So, I recently picked up the beginner adventure for Age of Rebellion (Slightly different system I know, but bear with me). Did a test run with a group that I play with, all relatively experienced RP'rs, just to see if we liked the system. We found it enjoyable, so I'm in the process of picking up source books and the like to start up our game.

Now, I've done a little bit of reading, and I'm really liking the sound starting with edge of the empire and then transitioning to age of rebellion when the PC's actions invariably piss off the empire. I don't want to man-handle the campaign in that direction, but I would like to encourage it, as it makes for great narrative. It also helps that EoE currently has more material to play with, and I'd love to see a few more releases for AoR before getting into that.

Now, here's where I need a little advice.

1. Is my above idea practical? Just wondering if others here have experience doing that. My only worry would be if the power creep gets excessive, that by the time they become rebels, they blow apart anything that comes their way since they have access to who knows how many specialties at that point. And how does the transition from obligation to duty work out?

2. Any recommendations on a starting point? I'd like to use sourcebook adventures to get a feel of the system first before using my own content. I know there are 3 pre-mades, 2 based off the beginner set and the one downloadable one (black sun something), but these are also designed for the pre-made characters included. Would it be better to just start from the back of the core rulebook instead of messing around with those?

3. For those who have run the system for a while now...are there any pitfalls or mistakes that are easy to make that I should really work to avoid? I've cottoned on to the fact that dice advantage is huge, and that positive/negative dice will often cancel each other out on a one-for-one basis. So going overboard with difficulty dice will lead to TPK. Anything else I should really know?

Thanks for any advice

My current campaign was designed to transition from an EotE to an Age of Rebellion game. We're near the halfway point and I was planning on introducing some Rebellion story hooks when one of my players thought it might be neat to have Rebel sympathies. So this will be accelerated a bit.

In answer to your questions:

1. Don't introduce conflicts that a starting AoR PC would face. If your players' characters are seasoned fringers, they need to be facing difficult missions as Rebels. In regard to Obligation... it doesn't disappear just because they joined the Rebellion. My PCs will need to balance both until their Obligations are worked out in play.

2. I'd recommend one of the two pre-made adventures, Beyond the Rim or The Jewel of Yavin . Neither will blow your socks off as stories but they use all of the types of skill checks that a group of players may encounter which gives everyone something to do.

3. High difficulty dice pools rarely lead to TPKs. Characters get hurt and knocked out easy, but it's hard to get killed. As I'm now running my second campaign, my advice would be... don't be afraid to hurt the players. If they roll a bunch of Disadvantage, hit them with an equivalent amount of strain, have them fall over... anything that slows them down but doesn't kill them is good. Don't let them simply pass blue dice around with Advantages. Don't be afraid to burn Dark Side tokens to upgrade difficulties.

1. My players are mostly EotE but the bleeding heart Jedi exile in the party does mean they might end up in the thick of the civil war at some point. I have what once was a cameo player has now become a recurring player as a Rebel Saboteur, Rakine Bokete . When our friend is in town they sometimes do a mission with a rebel theme. If not, she still enters by walking away from an explosion because Yes. It is a gradual change though. They might do a smuggling run of supplies for a rebel base or be dragged by Rakine into the middle of a mission vs. the Empire that's gone south, but they won't be front line soldiers vs. the Death Star.

2. Jewel of Yavin is defintely a big yes from me. I actually have only run part of it, and the players went on a tangent. I'm eager to return and continue, or port it to another location (though Bespin is so unique). It is very worthwhile if you have players with sneaking and face focus instead of combat. What I tend to do is package my own content with some of the little pre-made adventures. What ultimately happens is that meaningless NPCs from pre-made adventures end up becoming more important to the plot in my campaign because of the way the player base responds to them. Take your protagonists to the Corellia system - Suns of Fortune has oodles of fun short pre-fabs that you can fit into the middle of your own content or sandwich two around a cool idea of yours that you hadn't time to flesh o ut. The GM's kit also has a droid mission I'll be running in July, and there are missions in many of the books. Lords of Nal Hutta is another that I'll be using heavily once they get to Hutt space to collect the holy grail of a ship they've been working towards paying debt off of.

3.What I mentioned above was probably the hardest thing for me to learn. I'm a new GM and so I found it daunting to try to piece together an entire campaign. Splicing in prefab missions really takes the pressure off so I can make what content I do create as high quality as possible. I also get a kick out of turning a nothing NPC into a recurring antagonist or ally, and killing the latter to make them have feels. Also - destiny points. I was nervous to flip a dark side point against my party because I didn't want it to seem confrontational. Then I adjusted my thinking - if I flip a dark side point, they get to use a light side point on another check. Use them often.

Thanks for the advice thus far.

Any opinions on the adventure at the back of the core rulebook?

3) Practice interpreting dice. Just sit down perhaps alone, perhaps with another player. Run a simple poinltess scenario with the whole idea to try and figure out how to translate the results into effects, into the narrative. It's not hard, but it takes practice to get good. Especially those Triumphant Despairs.

Learn vehicle combat. It's not a bad system, in fact it's really good in that it moves quick and reasonably smooth, generating a very cinematic narrative without getting bogged down. But... it doesn't work the way a lot of people expect it to work based on other games and systems. Learning things like how facing doesn't matter except when it does can be hard for some people to adjust to when other games track that kind of thing very closely (and usually end up with vehicle encounters that take forever).

Wow actually I haven't done that. Trouble Brewing seems like a lot of content. I'll put it on my list of prefabs to try.

1. Keep xp rewards tame an you'll avoid OP issues. Also have a multitude of different skill checks every session which will force the group cross spec.

2. No good or bad starting points I don't find.

3. Even if you don't use all the premade content, reviewing it can give you a feel for appropriate difficulties and alternative dice result interpretation.

Thanks for the advice thus far.

Any opinions on the adventure at the back of the core rulebook?

It's short. You can get through it in an evening.