So I've had the fortune to run two sessions so far of Edge of the Empire, and my players have been loving it. I've been running a modified version of the Shadows of a Black Sun campaign from Free RPG day, and it's been going great (I might start posting details on the GM forum if I can summon the willpower.)

Two things have come up: first, I can't find the rules for the base damage on melee attacks - weapon damage for melee is listed as +X, indicating that it should be added to something.

Second, I can't find any recommendations on the amounts of baddies my players should be facing/what they should be composed of (a feature that was a godsend in the 4E books when it came to assembling encounters.)

Odds are I'm just overlooking things, but does anyone have information on these two questions?

The rules say you have Brawn as the basis for your melee damage, modified by the weapon you use.

one of our players wanted to be a melee dude and was disappointed that things like Vibroknives were only listed as 1 base damage, compared with a blaster pistol's 6. But, he went with it anyway and picked up some talents to boost his melee damage as well as buying a vibroknife which ignores 2 points of soak.

He was doing okay being a tank-y Wookie, but we got halfway through the adventure before realizing the Melee weapons were +damage as opposed to ranged weapons listing an actual damage. Did a quick check, realized we were supposed to be adding Brawn all this time, and because he had the forethought to make his Brawn 4, started increasing his damage output significantly.

Second, I can't find any recommendations on the amounts of baddies my players should be facing/what they should be composed of (a feature that was a godsend in the 4E books when it came to assembling encounters.)

I seem to have missed that part, too. The suggestions from the beginner box weren't enough for my group of 5 despite their instructions, but my players are clever and generally roll well.

The most challenging combat encounter they've had was last night, with a dozen minions and two nemeses, and even then, only the wookie tank went down (to a lucky shot, and he lived) and the droid was badly hurt but didn't fall.

In my limited play experience (so far) andafyter listening to the Order 66 podcast for encounter difficulties I typically use/plan to use one rival or minion group per PC with the skill of the rivals and size of the miniion groups determined by the PCs skills. So if the PCs typically are rolling YYG then I would use a minion group of 3 with a 3 attack characteristic to produce a minion group that attacks YYG. But these are very rough guidlines and I will adjust these rules of thumb as necessary.

I like 4e D&D too but this system doesn't have the same assumptions for creating combat encounters. For example, if I had a PC that had little to no combat skill then I probably would not take that character into account when creating encounters.

Not only that, but those weapons generally have extra qualities, at the very least Pierce.

Pierce ignores soak, so if your wookie has a brawn of 4, and he's using vibroknives that give +1, he's doing 5 damage. With a soak of 2, it's ignoring 2 points of soak on top of that.

For example, against a bounty hunter with a soak of 4 and a wound threshold of 5, if he hits with just the base successes, he'll get +1 automatically for the extra success, and 5 damage for the vibroknife (brawn 4, +1 from vibroknife). That's 6 damage total.

But it also ignores soak, so the bounty hunter only soaks 2 of that damage, dealing 4 damage to his wound threshold. That bounty hunter is now down to 1!

The system does not have exact x players of x levels, means you should oppose them with x badguys, like D&D or Pathfinder.

I don't actually find that unusual, as mostly I've GM'd WEG Star Wars, and Hero system, which also don't. Generally I feel it out. I'm guessing for an easy fight throw a minion group or two, or maybe a couple similarly skilled Rivals. Ramp up from there.

I'll be generous with players for our first few sessions while I figure out balance, usually erring in their favor. Don't want an accidental wipe because of an unbalanced fight. I'm also not afraid to say "Oh crap, this guys two hard. Hmmm, now he has 5 less wound threshhold.

I have been looking for this info all night. I am surprised the core book didn't have more intel on that.

The most accurate way to judge what your given PCs can handle is to do some playtest rolls yourself. Set up an encounter and roll it off yourself in between sessions to see what they can do.

A combat focused PC generally should be able to make short work of a 3 man minion group early on, if not right off, with the right load out of gear, skills, and talents. Other specs will depend entirely on do they have a stat like Agility or Brawn that can be used in conjunction with an attack.

Rivals can vary so widely in level of lethality and toughness it is hard to say, but best to make sure there is a PC who deals decent damage and can take a hit on each rival at most.

If PCs are going to get into combat they have to put some thought into some level of attack, defense, or support to those that do.

Basic rule of thumb is don't match target groups to number of PCs, unless the whole PC group is decent in combat.

The most accurate way to judge what your given PCs can handle is to do some playtest rolls yourself. Set up an encounter and roll it off yourself in between sessions to see what they can do.

This. It's also a good way to anticipate the strategies one might work toward. I threw together a knight-level Jedi for myself and faced him off against a tweaked Forsaken Jedi from EotE. Strain recovery became very important very quickly. In fact, the battle ended with the good guy taking out the bad guy with Wounds, then immediately collapsing due to Strain. I kinda wished I could have had that happen in actual play. Neat ending for a duel and all...

I have been looking for this info all night. I am surprised the core book didn't have more intel on that.

The melee damage part or the number of enemies part?

The melee damage using brawn is covered in the combat chapter, if not in the gear chapter.

If your players are anything like mine, you also have to expect that they will probably completely bypass everything you thought they might do.

SCENE - Abaonded, forgotten, remote ore mining facility on a large planetesimal* in remote asteroid belt. The party's arch rival discovered the location and is grabbing the ore to sell. The party secretly followed her to the location, landing on the far side of the base.

I set up the arch rival (nemesis talker/charmer) on the loading ramp of her HWK-290 (tricked out with upgraded engines and enhanced rear shields), she was overseeing the loading of the cargo onto her ship and nervous about anyone showing up to stop her. She had her pilot in the cockpit waiting for the signal to take off in case there was trouble.

She also had two cloakshape fighters nearby (a few hundred meters away), the pilots awaiting for her signal to escort her or intercept any intruders.

All three of her ships were sitting idle, ready to fly at a moment's notice.

Next to her at the cargo ramp she had 4 combat droids (roger-roger type minions) being lead by a squad leader droid (rival).

I figured these droids would keep the party busy for a turn while the Nemesis makes her getaway.

There was also a small group of workers moving crates from a warehouse to her ship, but they weren't really part of the planned fight.


WHAT HAPPENED
The smuggler/thief sneaked around the outer fringes of the camp, accidentally found the resting pilots, but managed to finish them quickly and quietly with a vibro knife. He then hopped into one of the cloakshapes, plugged in the slicer's data spike. The slicer unlocked the ship remotely, although setting off the alarm (lots of threat).

Initiative: GM PC GM PC

• The nemesis closes the cargo ramp, leaving her workers and droids behind, and tells the pilot to "Go, effing GO!"
• The thief pilots the stolen cloakshape over to the HWK and blasts it while it's sitting on the ground. He hits hard and rolled enough advantage to activate link. That almost destroyed it outright in one shot.
• The HWK pilot uses Punch It and Evasive maneuvers, and the HWK takes off
• The PC that had been left on the players' ship flies over and shoots at the HWK
  • His gunnery is 2G.
  • I upgraded the difficulty, they upgraded back.
  • The HWK had all shields rear.
  • It was using Evasive Maneuvers.
  • It was traveling at speed 5.

Of course, the PC hits, finishing it off. The HWK goes crashing to the ground, and they capture the nemesis without really any kind of fight... in the first round.

So, the lesson here is that even if the die pool is GYRRKKKKK, you can still expect your players to roll success with no despair and capture their arch rival regardless of how many droids she has.