Getting Started
Introduction
This guide provides the fundamentals necessary to play in Star Wars Universe using West End Games’ famous D6 System roleplaying game rules. The rules contained in this guide are a simplified form of the D6 System as used in the Star Wars Role Playing Game. This game is compatible in all ways with the full version of the game, and everything within this game will work with the full version. If you’re reading this guide, you are probably quite familiar with role playing games. In case you need a refresher or to explain it to your friends, we suggest telling them that this is an interactive storytelling game wherein they play the part of major characters in the story. Ifthat rouses their curiosity, let them read this introduction. You might also want to start with this introduction if you’ve roleplayed before getting this book but it wasn’t with the D6 System.
What Is a Roleplaying Game?
A roleplaying game is very much like improvisational acting or interactive storytelling – but with rules. Many video games are like this, and there are plenty of online interactive worlds, so chances are good that you know what a roleplaying game is about. This roleplaying game, however, doesn’t need any expensive equipment, special software or cartridges, or a connection to the Internet.
What Do I Need to Play?
To play this game, you need this book, some paper, something to write with, some six-sided dice, a lot of imagination, and a group of people, one of whom is willing to act as the guiding force in the game.
This person is called many things, but “gamemaster” serves well as a short-hand for someone who presents information about the game setting, creates obstacles for the other players to overcome, takes the part of the people the players encounter, and adjudicates the rules. The rest of the group, simply called “the players,” take on roles of major characters in the story that they and the gamemaster create together.
The stories are called “adventures;· or “scenarios:’ Very short adventures, usually encompassing only one or two obstacles to a simple goal, are referred to as “encounters.” A series of encounters can become an adventure, while a series of adventures can turn into a campaign.
System Overview
This overview provides basic concepts essential to roleplaying with the D6 System. The concepts presented herein are further explained in the rest of this book, and an introductory adventure will give you a chance to try out what you’ve learned here.
Making Actions
Each player has a character with attributes and skills that describe how well he or she can perform various actions. Attributes represent a character’s innate abilities, while skills are specific applications of those abilities.
Most game mechanics in the D6 System involve rolling some six sided dice. A die code associated with each attribute and skill represents how good the character is in that area. A die code associated with a weapon shows how much harm it can cause. The larger the number, the more experienced, trained, or naturally adept your character is, or the more deadly the weapon, or the more useful the equipment.
Each die code indicates the number of six-sided dice you roll when you want your character to do something (10, 20, 30, 40, 50, etc.), and sometimes an amount (called pips) of’+ 1″ or”+ 2;’ which is added to the total result you roll on the dice.
Example: If your character’s Strength attribute is 30+ 1, when you have her try to lift a cargo container, you would roll three dice and add 1 to the total to get her result.
To represent the randomness of life (and the tons of little modifiers that go along with it), every time you roll dice, make sure that one of them is of a different color than the others. This special die is the Wild Die, and it can have some interesting effects on your dice total. (If you only have one die to roll, then that die is the Wild Die.)
If the Wild Die comes up as a 2, 3, 4, or 5, add the result to the other dice normally. If the Wild Die comes up as a 6, this is a Critical Success. Add the 6 to your other dice results and roll the Wild Die again. As long as you roll a 6, you keep adding the 6 and you keep rolling. If you roll anything else, you add that number to the total and stop rolling. If the Wild Die comes up as a 1 on the first roll, this is a Critical Failure. Tell the gamemaster, who will let you know whether or not to add it to your total.
The higher you roll, the better your character accomplishes the task at hand. When your character tries doing something, the gamemaster decides on the required skill and a difficulty based on the task’s complexity. The gamemaster doesn’t usually tell you the difficulty number you need to equal or beat to succeed. He often won’t inform you which tasks are easier and which are harder, though he might give you hints.
(“Hmmm, catching your grappling hook around that small outcropping is going to be pretty hard … .”) The gamemaster then uses the rules to interpret the die roll and determine the results of the action.
Taking Damage
To describe how much injury a character can sustain, you use Wounds.
With the Wounds system, each character has a certain number of Wounds. You roll your character’s Strength while the attacker rolls damage. Compare the difference between the damage and the Strength roll a Wounds level chart; the chart lets you know how many Wounds your character gets from the attack. In either system, when your character has no more Body Points or Wounds left, she’s toast.
Improving Rolls
In addition to scores for a character’s attributes and skills, she has Force Points and Character Points. You can spend these points in particularly difficult and heroic situations.
When you spend a Character Point, you get to roll one extra die when you character tries to complete a task. You may choose to spend a Character Point after you’ve madea roll (in case you want to improve your result).
When you spend a Fate Point, that means your character is using all of her concentration to try to succeed. You may spend a Fate Point only before any die rolls are made. Doing so doubles the number of dice you normally roll, usually for one round and one action only; though the gamemaster may allow players to spend more Fate Points in particularly challenging moments. This allows the character to do one action really well.
Once a Character Point or Force Point is used, it’s gone. You gain more Character Points at the end of a game for completing goals and playing well. You may get back Force Points at the end of the game if they were used at a brave, heroic, or climactic moment.
Key Terms
These definitions provide you with a general idea of what each term means; they are described in more detail within the book. Terms italicized within each definition refer to another entry within this glossary.
Action: A task that the character undertakes or something that the character does, like give a speech or climb a wall.
Active Defence Value: A number the character gets when concentrating on getting out of the way of an attack.
Armor Value: A die code representing the amount of protection a defensive covering provides. It can help determine the damage resistance total. This term is sometimes abbreviated AV.
Body Points: One of two ways of indicating the amount of injury a character can sustain, listed as a number. The damage total is subtracted from the character’s current Body Point total. May be used alone or with Wounds.
Character Point: A bonus representing a surge of adrenaline or that extra luck the main characters of a story seem to have. Allows the user to roll an additional Wild Die.
Combat Difficulty: A number representing how challenging it is to attack someone or something. It equals the active defence value or the passive defence value.
Complementary Skill: A skill whose results could aid in the use of another skill.
Creation Points: Points used when designing a character to purchase die codes in game characteristics or other features that represent the character’s abilities, experience, and background.
Critical Failure: A result, represented by a I, on the Wild Die that indicates something bad has occurred.
Critical Success: A result, represented by a 6, on the Wild Die that indicates something good has happened. Generally, the player adds the 6 to the current total and rolls again, adding and re-rolling as long as a 6 comes up.
D (as in “1D”): An abbreviation for “six-sided dice.” The number in front of the “D” is part of the die code, and lets you know how many six-sided dice to roll.
Damage Resistance Total: A number that indicates how much injury a character or object can absorb, soak, or deflect.
Damage Total: A number representing how much injury or destruction something has caused.
Defaulting to an Attribute: Using the die code for an attribute when the character doesn’t have a higher die code in the needed skill.
Die Code, Score: The number of six-sided dice players roll (ID, 2D, 3D, 4D, 5D, etc.), and sometimes an amount (called pips) of “+1 or “+2” that is added to the total result that came up on the dice. “Die code” and “score” are used interchangeably. difficulty: A number representing how challenging it is to perform an action.
Fate Point: A bonus representing that a character is using all of her concentration to try to succeed. Allows the player to, at least, double the number of dice on one roll. Sometimes the gamemaster will provide other benefits.
Free Action: Any action that needs only a few seconds to perform or do, such as taking a few steps or glancing quickly around a room.
Modifier: A number or die code that is added or subtracted from another number or die code to represent a change in the typical situation.
Opposed Difficulty / Opposed Roll: A difficulty that applies when one character resists another character’s action. In this case, both characters roll die codes related to the activity and compare them.
Passive Defense Value: A number representing a character’s innate ability to get out of the way of danger. It usually equals 10.
Pip: An added bonus to the total result that came up on the dice. A “+I” means one is added to the total, while “+ 2” means two is added.
Range (in combat): The distance from the attacker to the target.
Result Points: The difference between the total rolled with an attribute’s or skill’s die code and the difficulty of an action.
Result Point Bonus: Usually, one-half (rounded up) of the result points figured for an action. It sometimes may be used to affect other rolls.
Round: A unit of time equal to five seconds in the game world. Figuring out what happens in a round can take longer.
Scale: A game mechanic representing that opponents of vastly different sizes can affect each other differently in combat.
Standard Difficulty: A number, generally selected from a chart, assigned to an action based on how challenging it is.
Strength Damage: A die code representing the amount of harm a character can do because of his or her physical prowess.
Toughness: A die code representing the amount of damage an object can take, similar to a character’s Physique attribute.
Unskilled Modifier / Untrained Modifier: A modifier added to an action’s difficulty that represents the increased difficulty of doing something without the right training or experience. The terms are used interchangeably.
Wild Die: A six-sided die, of a different colour or size from other dice used, that represents the randomness of life, with the I and the 6 indicating a special result (see Critical Failure and Critical Success).
Wounds: The way damage is determined to a character within the D6 System.