How big?

[Melkor]

A question that continues to plague me as a GM is how big of a ship should I allow my players to get to. What is the largest vessel a group of PC's should ever attain? Personally I try to keep them down at Freighter sized ships and smaller ones at that. But I've been wondering if it would be reasonable to allow them to eventually get a smaller sized Capital ship, something in the Corvette range. Thoughts and Experiences?

[shootingwomprats]

For me allowing the players a capital ship never worked out long term. It was best used is a plot device for a story. Though it may work if the theme of the game is in keeping with them running around with a capital ship.

Logistically, a capital ship requires a large crew. Not always, but in way more cases than not, this is true. To make it work you would need a number of key NPCs or player run NPCs. You could try to get around this by allowing the players to have multiple PCs, but in my experience this did not work well either.

Largest ship I ever allowed my PCs to have was a very large freighter with issues. It was in bad shape and I downgraded it from capital to starfighter scale.

I have had the group steal an ISD before, very similar to Hunt for Red October for Star Wars with an Imperial captain wanting to defect to the Alliance with or without his ship depending on the how the adventure went. It was fun and memorable, but they did not get to keep the ship.

Not sure if this answers all your questions but I hope it is helpful.
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[garhkal]

Largest i have had pcs get was a bulk freighter..

One group used a Etti light transport (cap scale, 5 crew, up to 50 passengers), one an Action IV transport, filling the 8 crew requirement with droids, Two groups had Brayl bulks, and one a Ghtroc Cargo Empress.

I've also seen some which have had Gallofree yards medium transports..
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[thedemonapostle]

as a gm largest ships ill let my players have is usually around 250 meters. and at that point its less ship and more mobile space station. usually because 5-6 guys cant really properly operate a ship of that size.

as a player largest ship i ever captured was an ISD. i wanted to take it to a remote area and use it as my pirate base, but i got overruled. darn those greedy rebels...

we always try to use real world examples. like can one man drive a battleship? yes. can that one guy do anything else? nope. docking will be a nightmare. can one guy fire the big guns? yep. kinda. although he might not know what hes shooting at, it could be an enemy ship or it could just be a bird sitting on the radar.

sometimes ill get players that dont understand the size difference between the 2 types, freighters and capital ships. its like a box truck versus an aircraft carrier.
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[Melkor]

I figured crew would be a massive issue, though my PC's keep on insisting that they could acquire enough droids to serve as crew. And in a Post Clone Wars Galaxy what could go wrong with a Capital ship crewed by droids and captained by Alliance Operatives who have somewhat questionable morals at times (Much to the Jedi's constant dismay and panic attacks).

As a player, I currently run a modded to hell and back Venator SD that I managed to capture while doing a job for the ISB. I thought I was being smart and getting a better deal than the agreed upon price, but as the adage goes "When the GM smiles It's too late". I think I still owe the Empire quite a few jobs Pro Bono to make up the debt I owe for licensing fee's and all that. Not to mention how much money it costs to keep the crew working :'(.

But back to the GM side of things. My players are working as Alliance Operatives during the Legacy era, battling it out against Darth Krayt's forces. At some point they'll accrue enough prestige and promotions to where I'm not sure I can justify not giving them a larger vessel to command.

[Zarn]

The largest I have ever allowed the player characters to run, was a medium bulk freighter that could dock one or two parasite starfighters. Or, as it was in this case, one Y-wing and one X-wing. I can't remember how much tonnage they got, but I think it was about 400 metric tons after I had (liberally) cut away tonnage to account for the infrastructure needed to dock the two starfighters.

Mostly because I had one brash pilot-type in the group, and the player was chomping at the bit to get his own ship in any given fight so that he could show how much more of a pilot he was than the smuggler guy. And the other hangar was originally empty, but they 'acquired' a Y-wing later on. (It was just sitting there, and it would be oh so disappointing to just leave it behind, and it was going to a good home, and ... well, they nicked it.)

[Whill]

Never ran a campaign where PCs needed anything more than a light freighter.
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[Azai]

Nebulon-B Frigate. Though I don't know if it counts. It was completely crewed by their faction that over the campaign they recruited. So they basically had it go from point A to B, act as a base, and jump in their space transports and starfighters when battle came and I then controlled the Nebulon-B through their npcs.

Though it wasn't a limit on my part it was just what my players could get their hands on.