I've got the Legacy Era Campaign Guide now. I've read over it quite a bit and it's a very good book. I must admit this was the book I was least looking forward to — knowing that a lot of stuff in here wouldn't work in our current campaign — but it's still mighty impressive.
None of the new species are super-spectacular, but the Nagai looks like it would be fun, and it's good to have stats for species like Klatooinian and Weequay. And Zeltrons really are masters of persuasion — they get a +5 bonus to change the attitudes of others.
The new Legacy destiny is pretty nice — it's very open-ended, but you're the descendant of somebody famous and so you either live up to or reject following their path (whatever that might be). You never complete it per se, but you do get new uses for Destiny Points instead. For example, a character with the Qel-Droma legacy can spend a Destiny Point to double the results of your Force Point rolls for an encounter, or a character with the Solo legacy can spend a Destiny Point to get an automatic natural 20 on your next Mechanics check. It's very broad and open to DM and player design.
New talents: The Jedi get good combat talents. Defensive Acuity gives you, when fighting defensively, +1 die of damage with lightsabers and +2 on your checks to Block or Deflect. Precision is a good talent for those who only wield one lightsaber and don't do Double Attacks — it lets you make a lightsaber attack as a standard action, and a hit deals damage and reduces the target's speed for one turn.
The Noble gets the Provocateur talent tree, which is all about turning your enemies against each other. The talents do things like negating insight and morale bonuses, healing allies, and getting enemies to "accidentally" hit each other. The Scoundrel gets two new Misfortune talents — Seducer and Seize Object — plus the Yuuzhan Vong Biotech tree, which sadly will not apply to our games. Scouts get the Versatility talent tree, which are some basically nice defensive abilities. Soldier gets the Brute Squad talent tree, which gives you melee bonuses when you and your allies surround and beat up somebody. Three new Brawler talents also make unarmed combat significantly better — Hammerblow, which doubles your Strength bonus to attack rolls when unarmed and holding no items, is practically a necessity.
The feats are surprisingly general-purpose, but good. Autofire Assault gives you extra damage and a bonus to hit on autofire attacks if you attack the same area more than once. Brink of Death will ensure you never accidentally kill somebody in combat. Conversely, Fatal Hit means you will more often kill people in combat — you don't have to deal damage at or above the target's threshold when they hit 0 HP to kill somebody, you just have to bring them to 0 HP. There's some good feats that improve grappling. Return Fire lets you attack out of turn when somebody misses you with a ranged attack. Vehicle Systems Expertise makes you a master of working ship shields. Zero Range gives you an extra die of damage when you make a ranged attack at an adjacent target.
Prestige classes get a boost as well. The Bounty Hunter gets the Force Hunter tree, which improves your defenses against Force-users. The Elite Trooper, as required by contract, gets another new talent tree, the Protection tree, which functions as a pretty strong bodyguard build. (Seriously now — Threats gave us the Teras Kasi tree, KOTOR gave us Mandalorian Warrior, Force Unleashed gave us Critical Master, and Clone Wars gave us Melee Specialist and Republic Commando. I think Elite Trooper now has more talents than Soldier.) Gunslinger gets the Carbineer tree, which lets it use rifles and blaster carbines just as well as pistols. Jedi Knight gets the Jedi Refugee tree, which makes it difficult to sense or track. Officer gets the Fugitive Commander tree, which makes it a master of deception and staying alive in tight spots. Sith Apprentice gets the Sith Commander tree, which enriches your allies with the power of the dark side.
The two new prestige classes are era-inappropriate — Imperial Knight and Shaper. Imperial Knight is a Jedi/Soldier hybrid that is great at wearing armor (really, really great at wearing armor) and wielding a lightsaber with other Imperial Knights. The Shaper is a Yuuzhan Vong-only prestige class that is good at working with biotech and can give its allies Vong implants on the fly.
New Force powers: Ballistakinesis lets you hurl small debris as an area attack. Combustion creates a small explosion. Dark Transfer is Cade Skywalker's dark side healing ability. Detonate deals damage to unattended objects. Enlighten lets one ally use your Use the Force result in place of one roll or defense for one round. Lightning Burst is a weaker Force Lightning that explodes in a burst and can be maintained from round to round. Obscure clouds the mind of somebody just as they attack you. Prescience gives you a bonus to defenses and attacks against a particular target for one round. Stagger pushes an enemy away and deals a little damage.
Force Talents: Move Massive Object lets you make Move Object attacks as area attacks, though it requires a Force Point and has a prerequisite. Telekinetic Stability lets you avoid get involuntarily moved. Dark Preservation lets you spend Force Points (and gain Dark Side Points) to avoid moving down the condition track. The two new Force traditions are the Disciples of Twilight (mystics who can use the Force to bend light and hide in the shadows) and the Ember of Vahl (a fire-worshipping dark side cult).
Also, the Force chapter has official rules for death sticks. Kazbich, rejoice.
Not much super-powerful in the equipment section: some new guns, and rules for Yuuzhan Vong equipment and implants. Some new droids, too. There's a lot of new droids, vehicles, and starships, as well as templates to bring equipment from older eras into the Legacy era.
The campaign section emphasizes heavily that this is an era in which just about any character type and equipment might show up, and it also details the Heirloom Item rules first created in a Web Enhancement online. The Galactic Gazetteer doesn't have anything too shocking, but it's cool that the writers were able to take some creative liberties in this era.
The rest of the book is stats, and stats, and stats, and stats. I'm of a mixed feeling about these, because there is a whole lot of them, but some of them needed some editing work — some of them refer to talents that don't exist at all, and some of them don't make any sense ("Bantha" Rawk is supposed to be a former Jedi turned mechanic, but he's statted as pure Scoundrel with not even Force Sensitivity, even though in his first appearance he uses the Force). I admit that I have not read these stats too thoroughly yet, as they will not apply to our current game, but there are some new species statted out throughout — Devaronian, Advosze, Sakiyan, and Chadra-Fan. (I may have to make a new Vihn character for Andy. He'll know what I mean by that.) Also, they seem to stat out every single character who's appeared in the Legacy comics so far, no matter how minor, which I find to be a little excessive, but oh well.
Overall a good book, a lot more useful to me if I were playing in this era, but solidly done as always.
