So when creating a PC, you can modify their starting morality to start off with more xp/credits.
But how much is their morality modified? Is it just GMs discretion?
Starting Morality
The way I read it, it is 21 points.
On page 49, lower right hand corner.
So when creating a PC, you can modify their starting morality to start off with more xp/credits.
But how much is their morality modified? Is it just GMs discretion?
You can modify their starting morality by 21 points or start off with more XP/credits. You start with 50 Morality, and either get more XP/credits or start off as a Dark Sider (-21 Morality) or a Light side Paragon (+21 Morality).
-EF
Seems like quite the jump in morality. Figured it would be something like getting 5 or 10 obligation in Edge of the Empire.
Seems like quite the jump in morality. Figured it would be something like getting 5 or 10 obligation in Edge of the Empire.
It needs to be. +10 morality is two sessions of average rolling with no conflict. -10 morality is a single unjustified killing.
21 lets PCs start as Light or Dark Paragons, trading their extra gear/XP for more destiny (and strain) to flip force pips with, or for more reliable (but weaker) force powers and more wounds (but less ability to flip force pips)
Seems like quite the jump in morality. Figured it would be something like getting 5 or 10 obligation in Edge of the Empire.
If you run the numbers... it kinda is, it's just the differences in the systems that make it seem off. When you compare the actual in-game benefits/penalties of activated Obligation and Duty, it pretty much lines up with Morality threshold results. Taking extra Obligation, or not dropping your Duty will result in dramatically increased likelihood of activation, and the associated benefits/penalties.
One of the challenges of the Morality system is getting over it. Terms like Darksider and Light Side Paragon have been associated with the likes of Yoda and Palps so long that you really need to remind yourself that they were amazing because of their huge XP counts, and not because of an extra couple Strain.
What I got from reading it is that you can either pick more money OR more xp OR change morality to go up OR change morality to go down.
As both high and low morality gives you bonuses (more hp for low and more strain for high), seems that they are just as much an advantage as the xp or money so its really pick what you want without consequences (although lower morality means you are closer to loosing your character to the darkside...but if you wanna play that way...).
But here now is a question of the day. If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Example being you raise your obligation for more money, lower your duty for more xp, then choose the more xp again and keep your morality at the starting 50? That is a hefty bunch of starting advantage there. I guess that would be up to the GM though.
But here now is a question of the day. If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Example being you raise your obligation for more money, lower your duty for more xp, then choose the more xp again and keep your morality at the starting 50? That is a hefty bunch of starting advantage there. I guess that would be up to the GM though.
You only pick one to alter. So if you have all of them, if you want Morality to be the one you mess with, then you get the credits/xp or raise/lower it. Duty and Obligation would stay the same. If you wanted Obligation to be altered, you would raise it for whatever bonuses, and then Morality and Duty are left alone. You want to alter Duty, you can lower it, and then Obligation and Morality are left alone.
If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Nice try.
But here now is a question of the day. If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Example being you raise your obligation for more money, lower your duty for more xp, then choose the more xp again and keep your morality at the starting 50? That is a hefty bunch of starting advantage there. I guess that would be up to the GM though.
Yeah, while the cores are compatible, they aren't stackable. You get the one that comes with your character's starting Career. With GM approval may swap it for something else, and there's nothing to stop the GM from adding more on to it, but you can only ever benefit from one.
While AoR and FaD don't make it so clear, in EotE it's stated that the starting minimum Obligation you are required to take represents how your character got their base starting gear and ship. By extension it's probably safe to assume Duty and Morality are similar.
But here now is a question of the day. If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Example being you raise your obligation for more money, lower your duty for more xp, then choose the more xp again and keep your morality at the starting 50? That is a hefty bunch of starting advantage there. I guess that would be up to the GM though.
Yeah, while the cores are compatible, they aren't stackable. You get the one that comes with your character's starting Career. With GM approval may swap it for something else, and there's nothing to stop the GM from adding more on to it, but you can only ever benefit from one.
While AoR and FaD don't make it so clear, in EotE it's stated that the starting minimum Obligation you are required to take represents how your character got their base starting gear and ship. By extension it's probably safe to assume Duty and Morality are similar.
Nice point Ghostofman. Tying which core mechanic to use based on the starting career.
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But here now is a question of the day. If you play a campaign that uses DUTY, OBLIGATION, and MORALITY at the same time, would you get the bonuses from each of those?
Example being you raise your obligation for more money, lower your duty for more xp, then choose the more xp again and keep your morality at the starting 50? That is a hefty bunch of starting advantage there. I guess that would be up to the GM though.
The last update had a nice section on this exact thing on page 9:
" No matter how many systems a character is using, he can never start with more than 2,500 additional credits, and/or 10 additional starting experience points. "
I don't have the CRB yet, payday being Friday, but I doubt this has changed much.
-EF
So when creating a PC, you can modify their starting morality to start off with more xp/credits.
But how much is their morality modified? Is it just GMs discretion?
You can modify their starting morality by 21 points or start off with more XP/credits. You start with 50 Morality, and either get more XP/credits or start off as a Dark Sider (-21 Morality) or a Light side Paragon (+21 Morality).
-EF
So my character gets xp and credits and my morality is 50, or I can be a light side paragon or a dark side whatever? Thanks, that clarifies it alot, I had a post about this on the beta forms but nobody explained it very clearly to me.
do I get XP AND credits? Is it chose xp only? chose credits only?
So my character gets xp and credits and my morality is 50, or I can be a light side paragon or a dark side whatever? Thanks, that clarifies it alot, I had a post about this on the beta forms but nobody explained it very clearly to me.
do I get XP AND credits? Is it chose xp only? chose credits only?
As I don't have the core book, I'll be using the beta book for reference.
Per page 34, you have 4 options:
- Gain +10 XP
- Gain +2,500 CR
- Gain +5 XP & 1,000 CR
- Modify your Morality by 21, becoming Dark Side or Light Side paragon
If you chose one of the first three options, your Morality is 50. Otherwise it's 29 or 71, respectively.
-EF
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
Getting 21+ points in Conflict in a handful of sessions can net you a ton of Obligation for being a criminal or who knows what. Waiting for 21 points in dice rolls that is decreased by your Conflict earned that session can take as little as 3 sessions, but could even take 8 or more depending on dice rolls and how the player plays. So there is actually a bit of a drawback.
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
The morality options are specifically force related bonuses, for making your space so rcerer more reliable. As such, for the right characters its worth more than xp or credits.
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
It's the same options you have in AoR and EotE. You can increase your Obligation ("bad" mojo) for more XP and/or credits. You can decrease your Duty ("good" mojo) for more XP and/or credits.
Morality is neither good nor bad, so a straight increase or decrease doesn't work. If you could only decrease your Morality, you're saying that being Dark Side is Bad, but it's not. It's just one more option in the toolbox. And as Rakaydos said above, it's not always about the XP. I usually go for some extra credits, so my character can actually have something besides a comlink and holdout blaster pistol.
-EF
I still don't understand why there are options as I can only justify increasing my characteristics with my XP... though 10 doesn't go very far. As a GM, I will bend this a bit and with a really good backstory allow an extra 10 XP to increase a characteristic (not extra money or anything else, just a characteristic)... with this bumping them to 20 Obligation/Duty. I don't see this as being effective for Morality, so I will task them to start under something else (likely Obligation) and we'll add in the Morality later when they have a really bad day learning they are a Force User.
For starters, not everyone will want to increase their characteristics. Yeah that's a good option, but depending on the character type and concept, the credits might be worth it. There's lots of character types that might be less interested in starting with a +1 in Brawn if it means being able to start with the right gear for the concept from day one rather then scrapping around for it.
Likewise some character concepts might work better with the Light/Dark boost. Referencing the Green Lantern cartoon, imagine a player wants to run a character like Razer. A dark side character that, for whatever reason is running around with the good guys. 10XP vs. being able to start as a darksider? No real decision there.
Finally, don't forget that Morality was introduced in the same beta book as Knight level play, so there's a certain amount of connection there. Whats 10XP when I've got 150 more in a minute? 2,500 credits? I've got thousands more in a sec! But to start as a lightsider? Extra strain and a D-point? Oh, now that's interesting, especially if I want my character to start as someone with a greater connection to the force and slowly fall the the darkside over the course of the campaign until he's nothing but a kielbasa on the shores of a river of lava....
Sorry for the bump, but there's another CRB starting morality reference that is confusing. Page 107, under starting gear it says: "Characters may also have earned additional credits if they reduced their morality modifier in step 2." Where step 2 is the Determine Morality section.
Except you don't 'reduce your morality modifier' by taking extra credits. You can elect to take the 2500 creds and have no morality modifier at all (stay at default 50), right? This is just really badly worded and I'm not missing something?
Edited by jonamokProbably legacy wording- it's been in there since before the beta, and they forgot to change it when they realized some people like being darksiders.
Egh, I guess it's technically correct, definitely worded weirdly; the modifier goes up one way or down another, so reducing the modifier to 0, ie. no change, is what keeps it at 50.
But yeah, you only get the bonus xp/credits for keeping it at 50.
Have things changed since the beta? I thought that a starting character could increase/decrease their morality to the border of being a paragon of either side but not quite to the actually tipping point? Ie: You could increase your Morality to 70 but to be a Lightside Paragon Morality must be > 70.. though, with everyone saying +/- 21 it sounds like they decided to allow you that last point to actually put you over that line and into Paragon.
It was actually changed in one of the Beta updates. But yeah, essentially it's +/- 21 now.
It was actually changed in one of the Beta updates. But yeah, essentially it's +/- 21 now.
I apparently misread that one.. for some reason I thought I had read an update changing it from shifting you to paragon to just short of paragon and it was the other way around. Just my memory getting the best of me there, it happens.