Hello all,

Posting from the phone since I have an hour to kill (too early visit to the Administration...).

Yesterday we started building the story for the solo adventurer that I have pestered you about in other threads. We decided (was more or less decided befre, but anyway) on a solo explorer on a Sleuth. He or she will be flying around, discovering things and selling the information. And getting in trouble both in exploration and selling the info to the wrong guy or annoying someone when selling it. And then we have adventures.

Adventures can be a wide range of stuff. From opening new hyperspace lanes, to search for old battle sites to sell to scavengers (and scavenge herself), search for planets, track down people or animals, .... And sell it all in general. She is not aligned to.any specific faction in the galactic struggle so far, and right now plans to be a free agent, even if we need to think about a sponsor for the equipment she will need.

For building the character we have EotE, Hutt space book, enter the unknown And the beyond the rim adventure.

We decided to go for a pioneer big game Hunter. More because she (the player) thinks that combat will be fun and likes rifles than because we want her to hunt big game. The abilities of the big game Hunter are useful to an explorer both in space and planetside. Or so we think having not much experience with the game. We believe that the ability spread looks solid for a solo character. She will be lacking in social graces, but so is life.

Character race so far is likely to be one of those (player still undecided) human, duros (cool background), rodian (funny looking) or Jawa (even funnier being a midget). Even if other images are being considered as well.

She (the player is female, not necessarily the character) will be accompanied by a few droids to counter some of the problems that a single character might have. A pair of explorer droids, a pair of astromech and a triad or so of those small amount repair droids that appear in Watto's shop and That close up when you hit hem in the nose. Maybe a hunter droid as well.

Ship will be a Sleuth, and she plans to have a bike for exploration as well (probably carried UNDER the ship for space reasons). That looks better on a non jawa. I had quite a laugh imagining a Jawa riding a SW speeder bike.

For weapons she prefers non letal stuff (the player is not much of a killer herself) so we are going for electrical pulse traps and stun riffles. The model 77 slugthrower from EtU seems good for this. We are giving her one or 2 hunting/combat droids for backup.

And so far this is it. Will keep you posted.

Cheers,

Xavi

Jawas on a bike?

The jawa crazyness is inspired by those 2 cool images.

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/439030663666781729/

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/439030663666781732/

(edit: it seems I can't insert Pinterest images. I leave the links)

We continue building.

The character is likely to be a Duros or Rodian, so we build from there (funny eyes...)

Profession will be Pioneer Big Game Hunter, since we think it offers the most rounded character for a solo explorer (we might be wrong here, siggestions welcome).

The player wants a well rounded character, so we go for 2 3 3 3 2 2.

It is the same either way (Duros or Rodian), since we raise a level 1 characteristic to level 2, and then 2 to level 3 (80 pts total).

He gets 1 rank in Pilot starship or Survival. Since we want both, no problem with skills either. Abilities end up like this:

• Athletics 1 (10 pts; non favoured skill)
• Heavy weapons 1
• Knowledge, outer rim 1
• Perception 1
• Pilot Starship 1
• Survival 1
• Stealth 1

We believe that athletics can be useful, so we buy it at rank 1 (10).

Then we have to choose an obligation that we want to be significant (we will give her a freakin' ship! and droids, and explorer equipment) and get Talents. We have 10 remaining points. She is awfully BAD at social interaction, but that might explanin why on the galaxy she is going to the stars after all xD

If she is a Duros she gets better at piloting spacecraft, while a Rodian is better as a tracker. Astronavigation and mechanics will be performed by droids, since we do not have enough points for everything. A pity bit so is life with a solo character.

Let's see what we come up with Talent suggestions appreciated! Or if you think other profession combos can be good.

Will keep you posted.

2 hours ago, MonCal said:

Profession will be Pioneer Big Game Hunter, since we think it offers the most rounded character for a solo explorer (we might be wrong here, siggestions welcome).

I like the Archaeologist spec, as a jack-of-all-trades adventurer. It offers the Well Rounded talent, which could be used to help mitigate some of its deficiencies in combat utility. Athletics is a career skill, however, so there's that.

If you don't expect to use the Knowledge talents much, though, it would probably be a waste.

True. Good catch! This Talent would allow him to get stealth and a weapon ability to round him up.

However, if we think of the character as an explorer more than a ruin digger, Big Game Hunter would seem to fit better, no? A lot of talents are tailored towards wilderness, not necessarily killing stuff, necessarily. Archeologist seems more keen on the academic side of exploration. (and kicking some butt!!) So does not seem to fit so well...

After perusing my pinterest (i have... a few images from SW there) the player has selected some images she likes for the character. As said, we will build from there, not the other way around.

As siad, the concept will be around a solo character. Pioneer Big Game Hunter to have a nice spread of abilities, and the adventures will spin around exploration of both planets and space lanes. She has said she prefers to rely in a rifle over a handgun for combat.

Let's see what we end up selecting...

Human (space atire)

Human explorer

Human sniper

Human (more militaristic)

Rodian

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/d/d3/Rodian_DICE.png/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/241?cb=20151106032702

Rodian 2

http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/0/04/Rodian_Fringer_Explorer.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20130820195709

Bothan

https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/starwars/images/c/c1/Lelsk.png/revision/latest?cb=20160827223650

Twilek

Duros

2 hours ago, MonCal said:

As siad, the concept will be around a solo character. Pioneer Big Game Hunter to have a nice spread of abilities, and the adventures will spin around exploration of both planets and space lanes. She has said she prefers to rely in a rifle over a handgun for combat.

Bounty Hunter/Survivalist could be another option. Brawl + Ranged (Heavy) as combat skills, both piloting skills, bit of stealth (two ranks of Stalker) and plenty of Survival focused stuff. Some utility as well in Athletics and Perception. Just ignore the name, it's not like you have to hunt bounties.

You also have some solid choices for second spec here: Operator for more piloting, Assassin for more combat and stealth, etc.

Looking at the AoR book (got it recently) we have seen the greater focus of some careers, Tha rate the same time are broader on their side talents. Will need to look into a lot of potential trees it seems.... Even a field commander would Make for a good explorer combining exploration abilities with astrogation and ship combat in its talent tree...

After that random thought, a new trio of images that enter the fray of potential appearances for the PC. I specially like the rodian,but the player seems to be heading to the brunette images. she is a blonde herself, so the choice is curious

An imperial brunette, but she could be a rogue as easily.

https://pinterest.com/pin/439030663666854323/?source_app=android

Militia-like brunette

Rodian

On 10/11/2017 at 9:43 AM, Hampulina93 said:

Bounty Hunter/Survivalist could be another option. Brawl + Ranged (Heavy) as combat skills, both piloting skills, bit of stealth (two ranks of Stalker) and plenty of Survival focused stuff. Some utility as well in Athletics and Perception. Just ignore the name, it's not like you have to hunt bounties.

You also have some solid choices for second spec here: Operator for more piloting, Assassin for more combat and stealth, etc.

And skip tracer for dealing with shady people

5 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

And skip tracer for dealing with shady people

I do not fully understand this comment.... Would you mind to elaborate?

We do not have the BH book. I am actually away from my books ATM, but I looked at the Survivalist tree (found it online). While it looks OK, for branching out we think that archaeologist might be somewhat better, don't you think? The concept is an explorer after all... Our plan is to search for planets, space phenomena (like asteroid fields to exploit commercially or avoid in your trips) and old space stuff, like battlegrounds and ruins of old civilizations to SELL the information to people interested in it (archeologists, scrappers, tech-savy people...).

Lwet's compare Survivalist and BGH. We do not find much difference between them for a core career, really.... Anything we am missing out? Let's compare the skills:

ABILITIES

BH Survivalist: Athletics, brawl (x2), Coercion, mechanics, Perception, piloting (planetary), piloting (space), ranged (heavy), ranged (light) streetwise, vigilance

IMPORTANT MISSES: Survival, Stealth , cool, astronav. (not very important)

BGH: Astronav., cool, Perception, K:Outer rim, K: arcaic, K: Xenology (x2), piloting (space) Perception, ranged (heavy), resilence, stealth, Survival

IMPORTANT MISSES: Piloting planetary (not a major problem), vigilance, social skills (big problem!).

I am not that versed in talent trees yet, so cannot tell if one or the other is missing something important here....

Next (simultaneous) step. DA SHIP

We have already stabilised that we want a small exploration vessel, so it will be a Sleuth. Since we are going for a solo character, with all the limitations it implies, we will need help here. From the players around to design a good ship and for the character so she can be capable in space and as an explorer.

We play loose with the rules here since these are more narrative elements, that that in mind.

We do not.mind the cost of the ship, only that it is OK.

The ship has 3 hardpoints.

Obvious improvements will be:

1. A team of DUM pit droids repair droids (the ones that look like strong rusted chatty kids that can be punched in the eye/nose and they fold up). Let's say they have Mechanics 2, +1 per extra dude of their type. Thanks to Darzil for pointing the model.

2. A R2 unit to direct them and act as the ship's manager.

3. Astrogation droid brain (astrogation 2)

4. Pilot Droid brain (piloting 2)

5. A droid brain that can control the weapons of the ship (gunnery 2).

Not sure if 3 and 4 are really needed of you have an arrogation droid, but just in case.

5. She would like to have a turret weapon in the ship.

6. External clamps to attach an explorer biken to it (it is cramped inside...)

7. Maybe an increase in survivality. A Sleuth is not very durable, really. Dunno how to do that. Increase in speed? Increase in Hull Trauma?

8.Improved scanners so she can survey well a location before heading in.

A short buy list for improvements, eh?xDDD

We will start from here and see what we can get.

1. I believe (away from books) they are DUM-Series Pit Droids. They are in the game (away from book). As Minions they get Mechanics skill of (number - 1).

Droid brains (as you say not needed with an actual droid brain) don't use Hard Points (and can be upgraded to skill 3 or 4 by a good mechanic).

Don't know ship offhand, but if it has a weapon already, making it turret instead I don't think costs hard points. Adding extra would.

Best durability increase is probably armor, which is 2 hard points, but adds 1 soak. Adding shield generators is pretty good (and can be much improved by a good mechanic), and also costs 2 hard points.

I don't think we have improved scanners yet as a modification, but shouldn't be hard to house rule.

12 hours ago, MonCal said:

I do not fully understand this comment.... Would you mind to elaborate?

We do not have the BH book. I am actually away from my books ATM, but I looked at the Survivalist tree (found it online). While it looks OK, for branching out we think that archaeologist might be somewhat better, don't you think? The concept is an explorer after all... Our plan is to search for planets, space phenomena (like asteroid fields to exploit commercially or avoid in your trips) and old space stuff, like battlegrounds and ruins of old civilizations to SELL the information to people interested in it (archeologists, scrappers, tech-savy people...).

Lwet's compare Survivalist and BGH. We do not find much difference between them for a core career, really.... Anything we am missing out? Let's compare the skills:

ABILITIES

BH Survivalist: Athletics, brawl (x2), Coercion, mechanics, Perception, piloting (planetary), piloting (space), ranged (heavy), ranged (light) streetwise, vigilance

IMPORTANT MISSES: Survival, Stealth , cool, astronav. (not very important)

BGH: Astronav., cool, Perception, K:Outer rim, K: arcaic, K: Xenology (x2), piloting (space) Perception, ranged (heavy), resilence, stealth, Survival

IMPORTANT MISSES: Piloting planetary (not a major problem), vigilance, social skills (big problem!).

I am not that versed in talent trees yet, so cannot tell if one or the other is missing something important here....

This should answer all your questions about the skip tracer

7 hours ago, MonCal said:

Next (simultaneous) step. DA SHIP

We have already stabilised that we want a small exploration vessel, so it will be a Sleuth. Since we are going for a solo character, with all the limitations it implies, we will need help here. From the players around to design a good ship and for the character so she can be capable in space and as an explorer.

We play loose with the rules here since these are more narrative elements, that that in mind.

We do not.mind the cost of the ship, only that it is OK.

The ship has 3 hardpoints.

Obvious improvements will be:

1. A team of DUM pit droids repair droids (the ones that look like strong rusted chatty kids that can be punched in the eye/nose and they fold up). Let's say they have Mechanics 2, +1 per extra dude of their type. Thanks to Darzil for pointing the model.

2. A R2 unit to direct them and act as the ship's manager.

3. Astrogation droid brain (astrogation 2)

4. Pilot Droid brain (piloting 2)

5. A droid brain that can control the weapons of the ship (gunnery 2).

Not sure if 3 and 4 are really needed of you have an arrogation droid, but just in case.

5. She would like to have a turret weapon in the ship.

6. External clamps to attach an explorer biken to it (it is cramped inside...)

7. Maybe an increase in survivality. A Sleuth is not very durable, really. Dunno how to do that. Increase in speed? Increase in Hull Trauma?

8.Improved scanners so she can survey well a location before heading in.

A short buy list for improvements, eh?xDDD

We will start from here and see what we can get.

You could try a loronar e-9 explorer. There are good deck plans floating around.

I used these.

https://red-talon-wanted-dead-or-alive.obsidianportal.com/characters/red-talon

Note that you'll have to follow the links to photo bucket to get the images (which are still free just not as convenient) because photo bucket stopped free third party image hosting.

It's a good explorer ship (great sensors) it's stats are in the enter the unknown book.

Will check the link to the BH tomorrow. Thanks

The Lorenar is a big ship. Too big for a solo explorer. If I were to go for a bigger ship I would take a fires pray or YT1000, but I want to try to for a solo ship like a jumpmaster or the said A24 sleuth (enter the unknown as well). My idea for this is to be a quasi-fighter, not a dedicated carrier. Something that can molt be used for solo exploration.

A basic reason for this is that we also have other friends interested din playing from time to time. As such,the character will come to ask for help (and a larger ship) when the other rplayers are available. So, if she has a patge ship for her own that need for more resources gets diluted. A tighter ship only usable for exploration sounds good in that sense.

You might want to look at the hawk290 (sil 3 speed 4, I think far horizons but I'm not sure about that), hawk1000 (sil 4 speed 5, fly casual), and Mandalorian super shuttle from "Friends Like These" (sil 3 speed 3 or 4 but it's one tough mofo). They're all in og dudes character generator if you want to fidget with attachments

Another sil 4 ship to look at is the aggressor assault fighter from no disintegrations, it only has 20 enc of cargo but is fast and deadly.

Ok, after looking at the abilities we would need we ended up rolling on the floor laughting. The answer to "what do we need in skills" is "almost all of them" xDDD

So we will compare what we want to what we get from BGH and Survivalist. We will mark the BGH ones with BGH and the others with survivalist . Yeah, original xD Then we will make a post about knowledges, since that is an extremely grey area for us.

1. ABILITIES THAT WE NEED AND THAT CAN BE PROVIDED BY DROIDS EASILY

Astronavigation (R2 or droid brain) BGH

Mechanics (DUM droids and R2 units)

Gunnery (droid brain)

Medicine (DIY Medicine station)

Pilot starship (Dropid brain, but we prefer the player to do that, though, since it is cool to be the pilot of the ship in a chase) BGH Survivalist

"Perception" (not really, but scanning droids should help) BGH Survivalist

2. ABILITIES BY CAREER (in Bold, the ones that are desires as minimum skills, Yeah, right...)

Athletics Survivalist

Brawl Survivalist

Cool BGH

Heavy Weapons BGH Survivalist

Melee Survivalist

Pilot sharship BGH Survivalist

Pilot planetary Survivalist

Perception BGH Survivalist

Skulduggery Survivalist

Stealth BGH Survivalist

Streetwise Survivalist

Survival BGH

Vigilance Survivalist

Coordination

Negotiation

Resilience

In Knowledges (3 of them) the BGH wins hands down, but in general skills the Survivalist is more able.

So they are pretty much tied. their Talent trees are quite similar as well. The Survivalist has the social and low life skills (skulduggery, streetwise) that he would need while on an inhabited planet, and some better skills for combat, while the BGH has better skills for exploring, basically through knowledges. Both of them lack in some important skills. The BGH has the advantage of being able to branch out to more sensible specialisations (Archeologist) but that is not a priority.

Funny how Survivalist does not have Survival as a skill xD

I think we will end up choosing the Survivalist. Or more accurately, *I* will choose it and the player will use it, since she is not much into numbers and more about the narrative aspects of RPGing.

Will keep you posted.

8 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

You might want to look at the hawk290 (sil 3 speed 4, I think far horizons but I'm not sure about that), hawk1000 (sil 4 speed 5, fly casual), and Mandalorian super shuttle from "Friends Like These" (sil 3 speed 3 or 4 but it's one tough mofo). They're all in og dudes character generator if you want to fidget with attachments

The Hawk series has been looked into, and discarded by the player since she hates its appearance. I have not read Friends Like These yet. Wil take a look.

10 hours ago, MonCal said:

The Hawk series has been looked into, and discarded by the player since she hates its appearance. I have not read Friends Like These yet. Wil take a look.

Your player has terrible taste in ships. The HWK-1000 is the absolute pinnacle of Corellian culture and innovation, and only an unsophisticated brute could be so blind to the beauty of that marvel of modern engineering.

As for my personal suggestion on making a solo character, you might want to have the signature ability for her class already unlocked for free. With a BH Survivalist, this could give her a way to level the playing field in a shootout, or a quick way to track down someone she needs to find. With the Explorer BGH, she could take a lot of pressure off of her lower knowledge skills, or alternatively, she could HAUL *** like no one else can when things go terrible wrong.

Just something to think about.

7 minutes ago, Degenerate Mind said:

Your player has terrible taste in ships. The HWK-1000 is the absolute pinnacle of Corellian culture and innovation, and only an unsophisticated brute could be so blind to the beauty of that marvel of modern engineering.

As for my personal suggestion on making a solo character, you might want to have the signature ability for her class already unlocked for free. With a BH Survivalist, this could give her a way to level the playing field in a shootout, or a quick way to track down someone she needs to find. With the Explorer BGH, she could take a lot of pressure off of her lower knowledge skills, or alternatively, she could HAUL *** like no one else can when things go terrible wrong.

Just something to think about.

Nah. Give me a YZ-900 any day of the week and I'm a happy camper.

Just now, Tramp Graphics said:

Nah. Give me a YZ-900 any day of the week and I'm a happy camper.

Those are also acceptable, if a slight bit slower.

1 minute ago, Degenerate Mind said:

Those are also acceptable, if a slight bit slower.

Not when you have the Supreme Full Throttle talent.