It has been ten years or so since I played a full campaign of the west end star wars. Ihave very posititive memories of the games but don't remember too many specifics about the system (still I know I enjoyed it enough to make that my number one). D20 was okay. The Saga edition I really didn't like much.

Quote from: Simlasa;565541Actually, I guess I was being a dick from the start when I declared that my PC was a pimp.

With a light touch, that can actually be very 'Starwarsy'.  There's a seedy underbelly to huge portions of the galaxy, which stands in stark contrast to the shiny hypocrisy of Courscant.

Quote from: mcbobbo;565628With a light touch, that can actually be very 'Starwarsy'.  There's a seedy underbelly to huge portions of the galaxy, which stands in stark contrast to the shiny hypocrisy of Courscant.

We did some very dark and gritty stuff in the underwarrens of Courscant.  Our GM got ahold of some Necromunda stuff and went all googly eyed and the next thing you know, we're fighting gangers in caverns trying to recover... something important, IDR what now.

Quote from: mcbobbo;565628With a light touch, that can actually be very 'Starwarsy'.  There's a seedy underbelly to huge portions of the galaxy, which stands in stark contrast to the shiny hypocrisy of Courscant.

I think the point of Star Wars, that many gamers (and authors!) miss is that Star Wars can be ANY genre. The films were an homage to Flash Gordon serials of the 30s. If you want to play seedy underbelly stuff, it's pretty easy to pay homage to hard boiled crime stories, or gangster films. Likewise, we just did an old west game. I had rules for dueling, and the PCs were sent to the ass end of the galaxy to help acclimate a new sector to the Republic. Law was nearly non-existent and the local Jedi was like the marshal. I even went a little crazy and had him using a blaster. The PCs investigated Bantha poaching.

It's feasible, that with the right touch, you could do a Star Wars 70's blacksploitation thing without it being ridiculous or comical.

A friend of mine suggested a game where all the characters were clone troopers in the later years of the war, and have it be a Vietnam "what the hell are we fighting for?" type game. lol

Too often the books and comics try to be "Star Wars" and end up being nothing. I despise most of the books. I dislike anything Star Wars that even attempts to explain how hyperdrive or lightsabers work. The one thing Star Wars should never be is Star Trek.

I fully endorse the above posts. I see this variety as a strength.

For some reason, when you say "Star Wars", everyone seems to think of Jedi and Sith.

Am I the only one who thinks of Han Solo, and Lando Calrissian, and their quasi-Travelleresque exploits? I'm one of these guys who never quite understood the "Star Wars D6 1e was just Traveller in the Star Wars universe" as an indictment. I thought this was awesome! What is Han if not a free trader? And who the fuck wants to be the farmboy with a heroic destiny? I want to be the roguish, ruggedly handsome companion who gets the girl!

The Third Imperium is all serious and shit, and Star Wars' galaxy is balls-out pulp men's adventure in space, but you could even do a "pulp Third Imperium" with a free trader crew (complete with fluffy and overtly violent Vargr mate) on the run from a Hiver crime lord joining up with an old psionicist and his apprentice -- the last remnants of an underground psionic institute -- and getting mixed up with some Frontier War or another, fighting alongside Third Imperium-supplied rebels against Zhodani troops led by a creepy masked cyborg psionic Zhodani inquistor.

Not sure how CT would handle it, but Mongoose can do it right out of the box. There's even a Jedi -- sorry, "Psi-Warrior" career.

NB: This is not to say that I haven't had oodles of fun playing a pimped-out Jedi in an epic Old Republic (circa 4000 BBY) game.

Reading this thread made me think about the movies. Honestly I think Han could own just about any Jedi except mature Vadar, Yoda or Obi Wan.

A friend of mine has been running the Dark Stryker campaign (with all the extras) over the last seven years (had some gaps there). Ran d6 SW back in the 80s as well.

It has its rough spots. For example, no jedi leap. Also, I never liked the idea of spending character points to add dice. Too much 80s looking artwork. But the d6 system is really elegant and flexible, and the ability to do multiple actions makes for some great heroic action. And there are a lot of folks who have created nice refinements.

If you are not familiar with the d6 system, its all opened up now. Grab it from: http://opend6.wikia.com/wiki/Open_D6_Resurrection_Wiki

Quote from: The Butcher;565666Am I the only one who thinks of Han Solo, and Lando Calrissian, and their quasi-Travelleresque exploits? I'm one of these guys who never quite understood the "Star Wars D6 1e was just Traveller in the Star Wars universe" as an indictment. I thought this was awesome! What is Han if not a free trader? And who the fuck wants to be the farmboy with a heroic destiny? I want to be the roguish, ruggedly handsome companion who gets the girl!

You are not alone.

d6 Star Wars is perfect for pulpy sci-fi. I love Traveller, but it is more hard sci-fi than pulpy. Also, I can get people in a bar into playing Star Wars and have them create characters and rules explained in about 10 minutes with d6 Star Wars. It is a very simple system to learn and everyone knows the background setting.

Quote from: Pariah74;565641I think the point of Star Wars, that many gamers (and authors!) miss is that Star Wars can be ANY genre.

That's why I'm cranky that our GM went straight to pulling out all the props for a redux of the first movie... rather than setting up a more sandbox sorta thing and letting us make our own path. I'd rather just ignore the bait he's been tossing but there is a general... mindset, in our group, that if a GM puts bread crumbs on the ground the players should follow them (something I tend to disagree with).

I think Star Trek and 40K (Dark Heresy) can be any genre as well... but few seem to want to play them outside their presets either.

Quote from: Lynn;565696It has its rough spots. For example, no jedi leap.

Roll Control. Done.

It only gets fussy when you make the Jedi use "powers." It's weird, but in the first book they talk about the Force as a skill, and indeed, the Force skills are bought and work just like regular skills, but somewhere along the way the examples from the first book just sort of became the powers list, and Jedi used the skills to cast "powers."
I hated that.

I get tired of saying, "Don't look at that list. Put the book down and just tell me how you want to use the Force."

Quote from: Pariah74;565703It only gets fussy when you make the Jedi use "powers." It's weird, but in the first book they talk about the Force as a skill, and indeed, the Force skills are bought and work just like regular skills, but somewhere along the way the examples from the first book just sort of became the powers list, and Jedi used the skills to cast "powers."
I hated that.

That would be one of the revisions done in 2nd Edition; IIRC, you could only have as many "powers" as you had dice in each force skill (with "powers" such as Affect Mind requiring one from each of the skills).

I think it was meant as a limit to Jedi characters (2nd Edition had A LOT of Jedi nerfs in it), and explain why Vader and Luke weren't spam firing Force Lightning throughout the movies.

It also could help to differentiate two Force-users from each other. With "powers", two characters with 5d in Control, Sense, and Alter could still be wildly different in application on the Force.

Wow. d6/WEG is obliterating the other contenders. Good show.

Quote from: Novastar;565722That would be one of the revisions done in 2nd Edition; IIRC, you could only have as many "powers" as you had dice in each force skill (with "powers" such as Affect Mind requiring one from each of the skills).

I think it was based on pips, not dice.

QuoteIt also could help to differentiate two Force-users from each other. With "powers", two characters with 5d in Control, Sense, and Alter could still be wildly different in application on the Force.

This was how it played out in our games, also in the fact that force skills were so hard to raise that it put you at a disadvantage behind the other players for a bit until you got them to a high enough level to be useful.

Quote from: Benoist;565741Wow. d6/WEG is obliterating the other contenders. Good show.

d6 is an awesome system. More to the point, it is quite possibly the most awesome system EVER to introduce people new to the hobby with, especially with an IP like Star Wars.

Quote from: Panzerkraken;565754This was how it played out in our games, also in the fact that force skills were so hard to raise that it put you at a disadvantage behind the other players for a bit until you got them to a high enough level to be useful.

The problem I had is three Jedi players would each burn the double character points for one of the Force skills, then let the other two learn from them at normal cost.

Doubly a problem, as they fixated on upping their Force skills, at the expense of any others (save Lightsaber, for the inevitable lightsaber fights).

I'll admit, I really like nerfing out all the lightsaber powers, and making The Force an attribute in my game, with Control, Sense and Alter skills under it. It makes starting Force-users viable in the early part of the game, while keeping experienced Force-users from dominating the endgame.

Quote from: Novastar;565722That would be one of the revisions done in 2nd Edition; IIRC, you could only have as many "powers" as you had dice in each force skill (with "powers" such as Affect Mind requiring one from each of the skills).

I think it was meant as a limit to Jedi characters (2nd Edition had A LOT of Jedi nerfs in it), and explain why Vader and Luke weren't spam firing Force Lightning throughout the movies.

It also could help to differentiate two Force-users from each other. With "powers", two characters with 5d in Control, Sense, and Alter could still be wildly different in application on the Force.

I disagree. Two players with no limitations will completely make their use of the Force unique. That was exactly what I loved about it.

Quote from: Novastar;565799I'll admit, I really like nerfing out all the lightsaber powers, and making The Force an attribute in my game, with Control, Sense and Alter skills under it. It makes starting Force-users viable in the early part of the game, while keeping experienced Force-users from dominating the endgame.

I balanced my Jedi with the Dark Side. I did the same thing Savage Worlds, when I just made the Force skills in the same way as d6. I also allowed the lightsaber to do str+dd+8 AP 12 damage, and took it a step further and said that a called shot to a limb that caused a wound (2 for the torso) would remove that limb. I made many of the things like chokes, lightning, and slamming people around easy Alter checks. Basically, to use the force, you roll your Trait die like any other skill, then you roll two Wild Dice. One Light, and one Dark. The number of Dark Side points you have adds to the Dark Side die. So there's your temptation. The Dark Side die has a way of acing during critical moments.

I made Jedi that were incredibly powerful.  Why?

Because I then set harsh limits on how they could use that power. Killing earns you a dark side point. Fine, go around with that saber slashing people down and decapitating. It's quicker and easier!

It's hard to remove somebody's weapon arm at the wrist instead. It's hard to know you could crush somebody's throat, or fry them with lightning with but a thought, but that doing do only hurts you in the long the run.

It always bugged me that NO Star Wars game ever tempted the player with the Dark Side. Tempting the character is meaningless, tempt the players and watch how fast your friends become Sith.