Hello everyone,

First time posting here so forgive me for any mistakes I make. I've been playing in a EotE game lately and recently watched the Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order gameplay trailer. In it, the main character uses a droid that climbs up and sort of hooks onto their back. Seeing this gave me an idea for my Bounty Hunter and I was wondering if you all could please help me with suggestions for the mechanics of a droid jetpack.

My idea is that it's a collapsible droid, like the DUM-series pit droids that can hook onto your back and functions as a Jetpack whilst also providing utility slicing/scanning/light repairs, etc. in it's mobile form. I would also like if it could potentially work as a regular backpack for storage and my GM even suggested stimpack administration (though I'm hesitant to make it TOO strong less I risk it being OP). Any help here would be much appreciated.

In advance, I'd like to thank anyone who reads this. It's much appreciated and I look forward to any responses I get. Thank you.

Interesting idea however I think it may be a little much cramming Droid parts, Jet pack machinery, and available space for a regular backpack. I could see a couple pouches or compartments that would allow for small tools but not gain the benefits of a normal backpack. At most I would let it carry up to Encumbrance 2 of equipment.

I forgot which book has it but it is probably Dawn of Rebellion, they have listed the ID10 Seeker Droid which is like the droid seen in Battlefront 2. I would use similar stats for that and either increase the size of the droid to that of a jetpack OR modify a jetpack to have housing for the droid but that doesn't quite fit your plans.

Jet packs are large. Look at any star wars jet packs we've seen and you are talking something that is about 1/3 to 1/2 the size of an R2 droid. This is your first hurdle. R2 isn't just a hollow tube waiting for you to fill it with a jet engine. By clearing out enough space to get a jet pack in there you are going to be compromising the droid's ability to do stuff (by removing computer interface tools, repair tools, storage, etc). On top of that, the increased complications of such a combination would make things more expensive.

Best case scenario, to do everything you are talking about, you're basically strapping an R2 droid to your back at minimum. These seems a bit cumbersome.

I think you'd be better off just using a jet pack and getting a pit droid that can fold up and attach to the outside of the jetpack.

Considering we've now got a droid small enough to ride on someone's back:

which seems to have all slicing and hologram features of R2 while being a fraction of the size, a droid that folds into a jetpack or basically IS the jetpack that has few tools in stock with a little room to spare wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility.

That droid has no storage, no tools, plus it wouldn't be able to move if you stuck it on a jetpack. Take it's body and head, attach them to a jetpack, now give it limbs large enough to move itself and the jetpack, and what do you have? Something nearly the size of an R2 unit with none of the plethora of tools that R2 had. And what do you get out of that? A talking jetpack that can hack locks and display holograms? For what purpose? Why the extra complication to join two things that have no reason to be joined? This little droid does what you want without being attached to a jetpack, slap a fold up pit droid on there too for repairs. Problem solved without the complications.

I mean, it's star wars. If you want it to work, and the GM is cool with it, go to town! I just don't understand it. Size, weight, ability, none of that needs to make logical real world sense. Suspend that disbelief. We're playing a game with laser swords and space wizards after all.

A walking, talking jetpack that can open doors and display holograms sounds more like a mashup between dora the explorer and star wars. But a guy that has a jetpack and an army of droids that disembark from him to serve different purposes...now that screams straight up star wars. Go hardcore droid based character utilizing the droid based specs. Use a jetpack with a small utility droid and a pit droid that attach. Then have some of those training droids (like in ep4) but modify the power upwards so they hit like a real blaster. You fly into battle, drop off the utility droid and pit droid, send the utility droid to create a diversion, have the pit droid on standby for repairs, stimpack delivery. Release a swarm of training droids that swarm around and act as their own minion group, attacking enemies and what not. Now you have a cool guy with an droid army. Where as the other guy just has an annoying jetpack.

I'm now imagining the jetpack droid in detail and its funny. You get to a door you need it to unlock and you have to squat down in front of the door in a very uncool position to allow the droid access. Or better yet, it has this long interface device that comes out about waist high and you have to kind of hip thrust it into the receiving port. And you have to take it off to utilize the holoprojector as opposed to a palm sized holoprojector you could carry around. I'm now in favor of it because of how ridiculous it could be used in gameplay.

My player crafted a wearable gadget that he installed on two mods, a droid brain and armor mod for extra hand. Making it a Slicing droid third hand.

Well, on the other hand, both R2D2 and Chopper has built in jet packs, or perhaps rocket boots in R2D2's case.

And both have shown that their jet packs are strong enough to carry someone a short distance (although not the smoothest flight). But still, who wants to carry an astromech droid on their back

On 6/13/2019 at 12:09 PM, kmanweiss said:

That droid has no storage, no tools, plus it wouldn't be able to move if you stuck it on a jetpack. Take it's body and head, attach them to a jetpack, now give it limbs large enough to move itself and the jetpack, and what do you have? Something nearly the size of an R2 unit with none of the plethora of tools that R2 had.

Nope.

That's the jetpack Boba Fett uses. A jetpack like that could easily have a slot for a tiny slicing (or whatever) droid like BD1 with room to spare. Just a slot for the legs and fold up it's head when it's not being used, the droid isn't even as big as a laptop. The whole thing wouldn't even come close to R2's size. As for the tools, it would probably be best to have some general stuff and some things that can be swapped out as needed.

59 minutes ago, immortalfrieza said:

Nope.

That's the jetpack Boba Fett uses. A jetpack like that could easily have a slot for a tiny slicing (or whatever) droid like BD1 with room to spare. Just a slot for the legs and fold up it's head when it's not being used, the droid isn't even as big as a laptop. The whole thing wouldn't even come close to R2's size. As for the tools, it would probably be best to have some general stuff and some things that can be swapped out as needed.

Not necessarily. Remember, a lot of the space in that thing is taken up with fuel .

This guy folds up pretty well, so I don't see why a jet pack couldn't also contain a droid.

The main difference of that is a Droid that can combine/connect with a jet pack vs. a Droid that also is a jet pack.

I think the first is more workable.

19 hours ago, Ahrimon said:

This guy folds up pretty well, so I don't see why a jet pack couldn't also contain a droid.

16 hours ago, Varlie said:

The main difference of that is a Droid that can combine/connect with a jet pack vs. a Droid that also is a jet pack.

I think the first is more workable.

Connecting externally to a Jetpack? Maybe. Fitting inside of one? Not in a million years. As I mentioned, a good majority of a jetpack's internal volume is taken up with fuel . There really isn't room in one for a droid, or even droid components, to turn one into a droid.

4 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

Connecting externally to a Jetpack? Maybe. Fitti  ng inside of one? Not in a million ye  ars. As I mentio  ned, a good majority of a jetpack's intern  al volume is taken up with fuel . There really isn't room in one for a droid, or even droid components, to turn one into a droid.

So you can't perceive of any particular reality where they could make a jet pack with just a little extra room to fit droid parts...

6 minutes ago, Ahrimon said:

So you can't perceive of any particular reality where they could make a jet pack with just a little extra room to fit droid parts...

Not unless it was uncomfortably huge and cumbersome , so as to be almost impossible to wear normally. By that, I'm talking about something like this:

And even here, even more of its volume must be taken up with fuel becuase if its larger mass.

Didn't the mandolorians have smaller jetpacks?

3 minutes ago, MrTInce said:

Didn't the mandolorians have smaller jetpacks?

Yes, but they still required fuel, which takes up a large portion of their volume.

So...

Pit droid size droid + mandolorian size jetpack = Giant oversize silhouette 2 backpack...

Ladies and Gentlemen I give you the Amazing Tramp Graphics and his mystifying abilities of ignoring logic and digging his heels in rather than admitting something else could work...lol.

2 hours ago, MrTInce said:

Didn't the mandolorians have smaller jetpacks?

There's an armor attachment that gives your repulsorlift mobility in your skintight suit. The tech is pretty crazy.

There's no reason a jetpack has to have fuel. It's not a rocket that requires reaction mass. Those jets do not have to be combusion-driven and could instead be powered by energy cells.

Greetings @Cassian Ordo and welcome!

First off, I like your idea, and (despite what some people above may say, I'm pretty sure it's plausible) R2D2's thrusters seemed to be able to lift his weight fairly easily, and they don't appear to be very large (6 inches maybe?), and we've seen small droids (like your inspiration from Fallen Order, Pit Droids, and Mouse droids) I don't see anything wrong with slapping a 3 int 2 Computers/Mechanics droid on your back with the jets attached. (3int 2x skill for balance)

Stimpack application? Sure? Just make sure the droid doesn't get to do anything else that turn. Stimpacks have diminishing returns anyway.

A backpack as well??? I'd say no, for a couple reasons: It's counterintuitive to the "flying" aspect (you need larger engines if you want to lift more, and more fuel would be required). As was suggested above, I'd say a couple enc max. You can still carry gear in pouches/utility belts, etc. If you think about it, that's a strong balance aspect for the droid in general (if you want your jetpack, you can't wear a backpack)

Here's the point I really wanted to get to, and that's the whole "jetpack" thing. I'm not sure how experienced your GM is, but it's pretty widely accepted that there's a bit of rule wonkiness when personal scale combat intersects with vehicle scale combat. With a jetpack, you can zip anywhere up to extreme range in a single turn, which can cause all kinds of craziness in combat encounters. Might I suggest a compromise where, instead of a bona-fide Jetpack, the droid basically grants you an ability in the vein of the "Force Leap" talent in the Enhance tree, the Improved Freerunning ability in the Racer tree, or the Kyuzo leap species ability?

It would give you an edge in mobility, but not have to bring in all the vehicle mechanics. And it would keep things simpler. Which is generally desirable.

It also fits for a compact droid with a rocket booster, rather than a full time dedicated flying droid, or even an astromech with rockets.

If you're still worried about balance, it could always be a 1-2 uses per encounter/X uses per day(or between charging) Depending on how powerful your GM wants to make the ability.

Good luck, and let us know what your GM and you come up with!

On 6/8/2019 at 5:00 PM, Cassian Ordo said:

My idea is that it's a collapsible droid, like the DUM-series pit droids that can hook onto your back and functions as a Jetpack whilst also providing utility slicing/scanning/light repairs, etc. in it's mobile form. I would also like if it could potentially work as a regular backpack for storage and my GM even suggested stimpack administration (though I'm hesitant to make it TOO strong less I risk it being OP). Any help here would be much appreciated.

To keep it simple, spend the cost of all the things want for it, so a droid chassis+directives, jetpack, backpack, toolkit, slicing tools, etc and then let the GM set the cumbersome rating of and how much encumbrance it adds. Done and done.

Alternatively if you are building it, cut the costs in half for all the things and make a Mechanics check with a difficulty set by the GM for the hardware and a Computers check for the directives. This might be more fun for you both because the droid could have some hardware downsides and some personality quirks with any threat results.

Treat it like an animal companion, you have to sacrifice a maneuver to get it to do something during a structured encounter, otherwise it does nothing.

19 hours ago, Ahrimon said:

So...

Pit droid size droid + mandolorian size jetpack = Giant oversize silhouette 2 backpack...

Ladies and Gentlemen I give you the Amazing Tramp Graphics and his mystifying abilities of ignoring logic and digging his heels in rather than admitting something else could work...lol.

No, what I am saying is that you cannot fit a droid of any size into a jet pack as small as a Mandalorian jet pack because doing so would remove the jet pack’s fuel capacity, making it completely non-functional . Even a larger jet pack, such as the one in the image I posted would be hard pressed to fit even a tiny droid inside of it because it requires a significantly larger fuel capacity to lift its increased mass. Attaching one externally might be remotely possible, but you’re still adding extra mass, albeit temporarily, but this would still reduce the Jet pack’s fuel efficiency and lifting capacity significantly.

My question here isn't whether it can be done so much as should it be done. In the end you will have a character who has a droid backpack that is essentially a swiss army knife and transportation all rolled into one. Maybe the other PCs in the group are all so capable that this is the only way to be able to fight along side of the rest of the group and not feel like you are just some dude, I don't know.

But to me the thing is that you should imagine this idea in execution and ask yourself if it seems like a good idea story-wise, and is it setting up a precedent that will likely end up giving birth to more characters with what amount to transformers. Droid speeder bike, droid moisture Vaporator, droid armor, droid holonet terminal, etc.

The character will likely have a ready-made solution in the form of that droid for many many problems, and will that be fun to play, or will everyone playing already know your answer to every challenge before the Jetback buddy PC even has to do anything? Oh yeah he will try to use the droid for that. Stand back, he's got this.

On 6/14/2019 at 12:19 PM, immortalfrieza said:

Nope.

That's the jetpack Boba Fett uses. A jetpack like that could easily have a slot for a tiny slicing (or whatever) droid like BD1 with room to spare. Just a slot for the legs and fold up it's head when it's not being used, the droid isn't even as big as a laptop. The whole thing wouldn't even come close to R2's size. As for the tools, it would probably be best to have some general stuff and some things that can be swapped out as needed.

Yeah, you could stick BD's head on this thing. No problem. And you could stick BD's legs on this also...but those legs would be worthless, they couldn't carry the weight of a jetpack full of fuel and thrusters in an armored case. So now we need to increase the size of the legs by a large degree. Something likely on par with R2s legs. But you probably wan't them to be jointed legs so it can walk instead of roll. That's heavy. Now BD is small. Small body, small head, small legs. Not much power to move that around. However, a large jetpack full of fuel, that we've now strapped jointed R2 size legs onto, well, that takes a lot of power to move that thing around. So now we need we need to add a power supply, and a larger power supply than what BD uses, and you need space for tools and what not. But with all this added weight, to make it still as functional as a jetpack, we'd need larger thrusters and more fuel. So, basically, double the size of this jetpack, replace the rocket with BD's head, stick two bulky, jointed R2 size legs on the side. Good job, you now have a rather goofy looking droid that is twice as big and twice as heavy as this jetpack strapped to your back. Most of it's features are completely useless when it's on your back or being used as a jetpack. It's legs are pointless, but heavy. It's increased power supply is also pointless and heavy. You can't honestly expect to use it to slice into stuff when strapped to your back. It's needlessly complicated and ineffective.

Don't forget that droids are HEAVY. A pit droid is small and compact, but still 77 pounds. R2 is 70 pounds. BB8 is 88 pounds. Fett's jetpack is 66 pounds. Lets combine just the pit droid and the jetpack and without any other modifications you are talking 143 lbs. But again, we'd need to make adjustments to make the droid able to handle the additional weight and awkward size and the additional fuel/thruster adjustments. So we bulk that up to what? 160lbs? Modern day soldiers carry 100lbs or less of gear in total, but we are talking about one item here that is 160lbs, strapped to your back (not spread evenly around the body).

Use BD, use a pitdroid. Now you can drop them off, or deploy them as needed without building them into a jetpack. Heck, they could move around independently and not weigh you down.

It honestly would make more sense to go with a KX style droid modified to have a built in jetpack and just have him pick you up and fly around with you.

4 minutes ago, kmanweiss said:

Yeah, you could stick BD's head on this thing. No problem. And you could stick BD's legs on this also...but those legs would be worthless, they couldn't carry the weight of a jetpack full of fuel and thrusters in an armored case. So now we need to increase the size of the legs by a large degree. Something likely on par with R2s legs. But you probably wan't them to be jointed legs so it can walk instead of roll. That's heavy. Now BD is small. Small body, small head, small legs. Not much power to move that around. However, a large jetpack full of fuel, that we've now strapped jointed R2 size legs onto, well, that takes a lot of power to move that thing around. So now we need we need to add a power supply, and a larger power supply than what BD uses, and you need space for tools and what not. But with all this added weight, to make it still as functional as a jetpack, we'd need larger thrusters and more fuel. So, basically, double the size of this jetpack, replace the rocket with BD's head, stick two bulky, jointed R2 size legs on the side. Good job, you now have a rather goofy looking droid that is twice as big and twice as heavy as this jetpack strapped to your back. Most of it's features are completely useless when it's on your back or being used as a jetpack. It's legs are pointless, but heavy. It's increased power supply is also pointless and heavy. You can't honestly expect to use it to slice into stuff when strapped to your back. It's needlessly complicated and ineffective.

Don't forget that droids are HEAVY. A pit droid is small and compact, but still 77 pounds. R2 is 70 pounds. BB8 is 88 pounds. Fett's jetpack is 66 pounds. Lets combine just the pit droid and the jetpack and without any other modifications you are talking 143 lbs. But again, we'd need to make adjustments to make the droid able to handle the additional weight and awkward size and the additional fuel/thruster adjustments. So we bulk that up to what? 160lbs? Modern day soldiers carry 100lbs or less of gear in total, but we are talking about one item here that is 160lbs, strapped to your back (not spread evenly around the body).

Use BD, use a pitdroid. Now you can drop them off, or deploy them as needed without building them into a jetpack. Heck, they could move around independently and not weigh you down.

It honestly would make more sense to go with a KX style droid modified to have a built in jetpack and just have him pick you up and fly around with you.

EXACTLY!!!!!!! Finally, someone gets it!!!!