All you GMs saying "oh, my players are too powerful!" - a pox on thee! Just for fun, after I plugged in my character into Oggdude's character generator, I thought I'd see how much more I had to go before I round out my character to "done" status?

765 more points. That's on top of the 375 points I've already earned. 1,260 points.

Assuming 15 points a game, that's another 51 weeks of playing. A whole year and I'll be getting close to finished (and I'll still have more room for stuff to do, like the Sig Abilities)

Looks like I'll have to put in some overtime on this. . . .

Yes! I have a team of three now, and they are around 700 XP total. They still fail average and hard skill checks, and still are not invincible in combat, and I can easily challenge them without crazy house rules that hurt their characters. Even the crazy Bounty Hunter Gadgeteer with his suped up armor, I can still easily chew away at his health with a few groups of minions. Especially now that the medic is dead, he will have to be even more careful in combat about getting into cover.

I feel this game is balanced and scales well. People that munchkin and power build is the problem with the game, not the system.

I feel this game is balanced and scales well. People that munchkin and power build is the problem with the game, not the system.

My secret? Out, not up. So far my princess has four trees to work on - plus whatever force I decide to work up (which probably wont be much past the Move power) - so there's 50 points right there, and that's before I even get around to feeding the trees themselves.

But even just one additional tree above and beyond the starting turns into quite the points sink.

I think the overpowered comments are generally meant to refer to the fact that most campiagns struggle to deal with a well cooradinated party. My party is in a millitry campiagn and typically has two heavy blaster rifles, a Blast Rifle expert, and a lightsaber/extreme range expert depending on loadout. Even so; I imagine most of those issues would be sorted quite handily.

Currently at 500 exp at most in this party; Campiagn going on for a year and some. I imagine without the autofire weapons; it would be fine. Just we play it too much like tradictional D20 dnd

Too true, Desslok. It's very easy to find many ways to sink XP without actually showing much for it, in building all sorts of concepts. I mean depending if it's an in career or out of career spec, or skill, it eats up that extra XP quickly.

If a character's becoming "too powerful" it shouldn't be a problem of the rules, so much as perhaps the players (and perhaps GM, we're all only human). If you're getting into the headspace of the character, and his/her reactions to the world around them, they're going to branch out as they find they need to do other things to fill gaps, or something found caught their eye to pursue. Be it weapon, holocron, what have you.

And if you're trying to be the best you can as one thing, while still being the back-up something else, it'll definitely split your xp usage.

(Phooeey, I love that word!)

To be honest, Desslok, I think this is a pretty easy system to 'game'... Droids, wookiees, marauders in any combination can get overpowered quickly, and I've actually made the heavy Battle Rifle 'restricted' because it's such a beast - that autofire is lethal.

The Force powers are potent too, but you need a LOT of XP for that, so at that point, characters should be pretty potent.

One thing that actually makes my players more honest is that I don't allow armour (because it's 'not Star Wars-y' ) Soak seems to be a very overpowered thing, so keeping that low keeps enemies effective.

I actually think you can build a 1000+ point character that is fairly weak (in combat terms) or a starting character that is overpowered.

I also think that your growing 'out' instead of 'up' is key to this - I try and keep characters just from maxing out their combat stats, with 32 skills there's a lot you can challenge them with.

I don't quite understand why people go on about "overpowered" this and that. Anything a player can build, the GM can build too - only he can build more of them. You have a 12-soak player in the group? I have an NPC with a Jury-Rigged, Superior Disruptor that crits on a single Advantage, and the guy has 4-5 ranks in Lethal Blows on top of that. The phrase "Do you feel lucky, punk?" springs to mind.

If a combat monster is outpacing the rest of the group in fights, have them run into mixed groups of NPCs. Have a seriously badass rival or two for the combat monster, some tough rivals for the more combat-oriented players and a few minions for the ones who aren't huge on shooting things. Everyone gets to play with someone that poses a challenge to their character.

My players aren't too powerful. The highest point character in our group has 1800 XP and he's a "lethal tank" with some decked out goons too boot. Some of the other PCs in our group are a 1300 XP Smuggler who has a small fleet, and a 1600 XP Technician/Doctor/Jedi-in-Training with a decent droid entourage. That being said I made a 300 XP Wookiee Marauder with a tricked out VibroAx that could kill any one of those characters in a one on one fight but couldn't do much else to save his life.

Power in this game (and in life) is very situational.

It can be tricky to think outside of the trivial situations that make up the PCs surroundings to craft engaging encounters* for the group. This may be why many GMs complain about their groups PCs being too powerful.

*"engaging encounters" doesn't mean lethal combat challenges that are designed to disintegrate the PCs....

To back Lordbiscuit's comment, this past Friday myself and a couple other PCs were running a mission (we're part of the Rebel Alliance as a "odd jobs team") to swipe data from some corporate bigwig before he could hand it over to Sienar Fleet Systems and thus the Empire; something about improved energy efficiency on large-scale hyperdrives, particularly for capital ships (i.e. better gas mileage).

We took the GM completely by surprise on how we approached the heist, and our dice were pretty hot, although I generally squeaked by with a single success more than once. And we've only earned about 200 XP; we're a far cry from being "overpowered" (though our BH/Gadgeteer is certainly a beast in combat; even his fists can crunch a stormtrooper in one blow). The player for the social expert of the group was out sick, so his PC was generally reduced to "mission control" and the occasional bit of help on a skill check. And we pretty much aced the mission, getting now only the datacard we were initially after but several others which may well have useful info for the Alliance but leaving the corp exec and his security staff locked in their penthouse suite while we made a pretty clean getaway. And this was a mission that frankly only our Explorer/Fringer/Slicer was really suited for, yet we pulled it off.

So it's not always "how much XP have the PCs earned?" but "just how cunning/inventive are your players?" There was a comment in the old WEG supplement Galaxy Guide 9: Fragments from the Rim about how you knew your players were ready for Special Ops; you knew that the players were Special Ops material when they could do more damage to the Empire in one session with starting characters than most people could pull off in an entire story arc using the Heroes of Yavin.

Most the power creep comes from high skills or the odd combat specializations talent tree that generates critical, You could easily encourage broader development behavior from PC's by simply doubling the experience cost for training skills to ranks 3-5.

I love RPG Systems that give you a chance of developing your character in a way that does not upset the delicate balance between competence and hypercompetence. I had a Shadowrun character I made a point of growing "out". I hadn't even built it myself, so I spent my first points toward making it my own. That's when I discovered that while the character was perceived as "weaker" for not spending points towards rapid optimzation, he remained playable for a long time while the rest of the group had a pretty high turnover rate.

It only took the GM a glance at the character sheet and he had no problem with me playing that character. My buddies who were more into gaming the system ran into a brick wall sooner or later that forced them to retire their characters, usually after they discovered they had entered an arms race with the GM that was taking a big toll on the group as a whole. They usually restarted with another PC built for efficiency while I tried to remain in the sweet spot of lateral development. Needless to say, I gained a lot of innocuous, useful skills that my murderhobo friends never had: Parachuting, deep-sea diving, tons of knowledge skills. Good times.

I feel this game is balanced and scales well. People that munchkin and power build is the problem with the game, not the system.

It is somewhat resistant to min maxing by requiring a variety of skills from characters, but like most other systems its possible to create game breaking characters. This is the age old power gamer issue and is nothing new. However the system does nothing to prevent this kind of abuse, leaving it all to the GM.

Scaling is a problem though due to the fact that triumph does not cancel despair.

As die pools gain more proficiency dice the chances of throwing at least one triumph exceeds 1 in 3 (http://anydice.com/program/53af)

This means you get a huge number of Triumphs per game at high levels, even if you upgrade every check with challenge dice.

All of this may or may not be a problem though depending on your players and GM, which I think may have been the point you were making.

Personally I don't think a game *needs* to be balanced, it only needs to be perceived as fair by the players. Scaling can be a bit more tricky to handle.

Again I think the system is brilliant in the hands of a group who share the same goals and expectations for the game, but this doesn't mean that the problems don't exist.

Our groups haven't, for the most part, seen too much trouble with being overpowered.

Except 4RC-H3R.

There was a problem I was running into when GMing that campaign. This bloody battle droid would waltz into a room, boss the initiative check (someone had crazy cool and another had crazy vigilance) and proceed to autofire everyone in the room or field dead. I have never seen a character consistently generate so much advantage. These fights weren't a challenge after a few sessions.

I thought I would up the ante, I needed to give the other players some play time. So I added tougher and more things. That worked well. And then they failed an initiative check. Almost a TPK.

It had gotten to the point where this bloody droid required a bunch of bad guys to be a challenge, but failure to go first would guarantee a miserable time for everyone. Luckily the forums had the answer. I found someone suggest something called the "Rambo Rule". The character's autofire ability was then limited somewhat by his brawn characteristic: something he had totally neglected in favour of agility (he is a munchkin).

After that, fights weren't nearly as "save or die". Everyone was happier.

Our groups haven't, for the most part, seen too much trouble with being overpowered.

Except 4RC-H3R.

Cool Droid name, especially for a Battle Droid

Our groups haven't, for the most part, seen too much trouble with being overpowered.

Except 4RC-H3R.

Cool Droid name, especially for a Battle Droid

Everyone in our group is a huge fan of Archer.

One guy made a doctor droid named KR3-1G3R. Indeed, the Krieger-bot held a strange obsession for vivisection.

From my experience, power creep manifested itself in interesting ways. The mechanic that could fix or slice anything can be taken down by a single well-placed shot from a group of stormtroopers. The wookiee could sure bash in skulls but could barely order food at a computer terminal. The ewok pilot (don't get me started) could really bust a move, but was failed every fear check in the jungle.

From my experience, power creep manifested itself in interesting ways. The mechanic that could fix or slice anything can be taken down by a single well-placed shot from a group of stormtroopers. The wookiee could sure bash in skulls but could barely order food at a computer terminal. The ewok pilot (don't get me started) could really bust a move, but was failed every fear check in the jungle.

Well, I think that illustrates the point that a character that focuses on one particular task is going to be freaking awesome at that task in short order.

The Explorer/Fringer/Slicer PC in one of the games I'm in can pretty much crush most Computers checks, as he's got 4 skill ranks, Intellect 3, and quite a few helpful talents as well as a data breaker for 2 boost dice to his slicing checks. But that's mostly what he's good at, being a very sub-par combatant (Agility 2 and I don't think he's got any ranks in Ranged: Light) and only marginally good at being a space pilot (something the player has just started delving into for the character). Meanwhile, the Colonist/Doctor just recently dipped into Recruit and is starting to become pretty proficient with dual-wielding blaster pistols while also being a skilled surgeon and the face of the party. He's capable, but his success in those areas of endeavor are far from assured.

But then it's always been an issue with point-buy based systems, which FFG's Star Wars game ultimately is, as opposed to class/level based games. In a point-buy system, the players have a lot of freedom in how they progress, and many tend to focus pretty heavily on what their character's niche is in the group, be it combat, social interaction, or support.

But then it's always been an issue with point-buy based systems, which FFG's Star Wars game ultimately is, as opposed to class/level based games. In a point-buy system, the players have a lot of freedom in how they progress, and many tend to focus pretty heavily on what their character's niche is in the group, be it combat, social interaction, or support.

That't really the crux, isn't it? Enough rope to hang one's self.

I guess two ways to balance out a high-Xp game would be slowing down XP acquisition and increasing the importance of building in-game resources.

Even a 700xp character can get slammed by a few well-placed and rival-led minion groups, and starship combat is lethal enough to wipe whole parties if they are on the same ship. Making the game more about the player's collecting obligations from NPCs, rather than the other way around, is what I'd think the natural "end game state" of a EotE campaign. If a group can call in a Dreadnaught to rescue them from a Imperial crackdown of a planet, or attacking a mercenary stronghold with a smuggler alliance they've built over several weeks of adventures is argueably more satisfying than trying to earn XP to tactically handle every combat situation (although there is a appeal there, too).

The FFG system is flexible for "Scaling." Its often as easy as adding more minions, more rivals in a area, and making the enviornment more treacherous than a static room/hallway with some cover in it. A high level mercenary with a rotary cannon is murder against minion groups; its less effective if the minion group is supported by LAATs that will not only drop off troops routinely until the group leaves, but also uses ship-scale weapons on the area if the players loiter. If you really get desperate, always remember a Tie-Bomber with proton bombs can kill a entire party in one pass. It's the sci-fi equivalent of the ol' D&D addage of "Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies" for when the poor GM doesn't know what to do.

But then it's always been an issue with point-buy based systems, which FFG's Star Wars game ultimately is, as opposed to class/level based games. In a point-buy system, the players have a lot of freedom in how they progress, and many tend to focus pretty heavily on what their character's niche is in the group, be it combat, social interaction, or support.

That't really the crux, isn't it? Enough rope to hang one's self.

Yep.

See, I don't think a character can really be "broken" in this. Focused, yes, but not necessarily "broken."

I decided to run a test with my players to see how crazy focused they could get (and possibly get some villains/NPCs out of it) and gave them all 350 XP after character creation.

Even with all that, the "most powerful" setup went for picking up a second Talent Tree to get the extra ranks of Dedication to raise Presence to 5, and even then not every Presence-based skill was maxed due to all of the tree dancing. I think the best roll was 5Y3B, and even then he still had issues with "average" rolls or even lightly contested rolls (1R2P2B).

Right now, my players have about 150 XP each after chargen. The Corellian Pilot has been spending everything on Piloting (Space) and just hit rank 5, while having Agility 4 (saving up for Dedication next). What happened that game? He was blazing through a swarm of TIEs (counted as difficult terrain) and rolled a Despair and a Triumph (with one success remaining). The party doesn't plan on letting him live that one down.

After everything's said and done, it's a nice, open system with plenty going for it, and broken characters are just another way of saying "focused," as well as "unchallenged" or that the GM just wasn't prepared for how things escalated.

I was very pessimistic at first when I looked at how high dice pools could easily get, but the bell curve effect seems to be a lot more swingy than I had anticipated, and players are often (very) surprised at how often they fail rolls they thought would be cakewalks*.

But you really need to tone down the effect of Triumphs and Despairs from "OMFGBBQ!!1/EndOfTheWorld" to "great/dismal" if you are going for a sane game. Luckily, the suggested outcomes are a good indication.

*Which makes me crackle with glee.

Still have the record XDD (well my player, 2.430 XP)

Don't worry so much, unless some pools have 6 or more dices, the game still works. I really suggest to you, at that XP levels, and always if do you really wish that this game stills on a few years, use "cinematic XP & Advance" instead the usual one.

Instead give X Xp per session/campaign/adventure, agree with your players/GM a character upgrade and stablish prerequisites like "have this item or train X hours", then upgrade that skill/talent and add the corresponding XP just to contabilize it.