Or the Beginner Game is a one shot line?

I'm going to bet this is a one-shot item. Usually, Beginner Boxes are an intro to the game for people who are hesitant to spend the Big Bucks on the core book. It seems to me that the full game will likely be similar in packaging and price to WFRP, which is $100. The BG lets players try out the game before investing the larger sum in a game they might not enjoy. Now, I think that $30 is a bit high for an intro product ($20-$25 seems more reasonable), but the set of custom dice takes up a big portion of that cost,

What is the point of having the custom dice and tokens, etc. if the full set will include all of this anyway? Just to have extras? I get the advantage of extra sets of dice, but it seems like it would be a waste to have double sets of tokens.

From the product description:

"How will this product differ from the Edge of the Empire Core Rulebook?

For players who are ready for a more complex, in-depth roleplaying experience, the Star Wars: Edge of the Empire core rulebook will be available. With additional careers, weapons, ships, talents, and much more, the Edge of the Empire Core Rulebook provides a more comprehensive roleplaying experience than the Beginner Game. It is the starting point for a complete line of roleplaying products, including pre-written adventures, sourcebooks with more content for hero players and GMs, and other supplements."

jjcole said:

Edge of the Empire will be a hardcover book, it will contain no tokens or dice. A set of dice will be available for sale independently of the book. Tokens and maps are included in the beginners game only, and are not necessary for play.

cP
FFG

That's right; they were confirmed as separate entities on the Beta site. The ONLY question I'd have is, are the dice sets identical. I would guess so, but I don't know for certain. If SO, well then if you get the Starter you gots yer dice already.

The streamlined-rules starter is an old staple; nothing weird here. The WotC SW game had one, with simplified rules and an adventure that would get the party to 3d Level, Traveller has a Starter Traveller book and so on. Basically, the FULL rules just expand upon the Starter rules; not like they're mutually incompatible or anything.

Starters are great for beginners or the curious, but also a great deal for ANY player. Because the source company wants to draw people in to the product, you typically you get a whole lotta loot and greeblies for a very good price. Lots of "bells & whistles." I have the Beta, but I'll sure pick this up as well - just for the spiff!

The West End Games d6 line also had a "beginners" box set - the "Introductory Adventure Game", which also included some simplified rules.

I love Beginner Boxes, with these I get my players excited. They love the nice character sheets, they like the tokens and maps. It's a great way to get them into a new game. I can't wait for this box. Can we pre-order yet cause I have the money right now come on FFG take my money.

Yeah, I'm figuring this will be a one-shot item.

It seems that things like the original D&D Red Box (which was a self-contained game using bare-bones D&D rules) are a thing of the past.

Given the number of dice and general price range of dice sets these days, I figure picking this up with be a nice way to get a standard set of dice for those folks that want them. Besides, having a ready-made adventure complete with pre-gens never hurts for when you want to bring some fresh blood in to the hobby.

its interesting to see that even with all the flashy doodads, its the same price as the beta book was

but since i'm a star wars rpg nut I look at it as 'gee, i'm glad the beginner set is cheap'.

lupex said:

Well, the contrast is that instead of the fancy doodads, the Beta books is full-fledged, stand-on-its-own RPG that can be used to run campaigns for years, and quite likely covers a much broader range of material than the beginner set will. Heck, I'd be surprised if any of the pre-gens in the beginner box are Force-Sensitive, or that Force-Sensitives get anything more than a passing mention that effectively says "they're incredibly freaking rare.".

I kinda get a feeling that FFG knew their rules for Force Powers weren't quite up to snuff, and given the lead time on printed products and the guess they'd want the beginner box to be on shelves just in time for the Christmas buying season, not including rules for full-fledged Force-users in the beginner set would be a smart move.

Of course, I could be totally wrong and one of the 4 pre-gens is a Force-Sensitive, but they probably won't have much in the way of Force Powers, if only to keep things simple.

I'm disappointed that Fantasy Flight Gmes did not use Savage Worlds for their Star Wars RPG.

I counteract your vote with "I'm glad they didn't." Glad they started from scratch - and with a very creative vision.

newmarduk said:

As much as I like Savage Worlds (particularly Deadlands), I have to echo IG-58's sentiment and am glad FFG went with a brand new system rather than trying to wedge a pre-existing system into running Star Wars. Doing their own thing gives FFG a lot more freedom to tweak things as needed, and while it is 'fast, furious, and fun,' Savage Worlds can be a fairly nasty system in terms of player mortality, something you generally don't see with Star Wars.

newmarduk said:

I too. SW is a so much better system! Its easy to learn, flexible, fast paced and extremely cinematic. It would have been the perfect fit for the Star Wars setting.

Donovan Morningfire said:

If you really believe this, then you didnt hear anything about the scaleable wound system of the new edition (SW deluxe). And even in former rule versions there always have been non-lethal wound systems in SW setting rules (like Slipstream) In truth the lethality in SW is perfectly scaleable. (in opposite to many other rpg systems which have not such options)

superklaus said:

Actually, I'm fully aware of the optional rule to scale the wound system. But since that's an optional rule, other other options to make things even more lethal, I was referring to the baseline. To say nothing of healing being quite unforgiving if you're not able to take advantage of the "golden hour."

And with the way Savage Worlds handles powers, there'd be a lot of the same problems using Savage Worlds that a lot of folks complained about with the various d20 iterations, unless FFG devised their own method for handling Force powers.

Besides, a lot of FFG's strengths have been in designing their own systems, not piggy-backing on somebody else's work.

I just don't see why they would use a different companies rules system. Why do that? Why not create you own game? Savage Worlds is fun but I don't think it would be FFG's Star Wars Rpg it would be Savage World's game and that would make no sense.

Why, oh why…. (reasonably) from a mere common sense perspective… would you expect a game company as established as FFG, with a history of creating their own mechanics, to use a game mechanic someone else created?

Even if it's got an open license, and they don't have to pay for it, why would they do this?

newmarduk said:

They weren't ever going to do that. Savage Worlds is the propoerty of another company, and so they would have to get their permission to use it (or is it Open Liscence?), and almost certain some proportion of the profits from their brand new, shiney Star Wars liscence. They were obviously going to go for a system they had full control over (or create a new system entirely). In the end they chose an existing ruleset they had (WFRP 3rd) and heavily modified it.

Just to note, I agree that Savage Worlds could certainly have done Star Wars, and done it very well. The "pulpy" feel that I associate with Savage Worlds suits at least some Star Wars campaign concepts. However, I personally would still prefer a specific system for it. Savage Worlds is just a bit… generic to get a Star Wars feel for me.

Derp… seems people already made my point.

Donovan Morningfire said:

Actually, have you checked out the Pathfinder beginner box? It is so worth the money. I wish their core system was that streamlined and easy (tho, I guess you can ignore the other rules without it breaking the game, but I have not read all of the 500 + rule book)

I was curious if there was going to be any other support for this box set before moving on to the core rules. I have to say, I am disappointed so far (especially when you see what Paizo has done with their intro box).

But I can only hope the good folks at FF are reading these things, so I will at least say this: Please put out on-line extras for this box set like you do for your 40K games. That would be really generous and very awesome. I am looking forward to trying this out m/

I just don't see why FFG would go with another companies core rule books. That's like saying why didn't D&D use the story teller system for the World of Warcraft setting. No point in giving another company your hard earned cash and talent.

I would still like to know if they will have extra PC folios you can download from the web site. My group is 5 to 6 players.

Dustin said:

I would love a PDF or editable version of those to download and create my own.