Ok so have seen a possible issue with using traders and smugglers from EOTE when groups go up duty ranks in AOR.

Specifically with the talents "Know somebody" and "Black Market contacts". Both of these talents reduce the rarity of equipment for the trader or smuggler. When going up a duty rank players can either take an item each of rarity 3+ duty rank lvl or as a group take a starship/vehical of rarity 3+ duty rank ( unless ive got that wrong ).

I can see a plausible argument for a trader or smuggler saying i have the contacts why cant i use them when we get that equipment.

Apart from the counter of "this is rebel available equipment and your contacts arnt with them, therefore no rarity decrease". Does anyone else have any thought on this and its possible use as a wrought.

thank you in advance.

I'd not apply the know somebody nor black market contacts to requisitioned goods from the Alliance; your contacts don't logically matter when the item is provided by General Riekian.

I'd not apply the know somebody nor black market contacts to requisitioned goods from the Alliance; your contacts don't logically matter when the item is provided by General Riekian.

He has to get them from someone, and maybe you're the guy that facilitated the deal. In that case, why couldn't you use them?

I'd not apply the know somebody nor black market contacts to requisitioned goods from the Alliance; your contacts don't logically matter when the item is provided by General Riekian.

He has to get them from someone, and maybe you're the guy that facilitated the deal. In that case, why couldn't you use them?

I agree with HappyDaze. This is a clever use of the talent and really makes those characters shine in the story.

That being said, if you are the GM and you didn't want to these talents to be used in conjunction with Duty, then those black market contacts might not like the idea of directly supporting the Rebel Alliance. That could bring the hammer down on them from the Empire.

He has to get them from someone, and maybe you're the guy that facilitated the deal. In that case, why couldn't you use them?

Because then he's still going to issue you them on the basis of his total availability of them, not your ability to get them. He might let you have some of the profit as a bonus, or grant you extra duty for getting them cheap.

Plus, there's the whole issue of if you're acquring them for the Alliance, they aren't yours. If you are acquiring them for yourself, they're not the Alliance's, and cannot then be issued to you.

Military supply never cares who YOU know, unless it's the general or the Supply CO or SNCO. The Alliance is essentially a military. Issued goods are issued based upon central stores and their trust in the individual (in this case mechanically represented by CR).

I don't believe that the Alliance uses a typical military supply system. In this, I see them as being much more of an irregular force, possibly even working more like terrorist cells.

Depends on which part of the Alliance you are in. They do have a regular military and supply chain. It is fed by operatives, like privateers and cell groups, as well as by places sympathetic to them (Mon Calamari for the big fleet vessels, Incom for the X-wings and speeders).

So, if you're part of a cell network, then you really only have access to that which you personally can steal, beg, borrow. But if you're part of the Alliance Fleet, then you are given equipment as needed/able to suit the mission you're being sent on.

I don't believe that the Alliance uses a typical military supply system. In this, I see them as being much more of an irregular force, possibly even working more like terrorist cells.

This is probably true for the larger military, who are "part of the system" and thus would be supplied by Alliance quartermasters.

However, for an individual Mission Ops group (aka your average band of player characters), they're generally on their own, and so those talents would be quite useful for getting those "we really need it" items that the Alliance supply chain is either unable or unwilling to supply.

Seeing as how there aren't any mechanics in the Beta for requistioning gear directly from the Alliance beyond the "Alliance Asset" that a group can get from increasing there Contribution Rank, I'd say let the player make use of those talents. Just remember that the Alliance is pretty strapped for pretty much everything, so certain items simply won't be available for a bunch of "freelance trouble-makers" to requisition, particularly if those items would be useful for the enlisted folks that are part of the semi-regular war effort against the Empire.

With Black Market Contacts, the PCs should certainly be able to use it. They would, of course, have to pay the credit markup inherent to doing so...

With Black Market Contacts, the PCs should certainly be able to use it. They would, of course, have to pay the credit markup inherent to doing so...

Same with Know Somebody, as the PC suggests to the Alliance quartermaster that they "know a guy" that can track down a given item, and again with the PC either paying the cost increase (greasing the wheels as it were), or accepting a delay in getting the item as the folks in Alliance Supply work out the necessary details.

I might allow it, but I'd rather use those talents as part of fulfilling some type of Duty, to acquire equipment and gear for the Alliance, and that way you get Duty increases. This in itself could be a mission, or series of mission, for the operatives, to acquire gear, ships, weapons, medical supplies, whatever, for the Alliance, of course at an increased cost (sort of like the Han story arc in the ongoing Star Wars comic book series set between ANH and ESB). In turn some of that stuff could perhaps trickled down to the operatives as a sort of award for doing good work, particularly if they managed to decrease the cost and so on, not necessarily contingent upon CR... Of course at this point it's not so much the talent and its mechanic that comes into play, but ones contacts, roleplaying and so on - not that these are mutually exclusive, but it should not come down to a simple roll.

I mean, since the Black Market Contacts talent at least costs cash, I'd rather not let that decrease the rarity of free gear you get from the Alliance as part of the increased CR... that is, of course, if the CR award is free, but I seem to remember that it is.

Why can't you know somebody within the Alliance? The talent isn't specific as to who you know. As I recall Know Somebody is specific to legal goods. Thus you know a legitimate somebody, like say a requisitions officer you play cards with.

This is why a group wants the quartermaster or trader in the group. She gets them better stuff. Why would a GM want to take that away from a PC?

From personal experience, who you know and are friends with always matters. It's part of why you make friends at work.

Valid points, still the black market contacts talent at the very least has an added cost, which doesn't come into play with CR rewards afaik.

Why can't you know somebody within the Alliance? The talent isn't specific as to who you know. As I recall Know Somebody is specific to legal goods. Thus you know a legitimate somebody, like say a requisitions officer you play cards with.

This is why a group wants the quartermaster or trader in the group. She gets them better stuff. Why would a GM want to take that away from a PC?

From personal experience, who you know and are friends with always matters. It's part of why you make friends at work.

At its basest level, attempting to cheat the system with those two talents reeks of munchkinism.

Why can't you know somebody within the Alliance? The talent isn't specific as to who you know. As I recall Know Somebody is specific to legal goods. Thus you know a legitimate somebody, like say a requisitions officer you play cards with.

This is why a group wants the quartermaster or trader in the group. She gets them better stuff. Why would a GM want to take that away from a PC?

From personal experience, who you know and are friends with always matters. It's part of why you make friends at work.

At its basest level, attempting to cheat the system with those two talents reeks of munchkinism.

Every Talent cheats the system in some way. They exist to make exceptions to the mundane manner that the rules otherwise operate under.

As HappyDaze said, every single talent in the game is a means to "cheat" the system in some fashion or another.

So whining about how a PC that has spent XP on talents like "Know Somebody" or "Black Market Contacts" wants to use them to improve their chances of getting certain hard-to-find items as requisitioned gear is a lot like whining about how a PC that took Sniper Shot is using their blaster pistol to attack at Long Range, or that a PC used Side Step to make themselves harder to hit vs. ranged attacks, or that the PC with Skilled Jockey is able to negate the various setback dice imposed from terrain hazards during a chase scene, or the PC who took Natural Charmer wants to use their "once per session" re-roll option to make a second try at that really important Deception check they just catastrophically botched (failure with lots of Threat and a Despair) that could mean the difference between a successful covert mission or an extended fire-fight the PCs won't have a chance to win.

Well, when getting free stuff I think it's borderline at the very least.

It's not "free stuff." Your players are working to get that stuff. They just aren't paying credits. A player spent precious XP to get some talents. Then the group worked to up their duty to a level where they could actually get something decent. Then they want to game the system to get even better stuff.

Last time I checked this is a game, so why does gaming the system bother folks? In the military gaming the system is the norm. Not only is it expected, it's unofficially encouraged in order to complete the mission. The quartermaster who makes sure his squad has the gear to get the job done isn't a cheater. He's the hero who saved lives and achieved the goal.

That's what this is about. Big **** Heroes.

Well, we'll just have to disagree then. To me the talents, at least Black Market Contacts (I haven't looked at Know Somebody more than once so I don't know), comes with a price tag, an increase in cost, which in this case would be bypassed. Although, how they go about using it - if they are creative and makes it plausible - I'd perhaps allow it. But not as a flat rarity decrease per rank "just because"...

I'm working from memory, but Know Somebody reduces the rarity of goods by one per rank of legally available goods. So no thermal detonators unless you are on a lawless planet. Black Market Contacts allows you to get black market goods but comes later in the trees (and is expensive XP-wise) and I think that you have to spend more to make it work.

So a player could be getting a bonus in not having to spend the extra cash as the Alliance is doing it for him, but the Alliance is taking the stuff back after the mission so the players aren't benefiting long term anyway. I don't see the big deal.

The game is more about what your hero can do rather than what stuff he has. It's one of the things I like about it. It's not overly equipment focused.

If your players are the type that want to nuke everything, and you're not you have problems a game system can't solve anyway. If they want to infiltrate the Death Star with stealth suits, I don't see the issue. Sounds cool to me. Just make them have "Boring Conversations anyway."

The scoundrel has black market contacts as the first talent on column one. Sure, the other two are deep in there, but I don't know. The thief have two talents within 20 xp of each other.

The talent is in my mind contingent upon credit expenditure, which balances it. To use this with CR acquired gear or vehicles, which is theirs to use and have, permanently and for free... I see your points, and I wouldn't deny a good narrative and reasoning for why and how, but automatically? Nope.

The scoundrel has black market contacts as the first talent on column one. Sure, the other two are deep in there, but I don't know. The thief have two talents within 20 xp of each other.

The talent is in my mind contingent upon credit expenditure, which balances it. To use this with CR acquired gear or vehicles, which is theirs to use and have, permanently and for free... I see your points, and I wouldn't deny a good narrative and reasoning for why and how, but automatically? Nope.

I already said that Black Market Contacts (BMC) should require the character to spend the upgrade cost. So even if you get a 200,000 credit ship for free, if you had to use one rank of BMC to get it because of Availability, you'll be paying 50% of that (100,000 credits) and it goes up fom there depending on how many levels of BMC you used. This is hardly unfair - the Alliance provides the base value, and you can manage to get something a bit better than usual if you grease the right wheels at your own expense . That's just how BMC works.

If doing it like that, I would probably be ok with it. I must somehow have overlooked the part about spending some actual cash on the free CR stuff

From my point of view (which is questionable, I'll admit) a player could use Black Market Contacts to get better gear for their group from outside the Alliance. A player could use Know Somebody to get better gear for their group from within the Alliance. If the player is smart or creative enough to use both talents in conjunction... like saying they know someone such as an Alliance Requisitions Officer whom they introduce to their black market contacts... then I would allow it. After all, I imagine the requisitions officer might throw the players a bone as thanks for setting him/her up with a new source for supplies. But I would probably limit it to something like once per rank of the talent. I mean sure, you get a free bone this time, but if you want another one, you need something else to offer for it.