Star Wars: The Force Awakens RPG Review

Long ago we played D&D, creating worlds in our imagination. Sure, they were remarkably similar to Lord of the Rings, but still, we got to be the heroes. As time and technology marched on, developers put more on the table and our imaginations shut down, content to marvel at others’ sculpting prowess or mapmaking artistry. After powering through quality modular dungeon crawlers and attempts at one-night fantasy adventure, my imagination reignited and I picked up FFG’s latest Star Wars RPG effort, The Force Awakens Beginner Game. It was time to quit marveling at others’ art and create my own adventures.

Two of my players were veterans of Imperial Assault and its ilk but had never role-played before, and all four were concerned when I didn’t send them anything to study before our session playing the introductory adventure except their characters’ sheets, detailing their back stories and abilities, but that’s the magic of Fantasy Flight’s system. Unlike some of their other tabletop offerings, the “read this first” setup works very well in its beginner sets, and the Game Master (GM) introduces players to the rules they need as they need them.

Well, read the review first, then…you get the idea

Like all good stories, this one begins with a battle, and all our heroes need to get through it is the system’s core mechanic, the skill check. Everything characters do - whether capping Stormtroopers or deceiving cantina patrons - involves a roll of the dice, pairing the characters’ success dice with a number of setback dice dictated by the GM and dependent on the difficulty of the attempt. Roll once, compare successes and failures, and the higher total determines the winner. Three levels of achievement or shortfall convey additional bonuses or penalties, some of which are governed in the rules, but most are left to the GM’s storytelling discretion. And that discretion is definitely the better part of adventure.

Two successes remain with one un-canceled threat? Looks like you hit your target, but your blaster jammed, so you have to spend your next action fixing it. Two failures left and an un-cancelled advantage symbol? You failed to slice the star destroyer’s computer, but you’ve gained knowledge of its code, so you get to add a die to your next attempt. Everything hinges on this roll, and it works. Simple, clean and wide open for imaginative addition. The other bonus of this system: the GM has one answer to every question, in twenty-seven parts for you old-schoolers. If a wisecracking player tells you he wants to jump a thousand-foot chasm, simply nod, tell him to pick up one success die and ninety-seven failure dice (full disclosure: you’ll need to buy additional dice packs to make this happen. Curse your brilliance, FFG) and roll away. If they complain about their odds of success, remind them that 1) this was their idea, and 2) in a galaxy far, far away, never tell me the odds.

Level two of this aforementioned cursed brilliance is the future of your intrepid characters after the Discovery on Jakku intro adventure is played out. Over the course of three separate encounters, rules are discovered, the plot is laid forth and the characters take their first step into a larger world. But the next steps reside completely in the GM’s noggin, because FFG has no plans of producing a core book set in Rey, Finn and Poe’s generation, and what this knowledge does to your overall mood concerning this beginner game depends, like a great many things, on your point of view.

Me? I’m thrilled. My imagination has been given carte blanche to create a new generation (not a next generation) of adventure, free from the binders of how the original trilogy turned out, which definitely requires a leap, because no matter which of FFG’s three core books you choose to expand your galaxy, they’re all set in the Rebellion era. Using them straight-up is like roleplaying a Waffen SS unit in WWII; no matter how many successes you roll, you know how it turns out. But The Force Awakens era is a wide-open expanse laid out before the imaginative GM to create their own future, since as of this writing, Episodes VIII and IX haven’t reached theaters, so we don’t yet know that Rey is Kylo’s twin, Luke sacrifices himself in VIII and she kills all the bad guys in the end. This universe is what you and your friends make of it.

Those who might need more guidance will find this leap of faith frustrating, and while the beginner game rules allow for new character generation, they offer precious few paths except those laid out for its starting party of four, and absolutely no rules concerning the Force. But if you search your feelings, and acquire one of the existing core books, you’ll find a wide-open hyperspace lane stretching out before you. Trapped in a star destroyer, two characters wanted to take their time finding the right escape ship, confident the fried blast door controls would keep the First Order at bay, but another one admonished, “Get a move on. They’re going to get through that door. This is Star Wars.” I smiled. Not because they’d gotten into character, but because he was right. This is Star Wars.