As one of my friends pointed out, the only 'downside' of this box is that it doesn't really match with the other boxes on the art department. For the other 3 boces, they've used original art, but for this one they've gone with movie stills. While it doesn't really bother me, I do have to agree with him that this box feels somewhat like the odd man out because of it. Wouldn't have mind to see some nice TFA art that hasn't been used yet. (This was actually one of my pet peeves with the Special Modifications book, in that they used art from the Essential Species Guide instead of creating their own.)

But from a marketing standpoint, I completely understand why they did it. Just looking at the box from afar, you can immediately tell it's The Force Awakens. Seems like THE perfect product to get new people into the game, especially younger people who just got introduced to Star Wars through TFA.

Could also be that it's placeholder art.

A number of companies do that, especially if a product is still in development.

Given it's been a long drought since FFG made a product announcement, they probably wanted to have something on hand for May the Fourth, and so opted to show a box with the movie-inspired cover just so that they'd have something to show.

Given that the set has the same name as the movie it would be bizarre for them *not* to use the standard graphics!

As one of my friends pointed out, the only 'downside' of this box is that it doesn't really match with the other boxes on the art department. For the other 3 boces, they've used original art, but for this one they've gone with movie stills. While it doesn't really bother me, I do have to agree with him that this box feels somewhat like the odd man out because of it. Wouldn't have mind to see some nice TFA art that hasn't been used yet. (This was actually one of my pet peeves with the Special Modifications book, in that they used art from the Essential Species Guide instead of creating their own.)

But from a marketing standpoint, I completely understand why they did it. Just looking at the box from afar, you can immediately tell it's The Force Awakens. Seems like THE perfect product to get new people into the game, especially younger people who just got introduced to Star Wars through TFA.

I detested the pre-sequels (Phantom Menace was just about okay, maybe...) but I'd be absolutely fine if they made a splatbook for it. Good for those who like it, and easy to ignore or mine for those who don't.

I'd be chuffed if there was an Old Republic book too. More stuff is always good.

But as others have said, I think that's unlikely. I'm pretty sure they'll concentrate on the original movies overall. Pretty much the only thing every SW fan agrees on is that the original movies were good.

I'm pretty certain we're only seeing the Force Awakens stuff because of contractual obligations anyway.

Desslok, you made me cry

I think there is a hate "bandwagon". People in general love to jump on it. It becomes cool with the crowd to agree on how much they are disliked. This feeling gains momentum and affects other people who also think that's they way they should feel, and the consensus spreads. People become conditioned to think it's actual fact. It's quite sad, I think.

Note - I think this applies to many things in life, not just popular media. Positively and negatively.

I wish people would make up their own mind and ignore what other people think.

That's the thing, sure the movies themselves were flawed from a "performance art" point of view, but as far as all the new content that they added to the Star Wars meta-verse goes, that can't be discounted. And as we are talking about RPGs here, that is the stuff we live and breath on as it give us ideas and material to work with and flesh out for our own adventures/campaigns. But there is very few people who take and objective, "whole picture" view of the PT. Because "everyone else" says it's bad, then it must be all bad. Also, the Clone Wars animated series was an amazing source of material as well (even for RPGs).

I dunno, I liked the clone wars when it was a war between clones, before it became separatist droids vs republic clones. The Prequel series established some facts that feel uncomfortable when applied to the rest of the series... like how Obi-wan had to raise Anakin from age 9, instead of being peers of the same age like it was implied in the original trilogy. The Clone Wars added some neat hardware and a look and feel of the Republic era, but I can't really say I like what it did to the narration.

Still, the prequel era does make occasional appearances in "modern" FFG play. It's being treated apocryphally where FFG takes what it wants without being beholden to the lore. I'm fine with this approach, and I'd be down for a prequel trilogy splatbook not just to provide material for those who want to play in that era, but also for those who want to introduce retro-tech to current or Force Awakens era games.

I'd love to see a Force Awakens splatbook though, I wanna play a Tarsunt now.

I think there is a hate "bandwagon". People in general love to jump on it. It becomes cool with the crowd to agree on how much they are disliked. This feeling gains momentum and affects other people who also think that's they way they should feel, and the consensus spreads. People become conditioned to think it's actual fact. It's quite sad, I think.

Note - I think this applies to many things in life, not just popular media. Positively and negatively.

I wish people would make up their own mind and ignore what other people think.

That's the thing, sure the movies themselves were flawed from a "performance art" point of view, but as far as all the new content that they added to the Star Wars meta-verse goes, that can't be discounted. And as we are talking about RPGs here, that is the stuff we live and breath on as it give us ideas and material to work with and flesh out for our own adventures/campaigns. But there is very few people who take and objective, "whole picture" view of the PT. Because "everyone else" says it's bad, then it must be all bad. Also, the Clone Wars animated series was an amazing source of material as well (even for RPGs).

I dunno, I liked the clone wars when it was a war between clones, before it became separatist droids vs republic clones.

Why did you think it was a war between clones? Surely we didn't know anything about the clone wars before Ep II was released, apart from that it happened?

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Why did you think it was a war between clones? Surely we didn't know anything about the clone wars before Ep II was released, apart from that it happened?

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Point is some of the inferences in the original trilogy seemed more interesting than what we ultimately got in the prequels. Like Anakin being the best star-pilot in the galaxy and a cunning warrior when Obi-wan met him, not some kid pod racer. You'd think Anakin was like Luke in ANH, and had a similar adventure with Obi-wan, before falling to the dark side.

These little details and others point to a different set of events that happened in the past that the Clone Wars wipes out with its narrative. I just happened to think that inferred prequel story is more interesting than what we got. And it's not likely to happen ever, since Clone Wars and the prequels are one of the few things Disney retained as canon.

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Although to be fair, there was crazy speculation since '77. Back in the day everyone glommed onto that one line and went nuts with the "Are they cloning Jedi? Were the Mandolorians clones?" - every schoolyard seemed to have it's own microcosm of theory and debate during the 10 years of original trilogy.

You know I always assumed the Clone army was created so the Republic would have a truly neutral army to serve the Republic since their standing army was mostly composed from its member worlds.

The Separatists threatened that source, so they developed a replacement in secret not over ten years but far longer the reveal at Kamino was just window dressing so it avoided unnecessary scrutiny if anyone wondered how lucky they were so well prepared when the Separatists forced the member worlds to recall their forces to protect their home worlds from the terrorist antics intended to remove anyone from recognising the real threat.

To me the Jedi Order was already split apart, the Jedi Noble Families the reason for Yoda's caution over emotional ties were already dangerously teetering across the divide between light & dark, it took little to focus their aggression against their Monastic rivals notably led by force users like Yoda.

I picture the Sith as a convenient catspaw to hide the Noble Families aggression and actions to preserve their place and power within the Republic.

It was pathetically easy for Palpatine to trick both sides to fight each other and use the progressively worsening dark siding force users to pin the blame on them.

I picture Republic Knights instead of Jedi Knights, composed of not just force users when the Republic fell and was replaced by the Empire those still loyal became Imperial Knights already familiar with Force User tactics this made them ideal for hunting down surviving Jedi.

Their immediate superiors were the Inquisitors who functioned as teachers as well as Overseers for the Knights with Vader their Grandmaster.

Palpatine however fell prey to his own brilliance ultimately his mind would break as he'd realise like his former Master he was being used by an entity far more powerful than he, ultimately when he confronted Luke on the second Death Star his actions that led to his death was a deliberate act of suicide to free himself and the Republic he once loved from the control of an ancient Sith Spirit that had been confined deep beneath the Jedi Temple on Coruscant.

Snoke I see as a surviving Inquisitor using Kylo to uncover Palpatine's secrets meaning ultimately the First Order must retake Coruscant so they can delve into that long forgotten Sith Prison... sorry went a little too far off the subject!

After seeing Ep. IV when it was released, I had assumed that the Clone WarS were a series of conflicts where all sides involved were cloning troops to fight for them. Clones v. Clones. When Ep. V came out it was mentioned that Boba Fett was a, "clone warrior", so I assumed he was one of the few surviving veterans of these wars. Thus he was a grizzled veteran of many battles PLUS bioengineered to be an extreme warrior. Experience plus genetics made him the most feared bounty hunter in the Galaxy. I recall debates with friends where I took the stance his "Mandalorian armor" was, like Boba, a surviving set of old but marvelous armor once made by the Mandalorians (craftsmen, not warriors).

But, I also liked what was later done in Ep. II. Something I didn't see coming was cool too.

Ebak, on 05 May 2016 - 05:24 AM, said:Ebak, on 05 May 2016 - 05:24 AM, said:

So a farm boy, who we see pilot nothing but a land speeder, manages to pilot a military craft and destroy a superweapon. - legit.

A farm boy that wanted to join the imperial academy of pilots. A farm boy whose father was a great pilot according to Obi-wan. A farm boy saying how awsome he was at swoop racing in the ravin of Tatooine, minutes before the battle of Yavin 4. If those are not clues about Episode 4 ending, I dont know what they are. Rey, on the contrary, is shrouded with so much mystery that they made her look like a Mary Sue when she managed to beat those Ties or when she outclassed Kylo Ren both with the Force and with a lightsaber.

Ebak, on 05 May 2016 - 05:24 AM, said:Ebak, on 05 May 2016 - 05:24 AM, said:

So a farm boy, who we see pilot nothing but a land speeder, manages to pilot a military craft and destroy a superweapon. - legit.

A farm boy that wanted to join the imperial academy of pilots. A farm boy whose father was a great pilot according to Obi-wan. A farm boy saying how awsome he was at swoop racing in the ravin of Tatooine, minutes before the battle of Yavin 4. If those are not clues about Episode 4 ending, I dont know what they are. Rey, on the contrary, is shrouded with so much mystery that they made her look like a Mary Sue when she managed to beat those Ties or when she outclassed Kylo Ren both with the Force and with a lightsaber.

Regarding Kylo Ren, he was NOT at 100% by the time that he and Rey squared off, most notably suffering from a shot to gut from Chewie's bowcaster, a weapon that pretty much steamrolled everything else that got hit by it as well as having his primary sword arm clipped by Finn in the previous fight. During the early part of that fight, Rey spent most of it playing keep away and further trying to wear Kylo out; she had demonstrated an earlier prowess for melee via her staff, so it's not that much of a leap of logic to say she'd have a basic handle on tactics used in close-quarters fighting, and so making a badly injured man have to chase after you to further wear himself out isn't too foreign of an idea; that or she wanted to get that maniac as far away from Finn's body.

As for the TIEs, that was hardly effortless on her part, and she needed Finn's help to finish the job, and her biggest asset during that sequence was her familiarity with the terrain, something the TIE pilots didn't have. Which gave her more of a chance to adjust the Falcon's flight path to avoid obstacles she had a good idea were coming up, while the TIE pilots had to adjust on the fly.

I think the term "Mary Sue" has pretty lost value with how quick a bunch of insecure white males are to apply that label to a female lead that's capable of doing the sorts of things that wouldn't raise an eyebrow if a male lead had the same list of accomplishments. That or the most vocal complainers are pissed about being suckered by a perceived "bait and switch" that it wasn't Finn who was the new lead protagonist of the sequel trilogy.

I wager we'd have not heard nearly as many gripes about how TFA's leading protagonist if it had been male, and most of those gripes would have likely been "what, this again?"

A Mary Sue is kind of like a physical sensation, in that you can't exactly explain what it is to somebody who has never felt anything. You can't really define the term in a few simple words, you can't lay out a list of qualities that define what they are, and you can't set absolute boundaries on what one is, because suffering can come in all shapes and sizes. I can give a few examples of what a Mary Sue actually is (as in, the 'classic' definition), but it would mean I'd have to subject everybody to mental torture, and I think that might get me arrested.

I suppose one could start by describing a Mary Sue as a disaster of some sort, a catastrophe, in that nobody knows what it is when it happens, and people are touched by it in varying degrees, from victims at ground zero to unharmed observers a world away, but everybody but the most ignorant or deliberately stupid agrees on what it was, despite them all experiencing it in different manners. Except most disasters may kill some of its victims, at least, whereas a Mary Sue won't, forcing them to suffer.

It irks me that people throw the Mary Sue label around incorrectly, but only slightly more than saying that it has no meaning; people just need a more direct exposure to understand.

Actually, let me sum up by saying Rey is no Jenna Silverblade and that ignorance is bliss.

Hadn't heard of that character before, so I went and checked...

Huh, well hopefully they won't go with her being

Well on the plus side maybe she is

Can't wait to see what we have coming! This now actually sets up the pattern that FFG will use for non-Civil War era play!

Wonder if Prequels are now in the pipe?

I'm already getting ready! Going to use EotE as my main rulebook though:

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/220866-the-tyrexian-chronicles/

But I might post on this forum once the Beginner Game arrives

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Not exactly ... in '83 there was a Book-n-Record called "Droid World" in which Luke, R2, and 3PO went to ... you guessed it ... Droid World. Anywho, in it there was a line about "droids that the Jedi fought in the Clone Wars." While it wasn't ever described in detail, Lucas actually had all the basic information about everything in his notebook from the very earliest stages. He was a lot like Tolkien in that respect. He wound up having the basic story for all 6 movies (prequels and originals) before he settled on what to make the movie from.

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Not exactly ... in '83 there was a Book-n-Record called "Droid World" in which Luke, R2, and 3PO went to ... you guessed it ... Droid World. Anywho, in it there was a line about "droids that the Jedi fought in the Clone Wars." While it wasn't ever described in detail, Lucas actually had all the basic information about everything in his notebook from the very earliest stages. He was a lot like Tolkien in that respect. He wound up having the basic story for all 6 movies (prequels and originals) before he settled on what to make the movie from.

That was actually an adaptation of issue 47 of the original Marvel comics run, the same run responsible for such accuracies as a bipedal yellow Jabba the Hut (sic), the Majestrix of Skye telling Luke about he planet having been visited by Obi-Wan and his two partners Darth Vader and Luke's (unnamed) father, and *ahem* "favorite" elements of Lucas' such as Jaxxon. Archie Goodwin got lucky on the idea of the Jedi fighting droids during the Clone Wars.

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Not exactly ... in '83 there was a Book-n-Record called "Droid World" in which Luke, R2, and 3PO went to ... you guessed it ... Droid World. Anywho, in it there was a line about "droids that the Jedi fought in the Clone Wars." While it wasn't ever described in detail, Lucas actually had all the basic information about everything in his notebook from the very earliest stages. He was a lot like Tolkien in that respect. He wound up having the basic story for all 6 movies (prequels and originals) before he settled on what to make the movie from.

One of the biggest misconceptions about Star Wars (and just about any fandom) is that they've been planned from the get-go . Hate to burst your bubble, but other than some brief notes, not much was planned ahead. Embedded link shows Lucas's notepad RE: Star Wars saga planning.

Edit: As far as anything that was published outside of the movies, Lucas never considered any of it to be part of his universe . None of it. He would throw in some advice here or there, but he wasn't even nearly as involved with it as he was in TCW cartoon.

Edit 2: I had that Book-n-Record and I loved it.

One of the biggest misconceptions about Star Wars (and just about any fandom) is that they've been planned from the get-go . Hate to burst your bubble, but other than some brief notes, not much was planned ahead. Embedded link shows Lucas's notepad RE: Star Wars saga planning.

Planned out in every detail? No, certainly not. Mapped out with broad strokes? Much more likely. I remember when I was a kid people asking him "Wait - episode V? Where are the other three?" and Lucas responding that 1-3 was where all the boring politics and set up was, that part 4 was the stronger place to start the story, that if he started with the first one, the others would have never been made.

So at least at a high level, he had some idea where the story was going.

That was something that was implied or inferred in the original Thrawn trilogy. Lucas never described what the Clone Wars was about, so it was up to the writers to come up with their own interpretation.

Not exactly ... in '83 there was a Book-n-Record called "Droid World" in which Luke, R2, and 3PO went to ... you guessed it ... Droid World. Anywho, in it there was a line about "droids that the Jedi fought in the Clone Wars." While it wasn't ever described in detail, Lucas actually had all the basic information about everything in his notebook from the very earliest stages. He was a lot like Tolkien in that respect. He wound up having the basic story for all 6 movies (prequels and originals) before he settled on what to make the movie from.

One of the biggest misconceptions about Star Wars (and just about any fandom) is that they've been planned from the get-go . Hate to burst your bubble, but other than some brief notes, not much was planned ahead. Embedded link shows Lucas's notepad RE: Star Wars saga planning.

Edit: As far as anything that was published outside of the movies, Lucas never considered any of it to be part of his universe . None of it. He would throw in some advice here or there, but he wasn't even nearly as involved with it as he was in TCW cartoon.

Edit 2: I had that Book-n-Record and I loved it.

had "Droid World" when I was a kid and if I remember correctly there was another one that I can't seem to remember the name of that I had. (edit: was Rebel Mission to Ord Mantell)

Lucas did have a written back story to the star wars film, but it is nothing like the prequels.

It was only a few pages long and just covered the last fight between Obi-wan and Anakin.

When goes to some volcano planet to retrieve a special gem for the Emperor.