We are starting a new game in about 3 weeks. I have the character concept and the majority of its mechanics done, I am looking for ways to make it better mechanically. NOTE: This is going to be an exceptionally long campaign (multiple months) so I have a lot of room to grow.


Concept: Droid creator / leader of droids. Our campaign has a player made droid society whose leader (an organic who made them all) is dying. He created me to "replace" him when he dies. In order to give me a broad experience of the galaxy he has sent me on a "pilgrimage"

Mechanics: I am going to be first and foremost a crafter (yay special modifications) and by default ships mechanic. I am thinking of starting off in Droid Tech (for crafting droids obviously). I would like to start with a 4 in intelligence and a decent presence (for leading).

Skill wise (starting): 2 in mechanics and computers, 1 in leadership, others are incidental...I get ranks in most of the class skills as a droid anyways.


That being the basics of my character... I am pretty set for non combat situations IMO, but I have no idea what I will do in combat. I considered going Melee relying on crafted gear and cybernetics to be good there...but ranged has a lot more options. I could maybe branch out into a "leadership" class, but I think they are kind of weak

Also of note...all the other players are playing force users and will likely be very strong in structured time. To compensate I am considering going into cyber tech for its pseudo "Enhance force power" ability "Improved Overcharge."

For structured time, should I go into maybe Modder and pick up gunnery, keeping in line with my mechanical aptitude? Should I just bite the bullet on xp and just go ranged light/heavy? Should I find something good to use leadership on in structured time and be a support character? I appreciate any thoughts or suggestions on this.

The obvious solution to what to do during combat is the Hired Gun - Demolitionist. Build your own grenades and then use the Selective Detonation talent to exclude your allies from the blast radius. Of course, using grenades, with enough advantage you can activate Blast even if you don't technically succeed on the attack roll (typically Ranged - Light).

Because you're building a bit for Presence, you might want to consider the Smuggler-Gambler career. It has some very interesting things you can do to stack the odds in your favor.

Good thoughts. Just FYI we are allowed access to all books and all game settings.

Droid tech / modder and tactician or another commander sound like an excellent plan. As long as you have access to enough guys to boost you get extremely good value out of commander specs.

Modder is a great spec to get into piloting and star ship combat, droid tech sounds very good for your theme and is as well very strong when commanding larger amounts of droids and commodore/squadron leader/tactician would give you even more synergies with your droids, rest of the group and either squadrons, capital star ships or ground command (though imo tactician is great for fighter or capital ship command as well, just more a additional spec).

Lastly if you are heavy into ships there is great synergies between modder and rigger, but it might make you a little bit one-dimensional for you. Or the perfect addition the your force heavy group, the really depends on what the rest of the group is playing.

Just a note - I am in no way responsible for any bodily harm your GM visits upon you if you decide to use the Gambler's Double or Nothing (Improved/Supreme) talent(s) in conjunction with the item crafting rules.

I was planning to make a similar character for a campaign that my group is starting soon.

If you could get the Deft Maker talent early on as a droid tech, the cost reduction would allow you to make enough droids to let them handle combat for you. You could craft up a few cheap monotask droids with combat directives, and let them engage in combat checks as a minion group while you spend your turns directing them.

Just a note - I am in no way responsible for any bodily harm your GM visits upon you if you decide to use the Gambler's Double or Nothing (Improved/Supreme) talent(s) in conjunction with the item crafting rules.

wow....I didn't even think of that. That is ridiculous.

Gambler might just be the best Crafter in the game...

First off I n a game so heavy with non "I hurt the guy" options I don't always get why everyone feels they need to be able to fight.

So now what to do? Well you have a high Intelect I assume, so make the most of that; Dive deep into the Droid Tech tree to get Reroute Processes which you can use on yourself (no overcharging required!).

Then if you want to play up your leadership and ability to direct droids get a Spec with Field Commander in it; Mercenary Soldier, Squadron Leader, Tactician or Instructor.

Or you could use that intelligence to get better at Medicine with Medic, which has well rounded to get your pick of combat skills.

You could go the explosives route with either of Sabotur or Demolishionist.

Then you have Gadgeteer, Outlaw Tech and Modder if your keen to be fixing gear as well.

You don't sound interested in knowledge stuff so that cuts a heap out.

So there is a lot to choose from, if you have a good enough Agility (3+) and no one else is a pilot then Squadron Leader is great, otherwise I would go Tactician it's got a great variety of talents. But if combat is super important to you then Merc Soldier or Gadgeteer is definitely the pick of the bunch.

Think about what kind of campaign you are playing. Is it more combat oriented with a lot dungeons and caves? Gadgeteer or demolitionist. Is it a more sandbox game where you have enough time and freedom to build your droid army? Pump all your xp into droid tech. Are you more like rebel or imperial operatives and have to infiltrate a lot? Saboteur and slicer might be your best friends.

The choice also depends on the group you're in. If the group is cohesive and has good morale, picking up modder will make it even better. Then again, if there is a lot drama and betrayal in your group, you should probably reconsider giving the other PCs a better gun to shoot you with. Clarification: Picking up hidden storage to implant a bomb into an unreliable player might me a better idea.

So now what to do? Well you have a high Intelect I assume, so make the most of that; Dive deep into the Droid Tech tree to get Reroute Processes which you can use on yourself (no overcharging required!).

Overcharge just seems all around better than reroute processors. Especially when you include improved version and supreme version. If I get 6 cybernetics I can upgrade a combat stat and skill a number of times up to the number of cybernetics you have, and the chance to get another action to book.

First off I n a game so heavy with non "I hurt the guy" options I don't always get why everyone feels they need to be able to fight.

Last campaign I played an outlaw tech (before AoR beta was even out) I was very non combat... but we had one guy who just wanted to beat things with an axe, and another that was a sniper. If I dont build something combat-like in I would just get left out on more than half of the combats. My GM is pretty good and the other half of the time he gives something for the "non combat mechanic" to do...computers to diddle with, turrets to hack etc. One time when I had nothing to do I overloaded a power cell from a Turbolaser emplacement and blew up half the party with it (oops).

Medicine is covered by one of the force users.

I am not against knowledge skills. We have just not really had much of a use for them in the last campaign and when we did my 4 int was generally good enough.

Think about what kind of campaign you are playing. Is it more combat oriented with a lot dungeons and caves? Gadgeteer or demolitionist. Is it a more sandbox game where you have enough time and freedom to build your droid army? Pump all your xp into droid tech. Are you more like rebel or imperial operatives and have to infiltrate a lot? Saboteur and slicer might be your best friends.

The choice also depends on the group you're in. If the group is cohesive and has good morale, picking up modder will make it even better. Then again, if there is a lot drama and betrayal in your group, you should probably reconsider giving the other PCs a better gun to shoot you with. Clarification: Picking up hidden storage to implant a bomb into an unreliable player might me a better idea.

The campaign has a lot of both. There is a lot of combat, but I think the GM assumes hyperspace travel takes a bit longer than it does. We sometimes get more than a week of "hyperspace downtime"

The group is a mix. We have one player who always betrays the party (literally 100% of the time). Fortunately he is very incompetent. To get back at him I created a mechanical Voorpak that read as leaking radiation. That is after having the GM "leak" the plans to him that it had a nuke in it. I programmed it to be super cute and very attached to him. It was glorious.

Does field commander still limit the players to two maneuvers per turn?

Does field commander still limit the players to two maneuvers per turn?

No, they can then perform 3. Improved FC gives an EXTRA action, just think all your buddies get to shoot twice... Brutal!

Think about what kind of campaign you are playing. Is it more combat oriented with a lot dungeons and caves? Gadgeteer or demolitionist. Is it a more sandbox game where you have enough time and freedom to build your droid army? Pump all your xp into droid tech. Are you more like rebel or imperial operatives and have to infiltrate a lot? Saboteur and slicer might be your best friends.

The choice also depends on the group you're in. If the group is cohesive and has good morale, picking up modder will make it even better. Then again, if there is a lot drama and betrayal in your group, you should probably reconsider giving the other PCs a better gun to shoot you with. Clarification: Picking up hidden storage to implant a bomb into an unreliable player might me a better idea.

The campaign has a lot of both. There is a lot of combat, but I think the GM assumes hyperspace travel takes a bit longer than it does. We sometimes get more than a week of "hyperspace downtime"

The group is a mix. We have one player who always betrays the party (literally 100% of the time). Fortunately he is very incompetent. To get back at him I created a mechanical Voorpak that read as leaking radiation. That is after having the GM "leak" the plans to him that it had a nuke in it. I programmed it to be super cute and very attached to him. It was glorious.

Have you thought about taking engie/mechanic from AoR instead of droid tech? That way you start with decent combat ability and can watch your own back. You don't lose a lot on the crafting side, and you can always pick up droid tech later. Start off with 4 int, 4 agi and toughened, and work your way from there.

Even Engineer Scientist is a good place to start. Focusing entirely on the right side it combines extremely well with the Droid Tech, if you actually want to be directing droids.

Quick fix: Pick yourself up a Multi-Goo Gun, it's cheap and provides you with auto-advantage on droid/vehicle/ship repairs, so it's useful anyway. Fit it with the pressurized gas canister custom attachment, and mod it to increase the duration of the Disorient effect if you can. You now have a 5 damage weapon that can Disorient, Ensnare, or Knockdown, depending on the needs of the moment. Spend your combats messing with people to help your allies. You'll need to eat the cross-class XP to build up Ranged (Light) for better advantage generation, but that's a lower investment than grabbing an entire other specialization.

Check with your GM and see if he'll let you control droid allies in combat. If that's the case, in the long run you can build combat droid(s) to boost with the Speak Binary talent and use that for your active combat participation.

Engineer Scientist with a Goo Gun. Then choose how to focus your character; Combat Leader, Droid Tech, Cyber Tech or a modding character. But scientist gives you a bit of most of it, including the ranged light skill.

Personally the Scientist Tactician sounds so strange but is very interesting and fun, Or Scientist Squadron Leader (or Modder) for a co-pilot.

But you sound like your interested in the Cyber Tech, so my final recommendation is start Engineer Scientist then specialise in Cybernetics

So i have weighed your responses and spoke to the group. I believe I have decided on starting droid tech and going to something involving leadership. I cannot decide between Inspiring rhetoric or Field Commander.


Field Commander: Giving an extra maneuver or action is very strong. It seems bursty though. Either I do really well and give someone an extra action or I flop and give everyone an extra maneuver. Maybe I am lacking in creativity, but I dont see much you can do with an immediate maneuver after the first turn. I guess you can aim?

Inspiring Rhetoric: Heals strain both wide (multiple targets) and deep (multiple strain) with a decent roll. Also adds a Boost dice for multiple rounds. The biggest benefit I see here is I could use it as a maneuver, and then either shoot someone or do mechanics/computers stuff to aid the battle.

Side note: If I were to use either of the above options with droids would it stack with speaks binary?? Seems a bit cheesy, but what is your interpretation RAW/RAI.

So i have weighed your responses and spoke to the group. I believe I have decided on starting droid tech and going to something involving leadership. I cannot decide between Inspiring rhetoric or Field Commander.

Field Commander: Giving an extra maneuver or action is very strong. It seems bursty though. Either I do really well and give someone an extra action or I flop and give everyone an extra maneuver. Maybe I am lacking in creativity, but I dont see much you can do with an immediate maneuver after the first turn. I guess you can aim?

Inspiring Rhetoric: Heals strain both wide (multiple targets) and deep (multiple strain) with a decent roll. Also adds a Boost dice for multiple rounds. The biggest benefit I see here is I could use it as a maneuver, and then either shoot someone or do mechanics/computers stuff to aid the battle.

Side note: If I were to use either of the above options with droids would it stack with speaks binary?? Seems a bit cheesy, but what is your interpretation RAW/RAI.

Using a stim pack is a maneuver, drawing one as well, though quick draw can negate this, so basically everyone can use a stimpack, reposition himself to negate a maneuver, get back into engaged with an enemy for the meeles, defensive stance, sniper shot, bodyguard, balance, sidestep, true aim, aim, guarded stance (especially nice after you have already attacked this turn), assist maneuvers from everyone, take cover, open doors, closing doors, activating whatever, manage gear (hello medpacks), drop prone or stand up from prone (after knockdown for example), faster chasing or retreating via move, and lastly all those nice vehicle stuff, especially like activating your jetpack and doing a accelerate maneuver or evasive maneuvers. ( though no extra maneuvers for the vehicles themselves, which is a shame)

There are tons of maneuvers and some of them stack up quite nicely. Sure in many combat situation that extra action to decimate the enemy would be still better, but every maneuver helps.

I'd recommend you start engineer:mechanic (engineer gives better combat skills than technician) and then dip into doctor (not medic) to get pressure point, this gives you a strain attack against organics that ignores soak so your low brawn isn't going to hurt you much (besides limiting the number of yellow dice you get on brawl checks)

I am working on a technician character and was also excited about the crafting stuff so have been looking in to it a lot. The concept you have sounds like a lot of fun but if you want to build up some more bots for the party I think I'd go in a slightly different direction.

For specialties I think I would do:

cybertech to help yourself out and there is a little kick back in there to be a back up medic.

Outlaw tech to get your hands on your initial speaks binary and inventor (it's down the list a ways but you can never have enough blue dice when crafting)

Droid tech to finally start building your droid army.

I don't know if I'd worry too much about combat if I'm honest. They will be begging for your med help from cyber tech even if it is only a couple points when things go sideways. When it comes to crafting, particularly droid crafting the only out of career class I'd give a good hard look at is entrepreneur. Crafting is expensive and starting each game with 500 credits not to mention hocking your fail crafting attempts for an additional 20% over book price. If you can talk them in to getting a droid early on you can flex those speak binary dice to have it fill in your place for the fighting.

my 2 cents.

P.S. If you are still concerned with combat stuff I'd say go with a 3 in agility as well instead if you don't plan from the start to do the command thing. Lets you bust out a respectable # dice for any blasting that might need to be done as well as flying the ship in a pinch.

high int high pres droid with droid tech, then outlaw and finally scientist ;o command your own personal death squad of droids with what 7 speak binary? ;o n 4 inventor

and finally scientist

Yeah, Scientist is what I planned to pick up to complement my Droid Tech. Aside from more ranks of Speaks Binary, the ranks of Inventor it provides gives you boost dice on your crafted droids, which will speed up the process of getting the crafting check down to simple through schematics. There's also another rank of Hidden Storage, so you'll have more room to work with when using your droids to smuggle things (like explosive charges). All the way down the left side of the tree, you can get Intense Focus, which is one of very few methods available to upgrade an attempt to craft or program a droid.

Outlaw Tech has 2 ranks each of Inventor and Speaks Binary, but most of them are at the bottom of the tree, and that's all that you would really want from it. All the ranks of Tinkerer and Jury Rigged are nice, but not ideal for a character that's more invested in commanding droids around than doing things on their own.

and finally scientist

Yeah, Scientist is what I planned to pick up to complement my Droid Tech. Aside from more ranks of Speaks Binary, the ranks of Inventor it provides gives you boost dice on your crafted droids, which will speed up the process of getting the crafting check down to simple through schematics. There's also another rank of Hidden Storage, so you'll have more room to work with when using your droids to smuggle things (like explosive charges). All the way down the left side of the tree, you can get Intense Focus, which is one of very few methods available to upgrade an attempt to craft or program a droid.

Outlaw Tech has 2 ranks each of Inventor and Speaks Binary, but most of them are at the bottom of the tree, and that's all that you would really want from it. All the ranks of Tinkerer and Jury Rigged are nice, but not ideal for a character that's more invested in commanding droids around than doing things on their own.

id agree with you normally but... jury rigging grenades is awesome besides , you could always beef up your strongest battle droid's gear ;o

I'm too cheap. If at all possible I hesitate to go outside of career if one can help it heh, but scientist isn't a bad choice either. If you can add it on later, or add on outlaw tech you get your hands on 4 blue for crafting, woot.