Hi, I'm pretty new to being a GM and have been trying to look for some cool enemies to throw at my group. I've been looking into the Death Troopers from Rogue One recently but don't know if there are already any stats for them in other books since I only have the EotE books, or if one of the adversaries from the decks would work, and if so which one? I've also been thinking about building them from the ground up but I honestly have no idea how to approach that. Any suggestions would be appreciated

You could probably just use the Dark Trooper stats but give them Ranged Heavy weapons instead or Gunnery Weapons.

Or maybe the Stormtrooper Sergeant, though maybe bump Ranged Heavy and Discipline skills to 3 ranks (though the RAW state seldom do skills go above 2 it would differentiate them from the Sarge and make them seem more spec ops)

The Rogue One visual guide says they are taken from standard stormtrooper ranks if they show potential and meet the high physical standards, being 6'5" or taller, etc. They are then augmented with unkown cybernetic and possibly genetic modifications. I would probably use the standard stormtrooper stats, but up their Brawn and Agility by either 1 or 2 to reflect their enhancements. Then give them better gear, armor and weapons with the Superior quality, or other mods.

Nemesis Stormtroopers?

EDIT - Actually, thinking about that - that may not be a bad way to do it. Take your average minion group and shamelessly break the rules by giving them an Adversary level or two. Mind you, I'm just thinking off the top of my head here. No idea how that would work in play, if it's too broken or what.

44 minutes ago, Desslok said:

Nemesis Stormtroopers?

EDIT - Actually, thinking about that - that may not be a bad way to do it. Take your average minion group and shamelessly break the rules by giving them an Adversary level or two. Mind you, I'm just thinking off the top of my head here. No idea how that would work in play, if it's too broken or what.

It sounds nice. If you keep the other rules intact (like dieing on a crit, and taking strain as wounds) the adversary rank should be enough to make the minions Death Troopers feel more powerful and disconcerting to the PCs. In addition said PCs might start to worry at what a Death Trooper sergeant looks like, and they might want to avoid the Lieutenant altogether.

1 hour ago, Desslok said:

Nemesis Stormtroopers?

EDIT - Actually, thinking about that - that may not be a bad way to do it. Take your average minion group and shamelessly break the rules by giving them an Adversary level or two. Mind you, I'm just thinking off the top of my head here. No idea how that would work in play, if it's too broken or what.

Don't forget to give all of their attacks the linked quality.

Sound more like rival level to me. Ran some encounters a while back with the rival level storm commandos from the AoR beta. Went well. These guys seem to be a similar, if more conventional threat.

This really narrowed things down for me, thanks!

13 hours ago, Ghostofman said:

Sound more like rival level to me. Ran some encounters a while back with the rival level storm commandos from the AoR beta. Went well. These guys seem to be a similar, if more conventional threat.

Make the death trooper seargent and captain nemesis. And give the captain field commander and inspiring rhetoric.

3 hours ago, Daeglan said:

Make the death trooper seargent and captain nemesis. And give the captain field commander and inspiring rhetoric.

Technical this is good for making stronger enemies, but I rather don't see my death troopers talking, they seem more of the silent type. ;-)

45 minutes ago, SEApocalypse said:

Technical this is good for making stronger enemies, but I rather don't see my death troopers talking, they seem more of the silent type. ;-)

They talk if you pay attention in Rogue one they make a weird noise that is scrambled communication. You can't understand with out a death trooper helmet.

Something outside the box.

Keep them minions, use stormtrooper stats.

BUT make Adversary a group skill!

Muhahahaha

That would be awesome

I statted them up for a roleplaying event I'm helping run this weekend. Here's my attempt.

19 hours ago, Funk Fu master said:

Something outside the box.

Keep them minions, use stormtrooper stats.

BUT make Adversary a group skill!

Muhahahaha

That would be awesome

That's a good idea. Here's my entry, with help from the wiki:

Standard Stormtrooper minion stats, with these group skills: Athletics, Brawl, Discipline, Ranged (H), Ranged (L), Stealth

Gave them the "SE-14 Light Repeating Blaster," using blaster pistol stats with addition of Autofire quality, the "E-11D Blaster Rifle" using blaster rifle stats with addition of Pierce 1 quality, and added brass knuckles stats to their Brawl.

And, of course, Adversary 1.

Just did a play-through with three of them vs. Pash and Sasha from the beginner game, and although the 'PCs' won, it was pretty brutal. A solid hit from the light repeating blaster did a cumulative 10 damage to Sasha. Ouch.

10 hours ago, Superunknown said:

That's a good idea. Here's my entry, with help from the wiki:

Standard Stormtrooper minion stats, with these group skills: Athletics, Brawl, Discipline, Ranged (H), Ranged (L), Stealth

Gave them the "SE-14 Light Repeating Blaster," using blaster pistol stats with addition of Autofire quality, the "E-11D Blaster Rifle" using blaster rifle stats with addition of Pierce 1 quality, and added brass knuckles stats to their Brawl.

And, of course, Adversary 1.

Just did a play-through with three of them vs. Pash and Sasha from the beginner game, and although the 'PCs' won, it was pretty brutal. A solid hit from the light repeating blaster did a cumulative 10 damage to Sasha. Ouch.

Interesting reuslts, but Sasha never struck me as the most robust charcter in combat. Try playtesting against Pash and Oskara for a more balanced result, and then against Pash and Lowhrikk to see how a tougher combatant stands up. Or even better use the AoR pregens. it'ss till an interresting result because the detah troopers are powerful but still killable with effort by starting charcters.

That's sort of why I chose those two- they're not particularly combat-focused, but they're pretty capable. Might do a bit more play-testing, but I've got a lot of game prep to do and my time management skills are... poor. :[ Anyway, the results are good enough for now- currently putting together a "Dark Forces" episodic campaign to do in between things, and thought it would be fun to have a few Death Troopers show up at appropriate moments. When the increasingly scary PC characters encounter some, I'll let you know how it goes.

If there's any further changes to be made, might consider boosting their unarmed damage and have occasional groups armed with those rifles the scout troopers use. Forgot to mention it in the previous post, but none of their weapons have a stun setting, because that would be contradictory.

On 1/29/2017 at 1:26 AM, Funk Fu master said:

Something outside the box.

Keep them minions, use stormtrooper stats.

BUT make Adversary a group skill!

Muhahahaha

That would be awesome

Dear god! Adversary as a class skill? "You attack group of 10 deathtroopers at short range. Roll 1 purple 5 Reds for difficulty. 1 Purple for range, +10 upgrades for adversary 10"

...I may have to try this.

On 1/30/2017 at 3:53 PM, Edgookin said:

Dear god! Adversary as a class skill? "You attack group of 10 deathtroopers at short range. Roll 1 purple 5 Reds for difficulty. 1 Purple for range, +10 upgrades for adversary 10"

...I may have to try this.

Now I understand why they named the show “Nevermind the Buzzcocks”.

On 1/30/2017 at 5:53 PM, Edgookin said:

Dear god! Adversary as a class skill? "You attack group of 10 deathtroopers at short range. Roll 1 purple 5 Reds for difficulty. 1 Purple for range, +10 upgrades for adversary 10"

...I may have to try this.

Huh- just realising my misunderstanding here... In the play-through, I just treated the entire group as if it were a rival with the Adversary 1 talent- the idea being to have that danger of something going wrong when you fight them. The weapons load-out is there to boost their damage and ensure that they'll have an opportunity to hit at any range band, making them just a little more effective than other minion groups. Although they're very good at what they do, Death Troopers are just people, right?

HOWEVER. If you want to throw some high-level players into a "boss battle" style fight without giving them an actual boss, a minion group with +10 upgrades is probably not an entirely bad idea.

42 minutes ago, Superunknown said:

Huh- just realising my misunderstanding here... In the play-through, I just treated the entire group as if it were a rival with the Adversary 1 talent- the idea being to have that danger of something going wrong when you fight them. The weapons load-out is there to boost their damage and ensure that they'll have an opportunity to hit at any range band, making them just a little more effective than other minion groups. Although they're very good at what they do, Death Troopers are just people, right?

HOWEVER. If you want to throw some high-level players into a "boss battle" style fight without giving them an actual boss, a minion group with +10 upgrades is probably not an entirely bad idea.

The more I think about it, the more I like adversary as a skill. It represents the intense focus of a group that has trained to work together. Everyone knows exactly what everyone else is doing. Admittedly, letting it go up to 10 may be overkill. But I could see representing an elite squad of 5 to be minions with adversary as a class skill. It provides a step up for some tough group opponents, without needing to dump 5 rivals into a combat.

Weren't the Death Troopers also supposed to be augmented in some non specified fashion? The write up on Wookiepedia indicates that they are some scary bastards

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Death_trooper

From Star Wars Rogue One: Secret Mission:

Their armor is "treated with an advanced coating that makes it hard for sensors to detect," and their E-11D blaster rifles "have been modified to give increased firepower over greater distances."

SPOILERS FOR MY PLAYERS!

I've had positive experiences with using elite minions (Flesh Raiders on Tython), so I liked that idea. Here's what I came up with by combining various ideas from this thread. I feel their weird scrambling helmets should do something, though, but I dunno what. I felt Brawn was the best score to represent their cybernetics, and appropriate for their stature and scariness. I'd consider upping their Agility to 4 if the PCs were really tough, but I'm gonna run them together with "leader"-NPCs that can give them extra boost dice or even actions (stuff like the stormtrooper sergeant's Tactical Direction ability and the inquisitor's Aura of Command), so I wanted to exercise some restraint. The equipment block is a monster, I know, but me and a friend just had to geek out on representing all the weird attachments their weapons seem to have in the movies.

Death Trooper (Minion)

Brawn 4, Agility 3, Intellect 2, Cunning 2, Willpower 3, Presence 1

Soak Value: 6, Wound Threshold: 5, Defense: 1|1
Skills (group only): Athletics, Discipline, Melee, Ranged (Light), Ranged (Heavy), Stealth, Vigilance.

Talents: Adversary 1, Confident 1 (Decrease the difficulty of all fear checks by one).
Abilities: -
Equipment: E11-D blaster rifle with augmented spin barrel, integrated illuminator, laser sight (Ranged [Heavy]; Damage 10; Critical 3; Range [Long]; Stun setting. Gain 1 automatic Advantage on successful combat checks with this weapon. Remove up to 2 Setback dice due to darkness on any checks to use this weapon against targets within short range). BlasTech SE-14r light repeating blaster (Ranged [Light]; Damage 6; Critical 3; Range [Medium]; Auto-fire, Stun setting) C-25 frag grenades (Ranged [Light]; Damage 8; Critical 4; Range [Short]; Blast 6, Limited Ammo 1), serrated vibroknife (Melee; Damage 5; Critical 2; Range [Engaged]; Pierce 2, Vicious 2) , reflec armor (+2 soak, +1 defense; when in darkness or deep shadow gain 2 Boost dice to all Stealth checks), utility belt, extra reloads. Individuals or groups of two may be armed with DLT-19 heavy blaster rifles with integrated illuminators, laser sights and telescopic sights (Ranged [Heavy]; Damage 10; Critical 3; Range [Long]; Auto-fire, Cumbersome 3. Gain 1 automatic Advantage on successful combat checks. Remove up to 2 Setback dice due to darkness on any checks to use this weapon against targets within short range. Reduce the difficulty of ranged combat checks at long range by one.).