SO I ran my game for the first time on the 28th. I let my players make their characters and drop into the beginner game scenario. I had one doctor, marauder, scoundrel and an assassin. 2 dps a tank and healer basically. Which is fine. They all had a blast playing but...

When it came to the flight battle chapter the tie fighters wrecked them...HARD. My fiancé had taken up the pilot position and the 3 options for piloting were just NOT going to cut it. I was definitely ok with players using the core book for any and all ideas for the beginner game as they all have played RPGs before. But without my girl using angle deflector shields the beginner game may have ended up a one shot game.

I was rolling TO GOOD for the tie fighters. They looked on in dismay when every roll was a hit. I looked at the stats and saw twin linked and told them tie fighters hit again for the same damage BUT seems a bit OP with the damage I had already dealt them. So I told them the actual rule and I'll just be going with the single HIT for just the beginner game.

STILL not enough. They looked on in dismay as their hull trauma went down and down and down into the zero. I said don't worry-- good time to look over ship critical results. Low roll which made the pilot have to regain control of ship to perform a maneuver-- she easily did. A triumph was rolled on a gunnery hit and they slowly killed the tie fighters with a few misses from me.

Their ship? Sitting on one hull trauma (since the beginner game lets you repair both strain and trauma-- core says just strain). It was a great dramatic scene but their ship is literally being held together by a few duct tapped wires and rusty bolts.

Imagine if the twin linked rules were applied? They would have had stacks of crits coming their way! Has anyone else had this experience? Has anyone had the same results or worse? Is this how it's supposed to happen?

The pilot was literally doubling up on evasive maneuvers and every advantage they used they threw setback on me. Eventually it slowed my rolls but...it was painful and I was getting nervous for them. I wouldn't have let them die but still...

Also I'm new to the game and I was sort of not really getting how performing a task on ship and getting threat effected strain. If someone pilots and has to roll does that threat hurt them or the ship? If they strain for extra maneuver per rule is that effecting them or the ship? If someone guns and se result-- is that straining the ship or the gunner? How about the engineer who makes the mechanic roll to keep the ship from straining-- if he rolls to heal the ship of strain and rolls more threat and no success does he cause MORE strain to the ship or himself? If they roll advantage they heal strain off themselves but not the ship ( or use for boost or setback etc) it got a little weird and gray in some calls but most of the time they used advantage for setback or boost since those Ties were rocking them so hard.

This seems to happen a lot with the beginner box, first time I ran it the party ended up with one HP left as well. Second time was a lot easier. The Linked rules are pretty lethal, I agree. So it's nothing to do with how you ran it, many people have had this experience.

For your strain question, PC rolls that result in threat is applied to the PCs strain, not the ship. The only time you apply it to the ship is when performing and extra maneuver or using maneuvers like Punch It.

Ah ok thanks for the strain question. It's sorta vague in the little blurb in the starship section. It says a PC making an action involving the ship will strain the ship with threat. So it confused me because shooting a cannon and repairing ship is interacting with the ship. So mainly the strain is coming from maneuvers or piloting actions? Because under the table of how to use strain in starship and vehicle combat the chart states under the options that the ship suffers strain--- does that mean if I choose, being GM, I can have either the player or ship take strain, when it makes sense?

ALSO one more thing: in the beginner game it states crits against NPCs just defeat them. I do not see this in the core book. Was it just for the beginner game? If it is-- do most GMs find it easier to just have rando trash mobs get one shotted by crits?

Thanks for the help--- glad to see that the ship combat is just that dangerous. It makes a bit more sense since the weapons are that much more lethal. I should have pointed out the additional ship actions to the players-- they might have wanted to use boost shields as well-- it's totally worth it.

Because under the table of how to use strain in starship and vehicle combat the chart states under the options that the ship suffers strain--- does that mean if I choose, being GM, I can have either the player or ship take strain, when it makes sense?

I no longer have the beginner game handy, but just use whatever makes sense. If you had a mechanic trying to remove system strain, it wouldn't make sense to have any threat the dice produce go to system strain...kind of defeats the purpose. Makes more sense to apply it to the mechanic. Then again, if they fail and roll a Despair...

ALSO one more thing: in the beginner game it states crits against NPCs just defeat them. I do not see this in the core book. Was it just for the beginner game? If it is-- do most GMs find it easier to just have rando trash mobs get one shotted by crits?

It's somewhere in the core book as well. That's how I usually use it, one crit per minion. Had a situation once where there were four minions left and the shooter did 12 damage and got 9 advantage...enough to one-shot a minion and get three crits. In a normal situation (against PCs, Nemeses, or Rivals) the triple crit translates to one crit with +20 on the roll, but in this case since it was more epic I let the player take down all four.

Got the minion thing-- it's under minion in the back while it discusses minions and how they work.

I'm don't know about that system strain stuff though it still doesn't seem clear. Because if your manning the gun for instance and roll strain I'd assume since the threat chart states that threat is system strain that your pushing th controls and the guns to it limits as you fight ship to ship. I'd assume though if your on the ship not interacting with the ship than strain is in the PC... Like if boarded and fighting off pirates.

But the mechanic strain scenario threat could mean that he's trying to fix the ship but threat is like him pulling wrong wires and or wrong fuses etc.