Along with Stay On Target and the Force & Destiny CRB, this is the SWRPG book I was most eager to read–because I love Star Wars Rebels so much. For the record, I totally did not listen (Ha!) to the Dawn of Rebellion Order 66 episode, when doing my homework, to avoid asking the same questions of Keith.
I believe you wrote both the species and the Atollon/Chopper Base sections? Did you do the associated scenarios and NPC/creature stats as well?
I did! It was a lot of fun to try and sort of imagine how the creatures and coral and caves sort of interact to create an ecosystem, and try and puzzle out the whole lion king circle of life on Atollon. When it comes to RPG writing, sometimes you spend a lot of time researching (2-3 days) for something that is only 2-3 paragraphs, but I felt like I had to sort of develop that to add something to it. I was afraid that just saying there are spiders and snails and coral would be kind of boring, to present them all as entirely separate things. Also, Atollon is clearly a world strong with the Force in some way, that the Bendu was drawn to it, and our understanding of the Force is that it binds and connects us all together, between the rock, tree, people, and creatures. So it felt natural to sort of spend some time showing how the disparate elements of Atollon are related, where the water is, etc.
Coming from a life sciences background, I find the little details of ecology, xenobiology, etc. most impressive. (like the cenote [This was Sterling[Hershey’s], and definitely came from his architectural background–Keith] in Nexus of Power and the coral and springs here.) Do you spend time studying up on these for projects? Are they other hobbies of yours?
Gah! I sort of went into this already. But I don’t have much in the way of formal training, no. I do have some training as a research intelligence analyst for the military, and it turns out a research background is pretty versatile for having an approach to “get smart” on any given subject. Becoming an overnight subject matter expert was part of the job there, though it was usually about a subject much more narrow in scope than say, biology. Still, with Star Wars I have the power of sci-fi/fantasy working for me, where things don’t have to be perfectly scientifically sound, because aliens/magic/the Force. But at the end of the day, it comes down to having just a broad enough understanding of the sciences to look at stuff and get ideas, and then be able to research concepts and understand what I’m reading enough to apply it to what I’m writing. This helps me answer questions like, why would a species have a weird color of blood, or how could a snail and coral survive on a world that appears to be mostly desert? So it’s a matter of finding out what those things mean or typically need to survive, and then learning more about them, and finding interesting little hooks and things to say.
The sciences are interesting to me, I wouldn’t go so far as to say it’s a dedicated hobby (I’m nowhere near that “up” on it), but in college I did take a earth sciences class that was near and dear to my heart, where I had a great professor in Mark Sutherland at College of DuPage. I think earth science and biology and what have you are great for writing on Star Wars. I think I was in class one day, and we were talking about basic plate tectonics stuff, and how plates shifts and all that, when it occurred to me that on a world with no water, if it was no longer tectonically active, you eventually get something that looks like Tatooine. All the rocks erode into sand and dust, and that’s it. I think that was a moment where it clicked for me why understanding stuff about rocks might be important if I wanted to go write sci-fi, fantasy, and Star Wars, where you’re often exploring new terrain or new planetary concepts. I definitely spent time researching springs, snails, coral, and all that good stuff.
The aliens section too had some research components too, particularly for the Drabatans and Tognath, which aren’t mammals, and therefore opened up some new possibilities for life cycles and habitats and what have you. I mean, it would have been easy to have Drabatans give live birth, but I thought it might be fun and add an interesting hook to the species if they had a tadpole phase. Life is so much stranger than we always give it credit for, and this seemed like an opportunity to showcase just how varied life in the galaxy might be, and how different the experience of living might be for species outside of human.
Related to the above, how do you go about designing the mechanics for creatures and planets? This is something I enjoy, so I love to find out how other people do this.
Well, there aren’t much in the way of mechanics for planets, except noting it if it adheres to an extreme environment (which the core books have rules for) related to temperature, radiation, gravity, atmospheric content, weather, or lighting conditions. SO that tends to be pretty straightforward. With planets, it’s much more about providing what I like to call “theme parks,” a term stolen from the MMO developer community. Theme parks are locations where players and GMs can create story and do something interesting. Atollon was a difficult challenge, in that Chopper Base is sort of the only place with people, which is why it gets covered in so much detail between the planet entry and modular encounter. So the only other major location is the spider caves, which are great, since we know the Bendu is there, and he might be able to stash any sort of Force artifacts in there for PCs to stumble across. But the rest of the planet is more or less barren. So this necessitated creating some new areas to talk about, and the underwater springs were part of that. I figured we had a major spider habitat, why not one for the snails? It really just comes from applying some logic, and then researching, and then applying more logic and creativity to that. Eventually, you end up with something that sounds like a location PCs might like to explore, or a GM might use as an interesting environment and backdrop for an encounter.
Creature mechanics are a different beast. I approach them the same way I would any generic NPC. In my first crack, I generally just try to build what “feels” right to the lore of that creature, focusing on what they’re particularly good or bad at. I always try and design a special ability for any creature and most NPCs that give them a unique bit of flavor for the table. The important thing with any stat block, though, is to limit how many skills, talents, qualities, and weapons you’re giving them. It’s very easy to get carried away and list far too much, which means when a GM tries to actually use that NPC on the table, they spend a lot of time digging through various talents and weapons and get paralyzed by choice. You generally want to make it as simple for a GM to use as possible. Pre-genned NPCs are supposed to speed play up, not bog it down. So you have to try and think about how you want GMs to use these creatures, make sure that’s somewhat clear in their text, and stat them accordingly to do that thing or things. But after an initial build (which tends to happen pretty quickly), I’ll look back at it later with fresh eyes and think about balance and challenge issues, and tweak accordingly, and sometimes remove a skill or talent or two, if I feel like I made them a bit too complex. Most creatures don’t need a bite AND claw attack, for instance. You can just make a single one, and give it a few different weapon qualities that activate with advantage, and if the GM activates one, it was a bite, and the other, it was a claw. Simple. But really, stat blocks get “made” in playtesting. A lot of minor tweaks happen there to ensure the creatures feel just right on the table. There is just rarely time in the freelance process to do much in the way of playtesting them myself, I just have to eyeball it.
A more general question, now. I know a little about how you got started doing Star Wars RPG source materials, as an amateur. It’s a cool story, and I thought others might like it. So tell me more about that.
Sure! So I’ve been doing Star Wars RPG related stuff for a long, long time. When I was about 14 or 15, I got AOL, and met Ryan Brooks. Together we formed a Star Wars RP group, and eventually created our own set of rules for doing an AOL chat room Star Wars RPG game (called NSU), where different chat rooms represented different locations. It was a ton of work, and a lot of fun, but ultimately we walked away from that in our early 20s. Of course, at this point, we had hundreds of WEG Star Wars RPG books and novels and comics and we felt like we needed a new outlet to justify having an entire roomful of Star Wars lore in our houses. So we started Fandom Comics, which was SUPPOSED to be a project with a really limited scope, so me and Ryan could focus on our actual lives. Fandom Comics produced Star Wars fan comic books and fan D20 RPG content. We started it in 2005 with the release of Episode 3, and kept going until 2013, when we both started getting freelance gigs with FFG. Our big project was the Clone Wars fan sourcebook, which took advantage of the digital platform’s lack of concern about pages to write insanely long character bios for hundreds of NPCs that covered all of their various appearances in chronological order. Most of our comics were focused on Cracken’s Crew, a team of elite rebel operatives working for General Airen Cracken.
So, towards the end of our run at Fandom, I broke my leg, which meant I couldn’t bartend for a time. So the only way I could pay rent was to go back to college (which the US Navy would pay me to do, via the GI bill). My entire plan was to just go long enough to literally get back on my feet, and go back to bartending. Because I wasn’t looking for a career change, I decided I should just learn something I’d enjoy, and that would engage me as a student. I ended up going to Columbia College Chicago, and pursuing their degree in Creative Writing. I assumed that I’d be the old guy with very little talent in class with a bunch of 19 year old writing prodigies who have been journaling all their lives and were already on their third novel. But I told myself it didn’t matter, because I was only going for fun, and if it improves my writing for Fandom Comics, it’ll be worth it, and really I’m just here to make sure rent gets paid, anyway.
So it turned out going to college at 29 for writing was a strength for me, not a drawback. I had a lot of life experience on the 19 year olds, including military service and a lot of time in bars observing humanity (rarely at their best). This sort of life experience ends up being a huge advantage for a writer. You have a viewpoint and a worldview on a range of subjects, and you have something to write about. I also was already through my “party phase” a lot of kids have the first time they’re away from home, so I was much more focused on milking as much education as I could out of the experience than several of my peers. It also turned out I had a pretty good ear for writing. The program I went through really emphasized the connection between the oral tradition of storytelling and writing a story, and I think that went a long way toward helping me find my own unique voice, and learn how to translate my sense of humor and speaking rhythms to the page (and shut them off for more neutral voice RPG work).
In addition to my classwork, I was still doing Fandom Comics stuff, and so Ryan Brooks was sort of learning through osmosis a lot of the formal training I was going through as we peer-edited each other’s work. I was also going to the Star Wars Celebration conventions, where I met famed Star Wars RPG writer Sterling Hershey. We were both basically attending the same panel program tracks, and just kept bumping into each other. Celebration does this wonderful series of author seminars, where you can learn from people with New York Times’ best sellers about how they approaching plotting or dialogue or scenes or other process stuff that is just really unique. So Sterling and I became social media friends, and he was a mentor for me, aware of what we were doing with Fandom Comics. When Sterling found out FFG was going to do an open call for freelance writers (maybe a month after I graduated college), he made sure Ryan and myself knew about it and applied. We were both lucky enough to get opportunities to work, and it’s been a steady stream of work from them ever since. I still bartend, but it’s dropped down from 5 days a week full time to 1 day a week since 2013 when I started.
Wow, a whole lot of cool stuff in only four answers! I have heard, as I mentioned, bits and pieces about your journey to Star Wars RPG freelancing and how you approach design from conversations at Gamer Nation Cons. But now we all have the rest of the story. Thanks for sharing all this with us today.
Linda Whitson
Latest posts by Linda Whitson (see all)
- Astral Projections – The Ripperdoc Is In - May 8, 2023
