Any tips for someone who wants to run a D&D campaign set during TOR period?

[Psilanthropy]

Maybe not exactly TOR period, but it's the only point of the EU that I know. I'm open to other suggested periods in the Star Wars universe, although I already told my friends they weren't going to be hanging out with Han Solo or any movie characters.

 

How do you guys handle role playing ingame? Maybe I can incorporate some of those ideas into my campaign. Do you place a lot of emphasis on the universe around them, i.e. the specific battles and wars, or do you stay focused on the characters and their own internal conflicts? Do you have a general plot set up? I'd love to hear plot ideas, as well.

 

Star Wars is (literally) a massive universe. I've never been a DM for any campaign before, and I only just started playing D&D this past winter. I realize I've thrown myself into the deep end with this, but I'm determined to run the best (and only) SW campaign my friends have ever experienced, and I need some help.

[WayOfTheWarriorx]

Maybe not exactly TOR period, but it's the only point of the EU that I know. I'm open to other suggested periods in the Star Wars universe, although I already told my friends they weren't going to be hanging out with Han Solo or any movie characters.

 

How do you guys handle role playing ingame? Maybe I can incorporate some of those ideas into my campaign. Do you place a lot of emphasis on the universe around them, i.e. the specific battles and wars, or do you stay focused on the characters and their own internal conflicts? Do you have a general plot set up? I'd love to hear plot ideas, as well.

 

Star Wars is (literally) a massive universe. I've never been a DM for any campaign before, and I only just started playing D&D this past winter. I realize I've thrown myself into the deep end with this, but I'm determined to run the best (and only) SW campaign my friends have ever experienced, and I need some help.

 

If you are serious about running a real hardcore truth to Lucas Star Wars game for a lengthy compaign use WeG Star Wars RPG. It's friggen awesome as hell and it was made in it's entirity specfifically for Star Wars. Its got a TON of extra sourcebooks if you want to use them [but it isn't necessary, you can just use like the standard main 4 sourcebooks and play fine].

 

It's awesome as hell.

 

It's not a hard system to learn, it's actually kinda of basic in design but meats every need to can think of. If you ever played the White Wolf RPGs [Vampire, werewolf, etc] the system is similar in design. WeG is not a hard system to learn and makes running a campaign easy and comes with all the trimmings.

 

I highly recommend the WeG Star Wars RPG. It's friggen awesome.

 

This link has PDFs for a ton of them, you wouldn't even need to buy one book.

 

West End Games Supplements and Sourcebooks

http://www.starwarstimeline.net/Westendgames.htm

[Banderal]

I second Grim's recommendation. That was a fun system, as I recall it. (Was a long time ago though.) If you want or have to stick to D&D - well, it's just a system. You might actually find a "D20" star wars adaption "out there on the web somewhere" - I haven't looked, but it would not surprise me.

 

As far as how to DM it... not sure this is what you are looking for (i.e. I'm not sure I understood your question correctly) - but I cater to my players. The group I usually have, I've known them all for a long time - they like a bit of plot, good tactical battles, and I know that we'll probably only play 4 or 5 sessions tops before "life" gets in the way and we won't meet again for a year... so a big over-arching campaign is not really necessary. I also know that I might get a slightly different set of people from session to session (this time someone has to work that night, or a friend is in town that want to try it or whatever). I could let people run other folk's characters, but I've found that to be too much of a problem, so we just introduce some silly "excuse" for why characters vanish or appear mid-show so to speak.

 

I also know that I don't need to come up with too structured a plan, because they are going to try to screw with me by going off in some unexpected direction anyway. "What do you mean you want to split into 3 sub groups and all go to different planets!" So I have to be able to make it up on the fly... but they also know that I'll do that, and sometimes things will happen because "DM says so". "Wandering DM Damage" is a thing, you know, if players get too uppity.

 

So my advice is... try to know your players and give them what they'll find fun. I guess? Not sure that helps.

[Storm-Cutter]

I've GM'd a RPG group for many years now - since the early 90s. We still meet up most weeks for a gaming session.

 

My main STAR WARS story was set in the clone wars era, but a lot of themes and plots and sub-plots would easily fit into any era. - Since a lot of the villains, Hutts, Bounty hunters, rogue Jedi, corrupt officials and the like can slot into any time period.

 

I would suggest they your party is a small band running a little outside normal channels - so that they can get into and out of scrapes in a quite STAR-WARS-y way. Having a commanding officer or mentor or just a senior contact can keep them together and a common goal over-arching the individual stories is also something to bear in mind.

 

Since most SW eras are set in times of war or uneasy-peace, then some of the usual stories some to mind - sabotaging the enemy, stealing their supplies, aiding oppressed people, starting or nurturing rebellions.... that sort of thing.

 

IDK how much you've done RPG IRL before, OP, but brainstorming a load of ideas could be a good start. - You might think of a villain and some minions, some settings - some exciting battles, some sneaking about moments and some face-to-face diplomacy type missions to mix stuff up a bit. - And as in the movies and Expanded universe all these situations can easily lead into something else rather quickly.

 

I personally like to keep movie and EU characters out of my sessions, since the players always have preconceived ideas about them... but OTOH you could take a minor character you really like and expand their backstory and create a set of adventures from there.

 

Feel free to PM me for some ideas if you wish.

 

GL.

 

EDIT: I based a recent clone wars story on the Voidstar scenario in PVP - which ran for about 3-4 sessions. If anyone is interested I could post it on the forums - tho' maybe not in General Discussion. Off the top of my head the write-up runs to about 10K words. -

[JediBoadicea]

I ran two groups through a huge interwoven Star Wars campaign for many years, and over that time used more than one system.

 

You have a lot of different systems to choose from, and ultimately which you choose will probably end up being a combination of which ones you can find and which one you like best (because you can like something all you want but if you don't have access to enough of the books it does you no good). There's the old West End Games version someone already mentioned, and then there's a D20 system that Wizards of the Coast put out in the very early 2000s. After that came WotC's SAGA Edition, which was like a hybrid between D20 Modern and D&D's 3rd edition. Nowadays the most recent line is Fantasy Flight's Star Wars system, which has unique dice requirements among other things.

 

Everyone is going to have a different opinion about which is their favorite, and in my case it's SAGA Edition. I like it because it's a little complex, though, and I appreciate that nuance. I would link to resources, but frankly a lot of that includes fan-scanned PDFs, and I have no idea what sort of copyright problems that might make on an official Star Wars forum like this one, even when the books are out of print. Best I can say is just do some Googling and see what you can find.

 

Generally speaking I don't like to give advice on how to craft a story, because that is so dependent on the personalities of your players, but even more so on your own personality as a GM, and what you do or don't feel comfortable with in terms of story, of pre-session work, of improvisation versus planning, and all sorts of other variables.

 

However, Storm Cutter said something that I do think is absolutely worth emphasizing:

 

Having a commanding officer or mentor or just a senior contact can keep them together and a common goal over-arching the individual stories is also something to bear in mind.

 

This, I really do recommend. Especially so if your group is new to gaming. Newer groups maybe haven't yet mastered the art of taking control of their agency in the story and they might appreciate a figure that can give them clear orders and a framework to follow. The flipside, with experienced groups but inexperienced GMs, is that an experienced group of willful players can, if given an inch, take a whole light year, and start to try to derail your plans or devolve into infighting. The infighting is particularly likely if you have players who choose to put together a mixed group (Jedi + Bounty Hunters + Soldiers + Smugglers makes for lots of conflicting interests). It helps to have, as a GM, concocted a reason for why there might exist someone giving the group mission orders, and for why the group would have a reason to follow them.

 

Don't worry about railroading them too much, just give them some clear goals and some clear mission parameters; if they know this is your first time GMing they should, one would hope, be grateful that you're putting in the work for them to have a game at all, and not get too up in arms about some early adventures that are more strictly laid out for them. They're going to derail your plans with the unexpected and the crazy no matter what, but it's a whole lot easier to improvise, as the GM, when everyone at the table has already agreed to the basics of the story/mission parameters themselves.

 

Once you've got some more experience under your belt and you feel comfortable as a GM, your next story arcs can ditch the mission giver and move on to something a little bit more organic and in player hands, but at least to start with I think a commanding officer NPC of some stripe is a useful tool to consider.

[Storm-Cutter]

 

Once you've got some more experience under your belt and you feel comfortable as a GM, your next story arcs can ditch the mission giver and move on to something a little bit more organic and in player hands, but at least to start with I think a commanding officer NPC of some stripe is a useful tool to consider.

 

You can always have their mentor be captured or die or cloned, or turn to the other faction or fall to the dark side to write them out or use them as a plot device in and of itself.

 

With a starter group you might consider playing your players' characters as kids or teenagers at the start of the story and then starting the next set of adventures a few years later on, when they have grown up a bit. - That way you can write an adventure that is mildly challenging for youngsters and can keep them in a fairly confined space with a mentor in place. - freeing them up in later episodes.

 

the Clone Wars episode "The Gathering" is a good example of a starter story for young Jedi. ( and could be in any era) The Gathering Or adapted to work for a crime-lord, academy training, clone school, military boot-camp etc.

 

STAR WARS d6 - By West End Games was the first commercial success. - I think it is currently out of print, but can still be obtained at games fairs and on auction sites. -It's rather quick and-dirty, easy to pick up the system and fun in that you can roll handfuls of dice. - The skills are pretty generic and the force feats fall roughly into three areas - but that does make it very flexible.

 

Wizards of the Coast issued a STAR WARS d20 system. - which is closest to the AD&D system. - It has attribute scores rolled on 3d6 and about 40 skills, and covers a lot of combat and force feats. - its a lot more detailed and can account for differing eras and races.

[DarthSpuds]

STAR WARS d6 - By West End Games was the first commercial success. - I think it is currently out of print, but can still be obtained at games fairs and on auction sites. -It's rather quick and-dirty, easy to pick up the system and fun in that you can roll handfuls of dice. - The skills are pretty generic and the force feats fall roughly into three areas - but that does make it very flexible.

 

Actually Fantasy Flight have just released a 30th Anniversay Edition of the Star Wars RPG rulebook and Star War Companion.

 

Even though I have 1st Edition copes of both I got the new version as well. Of all the Star Wars table-top RPGs out there it is, IMO, the best because it was designed from the get go to be fast and furious and not overly rules-lawyerish.

 

In fact I used variant of the Star Wars D6 to write a home-brew Babylon 5 game (long before there was on official game), I've also used it for a Horror Wild West and Aliens/Predator based game. I think the D6 system (base rules are free PDF) is just about the best possible "1st platform" for new players and GMs. If it has a weakness it is how it deals with damage resolution, but the PDF versions have an alternative damage resolution system that can overcome that (though I still prefer the classic version).

 

I'd be hard pressed to think of any genre or style of TTRPG that couldn't be handled by the D6 System, and as it is now open source there's tons and tons of free stuff out there for it.

 

All The Best