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Zulgyan's Newbie SW 1E Questions
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Zulgyan
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 4:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well, what's "an adventure" is quite an arbitrary definition. My session yesterday went from the start of the Tatooine Huntdown module till the found Old Arno. So adventure n°1 could be interpreted as "finding old Arno" and adventure n°2 could be "finding Adar Tallon". The second half of the module has quite a different feel with the characters trekking deep into the desert.

What I like about giving a reward at the end of the session is that it's a more satisfying conclusion. And players get a kind of "homework" (how should I improve my character?) that keeps them hooked off-session till the next time we get together. I don't find that 5 skill points are anywhere close to gamebreaking to get in the middle of the module.

We gamed from 2.30pm to 10pm. 1 hour and a half was spent on character creation. So 6 hours of solid adventuring. Reading the threads recommended by Bren, I think those 5 skill points for 6 hours of adventure is on the more conservative/slow side.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 6:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I like awarding stuff at the end of a game session, too. I got into the habit playing D&D.

But, I found, with D6 Star Wars, it's too much. The PCs advance too quickly. My advice is to stick to the rules as written and award the 5-10 skill points when you're done with Tatooine Manhunt.

You've already given half those points. And, that's half the higher number--the suggestion is 5 to 10. You could just give 5 skill points for the entire adventure. Or 7. Or 9.

If your game takes two more sessions to play, then you're already over-awarding by 50%, awarding 5 each of the three sessions. If your game goes to three more sessions, which it could easily do, then you are way over rewarded.

Your players will get used to it, and when you realize that they are advancing too fast, you will cut back--but your players are already used to getting at least 5 skill points a game session.



From my experience playing D6 Star Wars, if you have to give them something, then give them 1 skill point per game night. Then, at the end of the entire adventure (the end of Tatooine Manhunt), give them the balance, if there is any.

That way, if it takes you 5 game sessions to play Tatooine Manhunt, the PCs will end up with 5 skill points. You can give them each and extra 5 points at the end, if you want. Or you can just them them 0-5 extra, depending on circumstances.

Make them work for skill points.

Don't devalue them.

At least, that's my advice.

It is your game, of course.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 6:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
My session yesterday went from the start of the Tatooine Huntdown module till the found Old Arno.

(snip)

We gamed from 2.30pm to 10pm. 1 hour and a half was spent on character creation. So 6 hours of solid adventuring. Reading the threads recommended by Bren, I think those 5 skill points for 6 hours of adventure is on the more conservative/slow side.


The 1E rulebook says that 1-2 episodes usually takes 3-5 hours to play (one game session). There are 8 episodes in Tatooine Manhunt, so you can figure it will take a minimum of 12 hours, maximum of 40 hours to play.

I'd say that you are on track given that estimation. You played for 6 hours and covered 4 episodes. That sounds like you are humming through the adventure, but any little thing can throw off the timing of an adventure. A good roleplay encounter or an extended combat.

Your next episode is about exploration, so it could definitely take some time (it would in one of my games). In fact, it might be the entire game session.

Will you award another 5 skill points then?
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 7:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
Great job Wajeb! That's amazing.

I've been thinking that if the mandalorian character gets a regular income of credits from the Rebellion, that other characters don't get, maybe he won't get Force Points back at the end of an adventure, as a way of balacing that out. Thoughts?


What did you use for the Mandalorian Template?

I was just curious about how it differed from the one I created up thread.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 7:17 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

@Zulgyan

Two things to bring to your attention. There's an adventure set on Tatooine in the back of the Second Edition (not First Edition) Galaxy Guide 1: A New Hope. It's called Battle of Wayfar (or something close to that).

IIRC, the adventure sees a PC ship, in Tatooine's atmosphere, get caught in one of the world's massive sand storms. The intakes get all clogged, and the ship goes down, skidding in the sand. Before long, the sand has the ship mostly buried.

The PCs go for help to the near town of Wayfar, and they get embroiled in a mess--the Sand People have gathered into a hoard and are about to attack the town.

It's a fairly short adventure, but it's one that you could run as an epilogue to Tatooine Manhunt. The PCs take off from Mos Eisely, get caught in the sand storm, and viola, they're not going to leave the dust ball planet just yet.

Or, it's a nice little adventure to run if you ever want to return to Tatooine in your campaign.



The second item I want to bring to your attention is Galaxy Guide 7: Mos Eisley. It's an entire supplement devoted to that haven of sum and villany, and it's got a fair amount of info about Tatooine in general, as well. Plus, it is written post ANH, so you get some idea of how the place has changed after Luke Skywalker left the place.

GG7 is strictly a support book, but it may be worth the read if you are going to be spending a lot of time on Tatooine or make Tatooine important to your campaign.
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Bren
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 9:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
Well, what's "an adventure" is quite an arbitrary definition.
That's exactly why I included per hour information when talking about how I did CP awards. From a WEG design point of view, Tatooine Manhunt is one adventure, not two. So the WEG recommendation is 5-10 CPs for the entire Manhunt even if it takes multiple sessions.
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We gamed from 2.30pm to 10pm. 1 hour and a half was spent on character creation. So 6 hours of solid adventuring. Reading the threads recommended by Bren, I think those 5 skill points for 6 hours of adventure is on the more conservative/slow side.
I wouldn't call it that a slow rate of advancement…or pretty much everything Wajeb said.
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Zulgyan
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 11:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bren wrote:
I wouldn't call it that a slow rate of advancement…or pretty much everything Wajeb said.


A recommended progress rate is 1 skill point per hour? (That's the impression I get from the threads you linked above) We had six hours of adventuring time, and I awarded 5 skill points. Would that qualify as a slow, average or fast rate of progression?


Last edited by Zulgyan on Sun May 21, 2017 11:11 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Zulgyan
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 11:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wajeb Deb Kaadeb wrote:
Zulgyan wrote:
Great job Wajeb! That's amazing.

I've been thinking that if the mandalorian character gets a regular income of credits from the Rebellion, that other characters don't get, maybe he won't get Force Points back at the end of an adventure, as a way of balacing that out. Thoughts?


What did you use for the Mandalorian Template?

I was just curious about how it differed from the one I created up thread.


He finally went with another character concept. I will soon post the full cast of heroes in my game report.
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Zulgyan
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PostPosted: Sun May 21, 2017 11:13 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wajeb Deb Kaadeb wrote:
@Zulgyan

Two things to bring to your attention. There's an adventure set on Tatooine in the back of the Second Edition (not First Edition) Galaxy Guide 1: A New Hope. It's called Battle of Wayfar (or something close to that).

IIRC, the adventure sees a PC ship, in Tatooine's atmosphere, get caught in one of the world's massive sand storms. The intakes get all clogged, and the ship goes down, skidding in the sand. Before long, the sand has the ship mostly buried.

The PCs go for help to the near town of Wayfar, and they get embroiled in a mess--the Sand People have gathered into a hoard and are about to attack the town.

It's a fairly short adventure, but it's one that you could run as an epilogue to Tatooine Manhunt. The PCs take off from Mos Eisely, get caught in the sand storm, and viola, they're not going to leave the dust ball planet just yet.

Or, it's a nice little adventure to run if you ever want to return to Tatooine in your campaign.


Cool, I'll definitely check it out.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 9:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
A recommended progress rate is 1 skill point per hour?


Waaaaay too much, in my opinion.
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Zulgyan
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 10:26 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Really? But you need 5 skill point to get a skill from 5D to 5D+1. 5 hours of play just to get +1 (one pip) in a good skill. Seems like very little to me! But then I'm new to this system and might be missing something.

What do you consider an appropriate rate of advancement?
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Solo4114
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 10:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
Really? But you need 5 skill point to get a skill from 5D to 5D+1. 5 hours of play just to get +1 (one pip) in a good skill. Seems like very little to me! But then I'm new to this system and might be missing something.

What do you consider an appropriate rate of advancement?


I'm new as well, so take my opinion with a gram of salt, but I would bet that the advancement is more with the notion that these are characters the players will be playing for a long time. They'll go through multiple adventures together (either modules, or homebrews), over many, many gaming sessions if you guys really enjoy it. So, while it may seem basically fine to boost someone by one pip here or there after a couple of episodes within a module, that may leave them pretty overpowered for their next adventure.

From my personal point of view, the joy of the game should be from the gaming experience itself, and not from the metagaming experience of advancing PC abilities.

In other words, what makes the game fun for players? Is it the reaping of mechanical rewards in the game? (E.g., you got XP! You got more stuff! You guy a stronghold!) Or is it the fun of sitting down and playing through an adventure with your buddies and/or your family, immersing yourself in a gameworld and your own imagination for a few hours?

I think it's the latter, myself, or should be. Advancement in abilities is or can be necessary, but I think it's worth using as a tool to create new, interesting scenarios for players and GMs alike, so that the game doesn't feel stale. New/improved skills and/or gear lets players take on newer challenges and may expand the resources they have to solve problems. But the point isn't the getting new stuff/going up in levels. Rather, the point is that the gameplay experience remains fresh and challenging.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 11:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Zulgyan wrote:
What do you consider an appropriate rate of advancement?




I RECOMMEND RAW

My first recommendation is to play it by the book. Don't award any skill points until you are done with Tatooine Manhunt, and once you finish, award 5-10 skill points.

The 1E rules say never to award more than 10 skill points per adventure. And what they consider an adventure is several episodes as shown in their various published adventures like Tatooine Manhunt.

D&D players have to get used to not getting lots of XP after every game session. It's not that type of game.



POINTS PER EPISODE

My second recommendation is to award skill points per episode. There are 8 episodes in Tatooine Manhunt, and the recommendation is 5-10 skill points for the entire adventure.

Take the lowest recommended award, divide by the number of episodes, and that will give you an idea of how many skill points to be awarding per episode.

5/8 = about half a skill point. So, award 1 skill point per two episodes played.

You played 4 episodes, so that max the characters should have gotten is 2 skill points each.

Then, at the end of the adventure, make sure that each character was awarded the minimum (5 skill points). If not, award them the balance (probably a point or two). And, at the end of the adventure, you can award bonus points to get the total for the adventure 6-10 points.



HOW MANY TATOOINE MANHUNT SKILL POINTS?

The suggested award is 5-10 points. How to read that is: Competent players should each received 5 points for the entire adventure--all 8 episodes. Then, consider the remaining 5 point to be a bonus for exceptional play. Consider good ideas that happened in the adventure and excellent roleplaying. On top of the base 5 points that each character gets for competent play, they get another 1-5 bonus points.

If you award 10 total points to every character for the adventure, you are saying that each player was damn near perfect--couldn't have done anything better than what they did during the adventure.

Consider that 6 total points is the base 5 plus one bonus. 7 total points is the base 5 plus 2 bonus. And so on.

How much above standard competent play did the players provide? 20% better? That's 1 bonus for a total of 6 for the adventure. 50% better? That's a bonus of 3 for a total of 8 for the adventure.

Couldn't play any better than they did? No one was killed? Every plan worked? All roleplaying was AMAZING? Then give them the full bonus: 5 skill plus 5 bonus for a total of 10 (the max) for the adventure.



SIMPLE IDEA ON SKILL AWARDS

And, for a simple idea, just use what I suggested before by awarding 1 skill point per game session. That way, they get something, and the players feel as if they are moving steadily towards improvement each game session. Then, when you get to the end of the adventure, see where they are, and award the balance, if needed.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 11:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Solo4114 wrote:
Zulgyan wrote:
Really? But you need 5 skill point to get a skill from 5D to 5D+1. 5 hours of play just to get +1 (one pip) in a good skill. Seems like very little to me! But then I'm new to this system and might be missing something.

What do you consider an appropriate rate of advancement?


I'm new as well, so take my opinion with a gram of salt, but I would bet that the advancement is more with the notion that these are characters the players will be playing for a long time. They'll go through multiple adventures together (either modules, or homebrews), over many, many gaming sessions if you guys really enjoy it. So, while it may seem basically fine to boost someone by one pip here or there after a couple of episodes within a module, that may leave them pretty overpowered for their next adventure.

From my personal point of view, the joy of the game should be from the gaming experience itself, and not from the metagaming experience of advancing PC abilities.

In other words, what makes the game fun for players? Is it the reaping of mechanical rewards in the game? (E.g., you got XP! You got more stuff! You guy a stronghold!) Or is it the fun of sitting down and playing through an adventure with your buddies and/or your family, immersing yourself in a gameworld and your own imagination for a few hours?

I think it's the latter, myself, or should be. Advancement in abilities is or can be necessary, but I think it's worth using as a tool to create new, interesting scenarios for players and GMs alike, so that the game doesn't feel stale. New/improved skills and/or gear lets players take on newer challenges and may expand the resources they have to solve problems. But the point isn't the getting new stuff/going up in levels. Rather, the point is that the gameplay experience remains fresh and challenging.


Agreed.

Plus, look at the time in game. If you award a lot of skill points every game session, then the characters are improving as astounding rates! Their skills are going up in hours!

Sometimes, a game session won't take a full game day. Sometimes, two game sessions won't take a full game day. Time slows down in rpgs under many circumstances. Then, you've got characters improving not over a year, or even a few weeks, but within the span of one day!

A good Star Wars GM should be mindful of that.
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Wajeb Deb Kaadeb
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PostPosted: Mon May 22, 2017 12:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

TWO THINGS TO REMEMBER

Try not to bring your tastes from other games into this one. Experience in D&D is a much different animal than it is in this game. It's an entirely different set of mechanics.

For one reason, a Star Wars character comes out of character generation as a fully developed character. In Pathfinder or D&D, a 1st level character is a weak, beginning character. There's a WIDE different between the two.



CONSIDER THE HEROES

Take a look at Luke Skywalker's stats as provided in Galaxy Guide 1: A New Hope. Then, look at his stats for the Empire GG.

That's how much improvement Skywalker had over three years. Not only is Skywalker the biggest hero in the entire galaxy, but just think of the adventures he's had over those three years!

Seeing that may convince you that I am correct, at least as to where the game mechanics are intended to be played, in my post above with the recommendations.


Again, it's you're game, though. Don't let me convince you to play differently if that's not really what you want to do. I'm just giving you my recommendation.
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