Wiki Showcase: the Aristocratic Background Lens - The Imperial Heir

When my Patrons voted for the Aristocratic Lens to be the focus of the month, I asked them what optional lenses they'd like to see focused on, and we had a four way tie for second.  The Imperial Heir was the second of those tied for second.

So, what's it like to play the second most important person in the Galaxy?  You can't play as the Emperor of course (right? I mean, that would be silly), but why not one of his children? 

Star Wars never really talked about imperial succession, because it was interested in having a tightly constrained narrative that it could wrap up with a bow: find the Emperor, kill the Emperor, the galaxy is saved.  Hooray!  But we have the luxury of exploring these possibilities.  We can have an imperial prince or princess and a convoluted race for succession if the Emperor ever actually dies, including which person gets backed to be the next in power.

Like the Corporate Heir from yesterday, the Imperial Heir is not powerful in their own right, but because of who they're deeply connected with.  Just as we can look to real-world corporate heirs, we can look to the children of real-world dictators and see what they might be like: spoiled, with nobody in their empire willing to say no to them, though sometimes, they come to see the plight of their people and may act as a sort of hero figure (or be set up as one by their father's very clever propaganda arm).

Of course, playing such a character isn't cheap (60 points! For the basics!) but that's to be expected. The ability to throw a tantrum, and then get your own dreadnought for your birthday, is a pretty powerful one. And the GM needs to be careful if allowing this, as the campaign can quickly become about the Imperial Heir, which isn't necessarily a problem, but it's not the sort of character you just chuck into a campaign without working out some of the details first.  But if you want to play that sort of campaign, you have the tools to do so here.