Hey all, I'm reading up on the EotE rules right now and am getting ready to start up my first game. One thing I'm a little confused on is that there doesn't seem to be a traditional "leveling" system that I'm seeing. My limited RPG experience is only with D&D 4th ed.

My question is this - how do I know which modules will be appropriate for the characters given their experience? Is it somehow listed? Are all modules considered to be for all characters? What if a module seems too easy? Can I "upgrade" the difficulty for the character's experience? Can I likewise downgrade it?

Thanks so much in advance for the help!

The published adventures so far (Beyond the Rim and The Jewel of Yavin) both indicate what sort of PCs they're geared for. In this case, the former is intended for beginning characters, and the latter is meant for more advanced characters.

Both books, however, include advice on how to tweak the difficulty for different groups, so don't worry about a module being 'unusuable' for your PCs or anything.

The published adventures so far (Beyond the Rim and The Jewel of Yavin) both indicate what sort of PCs they're geared for. In this case, the former is intended for beginning characters, and the latter is meant for more advanced characters.

Both books, however, include advice on how to tweak the difficulty for different groups, so don't worry about a module being 'unusuable' for your PCs or anything.

Excellent! Thank you for the quick response .

As Rikoshi said, but before you run one of them use one of the starter adventures (in the rulebook, or the beginner game) to get a handle on how power is handled. I would NOT jump straight into Jewel of Yavin, for example, it's definitely geared for higher level play and has greater expectations for comfort with the rule set.

Edit: added very important NOT...

It's a narrative system so most situations I've encountered have challenged the creativity, cunning and roleplaying-chops of us Players more than our ability to design awesomely built Characters. So how difficult something is is more often based on how "on form" (or dumb) we are that week.

The most mechy bit is combat (obv) and even fightingness-wise, scaling seems pretty fluid. The things that threatened me when I began play (jerks with guns) are still a potential threat 500 xp in (it all becomes a matter of "can I end this fight / get away quickly enough?").

If your combats are too easy then obviously the bad guys are just playing for time until their backup arrives.

If they're too deadly, then maybe their boss is doing something more important and requires them elsewhere. Or they care about their lives and retreat when some of them start dropping. Or the law shows up. Or land piranhas. Hmm, land piranhas...

I have no idea why piranha cannon came to mind, but blasters are for Imps, give me a piranha gun.

I have no idea why piranha cannon came to mind, but blasters are for Imps, give me a piranha gun.

An excuse to dust off the Fear rules, too.

What if a module seems too easy? Can I "upgrade" the difficulty for the character's experience? Can I likewise downgrade it?

The answer thus far has been to add/subtract minions in encounters and to increase/decrease difficulty of checks, but you're not alone in observing a lack of a solid scaling mechanic and we've talked about it in several threads here with no real consensus. My group is sitting around 350xp now and could eat most challenges alive, and I feel like just increasing difficulty is a cop out since they worked hard to spend their XP where they did and I don't feel it's fair to just raise the difficulty of a task to suit their skill level.

So, what I try to do instead is to add more elements to a scene that inherently increase the difficulty, but not outright "this used to be hard, now it's daunting, suckers." "It's raining" or "that blaring alarm really is distracting" are good ways to accomplish this. Sure, that slicer with 5 proficiency dice may be able to crack into any system given enough time, but what about when they're on the back of a speeder being shot at while weaving through the underlevels of Coruscant?

This of course is only one solution - what else are you all doing to scale up?

Encounters where:

• you can't take your usual gear (I love my carbine but I can't take it to a party, even as my +1)
• you're against the clock (something will explode? reinforcements arrive?)
• you need to move through dangerous terrain (rain-slick rooftops make movement/dodging/getting hit more hazardous)
• something else needs doing (fixing a shield generator (accumulate, say, a total of 20 Mechanic successes) while fighting off land piranhas)
• the goal isn't clear (multiple guarded standalone computers to slice; targets who use bodydoubles; any kind of decoy, really)

More

And more

Even more