Are there any plans to have an app to help run Star Wars: Edge of the Empire games? Besides the dice app. Or are there plans to release any PDF versions of the book(s)? A friend told me it would not be difficult to have an app that is basically a PDF file, with integrated sounds and interactive visuals. At the very least it seems like the RPG industry can benefit from selling their books via iTunes and the Google store, but to my knowledge no one has done so.

This was discusses in a previous thread a while back, and the issue with releasing the rulebooks etc in pdf format is one of licensing iirc, such that Lucas always holds on tight to those sort of permissions. Although that discussion took place before the Disney switcheroo so who knows what the deal is currently.

It sure would be useful, especially given the size the rulebook is going to be.

Right now, whether or not FFG will be allowed to sell PDFs of their Star Wars products is entirely up in the air.

I seem to recall mention by Jay Little that their current license didn't permit the sale of PDF products, but whether that was from the GenCon 2012 In-Flight report or on the Order 66 podcast I can't say. And this was back in 2012 around the time that RPG product line was announced. So things may very well have changed in the several months between then and now.

The fact that FFG wasn't able to sell the Beta rulebook as a PDF (which would have greatly expanded the playtester base) strongly suggests that PDFs for sale are still a no-no, and that any PDF documents on their website are permitted under a legal technicality of them being "RPG support material" rather than separate electronic media, which prior to the Disney buyout was handled by LucasArts, and thus required a separate licensing contract. That's why WotC never sold PDFs of any of their Star Wars books, as it was simply not cost-effective for them to negotiate a license with both LucasArts and LucasBooks.

However, the hope is that with LucasFilm now being owned by Disney, this whole "need separate licenses for print and PDF versions of RPG books" mess will no longer be an issue. It'd be a real boon for FFG if they could sell PDFs of their books, given the market shift towards electronic media over physical copies (to say nothing of PDFs being vastly cheaper to produce for FFG as there's no printing costs involved), but they may not be able to renegotiate that particularly point in their current licensing deal until it comes time to renew the license, which quite a few folks with industry experience are speculating to be 2015.

The fact that FFG was able to produce and market a dice-rolling app gives some home that PDFs of the RPG books will be possible. But we'll have to wait and see.

I hope that they release an app for character sheets that you can update just by clicking different fields. Perhaps, even one that shows you what combining different skills will do for your Dice Pool. Of course, the GM ultimately decides finder details, but it could at least give you your Green/Yellow number.

herozeromes said:

Well, you can kinda do that already with the dice roller app, setting up specific dice pools for your PC which you can then update either short term (adding, upgrading, or removing dice from that particular roll) or long term.

Admittedly, it can be mildly troublesome if you've got several characters or a whole bunch of trained skills, but the functionality does already exist.

Yes, I was forgetting that feature. I have the dice app and it's a great roller. I'd be more interested in a mobile character sheet app, though. I find that I prefer the physical dice that I got with the Beginner Game to the app.

Donovan Morningfire said:

Not to mention that PDFs are searchable. However PDFs are also easily copied and pirated, so I would suspect that IF the game was to be released in a digital format, it wouldn't be PDF.

bobfrankly said:

There's been quite a bit of debate on just how drastically internet piracy impacts direct sales, particularly if the media is legally available in PDF format. I know WotC through a huge fit and took all their PDFs down, which of course only lead to more of their books being pirated. But I've been hearing that other companies haven't seen as huge a hit in their sales as you might think.

There are some folks that will download a pirated PDF of a game, see if they like it, and then purchase the actual PDF and physical copy (if both are available) if they do. So in that respect, some companies are seeing it as a form of free advertising, albiet one they didn't approve and does cost them a percentage of sales. Alternatively, I know folks that bought every book in WotC's Saga Edition line yet also have pirated PDF copies fo those books. So WotC still got their money from sales of the books and those people got a PDF copy as well as a hardcopy.

Now, that's not to say there aren't greedy, self-serving scumbags that gleefully grab pirated copies and not spend a dime on the company's actual products. In fact, WildFire (makers of CthulhuTech) even have a sidebar in each of their books addressing those folks that downloaded a pirated copy, and ask that "hey, if you like what you see, consider buying the material so we can continue to make more of it.": But there are folks that simply don't think beyond themselves, and revel in the fact that they've swiped hundreds of dollars worth of RPG books at no more of a cost than what their monthly internet bill. Some of them even have the audicity to be outraged when a company that produces a system they like folks because of lack of sales.

In spite of their appeal, not every gamer has access to a tablet, be it an iPad or Android-based, so while an app might be more secure in terms of preventing piracy. PDFs are much more accessible to the masses, and more accessible generally means more sales. It's also a lot easier for companies to produce a PDF of a gamebook, since they tend to use PDFs anyway when doing internal playtests and layout review.

Further, some companies, especially Green Ronin, take huge advantage of PDFs by releasing the PDF a few months before the book is scheduled to hit shelves, so that any glaring typos or rules mistakes can be corrected for the print version, with an updated PDF being made available shortly thereafter. Evil Hat Productions and Pinnacle did likewise with theri FATE Core and Deadlands Noir Kickstarter projects, giving backers early copies of the PDFs to review & proofread, trusting that the more eyes you got looking at something, the less likely any bugs are to sneak through tot he final product. But not every company has that option, especially as overseas printing seems to be the norm, particularly for bigger companies like WotC and FFG.

Speaking of apps, I'd love to see a decent EotE character sheet app. Even better would be one where you could tap a skill/talent/etc., and it would send the appropriate base dice pool to the die roller app.

I'd love a GM tool app with the following features

• NPC management and building with a built in dice roller and tracking strain/wounds, initiative tracker and everything you need to manage combat. It should be set up so that you create a campaign and NPCs are associated with specific campaigns, so you can track whatever you want with NPCs, locations etc. for campaigns.
• A lexicon of the star wars races and planets
• A random npc creator where you input for example "Shop owner tatooine" and it creates a fitting NPC. You can then with a push of a button transfer him to a campaign.

It could have many features, but a really cool GM tool would be awesome.

Gallows said:

The lexicon of Star Wars races and planets already exists. It's called a browser window open to ' Wookiepedia '.

Other than that, I like the idea of NPC/initiative management. I'm not so sure about the random NPC creator, but maybe it's just not my style.