Hi all,
Not going to put this in EotE or FaD fora, as they are all basically the same game anyways, I was wondering if anybody had the same idea as me, and started to reverse-engineer the species? What makes them 'balanced' as compared to each other? Is one species notably more powerful than another? Should a species ability cost more if it depends on a strong statistic score, for example, starting with a rank in the Brawl skill if the species has Brawn 3 as opposed to 2, or even 1? How do Wounds, Strain and Starting XP factor in? When 'deconstructing' a species through the Experience Point system in place (kind of like how the Genesys toolkit taught me to do), is everybody else coming to about 385 XP for a starting character in total including the free Starting XP to customize your character? And did you use that reverse-engineering to create a couple of species for your own game (either Star Wars or Genesys for that matter)? My findings below :
Attribute scores
Knowing the cost to increase a statistic from 2 to 3 (30 XP) or from 3 to 4 (40 XP), Genesys gave me the insight to say that a statistic of 1 would cost 10XP (sort of like going from 0 to 1). So, theoretically, as even the mighty Wookiees 'only' have a Brawn 3, to provide your custom species with any statistic, they would have to pay 10XP for a score of 1, 30XP total for a score of 2, 60XP total for a score of 3, 100XP total for a score of 4, and 150XP total for a score of 5. Again, theoretically, as the starting maximum attribute seems to be 3 before investing starting XP. a Human attribute line of 2, 2, 2, 2, 2, and 2 would therefor cost 180 XP, and a Wookiee line of 3, 2, 2, 2, 1, and 2 would cost 190 XP.
Wounds and Strain
These are a bit tricky. Species with both a high Brawn and a high Wounds starting total seem to 'pay' more of these species build points than species with low Brawn and high starting Wounds. The same goes for Strain and Willpower. Next to that, Wounds and Strain are not equal, as seen by the talents that add to them. One talent (Toughened) adds +2 Wounds, while the other (Grit) only adds 1 Strain. Both talents can be found in different Star Wars character careers at different tiers, so for comparison I assume the talents to be equally tiered. As such, when Brawn is 3 or greater, Wounds cost more. Likewise, when Willpower is 3 or greater, Strain costs more.
Starting Experience
In my experience, it was simple to port starting XP into this on a one-for-one basis. 110 Starting XP from a Human character would also take 110 XP from this species build total.
Species abilities
Then there is a whole slew of special abilities. One species can see in the dark. Another has a specific skill they are known for. The next can choose any one skill that is not a career skill. I am still figuring out 'cost' for a lot of these abilities, finding the suggestions in the Genesys book to be of great help. Some abilities even return build points, as they are species 'abilities' that can hinder a character (such as needing to breathe a different gas mixture from the normal Oxygen/Nitrogen/trace gases mixture most species seem to be able to breathe.
So far I have deconstructed a couple of Star Wars species, and like I said, the average seems to be a total of 385 XP to build a character all the way from a '0' in every score.
Edited by Xcapobl