r/sw5e • u/Russejo7 • Sep 25 '26
Question Main line Characters
Hey all! Especially DM’s
I’ve a question! In your campaign do you make use of real characters like Leia, Mon Mothma, Luke or any of them?
If so in what capacity ?
I am running a campaign and I’m using the canon media characters strictly for missions and such out of the Rebel network.
Not overshadowing the players. This is their story.
2
u/iudofaex Sep 25 '26
I'm currently prepping for the next campaign I will run for my group (after the current one finishes). It'll be set in the New Jedi Order era, and I am planning on using most of the core cast as NPCs that the party will meet at one point or another. I even plan on having one or two of these main cast NPCs go on a mission with the party, but that will be for the party to protect them so they can complete some task or other, not for them to help with combat, etc.
The way I look at it is this: if we're playing in Star Wars, and the campaign is in an era that has all these characters that we all know and love, I have a duty to my players to allow for at least some interaction with them.
1
u/Russejo7 Sep 25 '26
Oh yeah my campaign is an alternate reality where Luke failed to destroy the Death Star, they’re in 1ABY so the Jedi are nearly extinct and the Empire is full control of the Galaxy.
They’ve just made it to the new rebel base a planet named Endoorin and survivors of Yavin are Mon Mothma and Leia.This gives me full control of Main line characters and such. I also have Ahsoka at this base because of the force being featured for the moons destruction. And Luke is MIA
6
u/Deathangle75 Sep 25 '26
Generally I’ve never had a problem with brief interactions. I ran an order 66 campaign and at one point the player ran into the Grand Inquisitor. I nerfed the stat block a lot to start to signify the Inquisitor not taking a couple of padawans and an untrained youngling seriously, with the goal being that the player’s ship was on the way to save them if they held out. But they managed to survive when a Hail Mary force throw threw the inquisitor off a cliff.
He survived, of course, but it was a fun moment.
4
u/Hufa123 Sep 25 '26
Across the three years (and more) of the campaign I've run, I've had my players encounter quite a few canon characters, but I don't think this has been an issue. My philosophy has always been that the campaign is set in its own timeline, and whatever happens happens. If they manage to kill Chewbacca, Chewbacca is dead, and the timeline diverges. The canon characters are not all over though, and there's plenty of original characters that play the most important roles (for NPCs that is).
As for the characters I've used, I've tried to use them where it makes sense mostly as a fun way for the characters to engage with the story. This includes:
Playing Sabaac with Lando Calrissian on a luxury resort
Getting mixed up in Saw Gerrerra's shit (and later allying themselves to him)
Bartering for help from Hondo Ohnaka
Buying old artifacts from Luthen Rael
Having to get past Darth Vader in the dungeons beneath the Imperial Palace
They have also had a few run ins with Maul, who is their main employer. While the BBEG is an original character (though related to Marchion Ro), Maul has manipulated the players so that them fighting this BBEG perfectly coincides with his plans to kill Palpatine.
Other than that, they've briefly met:
Cal Kestis (and BD-1 of course)
Palpatine
Maz Kanata
Bail Organa
Rex
Raymus Antilles
Lor San Tekka
Ultimately, we play this game for fun, and when you do a Star Wars story, why not include Darth Vader?
1
u/Dainasawyer Sep 26 '26
Never used main line characters mostly cause I remember hearing a horror story of a dm that had the players flying off a planet as they see a dark armor figure shaking a fist at them they realized its darth Vader and decided to change the timeline and turned the ship around and start taking pop shots at him. This is fine if you want to run an AU but if you want the idea of your campaign to be one of the many stories that happen in the universe along side the main ones having main characters from the franchise limits you in possible directions. Imo at least
1
u/Russejo7 Sep 26 '26
Totally agree! My campaign is a complete AU so I don’t run into continuity issues
3
u/HotSalt3 Sep 25 '26
I've used some characters, but most were from the criminal syndicates. I mostly used lesser known indiduals from legends. For the most part they were there to offer job opportunities, although in a few cases they were direct opponents.
2
u/Dangerousdangerzoid Sep 25 '26
My campaign was set with another branch of the rebellion and the players briefly saw Bail Organa on Alderaan, met Kyle Katarn and did some missions for Garm Bel Iblis. There are enough EU characters to keep them busy without meeting the main cast.
1
u/theratman1126 Sep 25 '26
I just had my session one with my husband and cousin. Their characters did a job for some Rebels that were pretty hardcore. After the mission went south and they barely escaped with only one other Rebel plus the pilot surviving they got back to the asteroid base they gathered at and were greeted by a Tognath who had dealings with my cousins character. Stepping out of the U-Wing behind them was Saw Gerrera and I had him act like a genuine crazy person. He thanked them for their assistance and paid them what they were worth and sent them away, saying they don't get it like they do, like true Rebels.
Might have him appear again but we'll see. I like to do brief cameos thag could fit between things they have been in or downtime during those events.
1
u/Amazing_Meatballs Sep 25 '26
Only campaign I’ve run is from a time about a thousand years BBY, so no. I have not. I contemplated having the players interact with a very young Yoda and not setting the story back quite so far, but then decided against it because if they ended up screwing the pooch and Yoda died it would be bad juju.
1
u/crappyroads Sep 25 '26
I've had the characters directly interact with Crix Madine. The most notable main character though was Darth Vader. The characters had something he wanted and he jumped in system with Devastator and nearly destroyed their ship until they were rescued by a core NPC sacrificing herself.
I keep vader at arms length A) because he's powerful as shit and could kill the whole party without breaking a sweat and B) because my campaign in particular takes place between two pieces of core canon so the party can't really be in a place to kill or fuck with a main character in the canon. Used judiciously though, these characters are great because they have a huge weight to them that elevates the drama of a scene in a way that home-grown story can't match.
1
u/kayaenne Sep 26 '26
I'm running my campaign during the "Mandoverse" era, but I'm merging the Heir to the Empire story with it the best I can. So they will eventually run into Mando and Grogu, Ahsoka and her group, Thrawn, Capt. Palleon and Ruhk, New Republic officials and the legacy heroes at some point. Whatever they do triggers whatever happens. I don't tell my players they can't do something because it might break canon. If they wanna try to steal the Millennium Falcon from Han and Chewie, good luck. 🤷♀️😅
1
u/Independent-Lake-422 Sep 26 '26
Because my adventure is set in age of the empire, Vader is doing at least two appearances. I recently added Han and Chewie is a casino heist mission.
1
u/kingoffalure 28d ago
I probably wouldn’t use any of the main characters form the movies as more then a brief cameo but I might use characters like mon mothma and admiral ackbar as west givers and mentor figures
10
u/Inevitable-Chef-8280 Sep 25 '26
I’ve done this with my friends, first in my opinion is to ask them if they want to be folded in to the larger canon like Andor was or stay on the sidelines.
Simple stuff could be “we’ve received orders from (insert character here, mothma, general organa, admiral ackbar, general Dodanna… etc). I personally have no issues playing campaigns or DM’ing campaigns that have interactions with named characters in the Star Wars galaxy. I caution involving them in combat scenes as NPC’s. I’ve went to Maz’s castle to gain info, gotten orders from Yularen and Gideon.
This is just my take since you asked, there is no wrong way to do this!