So I've picked up Age of Rebellion and already have a group I've joined, but I'm struggling to figure out just what to play to best help the group, so I was hoping for some suggestions from the more experienced players here.

The concept of the group and its campaign is that we're part of the Rebel Alliance's combat engineering corps (I'm not sure if that's its official name, but it gets the point across), going on missions to sabotage the Empire's operations and conduct guerrilla warfare against them. The current party consists of:

• A Sullustan Ace with the Pilot specialization, whose signature tactics involve flying a ship that's made to look as small and non-threatening as possible, to appear beneath notice and slip through check-points and blockades.
• A Human Engineer with the Shipwright specialization (not sure what this is from, as she has more books than me) , who's an Imperial Academy washout whose family was disgraced because she questioned the Empire's treatment of nonhumans.
• Another Engineer with the Saboteur specialization. I'm not sure what species he'll be, or much about his personality beyond him being a "tunnel rat."
• Another player is still deciding what he'll play, but he's leaning towards a Soldier with the Sharpshooter specialization to be a sniper.

So, I'm honestly open to play whatever the party needs to function smoothly, though some of this is lingering Dungeons and Dragons mentality looking to fill the arbitrary roles of "Fighter, Mage, Thief and Priest," which doesn't really apply here. I've got some vague ideas of maybe being the group's face, their medic, or computer expert. What do you fine folks think? I appreciate any advice you might have. Thank you! ?

Former Imperial Commander using a variety of identities they set up whilst a member of ISB.

Your rebel friends have no idea about your former life and you're helping them to combat Imperial atrocities but in turn seek to minimise loss of Imperial lives since many of them don't deserve to die to further this abomination the former Republic has been turned into!

Think George Peppard from the A Team meets Agent Kallus!

That certainly is DRAMATIC! ?

EDIT: The GM has made this recommendation, "You're saboteurs, the more kinds of tech you specialize in the better you are at your job."

A Commander might be more helpful, the Imperial angle is to both explain and make your missions easier as ideally you don't want your actions recognised!

In Gundam 00 they had a rivalry between two military commanders one who left the service after a nasty situation she wanted to prevent happening again.

Also friends they inevitably went head to head and that is something I'd see happening in your game.

Surprised there's been no other suggestions!

Are you able to use source books for the AoR careers? Or are you limited to the Core book.

42 minutes ago, Quigonjinnandjuice said:

Are you able to use source books for the AoR careers? Or are you limited to the Core book.

I don't have the books myself, but my GM does, and so can provide me any information I ask for. I did have two ideas that have been kicking around in my head:

1. Taking inspiration from a Tumblr post imagining an AU where at the end of RotS, rather than allow baby Luke and Leia to be separated, R2-D2 and C-3P0 run away with the Skywalker children and raise them themselves, a young man raised by a pair of droids with his sister, having spoken in Binary until he was five years old, while his sister was fluent in more forms of communication than any child her age. He and his sister joined the Rebellion because they treat droids with respect and the Empire's dehumanizing laws and such being the reason for his unique family situation. I was hesitant to use this as we already have two Engineers in the party to begin with, and the guy's basic concept was being "more machine now than man."
2. Taking inspiration from the "Salvage Yard" mission in DroidWorks, a favorite game of mine from 20 years ago, a 2-1B surgical droid modified with a more resilient, combat-ready chassis, with an intravenous medical injector for one manipulator and an industrial wire cutter for the other, his programming to do no harm slightly warped by the contradiction of allowing the Empire to continue operating, he has allowed great harm to be perpetrated, so he has come to believe that he must take some lives to save many more by helping to bring the Empire down. I'm not sure how to get that set up since the Medic is a Soldier specialization, and you can't really hold and fire a blaster if one hand is a syringe and the other is a large pair of scissors...

On ‎8‎/‎20‎/‎2018 at 8:18 PM, Archpaladin Zousha said:

their medic, or computer expert.

You know these are compatible?

You could take Spy: Slicer to stick with the covert ops and sabotage theme, take human to get a free rank in two out-of-career skills (medicine being one of them) and then bump up your Intelligence, which is the base ability for both Computers and Medicine.

Ride it out as the team "not-medic-but-medic" for a while (with an emergency medpac and a fist full of stimpacks you'll be fine) and then as things progress spend 30XP to spec into Medic or Doctor and start picking up more Medicine ranks and talents like Surgeon and Stimpack Specailization.

I mean, it's an odd hybrid, but certainly doable as the groups "nerd."

Building on what Ghost suggested, maybe a rank in Charm and Negotiation too (and Presence 3 from the start) so as to be the "face" that can back up the sliced credentials that get the group past the blockade/inspection point and into the Imperial base/building?

And Stealth maybe?

Now I'm thinking of an Agility/Intellect/Presence 3 human filling this role. Maybe for my next character!

4 minutes ago, Bellona said:

Building on what Ghost suggested, maybe a rank in Charm and Negotiation too (and Presence 3 from the start) so as to be the "face" that can back up the sliced credentials that get the group past the blockade/inspection point and into the Imperial base/building?

More likely Cunning / Deception if you are pretending to be something you aren't.

Second the spy/slicer or any spy/specialization.

-Commander/any specialization

-Soldier: Medic.

-Soldier: Sharpshooter if the other player is not going to play one.

I like where this is going. We certainly could use someone sneaky to keep up with our tunnel rat...and Imperial disguises are a time-honored Star Wars tradition.

On the other hand, I'd like to be something besides a human, and that would make it hard to disguise myself as an Imperial (just ask Rio, man I wish he'd lasted longer in Solo ?).

Can I do the "group nerd" thing without playing human or would those out-of-career skills be essential out of the gate?

Not in the AoR line but you could get gadgeteer EotE core book or demolitionist (EotE: dangerous covenants) both fit the tech theme and are reasonably adept at combat and both have kick @$$ combat signature abilities if they're your starting spec.

Oooh, tell me more! What career are they for?! ?

Bounty Hunter (Gadgeteer) and Hired Gun (Demolitionist).

Out of curiosity, what makes the Hired Gun (Demolitionist) different from the Engineer (Saboteur)? Our "tunnel rat" guy's specializing in that and I obviously don't want to steal his thunder.

The droid idea sort of evolved in my head earlier today: What if they were an Engineer (Scientist) used by the Empire to aid in their Bioweapon R&D? While initially performing their duties for their human project leader without question, their programming to cure sickness and heal the wounded clashed more and more with the actions they were taking working to genetically engineer a disease the Empire could unleash on its enemies, until finally it "broke." They took the drastic action of murdering their project leader, an unscrupulous mad-scientist type, contaminating the samples to render them useless, and destroying all the notes and documentation to set the project back as far as possible, and then snuck out with a medical convoy and ran away at the first opportunity. In that moment, their philosophy crystalized: sometimes to save lives, you have to take lives, and since the Empire harmed so many people simply by existing, bringing it down was a moral imperative. This is why they joined the Alliance as soon as they snuck away. They're part of this saboteur team both to keep the team alive in the field, but also because they know what to look for if the Empire is preparing a bioweapon attack or test, so they can shut such an operation down quickly and efficiently, the team being the ounce of prevention to prevent needing the pound of cure to try and stop an outbreak already in progress.

The idea is to start as an Engineer with the Scientist specialization and then take Medic and possibly recruit too to reflect "combat upgrades" so they could serve in the field with their team. What do you folks think? Doable? Interesting?

5 hours ago, Archpaladin Zousha said:

Out of curiosity, what makes the Hired Gun (Demolitionist) different from the Engineer (Saboteur)? Our "tunnel rat" guy's specializing in that and I obviously don't want to steal his thunder.

The droid idea sort of evolved in my head earlier today: What if they were an Engineer (Scientist) used by the Empire to aid in their Bioweapon R&D? While initially performing their duties for their human project leader without question, their programming to cure sickness and heal the wounded clashed more and more with the actions they were taking working to genetically engineer a disease the Empire could unleash on its enemies, until finally it "broke." They took the drastic action of murdering their project leader, an unscrupulous mad-scientist type, contaminating the samples to render them useless, and destroying all the notes and documentation to set the project back as far as possible, and then snuck out with a medical convoy and ran away at the first opportunity. In that moment, their philosophy crystalized: sometimes to save lives, you have to take lives, and since the Empire harmed so many people simply by existing, bringing it down was a moral imperative. This is why they joined the Alliance as soon as they snuck away. They're part of this saboteur team both to keep the team alive in the field, but also because they know what to look for if the Empire is preparing a bioweapon attack or test, so they can shut such an operation down quickly and efficiently, the team being the ounce of prevention to prevent needing the pound of cure to try and stop an outbreak already in progress.

The idea is to start as an Engineer with the Scientist specialization and then take Medic and possibly recruit too to reflect "combat upgrades" so they could serve in the field with their team. What do you folks think? Doable? Interesting?

The demolitionist is more of a well rounded combatant, the saboteur is sneaky and great at strain management. Both are good with explosives, both have time to go + improved time to go. If you both use improved time to go you can get 4 characters into cover, yourselves included, which is pretty darn useful for a party.

Very few games last long enough to get three specs. My advice is play something that you will be happy with from the get go.