For the advanced GM I'd not recommend Enter the Unknown. Except for some items, vehicles, starships and specializations, there is virtually nothing useful. The first three things I can make up on my own, the specializations are for the players. Of course if you are a SW RPG fan, you should buy everything like me !

I too would prioritize Dangerous Covenants over Enter the Unknown. It is a more universally useful book, though both are worth purchasing.

The screen is very useful, and I don't use screens other than as reference.

Not wanting to start an argument or anything. Just trying to understand. I went back and read through both books.

DC has lots of gun, bombs and armor. It has lots of how to blow stuff up and lots of how to kill stuff. It has practically no information on campaign building other than "they kill stuff" and "pay for kill'in stuff".

EtU has less equipment, and the equipment it does have is more generally useful in an overall story. It has a lot of information on how to build campaigns and story lines for exploration and such.

If you do not intend to run you game on the Edge of the Empire (?) then EiU could have limited use. But even in a Core campaign like SuF, it has a lot of use.

But DC literally is just about kill'in and blow'in them ups. You'd have to be running a Pirate game or a combat mercenary game to really need any of it.

Of course there is nothing wrong with those. Personally I think it a waste of a beautiful narrative system to just play what appears to me to be just D&D with blasters...

Note... I said appears to be. Meaning that you could be doing something totally different than what I am imagining

EtU has simply to little equipment to justify the money spent. Also there are no illus for all the vehicle, ships and items.

As for the information on how to build campaigns and story lines for exploration, I find far more useful info in the Galaxy Guide: Scouts supplement. Or even Unknown Regions from SAGA.

Everything is IMO only.

I found

For the advanced GM I'd not recommend Enter the Unknown. Except for some items, vehicles, starships and specializations, there is virtually nothing useful. The first three things I can make up on my own, the specializations are for the players. Of course if you are a SW RPG fan, you should buy everything like me !

I too would prioritize Dangerous Covenants over Enter the Unknown. It is a more universally useful book, though both are worth purchasing.

The screen is very useful, and I don't use screens other than as reference.

Not wanting to start an argument or anything. Just trying to understand. I went back and read through both books.

DC has lots of gun, bombs and armor. It has lots of how to blow stuff up and lots of how to kill stuff. It has practically no information on campaign building other than "they kill stuff" and "pay for kill'in stuff".

EtU has less equipment, and the equipment it does have is more generally useful in an overall story. It has a lot of information on how to build campaigns and story lines for exploration and such.

If you do not intend to run you game on the Edge of the Empire (?) then EiU could have limited use. But even in a Core campaign like SuF, it has a lot of use.

But DC literally is just about kill'in and blow'in them ups. You'd have to be running a Pirate game or a combat mercenary game to really need any of it.

Of course there is nothing wrong with those. Personally I think it a waste of a beautiful narrative system to just play what appears to me to be just D&D with blasters...

Note... I said appears to be. Meaning that you could be doing something totally different than what I am imagining

I didn't find the campaign info in EtU to be very informative, to me at least. By contrast, DC's campaign material was more flavorful. I found it to be more than just gun stats.

I haven't even finished reading SoF. I found it tedious. Stat blocks for NPC are useful though. I'll try to get back to it at some stage.

I found the going rates for jobs in DC to be really useful as templates for all manner of tasks. The rules around explosives (pleasantly) surprised me i.e. having them effect range bands instead of using the blast quality. Personally I'm less interested in weapons and armour. Other forms of gear are great (I think the EtU gear is more interesting)

My players and I are enjoying Beyond the RIm.

I like the GM Screen (as an aid that sits next to me), I really like the tone of the adventure in the supplement too. I intend on running that soon after the completion of BtR.

EtU has simply to little equipment to justify the money spent. Also there are no illus for all the vehicle, ships and items.

As for the information on how to build campaigns and story lines for exploration, I find far more useful info in the Galaxy Guide: Scouts supplement. Or even Unknown Regions from SAGA.

Everything is IMO only.

Fair enough.

I generally don't usually count gear and equipment lists as 'value' for a supplement so for me it is 'lost space' in a sourcebook. My better than usual liking for gear here was because there was more non-combat gear than is usual.

I don't have any of the non-FFG books and don't usually refer to non-line gamebooks in a game specific forum. That said, I have heard that the non-system content in the SAGA and the Westend Games SW's games was pretty good.

Most of my opinion is based on the books currently available from FFG's EotE line. I am not informed enough to venture an opinion on the other game systems books.

So in a nutshell it looks like we both focus on different aspects for 'value'. Thanks for giving me your perspective .

I found

--snip--

I didn't find the campaign info in EtU to be very informative, to me at least. By contrast, DC's campaign material was more flavorful. I found it to be more than just gun stats.

Thanks for the info Doc. Like Nico, you have a completely different view of the information. To me I didn't see any real campaign info in DC at all. A lot of encounter/combat round blow stuff up suggestions. Every thing looks to be single "scene based" items, but very very little on actually designing a multi-arc campaign. Unlike EiU, which does give a fair amount (though not as much as I would like to see) of actual story crafting and story arc building advice.

When I read DC I basically came away with "blow it up with a blaster", "Blow it up with a bomb", "blow it up from ambush", rinse repeat. Not wanting to bring up other systems specifically, but DC didn't have anything really different than 100 other RPG supplements I've owned in the past. Where EiU at least tried to present advice to cover a wide range exploration style story-lines from path finding a new star route to discovering the remains of unknown civilizations.

Once again, YMMV as well as what you consider to have 'value'.. And like I said to Nico, Thanks for giving me your perspective.

I'm getting a lot of use out of the GM screen as a player. Yeah, all the material is elsewhere, but thr cost is quite low and the production is quote high. There is also some material on creating villains included, which could be of some use. All in all, I've found it to be a good buy.

I don't own any others (besides the Beginner game and the AoR beta), but I've heard good things about Dangerous Covenants. It seems to be a little more universally usable than the explorer book. Adventures are adventures (for good or bad), and I'm not too familiar with the other books aside from new species and the usual affair.

I am loving Beyond the Rim on multiple levels