mouthymerc said:

I think orc is a better analogy.

There isn't an enormous themeatic difference between Nazis, Orcs and Stormtroopers. Second World War movies, The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars are telling the same story.

The only way I've ever explained, "OnlyImperial Stormtroopers are so precise", to what we see is the plot armor you already mentioned and explained in the link. They were shooting at the heroes in the movies, so they had to miss. When the Stormtroopers are shooting at non-heroes they seem to be excellent shots. For me, the Stormtroopers fightin the heroes were very unlucky or the heroes were destined by fate and thus very lucky. So, left with the Stormtroopers assaulting Hoth or the Tantive IV as average, they are back to being elite (at least above average), and earn their reputation of, "Only Imperial Stormtroopers are so precise".

In my mind, as far as EotE is concerned, Stormtroopers should be tough opponents. The PCs should be used to dealing with common scum, so when the Imperials show up, it should be an "oh crap" moment.

Doc, the Weasel said:

+1

I am sure everyone has seen this article.

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2013/02/battle-of-hoth/

But it is this section that bothers me.

>>While I’m not comparing the Rebel Alliance to al-Qaida or the Galactic Empire to the United States,<<

Yes you are.

>>in strategic terms, this is like Osama bin Laden’s escape from the December 2001 battle at Tora Bora, Afghanistan — a disaster masquerading as a tactical success.<<

And the comments.

>>Have you even served with the Imperial forces? Sure it's easy to take potshots from your military blog in some no-name star system while the fleet and its legions fight the rebel insurgents, but combined space/air/ground operations are a lot messier than any infographic could ever portray.

Even with the Empire's full spectrum dominance of the battlespace, you can't just leverage fleet assets which are optimized for ship-to-ship combat into a large scale ground invasion force. A Star Destroyer might have more firepower than the entire militaries of less advanced worlds but you still need a proper ground assault ship to support infantry landings.

Unfortunately, the do-nothing blowhards in Coruscant couldn't get funding for the promising alternative designs from Sienar Fleet Systems and we ended up (as usual) with Kuat Drive Yards' overpriced, overdue, and underperforming AT-AT mess.<<

>>Guys, cut Palpatine some slack. He's still in his first term as Emperor and it's hard working with the Imperial Senate, even after he had that Gungan executed for incompetence. If only we still had those clones…<<

Seriously. People these days find it easier to imagine themselves as the Imperials than the Rebels.

This troubles me because

1: It is ass backwards for Star Wars.

2: From a think of the children angle, I don't think the Evil Empire make very good rolemodels.

3: From a practical point of view, if the games are going to expect players to be the Rebels, this is a real problem. For a start, no one wants to be the bloody Taliban. They do suicide bombings, shoot girls in the head for wanting to go to school, and perhaps more importantly they get their asses kicked every time there is a battle.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Why?

Flash Gordon never says "oh crap". He jumps in with both fists. The samurai dude doesn't say "oh crap". His emotionless face never shows fear. Same with Clint Eastwood.

I am just not sure that "oh crap" is an enormously in genre reaction for Star Wars. A nameless rebel might say "Theres too many of them!" but largely only so one of the PC can tell him to calm down.

ErikB said:

Wow.

I hadn't seen that before, but didn't really get anything from it. To use game terms (which I think is fair, given where we're posting), Lucas, the GM, set up a scenario where he allowed the characters to influence the outcome and led to the next act that he wanted to play out along his narrative path. Nothing more, nothing less.

I get what they were saying in that article, but its just a lot of necessary deconstruction that made some interesting points to keep in mind for environment/ecounter design, but ultimately drew a bumch meaningless conclusions.

Author thinks Vader botched it. We get it.

-WJL

Doc, the Weasel said:

Completely agree.

LethalDose said:

Well, I was just linking to it as an example of why I think it is so important that they do everything possible to ensure that the relationship between the Rebel Alliance and the Galactic Empire is less Islamic Militant vs. Free World and more Free Peoples vs. Mordor.

People do get that it is important that people don't think the Rebellion are Al-Qaeda, right? On the grounds that there is little less cool in the western world than Al-Qaeda?

Doc, the Weasel said:

+1 (we need a Like button). This sums up what I've been trying to say in a much simpler way.

ErikB said:

2) There is some grounds to compare Al-Qaida and the Rebel Alliance, or at least the guerilla groups that end up affiliated with Al-Qaida. Namely, they are fighting a guerilla war. The Rebel Alliance cannot go toe to toe with the empire and have a chance in hell of winning. Instead it avoids that. However, that is where the simiarlities end. The Rebel Alliance are the good guys in a black-and-white universe, and tactically they operate more from the "avoid figthing where the enemy has much strength and so maintain local superiority", striking where the Imperium is weak, drawing off forces with diversionary attacks etc, rather than directly attacking the morale of the soldiers and public through terrorist tactics.

3) I don't think there is anything to worry about children. Children will quite easily go along with the "good guys" vas the "bad guys", and they love furry teddy bears beating up what are meant to be well trained soldiers (that and stupid slapstick characters with long ears and frog like eyes). It is more a teenage onwards thing where you go "Wait, some of the Imperial stuff looks cooler" and you get fed up of pointless cutesiness and predictable characters.

4) Also, I think you are taking it far too seriously.

The reason that it should be an "oh crap" moment: In Edge of Empire you are playing… well just civilians really. People living a nearly hand-to-mouth existance in the edge of the law and the edge of civilisation. Most of the people you face are similar, or used to dealing with similar people. Thugs are usually more about intimidation and threat than actually fighting. Even most bounty hunters are usually dealing with the occasional thug or easily intimidated non-violent crook. Also, you are existing in a world where people are usually willing to negotiate. Yes, they may have insructions to bring you to their boss, but with enough persuasion, and a little incentive, they might be willing to look the other way.

Stormtroopers, on the other hand, are properly trained soldiers, who have trained to fight harderned opposition, rather than cowardly crooks. They are also unrelenting. You cannot persuade or bribe them to convince them that it might be in their better interest to look the other way, and they will not be intimidated by some petty show of force. They will come after you until they are told otherwise by a superior or you have dealt with them (which wouldn't be easy for your average petty criminal).

ErikB said:

Let's just say the Rebels are the good guys and the Empire are the bad guys and leave at that.

mouthymerc said:

Yeah, but we torture people and we assassinate people and we kidnap people and detain them without trial and we prosecute aggressive wars against countries for possibly not the most noble of reasons, and I think an unfortunate subtext of the whole thing is that it matters less who is the good guy than who can **** up peoples **** the best.

So, in closing,

If you as a GM think SWAT teams are cooler than Bank Robbers, you really, really need to be running a game where the players are SWAT guys foiling bank robbers.

(And SWAT teams don't have to be cooler than bank robbers. Look at Heat or Public Enemies or Kayne & Lynch or Leon or The Killer or all the other crime movies.)

Because as a player there is nothing less fun than a game where the GM just wants to use the PCs as a punching bag for their pet NPCs. I've played that game a lot.

And if there are to be moves to update Star Wars view of how Superpower vs. Insurgents and their Hokey Religions conflicts work to more modern sensibilities, I would be much more comfortable if the focus was on 'With great power comes great responsibility' than 'With great power comes great opportunities to force choke a bunch of dudes like Darth Vader'.

So all in all, I'd like to play a Rebel, but only if I can play Legolas vs. Orcs. If you are thinking more of having us play an untrained, illiterate Pashtun peasant with a rusty AK-47 crudely converted to bolt action and no front sight vs. the USMC, in what ways do you expect we will find that entertaining?

--

For the record, do people in this thread think Stormtroopers are cooler than Rebels, or Rebels are cooler than Stormtroopers?

ErikB said:

I think you are involved in a completely different discussion than everyone else.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Well humour me, and tell me if you think Rebels are cooler than Stormtroopers, and if so, why.

Same question to everyone else.

Yup he is. He is still on that stormtrooper/Imperial discussion from back in the beta forums. This is about how someone gives their stormroopers some distinctiveness in their version of the Star Wars universe. But yes I do think stormtroopers are cooler than rebels. Betterlooking armor. Cool subsets. Would have been interesting and different if they had gone with them having lightsabers like it was originally planned. Probably why I like the Imperial Guard in the Legacy era.

Doc, the Weasel said:

Yes. That being said, Rebels all the way! And just because I think the Rebels are cooler does not mean I think the imperials are inept. Nor does thinking the Imperials are capable grant their position any moral authority. If your point is Rebels are cooler, thus Stormtroopers should not be a threat, I don't see how the one leads to the other.

cparadis said:

It is more about how they go about generating the threat. Most people prefer to be The Elite rather than The Horde, so it is more pleasing for peoples egos to have the threat they face be provided by there being large numbers of inferior enemies rather than a smaller number of superior opponents.

Slike, the 300 Spartans may have lost, but people still think the Spartans are cooler than the Persians.

And from a practical point of view, if your party consists of four dudes, and there is an unending horde of stormtroopers with more reinforcements on the way, it is probably sensible that the PCs are better than the troopers.

ErikB said:

This is full of assumptions I do not agree with, and I see no evidence to support.

No one is saying PCs are "the Horde." even if Stormtroopers are "the Elite" PCs can still be elite.

You may personally like facing hordes of mooks, but I believe a party fighting a single dragon is a time honored RPG trope, so I don't think your assumptions about large number of inferior enemies versus small number of superior enemies is correct.

Not really sure what the Spartans have to do with this discussion … Are the Spartans like the Imperials because they are a professional army trying to protect their established government or are they like the rebels because they are "elite?"

Your final point begs the question. If it is four people versus an unending horde of stormtroopers it is only "sensible" that the PCs are better than the troopers if you assume the PCs are going to win. If you don't assume the PCs are going to win it is neither more nor less sensible to have the Stormtroopers be better soldiers.

cparadis said:

Sure, but the dragon equivalent is Darth Maul, not a battledroid.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheDragon

And, yknow, if you and your three mates rob a bank, hordes of police and swat dudes will descend on it. So they can't all be The Dragon.

Thank you for agreeing with me that it is not the case that people unanimously prefer facing numerous inferior opponents versus a lesser number of superior opponents. I think there are a lot of assumptions here based on creative agenda. I respect people who want stormtrooper mooks in their games, it's just not a game I would want to play in, because those are not the stories I want out of a Star Wars RPG. At the end of the day players and GMs should choose to make the stormtroopers that fit the story they want to play. If that's a story about murdering thousands of stormtroopers, make them mooks. If it is a story where stormtroopers pose a real threat to people then don't.

Part of the problem is that Stormtroopers don't come in small numbers. Well, unless you set up IEDs to ambush patrols, but did I mention I really, really don't want to play Al-Qaeda?

So I dunno. I tend to think in terms of films and books and games, so maybe people could talk about the kinds of stories the would like to see. How would you like to see Rebel/Stormtrooper interactions go?

ErikB said:

This discussion wasn't about Rebels vs Stormtroopers.

Frankly, this board should be talking about Scoundrels vs Stormtroopers. Rebels is the next game.

It works with soundrels as well. A bank robbing crew like the Dillinger gang or the McCauley crew from Heat or the Ex Presidents from Point Break or The Jokers crew from The Dark Knight or Kane & Lynch or the guys from The Heist are likly to be far more dangerous than rebels are.

And I cannot help but notice that you did not answer the question.