Hi all,

Yesterday while playing we wanted build an astromech so as a technician I went for the specialist chassis and navigational directive. I rolled fairly well, 2 successes and 5 advantages on my mechanics roll for the chassis and 1 success and 3 advantages for the directive. For the Chassis I spent the advantages on Superior hardware, I picked agility to improve any piloting checks the droid might make, and Reinfoced Chasis for +1 WT mostly to spend the advantage on something. For the Directive I picked Broad Utility (Mechanics) and Archival Functions (Lore).

So we ended up with a Droid with the following stats:
122222
Astrogation 2, Computers 1, Piloting (space) 1, Mechanics 1, Lore 1
Galaxy mapper 1, Technical Aptitude 1

But when looking at Astromechs that we could buy, the Q7 astromech in Stay on Target or the Astromech in the CRB they have Astrogations and Computers 3, Mechanics and Piloting (space) 2.While they do have a few characteristics that are lower, Willpower and Presence, and they do not have the talents they still feel like superior Astromechs when compared to the droid I built. Not to mention the R7 Astromech in Stay on Target, which is even better.

I cannot find any rules for improving skills further, not while crafting the droid or after. Am I missing something? All other crafting rules seems to have the potential to create weapons/armor/items that are better than the standard stuff in the item lists if enough advantages are rolled. But Droid crafting seems to create inferior droids, at least when trying to create an astromech.

First, building a droid depends on the roll and on the other members of the party. Will it usually be Assisting checks, or be expected to do things independently? What is it expected to do?

For my answer, I'm going to presume you've got a decent pilot already, but are lacking in the Intelligence department and need a droid who can do that independently and/or assist.

If you try to generalize a crafted droid, it'll be pretty weak. You've have been better off boost Intellect so that it is good at Astrogation, Mechanics, and Computers, which are the skills typically farmed out to Astromechs.

The Astromech statblock has 2s in the characteristics it has, meaning with 3 ranks it gets a pool of YYG.

If I were building a droid with your rolls, I'd take Superior Hardware and put it into Intellect. Then you've got a pool of GGG at a minimum for Astrogation, Mechanics, and Computers.
Then I'd take Adaptive Programming and put it into Piloting (Space). Then I'd grab the quirk, but that's just my taste. I'll go with Lore since that's what you picked.

Here's a comparison:

RAW Astromech:
Piloting (Space) (YY), Astrogation (YYG), Computers (YYG), Mechanics (YY), Cool (YG)

Your build:
Piloting (Space) (YG), Astrogation (YY), Computers (YG), Mechanics (YG), Lore (YG)

My build:
Piloting (Space) (YG), Astrogation (YYG), Computers (YGG), Mechanics (GGG), Lore (YGG).

Both are slightly inferior to the RAW Astromech at their job, but their WT is actually higher and they have a better build for ancillary Characteristics. I believe they are also less expensive. If your roll had been one Advantage better on the programming, you could have picked up a rank in Mechanics in addition to my build and you'd be sacrificing three upgrades (one each in three skills) for an extra Ability die in Mechanics and the additional bonuses.

3 hours ago, k7e9 said:

But when looking at Astromechs that we could buy, the Q7 astromech in Stay on Target or the Astromech in the CRB they have Astrogations and Computers 3, Mechanics and Piloting (space) 2.While they do have a few characteristics that are lower, Willpower and Presence, and they do not have the talents they still feel like superior Astromechs when compared to the droid I built. Not to mention the R7 Astromech in Stay on Target, which is even better.

I cannot find any rules for improving skills further, not while crafting the droid or after. Am I missing something? All other crafting rules seems to have the potential to create weapons/armor/items that are better than the standard stuff in the item lists if enough advantages are rolled. But Droid crafting seems to create inferior droids, at least when trying to create an astromech.

First off, you're saving several thousand credits.
Secondly, you can sell the droid for a profit, if you don't really need it yourself.

Droid crafting is not really designed to allow you to make something in the CRB, but better. It's designed for you to build what you need. It allows you to prioritize some things over other in the hopes of getting something more specialized and more useful. It also allows you to churn out minions with decent stats for less than it would cost to buy them in bulk.

Thanks for the thorough answer. I see our first mistake, we missed Adaptive programming yesterday, I must have skimmed past effect while we were playing. Then obviously it's possible to get similar skill ranks as the astromechs in the CRB.

We have a good main Pilot, but our main ship needs a co-pilot as part of the crew we thought that we could the astromech for that. We have a starfighter as well, and our pilot uses it from time to time, and then someone needs to pilot our freighter.

We haven't used the droid at all after my rolls to create it, so my GM will probably let me change how I spent some of the advantages. As you suggest it might be better to increase inteligence rather than agility.

43 minutes ago, k7e9 said:

We have a good main Pilot, but our main ship needs a co-pilot as part of the crew we thought that we could the astromech for that. We have a starfighter as well, and our pilot uses it from time to time, and then someone needs to pilot our freighter.

Something else to consider is that you won't always need to make piloting checks. You can have an unskilled pilot flying the craft and you won't run into trouble until there's something to hit.

That's true, it just feels better to have a co-pilot with the actual Piloting skill somehow.

27 minutes ago, k7e9 said:

That's true, it just feels better to have a co-pilot with the actual Piloting skill somehow.

Something you might want to consider investing in is the Autopilot Droid Brain (6,000/5, 0HP). It has 0 Agility and 2 ranks of Piloting (Space). It can operate the ship by itself and if the ship is piloted by someone else, can co-pilot. It can be modded to have up to 4 ranks.

It's in Fully Operational.

That sounds like a nice way to solve the our missing co-pilot problem. I'll look into that.

Another question about the astromech. Could an NPC droid provide skilled assistance? For example giving a PC yellow astrogation dice from it's skill or will it only provide a blue assist die?
I seem to recall something about NPCs or droids only assisting with a single blue die, but we're fairly new to the game so it could just be something we misread or interpreted incorrectly.

41 minutes ago, k7e9 said:

That sounds like a nice way to solve the our missing co-pilot problem. I'll look into that.

Another question about the astromech. Could an NPC droid provide skilled assistance? For example giving a PC yellow astrogation dice from it's skill or will it only provide a blue assist die?
I seem to recall something about NPCs or droids only assisting with a single blue die, but we're fairly new to the game so it could just be something we misread or interpreted incorrectly.

I remember no such limitation, nor do I think one might exist. NPCs should be able to both provide and receive Skilled Assistance.

Cool, we probably have misinterpreted some rule. Thanks!