In other news

I'm working on compiling a master list of species, talents, feats, Force powers, etc.  I've got the Force section and the skill uses section done, and I hope to have it up soon for download.

Discussion topic: Worst species?

What, in your opinion, is the least playable species in Star Wars?

I'm going to throw one out there right now — Yuuzhan Vong.  They don't get weapon proficiencies at 1st level (except simple), they can't take Use the Force, and worst of all, they never get Force Points — so they can never enhance their own rolls, or save themselves from death.  And in return, what do they get?  They're immune to Force effects that target Will, and they treat amphistaffs as simple weapons.  And they get the Shaper prestige class, which isn't that outstanding.

To make them playable, I'd say at least give them an ability like "Use the Force checks against Yuuzhan Vong take a -5 penalty" to give them some significant resistance on top of the Will immunity.

March 25 recap

Ras Patul and Kelef Binks-Fett set out to find and rescue On-Warr, believing he was still on Myzil V and realizing they had yet to track down Aya Lim.  Ras Patul asked some of the docking bay officers, while Kelef went around the bars to ask around.  Eventually, Ras turned up that an alien matching Aya's description had arrived on a ship named the Bespin Franchise, and while the ship had already taken off for Duro, one of the crewmen, a Blood Carver engineer named Pa Gara, had jumped ship.

Kelef called Kazbich to find out where an engineer would hang out, finding out either a bar or a garage.  Ras remembered that Myzil V has a big swoop track, and sent Kelef to search around there.  Sure enough, at the swoop bar, Kelef found a Blood Carver at the bar who turned out to be Pa Gara, who drove a hard bargain "having trouble remembering" Aya.  Pa Gara pushed Kelef's buttons a little bit, making fun of him for being a Mandalorian taking orders from a Jedi, and eventually said that Aya had claimed that her drugged-up passenger had been attacked by someone and she needed to lay low for a while.  Pa Gara reluctantly told Ras and Kelef about the Chophouse, an illegal starship parts front and flophouse operating near the Human District, telling them only on the condition that they get him offworld.

At the same time, Logger was revived from his coma and informed about what had gone on since the Givins had overpowered him and knocked him out.  While in his coma, he'd had multiple visions about the Jedi Civil War, and just before he'd woke up, he had a vision of Ras and Kelef fighting Aya Lim, and also where they would find her.  So when Ras and Kelef arrived at the address given by Pa Gara, Logger was already there waiting for them.

After some introductions, Ras talked her way into the building, being led past the warehouse front into the starship garage in back.  Pit droids were busy outfitting a ship with new parts, and starship parts — some legal and some not — were everywhere.  The Khil in charge, Kraldo, asked who they were, and Ras intimidated him into leaving them alone.  Logger tracked Aya through the Force, finding the room she was staying in.

Ras ripped the door out of her room, just as Aya slammed them with the Force.  A short lightsaber duel ensued, with Kelef badly wounded, but Ras put enough doubt in Aya's mind that she fled rather than continue the battle.  Logger brought On-Warr back to the Republic embassy to help resuscitate him.

By this point, most of the Ewoks the crew had rescued had been resuscitated, and they were terrified — Where am I?  Why is it so cold?  Where are the trees?  Who are you strange people?  What are these lights, these buildings?  The Republic was happy to provide On-Warr with a ship to ferry Logger and the Ewoks back to Endor (as well as Pa Gara offworld, though not at Endor).  On Endor, Logger and On-Warr said their goodbyes, though On-Warr looked into the future and said they would meet again.  (Logger's destiny is now fulfilled, and his character is now retired.)

Details, details...

While looking over the last two recaps, I realized I completely forgot about something important, so here it is:

Once the Raraza landed at the Republic embassy after coming back from the Eutix dig site, Republic medics moved Logger into critical care in hopes of rousing him from his coma.

Also, as a reminder, the Sith still have On-Warr captive, which was part of Logger's motivation to come to Myzil V in the first place, as Aya Lim compelled Logger to come there.

March 21 recap

Commander Levatt summoned Lyta, Kazbich, and Gobmush into the Republic embassy on Myzil V for an important mission.  First, we introduced Jazz Sharmista, Kazbich's new follower: a slutty Zeltron who acts as his lawyer; and Oro, Lyta's new follower, a stoic Mon Calamari medic.

The Hammerhead cruiser Champion of Dantooine, stationed above Myzil V, had suffered an outbreak of Cardooinian chills, an airborne but nonlethal virus that had quickly incapacitated most of the ship.  Lyta and Oro were being sent to help concoct a vaccine, while Gobmush, Kazbich and Jazz were there to make sure it wasn't a Sith plot.

Everybody got into their hazmat suits, then took the Raraza out to dock with the Champion of Dantooine.  Lyta and Oro got to work on the vaccine with the Bothan ship captain, Captain Kre'yka, while Gobmush began searching the ship and Kazbich checked the video feeds.  No one actually knew how the virus had gotten out, it seemed.

Gobmush searched the bridge and the maintenance area, then decided to start searching the passenger cabins.  When he got to the first one, a Duros engineer, Lod Bell, angrily wanted to know on whose authority Gobmush was searching rooms.  Lod called security, and the security chief, a large Whiphid named Waroopa, came over.  Jazz convinced Waroopa to let Gobmush search the rooms.

Kazbich searched the ship's computers and came upon a crew manifest, including a brig listing.  The computer stated that a woman named Marina was in the brig — a woman from Kazbich's past.  He went down there and after a surprised reunion (he learned she'd survived Kelly's betrayal on Taris, and had been smuggling in the Core Worlds before being grabbed by the Republic), used the ship's security logs to free her and grab her equipment, then smuggle her back to the Raraza.

Gobmush, on his thorough search, found that the virus containment capsule was flushed down the refresher of Bell's room.  He called over Captain Kre'yka, who put out an alert to arrest Bell.  He wasn't in any of the monitored areas, but Gobmush deduced that he was in the droid storage room (based on clues in his cabin), and led a team there to arrest him.

The Republic security guards got to work examining the video feed for clues, leading Kazbich to realize he'd forgotten to blank out the security footage of him freeing Marina.  He got Jazz to "distract" the guards while he commed Gobmush to say that the person who'd released the virus was holding him hostage in the maintenance bay, and that if they accessed the computers or watched the security footage, a bomb would explode.  Gobmush did not believe this for a second.

At the same time, Lyta talked to Bell in his cell, and became convinced that Bell was innocent.  In interviewing the doctors who'd been in the medical lab when the virus was released, they realized that Waroopa's story didn't check out and that he must've been the one to release the virus.  Gobmush went to confront him, leading to a melee in the medical lab where Gobmush killed Waroopa with his arg'garok, only for Lyta to revivify him so he could be arrested and interrogated later.  Captain Kre'yka confronted Kazbich about freeing Marina (and he'd also been trying to falsify evidence against Bell, though the captain didn't know that), and simply said they'd keep him informed about their ongoing investigation.

The party got back on the Raraza and Marina revealed herself to the crew.  Looks like now it's a crew of 8, plus the droids.

(I know I'm missing some details here; that's why I usually post the recaps the same day, not the next day.  If anybody remembers something that I missed, post a comment.)

Fun with DMing

Here is an article about the Star Wars RPG in general that I found very amusing.  I'd like to think I'm a good enough GM that I don't expect you to know everything about Star Wars...

Legacy Assessment

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.