Sunday, April 18, 2021

Gaming with the Boys in a Galaxy Far, Far Away

 Instead of more procedural D&D, the boys wanted to play some WEG d6 Star Wars today. Even though it's not the sort of game you even want to try procedural play with, I agreed despite not having anything planned. I had a fairly simple scenario cooked up in my head (a simple rescue mission). 

But then they threw the curve ball. Despite my older son really being into this Mandalorian bounty hunter game on ROBLOX these days, neither wanted to play their Mandalorian characters. They wanted to play jedi. Of course. And since I'd set my game in the Rebellion era, there are already to many jedi running around in the game. And I should have been prepared for this, since they did ask back in December if they could have jedi PCs.

But after a bit of discussion, we decided to roll up the new characters and play in an unconnected game, with an "anything goes" Star Wars universe. Completely cutting the strings from canon. If we want to have to outwit Dooku and battle droids one session, then tangle with Kylo Ren the next, sure, why not? The Empire, Rebellion, Galactic Republic, etc can all just coexist. Sorta like the RTS Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds (which we've played a bit). 

So my younger boy asked if he could play a "bulldog man" (yes, he's got a thing for bulldogs these days) jedi, and I said sure. We used the Minor Jedi template and made a few skill picks and some equipment purchases, and found a picture he liked online. 

My older boy decided he wanted a zabrak jedi, one with yellow markings and a yellow lightsaber. We used the Young Jedi template for him, and he's on a quest to get a kyber crystal for the yellow lightsaber he wants. 

That took quite a while, actually, because the boys decided to see what was on TV at the time (Men in Black III) and spent more time watching that than making decisions about their PCs. 

After dinner we played a little. I had Yoda send them on a quest to some ruins to look for kyber crystals. I meant to have them encounter some RP challenges along the way, but my 1st son asked for a combat, so I through some battle droids at them. Too many battle droids. Their game stats are much tougher than the way they fight in the movies! I dropped eight, but had them in two ranks and only the first rank was firing. 

Son #2 did try to be clever, trying to use telekinesis to attack them with his lightsaber from far away, but at beginning level, there just aren't enough dice in the pool for easy lightsaber combat. Son #1 had some success shooting with his blaster, damaging two droids, but then he took an unlucky hit and was incapacitated in one shot. Son #2's PC grabbed him and ran. 

I looked up the natural healing rules (neither had bought medpacs despite my recommendation), and noted that the zabrak would die if he rolled 8 or less. He rolled a 7. My son was pretty upset, but held it in pretty well. It was bedtime by then anyway, so we wrapped things up, I said it was just a training game, gave them some character points, and said we'd try again another time once I'd had some time to plan a proper adventure for them. 

d6 System is definitely NOT the sort of system where you just want to throw random monsters at characters, especially when they're just starting out!


7 comments:

  1. Well this is a timely article for yours truly. My kids have been on a bit of a Star Wars kick lately as well, being in the process of re-watching Tar Wars Rebels. My boy has gone so far as to even design his own SW RPG (based on early D&D) which he calls “D&D 5;” he’s formed his own club at school to play and has a pool of about half-a-dozen 4th graders involved.

    Thing is, I was just considering digging out the old D6 Star Wars and running it for my kids. Seriously...like the day before I saw this post.

    Which edition of the game at you using? I thought WEG quit publishing before the prequel era of SW, so what did you use for battle droid stats? Did you kit-bash them yourself?

    Jedi characters (even the Jedi templates in 2E are pretty weak compared to the padawans seen in post-WEG SW (the prequel versions of Obi-Wan and Anakin, Ahsoka and her peers in Clone Wars, etc.). It’s purposefully designed that way (based on the original trilogy), but it’s sure to be jarring for younger generation fans who’ve seen the entire swath of SW media...fans like my kids who are sure to want to play Jedi.

    Anyway. Right on.
    ; )

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  2. There's a free fan edit pdf of the rules, condensing stuff from various sourcebooks and adding stuff from the prequels. I've been using that plus the 25th anniversary reprints of the original game I picked up last year.

    https://www.boardgamegeek.com/wiki/page/thing:169685

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  3. Are you playing in the pre-Empire era?

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  4. My main game has been set in the Rebellion era between Yavin and Hoth. This game with the boys, though, as I mentioned above, is just an everything on the table sort of game.

    Still, I've used some "clone war remnants" on remote planets in the main game.

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    Replies
    1. Huh. I did not know you were running a regular SW game (or if I did, I forgot). Would certainly enjoy hearing about both these games.

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    2. It's on hiatus right now. When my wife and kids were in the US and I was still here working in Korea, I had lots of time so started a SW game on the side. Recently, I've only been running West Marches.

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    3. Totally understandable.
      : )

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