SoylentWhite,
I
love your reviews. Thank you so much for looking so deeply into everything. Here's my response to each comment.
Activist
Why do they get an option to add a new option to the battlestar?
Does 'choose a new option for your command' mean for their criminals?
Both of those are typos, or rather accidental carry overs from the Commander. They should be new Criminal options. I'll fix that in ver02
CAG
Raptor scouting: isn't 'where do I find this' kind of a prerequisite for everything else? Wouldn't it make sense that if you roll a hit, you find it automatically?
Brief the Squad: Remove a weakness: I am unclear as to how the MU could get most of those weaknesses (unruly, fatigued, out of formation). Purely from the narrative?
Wingman: Is the harm moved before or after armour? In other words, you have 2-harm applied to a viper with 1-armour. Do you move 1-harm before armour, so both absorb the damage, or does the primary target only apply armour, resulting in 1-harm applied, which can then be moved around as AP harm?
Raiding party: Isn't the 7-9 downside too much? 1-harm ap, when you're definitely in a dangerous situation, is bad enough for a success, but to also have to choose 1 of 3 additional bad things on top just seems excessive. (Also, is it the player or MC who decides which option?)
Raptor scouting: Good point. There are plenty of options on that list. I'll either change it to "How can I get the fleet to this" or just remove it from the list.
Brief the Squad: There are several weaknesses in the Fleet/Battlestar playbook, there are also some that come up in the narrative. I'm considering formalizing that as conditions (like Joe did in Monsterhearts). I don't have a perfect answer for this yet though, still thinking on it.
Wingman: I should say "as AP harm" so it's clear that if you take it, you're taking it.
Raiding party: Hmm... I'll think on this, I want it to ensure you're in danger. Maybe I'll just drop the harm.
Captain
I think brief info on what the surplusses do might be useful – stuff like what's the effective difference between 'salvage' and 'supplies'?
To confirm: strengths are what you get on surplus, right?
Hmm... well first off I should remove +supplies, as that is confusing with the term "supply" that I use in place of "barter". I'll change that.
Otherwise, I think I'm okay with +skilled passengers and the like being a narrative tool.
Yes, strengths plus supply (equal to influence) is what you get on surplus. Damn... too many words that start with "s" in that equation.
Commander
You're the commander. Do you really have to select an option to have private quarters? What's the alternative? Top bunk in the barracks?
I always look at faith -2 with suspicion. Out of all the stats, weird/faith is the easiest for a player to avoid, if they so choose, so it's not nearly so much a hindrance as, say, sharp -2.
Special: I don't get this. I mean, I get what it does, I'm just having difficulty picturing why 'right place, right time' is something the Commander is notable for.
Private Quarters - The point there is you have secure place to put stuff with guards and such. You can bunker down, use it as an impromptu brig, etc. Without the option, it isn't secure. So I'll change it to "Secure Quarters".
Faith -2. Yeah, good point. It's a dump stat, especially for a role that (in the show) showed a total lack of faith.
Special: It seemed to me that Adama and Caine were never far from the ones they cared about, but perhaps they were only close in effect but not person. (Like Adama helping Starbuck by giving her fire support from the CIC). I'll ponder of other options here.
Engineer
You are aware you have both +1 sharp (max +3) as an advance and a move that gives +1 sharp (max +3)? While there are circumstances where one is preferable to the other, it does seem a bit redundant.
Yeah. Hmm, I'll think on a different advancement option. I like it being something the Engineer can pick at the start.
Marine
Unless I vastly misremember the base AW rules, there's no such thing as '3-sharm'. S-harm is just s-harm.
Final line of stats only seems to add up to +2.
If you don't have 'master at arms', and take 'choose a new weapon available to you', should you be able to select restricted munitions?
Boarding party: as Raiding Party.
Watch my back: as Wingman.
S-harm: you are right.
Stats: Yep, because it is Hard +3, Just like stat blocks that have two +2s only add up to net +2.
Weapon advancements: Yes, there are still heavy weapons and side arms available to you, thought they may not be as ideal as if you had Master at arms. I'm okay with that.
Boarding Party: Yeah. I might give one of them 1-harm AP and the other a condition to make them different.
Watch my back: AP
Opportunist
Pretty sure the advancement list is just flat-out wrong.
It is, accidentally taken from the Commander.
Partisan
Change your bond to another PC means what, exactly?
I'm giving 'get your gun' suspicious looks, since it's a move not usable by other playbooks.
Protect your mark: as Wingman.
Leave no one behind: too similarly named to the CAG move 'leave no man behind'.
Changing your bond means taking an new "Fit In" option. I'll reword that.
Get your gun: That is very intentional. There are too many +Cool playbooks out there that I don't want being able to use this to turn Hard into a dump stat. I also don't want the Partisan to be able to dump harm all the time.
Protect your mark: Gods Damn, I have this move 3 times? I gotta change that.
Leave no man behind: agreed. I'll tinker.
Pilot
In 'good pilot', youseize lacks a space. /pedant.
When it came up in a previous game, our MC ruled (fairly enough, we felt) that if you read a situation then acted on the answers, you were acting tactically, which was hedging your bets somewhat. As such, it's slightly surprising for the same playbook to have both 'Daredevil' and 'Perfect Instincts'.
'Versatile' seems weaksauce.
From the way I read 'New tech', if you also have 'Versatile', you still don't get both, you can only ever have one upgrade or the other. Correct?
Good Pilot: Thanks, will fix.
Move combinations: Yeah, that's worth tinkering on. Pilot used to be a +Sharp character (built off the Driver) that I changed to +Cool (because, c'mon Starbuck is the epitome of the battlebabe), so there is some lingering Driver-esk stuff in there that maybe shouldn't be.
Versatile: You think I should just give them both Viper and Raptor from the start?
New Tech: Correct. You can only ever get a stealth raptor or a FTL viper, never both.
President
Campaigns confuse me. What exactly does it mean when the president is campaigning 'bodyguarding' (for example)? Stuff like 'Colonial relations' and 'law enforcement' make sense, 'Deliveries' less so.
There is mention of 'Political sway', which doesn't seem to exist.
Well connected: given that you can just spend a favour to get an automatic 10+ result in seduce/maniplate, what use is this move? Going aggro?(!)
There don't seem to be any advances to get new campaigns.
Politicking: Hmm, any suggestions on replacement campaigns. Some of them are definitely fringe, but I've enjoyed seeing the president do some pretty shady/questionable jobs.
Political sway: Thanks, that was a move I took out, but there are still remnants of it. I'll clean that up.
Well Connected: Indeed. You're friend with the big guns for going Agro. Your contact with a private ship to get you off the Battlestar for Acting under fire, etc.
Adding campaigns: There should be advances to do that. I'll add it.
Supplemental Playbooks
I'll probably have more later, but I just wanted to ask now: what's meant by 'crossfire'? I have it in my head that 'crossfire' is where you have multiple weapons able to fire at the same point from different angles. In other words, a good thing, but it seems to be here as a weakness.
Crossfire is "you are caught in a crossfire" as in they might hit friendly ships. I'll think on how to reword.
Hope you find at least some of that useful. Thanks for making it!
Very, thank you for the feedback. Also, I'm going to copy all of this over to
http://www.seannittner.com/apocalypse-galactica-beta-version_01-released/ to keep it all in one place for me later.
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