...Gods, how I wish EoE had half the number of skills it has!

At least it doesn't have as many skills as WEG had. Thank god for small mercies, nai?

...Gods, how I wish EoE had half the number of skills it has!

At least it doesn't have as many skills as WEG had. Thank god for small mercies, nai?

Don't get me wrong, I love them both, but...

... there seems a lot of very situational skills there.

I agree. :-) But I maintain a largely love/hate relationship with skill list lengths... I suppose my appreciation of EotE's list comes from my (limited) exposure to Star Wars through the d20RCR and WEG - both have perhaps twice as many skills as they could have had.

I think this the following is true for most RPG systems, though some systems lend themselves to this line of thinking better than others:

Look at what types of characters your players are wanting to roll, this will tell you what kind of adventure they want to play. Once you have that lined up, your players are already filling the perfect role of your game.

Of course, that's all great in theory, but sometimes it's not so practical.

The number of skills in EotE hits a sweet spot for me. I like enough nuance to make context matter, but not too many that the player can't become fairly broadly capable after just a couple of sessions. D&D4 was too compressed for me, and you ain't seen skill lists until you've seen Chivalry & Sorcery 3rd edition, based on the "SkillScape" mechanic. In addition to the several dozen skills in the core book, they produced multiple sourcebooks with hundreds more. Each weapon was a separate skill, and you could go all out and be an amazing cake decorator, or dog-walker, or...

Oddly enough, One Ring has skills for Song, Riddles, and... Smoking...!

I just love that

But I couldn't get my group to play it if I was paying them

Compare with those like Pressure Point, which are useless unless you have skill ranks.

Yeah, this is the 'hobo under the bridge' problem, in which the talents and skills for each career or specialisation rarely line up. It's the biggest issue I have with EoE, that you pretty much have to buy non-career skills just to make use of your baseline abilities. You're pretty much forced to multi-class, which is unfortunate if you want to play a 'pure' single class character.

Well, if you're a Doctor, you should have multiple Medicine ranks pretty quick anyway, because that's basically your shtick!

I'm fine with things mostly, since you can "default" under any Skill you don't have ranks in and just roll Characteristic. Sounds kinda crappy but um...not really, just because of volume. This droid in a game I'm in has 5 Int, and regularly pulls stuff off completely unskilled. Pretty nice mechanic there.

On the topic of the number of skills, I think it's worth noting that the number of skills also directly impact how much 'advancement' the game has to offer. Too few skills would mean that you risk not having enough for the players to spend their xp on, while too many skills can make it difficult for players to have any idea whether their hard-earned xp are "wasted" going into a particular skill.

Just to say that that if you toy with the idea of reducing the list of skills, that can have consequences beyond what is readily apparent.

Not an easy balance, I'm sure.

(And also might not be a problem at all! )

...buy a medical droid...

I think I may have read over something. Where and how does one buy droids in the game?

Core Rulebook pg 409. Prices & rarities on droids as well as base stats.

I just want to thank everyone who has responded so far. Your answers have been quite helpful.

Core Rulebook pg 409. Prices & rarities on droids as well as base stats.

Excellent, thank you so much!

Now that's possible, but it's much nicer to have narrative things like 13th Age, One Ring and Edge of Empire where each character is not expected to have a certain level of skill or a certain amount of shiny items. Which is the exact opposite of some iterations of D&D, and what the new D&D edition seems to be trying to get away from.

I love One Ring, but I'd disagree. With starting characters, it's essential to split the group into individuals with strictly defined roles, otherwise you're going to end up with a group with no hunters or trackers, or no healers, etc.

Now that's possible, but it's much nicer to have narrative things like 13th Age, One Ring and Edge of Empire where each character is not expected to have a certain level of skill or a certain amount of shiny items. Which is the exact opposite of some iterations of D&D, and what the new D&D edition seems to be trying to get away from.

I love One Ring, but I'd disagree. With starting characters, it's essential to split the group into individuals with strictly defined roles, otherwise you're going to end up with a group with no hunters or trackers, or no healers, etc.

So what? Have the guy running the game take that into account when making his adventures. It is what he is there for.

So what? Have the guy running the game take that into account when making his adventures. It is what he is there for.

Yes, that was my point. 4E built its adventures purely on the concept that you had to have all the roles, and x amount of gear.

There's nothing stopping you in One Ring or EoE writing your adventures based around the player careers you have. The game can function fine without a PC doctor or a pilot, for example.

If the group has characters with ship skills, make the ship a central part of the story and let them have something they can modify.

If they have ground-orientated roles, the ship just becomes background and a means to get from A to B. They buy (or be given) a droid to do all that off-screen if absolutely necessary.

I don't think there are any inherent "must have" character types. That said, their are certainly some that are handy based on your campaign. Obviously if you're playing a smuggler game, somebody needs to pilot.

Handy archetypes to have: pilot, mechanic, doctor, stealther, combat monster, face.

That said, any of these can be mixed and matched. In our current game we have 4 characters

1: I think just Marauder so far - Combat Monster

2: Diplomat / Quartermaster /with ranks in pilot: Face & backup pilot

3: Mechanic/ Outlaw Tech / Combat Medic: Mechanic and Healer

4: Assassin / Pilot w/ranks in skullduggery and thiefly stuff: Jack of all trades ranged fighter, thief and skulldugger

The system really encourages mixing and matching, so have fun with it. No reason not to have a fighter / doctor / diplomat, if you're not excessively worrying about min/maxing.

Ever one of our groups is missing something(s)

First group has an assassin exile, gadgeteer, body guard, scoundrel, and a slicer.

This group is missing a medic.

It is also missing a pilot. (I mean a REAL pilot) The assassins can fly BUT spends points on developing the force. The gadgeteer can fly but devotes time to sharpening his tracking and weapon skills. The body guard is just straight combat driven. And the scoundrel /could/ be a great pilot ...but is focused on stealth and other scoundrel-y things as well as being the 'face' of the group.

The group is also missing a real mechanic. The gadgeteer and slicer make due just fine but not the same as an actual mechanic could.

The second group has a doctor, scholar and a marauder.

No mechanic.

No pilot. No Navigator.

No slicer.

The Marauder is an absolute beast in melee but is a wookie and owes a life debt to the pacifist doctor.

The scholar is a little of everything master of none.

The third group has an explorer, pilot and a mechanic.

They have REALLY good navigation and piloting skills. (the explorer and pilot are both droids) But they are extremely dedicated to their particular 'class'

The mechanic is great at maintaining the ship and the droids but is also alone. In deep uncharted space.

This group has essentially no (outside the ship) combat potential.

They also lack a 'face' character as well. Uncharted worlds are HUGE money. They bring raw resources to the table. They also are safe havens for people/things that do not want to be found.

No medic.

In every groups its what is missing that makes things fun and interesting.

For instance the third group the mechanic was gravely injured. THAT was an adventure.

I have found that this game is a bit more flexible than D&D was. Without needing things such as weapon proficiencies and ranks in medicine in order to make a character more dependable in combat, everyone can pick up a weapon and be expected to be able to at least use it a bit. Even without putting ranks in combat, you naturally are given additional dice based on characteristics. This means a nimble explorer with 5 points in Agility just to become a good pilot will also become good at firing weapons in combat. It adds to the game by not letting anyone really get left behind in terms of level but the one issue I have with the system is that talents truly become the one thing that makes a medic stand out from an assassin.

For my game though, we have

1 assassin

1 doctor

1 trader

1 marauder

1 politico

1 scoundrel

1 pilot

1 outlaw tech

This has worked really well so far. We have the marauder and assassin destroy things in combat, the doctor makes sure to keep everyone patched up, the trader and scoundrel are the big time role players when bouncing from shop to shop and interacting with NPCs, the politico is the role player with the contacts when the group needs to pick up additional NPCs to help with difficult situations, a pilot for the starship and planetary transport vehicles, and an outlaw tech that patches up the ships, builds droids, and slices computer systems.

It's true that we have an extremely large group so it's easy to have every group role covered. But even in our large group, everyone does multiple things. For instance, the doctor takes ranks in gunnery and deception/charm so that when needed, she can be the large gun support and/or participate in social interactions when other PCs are off doing something else. When everyone understands they can play the role of more than just "the doctor" you can make a very small group work.