Sensible simplifications for a first REUP campaign?

[Yora]

Looking over what people have said over the years about the many editions of the game, the very first edition is regularly praised for having kept things fairly simply, which then later were needlessly complicated.

I want to give the system a try, and REUP is the most convenient way to make it accessible to players who want to read the rules themselves. But I am also a big fan of rules light games in general, so I am considering making the following simplifications.

- No advancement of Attributes.
- No specialization of Skills.
- No advantages and disadvantages to get extra skill points.
(- No Advanced Skills.)
- Also using only the skills as they were in the first edition.

The main issue I see with later editions is the length of the skill list and specializations. It really looks like it favors characters being really good at a few very narrowly defined things instead of being decent allrounders. I think a Star Wars hero should just pick up any random weapon or jump into any random ship that is sitting around nearby and do heroic stuff.
Splitting up the two piloting skills for spacecraft and planetary vehicles into 12 seems just ridiculous? Who would ever put any points in Aquatic Vehicle Operation? How often do Star Wars characters drive a boat? And the one time a GM has a cool idea for a speedboat chase, you want one of the PCs to be actually competent at it. Maybe unrealistic to use your hover speeder experience for driving a speedboat, but Star Wars is cool action, not mundane realism.

However, I am usually of the opinion that you shouldn't houserule things before you've seen how they actually work out in practice. So I am asking you if this seems like a sensible way to improve the game, or if that opens up major pitfalls that I am currently still unable to see?
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"Adventure? Eh... Excitement? Eh... A Jedi does not crave these things."

Iridium Moons Retro-futuristic Space Opera

[The Bissler]

I know others will give you a better reply, but here's my thoughts.

My group of players played a 50 week Star Wars campaign before we embarked on our new one (both using REUP). In our first campaign, everyone was getting used to how the system worked. We used no skills specialisations, advantages and disadvantages or advanced skills.

I did allow Attribute increases (within species' limits), but the truth is, it isn't worth increasing Attributes as the cost is 10 times what it would be for an individual skill increase - how many characters have 10+ skills under a single attribute.

The one exception would be Strength attribute because that determines how much damage the character can soak up when hit. I would allow a PC to increase this (particularly if their Strength was between 2D - 3D), but I'd want them to explain how they are building towards that (lifting weights etc) as they built up the required Character Points to do that.

I can't comment about 1st edition skills, but in relation to skill increases, you're right, my players very much focussed on the skills relating to combat, namely:
Blaster, Dodge, Brawling/Melee Combat (depending on weapons carried), Vehicle Blasters, Repulsorlift Operation, Space Transports/Starship Piloting, Starship Shields, Starship Gunnery, Climbing/Jumping, Con.

Part of that was my fault as I didn't write enough other skills usage into my scenarios (part of the reason I now want to run published adventures is because I know they'll have more variety in the skill usage), and part of it was that the PCs didn't care about many of other skill categories (notably Knowledge and Technical). As GM, I'd encourage you to throw some curve balls using the unloved skills where you can so that players don't simply spam Blasters, Dodge and spacecraft skills.

With that first campaign under their belt, some of my players have now got more hands on with the shaping of their characters, with one of them designing his character from scratch. One or two have toyed with the advantages and disadvantages which I think are really good for a GM as they tend to present you with options for storylines in your campaign.

In relation to specialisations, my players are often spending Character Points on skill rolls in-game (which didn't happen much in our first campaign) and so specialisations which are cheaper to increase have suddenly become more attractive, particularly as they use the same Space Transport or Blaster type in most sessions.

My general advice though would be to keep it as simple as possible until your players have got the basics of the system - you can start introducing more elements if you (and they!) are interested in doing so, but you'll still have great fun playing the game with the system stripped right back!

Good luck - and please let us know how your campaign goes!

[Raven Redstar]

[Naaman]

Not sure how long the OP has been RPing, but I'd caution against promoting a party of "well rounded" PCs. Rather, the party itself would do well to have (between them) a diverse mix of skills and capabilities, if everyone is "well rounded" then no individual has a chance to really shine, where his character is the "only one" who can move the story forward.

Blaster slingers and fighter pilots will typically get lots of opportunities in most games. Young senatorial? Gambler? It's great when characters like these have opportunity to remove the obstacles that blasters and proton torpedoes cannot.

Another thing you can do is make "knowledge" cost money. PCs who lack knowledge skills (in my experience) usually just ask NPCs for the information they need. If they have to fork over an uncomfortable amount of credits (or other assets) for information each time, they might give skills like Bureaucracy or Law Enforcement or Streetwise a second look when preparing for the next play session.

However, I find that "knowledge" also makes good freebie skills once in a while (important not to overdo it). If the players gain enough familiarity with a topic (say, interacting in the underworld), then I might give them all a free pip in Streetwise for each time the party completes a major operation that involves lots of underworld interaction. I justify this on the basis that knowledge is a thing that can be more or less passively acquired without necessarily expending effort or energy.

As for piloting skills, I think that a general piloting skill is a "more correct" solution than the 2R&E rules, but I feel like it's a bit TOO oversimplified. If you don't want to house rule, I can appreciate that, and would say just make two piloting skills: one for capital ships, and one for everything else. What I feel might be a good middle ground would be to have "specializations" in starfighter, space transports and capital ships. The standard piloting skill will allow you to use speeders and other non-space craft at full effect and would allow you to pilot space craft but without adding the ship's maneuverability bonus. You may add a number of the ship's maneuverability dice up to the pilots skill code in the specialization. So, to get the full effect from, say, an A-Wing, a pilot would need 4D in Piloting: Starfighters.

Example:
Rhett Divonae has 8D in Piloting and 2D+2 in Piloting: Starfighters. When he pilots the new A-Wing, he rolls a total of 10D+2. After a while, he raises his Starfighter specialization to 4D and when piloting the same A-Wing, he rolls 12D.

Just an idea I came up with on the fly while writing this.
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SpecForce Combat Elements
All About Lightsabers: Designing, Building, and Fighting

[Yora]

Not everyone has to be great at everything. You don't need Leia to jump into an X-Wing to go with Luke to destroy the Death Star.
But you also don't want Luke and Leia standing at the retracted bridge and Leia saying "Sorry, I don't know how to blaster. You're own your own."

Instead of having some characters having certain skills at either 10% or 90% efficiency, I want all characters to be somewhere between 40% and 80% for most skills. Having some characters be substantially better at some things than other characters is a good thing, but I always hate it when players encounter situations that are not ideal circumstances for their character stats and take that as a signal not to engage with it at all.
Particularly in a Star Wars campaign, every character should be able to take over for another character who has to run of doing something more important.
_________________
"Adventure? Eh... Excitement? Eh... A Jedi does not crave these things."

Iridium Moons Retro-futuristic Space Opera

[Odea Ionstrike]

[garhkal]

[The Bissler]

[Raven Redstar]

[garhkal]

[The Bissler]

Ah, I understand now! Thanks for explaining, I'll pass this on to my players!

[Yora]

Thanks for all the replies. I now have the impression that while those simplifications might not all be necessary, at least they won't be causing any issues.
I probably might even be able to drop some of them during an ongoing campaign if that starts looking more attractive as the game goes on.
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"Adventure? Eh... Excitement? Eh... A Jedi does not crave these things."

Iridium Moons Retro-futuristic Space Opera

[Naaman]

[Yora]

My point is that simply by having a lower number of skills that don't differentiate between ground vehicles, hover vehicles, podracers, swoops for example, or not having separate skills for Armor repair, Blaster repair, and Equipment Repair, players will automatically encounter many more situations in which their skill ratings apply.
A player who wants to improve his skill to drive landspeeders automatically makes the character better with driving all ground vehicles if there is only one Ground Vehicle Operation skill that includes all of them.
It's a simple as that.
_________________
"Adventure? Eh... Excitement? Eh... A Jedi does not crave these things."

Iridium Moons Retro-futuristic Space Opera

[The Bissler]