5. Come Together

Most Star Wars characters don't work alone, and while some starships can be operated by a single crew member, it is more dynamic—and engaging—to crew a starship with a party—each member of the party fulfilling a needed role on the ship. Teamwork and cooperation greatly improve your party's chance to survive the unapologetic lethality of spacefaring.

Deployments

There are six major roles directly tied to the control of a starship: coordinator, gunner, mechanic, operator, pilot, and technician. Any character can have ranks in any one or more deployments and any character can fulfill any one or more roles on a ship at any given time, but because there are only some functions a pilot can access, one character must be at the helm, whether or not the character has any ranks in Pilot. How your character interacts with your ship—or enemy ships—is determined by what they decide to do on any particular turn, but characters will usually begin to focus on one or two particular roles. Chapter 2: Deployments provides more information about each deployment.

The deployment you choose may be the first impactful decision you make when you adopt the space portion of your campaign. Each of the six deployments has a unique and tangible function, and many of them interact—and synergize—with your character's species and class features. As you progress through the ranks of your chosen deployment, you unlock unique features that augment and enhance your interaction with that deployment, potentially granting you new actions, or simply improving the actions already available to your deployment.

Rank

Typically, a character starts their space journey at deployment rank 0, and advances through the ranks (up to 5th) over time. A rank 0 character is typically inexperienced in the ways of their starship, although he or she might have been on a starship previously.

Starting off at rank 0 marks your character's entry in the spacefarer life. If you're already familiar with the game, or if you are joining an existing SW5e campaign, your DM might decide to have you begin at a higher rank, on assumption that your character has already survived a few harrowing adventures. Record your rank on your deployment sheet. If you're starting at a higher rank, record the additional elements your deployment specialization grants you.

Building the Millennium Falcon, Step 5

A ship is no good without a crew, especially her pilot: Han Solo in this case. Han is a versatile character aboard a ship, but he is strongest in the piloting role (best in the galaxy). When Han achieves his first rank, we spend that rank in the pilot deployment specialization, unlocking the Piloting Procedure and Venture deployment features. For his Piloting Procedure, we mark that Han's power dice are d4s. Additionally, Han knows two tactics: for these we choose Koiogran Turn and Snap Roll. For his Venture, we choose Precision Gunner.

Beyond the Basics

As your characters—and their starship—go on adventures and overcome challenges, they can increase in their ranks and tiers, respectively. While tiers are driven by the amount of effort—and credits—directly applied to the starship, ranks are earned separately.

Typically, characters start at deployment rank 0, achieving rank 1 after completing their first successful encounter and earning prestige. The GM may decide, however, that characters start at 1st rank or higher, depending on choices in a character's background or during an adventure. Higher ranks are achieved by successfully completing more encounters and earning more prestige, as shown below in the Deployment Rank Prestige table.

Deployment Rank Prestige

Anything that requires the characters to exercise their skills yields prestige. Defeating, routing, or escaping an encounter are the most common methods, but other actions might yield prestige at the discretion of the GM; completing a training simulation or successfully talking your way out of a situation might earn you prestige, for instance.

Beyond 5th Rank

Characters who reach 5th rank across their deployments may want to continue progressing in their starship skills. Additional prestige earned can yield additional ranks, though no character can gain higher than 5th rank in any deployment. For each rank beyond 5th, the amount of required prestige increases by 4; achieving 6th rank would require an additional 8 prestige (24 total), while achieving 7th rank would require an additional 12 prestige (36 total).

The expectation is to tie ranks—and hopefully tiers—to proficiency bonuses. When characters reach 5th-level, their proficiency bonus increases to 3, and again at 9th (4), 13th (5), and 17th (6). Ranks 2-4 are designed to be awarded at or around those same improvements.

Features and Hull/Shield Dice

When your starship gains a tier, it unlocks additional features, depending on its size, as detailed in the description. Some of these features allow you to increase your starship's ability scores. You can't increase an ability score above 20 unless otherwise noted.

Each time your starship gains a tier, it gains gain 1 additional Hull Die and 1 additional Shield Die. Roll the Hull Die, add your ship's Constitution modifier to the roll, and add the total to your hull point maximum. Next, roll the Shield Die, add your ship's Stength modifier to the roll, and add the total to your base shield points which is then multiplied by the appropriate factor depending on which shields your ship has. Alternatively, for both hull and shields, you can use the fixed value shown in your class entry, which is the average result of the die roll (rounded up).

When your ship's Constitution modifier increases by 1, its hull point maximum increases by 1 for each Hull Die it has. For example, if your tier 0 Medium ship has a Constitution score of 14, when it reaches tier 1, you increases its Constitution score from 14 to 16, thus increasing its Constitution modifier from +2 to +3. At tier 0, your Medium starship has a total of 6 Hull Dice, so its hull point maximum then increases by 6. The same rules apply to your base shield points and your Strength score.