Any suggestions? I've had players take jobs before to bide time between jobs but can you think of anything more interactive or alternative?

Illegal swoop racing?

Fenderstat said:

Mercenary work

Someone always needs soldiers somewhere for something. H3ll, have them start their own company, then get betrayed to make it interesting. See and Zaeed Massani and Vido Santiago .

Espionage

Someone somewhere always wants to know something that someone else doesn't want them to know. Figure out what information is valuable, and go steal it. Also, steal things.

Scouting the Rim

Something like 98% of objects in realspace are uncharted. So someone somewhere might want to know where a new Star system/asteroid/planet/nebula is. Try and get WEG's Galaxy Guide 8: Scouts (System Generation chapter, in particular) or check out Steven Ross' Rogue Event article series on the GSA .

Smuggling

Someone somewhere wants something someone else doesn't want them to have. Sneak that special something past those jerks and let the free market work.

-WJL

High stakes sabacc would seem to be in character.

heists.

work as hitmen.

If you meant legal ways…trading works fine. Or how about Exploring, mapping new routes, finding relics…

We're actually running our whole campaign around this concept. Cons and vagabonds, wandering the galaxy in search of a quick buck. Some of the things we've done:

Small time cons: We try to limit these to one or two a session for flavor, so as not to bog down the game. One of my favorite being buying a cheap ring, disguising myself as an elderly person, finding a shifty pawn, and letting him "con" me out of my wedding ring (or some other heirloom) for a "quarter" of it's price (still three times what I paid for it).

Big time cons: often the focus of our adventures. For example: setting up a borderline illegal business front (the kind of get rich investments many Imperial governors/nobility love) and getting corrupt officials to invest in it. You give them a couple of small to moderate payouts (so they feel invested and see the promise of future returns), and then, OH NO, something is threatening the operation! But we can fix it with a little cash, and make ten times our investment back. Then you disappear with their cash. (Bonus points if you got them to give you their account numbers and empty their accounts. Double bonus points if you can run up credit and fit them with the bill)

Heists: Oceans 11 for the win! Our current "project" is to lift a corrupt nobles yacht which is filled to the brim with rare artwork he bullied away from their rightful owners.

Gambling: again, we try to limit these to one or two a session for flavor.

Rigging swoot races: We made sure to have a top swoop pilot in our group (being a travelling race team is also great cover). Then we bet on his races (or against him) and do our best to rig the rest in our favor. The best racers? Won a trip to X, loans being called in, or their ships have "mechanical problems" mid race. The worst racers? Bet on them, then make them win. (we once drugged a bottom rung racer and replaced him with a droid)

It's especially fun to try and do it with a karma flavor. Con those who con others, and give back a bit to the people they hurt (but not too much. We're still scoundrels after all).

Ship for Hire. Technically, trade is when you buy and sell goods, so hiring passenger and frieght space out isn't actually "trade"…

"Hired on call" - you're the backup plan. "Be at X, wait Y hours for Z signal, and if it doesn't arrive, we didn't need you. " May involve a passenger to witness you being ready and ensure payment after. The problem is, loitering looks really suspicious. And draws time for all sorts of fun social tasks.

Mining - find the right rock. Get the right stuff from it. Go sell that right stuff. Maybe fight some legitimate claim holders.

Salvage - find a wreck, loot it. Don't get caught.

Shattered world salvage - Alderaan and Dantooine systems. The wreck is the assorted asteroids which used to be the planet. Some of which still have valuable stuff. A few might still have people.

Yeah I've got a Random Heist Generator here , plus I found an awesome (and similar) page that is Firefly themed here .

So you could have your crew Capture, Steal, Smuggle past, Rescue, Investigate, Discover, Protect or Destroy any number of things owned by any number of entities. Just remember to add some twists into the mix to make every job or heist a little bit tricky and a little bit unique.

all good replies. Thanks.

These are all really great ideas that I will be using.

What is a good way to determine how many credits a job is worth? and/or how much an Obligation is reduced from a job?

Thanks

Aric

aaw7272 said:

To determine the credit value of a mission, It depends on what you want your players to be able to afford. I have personally found it most valuable to keep the players hungry in any Star Wars campaign I've ever run. It gets to be problematic if the players have substantial amounts of credits they can sling around with little effort.

To determine the obligation value of a job, the answer would be similar: How much obligation works for your game. Based on the Beta text, it seems that obligation tends to be handled in 5 unit denominations. Because, at least in my game where I want obligation to carry some weight, I don't reduce obligation unless the players went substantially out of their way or made a sizable improvement in their debt-holder's situation. Basically, make them work for any obligation reduction.

-WJL

aaw7272 said:

As LethalDose said, it depends on the needs of the narrative, and the feel you want for the game.

LethalDose's example of a hungry game is a good example. It's the feel he wants to go for. I run mine very differently: easy come, easy go. We're running an "Ocean's 11" style game: big heists, little combat. Rewards tend to be big are big, but typically disappear as fast as they come. Likewise our players frequently pay off obligation, but just as frequently are forced to rack up new obligations to pull off the next scheme, with the net result being they are (on average) carrying a high amount of obligation.

The thing to remember about running a game like that is that typically you can't just SPEND that amount of money. Sure you can load up on small stuff, but the BIG important stuff is fairly controlled. The players may be able to refit their ship with a top of the line hyperdrive, but not top of the line engines, scanners, armor, etc.

The net result of this "easy come, easy go" style game is a slow, steady increase in baseline power. While credits fluctuate wildly, they don't effect things as much as you would think.