The Gaming Den

It is also equipment that can be built into the actual droid itself. Using Scum and Villainy you can even have your repair bot live in a tiny compartment inside your regular droid. PL doesn't know that cause he hasn't read the rules to this game.

Also, now that PL's has backpedaled about his misquoting, here is the complete text for the Heuristic Processor for any who would like to read it. Seeing that it gives 100% of the agency to players without mentioning GM interaction a single time is pretty apparent.

Heuristic Processor: This type of processor allows a droid to learn by doing, usually without instruction. The droid is able to reason through several potential solutions to tasks and formulate the best approach. Because of this a droid with a heuristic processor may use skills untrained just like any other character. Similarly the droid can wield a weapon even if it is not proficient in it's use (but still takes the normal -5 penalty on attack rolls).
In addition, a droid with a heuristic processor can creatively interpret its instructions allowing it to complete tasks in a manner that it deems appropriate. A heuristic processor allows a droid to work around its behavioral inhibitors as long as it can justify a given action. For example, a noncombat droid with a heuristic processor can attack and even harm sentient living beings as long as it believes that doing so will ultimately save more sentient living beings from harm. Over time a droid equipped with a heuristic processor develops a unique personality based on experience. Because of this, memory wipes and restraining bolts are commonly used to ensure that a heuristic processor doesn't allow a droid to stray too far from its intended purpose. Still, some progressive masters actually encourage their droids to break their programming, trusting the droids judgement to make independent decisions without taking advantage of the situation.

It's actually kinda interesting that PL seems to want to turn this thread into a pyre to burn any remaining credibility he may have with anyone reading. In this thread alone he's admitted to not reading the sourcebooks he was arguing about, admitted to not reading the builds he was arguing about, strawmanned the post after being told he was gonna strawman, moved goalposts, intentionally misrepresented the rules over and over. His willingness to lose every hand and just keep doubling down is fascinating. He's committed himself to arguing a system he doesn't know, on topics he refuses to read, through dishonest methods, in a thread where the most common response to his posts is people telling him he argues like shit.

It's just uncommon to see someone making a last stand on ground they are lighting on fire.

Oh for fuck sake you fucking idiot that text is a flat out reiteration of the text on Behavioral Inhibitors.

Behavioural inhibitors reads "You cannot attack stuff... unless you have a heuristic processor and suck the GMs cock!"

Then Heuristic processors reads "You can use your Heuristic processor for things, for example you can use it to attack stuff... by sucking the GMs cock like in this example!".

What the FUCK is your problem you dumb shit.

The quoted text about Heuristic Processor does not make any mention of clearing your interpretation with the DM. It says "For example, a noncombat droid with a heuristic processor can attack and even harm sentient living beings as long as it believes that doing so will ultimately save more sentient living beings from harm."

I don't know what kind of DMs you've had, but I've never had to ask one "may my character believe this thing?" Now, I have had one... slightly too restrictive... dm ask "how does your raging barbarian have the presence of mind to flank an opponent?" to which I answered "pack tactics," and it was all good. Generally, a player gets to determine what their character believes and thinks and all the other things that go on in their head. A noncombat droid need not even believe that harming a sapient will prevent harm to more sapients, it's just an example. A noncombat droid could also justify doing such harm through the belief that the target doesn't qualify as the verboten class, whether through believing them to not be living or not sapient. Hell, a droid could conceivably create a philosophy of sapience that precludes most living creatures. For that matter, a non-combat droid could, say, shoot a sign above a living sapient, on the justification that "I did not intend harm to the person beneath, the sign merely seemed to need shooting. How was I to know that it would fall and knock out the person below?"

This seems pretty clear cut, honestly.

Prak wrote:I don't know what kind of DMs you've had, but I've never had to ask one "may my character believe this thing?"

They exist, certainly; or have you not heard about players losing their status as paladins because of the DM's interpretation of alignment? These will be the same DMs that will make your Jedi fall to the Dark Side.

In core, the Droid is probably the only one who can turn cash into power beyond having a basic set of equipment or getting minions. In one of the other books though, you get the concept of tech customization, which means you can spend a lot of cash and go dumpster diving to end up with superior weaponry/armor/other stuff.

Re: losing a level to body swap. It's worth it. You're basically taking +1 LA (or less than that, depending how SAGA does XP) in order to get large physical stat increases, and you're a non-caster, so there's little downside.

Prak wrote:The quoted text about Heuristic Processor does not make any mention of clearing your interpretation with the DM.

You have, according to the "inhibitions are totally player agency!" argument, two choices on how to interpret the easily half a page or so (the pages are tiny and funny shaped in Saga edition) dedicated to behavioral inhibitions.

Either they are limitations on your actions. And are in fact rules restricting them which by implication are ultimately enforced by a GM who listens to and judges your claims that your droid totally believes he needs to punch Jar Jar binks in the face in order to save all humanity. The same as the GM largely adjudicates/enforces the application of all the other rules about droids like Ion damage without it ever explicitly saying "and the GM adjudicates this!".

OR the book just spent all that time saying "your character can just do anything they like without any limitations or judgements by anyone on the value of your excuses to punch Jar Jar binks in the face". And because the rule text presented under Behavioral Inhibitors never says "GM" it therefore has no practical application or limitation on behaviour whatsoever.

NO ONE should be able to honestly look at the text as presented and reach that second interpretation. But assuming you do, that means you actually believe that precious space, time and complexity was burnt to let you know basically nothing of value (and in the process basically just confuse the matter compared to just not having that text).

As for "the same GMs screw you on the dark side". I should quote you some of the dark side stuff. It's fucking hilarious.

There is a practical purpose, however. It tells players what to expect of NPC droids who don't have Heuristic Processors, and what they can expect if they were to somehow lose their's. Saying that "the player agency interpretation makes this wasted space" is like saying the NPC classes, or statements of what human average is in D&D are wasted space. They lay out the rules for NPCs, and PCs are exceptional.

At first I was going to reply, "but that interpretation is an unreasonable rule!", but then I remembered that the conclusion PhoneLobster is arguing towards is that SSE is a terrible game, so a rule that's unreasonable is actually a legit point towards his argument.

The behavioral inhibitor rules aren't wasted space just because Heuristic Processors say you get to break them. Those sections are giving you knowledge of how an average droid works which is perfectly valid even when they add that PC's don't need to follow those rules. In the Players Handbook it says "Half-Orcs would rather act than ponder and would rather fight than argue". and though you're not held to those words it's not meaningless text. It is giving you knowledge of how the average Half-Orc acts. If it then contained text that expressly said "PC half Orcs can act outside of these norms if they judge that to be reasonable" you would be in the same territory as the text we're talking about. PL's claim is that a Half Orc character in an argument must either be mandated to fight by the DM or else that racial description is invalid and pointless.

virgil wrote:

Prak wrote:I don't know what kind of DMs you've had, but I've never had to ask one "may my character believe this thing?"

They exist, certainly; or have you not heard about players losing their status as paladins because of the DM's interpretation of alignment?

In systems with both players and DM's there are clear lines as to who controls what. The player controls the thoughts, actions, and decisions of their avatar and the DM controls everyone else. A paladin or cleric may lose their powers if they take actions at odds with their God or code but that is perfectly in line with the DM/Player split. The players actions are being judged and responded to by one of the characters under the DM's control but the player still gets to take those actions even if the DM thinks it is out of character for them. The player controls the PC, the DM controls anyone else.

The Heuristic Processor says that it's purpose is to allow Droids who have them to bend or break the normal droid rules as long as the Droid can excuse it to itself and no one else. Control is put entirely in the only realm that DM's are not allowed to participate in, the player characters own mind and decisions.

Lets compare to the paladin. A paladin, like a Droid, is expressly allowed to break the rules they are supposed to follow. In the Paladin's case they lose their powers and can't get them back until the god they pissed off forgives them. In the Droid's case their are no consequences except that their personality changes based on that choice (as is expressly written in the Heuristic Processor description). If a Paladin lies he will lose his powers but he may still lie. That is the player's choice which the GM may not stop. If the Droid kills someone (a choice he is expressly allowed to make) that is also the players choice, which the GM cannot stop, and one for which he suffers no consequences. In neither the Paladin or the Droid's case can a GM take control over the character and refuse to allow them to act. That is what PL is claiming.

PL's argument is that a GM can stop your Droid from killing someone because NPC droids can't kill people. The Heuristic Processor that PC's get explains that its function is to let PC's break the common rules that NPC droids operate by. The book gives us a single example of this, which is a droid being able to kill someone. PL's entire argument is against the singular example we are given about how Droid's are allowed to break their programming.

The Heuristic Processor is clear. PL's argument; that a terrible DM could make it not work, is a bizarro-world version of Oberoni. Rather than saying that a broken rule is fine because a good DM can house rule it his position is that a working rule is flawed because a bad DM might house rule it.

Ice9 wrote:Re: losing a level to body swap. It's worth it. You're basically taking +1 LA (or less than that, depending how SAGA does XP) in order to get large physical stat increases, and you're a non-caster, so there's little downside.

Yeah it's obvious. You lose a feat but get to be a super-genius in a hulking battle robot body, so you're clearly gaining more than you lose since there's no feat which says "You get to be this guy"

Finally, on the topic of the Punch Droid build, I found a feat called "Follow Through" which is like Cleave except when you kill someone you get a free move instead of a free attack. They say directly that you can move before making a cleave attack if you have both which means that would do really well in the Punch droid build. He could Great Cleave everybody around him in a 25 foot area and then move up to 60ft (depending on his locomotion) to new targets and then keep the chain going as long as their were people. If he had burrowing he can even do a Bulette impression. He can come out of the ground, murder everyone in range, then take a free move to go back under the earth.

If there's any other kind of builds people are interested in I'd look around. I've been trying to make a force user I found really impressive but it's all kinda low level stuff. I think a Jedi Wookie might be an impressive character. Wookies can mess with the RNG pretty bad and hit like trucks and there's some Jedi powers like phasing through walls that could make a pretty good Ninja-wookie.

Prak wrote:There is a practical purpose, however. It tells players what to expect of NPC droids

Well first of all you can't really claim all that text about the behavioral inhibitions of PC droids with Heuristic processors is somehow about NPC droids with basic processors instead. We actually have text regarding them.

And don't get me going on NPC droids. Just for starters they have things like...

Basic processor (or more accurately, as I will get to in a moment, non-heuristic processor) droids cannot even attempt untrained skill uses period even if they are skill uses that are permitted for normal characters untrained. Except for a short list of skills. The short list of skills does not include Initiative which again I remind you is a skill.

No the system has no explanation for WTF is up with that.

Oh, and while we are talking about other processor types it is worth noting that Remote Recievers and Remote Processors are not explicitly defined as sub types of heuristic processors. They aren't basic processors either, but basically all the text that lets you make untrained skill checks or have an argument in order to be allowed to punch Jar Jar binks in the face all use wording along the lines of "unless/only if you have a Heuristic Processor". So... remote processor or receiver or both droids may have some incredibly serious hang ups and as insane as a the system is we cannot rule out that it isn't intended. Hell. The shortest range Remote Processor is actually half the price of a standard Heuristic processor if you were looking for evidence.

So I asked my Star Wars fanatic friend his opinion on this, I believe he has also played SAGA.

Friend wrote:What you'd do is you'd have to work with the GM on what the glitch was that allowed you to do that (illogical conclusion of a protection mandate, error such that the prohibition against violence only applies to your owner or associates, etc), or just that your glitch removed that prohibition completely. That way you'd have a guideline for your character. As long as you didn't go too far out of line with that, your GM shouldn't need to be constantly referenced.
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Me: What about lines of reasoning like "this organic poses a threat to four I'm with, and I should protect the larger number? "
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A "greatest number" evaluation is a glitch. By the standard prohibition, you aren't allowed to cause harm in the first place. That would take priority over not allowing harm to happen to others. What your glitch would be would be a priority shift. Instead of not causing harm, then not allowing harm to happen, then avoiding harm to yourself, your glitch might reverse that priority order, such that you protect yourself first, then prevent harm from befalling others, then not cause harm except where the other two would override.

Notably, he and I have very different Dming styles, but given that he's the most likely person to run a SAGA game if I wanted to play Punch Droid, I was curious about his view on it.

Its a stupid rule, anyway. Star Wars ain't Asimov and we see no on-screen evidence that droids are limited in that way.

How is Rebellion and Force, the other books in the series ? Anyone reading or playing it ? How are they different from Edge of the Empire ?

Age of Rebellion? It's 99% the same as EotE. The Obligation mechanic has been replaced with a Duty mechanic that provides bonuses to characters rather than penalizing them.

I haven't gone through the entire book yet but I believe there is also a mechanic that sets up NPC squads as damage soaks.

I've only thumbed through the 'Jedi' book but I understand there's a Morality mechanic that replaces/compliments Obligation and Duty.

SW:EotE and its relatives suffer from its primary resolution mechanic of Successes and Advantages. On some skill checks the Advantage results are better than Successes, overage of Successes on most checks doesn't mean anything (and your ideal roll is often 1 Success and everything else an Advantage), and in general the Advantage mechanic forces the GM to constantly redefine scenes, add in details, and generally I believe overtax their ability to run the game by being distracting rather than cool.

There are other issues, such as:

...attributes being of paramount importance over skill ranks: an unskilled attribute 4 check is roughly as likely to succeed as an attribute 3 rank 3 check, for example.

...dumpster diving for equipment is highly effective and can net massive amounts of character storage capacity, additional dice, and capabilities that overshadow any character not willing to dumpster dive, for reasonable cost. Not only that, but these pieces of equipment have explicit Rarity scores which imply they are widely available.

...firing two blasters or using Autofire with a tricked-out weapon is devastating, probably too much so.

It doesn't help that past chargen, you can only buy up attributes one point at a time by filling out most of a talent tree. So if you fail to spend your points on attributes at the start, you're just permanently hosed.

Just wanted to mention that I had a ton of fun the other day when we played Star Wars Saga. Mooks were slain, ships were blown up, droid battles, the whole nine yards.

What are you playing as?

I've been running it. Players included a noble with a war droid and a semi-mobile turret, a jedi, a scout/scoundrel pilot type, and a scoundrel/soldier rogue type.

So... did the ship battles involve any hand-to-hand combat, and what did people spend their force points on?

The closest thing to hand-to-ship combat was one of the droids was physically plugged into the ship (as per Farscape's Pilot) got into a grapple with the Jedi. Otherwise ships stuck to fighting other ships.

Force Points were almost never spent unless it was for an important saving throw. But that's the same reticence that results in cRPG games ending with 500 health potions.

Is it SAGA or a different edition that allows you to redirect your ships shields? It wasn't quite "hand to hand", but in one of the editions redirecting all of your shields to the front then ramming something was a really effective way of killing things smaller than your ship.
After we won the battle of Hoth by running over all the AT-ATs, the DM informed us that if we ever brought our ship in from orbit to run something over he would kill us.

Possibly the previous version. I'm pretty sure SWd20 revised had rules for redirecting shields, because I vaguely remember such rules and that's the only Star Wars RPG I've read in detail.

Anyway, where did the idea that Star Wars droids have Asimov's laws of robotics come from?

After the debacle that is 5e DnD my group is going give SAGA a try. ITs going to be one of those 1 to 20 campaign paths, and I am intrigued by Dean's Iron Man soldier, so will be willing to give that a shot.

Relevant house rules is Skill focus is +1/2 levels (max +5 at level 10), and that is it. Every splat is included, though some KOTOR era stuff is on a case by case basis.

I didn't read any splat books, and skimmed the main book. So Ill ask here:
Are humans the best race for a Iron Man build?
IS it worth investing more in INT (plan was at least 13, maybe 14) (25 point buy).
Any pitfalls to avoid?

Ghremdal wrote:I didn't read any splat books, and skimmed the main book. So Ill ask here:
Are humans the best race for a Iron Man build?

It depends, dont know the specifics of the iron man build. From the top of the head, I would say no. Unless you Need that one feat really really urgent. Because you get many feats in SWSE.

IS it worth investing more in INT (plan was at least 13, maybe 14) (25 point buy).
Any pitfalls to avoid?

For what? Tech Specialist? Maybe.
Skills? No (just take an class with more skills at first Level).