Librarian said:

Actually I always figured Bib was speaking Huttese, the language of his master's court, and that Luke at least had enough passing familiarity with the language to suss out that the major domo wasn't going to admit him.  Leading to Bib's mind being on the wrong end of a Jedi mind trick

As I suggested earlier in the thread, if you really do want a hard mechanics-based cap on the number of languages your heroes start out knowing how to speak, simply use their Intellect rating, with them getting Basic and their species' native tongue for free (which means Humans only get Basic out of the gate), and that more can be 'learned' during game play, probably with Knowledge (Education) or Knowledge (Xenology) checks.

Luke probably picked up enough Binary to get the jist of what Artoo was saying thanks to some good Intellect results, but still needed a datapad to translate the more technical stuff, and Leia botched her check to see if she could understand Chewie (the GM opted to spend a destiny point to upgrade one of her difficulty dice to a challenge die, which then came up a Despair) and so had trouble with Shyriiwook for the rest of the campaign.

 Or from my table perhaps when Chewie's player made a bad pun she decided she didn't speak "furball" and made a point of ignoring him. 

We have run into this 2 times now. The first one was the droid in the group deciding to speak with a Hutt- owned droid discreetly by speaking Binary.  The rules were not questioned at this point as they were both droids and it made sense. However our group ended last session having gained a wookie party member through the storyline. Our GM has ruled that we will pick up the language through interatction with the character (more intelligent players picking up faster) but for right now, the wookie has a notepad

Despite Really likeing the fluid nature of the game and really disliking "you get a number of languages based on your int" or "purchasing languages through skill points" I would like to see a paragraph that at least says to pick languages you feel are appropriate for your character and then have a list.

That aside we keep forgetting about the language barrier as we had a few conversations with a hutt prior to encountering the wookie which triggered our discussion.

Sirkamina said:

Hutts can speak languages other than Huttese. So, it is possible that he was speaking with the party in Basic. The only time language barriers really seem to come into effect is when dealing with Sapients that can't speak other languages, like Wookies.

The reason for the lack of fine grain distinction in the game seems to be to keep it cinematic. Like in Star Trek… they all speak English, even when it is a new planet that they've never encountered before. Saves the writers time in the episode to get the real plot going rather than wasting time over and over again showing the crew members picking up a new language or teaching theirs to someone else.

I have to also be a fan of the PCs not knowing every language; any "other" language is hard for a speaker to learn, and I couldn't even pick up an extra ONE in school, much less fluent in, say, six. For every Dr. Daniel Jackson, fluent in 26 languages, 4+ being xeno-languages, there should be dozens of multilingually challenged individuals, like me, and I don't know if their regular schooling, in Star Wars, depending on who you are, and where you grow up, even dedicate much to learning additional languages.

Besides, it makes for a fun opportunity to introduce fun NPCs. I love HK-47, and if you didn't need him to speak Tusken, the ONLY language Revan cannot polyglot is way through, he'd be rotting on the refuse of a four millennia old ruin of a shop, on Tatooine, when Luke lives there. There is NO good reason for most characters to be able to say that Shryiwook makes any sense to them; how often do you really need to understand a Wookiee verbally? I don't believe Tuskens actually even speak; they are just diseased, crazed monsters who shout gibberish, and kill things (this is not the case, but it might as well be, some days.) Why would you know Ewok, or any of a dozen other languages? This means that translator droids have a job, and you can spend some of that hard-earned money on something other than another gun, or suit of armor. get a little PDA of a thing, with an integrated translator, and put a comlink in your ear; it can translate it into good old "whateva ya speak", no problem.

venkelos said:

I'm guessing this is from trying to learn a language later in life (like the US education system does). The earlier in life you are exposed to other languages, the easier it is to pick them up as if they were just part of your primary language. Europeans tend to pick up more languages as they encounter more of them in their daily lives. Same thing in Africa and all the different tribal languages.

In the case of Star Wars people would grow up exposed to lots of languages just due to the nature of interstellar trade being so integral to the daily lives.

You know what the word is for someone who speaks two languages?  That's right… "Bilingual".  You know what the word is for someone who speaks three languages?  "Trilingual".  You know what the word is for someone who speaks more than three languages?  "Multilingual".

You know what the word is for someone who speaks one language?  "American."

GM Chris said:

Please, at least pronounce it properly.

We speak 'Murikun!!

Let's please don't go down this road.

Sturn said:

Which road is that?

ROFL!!!

'Merukin!!!! 

They took our JOBS!  DE TUK OUR JUBS!!!!  DERPADERRRR!!!!!

Ok, here's my thoughts on the matter.  Most characters in Star Wars seem to be multilingual, and only can't speak a language as a plot device (Uncle Owen can't speak Bocce, the heroes can't speak Ewok), so you'll want that starting language count to be fairly high (5+ languages) so it doesn't come up *every* time they meet a new NPC.  (Where's the fun in that?)

So, pick a basic limit (e.g.: 3 - 6), add the character's Intellect and/or Knowledge: Xenology, and establish an XP cost (e.g.: 5 or 10) to add a new language to that list.  Past that, have the characters make Knowledge: Xenology checks when they run into a language that they don't speak.

• Net Success: You can understand this guy, and he can understand you.
• Net Failure: You think you've made yourself understood, but you wouldn't count on it.
• Net Advantages: The conversation went well.
• Net Disadvantages: The other guy probably thinks you're clueless, or rude, or something like that.
• Triumph: You can speak whale!  (You're fluent.)
• Despair: You don't have a stinking clue.   Maybe someone else should try telling him to put down that blaster.

 I'd rather see a "Knowledge (Languages)" than wrap it in xenology. I know several polylingual types who are completely  clueless about cultures… and a couple cultural anthropologists who are essentially monolingual.

And, given the lack of an unskilled penalty, it's perfectly reasonable to use a single skill with task to know a given language.

Ewok should be ◊◊◊◊◊ while Wookie probably ◊◊, and Basic is no roll unless you can't produce it.

aramis said:

Agreed, which was why my suggestions were either to use Education, or just straight Intellect.

I suppose if you really are concerned with tracking what languages a character can speak, a separate Knowledge skill would work, but there's then the question of which careers and specializations get it as a career skill.  Or should it just be a "universal skill" that anyone can purchase as though it were a career skill?

 The rule I like is, Int x 2 = number of languages the character is fluent in beyond Common (which everyone gets for free). The PCs can fill in what those languages actually are as the game progresses, but each time that decision is made it has to be recorded on the sheet.