Saga Edition Alteration, Opinions?

[Strormer]

So a friend of mine and I were discussing one of my favorite systems, SWSE, and the possibility of making a rather major change to character creation and advancement for a game we'd like to play in the near future. I will detail the changes we're considering below and I'd appreciate any opinions on the viability of these changes and any issues I should address before attempting to implement such a system change.

Spoiler: Change Details

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So basically the change we're wanting to make is to remove classes from the game entirely. We plan to have the initial creation run off of a system of player selections. Pick which saves, attach bonus, initial proficiencies, etc you want based on a set of checks and balances. From this point forward players would switch back and forth between picking talents and feats, pretty much like normal save for the fact that there would be no class restrictions on available talent trees or feat selections.

To add a bit further detail, here's what we're thinking at this exact moment for the initial build selections.

Firstly, species is selected normally.

Second, the player will select his base attack bonus progression (slow or fast).

Third, the player will select his defense bonuses by dividing three points among his Fortitude, Reflex, and Will defenses, with no one defense gaining more than +2.

Fourth, the player must select class skills. The player selects 2 + Intelligence modifiers skills at level one and gains 4 + Intelligence modifier skill points per level. Not only does the number of skill points per level increase with an Intelligence modifier increase, but an additional class skill is gained. These numbers can be increased by selecting as a feat either an additional 1 skill point per level or an additional class skill.

Fifth, the player determines starting proficiencies. All characters may select three weapon or armor proficiencies at level 1 in addition to their level 1 feat (which could, of course, also be a proficiency feat).

All classes start with HP of 24+CON/1d8+CON. You can sacrifice one of your level 1 feats or your level 1 talent to improve this to 30+CON/1d10+CON. If you decrease your HP to 18+CON/1d6+CON you can select any one additional feat or talent at level 1.

All classes will have access to all Talent trees, allowing a great variety of builds to possible. There will, of course, still be talents that have some restrictions, such as Force Talent Trees requiring Force Sensitivity. All situations will be adjudicated by the GM in order to keep overall game balance.

I'm still not certain how this system will interact with Prestige classes, but I think it could be implemented without too much difficulty.

[Mando Knight]

So, you don't want anyone to make a Soldier (or Noble)? You're forcing a player to give up a lot more than the Soldier does in order to get 30/1d10 HP and 5 proficiencies. Jedi lose nothing except for a feat if they want the full HP (not that great a use for a feat, honestly, not compared to UtF stuff), and will in fact scale a lot better than in the normal game (because you're using skill points, which means that the do-everything Use the Force skill goes up by 1/level instead of .5/level).

In general, the not-Soldier classes get fewer proficiencies, the lower HP classes get more skills (not feats), and everyone gets at least 3 class feats (unless you make an idiot of a Noble) as a starting point rather than an endpoint.

I don't like skill points in this system, since the original system gives everyone a bit of dabbling competence as they level when comparing to fixed DCs. With the proposed structure of the skill points, if you can dump everything into one god-skill, so much the better, even more so than UtF already is.

Mark Hall's written up a classless variant, as well.

[LibraryOgre]

I did something similar...

http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/2013/07...terations.html
http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/2013/08...es-change.html

[Strormer]

Thanks guys. I do like Mark's version as I think it's getting at the same goal that my friend and I were going for. A couple questions though.

1. Doesn't having BAB and HP all uniform make it difficult for combat-centric builds to out-perform non-coms (in their specialization, combat), or do feats/talents balance this as well as one would hope?

2. Nine starting feats of any choice seems like a pretty major bonus to me. Were there any other restrictions to keep players from abusing this resource? (I ask since most players would really only select one or two proficiencies as almost all players specialize in one type of weapon.)

Otherwise, I really like this and will probably implement it into our game. I really love the red dark-side chip. It's so nice and seductive-feeling and adds an excellent RP balance to a powerful mechanic.

Thanks again!

[Mando Knight]

I'm of the opinion that anyone who doesn't get general proficiencies as well as their specialty hinder themselves when their weapon of choice isn't available (if it always is, then make your weapon of choice something like an Aratech 74-Z or a TIE Defender and just laugh at everyone's attempts to catch up to the potential damage output of vehicular weapons in character-scale combat).

Simple proficiency gets you unarmed, melee weapons, and grenades (why would you ever skip grenade proficiency?). Pistols are handy for everything that sidearms are good for (easy to handle, easy to conceal, generally more power-efficient). Rifles and heavy weapons give you better damage output at the cost of some limitations. Medium armor (only melee characters with the juggernaut feat really get much benefit out of heavy armor) requires light armor, so you can't skip a proficiency that way.

With only Int modifier starting skills, you're expected to spend a bunch of them on Skill Training. It doesn't help you much to have nine combat feats, but with 8 Int (because you're going for all combat stats!) you're stuck without any trained skills... and Pilot, Initiative, and UtF are all skills.

1:1 BAB is the only one that lets you be even competent at high level combat unless you're optimizing your bonuses from something else (since defenses grow at 1:1 regardless of BAB), and the medium HP progression is a decent middle ground. Nonheroics don't progress their defense by level, so everyone will generally be pretty good at shooting them down anyway.

[LibraryOgre]

Thanks guys. I do like Mark's version as I think it's getting at the same goal that my friend and I were going for. A couple questions though.

1. Doesn't having BAB and HP all uniform make it difficult for combat-centric builds to out-perform non-coms (in their specialization, combat), or do feats/talents balance this as well as one would hope?

I find that the specializations and talents really favor the combat builds, even though everyone has the same BAB and HP... and those who want more HP can easily take feats to do that.

2. Nine starting feats of any choice seems like a pretty major bonus to me. Were there any other restrictions to keep players from abusing this resource? (I ask since most players would really only select one or two proficiencies as almost all players specialize in one type of weapon.)

Those 9 feats include any skill trainings they want (though they still get bonus skills for high Int). It covers weapon proficiencies, skills, any anything else they may wish.

[Alejandro]

What are you trying to accomplish by removing classes from SWSE? Once I know that, I can comment more accurately.

[Strormer]

Awesome, thanks guys. We'll be implementing this system for sure now!

[LibraryOgre]

What are you trying to accomplish by removing classes from SWSE? Once I know that, I can comment more accurately.

I started it because, in building characters, I found a lot of the builds to be needlessly restrictive, and the classes largely only differentiated by what talent trees they had access to. Why can't a Scoundrel take Evasion? Because he doesn't have access to right tree. Why not? Because that's a scout tree.

Moving everyone to +1 BAB, but moving the +1 BABs down to 24+d8 HD, gives parity between attacks and defense on the same level... so fighting someone higher level is always harder, someone on level comes down to skill, and someone below your level is easier. It made the math easier (add you level), rather than making BAB a real separate stat, which gets occasionally wonky with the 3/4 BAB classes and multiclassing. It also lessens the dominance of Jedi, who still have plenty of ways to be awesome.

Once you address a few of the problems with this (such as certain trees basing effects off a certain class level) and what to do with prestige classes, you have a pretty simple system that does a lot of things you want, while reducing the complexity of builds. It's more flexible, without being radically more powerful.