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My gaming group currently has 5 players. Of these, 2 are using EotE characters. The other 3 are force users, using F&D characters. One of the force users also has a small obligation, selected at chargen.

We are having an issue with morality and some of the players (the force users) have asked me to do something about it.

Before i explain the situation, note that i'm playing a "good" campaign, even if the some of the heroes are scoundrels, it is supposed to be about a party of "good guys" as we agreed before the game.

As such, i'm using morality for force users and we agreed on retiring characters at 0 morality, with the character that "falls" responsible to DM (or co-DM) a session or two depicting his downfall.

One of the EotE character is always making morality choices that affect everyone else, especially the F&D characters, and the characters are not ok with it, especially since they are gaining conflict for "knowing inaction", or they always have to argue with him not to make him do things (which he does anyway once everyone else is not looking), and are accruing additional obligations for his bad choices.

What should i do? I'd like to tell the EotE guys not to dabble too much in moral choices when they have no consequences, but let the F&D guys have the last word on how to behave, while also telling the F&D guys that obligations and how to settle or acquire them should be up to the EotE guys.

However that seems heavy handed and i cannot really see how it's fair that you dont get to make moral choices if you are using EotE characters.

The other possible solution would be to apply morality to the problematic EotE player, too.

However, i can't see how using "anger" or "knowing inaction" (or some of the other entries) would give conflict to a non-force user.

What would you guys do?

How does your group work together? Are they are shipcrew with a (rigid) chain of command?

Or a more democratic party that votes on things?

Even if you have a c-o-c your captain can't continue to decide things the other 3 don't agree on or risk a mutiny or them walking of the ship. In case of a democratic party they simply win by voting.

Suggest to your players to establish a voting process.

Or, excuse the choice of words, grow a pair and stand up to the player making these decisions for them.

I simply wouldn't put the Edge guys obligation on the party.

If he does it when they aren't looking, they shouldn't carry the weight for it. Or at least give them 1/3 to 1/2 of what he gets.

And remind Edge guy, they agreed to be Good Guys. He really sounds like he isn't.

The Force guys are paying the price of hanging around a Bad dude. Make them own that choice.

Knowing inaction is kinda tricky. I'd imagine that should apply when the character knows something is happening WHILE it happens. If the naughty PC is doing icky stuff that the F&D characters don't know about until after the fact, then they're not actually indifferent. They're ignorant.

The movies show this. Qui Gon doesn't do anything about the existing slavery he encounters. It isn't because he's indifferent. I'd have to imagine ALL Jedi were aware of the slavery in Hutt Space. They weren't waking up to building Conflict because they didn't rush off on a crusade to end it.

But that shouldn't be a loophole for F&D characters to avoid Conflict. If their players are having their characters go into another room to avoid knowing that the naughty PC is going to torture a prisoner, they deserve a full set of noogies... delivered by my big brother.

If the naughty PC keeps it up, the F&D characters may decide, at some point, he's choosing his own fate and, I guess, leave him to it should he get himself in trouble. That'd be a pretty extreme thing. Hopefully the naughty PC gets the point if it is explained to him before it comes to that.

If you allow mix game with scoundrel and Force user, you need to do concessions. You cannot constantly punish the Force user player because you allow his friend to play a criminal. So forget about knowing inaction and keep the conflict for when the force user do reprehensible actions and take bad decision.

This sounds like the classic 'Paladin trap' from D&D where if the party has even one Paladin, the morality of the party must match the morality of the Paladin.

If everyone agreed to follow the same morality at the beginning of the campaign, pull the EotE guy aside and tell him that he has to follow the wishes of the rest of the party and knock it off. Otherwise he'll have to roll a new character that doesn't do that kind of stuff. If, on the other hand, he's willing to only do that stuff when the other party isn't looking or aware, then don't penalize the rest of the party for their actions too much. With that said, they should get some kind of penalty for association if they know he's doing this stuff.

Consider White Collar where Burke still gets passed up for promotion and feels his morality slipping simply by associating with Caffrey and his ilk. Someone can't be completely upstanding if they associate with those who everyone knows are up to no good -- even if no one can prove it.

Unless the EotE PCs are doing some seriously heinous stuff (acts that would generate 6 or more Conflict), then the Force users wouldn't earn any Conflict themselves.

I'd suggest that the Force users need to take a more pro-active role in keeping the more bloodthirsty PCs in check, but at the same token the Force users shouldn't be punished for something they were unaware of, such as not finding out the Belkar of the group murdered a couple of innocent street urchins while off on his own until days after the fact. Since the Force uses weren't there and thus had no means to stop that action, they shouldn't be dinged with Conflict.

Hopefully the players of the EotE PCs are open to suggestions from the Force users that maybe they need to tone down the violence, or at least not resort to violence as the first and only option.

I think you have to decide which 'flavor' of the Star Wars setting the game is primarily taking place in. If it's primarily an Edge game, then I'd be a lot more lenient with Conflict as a concession to that tone (unless the inexorable slide toward darkness is something you want to play up).

I'd also maybe consider adjudicating Morality behind the screen and tracking it privately so that it becomes less of an issue in round-to-round play, but still can produce consequences when needed.

You could also begin tracking Morality on the EotE characters, if you're not already doing so. Once they drop down to 30 or less and start flipping Destiny points to Dark at the start of each adventure they might consider their actions a little more carefully.

Are the players PLANNING on going to zero Morality? In my experience that's hard to do, unless you're trying very specifically to do it.

But generally, I'd just talk to the offending player OOC as well as IC. At a certain point, a group of moral characters just wouldn't hang around with somebody deliberately doing evil and vicious things all the time.

I highly recommend having all characters use Morality if any do. Non-Force Users won't be drawing on Dark Side pips, so they have a bit more "wiggle room" in terms of Conflict for questionable activities. It also can help them realize how they've been acting over the course of several sessions, if their Morality keeps rising or dropping.

Most importantly, since you've instituted a mechanism for character "falls", it's only fair that all of the players be subject to it (especially since some of the F&D characters have Obligation). There's plenty of potential for evil without a direct connection to the Force, and having one character repeatedly betray the others in-game is a perfect example of it.

You could even work this into the story; with the trouble character eventually betraying the group and being "retired", but only do this if all of the players agree to it!

Also if the Force users are knowingly doing nothing to stop the edge character...well yeah they should get conflict because they should be stepping in and at least trying to stop them. They also need to act.

If he's in character and it isn't too over the top, I wouldn't put his issues on the Force users. As long as they're serving the greater good and he isn't committing a string of violent atrocities, it's not an issue.

If he isn't really playing to his character and is just doing it to be a pain to the Force users, tell him to knock it off.

I'd suggest using Morality for non-Force users to track their reputation. Sure, they can do bad stuff. But other folks on the fringe are going to find out about some of it, and that poor morality/reputation is going to influence some interactions and perhaps draw some attention.

Thanks for all your inputs.

The party is "democratic", but not voting on issues. Everybody roleplays what their character would do, including the offending player.

Conflict for knowing inaction is not that bad of an issue. Nobody really feels bad for getting a couple conflict that way. It's just they need to consistently "police" the offending player and the session ends up revolving around him. It's also not in character for them to let him do whatever he wants, and it's also usually common sense to stop him.

The offending player is just trying to roleplay his character. He just has a weird character and he ends up killing, disfiguring or torturing people as soon as he gets the chance to. And of course, the other players (not characters) cannot really abandon him, it's not very polite to do so. They also don't want to play that kind of game where he either disrupts everyone, or the session is about the characters trying to stop/save him all the time or face the consequences of his actions.

And since they hang out together, they end up getting (group) obligation as they get caught supporting someone doing horrible things.

For example, he decided to attack an imperial officer in an hospital. The players had to intervene, and stunned the officer before he could call for reinforcements, then they dragged him out of the hospital. The other players wanted to just abandon him somewhere to fake a robbery, but the offending player then decided to kill him because he had seen them. Now the robbery became murder.

Then, he decided he wanted to remove his teeth and generally make him unrecognizable.

And all of them were caught on cameras in the hospital, so they are now a band of murderers for the law. Best to leave the planet and never come back.

I'll try and talk to him and try to convince him to stop; if it doesnt work, i'll add morality to his character, and see if that works.

That sounds quite extreme behaviour that you're describing. I think, since it's become an issue for your group, you need to take the player aside and be firm with him. Don't try to fix this level of acting out with in-game penalties, tell him that you all agreed to play "good guys", and robbing, murdering and disfiguring a hospital patient is very far away from that. He needs to radically change his character concept, or roll up a new character.

Seriously, somebody who's willing to cause that level of disruption in a party who is forced, in character and out of character, to restrain him, is beyond rude. He may not be willing to reign it in at first, but that is why I say you should be firm with him. It sounds like he is negatively affecting everyone else's experience, and needs to be taken in hand and reminded to be more considerate if he wants to play with other people.

If this level of action is in character then he made a character that does not fit the group.

I think he is just pushing everyone's buttons. Speak with him, he is doing this to be awkward and is balently going against what was established at rule zero. There is no excuse for under table asshattery of "don't matter what you say, I will do it anyway." I have one character that does that, as a result the party collectivelylost interest in any backstory he had and nearly killed him when he attempted to screw the party over.

Tell him to knock it off and to stop being a bellend, for a lack of better terminology.

Now don't get me wrong, cohesion based checks in a confined environment are worth it occasionally, but to the extent that people have to continually watch his character isn't fair. The majority of conflict should result from hard, but interesting situations.

Perhaps the Force Users should just accept 6 more conflict and put him in the airlock. Assuming that killing a mass murderer is actually worth 6 conflict.

I have to wonder about the mindset of a player who makes a character that has a trait of wanting to kill and maim everyone, when you explicitly said you were playing a good guy campaign.

One of my players had a character that started out good, but greed got the better of them (IC and OOC) so started cutting people open to get organs for the black market. A freaking HUGE obligation of both Criminal and Bounty with CorSec soon put a stop to that. They hit 100 total group obligation and couldn't spend XP, which no player wants to happen. Problem solved.

I suggest something similar, or a forced retirement of what is a deliberately broken character designed to screw the party over.

I have to wonder about the mindset of a player who makes a character that has a trait of wanting to kill and maim everyone, when you explicitly said you were playing a good guy campaign.

One of my players had a character that started out good, but greed got the better of them (IC and OOC) so started cutting people open to get organs for the black market. A freaking HUGE obligation of both Criminal and Bounty with CorSec soon put a stop to that. They hit 100 total group obligation and couldn't spend XP, which no player wants to happen. Problem solved.

I suggest something similar, or a forced retirement of what is a deliberately broken character designed to screw the party over.

Yeah, group obligation is now at 70 and going up. I warned them about not being able to spend XP.

The players got upset and they are probably going to talk to the offending player themselves. I'll see what happens after i show the new obligation table and we have a group talk to see if we can reign in the bad behavior