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Big baddie, if the Emperor/vader died?
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garhkal
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 2:25 pm    Post subject: Big baddie, if the Emperor/vader died? Reply with quote

For those who've ran games post ROTJ, who have you had become the big baddie(baddies), if both Vader and the Emperor died??
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Yora
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 2:30 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I'm more of a Rebellion guy, but the first option that jumps to my head is to go with the EU and take Thrawn.
And after having thought some more about it, I can't really think of anyone else who would seem more interesting and fun for that position.

(Director Isard never really had me fully convinced of her greatness.)
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 2:33 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Yora wrote:
I'm more of a Rebellion guy, but the first option that jumps to my head is to go with the EU and take Thrawn.
And after having thought some more about it, I can't really think of anyone else who would seem more interesting and fun for that position.

(Director Isard never really had me fully convinced of her greatness.)

The problem with Thrawn and Isard is that they're both intellectual villains who specialize in outsmarting their opponents. That can be difficult to roleplay well, since the GM will have to put a lot of effort into thinking up convoluted plots and the associated twists. It's far easier for the GM to have enemies that are powerful, yet predictable and overconfident.
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Yora
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 3:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

True, but in that case Vader and the Emperor would have posed the same problem if they were still in charge.

I probably would not use any of them as NPCs in my adventures.
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KageRyu
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 7:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

In one of the Post ROTJ timelines I ran I had Luke fall to the Dark Side as he was already well on the path.
I had Thrawn as an antagonist - but serving the Will of the Emperor. I took elements from the Dark Force trilogy and the Dark Empire comics but hadn't yet decided if I was going to bring the Emperor back. The Empire was crumbling without his malevolent will to hold it together and the remaining Moffs and Grand Moffs were vying for power. I had a small circle of darkside force users that had long been in the emperor's service training Inquisitors rise out of the shadows as a Ruling Council calling themselves the Emperor's Will.
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Mamatried
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 12, 2020 7:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I am running a game set in 5BBY, the main antagonist is an Imperial warlord controlling a large military force and slice of the galaxy.

I mixed in this elements of new canon and the good old legends/eu.

My main badguy is slightly force sensitive, but his strenght is more in tactics much like thrawn.
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Whill
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 13, 2020 12:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

In my SWU's post-RotJ timeline, after many years of warlordism and Imperial civil wars, three Empire's emerge along with the New Republic. And there is a hidden "empire" too. Many bad guys to go around! I'll eventually get to posting about it, but there are a couple other things I'm working on that will lay the basis for that.
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garhkal
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 13, 2020 1:45 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

CRMcNeill wrote:
Yora wrote:
I'm more of a Rebellion guy, but the first option that jumps to my head is to go with the EU and take Thrawn.
And after having thought some more about it, I can't really think of anyone else who would seem more interesting and fun for that position.

(Director Isard never really had me fully convinced of her greatness.)

The problem with Thrawn and Isard is that they're both intellectual villains who specialize in outsmarting their opponents. That can be difficult to roleplay well, since the GM will have to put a lot of effort into thinking up convoluted plots and the associated twists. It's far easier for the GM to have enemies that are powerful, yet predictable and overconfident.


Add to that, if the party outsmarts the DM, how's he gonna show the baddie's greater smarts? Other than by saying the party's plans don't work>
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Yora
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 13, 2020 4:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

They don't have to be always right and get everything pulled off without errors.
When I read the Thrawn books recently, I always had an eye specifically on how perfect and flawless Thrawn really is. And it turns out he does make quite a number of mistakes and bad calls. He's just really good at convincing his underlings that the setbacks don't really matter in the long run because he always has multiple irons in the fire. The true objectives of his attacks are often very unclear to anyone else and he regularly does hit and run attacks. So even when one of his plans fails, his enemies don't know if they prevented him accomplishing his goal or not. Even when Thrawn wins a fight, his enemies don't know what he gained from that and if that really was what he was after.

The claims of his brilliance and making no significant miatakes mostly comes from himself. And both his underlings and his enemies are buying it, because when his plans work they look spectacular, and when they don't work the failure isn't obvious.

Players outsmarting Thrawn is completely acceptable. They are the heroes after all, and the people who have a chance to beat him are them.
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Leona Makk
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PostPosted: Mon Sep 21, 2020 7:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

KageRyu wrote:
In one of the Post ROTJ timelines I ran I had Luke fall to the Dark Side as he was already well on the path.
I had Thrawn as an antagonist - but serving the Will of the Emperor. I took elements from the Dark Force trilogy and the Dark Empire comics but hadn't yet decided if I was going to bring the Emperor back. The Empire was crumbling without his malevolent will to hold it together and the remaining Moffs and Grand Moffs were vying for power. I had a small circle of darkside force users that had long been in the emperor's service training Inquisitors rise out of the shadows as a Ruling Council calling themselves the Emperor's Will.


I did something similar. I was a big fan of the Dark Empire Sourcebook, so I planned a post RotJ game based around that. The group had not read the Thrawn books or the comics so i got to swipe and gloss over as much as I wanted. BUT, there was a New Republic trying to get on its feet and a secretive Dark Side Theocracy Cult dedicated to the Emperor on the dreaded planet Byss.

The heroes were in there own sector of the galaxy, (which we made up) trying to repel an Imperial resurgence. Eventually, they discovered a grand Dark Side plot. A new cabal of Dark Jedi moved to replace the Imperial Officers and Moffs. An evil mirror of the old republic and Jedi Order. Their foul leader was a deformed/mixed up clone of the Emperor and a player's Young Jedi character. This caused all sorts of drama, since people were not sure which one was the clone and which was the "not clone." (of course the player's character was proven to be the "pure" original.)

The heroes eventually made their way to Byss for an epic showdown with the Dark side Jedi, adepts, Sentinals, and Royal Guard who were running the Imperial War Machine. AND BEAT THEM!!! So the heroes took down the Imperial leadership, saved the galaxy and won the war!
Go Light Side!!!
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Raven Redstar
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 22, 2020 12:31 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've had a Sith Cult, the Ghost of Exar Kun possessing someone, Emperor's Hand, Imperial Warlords... whatever I think will make for a suitable villain to my PCs.
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Ray
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 22, 2020 5:54 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

With my group, it was the Empire's b@st@rd* children that we had to deal with. Warlords, despots, and so on.

We were a Privateer Fleet, so we went after the ones too small for the New Republic to spend time with, or with planets they couldn't get to easily. There were some Vader-trained Dark Jedi as well, but that storyline pewtered out.
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