As an introduction to Genesys for my players who aren't familiar with the FFG SW system, I'm starting off with a short campaign set in my swords and sorcery setting, Swords of Blackwater. I'm working on adding some new weapons to fill out the selection a bit, I wanted to share my progress here. Please let me know if you have any suggestions, and feel free to use or adapt any/all of this for your own games.

I've included the weapons from the rulebook for completeness and convenience. I renamed "Axe" to "Battleaxe" to differentiate from a basic handaxe, "Bow" to "Hunting Bow", and renamed "Light Spear" to "Spear".

EDIT: Rarity has been added (highly subjective, your world may vary). I've made a number of changes based on suggestions offered by the community. Also added the lance and tower shield.

Notes:

Lance: While mounted, a character wielding a lance may use his mount's Brawn rating instead of his own for determining damage. Using a lance while dismounted requires the Melee (Heavy) skill, and it gains the Cumbersome 3 quality.

Tower Shield: This shield cannot be used while mounted.

Just a few thoughts:

• Brass knuckles: should be a Brawl weapon, not a Melee weapon
• Buckler: I would replace disorient with inaccurate; they're not known for being able to 'shield bash' well…if at all
• Rapier: I feel it should have Unwieldy 3 because it's commonly used as the default "finesse" weapon
• Staff: should be Melee (Heavy) since it's a 2-handed weapon

50 minutes ago, c__beck said:

Just a few thoughts:

• Brass knuckles: should be a Brawl weapon, not a Melee weapon
• Buckler: I would replace disorient with inaccurate; they're not known for being able to 'shield bash' well…if at all
• Rapier: I feel it should have Unwieldy 3 because it's commonly used as the default "finesse" weapon
• Staff: should be Melee (Heavy) since it's a 2-handed weapon

Agreed on all but the rapier. I'm not sure what I was thinking on the buckler. The other two are copy/paste errors.

As far as rapier goes, I don't think it requires an inherent penalty. I see your point that the rapier is frequently linked to finesse and agility, but even in D&D you can use Strength or Dexterity for the attack. I'm going to be using the "Finesse" talent in my game (Use Agility instead of Brawn for Melee (Light) attacks), so anyone using a rapier is almost certainly going to be using it with Agility anyway.

I wouldn't be so sure everyone will be using Agility/Finesse. Unlike D&D, I feel Brawn has enough going for it (while Agility has very little) that most players will stick with Brawn for attacks. It governs Hit/Damage, Wounds, AND Soak, all very important factors for melee combatants. Agility has...uhh what does Agility have?

Don't like Finese, don't use it.

I made Accuracy a quality only available on master crafted weapons, so 10x cost and custom made to order.

I'm just talking about in my own game. I have no idea if others will use Finesse or not. Regardless, I don't think the rapier requires Unwieldy. It's certainly easy enough to add it if that is more suitable to someone else's game.

What tier would you put finesse in if I may ask?

2 minutes ago, Klort said:

What tier would you put finesse in if I may ask?

Regrettably, they did not include tiers with the Talents from the Gen Con characters. Based on the Force & Destiny talents that allow you to use a different attribute for lightsabers, I am going with Tier 2 for Finesse.

I just don't see Agility being as important of a Characteristic as Dexterity in D&D. There, it adds to your AC, reducing how often you get hit. Am I missing something similar here? I like the idea of replacing Brawn for melee checks, it just seems that it's not the best idea because Brawn does so much.

2 minutes ago, Cyvaris said:

I just don't see Agility being as important of a Characteristic as Dexterity in D&D. There, it adds to your AC, reducing how often you get hit. Am I missing something similar here? I like the idea of replacing Brawn for melee checks, it just seems that it's not the best idea because Brawn does so much.

In purely mechanical terms, I won't argue that Brawn is a better choice than Agility in Genesys. But there are still reasons why a player might wish to emphasize Agility over Brawn, even in melee. Agility supports Coordination, Stealth, Riding, and Ranged skills, all of which are valuable and useful in a fantasy setting. For RP purposes, a player may want a character who is faster and more nimble as opposed to bigger and stronger (I know I have at least one such player, possibly two).

You might tone down the warhammer and greathammer, slightly. Note that pierce 3 or less is almost always the same as that much damage, unless cortosis (or whatever you want to call the armor quality that ignores pierce) is common in your game.
Maybe drop their pierce ratings by 1 and give them disorient 2 for the head-ringer/appendage-numbing potential?

8 minutes ago, Doctor Xerox said:

You might tone down the warhammer and greathammer, slightly. Note that pierce 3 or less is almost always the same as that much damage, unless cortosis (or whatever you want to call the armor quality that ignores pierce) is common in your game.
Maybe drop their pierce ratings by 1 and give them disorient 2 for the head-ringer/appendage-numbing potential?

I'm still thinking about that. I tend to lean more towards the historical application of military hammers, which was to puncture and/or crush heavy armour and deliver severe damage. I'm not as sold on the disorient/stagger aspect of it. I originally was using the Greathammer from the Gen Con sheets, but Concussive 1 is such a massively potent effect that I didn't want to bring that into play (besides the fact that the weapon would cost more than a suit of plate armour). I thought Sunder was a better choice, for shattering shields and breaking armour. The Greathammer is the apex of Melee (Heavy) in terms of delivering damage through armour, but perhaps Pierce 2 + Sunder is sufficient. If the warhammer is Pierce 1 + Sunder, that would work pretty well, also.

2 hours ago, Cyvaris said:

I just don't see Agility being as important of a Characteristic as Dexterity in D&D. There, it adds to your AC, reducing how often you get hit. Am I missing something similar here? I like the idea of replacing Brawn for melee checks, it just seems that it's not the best idea because Brawn does so much.

I was contemplating making a Talent that increases defense tied to your ranks in Agility or an agility based skill... maybe coordination.

That way someone who wants to go the more nimble route can do so and not take so many hits.

I’m adopting Starfinder and was considering a finesse talent for weapons designated as “Operative” (bit of a dumb label, so I’ll change it), although it will certainly be powerful in a setting where Ranged Light is the goto combat skill. I really don’t see a problem with the talent though. Agility isn’t overpowered like it is in d20, and melee likewise is already fighting to close the distance before ranged attacks end the battle.

I would likely replace the “accurate” quality with “finesse”.

2 hours ago, Palomarus said:

I was contemplating making a Talent that increases defense tied to your ranks in Agility or an agility based skill... maybe coordination.

That way someone who wants to go the more nimble route can do so and not take so many hits.

There's a tier 5 talent in star wars that does exactly that: Coordination Dodge: Spend a [Story] Point when targetted by a combat check to add failure equal to ranks in Coordination to the results.

On 12/9/2017 at 0:56 PM, Cyvaris said:

I just don't see Agility being as important of a Characteristic as Dexterity in D&D. There, it adds to your AC, reducing how often you get hit. Am I missing something similar here? I like the idea of replacing Brawn for melee checks, it just seems that it's not the best idea because Brawn does so much.

On 12/9/2017 at 1:08 PM, Direach said:

In purely mechanical terms, I won't argue that Brawn is a better choice than Agility in Genesys. But there are still reasons why a player might wish to emphasize Agility over Brawn, even in melee. Agility supports Coordination, Stealth, Riding, and Ranged skills, all of which are valuable and useful in a fantasy setting. For RP purposes, a player may want a character who is faster and more nimble as opposed to bigger and stronger (I know I have at least one such player, possibly two).

I'm thinking about adding a talent that allows characters to add (or improve existing) Pierce to their attack equal to their Agility. Debating whether this should be wrapped into a Finesse talent, or separate, and whether it should require a maneuver, or other cost, to activate.

On 12/9/2017 at 0:15 PM, c__beck said:

Buckler: I would replace disorient with inaccurate; they're not known for being able to 'shield bash' well…if at all

Just to interject, bucklers are incredibly well known for bashing, like all the time. It's a shield explicitly designed to be held in one hand and used to parry blades by either bashing them out of the way or forcing them aside with the edge. If you get close enough to parry with your own blade safely, you can easily take the boss or edge of the buckler and strike a limb or the opponent's head and neck with lethal force.

Unless of course you're talking about whatever D&D calls a buckler, which it very much is not. That is just a fancy arm guard that counts as a shield.

So, while looking over this list (which I really love and probably am going to use for my own group), I had the thought of how a Bastard Sword/Hand and a Half Sword would work within the existing rules. I think I came up with a good solution with a simple idea of a new trait: Versatile.

Versatile would have a secondary trait in parentheses of either Cumbersome or Unwieldy (depending on the weapon itself) as a requirement to make it a light weapon rather than a heavy weapon. So it's default stat block for a Bastard Sword would be something like

Bastard Sword | Melee (Heavy) | +3 | 2 | Engaged | 2 | 250 | 4 | Defensive 1, Accurate 1, Versatile (Unwieldy 3)

This makes the weapon have clear pros and cons to both heavy and light without penalizing a player or NPC further than switching between two skills you have to train separately while giving benefits to those who only want it for one role or the other.

Thoughts on this?

7 hours ago, ErraticSeven said:

So, while looking over this list (which I really love and probably am going to use for my own group), I had the thought of how a Bastard Sword/Hand and a Half Sword would work within the existing rules. I think I came up with a good solution with a simple idea of a new trait: Versatile.

Versatile would have a secondary trait in parentheses of either Cumbersome or Unwieldy (depending on the weapon itself) as a requirement to make it a light weapon rather than a heavy weapon. So it's default stat block for a Bastard Sword would be something like

Bastard Sword | Melee (Heavy) | +3 | 2 | Engaged | 2 | 250 | 4 | Defensive 1, Accurate 1, Versatile (Unwieldy 3)

This makes the weapon have clear pros and cons to both heavy and light without penalizing a player or NPC further than switching between two skills you have to train separately while giving benefits to those who only want it for one role or the other.

Thoughts on this?

How do you determine the stats for using it with Melee (Light)? Or is the idea that the stats stay the same, but the item has Unwieldy 3 if used one-handed?

I like that, but I think you should probably also reduce the damage for one-handed use. Swinging something two-handed is going to give you more kinetic energy and should pack a larger wallop.

On 12/9/2017 at 12:19 PM, Direach said:

I'm going to be using the "Finesse" talent in my game (Use Agility instead of Brawn for Melee (Light) attacks),

I think I am going to take it a step further and allow anyone to use brawn or agility for melee (light) attacks. No talent necessary.

On 12/9/2017 at 1:08 PM, Direach said:

In purely mechanical terms, I won't argue that Brawn is a better choice than Agility in Genesys. But there are still reasons why a player might wish to emphasize Agility over Brawn, even in melee. Agility supports Coordination, Stealth, Riding, and Ranged skills, all of which are valuable and useful in a fantasy setting. For RP purposes, a player may want a character who is faster and more nimble as opposed to bigger and stronger (I know I have at least one such player, possibly two).

Any rogue needs agility more than brawn. Being able to leverage it in battle would be advantageous. Same thing for a ranger/archer.

I'm adapting Starfinder, where the predominant weapons are ranged. I'm still debating how I'm going to mark which melee weapons can be used by Finesse, but I suspect it will be a weapon quality (in Starfinder itself, the quality is "Operative"). I collapsed Melee-Light and Melee-Heavy into simply Melee, so I may just change how the quality "Accurate" works to simply indicate that it can be used with Agility (via Finesse) rather than granting a Boost. If the PC does not use it with Agility--that is, swinging for the fences with Brawn--the weapon shouldn't grant a Boost either. A rapier isn't a warhammer.

Brawn would still drive the base damage, unless the PC also has Finesse (Improved) which I contributed to the Talent document on this forum. then they get to use Agility for base damage.

35 minutes ago, fjw70 said:

I think I am going to take it a step further and allow anyone to use brawn or agility for melee (light) attacks. No talent necessary.

Would you consider the base damage to be Agility or Brawn? The bonus successes would be whichever one the roll uses (as normal), but I'm curious what you'd use for the base.

57 minutes ago, Dragonshadow said:

Would you consider the base damage to be Agility or Brawn? The bonus successes would be whichever one the roll uses (as normal), but I'm curious what you'd use for the base.

I think I would use Agility for base damage.

36 minutes ago, fjw70 said:

I think I would use Agility for base damage.

I'm inclined to agree. I think I may have talked myself into allowing "Accurate" to simply allow Agility instead of Brawn in all respects (including base damage), and do away with the Finesse talent. With that in mind, "accurate" could be applied to typical martial arts weapons like a quarterstaff even though it's two-handed.

1 minute ago, Dragonshadow said:

I'm inclined to agree. I think I may have talked myself into allowing "Accurate" to simply allow Agility instead of Brawn in all respects (including base damage), and do away with the Finesse talent. With that in mind, "accurate" could be applied to typical martial arts weapons like a quarterstaff even though it's two-handed.

Another idea is to just used a fixed base damage for melee weapons (using a base of 3 so daggers do 4 base damage). Still mulling that over.