Character Creation and Backgrounds

Well, there is life on our planet, and plenty of it. Lots of animals and therefore plants to eat.
And Selak didn't come unprepared. He would have gathered whatever training materials (computers, droids?) he needed to train Younglings into Jedi.

Although I do feel we should get that starting gear for free.

Selak: "This is a Jedi training saber, nicked by myself personally from the Jedi Temple on Coruscant."

Taryn: "Thank you Master."

Selak: "That'll be 250 credits then."

Taryn: "Wait, what?"

Our wise Master will now teach us to understand a subject that all Jedi must be familiar in the galaxy nowadays: Capitalism.

And hey, Carabas, what did you think about the bond I suggested between our characters?

Ian will call him 'little dude'. Especially after he gets taller than everyone. Please let me know if that leads to anger, hate and suffering or if it makes them besties.

I think we need actual character dossiers or something and use this thread just to discuss relationships and other details.

@Lux That sounds good, Zafe isn't too hung up on abstract concepts besides freedom, which is definitely common ground for the two of them. Although she doesn't have the same impatience, it wouldn't result in "trust in the force, have patience" lectures, those get old.

@cep Also sounds fun, Zafe would consider it good fun, and try to get back at him in a similar fashion, with mixed results.

Zafe's only hangup is trust, and she trusts her fellow padawans unconditionally.

I'm not so sure he'd have had a CHANCE to prepare for training everyone. Again, that's a lot of material for one guy to get a hold of. That old joke about parenting is that nobody is ready for it and this guy has to be ready for it to get someone to full adulthood times 9. That's a LOT of supplies. The ship thing is just easier.

The thing about eating each other was a joke about how living in caves would seriously stunt our ability to even have a modicum of civilized behavior or education. What I mean is that unless we have a larger technological infrastructure how do we all know how to read and write? Books aren't a thing anymore. That's why I'm advocating the buried ship premise, still. From a logistical standpoint we wouldn't get buy without a LOT of infrastructure. Even Ben Kenobi had go to Toshi station to pick up some power converters because if he hadn't his lightsaber wouldn't stay charged. i guess what I'm saying is that Selak is raising 9 kids. By himself. 9 kids with space magic. His job becomes ridiculously easier if he has the ship's computer to help with education, internal sensors to keep an eye on us, a med bay for Purge Night, a cargo bay with Florescent lights for hydroponics (or a big, open training facility), a reclamation and recycling system for food and waste processing, a means to lock doors to keep us from sneaking out.

I understand the gear thing is important, I honestly do, I'm just saying from a logic standpoint I feel I really need to figure out a way to resolve this, otherwise -none- of us should have Computers, Mechanics, Piloting or anything technology based as a skill. We might not even be all that literate because what would we practice on? Anyways, I'm going to give it a rest on this topic, for now, and give Arina a chance to actually respond to what amounted to a essay on the realism of Star Wars. Which is always a good idea and never results in any problems.

I can promise you that if her pranks ever didn't work he would help her develop one that would work and then unleash it on all the others. Like waiting until someone was asleep and taking their robe and using some of their precious tape reserves (or the Force) to pin it to the ceiling over their head but unfolded so it looked like a hooded person was hovering over them in the middle of the night.

You are correct, sir. I cannot keep everyone straight. Maybe Arina can make a Thread where the whole point is the dry information. A topic could be, for example: "Ian Maxwell Human, Male, 19" and inside is all the other stuff?

@Lux That kinda makes sense. Kit would definitely try to be equally friendly to everyone, and thus not really be actually friends with anyone.

@cep Kit would certainly take that sort of gentle joking in stride. He’d try very hard to maintain a Cool demeanor and not let you know if it led to anger et al

Of course, as described in other narrative speculations on the topic: the character creation mechanics don't actually have to mean the PC(s) ever had creds, nor ever bought anything, like everything else in character creation it's just a meta-level mechanic until you give it narrative. Until then it's just a game balance point.

It'll be alright, guys. All we have to do is wait for the inevitable imperial attack and then descend on them, as a legion, and take THEIR stuff! Although, speaking of Imperial stuff, are dark siders going to have red crystals because of the crystal's chemistry when they're artificially made or because the crystals are sad? I think that's the new canon, right?

Sorry Cep, didn't see your post! Uh, I don't think that raising your skill point in computers, mechanics and etc is that problematic to the narrative. I like the buried shuttle idea, but it's not weird to think that those that have points in those skills, idk, just tinkered with our Master's ship or stuff like that. I do agree, though, that we would probably need some basic stuff. Raising a kid alone is tiresome, imagine raising nine! And living inside a cave feels... Problematic. More than doable, yeah, but stuff like generators and all of that would probably be needed at some point.


All of that aside, guys, ha, poor Arina. We posted so much today, and she probably didn't even check it out yet. x)

Also, in lieu of Arina being probably super busy getting caught up on all of our chatter I made a "Character Dossier" thread, like we talked about and put my two ideas in there while I winnow them down.

Not so much because the crystals are sad, but because the crystals are naturally attuned to the Light Side, and Darksiders can only use them properly by forcing them corrupting them in the process.

The game follows current canon, with artificial kyber crystals not even a thing that can exist.

One of the things I like most about the Disney version is how much more mystical the Force and Lightsabers, and, by extension even things like the Death Star, have become.
Lucas and much of the old expanded universe spent way too much time grounding the Force like it was just some superpower that worked by quantifiable rules.

Probably the second or third most straight-laced of the bunch, but Taryn as a fellow Sentinel would see the pranking, specifically figuring them out before they happen and maybe preventing them (and occasionally counterprank), as a challenge and good practice real life.

I liked it a lot.

Taryn tries to get along with everybody. He also can have a short temper sometimes, and probably has gotten into a few rows with Ian over inapropriate pranking, especially if Avi was the target.

And while Taryn is probably one of the most studious of the group, the most dedicated to actually being a Jedi, he probably is also the most critical of what we are being taught, and isn't taking Master Selak's word as gospel. He realises their situation isn't even remotely normal. And while he keeps that mostly to himself about this, he would confide in Avi, and seek her guidance about these matters.

Of course if Selak breaks up him and Avi, that would lead to a big fight. The whole "no attachements" things has always seemed completely wrong to him.

I'll be interested to see what Arina says on the subject. I've always been split on making lightsabers more mystical because then they become, in my opinion, less personal. I do prefer that the Force is less knowable and I will be VERY happy if we never hear a single thing about midichlorians.

As to the color of the crystals being influenced by the wielder it never jived with the Taoist philosophy that the Force seems to most closely adhere to. Also, it reinforces my personal belief that Sith get their lightsabers to turn red by leaving them in a dark room with Linkin Park playing as loud as they can. I have trouble taking Sith seriously in a general sense just because they all seem so silly. Except for the Emperor. He seemed to really enjoy what he was doing all the time so he's genuinely intimidating to me.

Well, I have always though that the Emperor was a very bad Sith who ignored most of the rules and restrictions of the Sith religion, and just took the perks, and was as big a part of the reason the Sith don't exist anymore as Vader was.

As for colours, I don't know much about Taoist philosophy, but I do like I can have a Lightsaber in whatever colour I like without having to go on an epic quest to track down an ultra-rare type of crystal.

I disagree Lighsabers have become less personal. Not only do you still handcraft the hilt like before, now your crystal isn't just a crystal, it is your personal crystal that you have a bond with, and looks that way because of who you are.

That might be fun. Ian's pranks on Taryn would be things both great and small if he presented himself as trying to stop him. Everything from changing Taryn's dossier information so that it goes something like this:

Name: Taryn Koto
Species: Human
Sex: Yes, please
Age: Anyone over 40

All the way to elaborate ones like making a Taryn doll out of whatever materials he could find, canabalizing old robes or whatever, showing a lot more artistic talent than anyone should for a stupid prank and then embroidering it on the chest with 'I love your Force, let me feel it' and leaving it in Ari's bed under her blankets.

I suppose, I always just thought that the color pattern seemed really ethnocentric, is all. Red in China, for example, is a color associated with joy and celebration, something you wear to a wedding, because red is the color of blood and it's associated with life. But Taoism, as a belief purports that if you try to say one aspect of life is good or evil that you are missing the point and are further from the Tao. Basically that saying any color of a crystal has any reflection of ethics or morals is adhering to an extreme. Like I could get behind it if red was the color of high emotions but not, specifically, evil and selfishness.

The main reason it applies to Ian is that, if this were D&D, he'd be Chaotic Neutral because he swings wildly from pulling mean pranks (which are bad) to deeply caring about the feelings of others (good) back to intentionally causing trouble (bad) because he feels lonely and wants attention (neutral) all the way to never truly getting angry at his friends because whatever's happening in the moment is just a moment (good). And if his lightsaber starts changing between colors as fast as his moods I will be sort of annoyed.

And whether or not Palpatine was a 'good' Sith he was the only one who seemed really happy with his place in life and for some reason that jovial love of evil was more intimidating than anger or anything else. I know a lot of people liked Kreia, for example, and she was an interesting concept but EVERY time she opened her mouth I was thinking 'christ, grandma's telling her stories from the Great Depression again . . . Yes, the fools on the Jedi high council never watered down their juice and that's why they all had to die . . .'

Edit: As a side note I'm super jazzed by all the fast responses on this forum. This game hasn't even started and we're over 100 posts in.