Play Options 2.0: Character Improvement & Upgrades

By Vornargith

Game format: Casual Play
Supporting file: Sample of Main Characters with learned abilities

The Ultimate Missions books touched briefly on two interesting options — character improvement and upgrades. Experimenting with those options led to two results … Low-level grunts become terminators and it took forever to improve my favorite character. This article takes these options — roughly implemented in Ultimate Missions — and develops them into balanced game-play.

2.1: Character Upgrades

Ultimate Missions gave us the option of increasing a character’s attributes by spending additional points. It gave simple guidelines and failed to consider the ramifications of increasing the stats of already-powerful characters. The rules and table below introduce a balanced system when adding upgrades to your characters.

Upgrades can be purchased only while a player is assembling their squad. There is a limit of 12 points that each player can set aside for upgrades, and an individual character is allowed a maximum of 2 upgrades. The cost for each power-up is determined by the character’s original cost (see chart below). Typically, a character with a lower original cost will be cheaper to upgrade while more expensive characters with better scores take more points to improve. Droids and characters with mounted weapons cost twice as much to upgrade — multiply the costs in the chart by 2. Unique characters cannot be upgraded, but they do qualify for character improvement (see 2.2: Character Improvement below).

Original Cost of Character	Hit Points* +10	Defense +1	Attack +1	Damage** +10
1-10	+1	+1	+1	+2
11-20	+1	+1	+2	+2
21-35	+2	+2	+2	+3
36 +	+2	+3	+3	+4

* Hit points cannot exceed twice the character’s original value … so a Bespin Guard (with an original HP score of 10) may have a one-point upgrade to increase his HP to 20, but may not use a second point to upgrade his HP again to 30.

** Damage cannot exceed a value of 20

2.2: Character Improvement

The core of an RPG game is the development of your character — watching him/her grow in skill and ability from rookie to hero. Although Star Wars Miniatures rules leaves little room for the role-playing, the aspect of character development is an still a possibility in casual play.

The system introduced in Ultimate Missions develops a character at  a snail’s pace, and the basis of calculating the required “experience” to improve your character makes no sense (a character’s attack score?). Use these rules to put a bit of RPG character development into your game …

Only Unique characters can be improved, and each player should be allowed to designate only one or two characters to improve upon. These characters can be carried over to other games and gain more experience points as they successfully complete each skirmish. A non-unique character may be selected for improvement, but he automatically gains the ability Unique. Players can give these newly christened unique characters names to identify them. These “improvable” characters are designated “main” characters.

Gaining experience: A character gains experience in one of two ways — by winning a skirmish (even if the character is defeated) or by surviving a skirmish (even if the player doesn’t win).

When a player wins a skirmish (regardless of the objective) his/her main character(s) gains 2 points of experience. If his main character was defeated during the course of the game, he gains only 1 experience point (XP). At the end of a skirmish, only the surviving main characters of non-winning players gain 1 XP.

Improvement: Use the chart in 2.1: Character Upgrades to permanently increase your main character’s attributes, using earned experience points as the cost to improve each attribute. Note: There are no hit point caps when improving your main character; however, the damage limit remains 20.

As a character improves, so does his/her original cost. For every point spent on increasing your character’s attributes, 1 is added to his/her original cost. As your character’s original cost increases, it will take longer to improve your main character.

Secondary Option - Learned Abilities: Here’s where the character development gets interesting (and possibly complicated). Players need to discuss this with each other and come to mutual agreements. The file attached to this article depicts a main character. At 15 points, he’s well-rounded, albeit lacking in his full potential. Outside the card, you’ll find a section labeled “Learned Abilities.” These a abilities that may be purchase with earned experience points.

When a main character is chosen, players may discuss possible improvements outside the standard attributes. Select 2 abilities … one that costs 3 points and another costing 2. Use logic when determining these abilities, as some abilities are obviously worth more than others. Now select a Commander Effect that costs 3-5 points (again … discuss it with other players). Before the character can gain the commander effect, the player must have purchased the other abilities. (See character sample PDF)

Force abilities cannot be purchased. A character must originally have a force point in order to purchase force powers or lightsaber.

The characters in the PDF have been played with and should work well with any casual game. Hopefully, these play options add something to you Star Wars Minis gaming experience.

Questions or comments? Contact me at vornargith@excite.com.