Right, still waiting for the book to get available, but the O66 podcast told me that Cereans treat all knowledge skills as Career skills.

I gather that boost dice can easily bloat the dice pool and is a "boring" mechanic or bonus, but I think treating that many skills as career skills is a bit much. A free upgrade (or two?) would perhaps be another way to go about it that shows proficiency and braininess.

Thoughts?

By making them career skills, doesn't that simply save 5 exp from the price of improving Knowledge skills?

That doesn't seem like much, I mean you literally get nothing from this perk if you don't spend experience to gain the skills.

An upgrade or boost to every Knowledge skill seem like much more than that to me.

By making them career skills, doesn't that simply save 5 exp from the price of improving Knowledge skills?

Yes, but that stacks up pretty high, on one skill alone (going up to the 5th rank) you end up saving 25xp. So technically, if the character wouldn't buy into a career/spec that would give them the knowledge skill and decided to knock them all up, they end up saving XP across 7 skills (if you include Warfare, which FaD/EotE characters can't get as a career skill without going into AoR), which totals 175 in saved XP, but at the same time, means somebody has spent around 525 xp to get all those skills up there.

So in a small way, it is sort of imbalanced if we're just looking at it as "well this guy has the most potential saved xp", but unlike other species where they sort of get something for free, the Cereans only "get" something and exceed other species when they start investing heavily. Besides, I'd imagine that most players who want to be a Cerean that devotes so much into knowledge skills would probably be buying into knowledge-focused specs anyways.

So while I can definitely see where it can use tweaking, at the same time I personally don't really see it as too much of an issue.

I think your assumption that someone would buy all the ranks in all the knowledge skills is a bit flawed. 2-3 ranks in a majority? Sure. But this isn't CSI: Space where everyone wants all the sciences, so the actual XP savings is going to be a whole lot less.

-EF

It's not a huge issue, I'm just under persuasion that prefer not to hand out a bunch of career skills for free (yeah, yeah, I know they get reduced starting xp) due to species. Free ranks sure, boost dice sure, upgrades sure, other cool abilities sure... for some reason I feel that career skills shouldn't be handed out like that.

I think an upgrade reflects at least as good the Cerean's ability to learn and process as handing out 6-7 free career skills (of course varying between games and upon career/spec choice).

One could also let them get free ranks in a number of them, or apply the upgrade to a limited amount, but that is perhaps to restricting?

While I know each table is different, I like Knowledge skills, but my players do NOT use them enough. If this would encourage them to use more knowledge skills, that's fine by me.

I think your assumption that someone would buy all the ranks in all the knowledge skills is a bit flawed. 2-3 ranks in a majority? Sure. But this isn't CSI: Space where everyone wants all the sciences, so the actual XP savings is going to be a whole lot less.

-EF

Hence why I noted why most people who would invest heavily into a Knowledge skill, let alone all of them, would probably be taking the appropriate career/spec for the skill anyways.

Back on topic, upgrades/boosts to all knowledge skills is still a bit much, at least without knocking their starting XP down a bit. Maybe something like Duros where they can get an automatic 1 Advantage added on each Knowledge roll. Could also be like with Klatoonians, 1 rank in a certain set of Knowledge skills, and 1 rank in a Knowledge skill that isn't a career skill.

It's a benefit that looks impressive, but as folks have said unless you invest XP into it the beneft really does nothing. A free boost die or upgrade to any Knowledge check? That benefits someone who invests nothing into Knowledge Skills.

The way it's written s eems balanced to me. I'll have a Cerean in my playtest group starting on Tuesday. I'll see if it's something that even comes up and report back.

Their XP is already knocked down, so I think it seems fair enough - although it is a question of whether the upgrade should apply to all knowledge skills or a selection.

Going to Duros way might also work. Or an alternate route, but similar, that they get an automatic success instead of advantage, which could of course give a huge boost in some cases, but the benefit can still be cancelled. It's perhaps more powerful, so ... maybe not.

I think it's something that will affect long term play more than short term play, so whether or not it will have a great impact remains to be seen, and probably not in a lot of games. Still, it's not so much issue of it over powering the character, it's just a bit much I think, adding that many skills to the career skill list from the get go... I'd rather give them a bonus, be it to all skills or a selection, that benefits any representative of the species, whether or not they have invested XP in ranks. It represents the processing bit on a better level I think, but then again that's from my perspective. I see that the career skill way follows a similar reasoning, but I just don't agree with it... I guess.

DarthGM is correct in that It's balanced, but I do agree with the others that it's not very exciting unless you're going to be playing a character that plans on buying a couple of ranks in each Knowledge skill.

I do like the idea of providing a free upgrade to the check; it's the equivalent of a free rank in every Knowledge skill. But that's also a lot more powerful than the current set-up, so they'd either need to take another hit to their starting XP, or lose some other benefit (such as the increased Strain Threshold) to balance it out.

I like the idea of generating an automatic Success on all Knowledge checks. How do you think that compares to either upgrading all Knowledge checks, or making all Knowledges class skills?

It would be nice if the Mirialans also got something, anything , to make them a little more interesting.

Another notion is that instead of a free upgrade or success on Knowledge checks, Cereans instead gain an automatic Advantage much as the Duros do on Astrogation checks.

The free Advantage allows them to recall/learn additional bits of information related to the main topic, sort of an "oh, and another thing..." type of deal.

And it'd still be fairly well balanced.

25xp is still not that much.

I feel very fortunate that, at my table, players don't seem to mind spending XP on skills that aren't career skills. Sometimes they just want points in a skill that's not a career skill.

I feel very often, reading these forums, that people treat "non-career skills" as skills that they would never purchase. They talk about "having access to" skills by making them career skills, have endless discussions about which career skills should be granted to which specializations, and so on.

But really, it's an extra 5xp. It's not going to break the bank to spend a few more points on a skill and not cry about it.

Someone could totally build a "knowledge-monster" out of a Cerean character. That's awesome, I would love to see that. Those points in knowledge skills are also skills they're not spending on other stuff. That focuses the character, it's not game-breaking.

But really, it's an extra 5xp. It's not going to break the bank to spend a few more points on a skill and not cry about it.

If you're running a short campaign or are stingy with the EXPs... then yeah, the Players will probably get overly focused on costs (and will probably be pretty damned streamlined).

If the EXPs flow like water... then no they shouldn't get so "Career" focused. But that is the way the game is designed, so it's kinda to be expected.

Unfortunately, progressions...

Haters gonna hate.

Players gonna play.

Min-maxers gonna min-max.

Another notion is that instead of a free upgrade or success on Knowledge checks, Cereans instead gain an automatic Advantage much as the Duros do on Astrogation checks.

The free Advantage allows them to recall/learn additional bits of information related to the main topic, sort of an "oh, and another thing..." type of deal.

And it'd still be fairly well balanced.

I like this one, and had been thinking the same thing.

Another notion is that instead of a free upgrade or success on Knowledge checks, Cereans instead gain an automatic Advantage much as the Duros do on Astrogation checks.

The free Advantage allows them to recall/learn additional bits of information related to the main topic, sort of an "oh, and another thing..." type of deal.

And it'd still be fairly well balanced.

The books describe spending an advantage on knowledge checks allowing you to gain "extra trivial information about a subject." That sounds a little weak to me. If you want to go this route, I think you'd want to at least give automatic success(es).

Edit: Interesting, I've found an inconsistency. In Edge of the Empire, it says "trivial information". In Age of Rebellion (even though it has a typo / word omission) and F&D they word it a little differently as "spent to learn minor but possibly useful information about the subject". That may not seem like a huge distinction, but to me it seems at least written a little more positively.

Personally, I still think these sound kind of weak. I think I'm okay with the RAW as it is. Or if the consensus becomes that it's really too overboard, maybe Cerean can choose ~2-3 knowledges as extra career skills at creation. Depending on what their career/specializations are, that might put them at or close to having all knowledges as career skills anyhow, but only if they choose pretty 'knowledgeable' careers/specializations. You can add your own additional knowledge skills, but by the books I believe there are only 7*. (*That's including Knowledge: Warfare from Age of Rebellion.)

Unfortunately, progressions...

Haters gonna hate.

Players gonna play.

Min-maxers gonna min-max.

I'm just gonna shake it off.