I did a search on this and did not see a topic for it, sorry if this is repeated. I've been going through the EotE core book and looking at character creation. As I understand it, you can't increase characteristics with xp purchases after character creation.I know that you can overcome some of this by buying certain talents or investing in individual skills to increase the positive dice pools, but I'm worried starting XP (even with obligations) is a little low for some of my players who might want to roll unconventional characters. Do any of you provide bonus xp at character creation? If so how much?

I've considered this as well.There was some back-and forth about letting players reduce starting (base) characteristics for additional XP- here's the link to that thread: http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/98470-reducing-stats-at-character-creation/

Perhaps this will be of some assistance?

Thanks, that is certainly a potential idea, I'll consider that if it comes up.

Well, I didn't give them extra xp, but in a short game I ran I gave my players an extra +1 to one characteristic of their choice, not because the system requires it, but because a lot of the players bought talents with their starting xp and simply didn't have the dice pools to be effective. I wouldn't have done this for them were the game to have lasted indefinitely however. This was simply a boost to get them through the adventure I was running, as they were struggling with checks, particularly in combat. It cannot be emphasized enough that players aught to spend as much of their starting xp as possible on characteristics. Talents and skills will come soon enough.

I would only start with additional xp if you specifically want your players to be playing "veteran" characters.

Your table, your rules. Giving an xp boost won't unravel time and space. Gives you the opportunity to use some more interesting adversaries to start. I wouldn't get too crazy generous though or you'll have munchkinism badly.

Well, I didn't give them extra xp, but in a short game I ran I gave my players an extra +1 to one characteristic of their choice, not because the system requires it, but because a lot of the players bought talents with their starting xp and simply didn't have the dice pools to be effective. I wouldn't have done this for them were the game to have lasted indefinitely however. This was simply a boost to get them through the adventure I was running, as they were struggling with checks, particularly in combat. It cannot be emphasized enough that players aught to spend as much of their starting xp as possible on characteristics. Talents and skills will come soon enough.

I would only start with additional xp if you specifically want your players to be playing "veteran" characters.

That was my understanding they really should bump their characteristics right off the bat. How many characteristics do you think an average player should be investing in? For example do most of them bump one multiple times or do they spread them out? I'm not sure how my players will want to roll their characters, but I'm trying to anticipate some of the issues we might encounter. Maybe the free +1 is a good approach.

Just remember that characteristics don't have a flat XP cost, they cost more the higher you go. So if you give a +1 to any characteristic, your number-crunching players will probably use it to boost an already high characteristic, rather than boost a low one, since they'll save more XP in the long run. What you might want to do is give them a +1 in any characteristic that is at starting value, or at a 1 or 2, something like that. That way, your marauder won't use it to get a 5 brawn, which he really doesn't need at the start, but instead maybe a 3 presence so he can look more intimidating (and be more well-rounded).

Just remember that characteristics don't have a flat XP cost, they cost more the higher you go. So if you give a +1 to any characteristic, your number-crunching players will probably use it to boost an already high characteristic, rather than boost a low one, since they'll save more XP in the long run. What you might want to do is give them a +1 in any characteristic that is at starting value, or at a 1 or 2, something like that. That way, your marauder won't use it to get a 5 brawn, which he really doesn't need at the start, but instead maybe a 3 presence so he can look more intimidating (and be more well-rounded).

That is a very good point. I'll have to keep that in mind if I decided the player will need a boost.

In my group, I gave the the +1 to any characteristic, because most players had a 3 as their best stat.

That was my understanding they really should bump their characteristics right off the bat. How many characteristics do you think an average player should be investing in? For example do most of them bump one multiple times or do they spread them out? I'm not sure how my players will want to roll their characters, but I'm trying to anticipate some of the issues we might encounter. Maybe the free +1 is a good approach.

My anecdotal experience:

Players who play a species for the inherent stat benefit to a job (e.g. Twilek Politico/social Smuggler, Wookiee/Trandoshan Marauder, Rodian Pilot or gunfighter) are likely to increase their starting 3 to a 4 and probably also buy the 1 to a 2, and then if anything is left, will go with another stat that fits the character idea they have.

Humans start with everything at ok levels and can easily spread around to have 3 3's or a 4 and a 3.

Droids will probably hyper focus to have 1 very high characteristic (4 or maybe even 5), a couple middle, and a couple staying at 1.

The reason being the core itself advises players to put most of their XP into characteristics, since that's the basis of a large dice pool and it's much easier to raise Skills or buy Talents than Characteristics after chargen. I think a lot of players will pick up the fact that Characteristic advancement exists in a place of much greater scarcity and cost than improving anything else and will allocate most points accordingly.

Finally, if you wind up giving a lot of bonus chargen XP, I would suggest only a certain percentage being allowed to go to Characteristics. If you give +20 XP this isn't a concern. If you give +200 XP it can be.

After wrapping up my last campaign at 400 XP (beyond starting XP), I decided to start my new campaign at that level. However here were the limits I imposed:

1) Make character as normal with Starting XP. This is the only step where Characteristics can be directly raised with XP.

a) Additional Obligation may NOT be taken.

2) Add 400 XP. Spend it as if gained through gameplay with the following restrictions:

a) Skills may not exceed Rank 3. (Exception considered for allowing a Corellian Human's Piloting to go to 4, but it did not come up.)

b) Talents may not be purchased from the 4th or 5th rows (only the 5, 10, and 15 XP Talents may be taken).

3) Equip the character by spending 5,000 credits.

This allowed us to make versatile and broadly competent characters but the limits prevented hyper-specialization. Characters still show clear differences (they are not made to feel identical by forcing them to broaden their expenditures rather than diving for the bottom of Talent Trees).

After wrapping up my last campaign at 400 XP (beyond starting XP), I decided to start my new campaign at that level. However here were the limits I imposed:

1) Make character as normal with Starting XP. This is the only step where Characteristics can be directly raised with XP.

a) Additional Obligation may NOT be taken.

2) Add 400 XP. Spend it as if gained through gameplay with the following restrictions:

a) Skills may not exceed Rank 3. (Exception considered for Corellian Human's Piloting to go to 4 considered, but it did not come up.)

b) Talents may not be purchased from the 3rd or 4th rows (only the 5, 10, and 15 XP Talents may be taken).

3) Equip the character by spending 5,000 credits.

This allowed us to make versatile and broadly competent characters but the limits prevented hyper-specialization. Characters still show clear differences (they are not made to feel identical by forcing them to broaden their expenditures rather than diving for the bottom of Talent Trees).

Did you do this because they had been through a campaign already or was this because you preferred them having more skills to start the game? Also did you limit the number of additional specializations they could buy?

After wrapping up my last campaign at 400 XP (beyond starting XP), I decided to start my new campaign at that level. However here were the limits I imposed:

1) Make character as normal with Starting XP. This is the only step where Characteristics can be directly raised with XP.

a) Additional Obligation may NOT be taken.

2) Add 400 XP. Spend it as if gained through gameplay with the following restrictions:

a) Skills may not exceed Rank 3. (Exception considered for Corellian Human's Piloting to go to 4 considered, but it did not come up.)

b) Talents may not be purchased from the 3rd or 4th rows (only the 5, 10, and 15 XP Talents may be taken).

3) Equip the character by spending 5,000 credits.

This allowed us to make versatile and broadly competent characters but the limits prevented hyper-specialization. Characters still show clear differences (they are not made to feel identical by forcing them to broaden their expenditures rather than diving for the bottom of Talent Trees).

Did you do this because they had been through a campaign already or was this because you preferred them having more skills to start the game? Also did you limit the number of additional specializations they could buy?

Yes (to both sub-questions; they had already played the low XP game, and so had I) , and No (everybody purchased a second specialization, a few purchased a third).

If, and a mighty big if, I was to every give bonus XP (like, if I was boosting a new player into a well established group), I'd have them make their character as normal, then give them the XP to spend as normal. They'd have to buy up their talents and get to Dedication like everyone else. No free rides.

If I was running a one or two off and wanted players to be able to explore talents, I would just take the framework form the Beginner box and handout XP mid session to spend on talents and skill boosts. That way, they can still make a character with high enough characteristics to roll a successful pool, yet still be able to explore some of those aspects.

Problem is, demo characters never stay demo characters. If you give a player a whole bunch of handouts, free characteristics, and freebies, they'll want to continue playing the character (more out of attachment than power gaming). So now you've either thrown someone else's game out of balance or upset the player because they can never play this cool character they made and invested in.

I think I'd be more inclined if I were to boost players I'd tell them I'm giving them one amount, (X) xp, and let them spend that separate from their starting xp. The when they had spent the first batch maybe tell them here's another X amount, to try and simulate the organic nature of the advancement process a bit more. Then after the first session maybe another big chunk of xp to get them where I want them and then return to normal xp payouts.

I think I'd be more inclined if I were to boost players I'd tell them I'm giving them one amount, (X) xp, and let them spend that separate from their starting xp. The when they had spent the first batch maybe tell them here's another X amount, to try and simulate the organic nature of the advancement process a bit more. Then after the first session maybe another big chunk of xp to get them where I want them and then return to normal xp payouts.

I haven't decided if I will give them extra xp or not. If I do I'm thinking 20-50 xp tops. As I gather from the books that's about two sessions or so of playing? That is a good idea about giving them a bigger chunk of xp after the first session though.

Per session xp rewards are a SWAG kind of thing. Depends on how often you play. Me an my guys are probably lucky to get together twice a month, so I usually hand out 30 or 35ish a session. Just depends.

The thing to remember is that the FFG Fun Police aren't going to kick down your front door mid-session if you decide you need to house-rule or tweak things to your group's liking.

Yes, the system makes it tough to start with multiple high characteristics. This is a very deliberate design choice, and it's not an indication that the game is "broken" by having starting characters being a bit on the weaker side.

If your group doesn't like that, then by all means, change it. Just make sure that when you're changing things that you're keeping overall game balance in mind. As has been said in the thread, simply offering a free +1 to a characteristic after XP is spent can be worth something like 50xp depending on where it's put; doesn't mean you can't still allow that, but you should be mindful of it before giving the go-ahead.

If you want the players to start with higher characteristics, don't offer a +1 to one of their choice, someone going from a 4 to a 5 is going to get more out of it than someone going from a 3 to a 4. Instead, just add to starting XP.

Most of the species are set up so that adding +10XP from Obligation can upgrade an extra characteristic. Eg: humans start with 110XP, adding 10XP from Obligation gives 120, which means 4 characteristics can be upgraded from 2 to 3. That's a very superior jack of all trades character. Or you can get a single characteristic to 4, one to 3, and have 20 left over. +20XP at start should give you a 4, two 3s, and three 2s, making a very capable yet specialized character. The species that have 1s to start also have less XP to start with, so it should balance out.

So if you give them +10-20XP for free, expecting it all to be spent on characteristics, then another 30-50XP for skills and talents, you'll have some very tough and capable characters right out of the gate.

Lotsa good ideas here. Soooo....who wants to run a higher-power game?

I have a crazy gm who's starting a campaign based around a capital ship. He gave us a starting budget of 15 million (12 million of which went to buy a Nebulon B, a month's supplies for the ship, and a month's wages for the crew [i think he may be high-balling the wages quite a bit]). In a game like this, buying superior for every weapon is beans compared to the price of a squadron of starfighters. I have every bit of gear I could want, so in that sense the game is high powered. I also am direct commander of a squad of 7 Nemesis-grade Dresselian Commandos. We only have starting + 125 xp for now though. I don't know how fast we'll be gaining xp.

I have a crazy gm who's starting a campaign based around a capital ship. He gave us a starting budget of 15 million (12 million of which went to buy a Nebulon B, a month's supplies for the ship, and a month's wages for the crew [i think he may be high-balling the wages quite a bit]). In a game like this, buying superior for every weapon is beans compared to the price of a squadron of starfighters. I have every bit of gear I could want, so in that sense the game is high powered. I also am direct commander of a squad of 7 Nemesis-grade Dresselian Commandos. We only have starting + 125 xp for now though. I don't know how fast we'll be gaining xp.

How are you going to pay to keep the ship going after the first month? Pirates perhaps?

I have a crazy gm who's starting a campaign based around a capital ship. He gave us a starting budget of 15 million (12 million of which went to buy a Nebulon B, a month's supplies for the ship, and a month's wages for the crew [i think he may be high-balling the wages quite a bit]). In a game like this, buying superior for every weapon is beans compared to the price of a squadron of starfighters. I have every bit of gear I could want, so in that sense the game is high powered. I also am direct commander of a squad of 7 Nemesis-grade Dresselian Commandos. We only have starting + 125 xp for now though. I don't know how fast we'll be gaining xp.

How are you going to pay to keep the ship going after the first month? Pirates perhaps?

How to keep the ship operational is indeed a big question, as we need to come up with about 4 mil every month. The gm is providing a number of different options to go with, among which is piracy, though I doubt we'll go that route.

At 1 million per month for salary you are able to buy 1000 people a light freighter (yt-1300 for example) each month.

Where can I sign up?

At 1 million per month for salary you are able to buy 1000 people a light freighter (yt-1300 for example) each month.

Where can I sign up?

It would be 100 people, but you're right. Prices in Star Wars have always been kind of funky. Most things are about equivalent to dollars at the low end, but at the high end, a starship only costs about as much as a luxury car.