I'm trying to make my character load outs more realistic.

For example, an LBV with an encumbrance capacity of 3 and a backpack with encumbrance of capacity of 6... well, say I have 5 frags. Would I REALLY not be able to put 5 on a vest? Do I need to spend a maneuver to un-sling my pack to retrieve frag #4? I have an LBV IRL. If I wanted, I could get 16 frags on the thing, IF I only put them on the front. I mean, no one carries 16 frags unless they're 40mm rounds and they're a grenadier, but the point is, I could do it. M67s weigh 14oz. I can carry 16-ish pounds, so you can't say it's the weight. So, not that I would IRL, or would in game, but the point is, if we're going for realistic, I COULD.

My character is small. Could probably only fit two on the chest and 6 around the waist small. Point is, that'd be 8 encumbrance. Vest has encumbrance of 3. So... WTF?

Same goes for armor. There is a Reflex Body Glove in Force and Destiny's Consulars book with a soak of 3. I've seen some GMs say you can stack armor for its attributes, but not soak. But... IRL, if I have a kevlar weave shirt on under a Kevlar lined plate carrier, well, I can withstand more than if I just had one or the other. I see GMs saying that if the player can sell it, they'll allow it, but, if we're going for realistic, it's more like how can you, or anyone really, explain how it WOULDN'T work?

For example, if I wear that Reflex Body Glove under Laminate Armor, by what mental gymnastics can anyone explain how the body glove's soak simply doesn't apply because I have the soak of the laminate armor over it?

Again, if the justification for the prevention of doing dumb crap like wearing Mandalorian armor over Laminate armor is that it's unrealistic, the flip side to that coin is how can anyone realistically claim that if I have something that would legitimately and realistically work together, like Body Glove and Laminate, they just don't... because reasons. Makes you too powerful? ... And? So? It's in the books. If they didn't want players to get that soak value, they should have specified so instead of describing Body Glove as being able to be worn under clothes... if it fits under clothes, it fits under armor because you're not bloody naked under armor... you're wearing, you guessed it, clothes... or not put the ability to logically combine gear in such a manner.

I'm obviously a newb, and I'm not looking for like 15 soak and infinite backpack nonsense. A lot of the fun is in the playing and the process of acquiring more ability/power/weapons/etc, and also the tension of risk from being able to be harmed. But if it doesn't make sense and it's just something arbitrarily there to prevent you from advancing an attribute like soak just because, I can't get behind it. If it works in our vanilla *** real world, I'm pretty sure it works in a hysterically more technologically advanced (than our world) galaxy far, far away.

Quote

In general, players and the Game Master won't need to track a character's encumbrance (how much he's carrying on his person). Occasionally, however, it may play an important part in the story, and a player needs to know if the weight, mass, and collective bulk of the items his hero is wearing inhibits his actions. AoR p. 165

I don't pay alot of attention to encumbrance unless we get to kitchen sink number of items, and I think this line sums that up. I just use a common sense approach and think in terms of volume of the items. When anyone wants to carry anything above what I consider realistic with some consideration for race and Brawn we can use the encumbrance numbers to represent how much past encumbered they are going.

I realize some don't like this approach and they're paralyzed with the notion of being so cavalier with math, but my table hasn't burst into flames yet. I haven't had anyone storm out of my house in a blind rage at the audacity of my approach, so I assume it works.

1 hour ago, HVSD said:

M67s weigh 14oz. I can carry 16-ish pounds, so you can't say it's the weight. So, not that I would IRL, or would in game, but the point is, if we're going for realistic, I COULD.

My character is small. Could probably only fit two on the chest and 6 around the waist small. Point is, that'd be 8 encumbrance. Vest has encumbrance of 3. So... WTF?

Encumbrance is about more than weight, but I think you realise that where you’ve mentioned the small characteristic anyway, just wanting to make sure. Also, remember that simply being over your encumbrance doesn’t mean your character keels over or is paralysed, you simply have a setback on brawn and agility rolls. Want to strap 16 grenades to your chest? Sure, but climbing that cliff will be slightly harder with all those snags.

Overall your post comes across a bit power-gamey. Does it make narrative sense to stack armour that logically makes sense? Sure. Was that the intention of including those body sock types of armour? Probably not. I think concealable armour was more for characters that want to wear armour with a bit more soak without walking around looking like a Starcraft Marine. At the end of this it’s always up to your GM what is allowed. The argument against including or allowing this is that you may get around other balance issues, such as another character spending more to get armour with specifically high soak that maybe costs more or has disadvantages. Narratively would double stacked armour be tougher? Most likely, but the damage that goes through that first layer of laminate is likely still going to hurt regardless of what’s worn underneath. Also, maybe there are other disadvantages, so maybe it would be allowed but you suffer one constant setback due to the heat of wearing both or something. A key point here is balance and fun, if your GM has to throw Darth Vader, a platoon of Stormtroopers and an AT-AT at you just to make a dent, and said foes wipe the floor with the rest of your party, great, you lived and all your friends are dead.

If I was your GM I’d be cautious following your questions here about whether you’re in the right mindset for this game. I’d leave encumbrance to work RAW. As for your armour I’m not sure, maybe with the setbacks, but I’d probably be more likely to only allow one type to start, and allow for it to be your quest to try to find and effectively stack a second type.

You may have a GM who is like me and who just wants you to turn it down a bit. I would think that carrying 16 grenades on you in a firefight would be a bad idea. Plus you have the bulk of it, and while it seems you are familiar with wearing full battle rattle, it makes it hard to do a lot of things other than the usual infantry stuff.

It might be that grenades are weapons of war and by carrying a lot of them you are having your character show up to situations looking like you should be on a battlefield and not in some town in the Outer Rim. The GM may be trying to keep from having to have the cops or local enforcers fight you on principle.

But it sounds to me more like a GM objection than a real serious Encumbrance rules issue.

Consider that a leather vest or some basic workman's coveralls has a soak of 1 and heavy battle armor has a soak of 2. Quite simply put the game is built with a very narrow margin for what soak armor gives because star wars isn't about walking around like a, well, walking tank. It's a space opera that's about action and a story.

There's nothing stopping a GM from letting the players stack up armors that they want to allow, but the game will take a different road than what the traditional spirit of starwars is.

I don't have a problem with my GM. He is fine with what makes logical sense and lets me run my character like a hyper violent sociopathic ******** (HVSD) without being like, "Well, you want to toss a frag in a diner? Have 40 Storm trooper NCOs."

What I am trying to do is reconcile the rules with some semblance of reality. I brought the above up because I can actually get the encumbrance I would have if I wanted a proper vest, for example, but it's with buying notional in game gear that does not make bloody sense. With my GM, he's fine if I say I have say as many grenade or reload pouches as could reasonably fit on my character's vest. Otherwise I'd have to be like, "Okay, I have two belts for this 2 encumbrance pistol, because apparently one belt with a holster to hold my pistol is impossible because game rules and the belts only have an encumbrance capacity of one..." THAT is the goofy crap I'm looking around all the books to see if there is actually nay realistic fix for. Finding none, we're plenty happy to just make **** up as we go.

As for what has been said about the armor stack, I totally agree. I have worn fire retardant under clothing with body armor over it. That **** was light compared to something that would have what I imagine would have 3 soak in game to wear under laminate armor with 2 soak. NOT fun. Try it in Iraq or Tatooine, and I think my character is going to wind up rolling a black die for every agility, athletics and coordination check, at minimum.

Totally agree about that:

3 hours ago, Roderz said:

A key point here is balance and fun, if your GM has to throw Darth Vader, a platoon of Stormtroopers and an AT-AT at you just to make a dent, and said foes wipe the floor with the rest of your party, great, you lived and all your friends are dead.

And not only that, but if there's no risk, there's no tension, there's no fun. It'd be like god mode in a video game. Lame.

I'm really just looking to stay as true to the game as possible while having enough realistic ability/limitation to make it something I can actually visualize. We're mostly vets playing, so if we do come across something that doesn't make sense, like, "Why in the actual badger's cornhole would you only take one thermal detonator to a firefight with multiple K2s when you have a box full of the things?"

"Well, between my 6 backpack, 3 vest, 1 belt, and 5 plus 2 brawn for 17 encumbrance, I don't have room for more."

"How?"

"Well I used my last 3 encumbrance from the vest on my blaster rifle..."

"Really? Your... rifle... takes up space... on your... vest. No. *** that, you have grenade pouches and you sling your weapon How many pouches fit you? 8? 12? Congrats, you got that many of frags, TDs, reloads, whatever."

But a sling takes 1 HP. Really? I can see coupled mags, canted irons, laser, under barrel launcher... but a sling? Come on. What could I possibly put at my single point attachment point for a sling that putting a sling there prevents me from putting there? I can't have a laser... on the fore end... because there's a sling on the back?

Whoever makes this might do well to have some military consultants or vets tell them how this stuff really works. For example... if you put a grenade launcher UNDER the barrel, that doesn't magically mean you can't put an red dot on the top.

Just now, Ahrimon said:

Consider that a leather vest or some basic workman's coveralls has a soak of 1 and heavy battle armor has a soak of 2. Quite simply put the game is built with a very narrow margin for what soak armor gives because star wars isn't about walking around like a, well, walking tank. It's a space opera that's about action and a story.

There's nothing stopping a GM from letting the players stack up armors that they want to allow, but the game will take a different road than what the traditional spirit of starwars is.

Yeah, I get you. We play more like modern middle east meets jawas. Sometimes it behooves us to drop gear, go for heavy clothing, squirrel away a single pistol, and go incognito. But others we need a proper rifleman's kit and best possible battle armor (and if we were smart, air support, but our characters are idiots) to go full Mogadishu up in some outer rim pirate's or storm troopers grills.

1 minute ago, HVSD said:

I don't have a problem with my GM. He is fine with what makes logical sense and lets me run my character like a hyper violent sociopathic ******** (HVSD) without being like, "Well, you want to toss a frag in a diner? Have 40 Storm trooper NCOs."

What I am trying to do is reconcile the rules with some semblance of reality. I brought the above up because I can actually get the encumbrance I would have if I wanted a proper vest, for example, but it's with buying notional in game gear that does not make bloody sense. With my GM, he's fine if I say I have say as many grenade or reload pouches as could reasonably fit on my character's vest. Otherwise I'd have to be like, "Okay, I have two belts for this 2 encumbrance pistol, because apparently one belt with a holster to hold my pistol is impossible because game rules and the belts only have an encumbrance capacity of one..." THAT is the goofy crap I'm looking around all the books to see if there is actually nay realistic fix for. Finding none, we're plenty happy to just make **** up as we go.

As for what has been said about the armor stack, I totally agree. I have worn fire retardant under clothing with body armor over it. That **** was light compared to something that would have what I imagine would have 3 soak in game to wear under laminate armor with 2 soak. NOT fun. Try it in Iraq or Tatooine, and I think my character is going to wind up rolling a black die for every agility, athletics and coordination check, at minimum.

Totally agree about that:

And not only that, but if there's no risk, there's no tension, there's no fun. It'd be like god mode in a video game. Lame.

I'm really just looking to stay as true to the game as possible while having enough realistic ability/limitation to make it something I can actually visualize. We're mostly vets playing, so if we do come across something that doesn't make sense, like, "Why in the actual badger's cornhole would you only take one thermal detonator to a firefight with multiple K2s when you have a box full of the things?"

"Well, between my 6 backpack, 3 vest, 1 belt, and 5 plus 2 brawn for 17 encumbrance, I don't have room for more."

"How?"

"Well I used my last 3 encumbrance from the vest on my blaster rifle..."

"Really? Your... rifle... takes up space... on your... vest. No. *** that, you have grenade pouches and you sling your weapon How many pouches fit you? 8? 12? Congrats, you got that many of frags, TDs, reloads, whatever."

But a sling takes 1 HP. Really? I can see coupled mags, canted irons, laser, under barrel launcher... but a sling? Come on. What could I possibly put at my single point attachment point for a sling that putting a sling there prevents me from putting there? I can't have a laser... on the fore end... because there's a sling on the back?

Whoever makes this might do well to have some military consultants or vets tell them how this stuff really works. For example... if you put a grenade launcher UNDER the barrel, that doesn't magically mean you can't put an red dot on the top.

A utility belt doesn't have an encumbrance capacity of one. It increases a character's Encumbrance Threshold by one. The same is true of the Load Bearing Vest. It increases a character's encumbrance threshold.

3 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

A utility belt doesn't have an encumbrance capacity of one. It increases a character's Encumbrance Threshold by one. The same is true of the Load Bearing Vest. It increases a character's encumbrance threshold.

My bad. Like I said, FNG here. I meant the same thing I think, or am a I wrong? A utility belt means my character can carry an amount of items with an increased number of encumbrance of one, right? So does that mean that somewhere there's a pistol holster that can accept a 2 enc blaster I can buy, or a knife sheath that I can hold my vibroknife in, both of which AND some binders and a baton would be perfectly reasonable to carry on a belt in addition to everything a vest could easily accommodate?

Honestly wondering what I'm missing, and my GM knows WAY more. I'm just here to try to be less of a PITA to him, learn how to RPG without a question a minute.

10 minutes ago, HVSD said:

My bad. Like I said, FNG here. I meant the same thing I think, or am a I wrong? A utility belt means my character can carry an amount of items with an increased number of encumbrance of one, right? So does that mean that somewhere there's a pistol holster that can accept a 2 enc blaster I can buy, or a knife sheath that I can hold my vibroknife in, both of which AND some binders and a baton would be perfectly reasonable to carry on a belt in addition to everything a vest could easily accommodate?

Honestly wondering what I'm missing, and my GM knows WAY more. I'm just here to try to be less of a PITA to him, learn how to RPG without a question a minute.

Not quite. Let me give you an example. A character with a Brawn rating of 2 has an Encumbrance Threshold of 7. This means he can carry gear with a total encumbrance of 7 without penalties. If he wears a Utility Belt, his total encumbrance Threshold increases to 8.

15 minutes ago, HVSD said:

My bad. Like I said, FNG here. I meant the same thing I think, or am a I wrong? A utility belt means my character can carry an amount of items with an increased number of encumbrance of one, right? So does that mean that somewhere there's a pistol holster that can accept a 2 enc blaster I can buy, or a knife sheath that I can hold my vibroknife in, both of which AND some binders and a baton would be perfectly reasonable to carry on a belt in addition to everything a vest could easily accommodate?

Honestly wondering what I'm missing, and my GM knows WAY more. I'm just here to try to be less of a PITA to him, learn how to RPG without a question a minute.

Another thing to keep in mind with Encumbrance is that implicit in the RAW is that an item's ENC is not only weight and size but also includes the ability to retrieve that item with a Maneuver. So what that means is that even though a single Grenade may really be smaller than 1 ENC, it's really about being able to get to it in combat conditions with a single Maneuver. This means it needs to be easily accessible on the PC not just stuffed in a sack. So a GM could allow you to store more Grenades or whatever in your pack and let you count them as less than 1 ENC each but you shouldn't be able to get to them in a single Maneuver.

As for pistols and holsters they are generally hand-waved in this system, it's sort of considered as part of the purchase and your clothing. The details aren't really important in this system just the numbers, you can describe it any way you want.

Just now, Tramp Graphics said:

Not quite. Let me give you an example. A character with a Brawn rating of 2 has an Encumbrance Threshold of 7. This means he can carry gear with a total encumbrance of 7 without penalties. If he wears a Utility Belt, his total encumbrance Threshold increases to 8.

Okay, we're saying the same thing, I'm just saying it wrong I guess.

Still, doesn't make sense to me. Or reality. Sure, if that's ALL my character has, then yeah, a rifle and a pistol and MAYbe a reload. But with a vest, to say I can only carry an additional reload and 2 frags because my encumbrance only goes up by 3? That's wronger than dry docking right there.

5 hours ago, 2P51 said:

I don't pay alot of attention to encumbrance unless we get to kitchen sink number of items, and I think this line sums that up. I just use a common sense approach and think in terms of volume of the items. When anyone wants to carry anything above what I consider realistic with some consideration for race and Brawn we can use the encumbrance numbers to represent how much past encumbered they are going.

I realize some don't like this approach and they're paralyzed with the notion of being so cavalier with math, but my table hasn't burst into flames yet. I haven't had anyone storm out of my house in a blind rage at the audacity of my approach, so I assume it works.

So very much this.

I've never gotten a case of the @ss about what characters are carrying, UNLESS they, as Shadowrun put it, "carry everything from assault cannons to toasters and enough ammo and bread to keep them operating continuously for five years". In ANY system I've GM'ed. EVER.

Munchkins and other assorted scum will try to take advantage of this. Which means they out themselves, I don't have to go looking for them. And then they go away. I don't tolerate munchkins, power gamers, rules lawyers, or players that want to argue, and argue, and argue.

9 minutes ago, FuriousGreg said:

Another thing to keep in mind with Encumbrance is that implicit in the RAW is that an item's ENC is not only weight and size but also includes the ability to retrieve that item with a Maneuver. So what that means is that even though a single Grenade may really be smaller than 1 ENC, it's really about being able to get to it in combat conditions with a single Maneuver. This means it needs to be easily accessible on the PC not just stuffed in a sack. So a GM could allow you to store more Grenades or whatever in your pack and let you count them as less than 1 ENC each but you shouldn't be able to get to them in a single Maneuver.

As for pistols and holsters they are generally hand-waved in this system, it's sort of considered as part of the purchase and your clothing. The details aren't really important in this system just the numbers, you can describe it any way you want.

I do so very much handwavium.

22 minutes ago, HVSD said:

Okay, we're saying the same thing, I'm just saying it wrong I guess.

Still, doesn't make sense to me. Or reality. Sure, if that's ALL my character has, then yeah, a rifle and a pistol and MAYbe a reload. But with a vest, to say I can only carry an additional reload and 2 frags because my encumbrance only goes up by 3? That's wronger than dry docking right there.

No, we're not. The number that a utility Belt or LBV grants to a character is not a limit in how much that item itself can hold. It is simply how much the item increases a character's encumbrance threshold. So, you can put however many grenades you want on the thing And you can fit however large of a pistol in a gunbelt's holster.It doesn't matter what that item's encumbrance is. All that matters is the total encumbrance of all of your gear and how it affects your ability to make maneuvers. Let me give you another example. MY Jedi character Korath has a Jedi Utility belt (Keeping the Peace Page 52). As with a standard Utility belt, it increases my Encumbrance Threshold by one. It also includes several other items which, by themselves have specific encumbrance values, but are not counted against my total because they come with the belt itself, (a rebreather, comlink, Jedi Multitool, glowrod, medpac, 3 days food capsules). Each of these items, by themselves have encumbrances of 1 or more. However, because they come as part of the Jedi Utility Belt, they don't count towards my encumbrance threshold as long as they are stored within. On top of that, He keeps his lightsaber (enc 1), climbing gear (Enc 1), a datapad (Enc 1), and a breathmask (Enc 1) attached to his belt. This brings the total encumbrance of his gear to 4, which is 4 below his Encumbrance threshold. But all of that is attached to his belt or carried in the belt's pouches.

In your case, you could easily carry however many grenades on your LBV as you wanted, as long as it was within your total Encumbrance threshold. IF you go over that, you lose your free Manuever, which means you will take 2 Strain for every maneuver you make as long as you are over your Encumbrance Threshold. That is all it means. It does not mean that the belt can only carry one Encumbrance worth of gear or that an LBV can only carry 3 Encumbrance worth of gear.

4 minutes ago, the mercenary said:

All the stuff you said

Okay, now this is starting to make a bit more sense. I'd rather play like this than nitter away at the rules, lawyering crap left and right.

To what you said, you remind me of another thing that bothered me. 0 encumbrance rations, and stuff like them. I know there's somewhere it says 10 zero encumbrance items counts as 1 encumbrance.

Anyone who has ever picked up a case of MREs can tell you that calling 10 of those 1 enc, while a pistol or a knife is also only 1 enc, is nuts.

To my mind, and without my GM's insistence, I am far more strict on what I'll say I can carry. My character has like 6 0 enc items at any given time, and at that point, I say there's no more room. Just doesn't wash, makes no sense. Unless we're talking ruck sack, in which case I'd expect agility, stealth, athletics and coordination checks, and to have to spend a maneuver to retrieve anything if needed.

See, I'm not about being a stickler, but that's not rule lawyering to me. If I was GMing and had someone "carry everything from assault cannons to toasters and enough ammo and bread to keep them operating continuously for five years" I'd just flip the table and leave. If anyone I play with does it I'd bet my dangly bits he gets his peepee slapped by our GM.

Thanks everyone for all the prompt responses. Really helps. Was a bit worried I'd just get yelled at, "NEWB! Read the effin books, cherry!" I do. But there are a LOT of books, so this is handy. Thanks.

1 minute ago, Tramp Graphics said:

All the stuff you said

I appreciate the clarification. Let me rephrase: I understand what you mean and what the rules are, even though I do not effectively or correctly communicate it. In this most recent reply, it makes considerably more sense than how I could have come up with to describe it.

3 minutes ago, HVSD said:

Okay, now this is starting to make a bit more sense. I'd rather play like this than nitter away at the rules, lawyering crap left and right.

To what you said, you remind me of another thing that bothered me. 0 encumbrance rations, and stuff like them. I know there's somewhere it says 10 zero encumbrance items counts as 1 encumbrance.

Anyone who has ever picked up a case of MREs can tell you that calling 10 of those 1 enc, while a pistol or a knife is also only 1 enc, is nuts.

To my mind, and without my GM's insistence, I am far more strict on what I'll say I can carry. My character has like 6 0 enc items at any given time, and at that point, I say there's no more room. Just doesn't wash, makes no sense. Unless we're talking ruck sack, in which case I'd expect agility, stealth, athletics and coordination checks, and to have to spend a maneuver to retrieve anything if needed.

See, I'm not about being a stickler, but that's not rule lawyering to me. If I was GMing and had someone "carry everything from assault cannons to toasters and enough ammo and bread to keep them operating continuously for five years" I'd just flip the table and leave. If anyone I play with does it I'd bet my dangly bits he gets his peepee slapped by our GM.

Thanks everyone for all the prompt responses. Really helps. Was a bit worried I'd just get yelled at, "NEWB! Read the effin books, cherry!" I do. But there are a LOT of books, so this is handy. Thanks.

Star Wars Rations aren't like an MRE. They're more like an Energy bar. In the Prequels, the Jedi carried Food capsules in their belts, which were even smaller, and each capsule contained small gumball sized spheres to eat, which each was equivalent to a full meal's worth of nutrition.

Ration Pack:

Food capsules:

15 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

Star Wars Rations aren't like an MRE. They're more like an Energy bar. In the Prequels, the Jedi carried Food capsules in their belts, which were even smaller, and each capsule contained small gumball sized spheres to eat, which each was equivalent to a full meal's worth of nutrition.

Ration Pack:

Food capsules:

Well dress me up and call me Sally! I was thinking more like what I saw Luke with in Degoba, like what Yoda stole was like a small piece, maybe 10% of the overall mass, of a meal kit or something. This helps. My character can eat for days now.

Ok, you're looking at things a little too finely, and missing a few details, but I think we can get you about where you are trying to go.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

LBV with an encumbrance capacity of 3 and a backpack with encumbrance of capacity of 6

Right, don't forget you load bearing gear is compatible with a utility belt, so that's an extra +1 you could also add. That's a combined +10, not bad.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

well, say I have 5 frags. Would I REALLY not be able to put 5 on a vest?

No, you could. The Vest only offsets 3 Enc out of the total 5 though. You could put your grenades anywhere you like, on the vest, in you pockets, down your pants, whatever, I don't judge.

Same goes for things like backpacks and duffelbags. A duffel only increases your ET by 2, but you can put as much stuff in that bag as you logically could stuff into that bag. The Bag's ability to store stuff just doesn't dramatically improve things after the first +2. Which makes sense, stuff enough stuff into a duffel and it just becomes a different kind of bulky.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

If I wanted, I could get 16 frags on the thing, IF I only put them on the front. I mean, no one carries 16 frags unless they're 40mm rounds and they're a grenadier, but the point is, I could do it. M67s weigh 14oz. I can carry 16-ish pounds, so you can't say it's the weight. So, not that I would IRL, or would in game, but the point is, if we're going for realistic, I COULD.

Right, and here you can too, it's just that the vest hits a point at which it just becomes a different kind of awkward. And that's the ting, Enc isn't just weight, it's overall bulkiness and awkwardness to carry summed up an a distilled game mechanic.

More importantly, that game mechanic isn't there to represent reality, it's there to represent a movie. Movies don't follow the same rules as reality, why else you think those grenades need to activate with advantage and have the vague "Engaged" blast radius. Same thing here.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

Same goes for armor. There is a Reflex Body Glove in Force and Destiny's Consulars book with a soak of 3. I've seen some GMs say you can stack armor for its attributes, but not soak. But... IRL, if I have a kevlar weave shirt on under a Kevlar lined plate carrier, well, I can withstand more than if I just had one or the other. I see GMs saying that if the player can sell it, they'll allow it, but, if we're going for realistic, it's more like how can you, or anyone really, explain how it WOULDN'T work?

Again, it's a game mechanic. If you allow soak to stack (which RAW doesn't) you'll get characters that become impenetrable.

That said you have Talents that increase soak, which isn't real either, but it fits a movie-style archetype. The Star Wars Bounty Hunter or heavy trooper in armor.

Additionally, I promise you your kelvar weave shirt isn't going to significantly improve you ability to not get ventilated. Give PEO Soldier a call some time.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

For example, if I wear that Reflex Body Glove under Laminate Armor, by what mental gymnastics can anyone explain how the body glove's soak simply doesn't apply because I have the soak of the laminate armor over it?

It does apply even though it doesn't stack. It's the best soak you have, so you use that. The Reflective Bodyglove has diminishing returns though, so pairing it with another armor makes a certain amount of sense if you're expecting real trouble, as at some point the Laminate will take over your soak.

7 hours ago, HVSD said:

I'm obviously a newb,

Ok, so lemme lay out more what you have in mind:

I'm an Imperial Army trooper. I've got Brawn 3 for a naked ET of 8.

I'm wearing a basic uniform, which we know in AoR NPC stats is essentially heavy clothing. Heavy Clothing has an Enc of only 1, and since worn armor reduces it's Enc by 3, it doesn't count against me.

Now, I'll add a blast vest/helmet. The Vest is Enc 3, so nothing against my ET, but not I can use that when calculating my armor, making the near-miss explosion a little less likely to kill me. Not much, but a little...

Next I'll put on my load bearing gear. Web gear and a Utility Belt. This gives me a combined +4 to my ET for a total of 12.

I'll take an E-10 Blaster Rifle (4), several pouches full of spare powerpacks* (1), and 2 grenades (2). That's a total 7 Enc against my ET of 12. I can carry a lot more if I like.

So... comlink (0) 2 Stimpacks in a military belt pouch (0), goggles (0) standard issue breathmask to complete that Dollar store Stormtrooper look (1), a canteen (1), some rations (0), and a thermal cloak (2). I'm now at 11 out of 12 and carrying a lot of stuff, but still can carry a little more if needed without being encumbered.

If I'm expecting some light trouble I can add an assault pack (+4 ET) and easily carry more without being encumbered.

Lets say I'm not expecting light trouble, lets say I'm going long range. So I get an Imperial military military pack for +6 ET now totaling me at 11/18.

Now... I'm going to be out for a while, at least a few days... So I'll take a second Canteen (1) 10 rations (1) an entrenching tool (1), glowrod (1), 2 more grenades (2), scanner goggles (1), it gets cold here at night, so I take a tent and bedroll (3) and a spare missile I'm carrying for someone else (1). Wow, that's 11 Enc right there.... I'm overencumbered.

Now being overencumbered isn't that bad. You can't take a free Maneuver (so I either have to spend 2 strain, or downgrade my action) and I suffer 1 setback per Enc over my threshold to all Agility and Brawn based checks.

I'm 22/18, so that's 4 setback.

But that's no biggy, mostly all I'm doing is walking, so the maneuver thing doesn't matter, and I may need to take a Resilience Check if I walk a long way, but I'll probably pass it.

Now... only an idiot would carry all that stuff into combat, so I break it down. Everything I don't see an immediate need for, or that might be important if I get stuck, I place in my pack. That's somewhere are around 10 Enc. The pack doesn't fully offset that amount, but it can still hold that amount.

If we start getting shot at, I spend my turn taking my first maneuver (2 strain or a downgraded action) to dump the pack full of junk. And boom, I'm not below my ET and can move without issue.

* read the description. "Extra Reloads" isn't 1 powerpack, it's a whole stack of them. The exact count doesn't matter, just that you can reload until the nerfs come home off of 1 instance of the item.

17 minutes ago, HVSD said:

Well dress me up and call me Sally! I was thinking more like what I saw Luke with in Degoba, like what Yoda stole was like a small piece, maybe 10% of the overall mass, of a meal kit or something. This helps. My character can eat for days now.

What Luke had on Dagobah wasn’t one meal’s worth of rations in that case. That was his entire supply of his ship’s consumables. That one bar that Yoda picked up and took a bite out of was a whole meal in and of itself. That one bar was supposed to be his dinner, not the whole tin.

Layering armor can break the balance of the system quite fast, as it can push the squishy guys to acceptable levels of soak and the tanky guys to even more madness. As soon as this will begin at the table, it will creep into most of the heads (it will keep you alive longer, who won't want this?!) and sooner or later the whole game will end at an even worse level of insanity the GM has to throw at the group to harm the tank and will still (almost) outright drop everyone else.

Depending on how focused the builds on the table are, this will break things more and/or faster as the dmg vs soak system isn't perfect at it's base and won't get better when throwing logic into it to stack armor soak.

The encumbrance system is a great way to keep the typical "loot everything that the GM didn't nail to the ground!" - group from doing - this. You can throw in some nice loot on the NPCs to give the choice of an upgrade OR the shiny for credits, while not to "fear" trading simulator because the Group got their hands on 25 blaster pistols and 12 quite intact sets of padded armor. And I tend to believe that every GM had at least one such player at the table once. And as a GM I'm very strict with those rules for that reason.

From that starting point a Grenadier will suffer from the system, but so will for example a Cybertech as he will carry medical stuff and tools at the same time, which both have a quite high ENC. From the narrative perspective, they could have done something like giving a grenade ENC 2 but making it a whole supply and using despair or threat to "run out of grenades" - or going to ENC 0 and try to balance them over the price - but they didn't and I blame balancing issues for it. But opposed to any stacking of armor soak I would at least try one of the two ways for grenades when running AoR settings with much fighting - but not for EotE or FaD settings as I find it not very fitting and just everyone in those environments would concentrate fire on a guy visibly carrying 10+ grenades.

And come on - those levels of logic put into Star Wars?! One of the best settings when it comes to denying physics and (what we would see as) logical decisions in tech design.

Its done purely for game balance which isn't a thing realty has to worry about. So the system is an abstracted system not intendedto emulate shadowrun like simulator or a d&d tactical show.

The encumbrance rules in general are broken, so just going with what makes sense is the best choice.

Packed Stuff can have Enc reduced to a certain amount (well it´ s mentioned for enc 0 items, instead of 10 = 1 Enc, it´ s 20 = 1 Enc.
Would be reasonbale to carry some grenades in the backpack, packed.
Get a grenade launcher, it holds 6 grenades, and you get a pack of 6 grenades for 50% off.

On 10/4/2018 at 3:03 AM, Tramp Graphics said:

What Luke had on Dagobah wasn’t one meal’s worth of rations in that case. That was his entire supply of his ship’s consumables. That one bar that Yoda picked up and took a bite out of was a whole meal in and of itself. That one bar was supposed to be his dinner, not the whole tin.

I still want to know what kind of probs they used for that, looked like a BiFi.

On 10/3/2018 at 8:02 PM, HVSD said:

For example, an LBV with an encumbrance capacity of 3 and a backpack with encumbrance of capacity of 6... well, say I have 5 frags. Would I REALLY not be able to put 5 on a vest? Do I need to spend a maneuver to un-sling my pack to retrieve frag #4? I have an LBV IRL. If I wanted, I could get 16 frags on the thing, IF I only put them on the front. I mean, no one carries 16 frags unless they're 40mm rounds and they're a grenadier, but the point is, I could do it. M67s weigh 14oz. I can carry 16-ish pounds, so you can't say it's the weight. So, not that I would IRL, or would in game, but the point is, if we're going for realistic, I COULD.

Think of equipment that increases your encumbrance cap like this:

If you carry 6 encumbrance worth of stuff tucked in just your pockets, in your waistband and wherever else you can fit it, it's going to be a lot more in the way and nuisance than if if you throw it in a backpack. A backpack that adds 6 to your encumbrance is a good, comfortable backpack that you can throw a lot of stuff in with out it seeming to weigh you down much. If you need to carry more than 6 encumbrance, it might mean that the weight of the backpack starts become noticeable, or it becomes large enough to be in the way, either because it's full of stuff or because large items are sticking out.

Encumbrance is, as many have pointed out, not necessarily just weight, but also size and general ungainliness. While not stated explicitly, I'd rule that bundling or packaging things efficiently would reduce the total encumbrance to less than the sum of the individual items. For instance, carrying two separate rifles is a bit of hassle and i'd count their full encumbrance (let's say 4), but if you lash or tape two rifles together side-by-side it's, despite doubling it's mass, not a significantly larger or more ungainly bundle than a single rifle and I'd reduce encumbrance accordingly (of course, while it's a practical way for lugging a pair of rifles around, if you actually want to use them while stuck together, you should probably get a few setback dice).

Since the system ignore fractions for simplicity's sake you could apply the same thinking to stacking smaller items, like grenades. I mean, rounding up, saying that a grenade is about as encumbering as pistol is pretty fair, but ten grenades might be quite a bit less than ten pistols. Considering that 6-shot grenade launcher, fully loaded (or not), clocks in at 5 encumbrance, it would be somewhat weird if there was no way to carry a spare reload of grenades for it that totaled less than 6 encumbrance. This highlights that the system plays a bit fast and loose with ammo. You could try a literal interpretation, saying that a weapon's encumbrance value includes just itself and a single loaded magazine, and every reload is a single 1-encumbrance item, but that starts making less sense when you start applying it to automatic slug throwers and such. This means that the encumbrance of a weapon could be assumed to include a "reasonable" amount of ammunition for it (unless it has Limited Ammo, of course). Carrying one or more extra reload (the 1 enc item) is probably something mostly done by people who expect to get into prolonged firefights, like soldiers and justifiably paranoid cops.

Well, that's just my 18 öre (at the current exchange rate, not including fees).