Equipment Rules

This page covers the rules layer on top of equipment — how rarity gating works, how carrying capacity and encumbrance work, and where to find the structured data for each gear category. For what individual items do, browse the catalog directly:

• Weapons — 235 entries with damage, range, and properties.
• Armor — 80 entries. Categories and the Max Dex / AC bonus rules live in Combat → Armor Class.
• Gear — 67 utility items across 9 categories.
• Medpacs — 5 tiers, healing dice, costs.
• Upgrades — weapon, armor, and droid chassis upgrades.
• Force Powers — 63 powers (rules-side, not equipment).

Rarity

Equipment is categorized by rarity, which affects availability, typical cost, and whether an item can be purchased openly or must be sourced through black markets, military channels, or underworld contacts.

GMs can use rarity to gate powerful equipment behind story beats, reputation thresholds, or faction favors — making gear progression feel earned rather than purely transactional. A party shouldn't be buying Beskar armor at the spaceport gear shop in session 2.

Some armors and weapons in the catalog are flagged as legendary outliers in their notes field — exotic species-shell armor like Vonduun Crabshell, or specialty pieces that intentionally exceed standard band rules. Treat them as Unique-rarity finds, not regular shop stock.

Carrying Capacity and Encumbrance

Every character has a carrying limit. Exceeding it causes encumbrance.

Carrying Capacity (kg) = (Strength score² ÷ 2) × Size Multiplier

The formula scales quadratically with STR — each point above 10 adds proportionally more capacity than the prior point, so genuinely strong characters carry dramatically more than average ones. A STR 10 Medium humanoid carries 50 kg; a STR 18 Medium humanoid carries 162 kg — about 3.2× as much, not 1.8× as a linear formula would give.

Size multipliers

Encumbrance effects

A character carrying more than their Carrying Capacity is Encumbered:

• Speed reduced by 10 ft.
• Disadvantage on Dexterity checks and Dexterity saving throws.
• Cannot Dash or use movement-based reactions.

GMs may waive encumbrance tracking for fast-paced, cinematic play and apply it strictly only in survival, heist, or wilderness scenarios where loadout management is a core challenge. The Streamlined Play design pillar applies here too — track encumbrance when it matters to the story; ignore it otherwise.

Jetpacks & Personal Flight

A jetpack turns a foot-soldier into a strike from the sky. It is Rare or better gear — restricted, expensive, and dangerous in untrained hands — and it runs on a short, precious fuel supply rather than granting free flight. The catalog carries three grades:

All three grades let their user hover. The Mandalorian grade is a custom rig built into a suit of beskar'gam and can be fitted with a single 1/day missile (treat as a thrown explosive — GM sets the payload).

Thrust Charges (the fuel)

A jetpack holds a handful of Thrust Charges — the discrete bursts of fuel it can fire before it needs to refuel. Charges are what keep a jetpack from being free, unlimited flight:

• Each turn you spend to fly costs 1 Thrust Charge (see activation below).
• A jetpack recovers all its Thrust Charges on a short or long rest (refueling from a fuel cell, a ship's tanks, or a spare canister).
• Out of combat, treat the charges loosely: a full tank is good for roughly ten minutes of cumulative flight — enough to scale a tower, clear a chasm, or make a getaway, not to fly cross-country. Long-distance travel is a job for a speeder or a ship.

Using a jetpack in combat

• Activation — Bonus Action. Fire the pack as a Bonus Action to spend 1 Thrust Charge and gain the jetpack's flying speed (and the ability to hover) until the end of your next turn. This lets you fly after your Action, satisfying the "movement after an Action requires a special rule" clause under Movement.
• Ceiling. A jetpack is a personal rig, not a starfighter — practical altitude is on the order of 50–100 ft. It cannot reach orbit or sustain flight beyond its charges.
• See Flying for what a flying speed does: ignoring ground terrain and hazards, hovering, and the fall that follows if your flight ends while you are still aloft.

Jetpack Training (the proficiency gate)

Flying a jetpack in a fight — juking fire, firing on the move, landing on a mark — takes practice. A character is trained with a jetpack if they have the Jetpack Training trait (an ASI-alternative pick) or are granted it by their background, culture, or faction. Mandalorians and Death Watch warriors are raised to it and count as trained without spending a trait.

• Trained characters use the full performance above, and can take the advanced flyer traits below.
• Untrained characters can still strap on a pack — but it is clumsy and risky:
  • Their flying speed is halved.
  • They have Disadvantage on attack rolls while airborne.
  • If they take damage while flying, they must make a DC 13 Dexterity saving throw or lose control and fall Prone (taking falling damage from their current height).

An untrained pilot can reasonably use a jetpack to escape straight up a shaft or vault a wall in an emergency; trying to dogfight with one is how untrained troopers become craters.

Advanced flyer traits

Trained flyers can specialize further. These are the traits that make an elite jetpack unit — the kind Death Watch field — genuinely frightening in the air (available as class features or GM-granted faction traits):

• Aerial Ace — You don't provoke opportunity attacks when you fly out of a creature's reach, and you have Advantage on attack rolls made while flying against a target on the ground.
• Evasive Maneuvers — While you are flying with a jetpack, attack rolls against you have Disadvantage until the start of your next turn — the thrust lets you juke a shot no ground fighter could.

Limitations and disadvantages

A jetpack is powerful, and the costs are what keep it balanced:

• It eats your Bonus Action. Every turn you stay airborne costs the Bonus Action you might have spent on an off-hand shot, a Heroic Surge, or drawing a detonator.
• It runs dry. Three to six charges is a handful of bursts, then you are grounded until you rest.
• You can't fly overloaded. A character who is Encumbered cannot use a jetpack at all, and standard packs struggle to lift a fighter in Heavy armor — only a Mandalorian Jetpack is rated to carry a full beskar'gam loadout.
• It is loud and bright. A firing jetpack ruins stealth — Disadvantage on Stealth checks while thrusting, and at night the exhaust is a beacon.
• The fuel is a target. (GM option) A critical hit against an airborne jetpack user, or Fire or Ion damage taken while the pack is active, risks a stall or a fuel rupture: the pack cuts out (the user falls) or vents a small burst of flame. Use it to make the sky feel dangerous, not to punish every flight.

Armor categories — quick reference

The detailed band rules live in Combat → Armor Class, but here's the one-line summary so you can spot what's what at a glance:

Pick armor your class is proficient with. Without proficiency, the armor doesn't grant its benefits and you suffer penalties — see Combat → Armor Proficiency.

Buying, selling, and finding equipment

A few practical conventions:

• Catalog prices are list prices. Negotiation, supply, and faction influence move them. A weapons fence might pay 50% of list; a desperate buyer might pay 200%.
• Most starting characters have ~250 credits plus class-specific starting gear. Players don't routinely need to track every credit; just track major purchases.
• Looted gear from enemies is fair game. A stormtrooper has armor + a blaster + a comlink — the party can take all of it after the fight, GM permitting. (And the GM permits it whenever it's not narratively absurd.)
• Custom and crafted gear uses the Mechanics skill — see Tech Specialist for the build that excels at it.