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I recently came across a interesting mechanic in Mongoose's Legend system that I am considering using in SWSE.

If you haven't read it Legend is currently available from drivethrurpg for $1 http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/97239/Legend?language=en

It's a pretty good percentile system, but back to my intended point of this post.

In character creation there are a few random tables for character fluff, how large your family is, the family's reputation, and connections. Sure some players would prefer to just make that up, but I don't think many would mind having rolled a random Uncle with underworld contacts.

This would limit the "I have no family" character and gives the family a story. Even if the player really wanted to play a character with no family, the difference between a poor family reputation and a good one would dramatically change the way the world perceives that character.

Now to the "meat" of the post.

The next random table is "Backgound Events", it is a d100 table with potentially important events that have happened in your life. Obviously if what you roll doesn't fit in the character concept re-rolling is encouraged. And most events are a little vague so there is plenty of room for the player to spice it up.

For instance you could roll "saw a great battle", "family secret", "Inheritance denied", or "raised by Trolls"

However what make this incredibly cool is the option of "Connections" it involves at least 2 characters. If both players agree then any event rolled can involve another character. Perhaps you both saw the great battle or the other character inadvertently learned your family's secret.

Now in Legend their is a mechanical bonus to get PCs to do this. You can have 2 bonuses each with different character. So you roll on the table and Bob connects to you, then Bob rolls and Sally connects to him. Bob gets 2 bonuses.

The bonus is +10% to any skill they already learned in character creation. I think this could be changed to a +1 for SWSE.

Anyone who has played Spirit of the Century (you haven't?) knows that starting the first game with adventure hooks for the GM, and having the characters connected previously so there is none of that weird/boring "you meet in a tavern" roleplaying is awesome.

Legend is somewhat gritty fantasy setting. Some of the events on the table could fit very well in a Star Wars game.

"Met a villain at a time when relatively unknown" - Obi-wan & Vader

"Family secret" - Luke learning is father was a Jedi.

"Father Died or Killed" - Luke learning Vader is killed his dad.

"Mute" - Han translating for Chewie (I know not really mute, but the flavor is there)

"Twins" - yeah you get the point

However some don't really work as well. I am slowly going to start working on a SWSE table. My understanding is that Traveller uses background tables so I might peruse that to see if I can find some more sci-fi event ideas.

If anyone has a good Star Wars Trope or cliche they would like to share I'd love to hear it.

I like the sound of these. Looking forward to see what you guys come up with,

Right on. Not many takers, but that's okay it's something I want to do.

When I finish or get at least half done I'll post again.

I think I may just have to take a look at this.

Several of my players are very strong role-players so they may not take to this as well because they like to make every aspect of their character, but this would be a really cool way to get someone with less role-playing experience a chance to just jump in and try something...and keep away from that whole "the Empire murdered my family and I'm an bounty hunter who works for himself and trusts no one also I have a huge gun," thing.

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Train your sons to be strong, and your daughters to be stronger.
-Mandalorian proverb

A 10% increase in a d20 roll would correlate to a +2.

_________________
aka Jim Jedi-Scramble

Quoting from the Saga Edition Core Rulebook: "The galaxy is a dangerous place (p. 143)...bad things happen sometimes. (p.246)"

Thankfully, I'm in a similar boat, as the folks I game with have no problem coming up with backstories for their respective characters, especially as we don't require several pages but generally a paragraph and answers to GM Chris' Three Questions.


And I agree on this point to. Though I don't know if I'll have the time to contribute to such a project, it's not a bad idea. The only thing I'd advise those is to be wary of making it too chart intensive, or providing broad (if really any) mechanical bonuses.

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Contributing Author of the GSA
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There is a whole book series for RPG's.
One for Fantasy, one for current time line games, and one for future fantasy. They are called Central Casting. We use them a whole lot to help people create back stories.

Like the one
Your mother is a bar wench hooker, who was raped by a sea monster
whilest you was inside her womb. You have a phobia of water and aquatic life. By the end of it he had so many negatives, but one hell of history. I tried like a demon to get him to play the PC. Trying to give bonuses, like he ended up with a -4 charisma in second edition D&D. So I tried to get him to wear a mask to hide his hideous face and play a female. Then once in combat if he showed his female PC's face he would stun his opponent for d4 rounds. But he had to suffer and role-play the hideous form in interaction in town.
I wish I still had that history... would make a great female BBEG.

Okay, so I said would post but there were so many replies I figured I would reply.


I remember the Central Casting vaguely...it might be a more in depth than I was thinking about but I will look into yhem. Thanks.



I would say half my group are strong role-players, but few of them ever bother to mix their stories so there character know each other or have similar goal in mind. So the first night is always little corny and sometimes that a lot of fun, others not so much.



I don't necessarily think I would want to use 10% of a d20. The degree of success in the dice mechanics are different, the 10% bonus while good in Legend is not equal to a +2 in a d20 system. Also I don't want to equate this background bonus to a Species Modifier.



It's gonna be less the 100 Events rolled on percentile. And it's really no big deal one of these days I'll have a hour to myself and I'll knock out a rough draft. It's good to know a few people will look it over and give it a yeah or nay.

I agree with the bonuses. My intent is not to give more power to min/max'ing but to encourage roleplaying. I have some newer players and thankfully have no Power Gamers to worry about breaking my games.

Currently I have a great game of Spirit of the Century going and I want to bring some of that interconnection to anything else I play from now on.