First off, I 100% get that this game is story driven first and foremost, and that relevant choices should be made with your characters identity in mind.

With that said, I'm curious what peoples thoughts are in regards to how much of your starting XP should be dedicated to characteristics. I'm really torn right now. On the one hand, our group meets once every 2-4 weeks, and our campaigns don't usually last longer then 8 months to 1 year.

So in that vain, I'd be tempted to spend minimal amounts of experience on characteristics, and more on ability tree upgrades that make the character more unique.

On the other hand, more characteristics while boring, let my character be more involved in the story because rolling 3/4 dice is really nice.

On that note, I'm curious of peoples experience in enjoyment of having more characteristics at a 3, vs having less 3's and instead bumping a characteristics up to 4.

So alot of questions, but rather then speculate, I thought I'd ask the community what you guys have found work in your games.

(all of this will be helpful next month when we have our first official start to our campaign, so I can bring some of this experience to others & myself during character creation.)

Personal preference will obviously play a part here, but so does your party dynamic. Having several characteristics at three means that you can get by without spending a lot on derivative skills. If you have a one or two characteristic in a skill you think you'll need, you'll have to pay for skill ranks to make up the difference. Conventional wisdom is to spend as much of your starting XP on characteristics as possible.

As I mentioned, though, your party dynamic plays into this. It's easier to play a character who's really bad at social skills, for example, if your party has a "face" who can pick up the slack in that area. PCs with a narrow focus can be shockingly good at that one thing, even just out of character generation. It also gives that PC a chance to shine and accomplish improbably heroic things in that one area - you'll just need to accept mediocrity (or worse) in other areas until you can build up compensating skills.

And as I said before, personal preference is the final arbiter in this. Some folks like playing jack-of-all-trades generalists, while others enjoy being subject-matter experts in their chosen field. Both are viable approaches, but it's nice to know how the rest of your party feels before you create a character.

The characteristic thing is a bit like, but not identical, to old 7th Sea.

So, if you play approximately once per month, perhaps twice, that means you have somewhere between 8 and 16 sessions for the "shorter" campaigns. Let's say 12 as a nice even middle ground.

Numberswise, if you get on average 15 XP per session that's 180 XP total, ish, depending on how the GM awards XP. If your GM is like me, he may award closer to 20 XP on average per session, at least the first half campaign. Depending on your build and where you want to end up, spend starting XP as you see fit with this total XP count.

Admittedly, I've never done what I've just suggested. I started a campaign August last year, and we're having session 41 tomorrow. Or thereabouts. The first few months are a bit vague on what happened during what session. So, I have GMd 40 sessions already, some using pre-mades (which have relatively high XP awards per chapter), others being improvised and others again being planned by yours truly. Looking at their earned XP, I see that I average a bit over 20 - even if I usually only dish out 15 per session these days. So yeah, 40 sessions at, let's for argument say 20XP, that's 800 XP. They have a bit more than that - I also award XP for writing log (4 xp), extraordinary playing gets some extra, plot points, chapter endings, actions that move the plot along dramatically, extra XP. I'm not sure I can recommend it as a great tactic, but it is fun. Although now things are... well... it's getting out of hand

All that was a long-winded way to get to this: in the two other games I play in, where I'm not GMing, I play a hyper focused hotshot/rigger in one of them. I'm a good shot, but beyond that, 2s... 1s... I love to play that character. Rolling 2 dice against 3 are bad odds, but it makes for a lot more fun roleplaying, even if you fail. It's a story in the making, it's risky, it's very much good fun. Having many 3s is cool. You are above average at lots of stuff, but you excel at little, not before another Dedication comes along (if you want to "waste" XP on that ) or you spend your XP on skill ranks. My point is, if you want a talented and skilled character, spend starting XP on talents and skills, as well as a characteristic or two. If you want someone who's a good all-rounder, innate ability as well as some training, characteristics and a talent or two. Or go the hyper focused way, get to that 4, or 5, in a characteristic, get a talent if you can, but get into that niche of excelling at one thing, and be average or below average Joe on everything else.

Personally, my preference is, I think, lots of 3s and some talents or skills. My hotshot has 4 agility, and I bumped Intellect up to 3 (iirc), but the rest are twos, almost no skills except starting skills.. and some talents (and too much starting obligation, for cash mainly.) My other PC is a Kyuzo trailblazer. No 4s, only 3s and 2s. Quite a good selection of skills and a few talents (started at knight-level, but with reduced starting cash, as we are rebels fair ruling from the GM in my opinion,) and I spent some time spending my starting cash to get the right weapon, right attachments and gear. It's important.

In my group, that I GM, one player (mirialan) made a major investment into Agility, it's what he can ... and he's about as cunning as a wall. He kicks serious behind in combat, Ataru striker and force rating 3 ... so ... saberswarm... he can't really take much of a beating, and its happened more than once that he falls unconscious due to his own actions, spending all his strain. The wookiee focused on brawn, somewhat, but went for talents (he is a meat wall) and some skill, and enhance. The human went for low stats, then talents, and force powers... the last one is arguably the most powerful, no stat is higher than 3 (I believe), but the talents combined with skills and force powers makes him a veritable army destroyer...

Standard Operating process is put as much as possible in to Characteristics, as the only way to put em up in game is with the dedication Talent.

Now as to 3s Vs 4 this is debated. I say it depends on the spec. If your specification is fairly narrowly focused, say droid tech, and most skills come frome one or two stats. Then go for the 4. If you need say AGI + Brawn + something else for a slick gunslinger/charmer, then have more 3s.

Saying all that SW RPG is not really a system that requires Min/Maxing as it is much more about the character. So if you wish more talents/Skills feel free to go for it.

My players went for the 4/3/2/2/2/2 pattern at first, then spent the rest of session 0 and part of session 1 trying to decide which characteristic got the 4. So I offered the 3/3/3/3/2/2 approach, and everybody jumped on it and have been happier since. It sounds a bit generic, but once they started upgrading their skills and talents, the differentiations became very clear. At this point, because I've been generous with XP and the PCs have earned over 500XP so far (with one or two Dedications each), each is very unique.

Does how long the campaign lasts, how often you play, and how much XP you earn per session play a factor in any of your decisions?

(I ask, because if I played weekly like I used too, I'd put it all in characteristics, and develop the rest as the story dictated. but considering the infrequency of play, I'd be sad to see my jedi put all of his XP into characteristics, only to have him go 1/2 way down 1 tree, and pick up 1 force power over an entire campaign.)

I meet in a similar fashion as yours and used to run my game as the rules imply. My players playing Jedi were always so xp hungry and I sensed their desire for more knight level abilities so I started knight level once. It helped but I found that I'm comfortable enough as a GM to crank it up a few notches. Since advancement and earned xp happened so slowly, I had them start with a sizeable chunk of xp to start with. So they built there characters, then had 200-400 xp to plow through after creation that represented previous adventuring. They ate it up and have been more satisified. I still award them normal xp but the fact that they can get closer to those nicer bottom teir talents or build the Jedi they imagine in their heads really increased the happiness at my table. It honestly hasn't been that hard to GM them either. I love this system.

Granted my group meets once a month so the players making characters as intended means in one year have gained 360 xp in a years worth of gaming but at times we miss a month and it just wasn't happening as fast as our campaigns were lasting. Our sessions are longer as well so advancement doesn't happen for chunks of story. Your mileage may very.

It really depends on how many skills of that characteristic you are using. Only plan to use perception and don't think you will use deception, skullduggery or survival as much, whether through talents or roleplaying? You don't NEED that higher cunning, just ranks in perception. Same goes for intelligence, want to navigate the stars but don't see yourself fixing ships or hacking computers, you don't need the intelligence bump.

Personally, I prefer to think about which characteristic I will use the most, normally what I will swing my lightsaber in, and make sure that is a 3 at starting, could be specie's or xp. Then look at what else I would need and make sure that is 3. (aturi striker might want that extra brawl for its soak, presence based Peacekeeper might want willpower).

Once I have those real building blocks I race through the tree to get a dedication. To me 40xp for 4 isn't worth it. I will buy the dedication for 25xp. Also I would rather have talent than skill ranks. Never have spent 25xp on 5th rank, you could buy a nee tree for that price!

Imho "all" xp should be spend on characteristics. It provides the most solid builds in the long run, see character development via the talent threes from one session to the next, allows for easier learning of the system, etc

If you are already familiar with all that, I would recommend in general to directly start with "knight level" play, a suggestion from the FaD core rule book which gives you additional 150 xp for talents and skills. This gives you a somewhat more fleshed out character which has already a clear direction and ironically is the perfect representation for a 14 year old jedi padawan.

Individual characteristics allocation should depend on your character concept. Narrow-minded highly specialist and focused characters with a starting characteristic of 5 can be fun, but they will depend heavily on the rest of the group on anything which is not based on their prodigious characteristic.

At the same time you can build very interesting (and skill dependant) characters with a wide range of abilities with a spread out build or create very interesting combos with a focus on two characteristic, for example the mix of high soak with high agility can focus on shooting, melee, flying, ataru lightsaber techniques, etc … creates a very physical and athletic character. Int + Agi would be another very interesting combo for example for an Ace: Rigger or Technician: Modder who can fly and shoot like an ace, while maintain and mod for the whole group equipment and ships and is still the nerd of the group. Our groups astromech falls into that category, and this build comes with the advantage to get easily two characteristics outstanding values with the help of cyberware and/or a few ranks of dedication.

For the xp question, we are as well on about a session per months and we gained in the last 12 months about 250xp per character.

One last thing, getting a career skill up from zero to five is "just" 75 xp. If the group spreads out a few tasks that way rolling 5 dice becomes quite normal regardless of characteristics.

The first big question: Are you going for a generalist or specialist? Generalists can get away with 3s across the board, while specialists should have at least a 4 in their primary attribute.

Second point: It's much easier to get characteristics up first instead of the talents and skills. The talents and skills can be acquired over time, while it can be a real pain to boost characteristics. Depending on the spec, the minimum cost is 75 Experience, while a few specs go up 150 Experience (looking at you, Slicer).

The first big question: Are you going for a generalist or specialist? Generalists can get away with 3s across the board, while specialists should have at least a 4 in their primary attribute.

Second point: It's much easier to get characteristics up first instead of the talents and skills. The talents and skills can be acquired over time, while it can be a real pain to boost characteristics. Depending on the spec, the minimum cost is 75 Experience, while a few specs go up 150 Experience (looking at you, Slicer).

For now, I'm not sure what route I'll be going. We'll be doing character generation together, so I didn't want to necessarily commit to one idea ahead of time.

My overall preference would be a making a Mystic Healer who focuses on grabbing a high force rating followed by alot of powers, but again, how everything shakes up will play an important role.

It really depends on how your GM runs the game, maybe breaking it down will help:

1. Does the GM always set it up so there is one thing for each expert to do that needs that level of attention and capability?

2. Or do they mix it up, pull people out of their comfort zones, impose skill checks for often-overlooked things like Fear, exhaustion, etc? Does the Face sometimes have to Pilot, and the Merc sometimes have to Charm?

3. Do the campaigns run to a grand make-or-break finale?

4. Or are they a setup for the next campaign?

If 1 and 3, then you'll probably want at least a 3 (if not a 4) in one chosen characteristic, and spend most of your XP on selected skills and the talents that enhance them. They will pretty much suck outside the bounds of their chosen areas, but that could be amusing too.

If 2 and 3, then you might want a generalist, and also suggest to your GM to double the XP awards to ensure you shine by the end. There's nothing worse than a Wookie Marauder who can't make a Fear check against common thugs.

If 4 it doesn't matter as much about 1 and 2, but you might be happier in the long run with someone who starts out broadly capable.

IMO, I'd go for a ""middle ground". I'd spend about 75 to 80% of your starting XP on Characteristics, and the rest on Specializations, Talents, Skills, and/or Force Powers.

The first big question: Are you going for a generalist or specialist? Generalists can get away with 3s across the board, while specialists should have at least a 4 in their primary attribute.

Second point: It's much easier to get characteristics up first instead of the talents and skills. The talents and skills can be acquired over time, while it can be a real pain to boost characteristics. Depending on the spec, the minimum cost is 75 Experience, while a few specs go up 150 Experience (looking at you, Slicer).

For now, I'm not sure what route I'll be going. We'll be doing character generation together, so I didn't want to necessarily commit to one idea ahead of time.

My overall preference would be a making a Mystic Healer who focuses on grabbing a high force rating followed by alot of powers, but again, how everything shakes up will play an important role.

You should really only need Intelligence, for the Heal force power and medicine checks and Willpower for your offensive force powers like move, bind, or influence. I would not invest in any other characteristic but rather the skills that go with them (perception, cool, brawl etc.

First off I like to try tough things with my characters, and a 4 dice pool vs a Hard check is much nicer than 3. Characters with many 3's in my experience can end up overshadowed by other more focused party members. But if your willing to split from the party regularly then it's very very helpful.

IMHO I like the 432221 spread that the majority of species can offer. It allows for some very cool big dice rolls even on skills your untrained in. It also allows you to have a secondary focus, potentially unrelated to your primary, to broaden your characters options. Then it also allows for a character flaw, which I really enjoy playing up when I'm not GMing. That spread also leaves you with between 10 and 30 XP (depending on species) to spend on Skills, Talents and Force Powers.

Droids and Humans are their own beast;

Humans are great for the 333222 with 20-30xp to spend on other stuff.

Droids are HARD! 432111 with extra for other stuff is about the most thematic. Droids really rely on skill ranks and a GM wiling to give them Cybernetics as rewards (or bucket loads of credits). You have to play up and utilise the major stereotypes of Droids in the SW universe too, they don't eat, everyone treats them like furniture, they don't need to breath etc.

There is 442221 as a another option with some alien species, it eats up all starting xp and then 10 extra which you can get from extra obligations or sacrificing some points duty in duty or choosing to the extra 10 xp on his morality options instead of credits or morality decreases/increases.

522222 (human) and 532211 (some aliens with double ones) is another options this way for very talented, focused, but unskilled characters.

But as a lot of people have pointed at, all kinds of builds have their own merits and in the end it all depends on how you want to play your character. Outside of a spaceship I would never go anywhere with my Agi 6 verpine without group support, while our force user has lots of 3s and can work a lot easier independ from the rest of the group.

The first big question: Are you going for a generalist or specialist? Generalists can get away with 3s across the board, while specialists should have at least a 4 in their primary attribute.

Second point: It's much easier to get characteristics up first instead of the talents and skills. The talents and skills can be acquired over time, while it can be a real pain to boost characteristics. Depending on the spec, the minimum cost is 75 Experience, while a few specs go up 150 Experience (looking at you, Slicer).

For now, I'm not sure what route I'll be going. We'll be doing character generation together, so I didn't want to necessarily commit to one idea ahead of time.

My overall preference would be a making a Mystic Healer who focuses on grabbing a high force rating followed by alot of powers, but again, how everything shakes up will play an important role.

Intelligence would be a good characteristic to have a 4 in, since the more difficult heal checks are usually at 3 difficulty dice with setback and usually a Destiny flip.

A second question is if you are going for the EotE/AoR "healer" specs, as those can add some utility and overlap for you. Certain talents in those specs appear earlier in some, and being able to reroll heal checks can be helpful.

The first big question: Are you going for a generalist or specialist? Generalists can get away with 3s across the board, while specialists should have at least a 4 in their primary attribute.

Second point: It's much easier to get characteristics up first instead of the talents and skills. The talents and skills can be acquired over time, while it can be a real pain to boost characteristics. Depending on the spec, the minimum cost is 75 Experience, while a few specs go up 150 Experience (looking at you, Slicer).

For now, I'm not sure what route I'll be going. We'll be doing character generation together, so I didn't want to necessarily commit to one idea ahead of time.

My overall preference would be a making a Mystic Healer who focuses on grabbing a high force rating followed by alot of powers, but again, how everything shakes up will play an important role.

You should really only need Intelligence, for the Heal force power and medicine checks and Willpower for your offensive force powers like move, bind, or influence. I would not invest in any other characteristic but rather the skills that go with them (perception, cool, brawl etc.

Yeah, WIllpower and maybe Cunning can be extremely useful, since being able to go first and spot trouble is always an advantage.