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jtanzer
Lieutenant Commander
Joined: 01 Mar 2023
Posts: 132
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 Posted: Fri Apr 04, 2025 4:12 pm Post subject: |
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Thanks for the link, I'll definitely check it out.
Edit: I'll make a Word Doc with the things that I disagree with. I'll try not to be too harsh, however there's quite a bit that I'm already not liking. I know that some of the GMs here prefer linear game styles, however that style comes with a variety of trade-offs that I don't particularly find enjoyable.
Edit #2: I'm doing a detailed strip-down on it, and while there are things I disagree with, there's also some good advice sprinkled in there. I'll be adding those to the Word doc as well.
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The best villians are the ones the PCs create. |
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pakman
Commander
Joined: 20 Jul 2021
Posts: 463
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| Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2025 10:43 pm Post subject: |
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| jtanzer wrote: |
By contrast, the original edition of D&D in 1974 contains very specific instructions for both things: How to prep a dungeon and how to run the dungeon.
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But that is because it was new then - we did not have much before - we needed - everything.
| Quote: | Virtually the entire RPG hobby is built on three core structures:
1. Dungeoncrawl (often genericized to location-crawl)
2. Combat
3. Railroad
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Would disagree - games these days have evolved - a lot more adventures and games are open world - or at least present themselves as such - using the quest hub mentality - or in some campaigns - the main quest and side question metaphor.
Why? Because of something we did not have "back in the day" - rpg based video games. From world of warcraft to skyrim to even more modern games like red dead 2 and cyberpunk.
Things have evolved tremendously.
| jtanzer wrote: |
As I told Whill, I don't know how you can run a location in WEG SW. I can trawl through the rulebooks and maybe come up with something, but I'm starting to wonder if starting over and writing my own edition isn't a better idea. |
It does not matter how good weg was 30 years ago.
Critiquing it is a dead end.
There are literally THOUSANDS of blog posts, videos, books and other resources on this topic. Everything from making a good campaign to the "quantum ogre" concept in gaming.
Combine this with the new metaphors of video games RPGs (quests = adventures) and the other concepts - we don't need our RPG to teach us everything - we need just how to use the rules and the setting.
Oh, and a someone who is already literally writing their own edition - I am not putting in how to be a good gm - why - because there are already plenty of resources on that.
| jtanzer wrote: |
Edit: I'll make a Word Doc with the things that I disagree with. I'll try not to be too harsh, however there's quite a bit that I'm already not liking.
...
Edit #2: I'm doing a detailed strip-down on it,
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The book was not offered up for a book review.
It was offered up in response of "hey if you are struggling to be a GM in star wars - try this".
Move on - this is not the book review we were looking for.
As asked before;
What is the point of this thread?
Are there gaps in our beloved 30 year old game.
Yep.
That is why we have tons of house rules.
Are some of those gaps a lack of GM advice?
Sure. Great.
Ask your question.
I mean I think an implied question was "how to run location"
see if this helps;
https://youtu.be/M2l-uCYYx64?si=aPYDEBZXuf69gNrC
(great channel - although a bit advanced - )
I suggest you also look at "how to be a great gm" Channel - its a good one, even I a gm with decades of experience picked up a lot of great ideas from it
https://www.youtube.com/@HowtobeaGreatGM
Running a Location
If you are still wanting some basics on a location - think about it.
Why is this important to the story. A location needs a purpose.
What is that purpose. What should the party get out of that scene?
Steal an item? Meet an informant? Hide from a patrol?
How to run it - start as you any location - what do they know, how do they approach...describe it.
"you reach the end of the street - and the abandoned warehouse you were told of - stands at the junction of the alley and some worn and battered trash containers...it is mid evening local time - a bit dusk with evening lights coming on...what does the party do".
The gm should have an idea - are there guards, security systems?
How difficult should this encounter be? Something easy - or is this boss level battle at the end of a long adventure.
If there is nothing in the warehouse - or no guards or challenges getting in...
"After a bit of scouting and finding an open window, your team is in the warehouse - with dozens of crates, a shipping office and an old speeder here...what do you investigate..."
The depth of an encounter should be based on;
* the importance to the story.
* the style the group of players likes.
Some groups - like roleplaying buying every blaster clip. Many - could care less - and just want encounters where they get to roll their skills.
Some - only care about combat.
Each scene should serve a purpose - even if that is just fun or roleplaying with some interesting characters. Of course - the best scenes are those where some fun and roleplaying leads to a clue the party was looking for to get past a block in their adventure.
So seriously - if you have specific questions - ask.
But complaining about the past - or giving us an unasked for book report?
Not so useful.
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Working on massive House Rules document - pretty much a new book. Will post soon.... |
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Whill
Dark Lord of the Jedi (Owner/Admin)
Joined: 14 Apr 2008
Posts: 10488
Location: Columbus, Ohio, USA, Earth, The Solar System, The Milky Way Galaxy
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| Posted: Sat Apr 05, 2025 11:59 pm Post subject: Re: Structures and procedures matter |
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| Justin Alexander wrote: | Virtually the entire RPG hobby is built on three core structures:
1. Dungeoncrawl (often genericized to location-crawl)
2. Combat
3. Railroad |
"Railroad" is an unnecessarily derogatory sandbox-supremacist term, and this guy doesn't know what he is talking about. There is a happy medium between truly linear and open campaigns: a more matrix type of game where there are many characters with many motivations and some plot elements. There are multiple outcomes possible depending largely on PC actions. WEG Star Wars had published supplements with this, and several other games I've played have this too.
| jtanzer wrote: | | Whill wrote: | | From what you have quoted here, I disagree with him that location-crawl procedures are fundamental to virtually all games (or specifically Star Wars)... |
I'd really like to know how you run locations then, because I don't have the foggiest idea of how to do it in WEG SW. All I can come up with is that the designers figured that GMs could come up with a structure on their own. From reading the skill section, and seeing that they included how long each skill took to use, it seems like they had an idea but never got around to formalizing it. |
If you would read the rest of my post you snipped the quote from, it should be obvious that I don't run "location crawls" in Star Wars. It's not that kind of game so crawl procedures are not so important. The movies it is based on are not that kind of movies. WEG Star Wars is cinematic adventure, not D&D on other planets.
| jtanzer wrote: | | I know that some of the GMs here prefer linear game styles, however that style comes with a variety of trade-offs that I don't particularly find enjoyable. |
So your criticism is that the game is not more conducive to running open sandbox adventures/campaigns. Back when the game was published, my experience was that only a small minority of Star Wars game groups ran open sandbox campaigns, so most of the published material better supported the norm, which was more story driven adventures/campaigns (both using published and GM-created adventures/campaigns). For those of us still playing this old game, open sandbox campaigns seem more common now, but this is the first time I am encountering a GM new to the game being so disgruntled about its lack as to present a treatise against a game that ceased publication 27 years ago.
In 1987, all GMs were much newer because roleplaying was younger. New GMs tend not to run open sandbox games, and this game wasn't created to be an open sandbox type of game. The published game not especially catering to an uncommon type of play is not a general deficiency of the game as published. It's a deficiency for you.
In my experience, open-sandbox-campaign-running GMs generally feel confident in creating any material they need (even repurposing charts from other games as needed), so it is odd for me to learn about a potential GM that prefers an open sandbox style but feel so inadequate in supplementing published material themselves.
| jtanzer wrote: | Thanks for the link, I'll definitely check it out.
Edit: I'll make a Word Doc with the things that I disagree with. I'll try not to be too harsh, however there's quite a bit that I'm already not liking...
Edit #2: I'm doing a detailed strip-down on it, and while there are things I disagree with, there's also some good advice sprinkled in there. I'll be adding those to the Word doc as well. |
You posted this thread bashing the published game's lack of new GM guidance, but you've never heard of the GM Handbook before yesterday? There is a forum guideline about doing research. The published game you are criticizing would be required research before criticizing it.
Also, if you are new to this game, how are you so adamantly opposed to some of the GM advice? It looks to me like you were expecting WEG Star Wars to be something it isn't, and you're disgruntled that isn't (27 years after it ceased publication).
| pakman wrote: | It does not matter how good weg was 30 years ago.
Critiquing it is a dead end.
...
What is the point of this thread?
...
So seriously - if you have specific questions - ask.
But complaining about the past - or giving us an unasked for book report?
Not so useful. |
Exactly.
jtanzer, there is no point in merely complaining about the game. We are all about possible solutions here. If you need something, ask for help.
If you have a constructive purpose here, please clearly state it. If you don't, then there is no reason to continue this discussion.
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Mamatried
Commodore
Joined: 16 Dec 2017
Posts: 1895
Location: Norway
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| Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2025 5:22 am Post subject: |
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I have been reading the original post here, and I am a little confused as to the whole thing.
it is made as a claim that D&D is some form of industry standard, it is NOT the system is however.
We see that the D20 system in it variants is still the most prevelant game system in the industry.
The "funny dice" system (funny dice is my words on a system I am not very familar with) that came with the new Fantary Flgight books are not an industry standard yet, but is getting up there.
As one who started RPGs in the early 1980s I have played D&D, D&D 2ed, Advanced D&D and then the 3.0 and 3.5 additions all based on the "older" d20 system, with the disaster that came with D&D 4th edition a lot was changed.
As to being sandbox I would say that the systems are both very sandbox and equally very structural.
To run a SWD6 mission where your rebel strike team sabotages the Imperial Supply base, IS not much different than a dungeon crawl, both are in a defined area and this is the relevance, both could use a battlemap and tokens, even the floorplan of a ship IS a dungeon, have a crew defend their ship and we have a small dungeon.
My introduction to SW D& was of course though the movies and the theme, but after a very little time most of the people I played with becvmae "sandbox2 players and GMs, even changing a template, making a new one or even playing out a simple supply run is and will have elements of a "crawl" it can not be avoided.
Structures and rules only go thus far, and Most if not all RPG systems do state that the rules are to be seen more as GUIDELINES than anything set in stone.
If you go back to the late 70s, through the 80s and until the early 90s, we had many mixed systems, like the d100 based Rolemaster that while very structured and ruled, was designed to be sandboxed by the GM.
I am confused as what the complaint about the system is?
it is lacking too much rules and stuctures or does it have too many?
I see the system over the game, to me the game is a setting and the system is the "world and rules" meaning it is no differnt with a knight riding a horse or a stromtrooper riding a speeder bike....
so what is actually the complaint, too much sandbox, too little little sandbox or is it some confusion on where the system stands on this?
I would say that the GM and the payers toghether makes their awsers to all the issues raised by playing and deciding on how to at their table. |
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