My players are interested in running a much more Edge of the Empire focused game, however, I only have the Force and Destiny rule book, and while I understand obligation in the most basic sense I don't have the actual rules so I don't really know how to run it as a GM. For added flavor does anyone know of any particularly interesting organizations I should include that my PCs can owe favors to, and I have no idea how to handle talents based on favors like in Genesys.

Has anyone here done this? What were the results? Does anyone have the rules for obligation they'd like to help out a poor GM with?

Obligation is really, really simple. It's essentially just free adventure hooks for the GM

PC picks a thing from their past that has potential to come back and cause trouble, and writes a little (or sometimes a lot, depending on the player) bit about that background and what/why it's there. e.g. Han has a bounty for dumping a cargo.

That thing has a numerical value from 10-20 depending on party size, and these are assigned by the GM to a table. My group's looks like this:

1-10, Atelia - Betrayal

11-20, Rex - Debt

21-30, RX1 - Betrayal

31-40, Nawara - Favour

41-50, Naieme - Family

51-60, Hican - Addiction

Then before each session ( I usually do this before my prep, in case I want to add something to session related to it) you roll a D100 to see if one of the obligations is triggered.

If it does, everyone gets a point of Strain (to represent stress and tension in the group), and you can either hint at it's effects subtly, ("A death mark's not an easy thing to live with") or chuck a cool encounter in there (Greedo confronts Han in the cantina).

Some GMs aren't too bothered with it narratively, as it could interfere with what they have planned. I personally absolutely love Obligation, have knitted ot thoroughly into all my prep.

I have levels of encounters for each one on a word doc. I started off with just a quick outline for a level 1 triggering of each PC's Obligation. So the kid with Family will see his brother's face on a bountu board, or Atelia overhead someone in a cantina talking about 1 of the people who betrayed her.f

Once I've used their level 1 encounter, I replace it in my word doc with the next level, basically an episode 2 of this side plot.

My players seem to be really engaging with it, and it's bringing the galaxy to life, and helping them properly feel like they're a part of it.

I've seen a few folks consider dropping Obligation and instead using the Favor system from Shadow of the Beanstalk, but I've never heard of the results.

I don't see why it couldn't work, though you'd need to adjust the credits provided as Star Wars gear is far more expensive. Probably easiest to just double the amount of credits for gear that's offered. Maybe even tweak Big Favor so that the PC gets both the perks of a Regular Favor (+10XP and extra credits).

As for who the favors would be tied to, hitting Wookieepedia and doing searches for types of organizations (especially criminal ones) should provide plenty of suggestions, from corporations to crime syndicates all the way up to the Rebellion or the Empire.

10 hours ago, Stethemessiah said:

It's essentially just free adventure hooks for the GM

This, basically. In and of themselves, I think these mechanics are pretty much pointless in-game. Where they are useful is in getting the players to go through the process at char-gen and think about their PC's backstory, and for the GM leverage them to flesh out their story sessions for emotional or dramatic impact. If you're doing that anyway you don't need these mechanics, just give out +10XP and be done with it.