes first - and that's where the "my pilot skill is not coming into play" conversation came from.

Not "open space" at all. They are in the ring system around Geonosis but just getting "into" the rocks...

You mean like "spend advantage to spot a weakness" and such? Or are you talking about other things?

I'm not claiming to be "running it right" at all, but I also don't see a "wrong" way to do it... Again, just our second space battle so far. I'm the GM and want to give them a good game. We are ALL new to this system and again, it's a "Yes and" system and not a "no" system, so I'm looking for ways to give them what they want.

Thanks for the reply! Any help is appreciated! :-)

1) at least one advantage to recover a max of one per round - on another forum it was suggested TWO advantage, and of course only the pilot may "activate" this

2) the backstory is that the players commented on how much more important Gunnery was that Pilot when flying a snub fighter. I pointed out "gain the advantage" and "traversing the asteroids they were in," but the bottom line was that they weren't "using" pilot skill...

On the other forum it was recommended to instead allow a boost die if there was any ranks in Pilot and not have it be one boost die per rank.

3) This was a direct answer to a player asking to negate Punch It strain as well as #4 for accelerating "not quite" punch it. They said a better pilot should be able to do these things.

4) True, but again they counted with, "but a good pilot..." etc.

5) Same as number 4. :-)

Thanks for the reply!

2) They should be using the pilot skill if moving through a asteroid field, gaining the advantage or making any sort of manoeuvres in hazardous terrain.

3) Still, once it's an Action it requires more of the pilot, and skill check = Action, otherwise I have no biggy with this one. Just keep in mind that these checks would stop the pilot from using weapons or performing other Actions.

(3), 4 & 5) Being a good pilot doesn't make the engines or power supply or wiring in the ship any better or able to withstand more drainage and stuff - it's the engineer that can do something about the energy reserves and system robustness, not the pilot. Being a good pilot isn't a catch-all argument to ignore the rules of system strain, that's just cheap shots and powermongering. There are some talents that allow for related stuff to be done and that still requires strain from the starship, having ranks in pilot shouldn't in any way really change that, this is the point of the strain system, it's a resource, spend it as you must, but mind your wastage. A good player won't waste strain unnecessarily.

I think a lot of making Piloting Skill seem worthwhile in combat comes down to encounter design by the GM.

Over the weekend I played a scenario run by GM Chris and there was piloting the ship through an asteroid field. Some of the asteroids had turrets on them, and there were enemy ships.

As the Pilot character, I had plenty to do in this encounter. I used my Piloting skill every turn to make a Fly/Drive Maneuver through the asteroid field, and I used many of the various other Pilot Maneuvers and Actions, including Punch It, Evasive Maneuvers, and Gain the Advantage.

In our case I gained the advantage on a fighter, then it gained the advantage successfully on us, and I rolled again my next turn to gain the advantage right back.

All told I was very busy and very happy about this encounter. My hands were full as pilot, and so were our 2 Gunners plus our Mechanic AND our Politico.

(3), 4 & 5) Being a good pilot doesn't make the engines or power supply or wiring in the ship any better or able to withstand more drainage and stuff - it's the engineer that can do something about the energy reserves and system robustness, not the pilot. Being a good pilot isn't a catch-all argument to ignore the rules of system strain, that's just cheap shots and powermongering. There are some talents that allow for related stuff to be done and that still requires strain from the starship, having ranks in pilot shouldn't in any way really change that, this is the point of the strain system, it's a resource, spend it as you must, but mind your wastage. A good player won't waste strain unnecessarily.

If I could like this more than once, I would.

2) They should be using the pilot skill if moving through a asteroid field, gaining the advantage or making any sort of manoeuvres in hazardous terrain.

3) Still, once it's an Action it requires more of the pilot, and skill check = Action, otherwise I have no biggy with this one. Just keep in mind that these checks would stop the pilot from using weapons or performing other Actions.

(3), 4 & 5) Being a good pilot doesn't make the engines or power supply or wiring in the ship any better or able to withstand more drainage and stuff - it's the engineer that can do something about the energy reserves and system robustness, not the pilot. Being a good pilot isn't a catch-all argument to ignore the rules of system strain, that's just cheap shots and powermongering. There are some talents that allow for related stuff to be done and that still requires strain from the starship, having ranks in pilot shouldn't in any way really change that, this is the point of the strain system, it's a resource, spend it as you must, but mind your wastage. A good player won't waste strain unnecessarily.

Okay - "SS as a resource" is a good answer. Their main complaint is that they don't get to "be" a pilot as much as "be" a gunner...

Making it their action is not a big deal if they are piloting a YT-1300 and the gunners are in the turrets, but in this case they were each piloting AND gunning a small, one man fighter. They were hesitant to do "gain the advantage" because they couldn't shoot that turn...

All told I was very busy and very happy about this encounter. My hands were full as pilot, and so were our 2 Gunners plus our Mechanic AND our Politico.

This... If the circumstance I described had been them in their freighter, yeah - the pilot would have hand his hands full, but each one was in a one man Y-Wing. How do you make that exciting to a PILOT when the main focus is on SHOOTING?

And I'm not being defensive - I'm asking a legitimate question and would love a good answer! :-) My goal is to continue to have fun with this system and to continue to grow both our sessions and the campaign. We've been having a great time with it and this is the FIRST place any of it has fallen flat... Even when they went to the party in "Long Arm of the Hutt" one of the players got a LITTLE bit of info and said, "well, this is what we came for. I'm done." Two of the others said, "whoa - wait - there's more people here - let's see what else" etc. etc.

Thanks!

If I were running an encounter like that, I'd put the fighters in some kind of dangerous terrain like an asteroid field or a debris field, or perhaps there's ion radiation or nebula clouds or space traffic of some kind.

The circumstances could still be very similar.

The Pilot must make the MANEUVER "Fly/Drive" with a Piloting skill check, in order to move through the asteroid field. That was their maneuver. Then they can use their Action to shoot the enemy, or to perform a Piloting action (another Piloting skill check) like Gain the Advantage.

Keep in mind adding Setback dice for ship's Handling and for the environment to the Piloting checks. This represents the chaotic circumstances and lets the player use Skilled Jockey to remove Setback dice.

Does that make sense?

By the way our first several space encounters fell really flat, too.

I didn't know how to run them or how to make them interesting. I listened to Episode 25 of Order 66 several times and have been trying to absorb hints and advice about space encounters ever since.

Chase - no. This is our second space combat. The first was aboard the Krayt Fang as they escaped in the beginner game. I had them fight TIE's until they could make the jump (escape).

I've said it before and I'll say it again. The beginner game space encounter is lame, and not a very fun encounter, but it teaches the mechanics, which is technically the goal.

Try a chase sometime, it requires more pilot rolls and still allows the pilot to do other things.

This time they are taking some modified Y-Wings from Tatooine to Geonosis (something I came up with). They are single pilot versions - modified with better engines, so a max speed of 5 but a lower SS threshold. They encounter pirates much like the modular encounter from Suns of Fortune. They encounter two of the cloak shapes first - and that's where the "my pilot skill is not coming into play" conversation came from.

Not "open space" at all. They are in the ring system around Geonosis but just getting "into" the rocks...

Ok, I don't have Suns handy for exact reference, but I see a possible issue...

Watch the speed upgrades, when dogfighting Speed is a HUGE deal. In this case by bumping up the speed of the Y-wings you gave them a really unfair advantage against the cloakshapes. Now the cloakshapes are going to have a heck of a time performing GtA, and the Y-wing can do it almost without trying. This not only makes the Pilot feel less awesome (because the non-pilots are succeeding at everything too) but it also lowers the value of the other space maneuvers from the perspective of the Cloakshape pilots, making them sitting ducks.

Also don't forget the terrain modifiers to EVERYTHING.

So I'd try and fix this by doing the following and see if it helps:

Let the players murder these poor Cloakshapes, and have another flight of fighters show up. These aren't more cloakshapes, They should have Speed 5, Handling 2, and Shields 1 front, 0 aft (you will probably have to generate these yourself). Have their tactics be to make one quick pass on the players, then head deeper into the asteroid rings and try and get the players to follow them. Let them follow the new fighters through the rings and when things lighten up on the other side have the fighters then turn and dogfight again.

Odds are after a few Fly maneuvers through an asteroid field (pg 240), the Pilot should be in much better shape and further along then the other players and when the fight does happen, the Pilot's skills will have a greater impact.

You mean like "spend advantage to spot a weakness" and such? Or are you talking about other things?

No, I mean the part about an opposed check letting you choose which defensive zone you can hit. It's similar to GtA, but doesn't have the same restrictions. Just an option.

On the bright side it does sound like you're running it right, so once you get the hang of it things should start to work better.

Sounds like it went well!

If you use that modular encounter again, you could always re-skin it so it's different ships

Sounds like it went well!

If you use that modular encounter again, you could always re-skin it so it's different ships

Very true... Didn't think about that, but it would be extremely easy. :-)

I'm thinking about having the group encounter these pirates again when they leave the planet. They will be on their freighter and they'll "overhear" a comm from the captain saying something about the ships they lost and the profit they missed out on from those jockeys in the Y-Wings. IOW, they will not be retaliating, but trying to make a profit after a bad run, and the PC's will know they are the ones that caused the consternation. If they "comm" that they are the same ones they might have a recurring bad guy... ;-)

I love the way this system can be so wide open. :-D