To summarize this. I need to

1. Learn how to scale encounters in this game, maybe start with fewer enemies and nerf their equipment , give them something like blaster pistols at best and not what adventures or corebook suggest.

2. Nerf tactical thinking on minnions so they won't aim, use cover, auto fire (it will be hard cause i don't like this idea )

3. Encourage players to spend xp on cool and vigilance so they have better chance of having first slots on initiative.

Anything else? I know that there always be some combats since it's part of the game but i don't think they want to dump all their xp into combat skills since from what book says having skill at 3 is true proffesional. And we want to play a firefly type game not combat heavy. But they want to survive simple encounters so they don't drop on the floor every battle.

This looks more like a case of your players sabotaging themselves. Light blaster pistols? Only 2 soak? What, two of them decided to pick a species with 1 Brawn and then settled for the worst armour in the game? Or aren't they wearing any armour at all?

And you need to seriously reduce the damage output of the NPCs. If their soak is deliberately low, equip your NPCs with blaster pistols and light blaster pistols. Give them heavy clothing instead of laminate armour. That sort of thing.

But most of all I'd advice you to stop running pre-made adventures. It's obvious that your players built their NPCs to be good at something other than combat; you need to make adventures that play to their strengths. If they prioritized combat skills this low they must be really good at something else, like talking or sneaking or... something. Those are the adventures you need to run for them. The core book adventure, as well as every other published adventure, assumes a rounded group of 4-5 players. You don't have that.

2P51

Like i said before. I was using adventure for fresh characters so i assumed that if starting character can have 3-2 .max 4-2 in combat skill then 3-1 it's not so bad. Also i assumed that starting adventure realized that players are fresh smugglers and other similar characters not trained soldiers running around with heavy weaponry. Maybe that was my mistake, thinking that encounter difficulty in that adventure was balanced. Or maybe game encourage power gaming and min maxing. Since normal well rounded characters can't even take minion enemies.

I'd like to know the build on these characters, because it isn't just that they aren't "trained soldiers", they have ignored their Agility and Brawn. They've also not bothered with ballistic protection at all. I don't know what they spent their xp on initially, but over the several session you cite it should have been readily apparent they needed to add some gear, skill levels, and or talents, to start making up the combat short fall. This isn't a game design issue like I said, they built characters who are bad at combat.

This game isn't any different from any other RPG in that one should expect conflict and danger. If you build 3 characters who are no good at combat in any game they are going to get a beat down. Plus in a three PC group there simply isn't room for someone to play the 'I'm a special snowflake that doesn't fight', in a group that small in any game everyone has to bring some ass kicking to the table and pull their weight.

This kind of depends on if the game they are in really is about combat. What about one with tons of social situations and maybe vehicle combat won't be the same as one with tons of melee or other personal scale combat.

If the players build a bunch of non-combatants and the GM is throwing them into tons of fights, then their is an obvious mismatch of design/expectations between the two. That is best resolved via discussion between the parties involved in the game. No reason to modify the rules of the game for a self-inflicted issue.

There is no room for PCs to be combat deficient in a 3 man group.

Yes, there is. Not every game HAS to focus on personal scale combat. Exploration, politics, traders, etc... don't have to be combat effective. Running from a fight is a valid tactic and one rarely taken by players that seem to think that when weapons are drawn, they HAVE to fight... nope, best way to survive a fight, don't be in one.

Where did I write focus on combat? What I wrote is in a 3 man team everyone needs to bring some level of skill to the table, that group is far to small to hyper specialize and not be multi talented. In a galaxy at war where adventurers are positioning themselves at cross purposes to nefarious individuals sometimes witty banter over ancient Corellian literature and being able to shoot a better azimuth navigating is not going to get it done and when 2/3 of a team like the one the OP lists is completely gimped at combat, it's a recipe for fail.

the highlighted statement shows where you say that everyone should be combat capable... and while the game may be called Star Wars, that doesn't mean everyone is involved in the "wars" part of it, nor that every group is interested in being in gun battles.

My question would be that if the characters are not built for combat, why are they entering it and not running away? Sounds to me that as GM you should be encouraging alternate ways for the group to resolve such actions, such as sneaking or distracting or something else. Which will mean, as others have pointed out, adapting the adventure to your group. Most adventures assume some combat ability, if not outright combat monkeys, in an average group. If that is not the case then some tailoring must be done. This group sounds like they need to use alternate means rather than head to head combat in many of their encounters.

My question would be that if the characters are not built for combat, why are they entering it and not running away? Sounds to me that as GM you should be encouraging alternate ways for the group to resolve such actions, such as sneaking or distracting or something else. Which will mean, as others have pointed out, adapting the adventure to your group. Most adventures assume some combat ability, if not outright combat monkeys, in an average group. If that is not the case then some tailoring must be done. This group sounds like they need to use alternate means rather than head to head combat in many of their encounters.

Because the way game is written. Most of the times book says something like "minions are easy and should be no problem for starting characters" or "player characters are powerfull individuals" or "the feel of star wars is that players are heroes above average people" so according to this everybody expected that combat would be easy and you don't have to specialize in combat skill to defeat simple enemies. The way i see it now from what some people are trying to tell me it's that if you don't invest xp in combat skills and money into heavy combat gear. Then a common thug with vibroknife can deafeat player "hero" without any problem. And it contradicts most what is written in the book. So it looks like that book gave us a wrong feel about this game and mostly because of this players engaged enemies with guns blazing action movie style instead of trying to sneak in or run away.

This looks more like a case of your players sabotaging themselves. Light blaster pistols? Only 2 soak? What, two of them decided to pick a species with 1 Brawn and then settled for the worst armour in the game? Or aren't they wearing any armour at all?

And you need to seriously reduce the damage output of the NPCs. If their soak is deliberately low, equip your NPCs with blaster pistols and light blaster pistols. Give them heavy clothing instead of laminate armour. That sort of thing.

But most of all I'd advice you to stop running pre-made adventures. It's obvious that your players built their NPCs to be good at something other than combat; you need to make adventures that play to their strengths. If they prioritized combat skills this low they must be really good at something else, like talking or sneaking or... something. Those are the adventures you need to run for them. The core book adventure, as well as every other published adventure, assumes a rounded group of 4-5 players. You don't have that.

Like i stated above players didn't expect that they will have a hard time with minnions. They equiped themselves according to their character concept so smuggler only have heavy clothing and blaster. Mechanic have light blaster pistol, some tools and a hydrospanner. Bounty hunter did'nt have any money to buy better equipment but he will stop at armoured clothing and two blasters because it fits his character.

Like you said i need to stop running pre-made adventures for now at least until we get the encounter difficulty right. So we won't have any more accidents like whole party down cause adventure was written for 5 players assuming 2 will be build for combat.

1. Learn how to scale encounters in this game, maybe start with fewer enemies and nerf their equipment , give them something like blaster pistols at best and not what adventures or corebook suggest.

2. Nerf tactical thinking on minnions so they won't aim, use cover, auto fire (it will be hard cause i don't like this idea )

3. Encourage players to spend xp on cool and vigilance so they have better chance of having first slots on initiative.

1. To scale encounters just compare dice pools and base damage output. It looks to me like a low level rival (10 wounds or so) and two minion groups of 2 thug types (not stormtroopers) is more than enough. If that's easy, ramp it up.

2. I don't agree with nerfing tactics, aim all you want, and make the minions as smart as is suitable for their character. However, note that minions can't voluntarily spend strain, so if the party runs, spending extra strain to move twice while still shooting, the minions won't be able to shoot and keep up. In other words, retreating is sound tactical advice.

3. Having at least YYG in a combat skill goes a long way, and the twin pistol wielder needs YYYG to dual wield effectively . Once they have that, plus maybe a blaster with the "accurate" quality, and some armour with extra soak or defence, they should be okay.

Thanks for advice

the best advice I have seen is start really really small and build up. you will quickly learn what they can do and what they can't do.

Also, make sure that the player can say what they are doing with advantages. Causing strain to a minion is a free wound effectivly, so if a player got 1 (or even 0) success but like 3 or 4 advantages that is potentially 3 or 4 more damage to a minion, or setbacks that can be applied to the target.