One of my players wants a specialization to represent his background and upbringing as a Core Worlder. I put this together for him. There are basically four parts to the spec: societal, trades, physical, and higher education. There's a focus on having Presence as a strong characteristic.

Does it seem appropriate? Is it overpowered in some fashion? If you have any suggestions to make it better, please make let me know. I want to work out any potential bugs before presenting it to my player. Thanks!

Can anyone else not see the picture? (Currently on an iPad)

Not sure about two ranks of Toughened given the nature of the spec. Other than that it looks true to the theme.

2 hours ago, Yaccarus said:

Can anyone else not see the picture? (Currently on an iPad)

Hmm... It's a .jpg. I'll link you to the .pdf in my dropbox.

Universal Spec: Core Worlder

2 hours ago, Kualan said:

Not sure about two ranks of Toughened given the nature of the spec. Other than that it looks true to the theme.

Which Toughened would you get rid of, and what would you replace it with?

At first glance, this looks more like a grab bag of good talents for a social-based PC while throwing in a couple ranks of Toughened just for giggles. It also looks more like it's a spec reflecting an upper-crust type of character.

To be frank, what exactly is the player looking for that's not already covered by existing specializations, be it within EotE, AoR, or even F&D? It seems a lot of this can be covered thematically with the Colonist career, just with the character's background that they were born/raised in the Core Worlds. Or the Diplomat career from AoR.

Yeah the Toughened stood out to me as well. Was it intended to represent something? I thought maybe it was there for like a Coruscant character who had to deal with lower level type places, but then I realized you meant Core World in general.

Maybe if you had that particular line named to reference Rough Districts.

Overall I like it very much though.

I would make some of the talents more specific. Here some talent ideas:

• Local Celebrity: Add boost to all social checks in a chosen city, sub-planetary region, or small planet.
• Regional Knowledge: When making a Negotiation check to find something in the Core Worlds, may substitute Negotiation with Knowledge-Core Worlds.
• Good Manners: Upgrade all social checks to interact with aristocrats or politicians.

Upper Crust is massively overpowered. Even for a bottom tier talent, that is unbalancing.

In general, there are far too few talents that remove setback or add boost dice. It would make sense to invent a talent akin to Streetwise that removed setback from social situations, something like "Cultured - remove one setback per rank when the character is engaging in a social check where social status is a factor".

Two ranks of Know Somebody seems excessive given the focus on Presence - it's going to make a lot of gear very easy to come by. I would swap it out with another rank of Sound Investments.

Rather than Toughened, I would replace both with Respected Scholar.

Also consider talents like Confidence, a trait that almost every Core World character in SW seems to have an overabundance of.

I think you should do a split down the middle. You have a topside core worlder and an underworld core worlder. The topside would have more... pleasant, socialite type skills and talents whereas the underworlder would be more rough and tumble... like grit and toughened and driving and coersion.

Either that or a socialite noble tree and an underworlder tree.

I'm not crazy about Intense Focus being here. It is in Scientist and Ascetic (others?), which are very disciplined, specialized people.

14 hours ago, TheSapient said:

I'm not crazy about Intense Focus being here. It is in Scientist and Ascetic (others?), which are very disciplined, specialized people.

I think there are four, FS exile or emergent, and someone else... don' recall off hand.

(Not including the new specs)

Force-Sensitive Exile, Scholar, Entrepreneur, Ascetic...maybe Scientist as well? And I think at least one Diplomat specialization. I'll admit to not knowing the Age specializations as well as I do the Edge and Force ones.

31 minutes ago, Absol197 said:

Force-Sensitive Exile, Scholar, Entrepreneur, Ascetic...maybe Scientist as well? And I think at least one Diplomat specialization. I'll admit to not knowing the Age specializations as well as I do the Edge and Force ones.

Definitely Scientist. Anyway, it doesn't seem to belong, to me, in a Core Worlder Spec.

Personally I wouldn't take this spec which suggests it's not overpowered even if not all the talents are quite appropriate.

Some really good comments and opinions here. I appreciate all of them. I'm going to throw the spec and the idea of the spec out completely.

At the heart of his request, he wanted something to represent his character's upbringing in the core worlds. He suggested it should be a spec tree, and that's what I went with, but I think it's not necessary at all. In general, specs are akin to jobs or professions, not backgrounds per se.

Looking at species gives me a better idea, I think. A background can be represented by a free rank in a skill, or maybe some low level talent.

For instance, a character's background might include a lot of swoop racing. Instead of coming up with a whole spec tree for that, just give the PC a free rank in Piloting (Planetary) or a free rank in Skilled Jockey. Something like that.

"I grew up in the core worlds. I am a core worlder." Give him a free rank in Knowledge (Core Worlds). Or even create something unique like what Yaccarus up above suggested.

I think that's a whole lot cleaner than "here, here's a universal spec to represent your background." And it's a freebie ability/skill/talent for the character. Players love a freebie.

Thanks!

16 hours ago, RLogue177 said:

Some really good comments and opinions here. I appreciate all of them. I'm going to throw the spec and the idea of the spec out completely.

At the heart of his request, he wanted something to represent his character's upbringing in the core worlds. He suggested it should be a spec tree, and that's what I went with, but I think it's not necessary at all. In general, specs are akin to jobs or professions, not backgrounds per se.

Looking at species gives me a better idea, I think. A background can be represented by a free rank in a skill, or maybe some low level talent.

For instance, a character's background might include a lot of swoop racing. Instead of coming up with a whole spec tree for that, just give the PC a free rank in Piloting (Planetary) or a free rank in Skilled Jockey. Something like that.

"I grew up in the core worlds. I am a core worlder." Give him a free rank in Knowledge (Core Worlds). Or even create something unique like what Yaccarus up above suggested.

I think that's a whole lot cleaner than "here, here's a universal spec to represent your background." And it's a freebie ability/skill/talent for the character. Players love a freebie.

Thanks!

Tbh I'm nor sure that a rank of this or a rank of that really expresses 20+ years of life experience for some people. Maybe for the masses sure but there are some that are brought up doing something in particular that a universal tree would really express effectively. Even if it was a half tree. Instead of 25 talents and 4 career skill perhaps 10 or 15 talents and 2 core skills. Almost like a signaure ability tree but universal and more basic.

There are a lot of fields that people enter into while young, especially if they are focused and or driven. Some societies teach their young war before they can barely walk, others teach their young politics and ruling with their mothers milk.

Obviously it's up to you and your table but I for one thought the tree had potential with some refinement.

22 hours ago, RLogue177 said:

I'm going to throw the spec and the idea of the spec out completely.

I'm not really a fan of "regional specs", and with Core there's just too much variation, as others noted. An above-ground Coruscanti is going to be very different from a Coruscanti who grew up in one of the "levels". So I think your decision is the right one...offer something for flavour, but it should haven't do define the entire character spec.

On 3/9/2018 at 9:43 PM, RLogue177 said:

At the heart of his request, he wanted something to represent his character's upbringing in the core worlds. He suggested it should be a spec tree, and that's what I went with, but I think it's not necessary at all. In general, specs are akin to jobs or professions, not backgrounds per se.

Looking at species gives me a better idea, I think. A background can be represented by a free rank in a skill, or maybe some low level talent.

For instance, a character's background might include a lot of swoop racing. Instead of coming up with a whole spec tree for that, just give the PC a free rank in Piloting (Planetary) or a free rank in Skilled Jockey. Something like that.

"I grew up in the core worlds. I am a core worlder." Give him a free rank in Knowledge (Core Worlds). Or even create something unique like what Yaccarus up above suggested.

I think that's a whole lot cleaner than "here, here's a universal spec to represent your background." And it's a freebie ability/skill/talent for the character. Players love a freebie.

Thanks!

As a possible suggestion, maybe take a look at the Background mechanics in Saga Edition's Rebellion Era Campaign Guide, which had options not only for planet of origin but also for major events and occupation prior to the PC becoming an adventurer.

The primary bonus was that each Background option allowed the player to select one skill from a very narrow list, and gain that skill as a class skill, and then a minor bonus depending on the type of Background selected (Event gives a small enhancement, Occupation gives a small bonus to certain non-trained skill checks, and Planet of Origin gave a bonus language).

So you could probably adapt that general notion for your game, with a Background making a single skill from a small pool of choices (no more than 3) into a career skill, and then a provide a boost die when making skill checks for those other skills provided the character's not trained in them.

No big fan of the tree ether.

For character backgrounds I normaly use Boost and Setback when appropiate.

Like The Coruscanti Upperclass will gain a boost in social events with other Upperclass guys but will have a setback when dealing social with some rought guys from the otherside of society.
Knowledge checks about his homeplanet or the best highsociety clubs, casinos and amusementferrys will also gain a boost but checks for the blackmarket or the illegal slavetrading house would get a setback ("hat I don't think we had something like that at home!")

It makes live easier for the GM, while the player doesn't have to invest into extra skills just to fluff out his background.
and it rewards a player for thinking on a good background, while not overpower him ^^