So I am on a mission to collect as many Star Wars RPGs as I can get.  My latest one is a good one called Black Star that came out last May, 2023.   I'll post about that game at a different time.

A while back I also heard about the Blades in the Dark style game called Scum and Villainy.  Full disclosure: I never gave it too much thought.   The core game seemed to be based on being Han Solo, with no Jedi stuff.  Recently, I saw a review that showed off that the game does indeed have lightsaber-like swords.  So, I must be mistaken?

Is Scum and Villainy a full Star Wars game, or are Jedi players better off looking for another game?   

Yeah, you could run Star Wars with S&V.

The Mystic template S&V uses isn't a 1:1 Jedi.  It's pretty darn close though.  Maybe like 75% Jedi and 25% generic space magic guy.

I don't have the book handy atm but if you want more specifics I can get back to you later with some answers.

Yes, I'm curious how the Force Powers work.  Do you use mana/fuel points?  Skill checks?   Is deflecting a blaster shot easy to do?   Things like that.

I don't know how familiar you are with the whole Blades in the Dark rules so here are a couple things you should know before I go into the S&V Mystic abilities.

• Stress – sort of like HP.  You take stress when you try and resist consequences. For example if you get hit for 2 Harm + Chest Wound you could roll resistance and take X Stress (reduced by the roll) to lower the result to 1 Harm + Brused or even 0 Harm.


• Trauma – when you are out of Stress you suffer Trauma and removed from the current action.  You come back later with a Trauma Condition (Cold, Reckless, etc).


• Pushing Yourself – You can choose to take 2 Stress to add dice to a roll, increase the effectiveness of a roll or act while "incapacitated".


• Gambits – another type of bonus die shared by the group.  Spending one gives a +1d to a roll.  You have a set number at the start of each job and get more whenever you have a critical success on certain types of actions.

Rolling checks is a process of stating what you want to do, what skill you are using, your "position" and the likely effect level of the action.  The GM sets the position (Controlled, Risky or Desperate) based on a bunch of factors.  Same for the effect level (limited, standard, great).

You roll all your dice and look at the highest result.  A 6 succeeds, a 4-5 is a mixed result and a 1-3 is a fail of some sort.  The exact results are based on the position of the action, so a fail on a controlled action is very different than one on a desperate action.  Obviously, the more dice rolled the better your chances of having something better than a 1-3.

With all that out of the way, The Mystic is the class you are looking at for your Jedi.

Mystics have access to The Way.  This lets them spend Gambits instead of Stress whenever they could spend Stress.  In certain situations this is a benefit as you could spend a single Gambit to cover multiple Stress costs.

They have a series of special abilities they can use which include:

• Kinetics – Push Yourself to either throw objects or propel yourself with superhuman speed
• Psy-blade – use your weapon to cut through non-shielded materials and grants your attacks Potency.  Potency is a key factor the GM looks at when deciding effect levels
• Center – Is a way to meditate and remove Stress
• Way Shield – blocking blaster shots with a Resolve roll.  If you resist you can spend Stress to redirect it and make an attack of your own with it
• Warded – a special type of armor that can resist mystic attacks or a one-time Push Yourself w/o the Stress cost.
• Psy-dancing – Push Yourself to do a Jedi Mind Trick
• Visions – Spend Stress to remote view a person or place
• Sundering – Push Yourself to basically do Force Lightning

S&V and Blades in the Dark are really good systems that would work terrifically for the right group, a group that is more tilted toward roleplaying rather than just gaming, and who like "heists" and such rather than combat encounters. My current group is split because half of us want to play this more, and the other half wants no part of the system.