@AluminiumWolf said:

Who the heck want to play it safe in a Star Wars RPG?

Obviously, you do.

It's Heroic when things are done in the face of danger. So, actually (using your mindset) charging into battle knowing that the likelihood of you dying is pretty high is more bad ass than charging in with no worries because you know you can take more damage than they can dish out.

@AluminiumWolf said:

Anyway, unless you are willing to pretend that the PCs actions are a lot more risky than they mechanically actually are, you are extremely unlikely to end up with a story that in any way resembles a Star Wars movie.

This is exactly the point we're making.

Nothing's risky if you know you can handle it. Combat should be like "high stakes gambling", that's how you get AWESOME stories. If your character barely survives then you feel a sort of rush, if you know he's gonna survive….there's no excitement and what's the point of playing?

AluminiumWolf said:

No, the answer is that they never played Call of Cthulhu.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Even there, from my own games and listening to recorded sessions on the internet, people just don't run away very often.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Ah yes, the game where the character with the highest life expectancy was the one with the highest movement rate.

And being a combat-focused character ensured a lifespan that could be measured in hours rather than sessions.

Good times, good times

+++++Combat should be like "high stakes gambling"+++++

I guess the question is are you willing to run a lot of stories about people who bet their rent money on the horses and lost, then get their house repossessed and their marriage falls apart and they only get to see their kids at weekends in order to tell one story about the guy who wins big and gets to live on a desert island with a supermodel.

+++++Ah yes, the game where the character with the highest life expectancy was the one with the highest movement rate.

AluminiumWolf said:

Your experience there is atypical. I wouldn't fault this game for not conforming to it.

@AluminiumWolf,

Do you purposely miss the point or do you just refuse to see it?

Actually, to Hell with it. I think you're just dragging this out for attention.

If this system is "too lethal", then don't play it. Play "checkers" or "tic-tac-toe" or whatever and leave the real gaming to people who can handle it better.

Sutter said:

If you like high stakes gambling you should probably be out betting your rent money on the horses rather than sitting around with your mates pretending to be an elf.

Fundamentally, I don't think it is good to design a roleplaying system around bull status posturing (MY group are not like that), wishful thinking, lack of understanding of probability and just frigging… propaganda rather than as cold an analysis of what people are going to find fun as you can manage.

You're the only one continuously whining about this game. Most everyone else IS having fun with the system as is.

Besides, you DON'T speak for anyone but yourself anyway. You keep going on like you're the representative for gamers everywhere. I've NEVER had gamers that were even remotely the way you insist on portraying them. It seems that, if you even actually do game, that your play style is drastically different than most. Not to mention, if you were so "hardcore" then you should love a more lethal system.

Sutter said:

It should be clear that hardcore I am not. I don't think hardcore is an enormously common trait among people who play roleplaying games.

(It might also be worth mentioning that my closest brush with serious gambling is a guy I lived with at university who put three and a half grand in to slot machines in a six month period and then had to quit and go live with his parents because he didn't have any more money. All the while claiming that he could totally make a living off doing this.

And I was just reading Casino Royal, and I think it was pretty clear that in that universe, winning at Baccarat (and gambling in general) has a lot more to do with how cool you are than any mundane odds, and a system to play it would therefore have to reflect that.)

Can we move the discusion back to the mechanics please. And away from the bickering. At least put some mechanical discusion at the end of the opinions.

What are some options for adjustment up and down.

What about wound recovery times? and battles in quick succesion but in different scenes.

How is autofire and other multi hit options affecting play?

Sutter said:

*derail* It's more of a can't see it than any willful omission…because he suffers from a tragic condition defined HERE . Basically…let the man have his opinions because yours aren't going to change anything . Personally, I'm not to miffed about A-dubya's posts because I think he does have some sideways views on things. To each their own. The media inspiration thread is cool though.*back on the rails*

I think LethalDose's post one or two pages ago was pretty awesome. I wish there was a way to +1 it or like it harder :-). Cheerio every-buddy! Back to the combat discussion as suggested by good sir adrick.

Yeah, good call. I'm done with this.

Back to the game and it's EPIC AWESOMENESS!!!!

FWIW, my expert opinion on getting players to run away is:-

-Have them play characters whose special skill is running away from things. Runners like Faith in Mirrors Edge or the Duke boys in The Dukes of Hazzard. If their skill is going fast they will want to go fast.

-Try to separate the characters who would write 'badass' as their job description from the non-combat characters, and then try to chase the non-combat characters back towards the badasses. The NCCs get to be chased, which they tend to enjoy, and the badasses get to save the day by being badasses, which they also enjoy.

-Make the goal of the fight specifically that if the PCs win they win, and if they lose they run away. They still won't like it, but it will be a lot easier if they don't actually have to consciously make the decision to turn tail and run. Plus it makes for a better game than if the PCs win they win, and if they lose they get killed. And they get their fight, and you get your chase.

Just an addendum to my extended post above. I was thinking about it before getting to sleep, and the line about getting "blasted repeatedly while unconscious is the only way to die", may have slightly overstated the facts, but still only slightly. Since crits "naturally" hang around for a week (or more, if you have more), its possible to get crit multiple times in separate combats, and die from that. It's not likely, and it really shouldn't be a surprise if you actually do manage to get yourself killed after going into combat rocking 3 or 4 crits already. Again, maybe that's the time you stay at the edge of combat, or out of combat altogether, until you get healed.

@seadaily: Below are some ideas to consider to make it harder for the opposition to hit you, and they're all in the book, or have been mentioned on these forums by FFG staff

• Cover (this one's a no brainer, but its just a maneuver, so its cheap). Also, the book states some cover can provide more than one setback die. Those add up.
• Go prone, unless you're in melee. Also a maneuver.
• If you are in melee, you can use Guarded Stance maneuver.
• Stay at medium or long range. Get a weapon to match
• Spend your advantages and enemy's threats to add setback dice to the enemy's attacks
• Use triumph and destiny points to add narrative effects to the combat that make it harder for you to get hit. The example of this is using a destiny point to say "there's a barrel of engine oil on the field", and shooting it lights it on fire, creating a smoke screen, making any targets past it much harder to hit. [This exact example was from FFG_Sam Stewart, I think. Just can'r remember where]
• Use destiny points to upgrade the difficulties of your enemies attacks.

In the long term, you can be proactive about increasing your defense by getting armor or other gear, setting ambushes (flex those narrative skills, players), and keeping an eye out for defensive talents (Dodge, for example, shows up in 3 specs in 3 different careers, including 2 that aren't combat oriented). No, I'm not saying you should be forced to change specs to be good at combat, its just an example.

So, in the short term, 7 options (6 if you count prone and guarded stance as one) in combat to protect yourself, by the book, without any special talents or gear (Blaster pistols go to medium range). And several more, looking forward. Hope that helps.

-WJL

@Callidon: Thanks for the support, buddy!

I agree with Callidon & Sutter above (and anyone else I unintentionally missed): This thread isn't the place for an argument about GM strategy and RPG threat level in general. It may have to do with combat, but we should be using this space for feed back on the Beta rules, not having a pissing contest about players running away. I kinda feel responsible for this because I said "avoiding combat may be an option"

@AluminumWolf: If you really think your point hasn't been made, please start a new thread, but keep it out of here.

-WJL

LethalDose said:

Again, FWIW, I think it is generally going to be safer to assume that anyone who thinks they are playing Boba Fett will never willingly back down from a confrontation, and plan accordingly.

Sorry for doing a 'last word'. But I thought the 'anyone who thinks they are playing Boba Fett' line was pretty good and I didn't want to waste it.

Sutter said:

Sutter said:

Everything you are writing is wrong. Your entire posts are made of ad hominem and misinformation. Much of the misinformation is common to many roleplayers though so on some level you can be forgiven, lets talk about it.

Roleplaying games do not have objective difficulty. You are not better at them than other people. You are not "real gaming" nor can you "handle it better". This is a fantasy that is actually intended to be created by the game which you have incorrectly taken away from the table into the real world. You see in a TTRPG you are supposed to go on "dangerous" missions against "impossible" odds and succeed. This is done by the rules and the GM coddling you and fudging everywhere that is necessary to make sure you win. Because of course if the odds actually were unlikely that you would succeed, you would fail most of the time. You don't win at RPG's because you are good at them, you win at them because literally everyone has showed up to this event with the social understanding that you should. I will say again that anytime someone insults or insinuates incompetence on the part of another persons roleplaying or GMing that they are almost certainly wrong.

Combat should not be like "high stakes gambling" because then you would lose it and that is not something you would accept.

Now moving on to Lethaldose. It's fair to say when we're talking about the lethality level of the system we are actually talking about the incapacitation level of the system. That's the point at which all decision making power is taken out of the PC's hands. They no longer have any real ability to influence the actions of others at that point, and they reach this rather helpless point in front of a group of people who were shooting at them moments prior. Now it's possible that at that point they are captured instead of killed, it's possible that they are let free to lick their wounds having learnt their lesson. Lots of things are possible but it is also a possibility, and one they cannot effect, that they are then murdered. This is obviously a case by case scenario. In a bar brawl it's likely they won't be, but a bar brawl with criminals that are unhappy they were seen in a bar they own, probably. If they are fighting a group of sand people, probably not, if they are fighting a your krayt dragon, probably. Essentially it puts the odds of "Will my character die" at precisely "no one knows". And of course the DM can fudge it. Obviously. They can make it so every character takes the party prisoner even if that action isn't rational but I don't think that's an ideal scenario. If you want that to happen you either need to make the rules make taking prisoners a rational action or you need to make it less likely that PC's fates are determined by actions and choices entirely out of their control. Which means reducing the "lethality" of the system.

I do not think it is fair to say that when we are talking about the lethality of a system we are really talking about the incapacitation level. To me, these are two different things. If you see them as the same thing, then I can see why you see the system as very lethal. I see these as distinct elements, and I personally think the system is not very lethal. It is fast (few rounds necessary to take out opposition) and it can leave lasting effects (critical injuries or capture due to incapacitation), but I don't see it as lethal.

Furthermore, the rules for Edge of the Empire expressly state that the GM is not the player's adversary. So if a GM is playing as an adversary and out to kill the PCs, then yes, she is playing the game wrong.

Also, isn't combat lethality dependent on the PCs and the opposition? A combat between noncombatant PCs and skilled opposition is going to be more deadly than a combat between combat-oriented PCs and a bunch of unarmed civilians? (Trust me those civi's had it coming.) Perhaps the game would benefit from some guidelines on creating encounters.

Anyone have any suggestions on what those guidelines might be?

deanruel said:

I agree. And until people accept and internalise this the rules can never really be more than… a pretense over GM fudging.

I think rules can add value to a game - either as a fun minigame or to help decide between outcomes that are acceptable to people at the table. Or even force a direction that people wouldn't choose on their own but will enjoy if it happens. But you have to be able to trust that the rules will generate an outcome you can use.

Anyway, as a first step, I propose that we take permadeath off the table. No matter what, the rules should never kill a character.

Having an unpopular opinion is not the same thing as trolling, so stop throwing that accusation around. AWolf is at least as open to your opinions as you are to his. Civility is a two-way street, and giving input as to how you think the system should work is WHY WE ARE ALL HERE.

And in regards to that comic? The author, I'm afraid to say, doesn't seem to know what hunched shoulders are.

Vigilante moderation aside, guidelines for creating encounters would be a good thing -- but I think clear-cut "modern" encounter guidelines (in the vein of 3E/4E) as to the perfect difficulty of each encounter should be avoided. One of the great things about a narrative system is that the players are more firmly in control of their own fates with regard to when and how they choose to approach a fight (and its incumbent difficulty).

Alright, (probably futile) attempt to drag this thread back on topic:

Over in general discussion, a question has come up around minions and walking fire. By a strict reading of the rules, you don't need to walk fire (i.e.: add one difficulty) to walk fire between minions in the same group, as damage automatically spills over (though presumably you do between different groups).

Is this actually the intent of the rules?

gribble said:

I believe it is. You may have situation where you have 2 groups of minions in an engagement, though, and to do damage to both with an autofire attack, you'd have to use the the walking fire rules.

-WJL

Donovan Morningfire said:

And the lowest perception score.

Quick question for those who have played with "other ongoing status effects" (pg141). It doesn't state how to get these effects in combat. I'm guessing there are talents or weapon stats that can institute staggered, immobilized, or disoriented effects but i can't find any info in the book other than that page. I was hoping that a character (pc or otherwise) could spend 1-2 advantages to inflict these status effects but i don't know if this would be a problem. My main reason for asking is figure out some way for melee centered characters to keep their victims from running away once they have been engaged. IE immobilized.