Star Wars: Orbastra's Planetary Peril! [Star Wars]

Anoat, once a world poisoned by the Empire, still has influential citizens on Bespin... citizens whose mercantile might is enough to warrant some deference from Governor Adelhard in the wake of the Imperial collapse and the Iron Blockade. Chief among these citizens is Cincinatus Orbastra, scion of a noble house and environmental engineer. Inspired by the historical restorations of Taris and Telos, Cincinatus Orbastra suggests a bold plan to cleanse Anoat of its poisons: Siphon the atmosphere completely from the planet, and replace it with the atmosphere of nearby, and officially deserted, Hoth.

The plan is bold, yet deemed feasible. Using the ice of the planet Hoth, two enormous, 1000 kilometer in diameter spheres would be created; one above Hoth, the other above Anoat. The atmospheres of both planets would then be siphoned into the ice spheres, and  Hoth's clear air towed, through hyperspace, to be placed on its new planets, with the ice of Hoth contributing the hydrosphere of the newly revitalized Anoat. The poisoned air of Anoat will be simply discarded... why haul an ice box full of poison to place on a nothing world? While this plan will cause a near-total loss of life on both planets, it will leave Anoat ripe for resettlement... with Governor-General Adelhard and Cincinatus Orbastra as the chief beneficiaries of the new world.

When this plan comes to light, it will be vehemently opposed by several factions. The Anoat Sector Rebellion, cut off from the galaxy by the Iron Blockade, still uses Hoth as a waystation and salvage yard, as do many smugglers and more legitimate businessmen. Furthermore, anything that damages Adelhard's regime is good for the rebellion, and so teams will be sent out to hinder the creation of the Ice Spheres, and to damage the pumps that will be necessary to turn the planets into giant vacuums. If this plan succeeds, what too could it mean for the galaxy, where one world may be robbed of its very breath so another might flourish? What other worlds, deemed "undesireable", would have their atmosphere stolen to create a biosphere on some Imperial or corporate rock?

Orbastra must be stopped.

H1: Levelless Star Wars Saga

H1: Levelless Star Wars Saga

This is an edit of a previous work I did, that we bashed out on the Giant in the Playground message boards. I’m attempting to edit it for cleanliness and ease of use.

In theory, this will work for anyone using the classed version as well, but I'm going to assume you start with my classless system. You also keep the XP system as-is, but instead of saving it to buy levels, which carry inherent increases in defenses, HP, and the opportunity for feats, talents, and other improvements, you get a bonus feat, talent, or class feature every Z XP; the default is around 5000xp, but someone in the mood for a faster-gaining gameplay might set it as low as 1000xp; I wouldn't suggest going much over 5000xp, because that will lead to a seriously slow game. A happy medium might be 2000xp or so, but experiment with it. Some ambitious soul might want to assign varying values to different feats, talents, and other such things, but that's beyond my patience; they are generally equal in value in SAGA, and so can remain equal in value in H1.

There are some very OBVIOUS problems with this, and it goes back to the source of almost all SAGA problems: The Use the Force skill. If you leave it a skill, force-users simply walk all over the game, and it gets even worse when you stick everyone at level 1 defenses (plus whatever they get from feats). The simplest solution to this is to make it so Use the Force is not a skill... it is instead treated similarly to a weapon, wielded with Charisma. Someone with the Force Sensitivity feat is counted as proficient in that weapon, and may use it as outlined in the skills section as if trained in the skill. Someone without the Force Sensitivity feat may spend a force point to use the "Search Your Feelings" or "Sense Surroundings" uses of the skill (representing a momentary connection to the force). A new feat exists, "Force Focus", which gives you a +1 to Force checks; Greater Force Focus, to give another +1 isn't out of line, either.

Force points might be better addressed using my replacement rules, which give 2 blue "force points" per session, and 1 red "dark side point", with Force Boon giving you an additional point per session. If you don't like those rules, it will greatly hurt my feelings, but you might consider having Force Points refill every time a new feat/feature/talent is gained.

Some other things need to be addressed as well, but they're relatively minor. Toughness is changed from +1HP/Level to a flat +4 HP... about 1/6 the average person's 24 HP. Many feats have a Base Attack Bonus requirement; that's obviously eliminated, and I'm not seeing too many feats in the base book that are broken by that. I would also add some new feats; Ability Training and Ability Advancement from E6, for example, and I don't think Great Fortitude, Lightning Reflexes, and Iron Will from the d20 SRD would be terribly unbalancing, especially if you allow Greater Weapon Focus to help counterbalance them. Most things that refresh with level (such as Force Points done not-my-way, or money from the Wealth Noble talent should be moved to a "when you get a feat" time scale. If they reference the character's level, instead use number of talents in a given tree, or number of bonus feats, whichever makes more sense.

In combat, it’s important to reexamine the Armor tree; armor becomes a lot more valuable when you don’t have a level-based bonus to defense for it to replace, and the mechanics of Armored Defense and Improved Armored defense become irrelevant. I would suggest making it so Armored Defense gives you a +1 to Reflex (above what is granted by the armor), Second skin gives you a +1 to Fortitude (again, above what is granted by the armor), and Improved Armored Defense gives you a +1 to Reflex for every trait you have in the Armor tree (replacing the bonus from Armored Defense).

The main balancing feature here is prerequisites, combined with a bit of opportunity cost. While BAB and level prereqs are obviously gone, other prereqs, such as specific feats or class features, are not. It should also be noted that monsters become a LOT nastier in this system... a 138 HP Rancor is nothing to sneeze at in base SAGA; in H1, it's going to eat you for lunch unless you can crush it with an pneumatic door.

Force Rules and "Wise Teacher" rules

Ok, so you may recall my Force Point rules from earlier, as well as the after-action.

One thing I am definitely doing away with on reflection? The idea that your Dark Side score innately adds to your Use the Force Checks. It worked well in d6 (where I got the idea from), but I think the "free force point whenever you're willing to embrace the Dark Side" is a much more effective lure. Thinking on it, however, I do have a slight change to make.

If you succumb to the Dark Side, things switch around. Instead of 1 red chip and 3 (or 4, with the feat) Blue, you will gain 3 (or 4; just take that as a given, now) reds and 1 blue. Spending a blue? That lowers your DS score by 1. But you can have as many of those as you want, provided it's in the service of the light side of the Force. If your side "switches" during a game, you don't "reset" until the next game... so if you go Dark, you can delve REALLY deep into the Dark but, likewise, it's possible to expunge a lot of Dark Side points at a heroically appropriate moment.

I'll post that on the Giant; there's likely some problems that need checking on my idea.

After Action on a Rules Change

So, tonight I bought some poker chips (and a deck of cards for an unrelated game I'm designing) for use in the Star Wars game. Every person got 2 blue chips and 1 red chip, representing their Force points for the session. The red chip, however, represented giving in to the Dark Side... using a red chip increased your Dark Side score by 1, in addition to the benefits of a force point.

Overall, it went very well. People used a lot more Force Points (I found in previous games that they tended to sit unused), and tended to suggest novel uses for them, some of which I allowed.

In addition to the standard "Add 1d6 to a given roll", I allow:
1) Add 1d6 to a given defense for a single attack.
2) Subtract 1d6 from the damage of a single attack. If the damage is to be halved (for example, folks were free with grenades this evening), this applies to the raw total, not the final damage; so if the bad guy rolls 14 damage with a grenade, and you roll a 4, you take (14-4)/2 damage, not (14/2)-4 damage.
3) A red chip may be spent for a single use of a dark side power. This will result in an increase of 2 to Dark Side score... 1 for calling on the Dark Side, 1 for a Dark Side power.

I also wound up PLAYING with the red chips a lot. Holding them up at appropriate moments. Turning them over in my hands. Because even when players spent them, I let them keep them. You can pour as much Dark Side as you like into an action if you REALLY want to succeed.

Classless SAGA, and other alterations

A few months ago, we played the Star Wars SAGA, and while I generally liked the system, I found myself very frustrated with parts of it related to character creation. It seemed to me that there wasn't much need for classes, and so I created a variation that allows one to play Star Wars SAGA without them... the only classes are "Heroic" and "Non-heroic".