The Morality System and my suggested fix

By LeighPouse, in Star Wars: Edge of the Empire RPG

People keep referring to that, but Vader died. It's not indicative of "paragon" status, only some kind of redemption beyond the rules. He's effectively outside the boundaries of whatever Morality system there is. His score doesn't matter. Or to put it another way:

'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-SITH!!

I seem to recall reading that, in an earlier version of the script, Vader's decision to kill his boss (who, in that same script, he'd already been plotting to murder anyway) didn't fully redeem him; but did bounce him back enough that Ben was able to intervene at the moment of his death and keep his 'spirit' from being consumed by the dark side (or something like that).

To put it another way, I don't want to deal with "I saved the Lurmen village so that balances out me butchering a temple full of Jedi younglings" arguments.

In a nutshell, exactly why I don't like the Morality scale, it leads to that kind of thinking.

No it doesnt. If it does you are doing it wrong. You either did something that causes conglict or you dont. You cant balance deeds with othee deeds.

To put it another way, I don't want to deal with "I saved the Lurmen village so that balances out me butchering a temple full of Jedi younglings" arguments.

In a nutshell, exactly why I don't like the Morality scale, it leads to that kind of thinking.

Agreed. The way the system is now, you can butcher a temple full of Jedi younglings, get a lucky roll at the end of the session, and then just not do too much evil stuff for your next couple of sessions and as far as the Morality system is concerned you're back on the Light Side again. How is that better? I'd rather have a person redeem himself with good deeds than to just refrain from being quite so evil for a while.

No you cant. Butcherung younglings is murder which is 10 points of conflict each. So 40 conflict right there. Rolling a 10 would still have you dropping 30 motallity. Seemsnlike ypu guys are ignori.g the table of actions that cause conflict in the back of the book.

I was generalizing, the actual amount of Morality lost and its rate of renewal is irrelevant. The point is that the system is set up that Morality is lost through evil actions and regained through inaction, in the sense that you can't intentionally seek to make up for what you did but instead you have to avoid doing bad things in the future as such things come to you. There is no sense that doing good is helpful. That doesn't sit right for me. Some people object to the idea that doing good should make up for doing evil but that sure seems better than the character having no way to actively redeem themselves, all redemption is passive. That really doesn't seem right at all.

I was generalizing, the actual amount of Morality lost and its rate of renewal is irrelevant. The point is that the system is set up that Morality is lost through evil actions and regained through inaction, in the sense that you can't intentionally seek to make up for what you did but instead you have to avoid doing bad things in the future as such things come to you. There is no sense that doing good is helpful. That doesn't sit right for me. Some people object to the idea that doing good should make up for doing evil but that sure seems better than the character having no way to actively redeem themselves, all redemption is passive. That really doesn't seem right at all.

That's not how I read it. The way I read it Morality is gained by making the difficult choice to not give into the temptation to commit evil when confronted with the choice. It's not about avoiding temptation to do bad things, rather, not giving in when presented with it and, instead actively choosing to do the right thing instead.

I was generalizing, the actual amount of Morality lost and its rate of renewal is irrelevant. The point is that the system is set up that Morality is lost through evil actions and regained through inaction, in the sense that you can't intentionally seek to make up for what you did but instead you have to avoid doing bad things in the future as such things come to you. There is no sense that doing good is helpful. That doesn't sit right for me. Some people object to the idea that doing good should make up for doing evil but that sure seems better than the character having no way to actively redeem themselves, all redemption is passive. That really doesn't seem right at all.

No it is not. Inaction should either be generating conflict from knowing inaction or it should be generating no die rill because you did nothing. Sitting on your ass doing nothing conflict worthy means no die roll per sam stewart.

Sitting on your ship eating bon bons should get you knowin inaction conflict because you know there are things you could be diong to improve the galaxy and you are choosing to do nothing but eat bon bons. You guys really should read the chartband use it.

You guys really should read the chartband use it.

We should do what we want.

I was generalizing, the actual amount of Morality lost and its rate of renewal is irrelevant. The point is that the system is set up that Morality is lost through evil actions and regained through inaction, in the sense that you can't intentionally seek to make up for what you did but instead you have to avoid doing bad things in the future as such things come to you. There is no sense that doing good is helpful. That doesn't sit right for me. Some people object to the idea that doing good should make up for doing evil but that sure seems better than the character having no way to actively redeem themselves, all redemption is passive. That really doesn't seem right at all.

No it is not. Inaction should either be generating conflict from knowing inaction or it should be generating no die rill because you did nothing. Sitting on your ass doing nothing conflict worthy means no die roll per sam stewart.

Not at all what I said. Re-read what I read. You get no benefit from good acts. You just avoid getting conflict.

Let's put it this way, if you're given the opportunity to help someone and you avoid doing anything, you get conflict much the same way that you would if you'd done something evil. I get that, that's understandable. So you do your obligation and help them.

Now, what if you really go out of your way? Go above and beyond what would be expected of you? You really put your life on the line, you risk it all to not only help the person but you stick around, and try to find the heart of what is causing the problem, and end up liberating not just that person but their entire village or culture? What do you get? Nothing.

It's pretty lame. I'm not trying to convince anybody of anything (what would be the point, the rules are what they are) but I'm hoping to make my opinion clear and explain why I have it. Why this aspect of the game totally doesn't feel like Star Wars. I wish they'd gone with something closer to the Honor system of Legend of the Five Rings or the like. It's not a broken system, it works. It's just a disappointment.

I don't understand why a heroic character should expect credit for doing good acts. Doing good acts is the default expectation of a fictional hero and it's the status quo of every morality tale.

"'I take care of my kids!' You're supposed to...!"
~Chris Rock

You guys really should read the chartband use it.

We should do what we want.

*leans over to Whafrog, whispering*

What's a Chartband?

What's a Chartband?

A group of musicians of adequate popularity to be listed by Billboard or similar entity?

You guys really should read the chartband use it.

We should do what we want.

*leans over to Whafrog, whispering*

What's a Chartband?

A band that hold charts obviously....

I was generalizing, the actual amount of Morality lost and its rate of renewal is irrelevant. The point is that the system is set up that Morality is lost through evil actions and regained through inaction, in the sense that you can't intentionally seek to make up for what you did but instead you have to avoid doing bad things in the future as such things come to you. There is no sense that doing good is helpful. That doesn't sit right for me. Some people object to the idea that doing good should make up for doing evil but that sure seems better than the character having no way to actively redeem themselves, all redemption is passive. That really doesn't seem right at all.

No it is not. Inaction should either be generating conflict from knowing inaction or it should be generating no die rill because you did nothing. Sitting on your ass doing nothing conflict worthy means no die roll per sam stewart.

Not at all what I said. Re-read what I read. You get no benefit from good acts. You just avoid getting conflict.

Let's put it this way, if you're given the opportunity to help someone and you avoid doing anything, you get conflict much the same way that you would if you'd done something evil. I get that, that's understandable. So you do your obligation and help them.

Now, what if you really go out of your way? Go above and beyond what would be expected of you? You really put your life on the line, you risk it all to not only help the person but you stick around, and try to find the heart of what is causing the problem, and end up liberating not just that person but their entire village or culture? What do you get? Nothing.

It's pretty lame. I'm not trying to convince anybody of anything (what would be the point, the rules are what they are) but I'm hoping to make my opinion clear and explain why I have it. Why this aspect of the game totally doesn't feel like Star Wars. I wish they'd gone with something closer to the Honor system of Legend of the Five Rings or the like. It's not a broken system, it works. It's just a disappointment.

That is kind of true. In the movies we never see the force senstive heroes really stopping to deal with any additional problems; though that is more to do the fact that every star wars movie has them on some epic task or in the middle of a gigantic war. Thus stopping all that to help a Bob and Joe really isn't in the spirit of the settings unless your playing edge of the empire; where those small interactions are expected.

That being said it's fully possible to encouperate all those in an Edge Campaign and have it be meaningful. Rather then using random people, use cargo, or people affected by actions.

I also believe that not every job should be a moral tightrope, I often gain a lot of conflict for acting freely and I am fine with this as being a paragon or a darksider doesn't mind to me, I just follow my characters moral compass, for both good and bad.

My thought was to just let Conflict be cumulative. Every 5 points (or maybe 10 points) of Conflict lowers your Morality by 1. No end-of-session dice roll. Good deeds do not erase Conflict or raise your Morality. Players can initiate a Redemption Story arc, which would be difficult and involve sacrifice and such, to raise their Morality. Don't know how well this would work or not as I haven't been able to play it out at all.

I like the Notoriety idea from above though.

My thought was to just let Conflict be cumulative. Every 5 points (or maybe 10 points) of Conflict lowers your Morality by 1. No end-of-session dice roll. Good deeds do not erase Conflict or raise your Morality. Players can initiate a Redemption Story arc, which would be difficult and involve sacrifice and such, to raise their Morality. Don't know how well this would work or not as I haven't been able to play it out at all.

I like the Notoriety idea from above though.

This leads to gaming the system. Which is why the die roll.

Personally, I been GMing a F&D campaign for a little while. I have found that keeping a running total throughout an adventure and rolling for Conflict at the end of the adventure as opposed to every session has worked out well for me. It means that I can throw in the occasional moral situation (or have an adventure end with such) without having to have the PCs walking a tightrope every week.

After running this campaign for six months, with around an adventure a month, I have one PC who has just hit the 60's in Morality (and he has really tried hard to keep to the Light Side, and has rolled quite well for Conflict after each adventure).

Personally, I been GMing a F&D campaign for a little while. I have found that keeping a running total throughout an adventure and rolling for Conflict at the end of the adventure as opposed to every session has worked out well for me. It means that I can throw in the occasional moral situation (or have an adventure end with such) without having to have the PCs walking a tightrope every week.

After running this campaign for six months, with around an adventure a month, I have one PC who has just hit the 60's in Morality (and he has really tried hard to keep to the Light Side, and has rolled quite well for Conflict after each adventure).

We've started doing the same thing in our campaign. Rolling for Conflict has been a little more harrowing but the players have still come out ahead.