I thought it could be fun to run a small adhoc poll on which characters are in the groups you play or GM??

Im currently a player in 2 groups:

First Group: "Smuglers Delight" where we have done 2 sessions of 12 hrs each (65xp gained)

* Human Assassin: Brawn 3, Agi 3, Will 3 ….others 2, defining skills Ranged Hvy & Coerce

* Rodian "gunner" Bodyguard: Brawn 3, Agi 4, Will 1 …others 2, defining skills Gunnery & Ranged Hvy

* Bothan "fluffy" Trader: Cunning 4, Presense 3, Brawn 1 …others 2, defining skills Negotiation & Deciet

* Human "mechanic/hacker type" Outlaw Tech: Agi 3, Int 3 …others 2, defining skills Mechanic & Computers

* Human Pilot: Agi 3, Int 3 …(cunning 3?) …others 2, defining skills Pilot !!!

- Essentially we have 2 out of 5 characters "build" for ground combat …whereas in space combat we have both a specialized pilot and a specilized gunner / very well balanced group so far …

Second Group: "?" Playing online, one session of 4 hrs so far (20xp gained)

* Human Mechanic with a dash of pilot - stats ?

* Transdosian Marauder, boxing style - stats ?

* (now retired as NPC) Wookie Doctor: Brawn 3, Int 3, defining skills Brawl & Medicine … surprisingly effective using pressure points, but retired due to desire to play a more socially adept character … since our "face"-guy seems to have dropped …

2 Play sessions of 5 hours each (65 EXP total) played through Crates of Kraytes

--------- MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS------

The following is the best I can remember and the skills represent not their best skills, but the skills I remember them using the most.

Bothan Technician (Slicer) Defining Skills Mechanics + Computers + PIlot +Knowledge underworld. all stats between 2 and 3, brawn of 1

This character did most of the piloting when applicable and is a heck of a mechanic. he spent most of the combats getting vehicles ready, taking cover, bypassing security or pushing the gravsled with the crates of krayts.

Human Colonist (Doctor) Defining Skills, Medicine + Negotiation + Knowledge Education. all stats between 2 and 3

This character is built well but kept rolling poorly and spend most of the session struggleing the keep the krayt dragon unconscious. She did most of the social interactions and spent combat taking potshots, pushing sleds and trying not to die (she got hit a few times). Her most sucessful role was in negotiations with the Sinasu The Hutt.

Rodian Hired Gun (Not sure) Defining Skills, Ranged Light, stealth Agility 4, unsure of other stats

This guy does not actually have the stealth skill, just a really good Agility. He spent some of the session scouting through buildings and spent his combats obliterating everything with his disruptor pistol. he was not there for session 2

Droid Bonty Hunter (assasin) Brawn 4, Agi 2, Int 1, Cunning 3, Will 1, Pres 1 Defining Skills Athletics + Skulduggery + Brawl.

This is my character. He spent most of the session stealing things (blasters, cars, people(laani)) and climbing things. In combat he tended to spend most of his time sprinting/climbing to whatever vehicle we were trying to get to as he could get there fastest and get it started for our escape. His shining moment was jumping out of his recently stolen car onto the vehicle of 2 thugs who just stole Laani from the hospital (our contact). At this point he threw a stun grenade in the car, brawled with the 2 thugs and threw them out of the car 30 stories in the air. He then drove Laani back to the ship for questioning.

??? ??? (???) ??? There is a 5th character who almost always plays with us but had to step out the last 2 sessions. We will see what she rolls up.

The group is relativley well balenced except that we have noticed that we have very poor ranged skills (when the rodian was gone in session 2) and people have spent some skill points to fix that a little bit. We have just about one of everything, although the characters still need more playtime to truly develop. The space combat went well, except none of us have gunnery so we just had characters gunning based on whos Agility was best.

-Edited for format

Man… I wish I could find 12 hours to play! My group has 5 players that tend to rotate from week-to-week. We've run about 7 sessions that last 4-5 hours each. The breakdown looks like this:

Twi'lek Tech/Slicer - 4 Int, 3 computers… Very creative player and has tons of fun doing whacky R2 style shenangans. Suffers from low Brawn and thus gets annihilated in combat unless he just hides.

Rodian Smuggler/Pilot - 4 Agi, 2 piloting… Doesn't even bother putting points in combat skills, because 4 Agi is god-like. Plans on drilling down the talent tree to increase Agi to 5 ASAP.

Droid Explorer/Scout - mediocre stats, shotgun of skills… Relies on grenades and lots of aiming in combat, but enjoys a little triumph here and there due to the wide spread of skills. Tries to drive everything possible; often results in horrific crashes.

Human Bounty Hunter/Gadgeteer - 3 Br, 3 Agi, 3 Will, 2 into vigilance and ranged heavy… Still misses more than the untrained rodian, but has great survivability thanks to jury rig, high brawn, good armor, and decent vigilance. Deals tons of damage when he hits, and was the party damage-dealer… Till the rodian realized he could just grab a rifle and use that untrained also. (lol)

Droid Hired Gun/Bodyguard - 3 Br… Lots into combat skills… hasn't played yet, only got through character creation.

We all really enjoy playing. It's not a perfectly balanced group, but they do just fine. I'm definitely looking forward to the "big" updates coming out next week…

Exalted5 said:

Well, we dont play so often then We are mostly in our late 30s so there are several guys who are familymen with kids - so we try to take a whole saturday a couple of times per quarter or so … usually meet up around noon and play until 4-5am into the night with break for cooking some food together, catch up on some new videogame someone bought, have a few beers and smoke some cigarets outside etc etc.

Regarding the skill vs. attribute talk - dont forget that while expertise dice dont add all THAT much to success rate, they do boost number of advantages rolled significantly …which allows you to recoup strain!! In our group Im playing the Assassin and spending anywhere from 2-6ish strain (extra maneuver + dodge talent) per round you NEED those advantages ….

Sirkamina said:

How the H…. did he get his hands on a disrupter pistol being a starting character?? (ok I dont have the book here to look it up) but isnt that supposed to be crazily expensive AND kill-on-sight illigal-ish ?!? or something like that …

Boehm said:

Honestly this is a very good question. I dug throgh the book on the rules for this. I could not find anything stopping you from buying restricted itemss at the start of the game other than the price. You have to simply be able to make the roll to find it.

A disruptor pistol is a rarity of 6®. Being restricted, it can only be found on the black market. The difficulty for a 6 rarity on the black market is daunting (4 dice) and the cost is 500%. The book states a disruptor pistol only costs 1k. The errata changed this to 3k. so the cost is 15k to buy if you can find it. I know he picked upt 10 points of obligation for cash, so he had 3k credits. I can only assume that they were using the origional chart for cost (1k) and they missed the part about the black market costs. To be fair these characters were created prior to us having a decent understanding of the rules. I am probalbly the best versed of the group at this juncture. So this was likeley a mistake.

as far as kill on sight.. We have only been on Tatooine and Nar-shadda. The republic is far from the reaches of enforcing any legalities.

Everything else aside there may have been some agreement or backstory that made this possible on a house rule. I wouldnt know as i created a character with no weapons (as I always do in most RPGS) as weapons are usually easy to come by. (my character is rather well equipped at this point)

This character was also not present for session 2, and this will likely be addressed when we play next in 2 weeks.

Sirkamina said:

Ah well … mistakes happen all the time … as long as you and yoru group are having fun, but having a disrupter pistol at the get go ….is IMO a bit like handing out a +4 sword to a 3rd level fighter in D&D runs the risk of imbalancing some things and means that the desire for better stuff …is atleast to some extend satisfied already….

It will be discussed when we game in two weeks, again the player was only present for the initial session.

Although I dont see it being too much of an issue. The way our group plays and the way the GM runs is kind of terrifying when left to our own devices.

The GM, has a tendancy to throw things we arent prepared for at us, and we have a tendancy of being able to rise to the occasion. For example in saga edition as level 10 characters, when i first joined the group, I asked why the creature we were fighting (which we had fought 4 of so far in the complex) did so much damage. Apparently it was CR 15 (and we had been fighting them 2 at a time so far).

The same goes for crates of kraytes. (SPOILER ALERT) The canyon is only 30 meters deep(25 to the docking bay) and the path up is 12 meters long with 2 switchbacks (so roughly 36 meters of path) The GM decided it would be more fun if he made the canyon deeper and added a second group of tuscan raiders up top. He stated it would take 8 moves to get up the canyon side with the sled. By the end of the 3rd round I had made it to the top of the canyon (I chose to climb due to a very high atletics check (2 green 2 yellow and one blue) I was planning on starting the ship for our escape, expecting the fight to be more difficult) and by the 4th round all of the sand people were dead (including the melee groups down below). (we noticed them before they got a chance to fire of their first shot and opened fire immediatly)

BAck to the point of the thread though, what is your group composition?

Human- (cyborged) Scoundrel/Hired gun

Wookie- ??

Rodian- Thief/Scoundrel

Twi-lek- Medic/force user

Trandoshan- Hired gun/Gadgeteer

We've only had one session, and we opted to start 'en medi ros' (sp?) (in the middle of things

We've already pissed off our contact and have decided we need to toughen up and start stealing freighters….

Sirkamina said:

Pardon the interruption, but there is a rule that specifies that players need GM permission to start with restricted items. Don't have the book handy for a page number, but it's definitely in there.

gribble said:

It was added in the PDF update (week 1). The rule might not have existed yet when they created their characters.

" Player Characters in Edge of the Empire receive a budget of credits to spend on starting gear before gameplay begins. This budget is 500 credits, although it can be increased by undertaking additional Obligation (see page 30). Before their characters begin the game, players may spend these credits to purchase items from Chapter V: Gear for their character. They may not purchase Restricted ® items unless specifically given dispensation by their GM . "

Aazlain said:

Apologies - I had assumed the rule always existed…

In order to contribute something to the original intent of the thread, we have:

Male Twi'lek Mechanic

Male Human Gadgetter/Marauder

Female Human Assassin/Doctor

Male Rodian Pilot

and a fifth player, who just replaced his Male Human Hired Gun/Force Sensitive with a Male Human Thief/Explorer (I think, the character is being made for the next session).

If I were playing rather than running, I want to play either a Droid Trader (who has a high intellect/knowledge skills for the theory of trading, but low presence, etc for putting it into practice), or a hard-nuts and scarred Female Twi'lek Bounty Hunter (i.e.: not your usual gorgeous twi'lek), probably with a smidgen of the "Sense" force tree, representing uncanny reactions/luck that she doesn't actually realise is force powers. The picture of the female twi'lek bounty hunter from the beginner box is something I saw after I had the concept, but captures the idea perfectly (although I'd probably give her dual blaster pistols as her primary weapons rather than the heavy weaponry the beginner box picture implies).

My main group consists of:

1) Human, female, Bounty Hunter/Assassin + Force Exile. Quiet, deadly, non-descript. Androgynous in appearance, killer with her Zenji needles. Handles big guns with ease. Can fly with special backpack of flaming jets. Has dark past as slave, being blackmailed for killing a few hutts during escape. Has only recently realised that she has "special" powers.

2) Human, female, Colonist/Medic - the definite negotiator and de facto leader of the group - elderly woman, doctor - got a troubled past with the empire, think Mengele. Enjoys dexterification (the use of strong anaesthetics) instead of killing, only semi-paranoid due to past, and completely OCD on her old boss and his new partner in Black Ops project.

3) Human, male, Smuggler/Scoundrel - Owes money EVERYWHERE, but that's ok, as long as he's got clean clothes, a drink and no one touches his vibro-rapier. Has tried, almost fatally, to seduce miss doctor above, could have ended in his premature death (despair on charm checks…)

4) Droid, androgynous (but acts more feminine in social situations), Smuggler/Pilot + Scoundrel - Odd, thin, spindly even. Has no visible visual sensors, retractable blades, very fast and agile - not very smart. Enjoys gambling, particularly enjoys loosing, enjoys helping people for no reason - particular people with plans to do no good. Does not consider meatbags important, does not waste hard drive space for remembering first "master" or "creator". Prefers flying and wasting cash.

5) Rodian, male, Bounty Hunter/Gadgeteer - Paranoid, brutal, violent - smart, but doesn't really think - slightly bi-polar, although not in the emotional sense, more of an intellectual sense, he's either stupid and inconsidered, or smart-er and considerate, it scares his victims, his partners in crime (even his GM). Has spent way too much money on the one gun (SoroSuub Kylan-3) with a blaster actuating module attachment . Hoards. Everything.

The secondary group:

1) Twi'lek, female, Colonist/Politico.

2) Wookiee, male, Hired Gun/Marauder.

3) Bothan, female, Explorer/Scout.

This last group have only had 1 session due to kid, and the parents (twi'lek and wookiee) lives on an island far away.

Jegergryte said:

Not …on a island FAR FAR away ?

Almost, but I don't need a hyperdrive to get there, only a ground vehicle and a boat. Imagine the hairy lekkus - its a strange encounter every time, but she's a sweet twi'ookiee.

gribble said:

An Assasin medic? That way you can bring them back to life and then shoot them a second time! I find this both a hilarious and awesome combination.

I'm GMing a game, and we just made characters yesterday. My PCs' party composition is as follows

Human Bounty Hunter (Assassin)

Human Technician (Mechanic)

Droid Hired Gun (Mercenary Soldier)

Bothan Explorer (Scout)

Rodian Smuggler (Scoundrel), Force-sensititve Exile

we have a decent group

Me Togruta Male Smuggler/force sensitive doesn't know hes can use the force for now hes the pilot/gunman

A Rodian male bounty hunter he's our current gunman

Human male colonist Mechanic/computer guy

Droid has to get his skills up because we have no idea what to use him for but i think he's gunna be usefull

its been real fun we are doing the Crate of Krayts campaign and we are feeling the game out really fun.

Togruta? How did you guys handle creating a Togruta character?

Pssibly using this document or winging it themselves. With SE or RCR versions its doable without much fuss - for those that have a feel or making species, I'm not one of those. I prefer ships and gear.

Sirkamina said:

He he, yeah, it was more of an "out of character" decision that the group needed a healer. The in-game rationale is knowelege of human anatomy can be put to two uses…

gribble said:

Very good rationale!

Voice said:

The medicine skill even states it is the skill to be used for poisons and toxins, an appropriate skill set for an assasin.

Rodian Bounty Hunter Survivalist

Twi'lek Politico

Droid Doctor

Trandoshan Bodyguard

Wookiee Outlaw Tech

Venthrac said:

there is a unofficial species list floating around out there our gm said it was okay so i rolled it.