Edging out Edge Of The Empire

As per my last post, I visited Dragonmeet early in December. I came back with a copy of the much discussed Edge Of The Empire beta book, published by Fantasy Flight Games.For those not in the know, this is literally the beta version of the first Star Wars RPG in FFG's trio of games coming in the next couple of years. The Edge Of The Empire is focused around the time of Episode IV when the Empire is in charge and the rebellion has started, but is still very much on the back foot.The game is more about the fringes of society, the scum and villainy of the Star Wars universe.

I own all of the previous attempts at a Star Wars RPG and have enjoyed reading them all, if not playing them. I'm always on the lookout for a new Star Wars gaming experience and was excited to get the book. Having read through it quickly, i'm impressed with the book and what the designers are trying to do with the game. Unfortunately I have a problem. The people I game with are not really interested in buying into new mechanics. I've had this problem with other games, notably Mutants and Masterminds. i realised quickly that I would have to do a lot of work to run the game because my players are not going to run out an buy the book or read up on the mechanics which means I have to do a lot of explaining as we play, accept that the players are not going to get the most out of the system or write up a metric shit ton of crib sheets.

I have decided, therefore, to do what any sensible person would do and that is use Savage Worlds to run the adventure in the core book. I'll get my guys to create characters in SW using a system they know and understand. I'll run the core book adventure on the fly, using stats cribbed from other people's Star Wars conversion for Savage Worlds and then if the game takes, I may try and get them to port their characters over to Edge Of The Empire.

I'll let you know how that bright idea pans out.