Fantasy Flight Games

Laws of a Lawless Region

Published 12 August 2015 | Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Laws of a Lawless Region

A New FAQ for Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™ Has Been Posted

“Now look, don’t get any funny ideas…”
–Han Solo

Even in the lawless wildernesses of the Outer Rim, there are still a few things you should know and rules you should follow in order to survive. The new FAQ and Errata for Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™ helps fill out your knowledge of the grim and gritty parts of the Star Wars universe. You can download it now from the support section of the Edge of the Empire™ minisite.

This FAQ includes new information about resolving results when using talents and Force powers, and adds errata for several Edge of the Empire™ adventure books and Career supplements including the Colonist sourcebook Far Horizons and the Hutt Space sourcebook, Lords of Nal Hutta.

Expand your horizons. Download the FAQ and use your newfound knowledge to become a more devious Smuggler, a hardier Colonist, and a craftier Technician, fully equipped for all the grim and gritty Outer Rim adventures that await you in Edge of the Empire.

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Fight for Your Home

Published 14 August 2014 | Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Fight for Your Home

Far Horizons Is Now Available for STAR WARS (R): Edge of the Empire (TM)

“The Jundland Wastes are not to be traveled lightly. Tell me, young Luke, what brings you out this far?”
–Obi-Wan Kenobi

Far Horizons, the Colonist sourcebook for the Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™ Roleplaying Game, is now available at your local retailer and online through our webstore!

Filled with new specializations, signature talents, weapons, vehicles, gear, and other equipment, Far Horizons introduces a wealth of new options designed to help you better outfit your Colonist – or any character – for life on the galaxy’s wildest, deadliest, and most exciting planets. Whether you’re looking to ply your skills in the service of a wealthy gangster or you’re looking to tame a planet full of untapped natural resources, Far Horizons provides you with the tools you’ll need to you build and play your character the way you want.

It also comes with an extensive collection of background information, adventure seeds, and other information to help Game Masters incorporate Colonists more fully into their campaigns.

Colonists in Your Campaign

Edge of the Empire campaigns are often full of smugglers, bounty hunters, hired guns, and other shady characters. Many of these outlaws are constantly running from their pasts, haunted by the decisions they’ve made and the debts they owe. They may have dabbled in crime in order to build lives for themselves free from the Empire’s oppressive influence, but their crimes have led them too far down the wrong paths. They might find themselves on the run, wanted by the Hutts. They might find themselves blackmailed by politically ambitious ISB agents. Or they might need to figure out how to deal with a Black Sun Vigo who considers them a serious threat to his business.

Still, the Star Wars galaxy is a vast and diverse place, and Edge of the Empire holds room for far more characters than outlaws and con artists. There are a wide range of characters who wish primarily to see what the galaxy has to offer. While they may also have some darker secrets in their pasts, these skilled individuals include your Explorers, Technicians, and Colonists. Events and circumstances beyond their control may lead them down many of the same paths as the game’s other characters, but their skills and interests can spur your campaign toward another whole set of adventures that focus less on blasters and stolen goods and more on tricky social situations and the difficulties and drama inherent in establishing a new life on a hostile planet.

Even as Far Horizons explores some of the different reasons your Colonists may have first become embroiled in your ongoing Star Wars adventures, it provides GMs some tools to amplify the drama and tension of their social encounters and introduces a variety of twists and revelations that may push the encounters in interesting directions. Furthermore, Far Horizons introduces a number of adventure seeds and payment charts built around the idea of contracted work. It even looks at designing entire campaigns around one or more Colonists, possibly even flipping the traditional campaign model on its head.

Centering Your Campaign Around a Homestead

You don’t have to haul illicit goods from system to system or chase bounties through the stars in order to find adventure. When you’re running from the Empire or trying to establish a home on one of the galaxy’s wildest or deadliest planets, adventures have a way of coming to you…

In a campaign centered around one or more Colonists, you may direct a colonization effort, help a struggling colony, or cast your lot in with a group of like-minded individuals looking to start new lives upon some remote, unsettled planet. In such a campaign, the majority of your adventures might all take place upon the same planet, possibly even within a limited geographical area, and the utility of your group’s starship might be significantly reduced. Accordingly, Far Horizons introduces a set of optional rules that allow players to start an Edge of the Empire campaign with a homestead (or other base of operations) instead of a starship.

Over the course of your campaign, you can grow your homestead in size and complexity. You can purchase upgrades like a mechanic’s garage, a landing bay, and advanced security systems. You might even develop your homestead until its influence rivals that of any land baron in the sector.

Of course, you are bound to encounter obstacles along the way. You may have to fend off raiders, arrange for the illicit shipments of goods to cure strange illnesses, or restore your communications arrays after natural disasters. Perhaps a rival land baron will seek to reassert his dominance. Perhaps you’ll actually establish lives that are both peaceful and prosperous – until one of your characters’ past obligations catches up to him and everything you’ve worked so hard to create is placed at risk.

If It Was Easy, Everyone Would Do It…

It’s easy to recognize the smuggler’s hardships or the danger inherent in the Hired Gun’s chosen profession; however, the Colonist’s life is just as dangerous and just as full of drama. If it weren’t, then the galaxy would be full of individuals happy to uproot their lives and transplant them on remote, hostile planets outside the Empire’s sphere of influence.

Far Horizons ensures that your Colonists – and other Edge of the Empire characters – can develop the talents and find the tools that they need in order to survive and prosper in even the most difficult of situations. Additionally, it helps Game Masters think of new ways to incorporate these characters into their campaigns, or even build entire campaigns around them. In the end, at the Edge of the Empire, a Colonist’s life is never dull.

Head to your local retailer today to pick up your copy of Far Horizons, or order it online through our webstore!

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Equipped to Survive

Published 25 July 2014 | Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Equipped to Survive

A Preview of the New Droids, Vehicles, and Gear in Far Horizons

“You got a lot of carbon scoring here. It looks like you boys have seen a lot of action.” –Luke Skywalker

Once upon a time, a young farm boy from Tatooine cleaned a droid, caused it to play a recorded message, and triggered a series of events that would reshape the galaxy…

When your destiny calls, there’s no place you can go to escape it – not even a desert planet at the far edge of the known universe. Even when the Colonists of Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™ travel to the far ends of the galaxy in order to establish new homes and new lives, their pasts have a nasty habit of catching up with them. Outstanding obligations lead to adventure. And since your adventures can take you anywhere, it pays to be prepared.

At the edge of the Empire, even routine shipments may run afoul of pirates.

In the Colonist sourcebook, Far Horizons, you’ll find a wealth of new droids, vehicles, starships, weapons, and gear that any character can use. However, since most of these items are designed to help tame even the wildest and most dangerous environments, the game’s Colonists should find them especially appealing.

Droids

It was Luke Skywalker’s interaction with a pair of droids that first led him down a path that would eventually take him off of Tatooine, past the destruction of the Death Star, and to the ultimate triumph of the Rebel Alliance over the evil Galactic Empire. To say, then, that there’s tremendous potential for adventure within the handful of new droids presented in Far Horizons is a bit of an understatement.

Perhaps even more so than in other areas of the galaxy, droids in the Outer Rim are essential to the day-to-day functions of civilized society. In a region where so many systems remain uncharted and unknown dangers can reside in even the most welcoming paradise, droids help make life easier and safer for their organic masters, colleagues, and friends. Accordingly, Far Horizons features a sampling of speciality droids common to the Outer Rim, including the AC Law Enforcement Droid, which is a relatively new entry to the field of police automata.

Nearly two meters tall, the broad-shouldered AC Series LE droid possesses an average intelligence and a stern, imposing disposition. It is programmed for both standard police duties as well as fast-response riot control, and it is covered in imposing plate armor with only a single red, horizontal photoreceptor band serving as any hint of facial features. These droids aren’t for everyone, though. Even as they’re becoming the standard for police droids at the edge of the galaxy, civilians tend to despise them.

Vehicles and Starships

It is a commonly held belief that the various worlds of the Outer Rim are where old vehicles go to die. Indeed, the region’s inhabitants work hard to keep a great number of speeders and groundcars alive and functional long after they would have been scrapped in the more civilized, affluent areas of the galaxy.

After all, no amount of preparation, innate skill, or specialty equipment can make a difference in an endeavor if an individual and his equipment can’t get where they need to go, and the work performed by colonists’ starships, speeders, and walkers is nearly as important as the work performed by the colonists themselves.

In Far Horizons, you’ll find a large selection of airspeeders, landspeeders, walkers, wheeled and tracked vehicles, and freighters, any of which may serve more than one purpose in times of need.

For example, the Hunchback construction strider is a lightweight utility walker designed for construction and civil engineering work. Similar to the Republic’s AT-PT, the Hunchback is a bipedal walker with a slab-sided rectangular command pod perched atop a pair of powerful reverse-articulated legs. The Hunchback's arms carry a wide array of tools such as plasma cutters, saws, welders, drills, compressed air guns, and small, dextrous manipulators for fine work.

While it typically carries no offensive weapons, the Hunchback is sturdy and armored, and desperate colonists may find a way to modify it in order to help defend their homesteads from enemy forces.

Weapons, Armor, and Tools

Typically, Colonists are the characters in Edge of the Empire that are least likely to embrace violence when other means may suffice. However, it would be a mistake to assume Colonists have no need of arms or armor. The truth is that on the fringe of the galaxy, violence (and the need to protect against it) is all too commonplace. Accordingly, Far Horizons presents a wide array of weapons and armor, as well as a range of speciality tools appropriate for Colonists of all specializations.

The Outer Rim can be a dangerous and unforgiving place, but that doesn’t you’ll want to shoot to kill each time a situation devolves to violence. Far Horizons introduces a number of non-lethal weapons, like the Telex-Delcor SWE/2 Sonic Rifle, which may not be as useful in a shoot-out against heavily armed Imperial forces, but are incredibly useful for a Marshal who wants to ensure that he earns a reputation for his resolve as well as his justice and mercy.

Such a Marshal may also do well to invest in some of the new armor from Far Horizons, or even some reinforced environment gear. Such suits are valuable to Colonists not only because they must often brave strange and hazardous planetary conditions, but because they are more likely to be exposed to airborne toxins and to suffer injuries from falls or unstable environmental formations.

Finally, though they’re often the last characters you’d expect to load up on weaponry, Colonists usually have the greatest need for specialized tools. Performers must have all manner of amplifiers, props, or instruments. Doctors require a great deal of surgical equipment and medical supplies. Even Politicos need remote access to communications, and Traders and Entrepreneurs need business aids.

Far Horizons introduces a diverse array of these materials, which offer benefits for nearly all characters, and since they introduce so many specialized abilities, their inclusion in (or exclusion from) your setting may provide the impetus for a wide range of thrilling adventures.

Can You Tame the Wildest Edges of the Galaxy?

As the Colonist sourcebook for Edge of the Empire, Far Horizons introduces a wide range of new character options and equipment for any character eager to explore and settle the wildest edges of the galaxy.

Meanwhile, it also explores the concept of the Colonist’s homestead and how the Game Master can use a homestead to shape a campaign. Whether or not your campaign features a character with the Colonist career, the homestead is an idea that transcends a single class and can lend an immediate focus and urgency to your campaign. We’ll take a closer look at how Game Masters can make use of the homestead in our next preview of Far Horizons!

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Civilization Doesn't Happen by Accident

Published 16 July 2014 | Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Civilization Doesn't Happen by Accident

A Preview of the Character Options Available in Far Horizons

Civilization doesn’t happen by accident. It’s hard work.

Accordingly, many people find it difficult to understand the colonist’s desire to brave remote areas and dangerous conditions in order to establish settlements on new worlds. When they could live on any of tens of thousands of civilized worlds, what exactly draws them to forge ahead with yet another settlement on a world that is most likely to be unremarkable or inhospitable?

This is a question that runs throughout Far Horizons, the Colonist sourcebook for the Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™ Roleplaying Game.

Of course, there are as many specific reasons for colonists to pursue new settlements as there are colonists, but the larger reasons tend to fit into categories that are ages-old. Colonists willing to brave the dangers of the wilds often wish to break with current society or government, establish civilizations based on specific ideals, or exploit new resources.

Despite their best intentions, not all colonists are able to enjoy peaceful and profitable lives on their adopted homeworlds. Some become swept up in events and find themselves caught in interplanetary adventures. In such situations, colonists do well to draw upon their considerable courage and talents. Although anyone can become a colonist, the best are typically smart, ambitious, tough, and willing to brave the unknown. These are the characters you’ll find given more attention in Far Horizons.

For more about what Far Horizons offers these characters, we turn to lead developer Sam Stewart.

Colonists extend civilization to the farthest reaches of the Star Wars galaxy.

Lead Developer Sam Stewart on the Colonists of Far Horizons

“In our announcement of Far Horizons, we looked at how the sourcebook fleshes out the Colonist career with three new specializations: the Performer, the Entrepreneur, and the Marshal. However, the book offers much, much more for both your Colonist characters and any GM looking to write these characters into a truly engaging campaign that plays to their strengths and interests. Among the first new options Far Horizons offers your Colonists are two new signature abilities. Signature abilities are powerful, advanced abilities that are available only to a specific career. Specializations can be taken by any character, but signature abilities are exclusive to the careers to which they’re tied.

“Appropriately, the Colonist’s two signature abilities play to some of this career’s greatest strengths, and the Colonists who take them become even better at drawing upon the knowledge and skills that allow them to thrive on some of the galaxy’s wildest and most dangerous planets.

“The first is called Insightful Revelation. As befits the career with the Scholar specialization, Insightful Revelation allows characters to really put their Knowledge skills to use; a character with Insightful Revelation can make a single check to reveal vital information about his or her situation that he or she couldn’t normally uncover.

“This is great deal more potent than a normal Knowledge skill check, because it’s specifically intended to reveal relevant information that would otherwise be outside your character’s frame of reference. In complex negotiations with a Hutt Crime Lord? Use Insightful Revelation to find out that his new slave is actually a Rebel agent, and make a deal with her instead. Captured by the Empire? Turns out the lieutenant heading up your prison detail is secretly Force-sensitive, and desperate to hide it from his superiors. Who knew? Well, you did, thanks to Insightful Revelation.

A human Politico has an Insightful Revelation about the Rodians with whom she’s in negotiations.

“Playing alongside these sudden epiphanies, we have Unmatched Expertise. Perhaps more than any other characters, Colonists such as Doctors, Scholars, and Performers are defined by their jobs and specializations. Accordingly, it’s appropriate that Unmatched Expertise rewards them for their dedication and helps make them the very best at what they do.

“Specifically, Unmatched Expertise allows the most talented Colonists to decrease the difficulty of all career skill checks by one for an entire encounter. Nobody out-talks a Politico, out-medics a Doctor, or out-deals an Entrepreneur!”

New Species

“Far Horizons also introduces three new playable species: Arcona, Gran, and Chevin. These species offer you some interesting choices when you build your character. While you can use them with any career, each species works especially well as a Colonist.

From left to right: Arcona, Gran, and Chevin.

“The Arcona are reptilian, community-oriented individuals from a dry desert planet. They have formidable wills, and their unique heat vision abilities allow them to read others’ moods, giving them a decided edge in negotiations. However, they have one dangerous weakness as a species; an Arcona can become fatally addicted to sodium chloride. To an Arcona, simple purified salt is more powerful than the strongest spice, and whenever these sociable aliens imbibe, they risk dooming themselves to slow and painful deaths.

“Meanwhile, the Gran first debuted in the Star Wars®: Age of Rebellion™ Roleplaying Game, but they’re back in Far Horizons because of their powerful personalities. Nobody gabs like a Gran, and their ability to talk the ears off a gundark makes them great Entrepreneurs, Performers, and Politicos.

“Finally, we have the Chevin. The Chevin are a species of cunning and dangerous merchants, nomads, and slavers from Vinsoth. Chevin may look clumsy, but you would be unwise to underestimate the resilience of their rock hard skin or their innate physical strength. However, as Far Horizons reveals, their real strength lies in their mercantile and mercenary minds. Chevin can find the advantage in nearly every situation, and exploit it for their benefit. And while many Chevin are known to be vicious slavers, there exist a significant number of Chevin who have turned their back on this deplorable practice and set out to try and change their society. A hard-nosed Chevin who turns away from slavery in preference for justice can make a formidable Marshal.”

Skills and Talents for Every Occassion

Isolation from the galaxy at large demands that colonists refine their intelligence, skills, and self-reliance. Simultaneously, the often challenging circumstances of their lives demand that they grow adaptable and resilient.

Accordingly, Colonists are some of the most reliable adventurers in Edge of the Empire. When they’re swept along by currents of events that carries them into adventures that may span the galaxy, you can rely upon them to make good use of all the skills and tools at their disposal.

Far Horizons allows you to prepare your Colonist for more of anything and everything with more talents, careers, and signature abilities. Of course, a good Colonist also knows when to share with others for the good of the homestead, and Far Horizons includes a wealth of material that any Edge of the Empire character can use.

Few may understand the Colonist’s desire to settle some of the galaxy’s most dangerous and most remote planets, but many have benefitted from their successes.

In upcoming previews, we’ll look at some of the sourcebook’s new gear and at how Game Masters can use the book to craft dynamic and dramatic campaigns centered around a colonist’s homestead.

For now, be sure to book your ticket to the next remote planet… Head to your local retailer today to pre-order your copy of Far Horizons!

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Far Horizons

Published 8 May 2014 | Star Wars: Edge of the Empire

Far Horizons

Announcing a New Sourcebook for Star Wars(R): Edge of the Empire(TM)

Fantasy Flight Games is proud to announce Far Horizons, a sourcebook for Colonists making their living at the galaxy’s fringes in Star Wars®: Edge of the Empire™. Far Horizons offers new options for Colonists, along with new gear, spaceships, and species that all players (and GMs) will find useful. Read on for developer Sam Stewart’s insight on what Far Horizons has to offer.

A Word From the Developer

Colonists really are the unsung heroes of Star Wars. When other fringers get their hands cut off, Colonists patch them up. When confronted with strange and terrifying mysteries, it’s Colonists who cooly assess the situation, solve the problem, and identify the sleazy Hutt behind it all. And when the rest of the heroes get locked up by Imperial stormtroopers, Colonists whip crowds into a raging frenzy to burn down the garrison and free them. Now, Colonists are get the respect they deserve in Far Horizons. This sourcebook features plenty of new content for the Colonist career. However, it should prove valuable for every character, with plenty of new material and information on making social encounters even more interesting, building your own homestead, and turning your character’s marketable skills into cold, hard cash during periods of downtime. New specializations, species, talents, spaceships, and gear will prove useful to anyone playing Edge of the Empire.

Colonists for Hire

One of the interesting things about Colonist characters is that they have access to the most varied career in Edge of the Empire. Even though they may both be Colonists, a Doctor and a Politico are very different characters. What they share is that each one is a job someone could have in their day to day lives. Colonists are people who lived normal lives and had regular work before something happened that sent them fleeing to the galactic fringe. The three new specializations in Far Horizons continue that trend. Players gain access to the Entrepreneur, the Performer, and the Marshal. The Entrepreneur is an interesting specialization, with a focus on making money and spending it in unorthodox ways. Entrepreneurs are characters with plenty of deals going on behind the scenes. They are generally involved in more business ventures than a gunslinger has blasters. They get a steady and significant revenue stream, and then have ways to spend that money to make their lives a lot easier. This might include knowing who to bribe to get some crucial information, or just spending a few credits to take their mind off their current troubles. And of course, few characters are going to be more useful than the Entrepreneur when sitting down at the negotiating table. The Performer on the other hand, is a specialization designed to encompass all types of entertainers; musicians, actors, acrobats, and even comedians. As is to be expected, they have quite a few talents that mesh with their abilities to charm and deceive. A lot of the Performer’s abilities are all about making him or her the center of attention, whether the audience wants to pay attention or not. They also have a few really flavorful talents. For example, once in a while, NPCs may turn out to be the Performers biggest fan, whether or not the GM expected it. And a portion of the specialization is dedicated to the Performer’s not inconsiderable athletic ability. Quite a few crime lords have ignored or mistreated their entertainers, only to end up with a knife in their back or slave’s chain around their throat. Finally, we have the Marshal. The Marshal is every inch the embodiment of law on the Outer Rim. He can be good with a blaster, since sometimes justice has to come at the barrel of a gun. However, Marshals are also tough, diligent, and relentless. A Marshal can get up and keep going after a lesser individual would drop to the ground exhausted. In addition, a competent Marshal can be almost impossible to deceive. They’re great at ferreting out the truth from unwilling suspects, and can play good cop or bad cop as circumstances require. These specializations add even more variety to an already varied career. However, Colonists aren’t the only characters who may want to use them. An Assassin could make use of the Performer specialization to reinforce his coordinated melee combat style and ability to trick his way closer to targets. A Trader might decide that the Entrepreneur is a great advancement to represent his business taking off and making some real money. Finally, a Mercenary Soldier might decide to quit being a soldier of fortune and put his leadership abilities and gun hand to use keeping the peace on a world on the fringes of Wild Space. In the end, your only limit to what characters you can make with these specializations is your imagination.

New Horizons Await

Thanks, Sam!

Far Horizons will hit stores in the third quarter of 2014, and with it comes brand new opportunities for Colonists to make a name for themselves at the Edge of the Empire. All players (and GMs) will discover new ships, gear, and more to introduce into their escapades at the galaxy’s fringes.

Keep checking this page for more news and information related to Far Horizons, and Star Wars Roleplaying.

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