Star Wars Roleplaying Game — Saga Edition

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, a ... company called Wizards of the Coast abandoned Star Wars fans who enjoyed their tabletop roleplaying game to an awful fate: product death. The Star Wars d20 product line, which saw print from 2000 to late 2004, attempted to capture the epic adventure that is the Star Wars setting within a simple quantifiable ruleset. Unfortunately, the d20 rules (circa 2000) were far too clumsy to make the RPG 'feel' like Star Wars. Even a 2002 Revised Core Rules book did little to create an intuitive play experience. Now, in time for the setting's 30th anniversary, Wizards has released a brand new edition of the rules, marking a relaunch of the product line. Dubbed the 'Saga Edition', it has completely revamped the d20 rules to meet with demands for Star Warsyness. Read on for a review of the changes, which may finally bring the fun to the galaxy far, far away.

Star Wars Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook, Saga Edition
author	Christopher Perkins, Owen K.C. Stephens, Rodney Thompson
pages	286
publisher	Wizards of the Coast
rating	9/10
reviewer	Zonk
ISBN	0786943564
summary	The newest edition of the Star Wars tabletop roleplaying game.

The first notable thing about the Saga edition of Star Wars d20? It is small. Instead of the normal 9 x 11 footprint of almost every other gaming book, Saga Edition looks more like a coffee table book, measuring a petite 9 x 9 inches. It's over 100 pages thinner than 2002's Revised Core Rules book, too. A few pages in, and it's obvious that the loss in size and thickness has not come at the price of production quality. The entire tome is full color glossy paper throughout. While there is quite a bit of art reused from previous products, there are also a number of notable original works peppering the pages. What's not there, to my relief, are the needlessly huge quotes from the movies. There are quotes, to be sure, but they're used sparingly. It is laid out to provide the maximum amount of information in the minimum space; a significant improvement over previous main books.The Revised Core Rules seemed to have a half-page-sized quote every three pages, turning most of its 400ish pages into wasted white space. Saga Edition is a tight, well crafted book.

That attention to detail extends to the rules as well, which may be the most refined version of the d20 mechanic yet released in an official Wizards product. Gone are the cumbersome concepts of Armor Class, Defense, Vitality points, and Saving Throws used by other products. The game takes a simple approach: every Star Wars character is a hero. As such, it's possible for every character to take part in every scene, to one degree or another. Character Level, then, becomes the tie that binds every other mechanic. Almost every d20 roll you'll be making is modified by your character's level; neurotically min/maxing every aspect of your character is no longer a requirement.

The difference, of course, is that your choice of class determines your character's specialties. Everyone can participate in the scene where the party flees from the Imperial Star Destroyer in a cargo ship. The star of the show, though, is the Scoundrel at the helm. Classes have been revamped to allow for several 'builds'. Seemingly taking a cue from Blizzard videogame titles, every class has a trio of talent trees. Talents accumulate from these trees as characters gain levels, allowing for my Scoundrel to be completely different from your Scoundrel. Further customization is encouraged by allowing free multi-classing. Prestige classes further this idea of customization by allowing access to novel talent trees, as well as mixing and matching talent trees from multiple base classes. The Officer, for example, allows access to trees from the Soldier and Noble classes.

The best part is, as far as I can tell, none of these classes are completely useless. The Noble, which had a poorly-understood role in previous editions, has become something of a social hacker/bard character. Smooth talking abilities and talents that improve the capabilities of her fellow characters combine into a highly effective support class. The designers have as much as admitted that these changes were prompted by the Jedi. Instead of tuning everything so that the Jedi beat everything else, the Jedi is the baseline all other classes were tuned to. Every character made under Saga Edition rules is going to be some kinda badass.

Badassery in combat is the focus of many class abilities, of course, and it's going to be easier than ever to convey that to players. Combat is dirt simple. There are very few ways to modify in-combat die rolls. The endless hunting for a +1 to hit here or a +2 to hit there will not longer be required. Even better, every character only gets a single attack per combat round, regardless of their level. High level D&D games are marked by endless dice rolling, as characters make a ludicrous number of attacks in a frighteningly short amount of time. And if you really want to attack more than once a round in Saga Edition, you can; you just take penalties for it, penalties more easily compensated for at higher levels.

An additional decrease in the fiddly-factor comes from skills. Instead of requiring you to track skill points, which must be slotted into a dizzying array of strangely over-specific disciplines, skills in Saga Edition are a binary state. Either you're trained or untrained in a skill. Thus, a skill roll looks like this: d20 + half your character's level + relevant ability score (strength for climbing, etc.) + 5 if you are trained. That's it. This mechanic, then, allows even the Princess Leia to fly the Falcon for a short while, or a merciless bounty hunter to sweet talk a taciturn guard; or, at least, it allows for the possibility of such a thing happening. There are far fewer skills as well, with specific uses outlined in the book. The skills Spot, Listen, and Search have all been combined into Perception, for example. This one skill also allows a character to ascertain an object's wealth (Appraise) and see through duplicity from another character (Sense Motive). Thus, with fewer skills to keep track of, players and GMs are encouraged to make heavier use of the few that still remain. Fun without the fuss is the order of the day.

The rules section that benefits most from these rule revamps is the vehicle combat section. Formerly an arcane labyrinth of edge cases and complex maneuvers, simple skill checks and combat tests now allow dogfights and space-based combat to drop neatly into the middle of a Saga Edition campaign. For example, ships are now functionally creatures; characters inside the ships alter die modifiers, and can act independently, but there is no longer a need to keep elaborate track of ship statistics as opposed to crew statistics. The two are now one and the same.

Though I've yet to have the chance to roll dice in a Saga Edition campaign, it's hard not to be impressed by the rule changes this book represents. Essentially the cutting edge of tabletop RPG rules, Saga Edition has the benefit of more than seven years of modern roleplaying design and dozens of gaming books to prove out ideas. The book was helmed by Chris Perkins, a Dungeons and Dragons R&D veteran, and it really shows. It's been a long time since I read through an RPG manual with such enthusiasm; the clarity and precision with which the designers have conveyed their ideas does nothing less than inspire excitement. Based on a tried and true mechanic, eschewing complexity for approachability, and integrating tightly with the miniatures game for even more simplicity, this may be the best product WotC has put out in years. While I'm not eager for a D&D 4th Edition, more products like this make such a concept seem much less repugnant. Highly recommended for tabletop playing Star Wars fans, and anyone interested in the future of d20 game design.

---

You can purchase Star Wars Roleplaying Game Core Rulebook, Saga Edition from amazon.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

How do I mod this ad down?

Blatant advertising. There's even a click-to-order link.

Re:How do I mod this ad down?

Blatant advertising. There's even a click-to-order link.

Last I remember, all /. book reviews had links to Barnes & Noble or some other such big-box book store. There's always a top level post in the comments that goes something like this "Why is there always a B&N link to the book? You can find it for $X.XX cheaper at Amazon [link to Amazon page]"

So, it's nice to see the Amazon link right in the article. Though, it's up to the critic to make it good or bad, 'reviews' are always a form of advertisement. It's usually common practice to give away samples as 'media kits' to get reviews in newspapers and magazines.

Cheers,
Fozzy

Star warsiness?

Is there a saving throw against hype?
Does a +10 charisma for small children give you an extra six trillion credits?
Can we actually slay George Lucas?

Re:Star warsiness?

"Does a +10 charisma for small children give you an extra six trillion credits?"

Not sure for others, but my +10 charisma for small children got me 10 years AND I have to register as a sex offender where ever I go. :-)

Re:Star warsiness?

No, you can't slay George Lucas, but you CAN roll for initiative to see who really shoots first!

Rules size

Instead of the normal 9 x 11 footprint of almost every other gaming book, Saga Edition looks more like a coffee table book, measuring a petite 9 x 9 inches. It's over 100 pages thinner than 2002's Revised Core Rules book, too. A few pages in, and it's obvious that the loss in size and thickness has not come at the price of production quality.

I should hope not. The massive and unwieldy size of the 9x11 rule books stems from the inexpensive printing of such sizes. By printing on such large paper (usually in mono-color black and white) they can reduce the cost of both printing and binding. Just run the paper through the printer, staple, and fold.

Printing in smaller sizes is bound to be a sign of quality rather than the lack thereof. Especially if grayscale, color, or (*gasp*) glossy paper are used.

Now if someone could just rewrite the Starfire rules in a format that makes sense to those new to the game... *grumble* *grumble* (Yes, I spent some God-aweful amount of time trying to decode rules that were listed completely out of order, spread across two volume for no real reason other than to confuse you.)

'Petite' coffee table book?

Instead of the normal 9 x 11 footprint of almost every other gaming book, Saga Edition looks more like a coffee table book, measuring a petite 9 x 9 inches.
 
Aren't "coffee table books" the really big ones? How is more petite more like a ctb?

Can't Win, eh? Eh?

The other day posters were complaining about the Sopranos not being 'news for nerds.'

Today they whine about this - Hey!

*slap*

D&D - Star Wars - this is what this site was built for!

Enjoy!

Capisce?

I predict good things!

Nothing signals success for a Star Wars RPG like a relaunch!

G.U.R.P.S.

Did G.U.R.P.S. have a Star Wars version or am I remembering wrong?

Re:G.U.R.P.S.

No, not Gurps. It was West End Games that had the Star Wars RPG license for a long time. It was a fun game. I'd be interested to know how this stacks up against it.

You could always do a sort-of LARP-ish thing...

501st Legion of Stormtroopers [501st.com]

You're kidding me, right?

neurotically min/maxing every aspect of your character is no longer a requirement.

It was a requirement before? The amount of fun you could have in a game was determined by how high a certain attribute was, as opposed to the interaction you had between the players and the GM? I guess if you measure success by "I can do more damage in less time than you, therefore my character is cooler and I win the game" it's a requirement...

The endless hunting for a +1 to hit here or a +2 to hit there will not longer be required.

See above. It doesn't matter if you can get a +1 for a flank attack or +2 because you're within 10' of the target. The dice really, honestly, seriously don't matter that much. Why undergo "endless hunting" to get a bonus to a roll? Just roll the die, see what happens, and take it from there. The GM's not out to get you, and if he is, he's a bad GM.

Thus, a skill roll looks like this: d20 + half your character's level + relevant ability score (strength for climbing, etc.) + 5 if you are trained. That's it.

"That's it," spoken like it's really simple. Simple in comparison to cross-referencing the results of four die rolls on six tables, sure, but that's still needlessly complex.

This is one thing that has always bemused me- how some people are so focused on the mechanics and gaming the system that they miss the fact that they're playing a game with friends. You're telling a story together, you're solving puzzles together, you're (get this) role-playing together. Yes, of course, there's no one way to play a RPG, who am I to tell people how to have fun in a game, but it seems all too often people misspell the first word in the abbreviation: it's role, not roll. Kudos to WOTC for making this "fun without fuss," at least.

Rules Matter

Rules matter.

The rules tell you what the game is really about instead of what it claims to be about. A game might promise "exciting pulp action," but if the conflict system is highly lethal you're not going to see lots of exciting pulp moments in actual play. The heroes will either die quickly and pointlessly, or they'll become cautious. The very tone of the game is set by the rules.

The rules impact a player's success at fulfilling their vision for their character. To take Star Wars for example, say I want to be a great pilot. However, the rules set has enough complexity and tradeoffs that I accidentally build a decidedly sub-optimal pilot. As a result, another character, for whom "be a cool pilot" wasn't their goal but who is better at working the system, is the best pilot on the team and regularly outdoes you. That's no fun. Or maybe your vision is a dangerous Jedi, but poor choices in character generation mean a lone storm trooper is a major threat and a pair is insurmountable. Not terribly fun. Ultimately, having to resign yourself to being the hanger-on to the team because of lack of rules master isn't fun. A player should play a bumbler because they want to, not because they are forced to.

Now, a GM can fudge or outright ignore the dice to lead to more desirable results, but then why are you rolling? Your success and failure ends up having little to do with your preparation and design and is in the hands of the GM fiat. The resulting success is hollow.

A GM can modify the rules to try and improve things, but then you're playing a new game. If the rules need to be modified to make it better, surely the publisher should try to improve their source material so their customers don't need to do so. At the very least it will same countless GMs from wasting their time fiddling with the rules.

This is why the Star Wars overhaul is important. If it works, there should be fewer cases of PCs failing to meet expectations. The new tone of the rules says, "You're really cool all the time." The old set of rules said a bunch of things, including "You can be exceptionally cool in some ways if you've mastered the rules, but if you haven't you have a real chance of being just mediocre," and "You can be really cool in a few areas, but totally useless in others, or you can be unexceptional in a bunch of ways." Neither one of those seems to reinforce the pulp space-opera feel of Star Wars. The new rules help balance the playing field. A group of players, some of whom are love studying and using rules, and some who don't, have a more even chance of satisfying their visions for their characters.

Ultimately the focus on "role" play instead of "roll" play is the entire point of these changes. The resulting system, if the changes work, will encourage role-playing. If it works, it's a huge win for everyone.

West End Games Got It Right

Personally I think the d6 system that West End Games had for the original Star Wars RPG was close to perfect. It was simple, fun, and didn't get in the way of storytelling. Here's an article on the system: Star Wars role-playing game (WEG) [wikipedia.org]

It was easy as a Game Master to assign difficulty numbers to actions and have the characters roll against them. The die rolling was fun (everyone loves lots of dice) and the wild die added an element of excitement to the roll. I once had a player roll the wild die 4 times! Everyone around the table was going crazy, especially since that roll saved their butts.

Advancement was easy and made sense, the skills system worked well, and the source material was amazing. The source material was so good that Lucasfilm considered it an authoritative source for Timothy Zahn when he was writing Thrawn Trilogy.

I have tried playing the Star Wars d20 system and I have come to the conclusion that there is no point in playing anything but the West End Games d6 version. They got it right the first time and there is really no reason to switch to the flavor of the week.

A fatigue system makes no sense for Jedi.

The one thing the WEG version was missing was limits on using Jedi Powers. The ideal Star Wars, to me, combines the west end games version with Shadowrun. Fatigue for using special powers [...]

Since when do Jedi get tired from using the Force? That never happens in the movies, even when it looks like they're straining themselves doing something hard. The limits on Jedi powers seem to be more that of mental stumbling blocks than a reserve of stamina. Frankly, the idea of Jedi having limits on how often they can use their powers is quite contrary to the style and feel of Star Wars where Luke casually tosses mind-control around, and Qui-Gon throws droids around like he's playing a game of kick-the-can.

Must be said

I've got a bad feeling about this.

West End Games.....

I liked the West End Games version better. Too bad it's probably history since West End Games is gone (bought by Wizards of the Coast).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Wars_role-playin g_game_(WEG) [wikipedia.org]

D&D v4.0

Could these changes foreshadow the 4th edition of D&D?

Re:D&D v4.0

THAC0 is still there, it just has a different name.

From Wikipedia's entry [wikipedia.org]:

The formula to convert THAC0/AC to 3rd Edition "Attack Bonus" (and vice versa) is:
        * BAB = 20 - THAC0
        * THAC0 = 20 - BAB
        * 3rd Edition Armor Class = 20 - 2nd Edition Armor Class
        * 2nd Edition Armor Class = 20 - 3rd Edition Armor Class

In older versions of D&D, your armor's AC value is a set number; for the case of leather armor, it's AC is 7.

If your THAC0 is 17 and you roll a 14, did you hit or not? Well, you subtract your opponent's AC from your THAC0 to see what number you need to hit; in this case, 17 - 7 = 10, so you hit with a 14.

The THAC0 system is counter-intuitive; better armor has a lower score, and will run into negative. So a person with an AC of -5 is actually harder to hit than a nearly-naked person with an AC of 10. And, with those higher -- er, I mean lower -- AC values, you end up subtracting a negative from your THAC0.

In 3rd edition, it's the same range of scores and modifiers, only it's all done via addition instead of subtraction.

Your base AC is 10; studded leather armor gives you a +3 to AC, so your AC is 13. (Note that with the older THAC0/AC scheme, your AC would be 7; in 3rd edition, we're effectively adding the armor value to the base 10 instead of subtracting it, but it's the same delta from the "unarmored" AC.)

To hit your opponent, take your attack modifier (a 3rd-level fighter has a base attack bonus of +3, we'll ignore modifiers for high Strength and the like for this example) and add it to your die roll. So if you roll a 14, add the +3 for your attack modifier, you get a 17, which beats your opponent's AC of 13 by 4 points. Which, if you'll note, is the same delta as in the THAC0 example.

The advantage is that it's more intuitive. Instead of my THAC0 of 10 being so much better than your THAC0 of 17 and my kickass armor giving me an AC of 2 versus the poor unarmored mage's 10, I have a +10 to hit as opposed to your +3 to hit and my armor class is 18 versus that same mage's 10.

Jay (=

I'll Just Stick With...

My second edition Vampire: the Masquerade, thank you! Though I've been dying to get some experienced roleplayers together and give Call of Cthulhu (non d20!) a shot.

I think it's getting oversimplified

That attention to detail extends to the rules as well, which may be the most refined version of the d20 mechanic yet released in an official Wizards product. Gone are the cumbersome concepts of Armor Class, Defense, Vitality points, and Saving Throws used by other products.

How is this a good thing? I can understand why people might not like the Vitality/Wound system as opposed to straight HP (though I think V/W removes a lot of weird things that can happen with HP), but the rest are really pretty important in determining what characters are likely to win in combat.

but there is no longer a need to keep elaborate track of ship statistics as opposed to crew statistics. The two are now one and the same.

It's not like you had to do much re: crew stats before. You'd declare your action, make any relevant check, and move on.

Is the next edition of the rules just going to make it a free-form RPG?

Uncanny!

I was just discussing with a friend the other day, why I can't stand to play D&D any more. Frankly, it's all the number crunching and the min-maxing. Back when I started with 2nd Edition, that kind of thing was considered anathema-- "munchkin" to borrow the term that was used. When 3rd came out (and with it the first printing of the new Star Wars game), I was leery at first-- but the simplified mechanics won me over, because I can't stand doing math when I'm trying to have fun. Unfortunately, the number crunching came back with a vengeance-- 3rd and 3.5 had design aesthetics that strongly matched that of CRPGs (the concept of item 'slots', and a wide variety of 'buffs'), including the concept of character 'builds' tweaked for maximum efficiency. Munchkinism was no longer anathema, but virtually required.

This vaguely excites me, if only because they've stripped the numbers down again and apparently made an effort at developing a game that's fun, instead of an exercise in spreadsheet manipulation. Unfortunately, I don't think it's likely to last, because mudflation, feature creep and rule proliferation is pretty much necessary to sell additional sourcebooks. Nobody wants to buy the Complete Book of Twi'leks unless it comes with rules (and illustrations) for Doing That Thing That You Do With Your Lekku.

You can play games without books.

If you can't play Star Wars without a chart to tell you if a heavy blaster kills you more than a light rifle, you've missed the entire point of roleplaying games.

The Story.

Don't get me wrong. I understand some people need structure in their gaming experiences, and sometimes GMs need structure to control the players. But you don't need to spend 30-50 bucks on a main book and a hundred dollars on More Books just to play Star Wars. When you were a kid, you probably did it with sticks and no dice at all.

Imagine watching d20 Star Wars on the big screen. Before Luke and Leia go for that famous swing, there'd be 10 minutes of measuring the distance of the swing, checking the working load on the cable, verifying the sturdiness of the pipes the grapple attached too, checking Luke's strength vs Leia's weight, and rolling constantly for the Stormtroopers trying to open the door.

At that point, I've stopped eating popcorn.

Write your own system. Throw out the charts. Tell stories. It's more fun, more memorable, and a heck of a lot cheaper.

If you like spending money, then take that 150 bucks and buy 10 indie games you've never heard of, and spend some time reading their systems and learning how to take a few rules a long way. Check out octaNe or Dust Devils or Shambles or any of a hundred others.

Money, and time, well spent.

A good GM is never bound by the ruleset.

I played a little bit of the original variant of the d20 Star Wars game, and I don't see how the ruleset bound it from not feeling enough like Star Wars. A good GM is never bound by the ruleset, and I feel that I played with a GM talented enough to make our sessions fun and exciting. In fact, the close similarity to 3E DnD was helpful as we weren't hampered by having to totally relearn a whole new system.

Karma Restored

I think I can safely say this story cancels out yesterday's Soprano's article [slashdot.org]. All is well with the /. universe once again, carry on.

Screw the RPG

Wizards killed the Star Wars CCG, bastards...

Full color glossy paper?

A few pages in, and it's obvious that the loss in size and thickness has not come at the price of production quality. The entire tome is full color glossy paper throughout.

Am I the only one who looks at modern role-playing game manuals and gets a headache? This obsession with four-color printing on every page needs to go. The stupid doo-dads around every page number and obnoxious icons do nothing to improve the readability of the book. They probably do, however, help to justify charging $30 for a book that tells you how to play a game. Give me a 1980s-era AD&D manual any day.

Remember the 1st edition

As a kid we used to play the 1st version of the RPG that must have been released back in the late 80s. It was far more a slick a production than all of the other RPG books out there (I probably played 10-15 in my life), had humor (Storm Trooper recruitment posters and astromech droid ads), and a very cool dodge-first combat system. Everything was driven from D6s as I remember and accounted for armor penetration (idiotically omitted from games like the Robotech RPGs).

My favorite feature of the games though was that it distilled Star Wars down to its crucial elements for GMs to follow:

1. The characters are as unimpressed with their own gadgets as you would be with a remote. A ship's capatain should never shake his fist at a target on a giant view screen and yell to his crew "Fire the proton torpedoes!".
2. Technology just works. Don't worry about silly rationalizations like you see in Star Trek (sorry fans). But, know the limits of the technology.
3. The world is black and white. Some people just haven't picked sides yet. Very Romantic (not the soap opera definition).
4. The banter between characters is so colloquial. No technobabble.

My one disappointment with the new SW movies was that they'd forgotten these elements.

Why level-based?

I'd be a lot more excited if it weren't a level-based system; growth in "levels" was a fresh idea 30 years ago, but today there are better ways to handle character development. "No, you can't learn to swing this sword better without sacrificing a few wizard levels" makes zero sense. Point-buy systems are both more realistic and more fun, especially if you prefer a narrativist or simulationist outlook to a gamist approach.

I'm really not sure why anybody would write a level-based system these days, other than to fit the d20 branding. Would it be the end of the world if the new Star Wars game weren't d20-powered? If there's any brand that shouldn't need the d20 stamp to succeed as an RPG, Star Wars should be it.

Who needs the d20 version anyway?

I cut my teeth in role playing on the old West End Games Star Wars d6 system. I played the d20 and truth be told, spent the entire time missing the d6 system and material. I'd take the old standby d6 any day over what WotC put out. The real shame was not the original d20 version from Wizards meeting product death, but rather the West End Games version doing the same. I finally found all of the d6 material at a used bookstore and coughed up the cash to rescue it, so it couldn't be lost to me and my small collective of friends who miss the real classic Star Wars role playing experience.

Savage worlds

is the best system to run Star Wars in.
It catches the easy to remove Secondary characters A.K.A Mooks, and still makes for tough villains.
I hate it when the heros end up in a 1 hour fight with 4 stinking guards. It's not about the guards, it's about the story, the heros, the epic villains.

I want a game where the player is pretty good at the beginning, not after 2 years of play.

The HERO System

If you *really* wanted to run a campaign set in the Star Wars universe and you were willing to do a bit of work fleshing out some of the details then you could have used the HERO System [wikipedia.org] to run your game and it would have been a hell of a lot better than WotC d20 Star Wars. I know that HERO is a bit complex, but it really works well in groups of older gamers (who have better than high school level of education) with previous experience in similar RPG type games. The problem with d20 and similar simplified systems is that they are bound by their simplification to pre-determined and templated campaign styles and this is fine IF you just want to run quick and casual games where the action moves quickly at the expense of some realism and details. However, serious players with more refined tastes will appreciate the greater flexibility and freedom afforded by the HERO system when the game becomes longer, more detailed, and more drawn out in scope.

Worst, Starwars Adaption Ever

It might have some redeeming factors if they removed several key retardations of the Starwars universe... First, "drain" for using force powers... Dr. Weird has a word for that. Second, by the rules of d20 Starwars, the Emperor - despite his mass evilness and mastery of the darkside of the force - would be dead 1 year after the events in episode 1, at the LATEST.

Rules? Check. Setting? Um ...

That seems to be a review of the rules of the game. Thanks.

Where's the review of (what there is of) the setting info? Please just don't say 'Who needs it? It's Starwars!' :)

How about mentioning the index is godawful?

it was still better...

when it was a more open ended D6 system before wizards took over

Skills are wrong

" Thus, a skill roll looks like this: d20 + half your character's level + relevant ability score (strength for climbing, etc.) + 5 if you are trained. That's it."
 
If that's the case, why did my quick thumb-through the book at my local retailer turn up people with skills that have "plusses" such as "Negotiate +13"? Now I freely admit to not having read the skill use section, I just looked through it, but it seems what you say and what's in the book do not jive 100%... Of course, I could just be stoned; but there shouldn't be skill plusses if you get, as you say, +5 for skilled and +0 for not...

Cutting Edge

The Saga edition's a nice evolution, it's rather far from the cutting edge of anything. For the real cutting edge in tabletop roleplaying game design go here: http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/home.php [indiepressrevolution.com] or here http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/ [indie-rpgs.com]

Re:Ok so its flame bait....

You had me until you dropped the P-word. Let's compare: Vagabond vs Glitterboy. Balanced, right?

Re:Saga?

There was a game system named that. This is not that game system. Confusing, I know.

Re:Is it the best ever?

Wow, hi AJ! I thought for sure that the black screen at the end last Sunday meant that you and your whole family got whacked. I thought the hot underage girl and new car would have kept you happy longer, too...

Re:Wizards of the Coast is the Shit!

Then why'd you post anonymous coward? Nothing like winning a magic tourney to make you feel like King of the Nerds.