[SWSE] Destiny

[Ceti]

How does this work in actual play? I'm wary about using this in my game, because:
1) its another mechanic (and my players don't want information overload)
2) their destinations are not clear yet
3) it seems silly for each player to have a destiny
4) the bonuses seem fairly strong.

[Della]

1) its another mechanic (and my players don't want information overload)

You can introduce it after a while, at the second, third, fourth gaming session or even later. Don't overload your players, give them time to get used to everything.

2) their destinations are not clear yet

Another good reason to delay the appearance of Destiny mechanics. Anyway, their objectives don't NEED to be clear yet. You just need to pick some interesting destinies for them, and see how things evolve.

3) it seems silly for each player to have a destiny

Why? It's Star Wars. Everyone important has a destiny. And your PCs are important, or else they wouldn't be the PCs, right? :D

4) the bonuses seem fairly strong.

That's the whole point of it. Keep in mind however that Destiny points aren't renewable. You use them when you fire proton torpedoes at the exhaust port, when you chop off your son's hand, when you redeem your father and reject the Emperor's influence. You use them for the REALLY important stuff.

[Epoch]

My group is well into the point of "mid-length campaign" (coming up on our 14th session), and we don't use the Destiny rules as of yet, and perhaps never will. I'm sure they're fine, but you don't need them to make the game work. If you aren't feeling much love for Destiny, don't use Destiny.

[Jim DelRosso]

My group has been using the Destiny rules since the beginning of our campaign. I found it helped the players come up with some concrete goals to drive their characters forward, and I used the Destinies they chose as flags to help determine the direction the campaign took. They've proven an excellent way of keeping everyone invested in the action.

That being said, the mechanical side of it hasn't seen as much use: we've seen maybe one Destiny Point spent, and the bonuses are somewhat hard to keep track of. I may have to write up some "Destiny Bonus" cards to make sure they get used, because my players have certainly earned them.

[Ferrinus]

Given the sheer amount of damage a critical hit can theoretically do for a character with the right feats and talents, it seems like the ability to cash in destiny points for automatic critical hits would work like a "kill target NPC" cheat code. Sure, you can only do it twenty times, but should you even be able to do it once?

[Asmodai]

Given the sheer amount of damage a critical hit can theoretically do for a character with the right feats and talents, it seems like the ability to cash in destiny points for automatic critical hits would work like a "kill target NPC" cheat code. Sure, you can only do it twenty times, but should you even be able to do it once?

We ran into that problem with our group. It's compounded by the fact that there's 4 players and players tend to stockpile them when not needed. It results in a game-crushing nova effect when they're used in that manner.

[Fresh Ninja]

NPCs can have destiny points too. They can use them to negate an attack against them.

If the PCs rely exclusively on auto-crits, then give some NPCs Force Fortification and/or a few destiny points with which they can negate the damage from an attack. Once the PCs have gotten into a destiny point bidding war with a high-level NPC, they might not always fall back on that one tactic.

Of course you shouldn't punish the players for using the system effectively, but there's nothing wrong with encouraging some diversity in their approach.

[Epoch]

Given the sheer amount of damage a critical hit can theoretically do for a character with the right feats and talents, it seems like the ability to cash in destiny points for automatic critical hits would work like a "kill target NPC" cheat code. Sure, you can only do it twenty times, but should you even be able to do it once?

What feats and talents are you talking about?

The obvious one is Power Attack -- I can't off-hand think of anything else that, at mid to high levels, adds anything like as much damage as PA. (20 damage (before the crit) at level 10 for a 1:1 BAB class, wielding a 2 handed weapon). Power Attack is a pretty lame feat in SWSE normally (the high base damage of weapons, plus the automatic damage bonuses for levels, plus the high defense that heroic classes get, makes it mechanically suboptimal most of the time). So you're throwing a feat largely for the purpose of killing people with Destiny Points. Not necessarily a terrible idea, given how many feats a SWSE character gets, but worth noting.

Note that any enemy with Force Points can blow one FP to just fall over unconscious instead of dead when you try this trick. Depending on circumstances, you may be able to coup de grace them (Dark Side Point!), or maybe not. You probably also aren't guaranteeing a kill against anyone substantially higher level than you -- like Big Bads.

I'm not sure that this is a terribly degenerate scenario, though I could be convinced. Can you spell out more concretely what you're worried about?

[IMAGinES]

NPCs can have destiny points too. They can use them to negate an attack against them.

I was about to say, "nope", but thankfully I hunted down the appropriate section - its a heroic/nonheroic split, not PC/NPC. My mistake.

So I can give some of my NPCs destiny points! Cool! Thanks, Ninja!

[Fresh Ninja]

Thanks, Ninja!

Glad to do my part.

[Ferrinus]

What feats and talents are you talking about?

Power Attack and Triple Crit are the core here, but the fact that SWSE doubles or triples every point of damage you deal regardless of the source means there's tons of stuff you can draw on: Battlestrike, Dark Rage, Wookiee Rage, Mighty Swing, Rapid Strike, Weapon Specialization, Greater Weapon Specialization, Attune Weapon...you end up doing damage in the three hundreds.

Note that any enemy with Force Points can blow one FP to just fall over unconscious instead of dead when you try this trick.

So? They still instantly lose the fight. Even if they have Force Fortification, it just means that the PCs aren't able to instantly destroy a fraction of enemy Jedi Knights. I'm pretty sure it's conceivable that end bosses exist wthout a specific talent from a specific prestige class.

NPCs can have destiny points too. They can use them to negate an attack against them.

This on the other hand seems to more or less do away with the problem.

[Steven Howard]

Power Attack and Triple Crit are the core here, but the fact that SWSE doubles or triples every point of damage you deal regardless of the source means there's tons of stuff you can draw on: Battlestrike, Dark Rage, Wookiee Rage, Mighty Swing, Rapid Strike, Weapon Specialization, Greater Weapon Specialization, Attune Weapon...you end up doing damage in the three hundreds.

You forgot Dreadful Rage. Anyway, I think "damage in the three hundreds" is stretching the point a bit. Nobody's going to have all or even most of those feats and talents, unless they're a high level dark side Wookiee jedi/force adept/jedi knight. And even somebody did, a lot of them can't be used together. Dark Rage and Wookiee Rage both give "rage bonuses", and therefore don't stack. Battle Strike and Attune Weapon both give "Force bonuses", and therefore don't stack. Mighty Swing and Rapid Strike each specify that they don't work together.

[JDCorley]

Yes, keeping track of named bonuses is highly super important. I learned this in d20 and it helped a lot.

As for the question: I worked out Destinies after we'd played a couple of times. People like them. One thing I am about to try is getting players to help flesh out each others' destinies. In other words, if player A has a Destruction destiny, I provide an outline and players B, C, and D come up with individual episodes, NPCs, and problems on the way to destroying whatever-the-heck. That way people get more interested in what each other is doing.

[Epoch]

Power Attack and Triple Crit are the core here, but the fact that SWSE doubles or triples every point of damage you deal regardless of the source means there's tons of stuff you can draw on: Battlestrike, Dark Rage, Wookiee Rage, Mighty Swing, Rapid Strike, Weapon Specialization, Greater Weapon Specialization, Attune Weapon...you end up doing damage in the three hundreds.

I forgot entirely about Triple Crit. That's obviously important.

So? They still instantly lose the fight.

Well, sure, but if they end up alive and able to fight another day, it's not quite the same deal as, "We spent 1 DP and solved that problem for good."

[Ferrinus]

You forgot Dreadful Rage. Anyway, I think "damage in the three hundreds" is stretching the point a bit. Nobody's going to have all or even most of those feats and talents, unless they're a high level dark side Wookiee jedi/force adept/jedi knight. And even somebody did, a lot of them can't be used together. Dark Rage and Wookiee Rage both give "rage bonuses", and therefore don't stack. Battle Strike and Attune Weapon both give "Force bonuses", and therefore don't stack. Mighty Swing and Rapid Strike each specify that they don't work together.

I don't mean that you need to use that stuff all together, just that you have lots and lots of avenues with which to increase your damage output. I forgot to put Powerful Charge and your automatic level-based damage bonus in there, by the way.

"Damage in the three hundreds" isn't a random guess, by the way. Me and a friend were comparing characters we made for a game and decided to roll some dice randomly and discovered that mine really did deal something like 340 damage on a critical hit when he was at level 20.

He had a high Dexterity score (he used the Ataru lightsaber form), Power Attack, Powerful Charge, Triple Crit (I hate that feat's name so much), and Battlestrike, I think. Oh, and Basic/Greater Weapon Specialization. So his basic damage on an attack that he goes completely all-out on was something like:

2d8 lightsaber + 3d6 battlestrike + 10 level + 10 powerful charge + 4 both weapon specializations + 14 doubled dexterity modifier + 40 power attack. I'm not sure what a tripled critical hit like that wouldn't kill, but I definitely wouldn't want to meet it in a dark alley.

[IMAGinES]

As for the question: I worked out Destinies after we'd played a couple of times. People like them. One thing I am about to try is getting players to help flesh out each others' destinies. In other words, if player A has a Destruction destiny, I provide an outline and players B, C, and D come up with individual episodes, NPCs, and problems on the way to destroying whatever-the-heck. That way people get more interested in what each other is doing.

That's something I'm interested in. At the start of my campaign, two of my four players picked Destinies. One went with Destruction of an Imperial biomedical facility, which has given me quite a bit to work with. The other went with a Rescue, but didn't specify whom his character will rescue; by second session, he'd changed it to Destruction, but again with no specific target.

I'm a little uncertain as to what to do with it. Have any of you had similar situations? How did you handle them? JD, what sort of outline did you provide for your player?

[Danger Mouse]

That's something I'm interested in. At the start of my campaign, two of my four players picked Destinies. One went with Destruction of an Imperial biomedical facility, which has given me quite a bit to work with. The other went with a Rescue, but didn't specify whom his character will rescue; by second session, he'd changed it to Destruction, but again with no specific target.

I'm a little uncertain as to what to do with it. Have any of you had similar situations? How did you handle them? JD, what sort of outline did you provide for your player?

My group and I don't like the way the destiny rules make you pick from a pre-defined list, since it can lead to the kind of confusion about destiny your second player is having. I came up with the following house rules for destiny to make it more flexible:

Destiny House Rules

If you have a destiny, you can spend a destiny point at any time to do one of the following:
Automatically score a critical hit;
Cause an attack to miss that would have hit you;
Automatically succeed on a skill check;
Cause someone else to fail a skill check that would have succeeded;
Take damage that from an attack for another character in your reach;
Gain 3 force points

Whenever you take steps to fulfill your destiny, you can choose one of the following benefits:
You and all allies gain a +1 desiny bonus on skill and ability checks for 24 hours;
You and all allies gain a +1 desiny bonus on attack rolls for 24 hours;
You and all allies gain a +2 desiny bonus on damage rolls for 24 hours;
You and all allies gain a +1 desiny bonus to all defense for 24 hours;
You gain a force point

Whenever you move away fom your destiny, you will suffer one of the following penalties:
You take a -2 penalty on skill and ability checks for 24 hours;
You take a -1 penalty on attack rolls for 24 hours;
You take a -2 penalty on damage rolls for 24 hours;
You take a -1 penalty to all defense for 24 hours;
You lose a force point

When you have fulfilled your destiny, you can choose one of the following permanent benefits:
Increase two ability scores by +1, or one ability score by +2;
Gain a permanent +1 destiny bonus to all defenses;
Gain a permanent +5 destiny bonus to one skill of your choice;
Gain 3 force points now, and 1 additional force point each level

Note that destiny bonuses do not stack

Using these rules, my players have been good about coming up with specific, well-defined destinies. I added the bit about making people fail skill checks after a player got ganked by an unstoppable Force Grip. Funnily enough, they never had to use that option afterwards.

[JDCorley]

That's something I'm interested in. At the start of my campaign, two of my four players picked Destinies. One went with Destruction of an Imperial biomedical facility, which has given me quite a bit to work with. The other went with a Rescue, but didn't specify whom his character will rescue; by second session, he'd changed it to Destruction, but again with no specific target.

Well, the guy that keeps changing his destiny clearly really doesn't care about it, so you can do whatever you want with him. You can't possibly give him bonuses or penalties if he doesn't know what he wants it to be. I emphasized that you can't change your destiny mid-stream, but if it was that vague I'd probably allow it.

I'm a little uncertain as to what to do with it. Have any of you had similar situations? How did you handle them? JD, what sort of outline did you provide for your player?

For example, my wife's character's destiny is "I will Discover hidden truths suppressed by the Empire." Her character is a former student at a university whose historical researches were shut down by the Imperials and dissident professors and friends started disappearing. Thus she joined the Rebellion, wearing glasses and comfortable shoes! I combined her concept and her destiny to come up with a bad guy, a third-rate historian with political contacts that was in charge of suppressing anti-Imperial academics, and also using his resources to steal historical secrets (read: superweapons and evilness) and either A) make himself indispensible to the Emperor, or B) wipe him out and take his place. With the bad guy in place, I concocted the broad strokes of a few plans and events (mass mind control! bioagents! planting fake historical evidence! shaking his withered mummy fist angrily at the PCs! "Anything you can possess, I can take away!") and then pitched it to the other players for suggestions.

[IMAGinES]

It's sort of a tricky thing, JD. It's annoying that my player has a chance to define a big part of the world, not to mention flag for what he wants out of the game, and he's just handing them over (doubly so that he changed from Rescue to Destruction just before I figured out whom he would rescue). But GM-created Secret PC Destinies is encouraged as an option in the rulebook, and I'm pretty sure my player wants me to come up with one for him. So I'm sort of stuck.

... my wife's character's destiny is "I will Discover hidden truths suppressed by the Empire." Her character is a former student at a university ... I combined her concept and her destiny to come up with a bad guy, a third-rate historian with political contacts that was in charge of suppressing anti-Imperial academics, and also using his resources to steal historical secrets (read: superweapons and evilness) and either A) make himself indispensible to the Emperor, or B) wipe him out and take his place. With the bad guy in place, I concocted the broad strokes of a few plans and events (mass mind control! bioagents! planting fake historical evidence! shaking his withered mummy fist angrily at the PCs! "Anything you can possess, I can take away!") and then pitched it to the other players for suggestions.

Now, that's interesting. I really like the way you took the opposite of her destiny - suppress truths - and turned it into a character who was in a way a twisted version of herself. Maybe that's a tack I can take with my other PC. What sort of person would want to protect an Imperial biomedical facility? And do I revise my existing NPC tied directly to the facility or come up with someone new?

[JDCorley]

It's sort of a tricky thing, JD. It's annoying that my player has a chance to define a big part of the world, not to mention flag for what he wants out of the game, and he's just handing them over (doubly so that he changed from Rescue to Destruction just before I figured out whom he would rescue). But GM-created Secret PC Destinies is encouraged as an option in the rulebook, and I'm pretty sure my player wants me to come up with one for him. So I'm sort of stuck.

Just tell him 'look, I can't create one if you keep changing it, pick one and stick with it, or pick none'. There is no need for everyone to have a Destiny and maybe he's just not that interested.

Maybe that's a tack I can take with my other PC. What sort of person would want to protect an Imperial biomedical facility? And do I revise my existing NPC tied directly to the facility or come up with someone new?

Obviously a Mengele-esque mad scientist. You don't need to revise your existing NPC, just have the new, even worse, bad guy come in and murder him halfway through, to establish that he's crazy and even eviller than the first guy the PCs were chasing. Now that's melodrama!

[IMAGinES]

Problem is, the other NPC is the Mengele-esque mad scientist. Plus, he's already the foil for another character - in retrospect, probably a mistake, but he played so neatly into the other PC's issues that it was too good an opportunity to pass up.

[JDCorley]

The the new bad guy is the money, and he cracks the whip on the mad scientist after the other PC gets the better of him.

Edit: or the scientist's cruel but hot daughter who falls for the PC and goes crazy vindictive when he won't turn evil.