This is an older post, but it checks out. We did some play-testing of these house-rules, and they did work fairly well. It is aimed at somewhat more enabling of power-play, and it was specifically designed for armour crafting (the only crafting rules out at the time of creation and play-testing). However, I do believe they can work with weapons also, and other items, although some tweaking may be in order.

I will test these further in my current campaign.

These customised crafting rules are aimed at expanding upon, but still be in the spirit of, the crafting rules in the FFG Star Wars RPG system, giving players some more control over their crafting.

When generating new crafting templates based on existing, published or home-brewed weapons, gear, armour and so on, follow these steps:

Cost: ~1/2 Rarity: -1 to -2 For example: Take the Kyuzo Energy Bow (from Forged in Battle), halve cost to 1200 and reduced the rarity by 1, and you have the start of a template for a (heavy) energy bow.

Crafting difficulty is based on original rarity: Rarity 1-2 Easy adjust for complexity Rarity 3-4 Average adjust for complexity Rarity 5-6 Hard adjust for complexity Rarity 7-8 Daunting adjust for complexity Rarity 9+ Formidable adjust for complexity The Kyuzo Energy Bow has an original rarity of 8, hence the difficulty would be Daunting, this could be adjusted up or down. I’d suggest to keep it at Daunting, it is not conventional, but not extremely unorthodox either.

Time: Adjust by table and what seems reasonable, err on the side of too long. Other: Remove non-unique and non-core functionality qualities Consider auto-upgrade, difficulty increase or adding setback dice for unique qualities Here the templates is basically designed and the final difficulty set.

Looking at the ranged weapons template table in Special Modifications, I consider the Heavy Energy Rifle to be similar enough, 24 hours is an appropriate time, although we may increase this to 36 if we want to signify some complexity or other in the creation of this bow.

The profile we base on the Kyuzo Energy Bow, so dmg: 9, crit 4, range long, encumbrance 6, and 2 HP. In spirit of the Heavy Energy Rifle, we also keep Cumbersome 3. The weapon has no unique qualities, but I’d consider allowing to keep one quality, to compensate for the Cumbersome 3 rating, and the base weapon’s lower damage, higher crit rating, and fewer HPs (compared to Heavy Eneryg Rifle). However, choosing to keep the Knockdown quality should warrant an added setback die to the difficulty. If we want to keep the Pierce quality instead, at a reduced rank, for instance 2 or 3, this may have they same modifier. If we are adamant to keep the Pierce 5, that could easily warrant an upgrade of the difficulty check. Keeping both qualities is not advised. We may also choose to not keep any but the Cumbersome quality for a more basic heavy energy bow template.

The following guidelines are for combining existing and new templates, as well as adding qualities to templates before the check is made, in essence potentially ensuring certain qualities to the finished crafted item.

Step 1 Pick base template from which base item profile is derived. Step 2 Determine cost and rarity of materials needed: Pick most expensive and/or rare template. Add half the cost of other template. Step 3 Determine time needed to craft item: Start with template with longest craft time and add an appropriate amount of time, I tend to go for half of second template or 6 hours, whichever is longer Step 4 Determine craft difficulty: Base this off the most difficult template and adjust further. The idea here is that accomplished crafters, may combine different templates to create more complex items, originally intended to combine various types of armour templates. In effect gaining more benefits in one item. Adjusting the difficulty as suggested below.

Customisation Difficulty adjustment Cost adjustment Time adjustment Combining 2 templates: Add 1 difficulty die Increase cost as per above guidelines. See above Adding 1st new core quality (see appropriate crafting tables): Upgrade difficulty once Increase by total number of advantages required for chosen quality/qualities multiplied by 200, and/or by 800 per quality requiring a Triumph* Add 5 hours to crafting time per added quality. Adding 2nd and 3rd new quality (from tables): Add 2 setback dice per additional quality or rank of same quality (max 4 setback dice) See above. See above. Adding 4th new quality: Add challenge die See above. See above. *A quality requiring 2 Advantages, costs an additional 400 credits to craft.

Using the template created above, where we in this example choose to keep the Pierce 5 quality in the template, gives us a starting difficulty of an upgraded Daunting (RPPP) mechanics check. Now we want to add the Knockdown quality, upgrading the check once more, and increasing the cost by 400 credits (1600 total). We also want to make it Accurate 1 out of the gate, adding another 800 credits to the cost, and 2 setback dice to the check, ending up at RRPPSS. For another 2 setback dice, we could also add Concussive, adding another 800 credits to the cost. Adding another quality would add a challenge die to the pool.

If the check is successful, you now have a seriously nice heavy energy bow. Any advantages produced can of course be spent on other modifications, and of course, at this difficulty there is a real chance for a bunch of threats, and even despairs, making your weapon that much more … interesting.