I'm a GM, and have played both Star Wars d6, some d20, and SAGA ed. Star wars (with SAGA being the favorite and best model for Star Wars style action up until recently). I was trying to figure out if I should make the switch between SAGA edition Star Wars to Edge of the Empire Star Wars so I made a Pro / Con list (feel free to comment or add to it). Some of my players seem very interested in EotE, but I'm not seeing excatly why -- here's what I've come up with:
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Pros and Cons
FFG Star Wars vs. SAGA ed. Star Wars
Pro’s
FOR
FFG Star Wars
1) Pro – The “New” Hotness (everyone likes something new and fresh; it’s not out of print like SAGA edition, and it’s got a good fan base / forum website online)
2) Pro – Less crunchy mechanics (easier for the GM to add miscellaneous modifiers / judgment calls and give players the benefit of the doubt on dice rolls for roleplaying, situation, etc.)
3) Pro – doesn’t use a d20 (more bell curved dice mechanic), nor is it a d20 “type” system
4) Pro – structured advancement trees and talents prevent unbalanced combinations / optimizations
Unknowns (?) for FFG Star Wars
1) May or may not be more balanced than SAGA for Jedi vs. non-Jedi? (don’t know till the book comes out in 2015)
2) Will system be simpler or more complex once supplements are published? (how much power creep, errata, FAQ clarifications, etc. will be forthcoming)
3) Cost, how much will all the products cost to collect? Will it require mini’s and maps to play?
Cons
AGAINST
FFG Star Wars
1) Con – can’t play an
actual
Jedi…in Star Wars! (no rules for Jedi or Sith or lightsaber forms, etc.)
2) Con – can’t play an actual
Mandalorian
with Beskar’gam armor / tech…in Star Wars! (no Mandalorian steel rules, no rules for integrated equipment/weapons, no customizable equipment, etc.)
3) Con – rigid character advancement trees and talents (like an MMO); can’t organically choose character advancement without abandoning trees (difficult in integrating future product paths and trees to current characters, hard for players to “get what they want” without jumping around between trees / paths)
4) Con – can’t play in other time periods (if you don’t like the Dark Times, currently your stuck)
5) Con – majority of iconic NPCs, races, starships, weapons, gear, and tech not written yet (very limited selection of the SW universe)
6) Con – limited pre-made NPCs, droids, beasts, “templates” (Sith abominations, swarms, squads, etc.), and pre-made creature stat blocks (less material, less stat blocks = harder for the GM to run on the fly)
7) Con – no pre-made modules or adventure paths (harder for the GM to run the game)
8) Con – no pre-made social encounter “templates” or how much XP social encounters should be worth (SAGA Skill Challenges, hazards, battle stations CLs, etc. help define this and help the GM)
9) Con – slow publishing schedule (1-2 main books/year; will take FFG
years
to catch up to SAGA at the current rate; 2015 for Jedi book [3 years])
10) Con – uses funky non-standard dice mechanics (harder for players and GMs to guess odds of success / outcomes; difficult for the players and could be difficult for the GM to create challenging encounters)
11) Con – have to learn two entirely different systems for PC combat vs. starship combat (SAGA is the same; full-round action for multiple attacks, standard action to attack, move action to move, swift actions to aim, 3 swift to recover up condition track, etc.)
Conclusion
FFG Star Wars will be an interesting thing to “try” but it won’t be a true replacement for SAGA ed. Star Wars for quite some time. And even when one does go to play it, the types of stories and characters to be played are severely limited (i.e. only in the Dark Times, no Jedi, at most a single Force sensitive, no true outlaw techs/ancient technology, limited race choices, no true Mandalorians or customized armor/weapons, etc.). Eventually we’ll see if the FFG version is superior or inferior to SAGA ed. as FFG publishes material and if it sticks around and doesn’t go the way of 4E D&D. Right now, it’s too early to tell one way or another, but, IMO it doesn’t seem a good replacement for SAGA edition in any but the most limited settings / stories (yet).
Others thoughts? What am I missing?
YIDM