We now have specializations within the Jedi career that have prerequisites. In this case, the prerequisites are Force Ratings of 2 (for Knight and General) or 3 (for Master).

Can prerequisites exist for other specializations? Should they?

What kinds of prerequisites? Should certain specializations have a minimum Characteristic value? What about requiring a certain Talent before allowing the Specialization to be taken?

As an example, let's consider the Clone Veteran from Collapse of the Republic. Let's say that I think it's stupid that Clone Veteran can be a character's first specialization. What if I gave Clone Veteran "Prerequisite: Dedication 1" to represent the necessary experience to be considered eligible to be a veteran?

16 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

We now have specializations within the Jedi career that have prerequisites. In this case, the prerequisites are Force Ratings of 2 (for Knight and General) or 3 (for Master).

Can prerequisites exist for other specializations? Should they?

What kinds of prerequisites? Should certain specializations have a minimum Characteristic value? What about requiring a certain Talent before allowing the Specialization to be taken?

As an example, let's consider the Clone Veteran from Collapse of the Republic. Let's say that I think it's stupid that Clone Veteran can be a character's first specialization. What if I gave Clone Veteran "Prerequisite: Dedication 1" to represent the necessary experience to be considered eligible to be a veteran?

Collapse has yet to hit our shores here in the UK (fingers crossed for next week) but I admit I was kind of expecting Clone Veteran and maybe ARC Trooper to have prerequisites similar to the Jedi trees, if only to simulate that both are supposed to represent clones that have been "raised from the ranks" rather than bred specifically for that job (in canon at least, I know Legends' ARC Troopers were bred for purpose).

I would need to take a good look at their trees to see exactly what they offer before making such a rule in my game, but I would be open to the idea of introducing house-ruled prerequisites for some trees.

Honestly I would say yes it’s possible, but I don’t think any of the existing specs are powerful enough to warrant it. Personally I would prefer FFG to publish some new Specs that are more powerful than the normal starting specs but do have those prerequisites your talking about. Perhaps call them Signature Specialisations if the prerequisite is certain talents in a specific career, just as the Signature Abilities do. Otherwise Mastery Specialisation or Hero Specialisation if the prerequisites are more generic such as “Characteristic X” or “Strain Threshold greater than X” or even “Rank X in Y number of Skills”

The biggest issue here is obviously power creep, but it really would just be making a 2 spec character closer in power to a 3 spec.

FFG could then publish a book for each of the three lines with a collection of these specialisations in each, focused on the things that make a character in that setting a Hero. The talents themselves wouldn’t have to be significantly more powerful, just having strong synergies.

3 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

We now have specializations within the Jedi career that have prerequisites. In this case, the prerequisites are Force Ratings of 2 (for Knight and General) or 3 (for Master).

Can prerequisites exist for other specializations? Should they?

What kinds of prerequisites? Should certain specializations have a minimum Characteristic value? What about requiring a certain Talent before allowing the Specialization to be taken?

As an example, let's consider the Clone Veteran from Collapse of the Republic. Let's say that I think it's stupid that Clone Veteran can be a character's first specialization. What if I gave Clone Veteran "Prerequisite: Dedication 1" to represent the necessary experience to be considered eligible to be a veteran?

No. Because the power level for the is lower than the spec with preteqs

Specializations aren't always taken within their 'expected' career or character theme, and if you start adding theme-enforcing requirements, or ones that can only reasonably be met in certain careers, you're blocking that off as an option.

This is where the GM comes in and just says no to clone veteran being a starter.

Based on the names alone, I could see requiring a rank of Dedication for all three CotR Clone specs: ARC Trooper, Clone Commander, and Clone Veteran. Those aren't roles that we see filled by shinies on screen. However, the mechanics don't really seem to justify it. Much like a character with the Assassin spec doesn't literally have to be an assassin, a character with the Clone Commander spec doesn't actually have to rank as an actual commander like Cody or Wolffe. Generally, I lean towards fewer arbitrary restrictions being better.

I do think the prerequisites for the Jedi career specs make sense, but I don't anticipate adding many more in my games. I will probably enforce a species requirement for the Nightsister spec, Retired Clone Trooper spec, and Clone Soldier career, but that's about it. I can't think of others I would add (and if someone really wanted a spec that wasn't era appropriate like Separatist Commander, I would probably work with them to find an appropriate way for them to make it work).

I hope FFG minimizes prereqs from here on out. Folks here are neglecting the old, "I used to be a ___, but my skills have gotten rusty" trope. Like Padawan Survivor, a Veteran can easily be a starting character with that justification.

40 minutes ago, SavageBob said:

I hope FFG minimizes prereqs from here on out. Folks here are neglecting the old, "I used to be a ___, but my skills have gotten rusty" trope. Like Padawan Survivor, a Veteran can easily be a starting character with that justification.

This is a pretty solid justification for not adding stringent per-requisites to further specializations.

For Knight and Master, it makes sense that the PC would need a certain degree of Force proficiency.

Retired Clone Trooper kinda makes sense that it requires the PC to be a Human given the plethora of combat skills it provides right out the gate simply for purchasing the spec, but that can easily be waived by the GM if they so desire. Though with the Clone Trooper specs now available, there's less need for doing so if the intent is "well my PC was trained by Clone Troopers back in the day" vs. the spec's intent of "I was a Clone Trooper in the GAR, so this is why I've got really solid combat skills on top of looking kinda familiar" (a hidden cost of the spec that most folks overlook, much like the hidden cost of playing a droid is that your character is property and frequently treated as such by the galactic populace).

14 hours ago, Garran said:

Specializations aren't always taken within their 'expected' career or character theme, and if you start adding theme-enforcing requirements, or ones that can only reasonably be met in certain careers, you're blocking that off as an option.

I could see Clone Veteran being a starting PC, as this being a clone trooper that when the campaign begins (unless the GM is starting directly at the Battle of Geonosis) has some degree of practical field experience where characters from the other specs might be "shinies," even for the ARC Trooper and Clone Commander. Granted, the Veteran might not have all that much practical field experience (especially if all the PCs are built using just starting XP) compared to their brethren, but that little bit of experience is enough to set them apart from the shinies.

On 7/18/2019 at 2:38 AM, Kualan said:

Collapse has yet to hit our shores here in the UK (fingers crossed for next week) but I admit I was kind of expecting Clone Veteran and maybe ARC Trooper to have prerequisites similar to the Jedi trees, if only to simulate that both are supposed to represent clones that have been "raised from the ranks" rather than bred specifically for that job (in canon at least, I know Legends' ARC Troopers were bred for purpose).

I would need to take a good look at their trees to see exactly what they offer before making such a rule in my game, but I would be open to the idea of introducing house-ruled prerequisites for some trees.

Collapse is on the latest New Releases brochure from Esdevium, marked for release on July 28th, so we should be getting them the week after next.