Grooving on most of the updates.

Kinda sad not to see anything about Force usage, but I figure that's still being worked on.

I hope this is a good sign of things to come in regards to things being updated as comments and observations are made by we beta testers.

Donovan Morningfire said:

If you read the last bit of the actual News Post, they say that they really appreciate all our attention to possible defenses, and that they're working on it.

Yeah, I wasn't expecting a Force Defense thing to come up yet.  It's something that's going to need more than a week to come up with a decent idea for, let alone have it ready for the masses to test.  I'd be a little surprised if it even shows up next week.

Venthrac said:

Exactly. I mean you get 10 XP just for making it to the end of the Crates of Krayts adventure at the back of the book.

Cyril said:

Cyril said:

Agreed!

On a second note:  FFG I HATE you (not really).  Look I bought this game and waited patiently for it tor arrive.  I suspected it would be a quality product like most stuff from FFG, but I had no idea this would become my favorite Star Wars RPG… and it has.  Yes, there are warts and some stuff to smooth out and Force powers definitely need to be addressed before the final release, but I am shocked how quickly my group took to the game and the narrative dice system, and how much EotE captures the spirit of the Star Wars movies.  Frankly this game is a joy to gamemaster, and I've already run two sessions and look forward to my next session next week.

And HUGE kudos to the design team… again I really had no clue there would be weekly updates, especially one presented in such a professional manner.  I expected maybe one or two Errata and Rules Clarifications on the forums before the release with designers popping in once and a while in a thread.  Great, great customer support especially given the little shipping hiccup when the game was first released.

Again super job!  Now I'm off to plot my group's next adventure in a galaxy far, far away…

Yancy

Cyril said:

Actually you get like 20. 10 for it, five for playing to your motivation, and I think there's another 5 listed there as well.

Inksplat said:

Yeah, there was meant to be an "at least" in front of that 10. Anniversary champagne makes it hard to remember what I was typing.

Inksplat said:

And that's not including the 10xp per session suggestion too!

Sam,

Something's currently wonky with the low-res copy of the pdf.  It's "cutting off" or "missing" most of the 2nd page of text.

Solid changes all around.

Personally I would have liked to see something more on defenses in general (I recognize the game is tooled in such a way to strongly tend toward success). It just feels that any time you are being attacked, there is very little you can do to prevent that. And if its a serious foe, most of the weapons can take down a capable PC fairly quickly.

Also, obviously Force resistance, although I'm less concerned about that (as I get that the Force really isn't supposed to be very common in game).

Good to see the clarifications on melee damage, and that the combat skill section is brought in line with the actual combat mechanics. The species changes are interesting, but now it feels more difficult to balance specieis/generate new ones. Droids still feel particularly underpowered, given the manner in which characteristics are purchased.

In fact, the metagame of "buy as many characteristic improvements at character creation" is still present. I'm not sure if it should be dealt with, but its a fairly legitimate case where one decision is inherently greater than another.

Inksplat said:

Can you clarify this a bit for me?  Why is increasing the XP cost of all talent trees balancing?  Can you give me an example of picking up a talent tree for skills being cheaper than buying the skill itself?

I just completed character generation for my group and this never came up so I'm just seeing an XP increase across that board and that seems strange.

selderane said:

The idea is that for 10xp, you could pick up an out of career spec, and train 3 different skills that are part of its career skills. Since each non-career skill has a 5xp "tax" assigned to it, buying 3 of the new career skills results in a savings of 15 xp. Subtract the initial 10xp cost, and all of a sudden you wind up with a 5 xp savings, (30 xp for 3 rank 1 non career skills, or 10xp for new spec + 15 for 3 rank 1 career skills).

20xp doesn't really solve the "problem" but it does push it back a bit. Enough at least that its not something a player is going to do lightly.

KommissarK said:

Or a Hired Gun, for example, you could pick up both in-career specs, grab a bunch of starting toughness/grit/whatever that is permanent, then drop them and pick up ANOTHER spec for some more.

And was this all the XP increase was supposed to address?

Unknown of course, but its probably the big thing. 10-20xp is still chump change in the grand scheme of this game (if its seriously a recommended 10xp per session).

Making out of career specs 20xp just makes it an actual decision instead of something one just picks up.