Indeed, if it gets people into the hobby then I think it's a good thing.

I don't generally buy the beginner boxes but I think there is certainly a market for them.

It sounds like it's stand alone, so I'm happy. Now my only complaint is, do we really need a whole new forum for this "game." That's 8 separate forums now for what's basically one game.

How about a little clean up and consolidation.

As for the other two PCs, given that Force users appear to still be rare as hen's teeth in the TFA era, especially with Luke's new generation of Jedi-to-be having been rather brutally purged, I'm guessing we won't be seeing any FaD-style characters for this.

Personally, I'm hoping for a BB-unit as one of the downloadable PCs. Or if not a BB-unit, then at least some model of droid, who don't get nearly enough love.

As it stands, this product is really just a shameless money grab by FFG to cash in on May the 4th Day and all the other Star Wars mania going on right now.

I suspect this is less FFG's doing, and more pressure from the House of Mouse.

That could very well be. I honestly don't know how much pressure Disney exerts on this sort of thing, but seeing as how FFG is just a niche licensee, even a little pressure would be considerable in this case.

Pure speculation, but if this is a new core set with bits and pieces of the last three thrown into one set I could see myself running this system again. I bailed a year or so ago when I realized that my completionist quirks were going to spell doom for my wallet. I couldn't do 3 lines...but I could do one "complete" one. Curious.

I think this checks off a couple of boxes for FFG as it's an easily marketable product that's connected to the new movie, in turn it'll probably direct people in the direction of the other game lines.

I think it'd be nice to get some more TFA era products like stand alone adventure books, but I'm not sure if it's wise for FFG to tread too heavily into the new era until Episode IX comes out.

I look forward to this though and hope it attracts more people to the hobby.

I was excited, but then I saw that the two action characters (soldier and pilot) are female and the two 'roll-your-craft-skill-but-useless-in-combat' characters are male. OK, OK, I get it... all action heroes are female now. Rey, that *other* 35-pound waif from Rogue One who can punch through brick walls, etc. etc. Everything is now Buffy/Doll House/Serenity.

Whatever. It would obviously trigger all the Millennials to mass suicide if you had a proactive male character.

I was excited, but then I saw that the two action characters (soldier and pilot) are female and the two 'roll-your-craft-skill-but-useless-in-combat' characters are male. OK, OK, I get it... all action heroes are female now. Rey, that *other* 35-pound waif from Rogue One who can punch through brick walls, etc. etc. Everything is now Buffy/Doll House/Serenity.

Whatever. It would obviously trigger all the Millennials to mass suicide if you had a proactive male character.

I know, I felt the same way about the F&D box set when I saw that there was just one human character compared to five obviously inferior alien characters. It really put me off the game.

Seriously, you actually think that this will be a bad game because of the gender of two of its characters? Do you know anything about them, their backstory, their character traits or any other facets of them, that would allow you to decide whether they really are a bad character? Or are you just prejudging because you think we need to go back to the good old days of -2 Str and armour that certainly doesn't look like it should convey cold protection?

And the less said about your last little remark the better.

Why not just merge all the sub forums involving the Beginner Box Sets?

So you have one covering all of the Beginner Sets with sub forums involving the Core Beginner Sets if they want them separate but it would resolve this.

I was excited, but then I saw that the two action characters (soldier and pilot) are female and the two 'roll-your-craft-skill-but-useless-in-combat' characters are male. OK, OK, I get it... all action heroes are female now. Rey, that *other* 35-pound waif from Rogue One who can punch through brick walls, etc. etc. Everything is now Buffy/Doll House/Serenity.

Whatever. It would obviously trigger all the Millennials to mass suicide if you had a proactive male character.

I recommend drugs. And not the awful ones you're currently taking.

Honestly an Era book is what's missing. I mean, we still need some career books, as the three bounty hunters in my campaign will tell you until the day they die, but even just a single setting book, perhaps a bigger one. I'd pay another $60 to get a core-book sized book, or even half that size, if it's all new content and not the obligatory rehash of "How to Dice". I love this series, but many of those I talk to would like to see a book detailing settings for the Old Republic, the Clone Wars, or the New Trilogy Era.

What we don't need, however, is a brand new line, so I'm glad that this won't be spiraling off into a new line. However, if it foreshadows one thing, its a new splat, at the least, that will add some of these new races to the RPG beastiary.

Also, upon having gone back and looked closely at the character foils included, I just want to say that I loved every part of VII, but the fact that the three foils visible just so happen to be holding the three rather iconic weapons of the new movie seems kind of forced. Oh well, perhaps we'll get stats for Rey's staff that some random dude appears to have picked up.

Also, upon having gone back and looked closely at the character foils included, I just want to say that I loved every part of VII, but the fact that the three foils visible just so happen to be holding the three rather iconic weapons of the new movie seems kind of forced. Oh well, perhaps we'll get stats for Rey's staff that some random dude appears to have picked up.

To my eye it just looks like you've got a generic pistol for the period, a Resistance-issued rifle, and a similar but not identical staff. For the AoR Beginner Game you had two PCs carrying the generic Rebel rifle, and Han's DL-44 was portrayed as the generic blaster pistol in all three games, so presumably it's the same sort of thing.

Also, upon having gone back and looked closely at the character foils included, I just want to say that I loved every part of VII, but the fact that the three foils visible just so happen to be holding the three rather iconic weapons of the new movie seems kind of forced. Oh well, perhaps we'll get stats for Rey's staff that some random dude appears to have picked up.

To my eye it just looks like you've got a generic pistol for the period, a Resistance-issued rifle, and a similar but not identical staff. For the AoR Beginner Game you had two PCs carrying the generic Rebel rifle, and Han's DL-44 was portrayed as the generic blaster pistol in all three games, so presumably it's the same sort of thing.

Yeah, the weapons used by the pre-gens in all the prior Beginner Box games were generic weapons no matter what the art looked like. Since it's a Beginner Box, there's no need to come up with a host of new crunch.

As for Rey's staff, could probably just write that up as a gaffi stick from EotE. It's what I did for a PC in my FaD game that wanted a heavy staff (not too unlike Rey's coincidentally), and it worked out pretty well.

Honestly an Era book is what's missing. I mean, we still need some career books, as the three bounty hunters in my campaign will tell you until the day they die, but even just a single setting book, perhaps a bigger one. I'd pay another $60 to get a core-book sized book, or even half that size, if it's all new content and not the obligatory rehash of "How to Dice". I love this series, but many of those I talk to would like to see a book detailing settings for the Old Republic, the Clone Wars, or the New Trilogy Era.

****, I would absolutely put core-book money down on a core-book sized product that had material covering all of the eras.

To be honest, I have zero interest in setting any RPG adventures/campaigns during the ST era at this time. Probably won't change until a few years after the third ST movie is released. Right now, TFA is such a derivative of the OT material that it just feels like the same stuff all over again. On top of that, there is very little material to pull from. The "new EU" has mostly been focused on OT era or stuff or story lines directly related to the main characters. Hopefully the next two movies will help to set the ST apart from the OT and PT and do the required "world-building", but right now, it just feels same-same. As it stands, this product is really just a shameless money grab by FFG to cash in on May the 4th Day and all the other Star Wars mania going on right now.

The story of TFA quoted the OT quite closely.

But the bits that actually matter for an RPG? Way, way different.

You have two eras to choose from: The New Republic era - between the Battle of Jakku and the firing of Starkiller Base - where your characters can work for a government that isn't overtly evil, isn't particularly militarized, and might do things like hunting down First Order agents (and double-agents) hiding in the New Republic and actively seeking to undermine it (which has the interesting side-effect of the characters a sort of anti-inquisitor - with the added drawback that the people they're hunting might be very powerful in the New Republic) and what I'll call the post-New Republic era - which follows the firing of Starkiller Base, its destruction, and the end of TFA - wherein the government has collapsed and your characters are struggling to survive in a basically post-apocalyptic galaxy, wandering lawless worlds in the Core, fighting corrupt former agents of the New Republic, agents of the First Order, and possibly even fighting massive battles in space and on the ground to defend worlds and systems from the depredations of the First Order (plus pirates and rogue New Republic Navy forces that decided to go everyman for himself).

The New Republic era is vaguely similar to the Rise of the Empire/late-Old Republic/Clone Wars era, but minus all the things that made the prequels horrible.

Frankly, the last time the Star Wars universe offered a period so open-ended in scope was 1999 (for the period from the Battle of Naboo to the Battle of Geonosis) or, more popularly, 1977 (something the FFG RPGs attempt to capture by setting their games in the period between Yavin and Hoth).

Now that's a very interesting interpretation of the galaxy post-TFA. I suppose it makes sense if the space government has been destroyed for everything to fracture. Planets cowering under the threat of the First Order, the onset of terrors from beyond the stars, petty empires springing up, frontier worlds left even more lawless than before - sort of a cross between Firefly and the Horus Heresy.

I imagine that VIII and IX will clarify everything for us, but until then we've got a whole galaxy to play with as we please.

Or modify depending on your view on how the movie should have shown?

In my case Poe still involved, flies the Falcon to Han who takes them to Takodana where Han contacts Leia who calls upon an old friend retiring Admiral Ackbar whose attending the decommissioning of Home One and they use the opportunity to take Home One on its last trip to be dismantled via Takodana accompanied by a honour guard of starfighters.

Star killer base was the original Death Star, Tarkin went with the two smaller versions as it takes decades to get SKB operational.

It jumps into the Hosnian System shortly after Home One leaves, it activates its superweapon effectively wiping out the system.

Kylo raids Takodana, he flees once Home One makes an appearance and Poe takes charge of a local Fighter wing.

Han & Finn pursue Kylo after he escapes with a captive Rey with both ships crashing on the surface of SKB after it jumps in system to pick up Kylo.

Like ANH it takes SKB time to get into position to properly destroy Takodana this gives Han time to sabotage the oscillator and bring down the shields.

The only other difference is that they don't succeed in blowing up SKB just render its main weapon useless and SKB defenceless forcing them to flee.

There will be a callback to SKB as its too important not to, sigh maybe that's just me not liking all those superweapon being blown up like they do with every new Enterprise in the rebooted movies!

Well if this thread did one thing, it's that it gave me an idea for having a campaign where the PCs are aboard the about-to-be decommissioned Home One when the Hosnian System is destroyed. Cue Battlestar Galactica with X-Wings.

Well if this thread did one thing, it's that it gave me an idea for having a campaign where the PCs are aboard the about-to-be decommissioned Home One when the Hosnian System is destroyed. Cue Battlestar Galactica with X-Wings.

Well, you certainly can't use the Liberty..

Shame that...

There will be a callback to SKB as its too important not to, sigh maybe that's just me not liking all those superweapon being blown up like they do with every new Enterprise in the rebooted movies!

It does get a bit tiring doesn't it?

Well if this thread did one thing, it's that it gave me an idea for having a campaign where the PCs are aboard the about-to-be decommissioned Home One when the Hosnian System is destroyed. Cue Battlestar Galactica with X-Wings.

Actually that's a pretty amazing idea.

Well if this thread did one thing, it's that it gave me an idea for having a campaign where the PCs are aboard the about-to-be decommissioned Home One when the Hosnian System is destroyed. Cue Battlestar Galactica with X-Wings.

Actually that's a pretty amazing idea.

I'm not sure how to make it work, but I really want to. Perhaps having the PCs as bridge crew, or a star fighter unit?

Well if this thread did one thing, it's that it gave me an idea for having a campaign where the PCs are aboard the about-to-be decommissioned Home One when the Hosnian System is destroyed. Cue Battlestar Galactica with X-Wings.

Actually that's a pretty amazing idea.

I'm not sure how to make it work, but I really want to. Perhaps having the PCs as bridge crew, or a star fighter unit?

Well if the PCs are senior officers, and you play the X Wing miniatures game, you could even use that to game out dogfights, with the player of the CAG in charge of the Republic forces.

You could have everyone make 2 characters... 1 to be a senior officer, and another to be part of the fighter squadron or recon unit that does most of the action stuff.

That's a good suggestion having the players make two characters, and it's probably the only way to make it work properly. X-Wing's a little thin on the ground in terms of ships to make it work until we see some more films, though I assume all the EU ships could be brought back into the canon.