Looting

By HistoryGuy, in Star Wars: Edge of the Empire RPG

Games like The Elder Scrolls Online have Thieves Guilds which are the only groups you can sell "stolen" gear to, and even then, you have a daily limit for how much you can sell. Something to that effect can be done here: not only are you getting just 10% of the store value of the item, but the buyer will only take 2-3 off your hands before declaring the whole venture too risky.

If people become real murder hobos, that might be a great time to start enforcing the encumbrance rules. Good luck carrying around 20 blasters.

The low encumbrance threshold is IMO one of the best tools to prevent looting. I used to love the Elder Scrolls games (particularly Morrowind - ah, so many hours years lost to that game), but there was something completely ridiculous about being able to carry 4 suits of armour, half a dozen swords and a chest full of potions without any penalties. When you've got those kind of mechanics, it encourages looting.

In EotE a single Ranged Heavy weapon can take up over half your encumbrance, and that's without getting into Tool Kits, Medpacs and other pretty crucial stuff. I'm not big on excessive book-keeping, but I do really like making my players actually think about what they're going to take with them on an adventure, and what they're going to leave on the ship (and if they really, really need something, well, that's what Destiny Points are for).

So, this is how I deal with looting:

First off, choose whether you're SEARCHING for intact items using the Perception skill, or SALVAGING potentially broken items to try and assemble a working item using the Mechanics skill.

It costs a base time of 10 minutes to Search (usually), and 30 minutes to Salvage. I might end up increasing those, though.

If you have plenty of time, you can do both, however the 2nd check that is made will incur 2 setbacks.

If you have LESS time, there are a few options; each advantage can reduce time by 1 minutes (to a minimum of 5 and ten minutes, respectively). You can also try and do a quick Search/Salvage; reduce the time by 2 minutes at the cost of a setback die. Threats can increase the time (if they're not on a time crunch, I don't use threats to increase time though, preferring to deal strain and setbacks, etc)

I also throw out setbacks for instances of things like: Lightsabers (or other breach or high Pierce weapons), blast weapons, extremely high damage, excessive crits, etc. These damage gear.

Once the roll is complete, each success corresponds to a piece of loot. HOWEVER, I have loot tables that I roll randomly on. These will often include items that were not listed in the adversary's stat blocks; that's on purpose. If, instead of a random roll, you want a specific piece of gear that an enemy had on them, you must spend 2 successes (and if it's sufficiently high credit cost, rarity, or a custom piece of equipment for the NPC, each requires an additional success. It cost the mechanic character something like 4 or 5 successes to Salvage a Dark Trooper's Plasma Shell Assault Cannon, for instance).

Triumphs allow you to either make a roll on the RARE loot table with each success, or it costs 1 success less to find a specific piece of equipment. So if fighting Stormtroopers, and got 3 Successes, and a Triumph, you can Make one roll ont he rare table, one to get a blaster rifle, and one to get their armor, etc.

This has worked very well for my group. I should post the loot table; I got it originally from somewhere on here, I think, but I changed it a lot. Maybe when I get home.