I actually understand why they created the Vong. The Empire-as-antagonist shtick had grown very stale, and they wanted new enemies that would feel different and fresh.

Unfortunately, they felt too different, like they'd stumbled out of Star Trek or some really bad anime. It didn't help that the 'emo kid S&M faction' was supposed to be just a part of the race, but someone made an error and made it the entire species.

Then the whole 'immune to the Force' thing just felt like they were a broken answer to the corner that the writers had painted themselves into by making the Jedi into unstoppable ninja supeheroes who needed overkill gimmicks to challenge them.

I don't feel they were intrinsically a bad idea, but they were poorly handled.

And as the focus of the FFG games is supposed to be the original movies, I think there's pretty much zero chance of this game including them.

So after seeing this thread and talking with one of my friends I read up on the Vong. I wanted to keep an open mind but after reading every single sentence of wookiepedia I think the vong should stay banished to the Legacy zone and never return to star wars.

Baring the notion of "them against everyone else" like you already get with the empire, and various other factions it is their wishy washy nature.

They are anti tech but work with Boba Fett. They ally with Hutts, which profit on technology and they even are manipulated by the Sith.

So why is it "Star Wars"-like to have a creature that is basicly the Tleilaxu from the Dune book series mixed with the Klingons.

They even stole the Living Ships idea from various sources. Oh, and lets make them Hellraiser like and make them a race of masochists. Yes this is what I want in a game that kids (of all ages) can play.

I will just a big old nope to the Vong and hope they stay the heck away from good games.

I agree with Maelora's post about the vong.

I don't think they will show up again.

However, I have thought about HOW to use an vong.

One: keep as much of what makes the vong.

The caveat, dial them back from 11. As Maelora noted, there was a mix up with the vong about one faction of vong being pain "aesthetes". Keep this - an issue of much fiction is to have alien races entirely composed of a particular trait. I understand the reasons fiction writers do that, but in reality no one would ever allow a bothan anywhere.

The organic tech can stay, it defines them, but as with other things it is not as overthetop special as it was in the books. It isn't better or worse, just different. Stat wise, give them equivalents to existing gear, where possible - no hardpoints , and a few unique weapons (amphistaff), which are just multi use/function weapons.

Two: reign them in from being a galactic threat. I would put them versus the chiss. It is implied they knew about the vong anyway, as I remember. Give the chiss access to a resource the empire wants (thorilride, phrik, etc) and have the chiss make a deal for military might to help combat the vong.

Three: the force, or lack there of. Non issue if the above is followed. Just state, like toydarians, that they can't be sensed in the force. Maybe too many living things in/on the vong to differentiate them as a sapient being. The Jedi will few and far between, as are Sith/dark force users, so a rebellion era game will not have as much focus (at least barring a farce and destiny game)

Four: use them sparringly, and possiblh incorporate them to the galaxy as a rare species, but not outside the galaxy. An uncounter with vong scouts capturing live creatures to mutate isn't too far fetched.

Five: as touched on above, use them as both allies and villians with a diverse culture and less as a 'ermagerhd aliens' galaxy spanning threat. Or, make them have no ftl travel and very slowly tyrranid-ing up the galaxy.

One of the annoying things about their weapon tech is it seems like every author had a different idea of the effects of their plasma cannons at times.

In Vector Prime the Coralskippers had to strip the shields of the Dozen and Two because the Plasma cannons weren't doing enough damage to the shields to punch through them. In some sources the Plasma cannons seem to be similar to Lasers if not higher in damage output. And some other book says that once a target is hit the plasma just continues doing damage until it burns through the shields, hull, or both. The last one makes no sense IMO. If it hits the hull I could see that happening but how would the plasma grip the shields to stay on them?

One of the annoying things about their weapon tech is it seems like every author had a different idea of the effects of their plasma cannons at times.

I think that was a common problem with a majority of the concept. As Melora stated, it was implemented poorly. There should have been better oversight and editing to keep everything cohesive. There were good and terrible aspects from what I gather, as I never read much of it. Didn't even finish Vector Prime it was so boring. Most of what I've gathered is from articles and information books (Books on warfare, species, etc.). The only thing with Vong I've actually red is the Dark Horse Legacy series.

Yuuzhan Vong Warriors (Minions)

Brawn: 3
Agility :3
Intellect: 2
Cunning: 2
Willpower: 2
Presence: 1

Soak Value: 5
Wound Threshold: 6
M/R Defense: 0/0

Skills (group only): Athletics, Discipline, Intimiation, Melee, Ranged (Light).
Talents: None.
Abilities: Cut off from the Force [Can not be affected by mind-altering Force powers].
Equipment: Amphistaff ( Staff form --Melee; Damage 6; Critical 5; Engaged; Cortosis [All forms], Knockdown, Linked 1; Spear form --Melee; Damage 6; Critical 3; Engaged; Disorient 2, Pierce 2; Whip form --Melee; Damage 3; Critical 5; Short; Disorient 1, Entangled 1, Pierce 2; Spit Venom --Ranged [Light]; Damage 0; Critical n/a; Medium; Disorient 3, Limited Ammo 1, Stun 5), crab armour (+2 soak).

I actually enjoyed the NJO series of novels. I think they were a game changer for what had become a stale book license at the time. Before people were complaining about the Vong, they were complaining about the super weapon of the week syndrome. At least the Vong were something different.

That said, I wouldn't expect to see anything NJO related in this game line for a long, long time.

1.) I don't remember any books where the Vong fought the Rebel Alliance. They aren't a significant part of the lore during this era.

2.) They are wildly divisive and on the whole unpopular with fans.

3.) They are almost certainly not canon anymore, as JJ Abrams is probably going to take that era post ROTJ in a radically different direction.

However, I cut my teeth writing RPG material at Fandom Comics, where we did the Star Wars Saga Edition Clone Wars Fan Sourcebook. An NJO fan sourcebook seems like it'd be a very worthy enterprise for someone in the community to put together. I'd wanna see that.

What makes you think they are unpopular with most of the fans? From what I remember most fans liked NJO it was the stuff set in the immediate aftermath of the Vong war that they hated.

I am one of the ones that liked new jedi order and hated the stuff that came after, as are most of my friends.

I didn't hate the first half of Legacy of the Force really, though there were some parts in the early books like one character pressing charges against another for ignoring an order that character ha had absolutely no authority to give and the charges sticking.and many characters becoming whiny hypocrites.Still it didn't get really bad until midway through Sacrifice IMO, and the last page or two of the series was utterly insane.

Fate of the Jedi depended on the average galactic citizen being a brain dead idiot, plus was stuck with showing evens after the madness of the Legacy of the Force Ending. Then for even more fun some of the writers seemed obessed with sabotaging the future of the Star Wars galaxy shown in the Legacy Comics. At the end of Legacy of the Force it was pretty clear how the few events that we knew happened between 41 ABY and the late 120s ABY ocurred for anyone that needed explanation but Fate of the Jedi gummed up the works one way then undid thatprobelm only to throw in a new one seemingly just to make figuring out how we got from point A: Legacy of the Force to point B: Legacy comics more complicated.

Mercy Kill wasn't a bad book but was a major disappointment to me because I feel it shouldn't have been labeled as an X-Wing novel. I was expecting something like Iron Fist. The Wraith's infiltrating the enemy while doing lots of flying around in starfighters and capturing or blowing stuff up.

Crucible wasn't tat bad either really except that it continued one of the plot points I really hated from the end of Fate of the Jedi and seemed to say there was no turning back from that point.

I am not a fan of the Vong. I thought that the worst part of the series was how they killed chewie and replaced him with a rynn. Vong were blah, not consistent in their power level, and seriously killing anakin solo. And later Jacen solo turned sith. Seriously Vong started (ok continued) a downward spiral. They could have been OK but after crystal star, and dark empire, I found the Vong to be the third worst thing to happen to star wars (worse than Jar Jar because there was only one of him)

Jacen didn't turn Sith until well after NJO was over.

The writers didn't want to kill Anakin Solo. They wanted to kill Jacen Solo but George Lucas stepped in and forced them to kill Anakin instead.because Lucas was worried that people would get Anakin Skywalker and Anakin Solo mixed up somehow.

And of the main seven (C-3P0, Chewie, Han, Lando Leia, Luke and R2-D2) I feel that Chewie was the most expendable by far so when they decided one need to die they killed the right one. Oh and the Rynn was only around for two books.

I'll take the Yuuzhan Vong over Darth Caedus any day. Once the Star Wars novels went to Del Rey, it was pretty obvious they had a "Go Big or Go Home" mentality, and they wanted to do something to shake up the galaxy that wasn't a superweapon of the week or a self-destructive wannabe Sith. Don't get me wrong, there are parts of the NJO that really bug me, but it was interesting enough to stay with until it was over. It had its share of inconsistencies, but at least it didn't

All I can say is I'm glad EotE made me interested in Star Wars again, because I finally had an excuse to take my old EU novels out of the attic. They're still a good read.

I actually quite like all of the NJO/Legacy books, and very much enjoyed the Vong.

Admittedly, I reckon the fact that the Jedi are the bit of Star Wars I like the least helped, because it meant they got culled for the most part, which is never a bad thing.

You liked the Legacy of the Force novels? The books that turned Leia and Han's only surviving son into a poor man's Palpatine then crammed his rise to power, the war to overthrow him, and his fall into 9 books and less then two years in setting?

Because disliking it objectively right? I liked it because I thought Jacen might have actually had a point, to a certain extent - that a galaxy as vastly populated by different races, cultures, etc, didn't work particularly well as a insanely large democracy, and that the choice was between different regions running themselves mostly in a loose alliance (which is what ends up happening once he was deposed) or a strong central government with a unifying figure to ensure peace.

I found it interesting, and it wasn't terribly written.

I am allowed my own individual opinion, right? If we all liked the same things, it'd soon get very dull.

I really liked the basic idea but feel that it needed more books and more time in setting to do it justice. Jacen's fall and his government takeover was IMO far too easy and should have taken a lot more setup time to pull off. I also feel that the war between the Confederation and Galactic Alliance became a sideshow after the Jedi turned against Jacen. And it didn't help that a third of the series was written by one of my least favorite Star Wars authors, and tat the authors Legacy of the Force books were three of the four worst they had written.

It took Palpatne an unknown amount of time, but probably years, to become chancellor once h entered politics. And once he was chancellor it took him more then a decade to gain the power needed to become a dictator. Jacen, with no political experience at all, manages to become head of state and turn the position into a dictatorship within less then two years. How does that make sense?

Well if you wanted to stat your own Vong I think a good spot to begin would be with 3 brawn and 1 presence and 1 in other stats. They would likely start with brawn+14 wounds and Will+12 strain. Thierry rating abilit makes them immune to force based attacks.

You would have to find analogs for their equipment, but many of their weapon qualities exist in game.

It took Palpatne an unknown amount of time, but probably years, to become chancellor once h entered politics. And once he was chancellor it took him more then a decade to gain the power needed to become a dictator. Jacen, with no political experience at all, manages to become head of state and turn the position into a dictatorship within less then two years. How does that make sense?

Hiyas!

Jedi mind trick?

L

MTFBWY

A

It took Palpatne an unknown amount of time, but probably years, to become chancellor once h entered politics. And once he was chancellor it took him more then a decade to gain the power needed to become a dictator. Jacen, with no political experience at all, manages to become head of state and turn the position into a dictatorship within less then two years. How does that make sense?

Hiyas!

Jedi mind trick?

L

MTFBWY

A

Way too many people involved for that to make sense IMO.

On 11/11/2014 at 9:39 AM, fatedtodie said:

wookiepedia

*Wookieepedia

7 minutes ago, Yaccarus said:

*Wookieepedia

So I've see you gotten bored correcting people's spelling (on a matter of no importance, and which is confusing no-one) and started to use the search function to necro threads, not to add nothing of value, but to correct someone who hasn't even been on the boards in over 3 years. I just have to ask...

...

Why? Are you THAT bored? Or just a fan of unbelievably compulsive orthography?

I was on this thread because I was statting Yuuzhan Vong and looking to see if anybody else had done anything with them.

Over four years ago someone forgot an "E"!!!! 😱

Almost made it to canon.