Hello there, we are starting up a new campaign and this is my first time running. Can a few of you player explain Obligation to me. I get the mechanic, i think, it's something of a backstory for your character. And the threshold of it is how often it comes up per session... right. So say my obligation is criminal and blackmail. I am a Rodian Bounty Hunter.

1. I can either have blackmail on say the HUTT that i work for because i am a criminal. or

2. I work for the HUTT criminals BECAUSE i am being blackmailed.

My total for this is 20 for each. so basically each time a session begins my GM would role percentile and see if it is going to effect me this game session.

That's how i read the rules on it.

Hello there, we are starting up a new campaign and this is my first time running. Can a few of you player explain Obligation to me. I get the mechanic, i think, it's something of a backstory for your character. And the threshold of it is how often it comes up per session... right. So say my obligation is criminal and blackmail. I am a Rodian Bounty Hunter.

1. I can either have blackmail on say the HUTT that i work for because i am a criminal. or

2. I work for the HUTT criminals BECAUSE i am being blackmailed.

My total for this is 20 for each. so basically each time a session begins my GM would role percentile and see if it is going to effect me this game session.

That's how i read the rules on it.

Obligation is basically a sidequest generator for GMs.

Here's an example: I'm preparing to run a mixed game with characters from all three books, two of which have Obligation.

Two characters have Bounty 10 from Zarda the Hutt because they went back on a job they were supposed to do for him. One of them also has Criminal 10 because he was framed as a "Rebel agitator" for starting a protest that the Empire put down hard.

At the end of each game (Book says beginning but I like to do it at the end because then I have time between sessions to be creative) I tally up the party Obligation:

1-10: Bounty, Character A

11-20: Bounty, Character B

21-30: Criminal, Character B

Then I roll 1d100. If it lands anywhere between 1-30, someone's Obligation is triggered and the next session has an added wrinkle depending on the Obligation.

For Bounty it could be as simple as hunters tracking them down and setting some kind of ambush for them when they least expect it--nothing like Boba Fett, but a group of journeyman hunters (Minions) with a Rival-level hunter can make things interesting when the party is in the middle of something.

For Criminal it could be that the ISB tracks down the "agitator" and launches a sting to arrest him, or maybe he's recognized when he lands on a new planet, or maybe even a Rebel cell tries to recruit him.

I'm re-posting this from a thread in the Game Master forum because it seems relevant.

Obligation exists to remind players that they have in-game goals. But triggering an Obligation at the beginning of an adventure doesn't mean the Obligation must come into play during said adventure. The associated strain penalty - which is pretty minor - serves as a reminder that the character has something hanging over her that she needs to address. However the player absolutely must have an opportunity to address it at some point during the campaign. That's where the GM needs to craft something, or a series of somethings, that directly involve the Obligation.

EotE doesn't work as a game system if the GM comes into it with an entire campaign pre-planned. GMs need to first work with their players to get a handle on Obligations, then weave relevant adventures into the campaign down the road. Speaking for myself, I'll come into a campaign with an intro adventure and a concluding adventure in mind and then, after character generation, work to weave stories that both meet PC Obligation needs and serve as good connecting tissue for the overall story.

The players in my current campaign have both individual Obligations and a group Obligation (money owed to a crime boss for the purchase of a starship). Since, statistically, the group Obligation came up more often, it served as a good motivator for me as the GM to develop adventures around it and for the players to take jobs from said criminal in order to deal with it.

I introduced a Dark Jedi patron at an early point in the campaign but I had no idea what else I was going to do with the character after the PCs double-crossed her. I realized she would be a good foil for one player's Philanderer Obligation and had her reveal, during a combat encounter during a later adventure when the two parties were reunited, that said Philanderer had, years ago, loved her and left her and it had hurt her. The "woman scorned" trope was corny but it was thematically appropriate. After the Dark Jedi was defeated, I told the player that his character had learned an important lesson and that his Philanderer Obligation was dealt with.