I'll be starting a new game, with new players soon, and I have a few ideas I'd like opinions on.

One of the first things I wanted to do was have my players, choose a theme for their characters, at character creation. Imperial Deserters, Swoop Gang, Family, Explorers, Family of Explorers, etc. I know other GM's have done things like this in the past, but I wanted to ask some specific questions.

1 - How did/would you handle Obligation? I was thinking of having my players share the same Obligation, due to their history together. Then during character creation, they could take on more as usual, but they could decide if this was a new Obligation or the same as the groups.

2 - Equipment - I don't want to give them the farm, but depending on the theme the players choose, I was also thinking of outfitting them myself. Imperial Deserters, may have some better equipment to start with, other than the fact that it's all Imperial. A swoop gang, may not have a ship at all, but they would all have swoops of some sort.

Any ideas or opinions would be helpful. Thanks.

I participated in a brief game where all the players were (recently burned) I.I. informants, who had worked with I.I. because I.I. had something over all of us and was threatening the things we cared about in order to get us to comply.

We each had our individual Obligations, and on top of that a separate 5- or 10-point group obligation to I.I. Needless to say our Obligation was pretty high in the end, after increases for money and XP.

We did not get special equipment. I would try to avoid that because it immediately ups the power curve from the get-go to have expensive weapons for free and be able to buy stuff with credits on top of it. I assume that the characters would have sold everything but what they're carrying to provide the credits they have up to this point. That being said I think it's fair to give a Mechanics a free toolkit, Doctor a free medkit, Slicer a free slicing kit etc just to let them do their jobs; it's unlikely for them to sell this in the end.

The only issue I see with a swoop gang or similar is you are basically restricted to one planet without a ship, and possibly even more restricted to certain parts of the planet, depending on which one it is. That can be fun, or that can feel very constraining. Just depends.

I'll be starting a new game, with new players soon, and I have a few ideas I'd like opinions on.

One of the first things I wanted to do was have my players, choose a theme for their characters, at character creation. Imperial Deserters, Swoop Gang, Family, Explorers, Family of Explorers, etc. I know other GM's have done things like this in the past, but I wanted to ask some specific questions.

1 - How did/would you handle Obligation? I was thinking of having my players share the same Obligation, due to their history together. Then during character creation, they could take on more as usual, but they could decide if this was a new Obligation or the same as the groups.

2 - Equipment - I don't want to give them the farm, but depending on the theme the players choose, I was also thinking of outfitting them myself. Imperial Deserters, may have some better equipment to start with, other than the fact that it's all Imperial. A swoop gang, may not have a ship at all, but they would all have swoops of some sort.

Any ideas or opinions would be helpful. Thanks.

I my guys start in a CSA labor facility because of their separate Obligations landing them there. However a shared one would be fine also imo.

Giving them some basic guns and a couple of doo dads isn't a big deal I don't think, so feel free.

I'll be starting a new game, with new players soon, and I have a few ideas I'd like opinions on.

One of the first things I wanted to do was have my players, choose a theme for their characters, at character creation. Imperial Deserters, Swoop Gang, Family, Explorers, Family of Explorers, etc. I know other GM's have done things like this in the past, but I wanted to ask some specific questions.

1 - How did/would you handle Obligation? I was thinking of having my players share the same Obligation, due to their history together. Then during character creation, they could take on more as usual, but they could decide if this was a new Obligation or the same as the groups.

2 - Equipment - I don't want to give them the farm, but depending on the theme the players choose, I was also thinking of outfitting them myself. Imperial Deserters, may have some better equipment to start with

EDIT: Grr... net went out when I posted. Why does it always get the quote, but not the post?

1) Obligation doesn't represent the characters problems, it represents the problems they worry about.

So your players can all be wanted men for their desertion, but that doesn't have to be what keeps them awake at night. Furthermore an Obligation can actually be the mcguffin that kicks it off. For example maybe one of them deserted because his sister went missing in a rebel attack on Garruda and he went to go find out what happened to her. He's probably got a warrant out for his desertion, but his Obligation is Family, and that's what pushing him forward, keeping him from getting a good nights rest, and eating away at him when his mind should be on the task at hand.

2) Starting gear is up to you, the stuff in the book is there as a suggestion to keep everyone on roughly the same level so they will be compatible with official adventure modules. If you want to trade the 120,000c starting ship for a nice apartment in Coronet city, it won't damage the game mechanics any, but Beyond the Rim is a hard adventure to run if you rely on commercial space liners...

For the Obligation, I'd still let them choose individual Obligations, as even if they're all part of the same group. They're bound to have different life experiences, and thus have gotten themselves into individual jams.

Han and Chewie, as an example, have been smuggling partners for years, yet Han has a Debt Obligation to Jabba while Chewie probably has a Criminal Obligation to reflect the fact that under Imperial law he's an escaped slave.

You could also permit players interested in doing so to have their respective Obligations linked story-wise. For instance, one PC has an Addiction Obligation due to a really nasty death stick habit, but a fellow PC has an Oath Obligation to help the first PC get clean and kick their habit. Or, a few of the PCs both have a Dutybound Obligation to the same group, reflecting that they're both beholden to the same larger organization.

On Equipment, I'd stick with the standard amounts, and if any PCs want additional gear, they can take extra Obligation to get it. In the case of Imperial Deserters, have that extra Obligation be allocated to Criminal to reflect that having gone AWOL, they're now criminals and likely to be hunted by the Empire for treason. If they're a group of explorers, perhaps have that extra Obligation for added money be Sponsorship to a major corporation or wealthy individual that's providing financial backing for their expeditions.

You know, the more I think about it, a few free blaster carbines is really not going to break anything. I'd assume they wouldn't try to keep their lamellar since it's so flipping obvious.

In my bounty hunter game, all PCs have the first 5 Obligation going into Sponsorship (from Enter the Unknown) to represent the Guild. Additional Obligations can be taken on personal selections.

Thanks for all the responses guys!

The more I think about this idea, the more ideas as a GM I get.

Kshatriya - I thought about equipment for a long time, but in the end, I figured if there was a power bump, I could just balance out the encounters. This is a really flexible system. Using the Imperial Deserter theme, I figured they could keep ST armor, but it puts a huge target on their back if they ever run into any Imperials while wearing it.

Mr. Morningfire - I'm still thinking about the Obligation bit, but I think you're probably on a better track, than requiring them to keep the same one. I'm still thinking on it though. Almost every character created for my games, has taken on extra Obligation. Maybe that will be something they can share. Now that I write that though, it seems as wonky as well.

When I tried to get my group to do something like that, they basically laughed and we all realized it was simpler to make them a crew of troubleshooters/hired guns/mercenaries/smugglers than anything.

As a matter of fact, the group basically recreated the crew from Firefly with a few changes (like the Doctor being a former soldier, and the big gun is a recent Imperial "deserter" since he went AWOL, while the Mechanic is a Jawa who loves droids. . .). This is what I get for introducing most of my table to Firefly. . .

In any case, people have really brought out the best details here, but I've done a few things in my game that may help set your mind at ease:

1) Obligation can be either Individual or Linked. At character creation, each player had their own Obligations they were worried about, but nothing was linked together until the first game. My group had a Linked Obligation right off the bat for their new ship that was slightly higher than the usual 120,000 (they asked to be groundlocked for a few jobs to give them a reason to leave the planet as soon as they had a new ship), and even though it put them over 100 Obligation, they paid it down via roleplaying (it was to show that too much Obligation can be a bad thing).

2) Every character started with one item worth up to 500 credits that was tied to their character's past. This meant the medic and mechanic could have their respective kits without going broke, and the smuggler could have his favorite blaster. I didn't go over 500 as the group recently crashed their ship and lost everything beyond 500 credits cash, a favorite item and the clothes on their back, but after playing a while, I reazied it wouldn't unbalance the game to give more credits and/or a free item.

In fact, when we introduced a new player, I gave him a more expensive item (a slugthrower carbine with the scatter barrel modification), and we all got a good laugh.

In a test game we ran, I gave each party member 3,000 credits, and they still weren't "over powered" by any means. So gear really is variable as long as you don't go too crazy with it (i.e. giving everyone heavy battle armor with filled hardpoints).

I'll be starting a new game, with new players soon, and I have a few ideas I'd like opinions on.

One of the first things I wanted to do was have my players, choose a theme for their characters, at character creation. Imperial Deserters, Swoop Gang, Family, Explorers, Family of Explorers, etc. I know other GM's have done things like this in the past, but I wanted to ask some specific questions.

1 - How did/would you handle Obligation? I was thinking of having my players share the same Obligation, due to their history together. Then during character creation, they could take on more as usual, but they could decide if this was a new Obligation or the same as the groups.

2 - Equipment - I don't want to give them the farm, but depending on the theme the players choose, I was also thinking of outfitting them myself. Imperial Deserters, may have some better equipment to start with, other than the fact that it's all Imperial. A swoop gang, may not have a ship at all, but they would all have swoops of some sort.

Any ideas or opinions would be helpful. Thanks.

I was going to describe how we did it in our campaign, by having a starting character development section where the players each came up with the broad strokes of their Obligations and their backgrounds, and then I (the GM) filled in many of the blanks, connecting up characters through shared backstories and even coming up with some details behind the scenes that connect the characters in ways they don't even know yet.

Then I realized you are in my group so you were there

Actually, if this is the new daddy, I WASN'T there. I remember you telling me, "Hey, so we need a doctor." I was a session or two late.

Actually, if this is the new daddy, I WASN'T there. I remember you telling me, "Hey, so we need a doctor." I was a session or two late.

That's right! You just missed the original character creation session.

In our case we had discussed from the start that we'd be "explorers" generally, but without a very specific organization for the group.

A lot of the work connecting Obligations was done behind the scenes by me. Two characters had similar ideas so I suggested they might be a Sponsorship Obligation from the same organization looking for the same relic.

This connected those two characters together. Then, based on the others characters' own ideas, we kinda worked together to come up with the rest.

Then Dr. Rip magically appeared on the side of a mountain climbing down with a bunch of strangers telling him to, "Be quiet! There's monsters." Ha!

I'm gonna miss our Wednesday game.

That being said I think it's fair to give a Mechanics a free toolkit, Doctor a free medkit, Slicer a free slicing kit etc just to let them do their jobs; it's unlikely for them to sell this in the end.

I get what you're saying, but this is a really slippery slope. Would you give a soldier a free blaster rifle? Or a character with 2 points in Pilot Planetary a landspeeder? How about a pilot their own ship? Surely these are all things they need to do their job. It's like that old school saying. If you didn't bring enough for everyone, don't bring any for anyone. If every character isn't getting their occupational gear for free, no one should be getting it. There are more than enough credits around to pick up medkits and tools.

That being said I think it's fair to give a Mechanics a free toolkit, Doctor a free medkit, Slicer a free slicing kit etc just to let them do their jobs; it's unlikely for them to sell this in the end.

I get what you're saying, but this is a really slippery slope. Would you give a soldier a free blaster rifle? Or a character with 2 points in Pilot Planetary a landspeeder? How about a pilot their own ship? Surely these are all things they need to do their job. It's like that old school saying. If you didn't bring enough for everyone, don't bring any for anyone. If every character isn't getting their occupational gear for free, no one should be getting it. There are more than enough credits around to pick up medkits and tools.

Yes and no to the "enough credits" side of things. I have a part of 5, so they could only pick up 10 Obligation. If they took the credits alone, they would have been able to buy those items with cash to spare, but since many of them didn't raise their Obligation (as again, a party of 5, so Obligation started at 50 and would hit 100 very quickly), many of them didn't have much by way of cash.

With the starting batch of 500 credits, a medic or mechanic will be clearing out their savings to buy their tools, a creative slicer can get away with a datapad (which is the cheapest "job tool" I've seen), a combatant will be relying on slugthrowers (especially if they use Heavy weapons), and armor will be a luxury no one is affording. The same is mostly true if they have 1,000 credits. A slicer can buy the best tools (as long as the GM okays the Restricted item at chargen) with nothing else, and anyone who wants a ranged weapon better than a slugthrower is paying 50-90% of their starting credits for a single object.

Granted, starting credits are low to make people pick up the Obligation for more credits and/or make them really work for their gear, but it does keep people from being able to get rolling at the start in their respective professions. It's a matter of perspective, really, and what you want your group to do out of the gate.

Personally, as I did with our campaign, I'd stick to the regular system for gear--500c to start with, and more if they want to add more Obligation.

Then you can give them opportunities to upgrade their stuff and buy more along the way.

I more or less provided through story what my players needed to include credits when they started. I just don't fret over payouts as it is too easy through story to make it go away. I reward well and I charge big. To me, if the main hook a GM uses in getting and keeping player participation and interest in the game is credits paid out, or not paid out, they aren't telling a very compelling story and being entertaining imo. Credits shouldn't be the focus of the game, nor should gear. I have never agreed with any system that starts out adventurers as transients.

I have never agreed with any system that starts out adventurers as transients.

I dunno. I think you are discounting the fun and adventure to be found in the Hobo: the Vagabonding . That is a great game!

I more or less provided through story what my players needed to include credits when they started. I just don't fret over payouts as it is too easy through story to make it go away. I reward well and I charge big. To me, if the main hook a GM uses in getting and keeping player participation and interest in the game is credits paid out, or not paid out, they aren't telling a very compelling story and being entertaining imo. Credits shouldn't be the focus of the game, nor should gear. I have never agreed with any system that starts out adventurers as transients.

I pretty much couldn't agree more. There is nothing sadder than having to loot someone's body or pay for a drink in the cantina you have to be in for a scene. Once the dice are rolling, good narration provides all the credits and equipment players reasonably need. This isn't D&D.

I more or less provided through story what my players needed to include credits when they started. I just don't fret over payouts as it is too easy through story to make it go away. I reward well and I charge big. To me, if the main hook a GM uses in getting and keeping player participation and interest in the game is credits paid out, or not paid out, they aren't telling a very compelling story and being entertaining imo. Credits shouldn't be the focus of the game, nor should gear. I have never agreed with any system that starts out adventurers as transients.

I pretty much couldn't agree more. There is nothing sadder than having to loot someone's body or pay for a drink in the cantina you have to be in for a scene. Once the dice are rolling, good narration provides all the credits and equipment players reasonably need. This isn't D&D.

On the other hand, having the credits to get that hyperdrive upgrade is a Pretty Big Deal. The same is true for upgrading your favorite blaster, decking out your armor, adding that part to a droid, or building your own lightsaber from parts you've bought.

I agree that narration provides what's the most important, but at the same time, having a "tangible" reward for those players is never a bad thing, and we see that come up quite a bit in canon.

I know that at times, the payout and the loss are tied to the story (like Han losing his pay from rescuing Leia, or gambling a ship to win the money for parts), but that gimmick can get old, fast. I'd rather have the group do their jobs, try to save money, sell things they "loot" (which thankfully has been VERY rare since they don't want to get caught just yet, but most "loot" has been weapon upgrades for two characters), and cause more problems.

In our campaign the first few adventures have the characters being pretty poor, and I thought our group seemed to have fun with it. They really committed to stuff like deciding whether to pay 20c for a taxi or to spend the 2 hours and gain a few strain to walk the distance.

My intent was always to start them out pretty poor and over time build up the amount of credits and/or gear they have access to as they gain more success.

We haven't had a chance to get that far, but that's my idea about it, anyway.