Now for Star Wars.
As a demonstration of how to make playable species in FFG’s
Genesys or FFG/Edge Studio’s Edge of the Empire RPGs. In preparation for me to
dump a great big pile of them here on my blog.
This involves somewhat tedious calculations and rummaging
between many books/PDFs/wikis.
We’ll do something a bit out there. Destiny’s Fallen, or Eliksni
as they come to be known as.
This draws from three sources, a blogpost from one of the EotE writers, where he explained how he started from a 120 or 130 XP base as most species have 20 to 40 XP worth of abilities and a decent pile of starting XP. Brawn + WT and Will + ST are added together, so if they are both of a pair is up or both of a pair is down, generally factor in an extra -/+5XP due to the compounding.
The Genesys Keyforge book, which gave XP values for building custom species
and archetypes. And a fan-guide where they reverse engineered the various species
to come up with the XP numbers.
All of these are needed because abilities are custom-made and adjusted at the
whims of the writer.
Starting from a basis of 130XP
I needed to give the Fallen the standard array of one stat at 3 and one stat at
1, for a net XP cost of -10.
Fallen can get big and strong, but they are also agile, even
when weak. So, Agility got the +1. Now they are hostile bug aliens, so Presence
might be up for the drop, but their culture of brutal piracy and bulling means
their resistance to it must be low. It’s more interesting to give them a -1 to
Willpower.
We will skip Dregs, they can just be minion group foes.
Fallen are normally over around 9 feet/2.7m tall. But most
of them are stunted and “only” Wookie-sized. And from there I start going
through their wiki entry to get all their traits from the Keyforge book.
They are good climbers, which is a trait (Climbers -5XP).
They are decently tough so +2 WT (-5XP x2), They have Extra Limbs for their
normal troops and pre-fallen state, so that is in (-15XP). Theya re noted for
resisting many hostile environments without suits so a choice of Artic, Desert
Dweller, Dark Dweller and Insulated (-10, -5, -5 and 0XP).
9 feet is about Silhouette 2, compared to all normal human
and bigger Silhouette 1. Now Silhouette 2 on its own is -5 XP, but the ability
to choose between Vandal (Silhouette 1) and Captain (Silhouette 2) is similar to
the Dowutin from Knights of Fate trait Large: Dowutins have a silhouette of 1
or 2, chosen at character creation.
But that has no XP cost, so I must reverse engineer it by
going through the Dowutin write-up and hoping it adds up to 130 minus the Large
Trait to find its cost. I eventually find it’s 5 XP and so irrelevant.
Going to silhouette 2 in Keyforge also increases the Wound threshold
by +2. So that needs to be accounted for and the cost supplant the generic +2
WT I was going to give them.
And since the Fallen have some sort of gaseous liquid they
need to live called Ether, that needs to be represented. Air Supply (+10XP) represents
all the aliens with gas masks because they don’t breathe oxygen. Without it,
they treat oxygen/the air as an 8 damage toxin. Fallen still breathe oxygen, so
this needs to be toned down. Changing it to a +5XP trait where they need the
ether and mask to heal wounds.
That gives us a complete package for the Fallen/Eliksni
Species Abilities
Brawn 2 Agility 3 Intellect 2 Cunning 2 Willpower 1 Presence
2 (-10)
WT 12 ST 10 (should be -10 but ambiguously associated with Large
via Keyforge)
Starting Experience: 90 (Remaining XP)
Starting Skills: A Fallen starts with a single rank in
Coercion during character creation. They obtain this rank before spending
experience points, and Coercion may not be increased above rank 2 during
character creation. (-10)
Climber: Fallen can climb surfaces with plentiful holds
without making an Athletics check. Generally, these surfaces count as difficult
terrain. Fallen may need to make a check to scale sheer surfaces, at the GM’s
discretion. (-5)
Ether Dependent: A Fallen needs a supply of gaseous liquid
called Ether to live, without it and a rebreather to keep it circulating, they
cannot heal Wounds. (+5)
Extra Limbs: Fallen can perform a second manoeuvre during
their turn without suffering strain or giving up their action, but they can
never perform more than two manoeuvres during their turn. (-15)
Insulated: Hardy exoskeletons give 1 Boost Die to checks
made to resist extreme temperatures. (+0)
Large: Fallen have a silhouette of 1 or 2, chosen at
character creation. (-5)
This is a good representation of the Fallen in Genesys but
run into a problem that we were making this for the three Star Wars RPGs, where
most species have at most two positive and one negative trait. If we want to
bring this to the baseline, we need to trim it down.
The ambiguity for WT is a good place to start. Is it 12 because
they have a silhouette of 2, even if they choose 1, like the Dowutin? Since
that doesn’t change for them.
We can move the Large rule into a subspecies trait, like
with how Aqualish subspecies work.
From there we can also trim back the starting WT and move
some of that to the same subspecies. Really avoid the problem that a silhouette
2 creature is “merely” as tough as a Wookie and the Vandal (the silhouette 1
types) are a bit leaner than Chewbacca.
Climbing really represents the ability of the Falllen to drop
from the ceiling and roofs during the first and never matched mission in Destiny. So, I guess Coercion can be replaced with Athletics and the Climber
trait removed.
Following the rules from Keyforge, a Captain has a starting
XP of 90, 5 less than normal. This doesn’t seem right though it is consistent
with the rules. In game tweaking might adjust it to 85 XP, so they are at a
disadvantage compared to the species which can use their 90XP to pump up their characteristics.
Species Abilities
Brawn 2 Agility 3 Intellect 2 Cunning 2 Willpower 1 Presence
2
WT 11 ST 10
Starting Experience 95
Starting Skills: A Fallen starts with a single rank in Athletics
during character creation. They obtain this rank before spending experience
points, and Athletics may not be increased above rank 2 during character
creation.
Ether Dependent: A Fallen needs a supply of gaseous liquid
called Ether to live, without it and a rebreather to keep it circulating, they
cannot heal Wounds.
Extra Limbs: Fallen can perform a second manoeuvre during
their turn without suffering strain or giving up their action, but they can
never perform more than two manoeuvres during their turn.
Insulated: Hardy exoskeletons give 1 Boost Die to checks
made to resist extreme temperatures.
Captain: Fallen who have achieved their true size have a
Silhouette of 2, +2 Wound Threshold and Starting Experience of 90.
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