Personal Growth
Captain Rico stared at the food synthesizer in his office as if it were a tactical battlemap. Its casing sported elegant design details, all suitable for the most senior administration wing in the Imperium Palace. Even the font used to display its menu options seemed somehow more sophisticated than the common citizen's aurebesh lettering.
Rico scowled.
The implied luxury of the shiny machine annoyed Rico. His annoyance interfered in the drink-choosing process. Until he picked out something to fuel his nerves, there was no point in returning to the bureaucratic fiddle-faddle on his desk. If he did not get his mind into the right shape to properly complete all the pesky forms, none of their attached problems would go away from his desk, and that meant--
"You wanted to see me an hour before end of shift, Cap?"
Rico turned his attention to his office door. He relaxed into a slightly friendlier mode upon seeing a fellow clone trooper with a slightly thickened bridge to his nose and a wavy pattern to the stubble of his close-shaved scalp. "Thanks for dropping in, Striker. Come on in. You want tea or something? Water for Doggo?"
Striker eased himself into the office as if the tile floor might harbor a trap. "You need your caf dispenser rebooted or something?"
Rico blinked at him. "What? No. This isn't a drill sergeant trick, jua'vod, where I ask you a question that leads straight into a chore. You can have tea, or caf, or ... this thing can't do a decent beer. And I won't touch the stronger liquor on the menu because I don't want the whole 'this is how the tabloids get their stories' lecture from Higgins ever again."
Striker chuckled. He stepped aside to let his barrel-chested kath hound follow him into the room. Doggo made a happy beeline for Rico.
"Thanks," Striker said over the rattling sound of Doggo's claws on the floor, "but we try not to fuel up the slobber machine too close to our final patrol of the day. I don't add stops to the route home if I can help it."
Rico took a few minutes for the important morale work of rubbing Doggo's jowls and ears while making silly faces. By the time both felt satisfied, Striker had gotten over his usual awkwardly stiff moment to settle on one of the guest chairs. Doggo pranced over to flop on his chosen person's feet.
"What did you have in mind for me?" Striker prompted as Rico dialed up a mug of spiced caf for himself.
"I got issued a clear advisory," Rico said, "that we need to clear up any remaining ambiguity on Doggo's official status. I do not care to see what shape the 'or else' would take." He picked up a datacard off of a dormant datapad on his desk and gently tossed the datacard to Striker. "The formal identification for one Trooper Doggo Hayc will get ratified by Major Razak at eighteen hundred tonight." Rico paused for a theatrical sip of his caf. "Gives you about forty-eight minutes to update the recorded scores for Doggo's attributes and skills on his documentation."
Striker sputtered.
"I am not going to spend my first Satunda of the year on it," Rico added firmly. "I have approximately two hundred official name change forms to initial. In triplicate. Including my own. I have the continuing logistical hash that the upcoming closed ceremony is making of our entire duty roster for the next standard month. You're a tech specialist, jua'vod. You can input numerical values into a form at least as efficiently as I can."
Character Advancement
The means of improving a character's abilities on a sheet come in four broad varieties:
- Increase an existing skill by one pip;
- Learn a new skill;
- Increase an attribute by one pip;
- Volunteer for unmitigated trouble.
All of these categories involve having an appropriate amount of in-game time to work on developing the new or increased capacity, spending Character Points off one's sheet, getting the GM's approval more than two real-world weeks ahead of time, and finally recording the upgrade on the World Anvil edition of the character sheet.
Character advancement can only happen between adventures. The wise player will make their decisions about advancement, and contact the GM about it, within 2 days of the GM issuing the end-of-adventure Character Point and Force Point rewards. By one real-world week before the start of the next adventure, it's too late for the GM to design challenges to suit the players' interests and abilities. An overworked Gamemaster is a cranky Gamemaster!
Certain potential upgrades require access to special resources (an instructor or a training tool or a specific location or membership in a particular social structure). Prior skills, conditions, or biological attributes may be mandatory.
In any given break between adventures, no one thing can be improved more than one pip. However, a character with enough Character Points and enough training time between adventures may make more than one improvement during the break so long as they are to different items on the character sheet.
Volunteer for unmitigated trouble!
Hunched awkwardly in the padded chair, Striker split his attention between the screens of two datapads . The one balanced on his right knee, with the official promotion datacard jutting out of the reader port in the top left corner, had several areas of its blue-white display outlined in daffodil yellow. The datapad laid atop the left arm of the chair gave off a more traditional green glow.
"Captain?" Striker said hesitantly.
Rico barely glanced away from the forms under his own stylus. "Yo."
"Says here," Striker trailed off to look at the instruction manual on his left screen one more time. "Says here, Doggo has just enough points banked up to become Force Sensitive. And since he's a good dog...."
On cue, Doggo rolled onto his back and thumped his tail on the carpet.
Chore list momentarily forgotten, Rico glared directly at the sergeant. "Jua'vod, if you even think about making that hound into a Jedi -- or worse, Force help us, a Street Judge -- then you and I are going to have real problems!"
Striker returned a mostly-innocent expression. "I was just telling you what I saw."
They held the staring match in silence for several minutes.
Doggo huffed a disappointed sigh. No one was rubbing his tummy.
Striker grinned. "Okay, Cap. No making him Force Sensitive. What about improving his color blending ability?"
Rico rubbed the side of his face with the hand holding his stylus. "You really did just start off by hopping your way down the entire 'Volunteer for Unmitigated Trouble' list, didn't you?"
"It's a Special Ability," Striker said, "and he has been using it frequently. Daily, even. For more than two years."
Rico sighed. He stabbed a few places on his main holoscreen until it pulled up the relevant notes.
"Doggo's fur thing is about the same as an Ulthar forest dragon's scales, right?"
Striker nodded. "Veterinary medic thinks it was probably Weren fur genes, but yeah."
Rico nodded. "Okay. That does not have any instructions written down on it as to how to improve it; so, no. You can work with him on his sneak skills. You can train him to be more perceptive. That particular Special Ability is never getting a higher die code."
Striker grumbled a bit. He scrolled upward on his directions. "Okay, now, serious ask here. How about if I speed him up?"
Rico had just returned to his current project. He blinked a few times. "You're talking about increasing his Move?"
Striker nodded enthusiastically.
"How fast does he traverse a hall already?"
"We're about even," Striker said even as he swapped his attention to the blue-and-yellow screen on his right knee. "Yeah, we are both qualified at ten meters in five seconds."
Rico fantasized for an instant about a quiet mountain cabin off the planetary power grid, no communications console, no meeting schedule, no younger family members with whackadoodle tactical complications.
"Yeah, that's fine. Eleven meters instead of ten? Fine. Make sure you document it when someone spends a month and change teaching that hound to run faster, and make doubly sure they covered different kinds of flooring."
To induce the GM to make a player's life much more uncomfortable, request one of these options:
- Become Force Sensitive after the character has already begun adventuring.
Entry into the ranks of the psionic and/or mystic costs 20 Character Points. And throws a serious wrench in the Gamemaster's existing plans. It might receive approval! But it's going to come with the counterbalance of much more difficulty for the Player as well.The character receives one Force point immediately -- which, hopefully, is justified by whatever happened in the most recent adventure to explain why this person is suddenly connected to the mystic power of The Force!A Force Sensitive character is capable of having more than 5 Force points banked on their character sheet at any given time. The sixth no longer converts to Character Points.Once a Character is Force Sensitive, they can never permanently lose this Special Ability.Also, a Force Sensitive character is now subject to The Dark Side of the Force. If a character falls to the Dark Side, at the end of that scene the character becomes a GM-controlled character whose first priority in life is the annihilation of their former Player Character allies. Every spiritual ethos in the Galaxy has its own guidelines for how to stay in charge of one's own destiny, and many include built-in social support networks to help one another resist the pull of self-destruction. To be Force Sensitive with no accompanying membership in a Force Order may give an individual character more sense of personal freedom from externally imposed obligation. It definitely gives that character a vastly greater likelihood of falling from playability.
- Improve an existing Special Ability.
Some species' Special Abilities cannot be improved; they either function or they do not. Ambidexterity, for example, is not improvable.If a Special Ability is capable of being improved at all, its official description includes the necessary cost, training times, and conditions required to make improvement possible.
- Add a Special Ability that the Character did not already have.
... Uh huh. Were you a host for one of those parasitic critters full of retrovirus stew, the altered bone worms that came from that blighted Tomb World Tor Ceti in Mecetti Province?Or maybe you've had a particularly ill-advised genetic treatment done to you by Dr. Jacques LeGrange in an outlaw tech facility that has never seen a health code inspection?Get the GM on board with this first.Expect to pay 20 Character Points, write up at least two articles for the Gamemaster here on World Anvil while your character spends {20 in-game weeks = about 3 standard months} on adjusting to this new Special Ability existence, and prepare to have a life full of exclamation!
- Improve Move by one meter per initiative.
Before getting excited, check the character's species minimums and maximums. Jawas, for example, simply cannot exceed a Move of 10. This is why Jawas go in for powered vehicles.Assuming the increase is within the species range, and that the Gamemaster approves: First, spend as many Character Points as the existing Move in order to raise to one Move higher. A Human, Clone Trooper, Togruta, or Rodian probably starts out at a Move of 10. That means they would spend 10 Character Points to go up to a Move of 11.A character who wants to move one meter faster per five second interval without external enhancement will be much better off if they have a teacher. (It takes twice as long to learn without that expert instruction, which you cannot get from an archived lecture in some dusty corner of the Holopedia Galactica.) The time necessary to learn a faster Move is equal to one standard week (five days) per Character Point to be spent. Or twice that, without the teacher.
Increase an Attribute by one pip.
"Why's this got to be in base three?"
"Caamasi," Rico answered without a pause in his scribbling.
Striker's head jerked up so suddenly that he knocked his worksheet datapad over. "Wait. What?"
"Caamasi," Rico repeated. He scrawled what might be mistaken for a personal signature in the final box on the current form so that it would mark itself as complete.
Striker gave Doggo a brief pat as apology for the disruption. "There's a real reason for putting everyone's brain through this? I figured it was just to make sheet advancement a smidgen more difficult. Really?"
Rico took a sip of his caf. He made a face. He began shifting stacked datacards aside to expose the warming plate built into his desk surface. "Caamasi have been around since before the Jedi Order had really worked out what a Jedi was going to be." Rico wedged his mug into place on the warming plate. He turned it on and set the timer. "The story goes that -- being as how the best diplomats were all from the planet Caamas back then, regardless of mystic advantages -- the students of a leading Caamasi philosopher taught the first Jedi Knights how to be compassionate diplomats instead of isolationist snobs. Anyway, they have three-fingered hands, so their cultural habits of measuring progress got spread around everywhere they did diplomatic work. Take a big deal and break it down: start. First step. Second step. Suddenly you're using your whole hand. Getting there was not so tough after all."
Striker watched Rico jot his way through another two forms.
"I can't tell if you're funning me or not," Striker complained.
"I can't tell if you were at least half serious about turning your hound into a Force manipulator," Rico said in the exact same tone of dubious complaint. "Go look it up on your free time. Anyway, you are still a tech specialist, aren't you? If you can't count off 'plus nothing, plus one, plus two, now we're at the next whole number', then you have afflictions I can't solve with some judicious bureaucratic rank-waving."
"Yeah, okay," Striker agreed. "Says here, Doggo can up one of his Attributes with some training and a whole lot of 'consumable reserves' math. I don't want to take him off the duty roster long enough to really amp up his strength, even if we had a weight resistance rig designed to teach a four-legged creature how to lift. But his official rating in 'mechanical aptitude' is a big 'Naas'. What am I supposed to multiply by ten, exactly?"
Rico went to rub the bridge of his nose where some of the advanced tactical controls in his helmet occasionally pinched him. The stylus in his hand got in the way.
"Now we're talking about giving your hound a sentient's level of abstract, layered reasoning," Rico said tiredly. "Starting, I presume, with zero-gee battlesuit operation?"
"On which he's already qualified," Striker agreed, "so we know it's a legitimate trail to pursue."
Rico looked at him.
"And sensors operation, no doubt." Rico reached for his mug. He dipped one finger in the spiced caf. He made a disappointed face but took a swig anyhow. "Next thing I know, you'll get Sparks to help you build a pilot rig so your hound can drive an AT-AT. Have the heavy laz fire when he barks."
Startled, Striker glanced down at the sleeping Doggo. He grinned. "I like how you think, Cap!"
"Jiminy." Rico put his mug back on the warming plate with a thunk. "I'd send you to explain yourself to a moral authority, only I have a bad feeling about the next budget review in the aftermath. I don't know how the system is meant to handle a starting point of 'ten times zilch', Striker, so let's not tempt fate. Okay?"
"I bet I can talk the chaplain around," Striker said, his voice full of supportive earnestness.
"You refrain from dumping this chore onto Vanya's comconsole," Rico instructed crisply. "She's on some kind of a stolen property investigation. She's inbound toward Procopia System and will probably get here in a couple of weeks, so you can request her opinions as usual. But this is your chore to finish today, not hers to tackle in twelve days."
Striker resumed grumbling. "She probably knows some way around the math problem. I don't want to ping a mentat for this."
Rico decided that this level of mutter did not require his attention.
To Increase an Attribute:
- Check the range of Attributes for the character's species.
Non-sentient "creatures" (like Doggo Hayc, as discussed above) and Droids lacking personality matrices may not have all of the Character Attributes. To add them to an existing character sheet -- to make the mathematical leap from 0d+0 up to a character minimum of 1d+0 -- is going to fall under the heading of "Add a Special Ability that the Character does not already have."All playable species have a listed minimum and maximum for each Attribute. To be below this range is to suffer a severe debilitation that prevents participation in an adventure. To be above this range is not directly possible within our campaign. Other resources can be used to add dice to Attribute rolls, for example Power Armor often adds dice to its wearer's Strength Attribute, but the physical form has its inviolable upper limits.
- Attributes may only be increased one pip at a time.
- Spend a healthy chunk of banked Character Points.
The cost in Character Points to increase an Attribute by one pip is 10 times the current number of dice to be rolled.
What's the number already in front of the "D"?
Spend TEN TIMES that many points to go up one notch.
The notches in question are:
- plus one;
- plus two;
- spend the same number of points as you did at either of the previous two notches.
Bump the number of dice up by one and resume the 'plus zero' notch.
The next new number in front of the D will apply when you try to go to "plus one" again. Not before.
- Spend quite a bit of continuous time in training for this Attribute ... and only in training for this Attribute!
If the character has a teacher -- not just a prerecorded holographic seminar and a few textbooks, mind -- then the training time is one standard week (five days) per Character Point spent. Since Attributes cost ten times the number of dice, that means the quickest Attribute increase will take ten weeks, equal to fifty days or a month and a half, to raise an Attribute from 1d+0 to 1d+1 .Without a teacher, the amount of time needed is doubled!
- Not used here: the WEG dice-off.
A WEG rule visible at d6 Holocron adds a contested roll between player and GM which could wind up costing Character Points without getting any Attribute Increase. We no longer use this rule.
- Raise most of the Skills under this Attribute by one pip as well.
All default Skills associated with this Attribute go up by one pip. This makes sense, since the character in question is defaulting to their Attribute to roll these skills anyhow.All General Skills associated with this Attribute go up by one pip. Yes, even if that Skill has already had a lot of advancement on its own. Yes, even if this means a Skill makes the bump from a "plus two" to its next die code plus zero. All of these increases are included in the Attribute increase!All Specialization Skills derived from General Skills associated with this Attribute also go up by one pip. They do not double that to go up by two pips.No Advanced Skills associated with this Attribute raise by anything in association with the pip increase of the Attribute. Neither do Specializations of Advanced Skills.
Learn a new skill.
Rico leaned back in his chair so that he could roll his head against the backrest. "You have gone mighty quiet over there," he said. "Find a new, horrifying Advanced Skill to inflict on me?"
"Nah."
That made Rico sit up again, astonished. "No?"
To judge by the sharp, darting motions of his stylus, Striker was working out some math on a scratch screen. "Don't want to deal with any mystic woo melee weaponry," he said. "Doggo Fu works just fine, he doesn't need to learn Echani. Medicine skill don't make sense for Doggo's wheelhouse. Same goes for Space Transports Engineering, Droid Engineering, that sort of thing."
While Rico knew it was self-defeating to argue the point, he found himself saying, "They are not all Technical Aptitude based."
Striker shrugged one shoulder. "We are not going to get trained on Economics or Beast Riding, neither."
Rico was pleased to note that two particular "Advanced Skills" were not even considered valid to mention.
"What are you going to have him pick up, then?"
"I want him to pick up some proficiency in con, under Perception. He can usually tell when I'm pranking him, but I want him to get better at picking up on deceitful body language in strangers, especially if they're in Alliance or ImpSec uniforms that aren't really theirs."
"Hunh." Rico thought that over. He liked the idea. "He might need a couple of Cultures specializations, too. Or a Scholar in how clothing smells differ based on how often the same person wears them and for how long."
"Oh, frell. I hadn't thought of that." Striker looked at his scratch sheet. He looked at the instruction manual. He looked back at his calculations in progress. "One specialization in using his sniffer is a smarter way to spend his points. Training time, too, since I can probably arrange a teacher for the odor thing sooner than I would find a time slot for an animal behaviorist who can design a 'learn all these uniforms' course. And it will layer on top of the con skill in tandem with his existing search, once we're using it on duty station. Thanks, Cap."
To Add a Skill to the Character:
- Determine whether this is a General Skill that follows the main Attribute-based rules, or a Specialization of a General Skill, or an Advanced Skill, or a Specialization of an Advanced Skill.
Most skills are going to be the General type. If parentheses or colons get involved, it's a Specialization. If the skill's description includes a note about- (a) this skill not being possible to default to Attribute, and/or- (b) this skill requiring prior knowledge of other skills before it can be learned, and/or- (c) a capital "A" listed with it that may be in parentheses or bolded or otherwise given emphasis,then this Skill is an Advanced Skill rife with complications.
- Refer to your notes from the most recent adventure to confirm whether you used the skill (via defaulting to Attribute) and can therefore avoid training.
If the skill was used for a pertinent purpose, this counts as training! The more often a skill was used before trying to officially add it to the character sheet, the less likely that the Gamemaster will scowl over the idea of listing the new skill as "learned" during a brief time-skip between adventures.If the skill was not used during the recent adventure, it will require training. As with Attributes and Move, the training time necessary will double if the Character teaches themself instead of arranging for a teacher. Every Character Point of cost to learn the skill is going to require one standard week (five days) of training with a teacher, or two standard weeks (ten days) of self-directed training.
- Does the GM approve learning this skill at this time?
Tell the Gamemaster what skill is to be added, which type of skill it is, how much training time will be necessary, and what its starting die code will be.Sometimes the skill itself will be fine by the GM, but the amount of time available between adventures will not be sufficient. Sometimes the teacher will not be accessible for plot-tangential reasons.
- Calculate the cost in Character Points.
Most Skills, General or Specialization, are learned by paying the necessary points to increase from their parent die code by one pip. Advanced Skills start off differently, but Specializations of Advanced Skills also begin at a one pip increase. This process gets covered in more detail below; here is a brief overview.General SkillsStart with the Attribute upon which the Skill is based. Spend 1 Character Point per die in that Attribute to add a pip to the new General Skill.Write down on its own line in the appropriate field under the Attribute, the name of the skill and then the vertical line key called a "pipe" and then the die code -- but use "d" not "d6". Skills listed under an Attribute but lacking a die code are defaulting, not trained skills.--
brawling|3d+2
climbing/jumping|6d+0- example of two Strength-based skills on Doggo's character sheet--Doggo has Strength 3d+1. He added the brawling skill by paying for one additional pip above his Attribute level.Specializations (from General Skills)Start with the General Skill upon which the Specialization is based. Spend 1 Character Point per two dice in that General Skill to add a pip to the new Specialization. (Round fractions upward if two different Specializations are not being learned in the same continuous interval.)Write down on its own line in the Specializations field under the parent Attribute, the name of the general skill followed by a colon followed by a space and then the name of the Specialization. Without another space, type the vertical line key called a "pipe" and then the die code -- but use "d" not "d6". Specializations, by definition, have to be trained skills. They cannot have default values.--search: tracking|5d+0
- example of a Specialization among the Perception Skills on Doggo's character sheet.--Doggo has Perception 2d+0. He picked up the Search skill early in his life and increased it several times before he was taught the Tracking specialization.Advanced SkillsBuckle on your armor, folks. We're getting complex!Every Advanced Skill has at least one prerequisite upon which it is founded. The primary prerequisite skill must not only already be known as a trained (not default!) skill; it must have been trained up to at least 5d+0. Additional skills may also be required at levels ranging from 1d+0 up through 5d+0. The more valuable an Advanced Skill will be to seasoned adventurers, the more intricate will be its requirements.Once all of the prerequisites are in place, most Advanced Skills cost 2 Character Points to learn. It might be more expensive according to its description. It will never be less expensive.All Advanced Skills require training at the usual rate: a standard week per Character Point of dedicated learning from a teacher, two standard weeks per Character Point plus extra trouble gifted by the Gamemaster to teach oneself a brand new Advanced Skill at 1d+0 .Write down on its own line in the Advanced Skills field under the parent Attribute, the name of the skill and then the vertical line key called a "pipe" and then the die code -- but use "d" not "d6". Advanced Skills, by definition, have to be trained skills. They cannot have default values.--Cybernetic Engineering|4d+0
- example of a Technical Advanced Skill on the character sheet of Yavio the Bloodsmith Raider.--Doggo has not got any Advanced Skills. Yavio had to learn 5d or more in Cybernetics Repair and at least 1d+0 in First Aid before she could start designing her own cybernetics.Advanced Specializations (from Advanced Skills)Start with the Advanced Skill upon which the Advanced Specialization is based. Spend 1 Character Point per one die in that Advanced Skill to add a pip to the new Advanced Specialization. (Round fractions upward if two different Specializations are not being learned in the same continuous interval.)Write down on its own line in the Advanced Skills field under the parent Attribute, the name of the advanced skill followed by a colon followed by a space and then the name of the Specialization. Without another space, type the vertical line key called a "pipe" and then the die code -- but use "d" not "d6". Specializations, by definition, have to be trained skills. They cannot have default values.--Medicine: Clone Trooper|7d+1
Medicine: Clan Venn Cybernetics|3d+2- example of two Advanced Specializations among the Technical Skills on Doc's character sheet.--Doc's list of complex niches in medical care keeps developing new branches. He has not volunteered to add Medicine: Veterinary to the list.
Improve an existing skill by one pip.
Striker glanced at the time. He had a quarter of an hour remaining before the deadline Rico mentioned; Striker felt like he needed to be done with at least five minutes to spare. He had to find some clear choice between the options still under consideration.
"How come Martial Arts is a Specialization of Brawling, anyway?" he asked. "This a hand-me-down from the Caamasi, too?"
"No," Rico said, "the Caamasi have cultural and biological reasons to stay far away from violence. Part of what made them good diplomats so early on."
Striker looked down at Doggo. "I can see we're going to spend a lot of time at the Senate Library later this month," he told the kath hound, "getting caught up on Alien Physiology Trivia."
Doggo showed his support in his usual method. "Bwoof."
"I am the eight times champion," Rico said mildly. He pulled up the checklist of forms he needed to complete by the end of his workday.
Striker moved quickly to retrieve the datapad out from under Doggo's head. "I'm almost done," he promised, scratching the good spot behind his dog's ears. To Rico, he said, "I figured for sure that any combat style more complex than throwing the occasional Corellian Short-Circuit has to be an Advanced Skill. You can't default it, plus it gets real useful mighty quick. Right?"
"Depends," Rico said. "Some specific combat styles do take that more intensive study, sure. Right now, though, you are looking at the Specialization Skill that couldn't afford a rigorous twenty week course."
Striker was interested despite himself. "I'll bite. Whose idea was a melee instruction speedrun, then? With an emphasis on making it cheaper?"
Rico smiled faintly at his holodisplay. "You can thank the Rebel Alliance for that one, jua'vod. Who wanted to teach your own cousin Yeager how to block a kick."
Striker tried to picture that. "I'd think 'plug the other party before they get their foot off the deck' would about cover it. Is there something more effective?"
"For a tech specialist, you really are such a sniper." Rico shook his head in mock dismay. "Anyway. This seems like a side issue, because Doggo is more about intel than combat. What's your real issue right now?"
Striker held the datapad with Doggo's official records a handspan above the subject snout across Striker's knee. "He can raise his Tracking, but then he wastes half a Character Point. He can improve his sneak like you suggested. Or I can just leave him a small reserve of unspent Character Points. I am trying to decide which best befits his career."
Rico gave Striker a wary glance. "What, is he already thinking about his prospects for promotion?"
A cackle of glee burst out of Striker.
"Just what the Beskar Aran needs," Rico continued, "Sergeant Doggo Hayc. Commanding his own detail of Privates fresh off their Orientation course. Also you, demoted for that express purpose. Rangir, man, the point of this whole task is to make clear that Doggo is one of the Beskar; we've all got his back. Sign him up for training that you think he'd enjoy learning. Don't sweat the snack plate, right?"
At the sound of a favorite word, Doggo circled around the desk to nudge Rico's hands.
"Now you're committed, you know," Striker said.
"This request is supposed to get filed through proper channels," Rico told Doggo. He unlocked the top drawer in his desk anyway, extracted a familiar oval cracker and presented it to the kath hound. "That's all the snack my office will issue today, Troop. Back to your station."
Carrying his snack delicately, Doggo circled around Striker's chair twice before he flopped down at Striker's right to eat.
Striker peeked at the time. "There's no skill for cadging baked goods out of superior officers, so let's call this a vote toward Tracking." He made the necessary last few changes to the form, then flicked it in the direction of Rico's console. "Finished, Cap."
"Thank the Force." Rico opened the file. He skimmed it at top speed, doing math in his head to make sure the numbers came out right. With minutes left, he scrawled a signature in the waiting box to send it one floor down. "Done. Call it a day, Striker. Slot that datacard into the locker room reader when you report for duty every morning, right after you scan yours, and otherwise he can keep it in his collar. And now, if any," Striker watched his cousin forcibly edit the slightly pejorative natborn out of his sentence, "Tapani natives bring up superficial concerns, the weight of the entire mercenary guild will squash them flat."
For a moment of stillness punctuated only by crunching, Striker bathed in the unspoken endorsement from multiple hundred comrades in arms.
"You realize, that won't stop everybody?" he said cautiously.
"Eh." Rico finished off his spiced caf. "Thumper volunteered to receive those complaints. He hates kath hounds in general. But Doggo's family, and a Troop. Thumper looks forward to relieving any would-be whiners of their pocket change in 'processing fees' that get their complaints exactly nowhere."
To Increase an Existing Skill:
- Refresh your memory as to what type of skill this is.
Here is a starting task that should take no time at all! What Attribute is it under? Which box is it in?
- Refer to your notes from the most recent adventure to confirm whether you used the skill for something plot-relevant and can therefore avoid training.
If the skill was used for a pertinent purpose, this counts as training! The more often a skill was used before trying to upgrade it, the less likely that the Gamemaster will scowl over the idea of raising the skill by one pip during a brief time-skip between adventures.If the skill was not used during the recent adventure, it will require training. As with Attributes and Move, the training time necessary will double if the Character teaches themself instead of arranging for a teacher. Every Character Point of cost to learn the skill is going to require one standard week (five days) of training with a teacher, or two standard weeks (ten days) of self-directed training.
- Does the GM approve increasing this skill at this time?
Tell the Gamemaster what skill is to be improved, which type of skill it is, how much training time will be necessary, and what its resulting die code will be.Sometimes a boost to the skill itself will be fine by the GM, but the amount of time available between adventures will not be sufficient. Sometimes the teacher will not be accessible for plot-tangential reasons.
- Calculate the cost in Character Points.
Advancement of any Skill, no matter its type, begins with the number of dice rolled at its current die code. (This is the number before the "d", ignoring the pips for the moment.)
What's the number already in front of the "D"?
Spend that many points to go up one notch.
The notches in question are:
- plus one;
- plus two;
- spend the same number of points as you did at either of the previous two notches.
Bump the number of dice up by one and resume the 'plus zero' notch.
The next new number in front of the D will apply when you try to go to "plus one" again. Not before.
- A General Skill costs one Character Point per die in order to raise the Skill by one pip.Note: This will not affect any Specializations based off this General Skill. They are now separate skills.- A Specialization of a General Skill costs one Character Point per two dice in order to raise the Skill by one pip.In the event of fractions, either find another Specialization to raise that already has an odd number in front of the "d", or else round up the number of Character Points spent to the next whole number.- An Advanced Skill costs two Character Points per die in order to raise the skill by one pip.It may also involve adding Maneuvers or Techniques. Read your skill description! You worked so hard to have this complex skill!- An Advanced Specialization of an Advanced Skill costs one Character Point per die in order to raise the Skill by one pip.
Type
Natural
Teacher Certification
With all of these training time increases for self-taught improvement, it may be wise to hire a qualified instructor.
Plot armor -- that general concept of "I'm a Player Character, I really want to spend my Character Points before the next adventure, and the GM would quite like it if I could accomplish things, so some NPC somewhere will be happy to bestow enhancement upon me!" -- is not a reliable way to amuse the Gamemaster. On the other hand, "I asked a known Outlaw Tech from the last adventure to teach me Comconsole Operation, how far in debt am I to BoSS next time I pick up my datapad?" is nearly guaranteed to work.
Whether they have in-game certification as an instructor at any institute of learning across the Galaxy, the "teacher" must have the desired skill with a rating at least equal to what the student's skill will be after completing training. If a character is improving a Specialization, that teacher must have the rating in that exact Specialization, not only in the broader version of the Skill.
This does mean that members of the adventuring party might be able to teach one another some of their Skills! This will require
- getting GM permission,
- both Characters devoting the necessary training time to this one endeavour,
- roleplaying it out, and finally
- a dice check to see if the teaching Character imparts actual skill or botches the job.
- see also pg 33, Star Wars 2nd Edition Revised and Expanded by Bill Smith,
published by West End Games in 1996.
published by West End Games in 1996.
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Author's Notes