Star Wars SAGA vs. West End D6

Well, since I see there are number of people involved in the DnD 4.0 discussion, I figured I might get some good response to this question:

I'm looking at getting a Star Wars RPG. I don't want the original WotC D20 version, but the new Saga edition looks pretty cool. Anybody here played it? My other option is to go with one of the old West End versions of the game. I played one a long time ago but don't remember too much. Anyways, just curious about any insights you might have about these games. Thanks!

West End's Star Wars RPG was my RPG of choice after high school. I've played WotC's newer Star Wars RPG. I haven't played the "Saga" edition, but from what I've read, it sounds very much like WotC's first Star Wars d20 system.

Personally, I much prefer the d6 system. It doesn't confine characters to specific classes and gives people more of a sense that they can do anything they want to. Also, it requires very little book keeping. d20 systems tend to be built around combat situations with some other rules for doing "everything else" thrown in just in case. West End's d6 system treats combat trials and everything else exactly the same; as a result, your slicer and pilot can feel just as useful as your wookie and weapons expert, and they can have tense combat-like situations where their skills are needed. Overall, Star Wars d6 feels like it was made to feel pulpy and cinematic, while Star Wars d20 was made to let you put some miniatures to use and waste some stormtroopers with your blaster or lightsaber.

Also, the movement and vehicle rules in d6 were ingeniously simple and intuitive; d6 chase scenes felt like you were in a movie or something.

You may prefer the Saga d20 edition, though; I don't know. Combat in WE's d6 system can be surprisingly lethal; you don't just lose a couple hit points if you get shot. You could be wounded, incapacitated, or die. If the tactical combat or "hack-n-slash" is what you really like about RPGs, then the Saga edition may better suit your purposes.

Thanks Aarontu. Your comments echo a lot of what I've heard elsewhere. Personally, I don't care for 3/3.5 D&D or D20 modern- like you said lots of rules that pigeonhold characters and make it a general pain for the GM to run things. From talking to people who have played Saga a lot of them say it really is much simpler, flipping through the book at the store seems to confirm this, it's just a question of how simple is "simple".

As far as West End goes do you have a favorite version?

-1st Edition
-2nd Edition
-2nd Edition Revised and Expanded

I've only played the revised and expanded edition (and a bit of d6 Adventure, the modern-set non-Star Wars d6 game by West End). I'm not sure what the differences are between editions.

I still have, like, 30 something books for it, though I only ever used a few. The GM screen was incredibly useful, though I could have just printed out the needed info. The only two tables you need in front of you (and only the GM needs them) are the damage table and difficulty table (though the difficulty one is easily memorized).

I remember having a lot of fun with the old west end version, but that was many moons ago when I played P+P.

I second everything that Arontu said (I played 2nd ed Star wars WEG) but let me make a pitch for my current favorite RPG Spirit of the Century. www.evilhat.com/home/?page_id=103

Its an pulp system based off of fudge but it very dynamic and narrative. Each of the characters creates a background consisting of 5 stories with tag phrases associated with the story

Ex
Dirk and the cult of the Thousand Blades.
On the streets of bagdad Dirk finds himself embroiled in a world of darkness and mystery. With danger at every turn, Dirk battles to find the missing idol of Mujeet Kralee and thwrd the leaders of the cult of a thousand blades.

Tags Cuts like a knife
sucker for a pretty face


Ect.

Gotta run.. i'll post more in a bit

I played the West End Games version years ago and it was a blast. If they set out to capture the feel of the movies, they suceeded.

mikoyan wrote:

I played the West End Games version years ago and it was a blast. If they set out to capture the feel of the movies, they suceeded.

Yeah, it was awesome. The way the force worked was great, too, though it could get complicated with all the die rolls and action modifiers jedi characters could get. e.g. just to deflect a blaster bolt back at a stormtrooper required a Sense and Alter roll for the force skill "lightsaber combat", a lightsaber parry roll to beat the stormtrooper's accuracy roll, and an Alter roll for the "telekenesis" skill to direct the blaster bolt back to the stormtrooper. The really cool thing is that you could try to do pretty much anything with the force, but it was difficult for a beginning character to do much more than turn the light switch off with no hands. Imagine how surprised I was to see in Star Wars d20 that there were at least 3 jedi classes and starting characters could use some of the more difficult force skills, though only a limited amount of times per day or something. (Yay! D&D with a Star Wars flavor!)

Also, playing with one player and one GM was a lot more fun and doable with d6 than with d20, in my experience.

I didn't think it was that difficult to deflect a blast back. I thought it was the difference between the target number and the hit of the stormtrooper.

I found the game was best when the group adopted a group mentality. No everybody is a jedi type shit. I remember a group I gamed in only had one jedi and we were like, not his henchmen since we were all pretty powerful pilots/bounty hunters, etc etc, but it was definitely clear that he was the most important part of our group from the NPCs perspective. A lot of fun and the Stars Wars universe, potentially, is one of the more RPG friendly IMHO.

I think the thing that I liked most about it was the fact that the combat system was fast. It didn't get bogged down in the littlest details. You had your difficulty and maybe some modifiers for cover and that was about it. With enough skill you could mow down stormtroopers. Also, your characters could do about anything (sort of like Star Wars...an ewok riding a speeder bike comes to mind). Plus, we had a really good GM.

It always seemed to me that SW was really hard to run as an RPG:

- if you don't include Jedi PCs, then why set it in SW as opposed to any other sci fi universe?

- but if you do include Jedi PCs, then the game quickly becomes all about the Jedi, because (as the other poster mentioned) from the NPCs' point of view, the Jedi are the most important guys around. The non-Jedi PCs quickly take a back seat.

Those of you who had good campaigns, how did you get around this?

mikoyan wrote:

I didn't think it was that difficult to deflect a blast back. I thought it was the difference between the target number and the hit of the stormtrooper.

The first two rolls I mentioned happened at the battle's start. Maybe I'm remembering it being more complicated than it actually was, though.


The people I played with actually didn't want to be jedis, for the most part. There was usually one character in the group who had some force skills. Weak jedi can be good plot devices, but they are rarely better in battle than the average non-sensitive character. One group consisted of an ewok, a rebel pilot, and a force sensitive guy, who went around being good guys and stuff. The force sensitive good guys in my games don't start with lightsabers or a jedi master to teach them; finding a master and building a lightsaber was going to be worked into the story somewhere.

The much more fun group to GM, that I later played with more regularly, consisted of a wolfman demolition expert, a Rodian bounty hunter, a pilot, a shok-boxer, and a goth wannabe Sith, none of them human. They started out running errands for corrupt crime lords on Nar Shadda and ended up with a gang and some territory of their own, the plot started getting a bit more epic when some of the main players moved away.

In the time frame the game is set, Jedi aren't exactly going around saying, "Look at me, I'm a Jedi". Plus, unless you've got a few missions under your belt, Jedi are pretty underpowered.

Man, you guys are making me want to play a Star Wars RPG. Which isn't a good thing, because then I'll obsess about it, even perhaps buy some and then have them sit around and collect dust, kind of like when I got obsessed with D20 Modern.