Is it possible to run a campaign from an Imperial perspective?

[Stormtrooper721 246]

For those favouring Imperials, is it possible to run a campaign from the Imperial perspective?

Maybe, a bounty hunter, a couple Stormtroopers, an officer, a force-sensitive jedi-hunter, an ISF agent, etc. with a few NPC Stormtroopers to act as red shirts. Give the players a Sentinel or Lambda and tell them to go hunt down the Empire's enemies.

Is this too twisted? I've played Lawful Evil parties in D&D before and thoroughly enjoyed it!

[Sturn 2,958]

I had a d20 Star Wars campaign involving only 2 players who both played bounty hunters. By their own doing, they ended up being agents-on-retainer for an Imperial intelligence officer. They weren't actually Imperial, they were mercs working primarily for the Empire with a couple missions I recall in which Stormtroopers were there for support. This lasted for about half of a campaign just before the Battle of Yavin. As the campaign got closer to Yavin, I steered them away from working with Imperials and they ended up becoming Alliance friendly. I'm not sure what would have happened if they had kept working for the Imperial officer. There were some dark moments.

I have a link I've posted here before with a synopsis of the first half of the campaign I was speaking about if interested.

[DylanRPG 101]

The truth is it's possible to run a campaign from any perspective. Go for it, I say.

[Stormtrooper721 246]

Sturn said:

I had a d20 Star Wars campaign involving only 2 players who both played bounty hunters. By their own doing, they ended up being agents-on-retainer for an Imperial intelligence officer. They weren't actually Imperial, they were mercs working primarily for the Empire with a couple missions I recall in which Stormtroopers were there for support.  There were some dark moments.

Yeah, there can be, but I find Lawful Evil fun. The players are more free to kill off NPCs they don't like, but there are ways to restrain the bloodlust.

 

[AK_Aramis 1,002]

Stormtrooper721 said:

For those favouring Imperials, is it possible to run a campaign from the Imperial perspective?

Not with the materials presented in the beginner box - it lacks character generation entirely, giving only 4 characters and those being fully pre-genned.

The Beta doesn't really support active military type characters, either, tho' that's more a matter of lacking the right classes - mechanically, it's easily handled once the right classes exist.

[Stormtrooper721 246]

aramis said:

Stormtrooper721 said:

 

For those favouring Imperials, is it possible to run a campaign from the Imperial perspective?

 

 

Not with the materials presented in the beginner box - it lacks character generation entirely, giving only 4 characters and those being fully pre-genned.

The Beta doesn't really support active military type characters, either, tho' that's more a matter of lacking the right classes - mechanically, it's easily handled once the right classes exist.

Thank you very much for this. The beginner box is not for me then, nor is the Beta. I'll wait for the core rule book. When is that coming out?

[WittyDroog 4]

People are estimating around April it seems like.

If you have an imagination you could do whatever the heck you want with the rules. It gives you all the skills, abilities, and a good heaping of useful talents upfront (Speaking about the Beta/Release game). That said it's going to require some work as there are no specific classes so you'd need to come up with that yourself. 

This particular game, Edge of the Empire, isn't really about an Imperial or Rebel perspective. Your group don't really represent one of the groups in the war but rather the "misc" category of smugglers, explorers, etc. You don't have to play the game as a bunch of moral goodytwo-shoes idealists, in fact it seems that this game has a slant to being a bunch of opportunistic jerks (But hey, maybe your smuggler is a rogue with a heart of gold who falls in love with a princess). 

This beginner game just teaches you how to play, and the story is pretty hammered down, but if you want to make your own encounters and start weaving a story that's more slanted to an evil campaign I think this game can accomodate for that easily. Even if you use the pregenerated characters you could play a story where the group is being bankrolled by a corrupt senator/planetary governor to cause trouble he can't personalyl get involved in for political reasons. I think the choice of setting and focus in Edge of Empire is great because it's very wide open to what kind of campaign types you can do, you're not pigeon-holed into being on one side or the other.

[AK_Aramis 1,002]

Stormtrooper721 said:

aramis said:

 

Stormtrooper721 said:

 

For those favouring Imperials, is it possible to run a campaign from the Imperial perspective?

 

 

Not with the materials presented in the beginner box - it lacks character generation entirely, giving only 4 characters and those being fully pre-genned.

The Beta doesn't really support active military type characters, either, tho' that's more a matter of lacking the right classes - mechanically, it's easily handled once the right classes exist.

 

 

Thank you very much for this. The beginner box is not for me then, nor is the Beta. I'll wait for the core rule book. When is that coming out?

Nor will be the core book, unless they are adding a bunch of untested classes to it.

The mechanics themselves will work fine, but the Core Book is expected to use the same classes as the beta.

Class - Specialties
Bounty Hunter - Assassin, Gadgeteer, Survivalist
Colonist - Doctor, Politico, Scholar
Explorer - Fringer, Scout, Trader
Hired Gun - Bodyguard, Marauder, Mercenary Soldier
Smuggler - Pilot, Scoundrel, Thief
Technician - Mechanic, Outlaw Tech, Slicer

Of these, Colonist could fit an imperials game, but not an active duty one. Assassin could be an Emperor's Hand, save for the point totals being way too low to reasonably be an EH. Technician-Mechanic is probably close enough to fake Imp. Navy. The Smuggler-Pilot's talent tree is a bit daredevilish for Imp Navy. Ground Forces and Stormtroopers are not well represented by the hired gun class - tho' it is the talent tree that'll get you, not the skills list.

If you're familiar with the 40K based games (Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, etc), the same dichotomy of talents vs skills exists. Talent trees are a big part of the long-term feel of the game, especially since attributes don't raise in play except through talents (expensive and hard to get ones, at that).

The default setting, as noted by WittyDroog, is neither Imperial nor Rebel - it's merchants and criminals. It's Firefly-in-Star-Wars. Players could easily be drawn into pro-imperial acts as easily as pro-rebel, or even anti-both.

It's easily done with the Beta to have a group with pro-imperial leanings - A politico or scholar, his bodyguard, their pilot and engineer, and maybe an assassin. In fact, the beta has provisions for PC's having ties to the Empire (in Obligation and in Motivation). Heck, my group has ties to two different Hutts…

[Stormtrooper721 246]

aramis said:

Stormtrooper721 said:

 

aramis said:

 

Stormtrooper721 said:

 

For those favouring Imperials, is it possible to run a campaign from the Imperial perspective?

 

The Beta doesn't really support active military type characters, either, tho' that's more a matter of lacking the right classes - mechanically, it's easily handled once the right classes exist.

 

 

Thank you very much for this. The beginner box is not for me then, nor is the Beta. I'll wait for the core rule book. When is that coming out?

 

 

Nor will be the core book, unless they are adding a bunch of untested classes to it.

The mechanics themselves will work fine, but the Core Book is expected to use the same classes as the beta.

Class - Specialties
Bounty Hunter - Assassin, Gadgeteer, Survivalist
Colonist - Doctor, Politico, Scholar
Explorer - Fringer, Scout, Trader
Hired Gun - Bodyguard, Marauder, Mercenary Soldier
Smuggler - Pilot, Scoundrel, Thief
Technician - Mechanic, Outlaw Tech, Slicer

Of these, Colonist could fit an imperials game, but not an active duty one. Assassin could be an Emperor's Hand, save for the point totals being way too low to reasonably be an EH. Technician-Mechanic is probably close enough to fake Imp. Navy. The Smuggler-Pilot's talent tree is a bit daredevilish for Imp Navy. Ground Forces and Stormtroopers are not well represented by the hired gun class - tho' it is the talent tree that'll get you, not the skills list.

If you're familiar with the 40K based games (Dark Heresy, Rogue Trader, Deathwatch, etc), the same dichotomy of talents vs skills exists. Talent trees are a big part of the long-term feel of the game, especially since attributes don't raise in play except through talents (expensive and hard to get ones, at that).

The default setting, as noted by WittyDroog, is neither Imperial nor Rebel - it's merchants and criminals. It's Firefly-in-Star-Wars. Players could easily be drawn into pro-imperial acts as easily as pro-rebel, or even anti-both.

It's easily done with the Beta to have a group with pro-imperial leanings - A politico or scholar, his bodyguard, their pilot and engineer, and maybe an assassin. In fact, the beta has provisions for PC's having ties to the Empire (in Obligation and in Motivation). Heck, my group has ties to two different Hutts…

Thank you extremely for this! Very informative!

[lupex 217]

Stormtrooper721 said:

Thank you very much for this. The beginner box is not for me then, nor is the Beta. I'll wait for the core rule book. When is that coming out?

I had an idea about running a game with a group of Imperial Special Investigators, kinda like secret service (see Johann Cross - Imperial Agent for info).  I will probably run a couple of one-off games using the Edge of the Empire rules.

I would actually say that all you need to do is change the character backgrounds slightly, or have the backgrounds as cover stories, to make it fit an Imperial perspective.  The beginner game starts with characters on the run from a Hutt, Mr Bond is always on the run from a bad guy whilst tracking down the main plot so this can work straight out of the box for an Imperial perspective.

I would advise downloading the free adventure to see if it can be subtly twisted to fit an Imperial group.

The main rulebook won't be designed for an Imperial group but a creative GM should be able to adapt the background to fit whatever style of play that you want. 

[player1658792 0]

lupex said:

Stormtrooper721 said:

 

Thank you very much for this. The beginner box is not for me then, nor is the Beta. I'll wait for the core rule book. When is that coming out?

 

 

I had an idea about running a game with a group of Imperial Special Investigators, kinda like secret service (see Johann Cross - Imperial Agent for info).  I will probably run a couple of one-off games using the Edge of the Empire rules.

I would actually say that all you need to do is change the character backgrounds slightly, or have the backgrounds as cover stories, to make it fit an Imperial perspective.  The beginner game starts with characters on the run from a Hutt, Mr Bond is always on the run from a bad guy whilst tracking down the main plot so this can work straight out of the box for an Imperial perspective.

I would advise downloading the free adventure to see if it can be subtly twisted to fit an Imperial group.

The main rulebook won't be designed for an Imperial group but a creative GM should be able to adapt the background to fit whatever style of play that you want. 

I have the Long Arm of the Hutt I'm reading it at the moment and it could easily be run for both a Pro-Imperial or Rebel Group.

Though if the Group is Imperial then when they are on Geonosis they will have to be careful not to reveal that their with the Empire as the Geonosians HATE the Empire

[ironman4 1]

I would say that your idea for your characters wont be ready till book 3

as it stands I think book 2 will be rebel vs imperial, and should have more military classes

your force sensitives probably wont be covered till book 3, although I feel force users and non-force users dont mix very well in a star wars rpg. Lets face it in that group your stormtrooper player wont really have a lot to do, and the officer will be making all the desicions.

The idea that a group of fringers like in edge of empire could be hired by the imperials sounds interesting.