A Galaxy of Crime

Editor’s Note: Filling in for Scott Alden today we have a new contributor to the Gamer Nation, Jeremy Melloul. No blackmail was involved.

It’s been a long time since Edge of the Empire first came out. The vast galaxy you run your games, or play around in has grown even larger since then, with Age of Rebellion, Force & Destiny, and all the sourcebooks that have accompanied those lines.

But whether you’re still playing Edge of the Empire, have moved on to one of the other lines, or are playing some combination of the three, there’s an element core to Star Wars you shouldn’t leave behind in your game – crime.

Crime is an integral part of Star Wars and regardless of the overall premise of your campaign, it can be an enriching part of your game as a player, and a fantastic tool to employ as a GM.

In the first section of this post, I’ll discuss how GMs can integrate criminal elements into their campaigns and adventures, both to test their players, and give their games that classic star wars feeling.

In the second, I’ll talk about how players can embrace their character’s relationship with crime – whether they’re a conniving criminal themselves, or a righteous vigilante – to flesh out their character and take a unique approach to solving problems.

An Undercurrent of Crime

As a GM you want to make sure your players are having fun. But you also want to challenge them, surprise them, and draw them into the universe so they feel like they’re actually there. The galactic underworld is a fantastic tool for doing just that. From the dashing rogues to dastardly masterminds there’s an entire galaxy of crime available for you to bring into your game. Bounty Hunters, slicers, thieves, and con artists – they can all be great reminders that the galaxy isn’t always a nice place. And they don’t have to steal the spotlight in order to do so. In fact, they can sometimes work best as supporting elements, making the galaxy feel just that much bigger for your players. The best way to do that is to add just an undercurrent of crime to the things your players are up to. Here are some examples that you might find useful for your games.

Crime & Obligation

Criminal Obligation tends to be the obvious direction to go when you’re thinking about integrating criminal elements into your campaign. After all, a criminal obligation will put crime front and center for one of your players. But the other obligations can be great ways to put a new spin on crime – and your players’ relation to it – in your games.

A character with the addiction obligation might know their way around the drug trading occurring on the Outer Rim – or be encouraged to rescue their dealer if they happen to go missing.

A character who has betrayed someone they were once close to, may find themselves confronted with the decision when their target seeks revenge, now backed by a new set of criminal allies.

Or a character might have taken an oath obligation or be dutybound to some sort of criminal organization that requires them to act a certain way – or force them to answer to authority, at the most inconvenient of times.

You can use far more than just the criminal obligation to tie your players’ characters to the galactic underworld – and you can encourage such association by keeping in mind your groups’ collective obligation threshold and reflecting their totals in the way the rest of the underworld reacts to them (as per the Obligation Threshold Guidelines on Page 308 of the Edge of the Empire Core Rulebook).

Duty

Duty isn’t an obvious place to integrate crime into your campaign. But, that’s part of what makes it such a great place to do just that. Duty usually revolves around some sort of higher calling – your players are part of a struggle that’s bigger than they are. Crime, here, can be a distraction. But not every distraction is bad. In fact, leveraging the pettiness or levity of crime can allow your players to take a breath and make the serious nature of what they’re usually up against far more dramatic.

When you’re being hunted by an Inquisitor, or taking on the full might of the Empire, there are few better respites than some dimwitted thugs who don’t know any better picking a fight with your players’ capable characters, or an overconfident con artist your players can read right through. They not only serve to remind your players of how far they have come, but they make your players’ experience in your galaxy more multi-dimensional and can help keep even the most dramatic of stories from becoming monotonous.

And, on the other hand, crime can be a vehicle to allow your players to fulfill their duty. How far do you go in trying to accomplish your goals? Do you ally yourselves with the worst the galaxy has to offer? At what point are you selling the rebellion to the highest bidder, just to gather the resources needed to win a war against the Empire or the Imperial remnants? That kind of decision making, where there’s no clear right answer, brings us to one of my favorite places to bring crime into a campaign…

Morality

It’s easy to say you have a moral point of view. But it’s a lot harder to act in accordance with it. You don’t need a Force-related instance (like vergences) to challenge your player’s morality. You can use the simplest of circumstances. And I often find that the best way to go about this is to make the “right thing” not fit with their personal morality. What will your player do if they’re challenged to be compassionate to the worst of criminals? What if their recklessness or anger ends up benefiting a criminal organization and having a real, tangible impact on the lives of the people they’ve otherwise just saved.

Ultimately, criminals are sentient beings, too, and as a GM you can make the argument that they’re as deserving of kindness – or a second chance – as the people your players would be predisposed to help. By using your players’ bias against them, you can challenge their characters effectively and give rise to dramatic moments and plenty of opportunities for them to accrue conflict.

Criminal Intentions

As a player, your options are generally more limited than the GM’s. but where GM’s need to consider the breadth of their options – you can go deep on your character, their past, their motivation, and their possible future…

If you’re starting as early as character creation, a criminal background can be a wonderful source of intrigue and potential future conflict. Some careers and specializations lend themselves to this kind of background – like the Smuggler Career, or the Enforcer Specialization. But consider the Politico Doctor – your character could have learned their skills mending broken bones and blaster burns for some gang or criminal group. Or the Droid Tech – maybe you were responsible for taking care of your boss’ protocol droid.

These are different and interesting ways to take a character and great personal story hooks. Maybe your Droid Tech saw something they shouldn’t have during a routine inspection of the Crime Lord’s droid and, rather than proceed with the memory wipe, you decided to escape their clutches – and blackmail your way to freedom.

The underworld is dangerous, but it’s also full of opportunity. That’s what makes it enticing – and can make it very exciting for you as a player. Even if your character doesn’t have much of a background in crime, perhaps your motivation deals with it. An Expertise motivation may mean you want to become the best thief the galaxy has ever known, or a Power obligation of running your own criminal group. On the other hand, a Cause motivation of Emancipation could see you going toe to toe with slavers and dismantling their infrastructure at every opportunity you have.

If your character has some ties to the criminal underworld, you have a brand new way to approach problems. The scum & villainy of the galaxy aren’t the sole purview of your GM. With the right Knowledge (Underworld) rolls to get the lay of the land and successful Streetwise checks to navigate your way through it, you may be able to hire Bounty Hunters yourself, or otherwise employ criminals to help you reach your goals. It may cost you in credits – or obligation – but the option is there. It’s a question of risk and reward. Of how far you’re willing to go into the dark and gritty underbelly of the galaxy to reach your goals.

It’s a vast galaxy…

I hope this has helped you reconsider how you might integrate crime into your Star Wars campaigns – even if you’re not running an Edge of the Empire game. It’s a vast galaxy out there and crime is just one way to make it that much bigger for yourself and the rest of your group.