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Parry with Sabers
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Esoomian
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 3:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So with these rules LSC is no longer a power and anyone with sufficient skill can wield a Lightsaber as effectively as a Jedi?

If that is the case would you houserule that increasing the Lightsaber skill (without a trainer) could result in injuries?
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ZzaphodD
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 3:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Esoomian wrote:
So with these rules LSC is no longer a power and anyone with sufficient skill can wield a Lightsaber as effectively as a Jedi?

If that is the case would you houserule that increasing the Lightsaber skill (without a trainer) could result in injuries?


Actually the whole idea is that the reason lightsabers are not 'common' for non-jedi is because they are so hard to handle (without the LSC power) in combination with the 'self-hit' rule.

Yes, I could do that. However, given that PCs are 'heroes' I probably wouldnt. If a player wants to spend all those CPs on a single skill that only cover a highly illegal (more so than any other weapon) weapon, Id say go ahead.
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Esoomian
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 3:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

So in this case the Lightsaber would remain a skill all on it's own so one couldn't just upskill in Melee combat to gain proficiency?
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ZzaphodD
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 4:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Esoomian wrote:
So in this case the Lightsaber would remain a skill all on it's own so one couldn't just upskill in Melee combat to gain proficiency?


Exactly!
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Esoomian
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 4:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Matthias777 wrote:
Lightsaber
Type: Lightsaber
Scale: Character
Skill: Lightsaber/Melee Combat (whichever your house rules uses for lightsabers)
Cost: Not available for sale
Availability: 4, X
Difficulty: Difficult
Damage: 8D
Game Notes: If the lightsaber's damage total does not beat the roll to resist damage, the remainder by which the damage total was beaten is the additional time taken (in rounds) for the lightsaber to cut through the object or material resisting damage. When attacking with a lightsaber, if a character misses the difficulty number by more than 10 points (the base difficulty, not their opponent's parry total), the character has injured themselves with the blade. Apply normal damage to the character wielding the lightsaber.


Does this (the section in bold) mean that it is possible for a character to kill both themself and their opponent with a poor attack roll if the opponent makes a terrible parry roll?
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CRMcNeill
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 5:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

ZzaphodD wrote:
Esoomian wrote:
So in this case the Lightsaber would remain a skill all on it's own so one couldn't just upskill in Melee combat to gain proficiency?


Exactly!


Why?
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garhkal
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PostPosted: Tue Jan 17, 2012 7:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I had a game (as a player) where one of our resident hunters loved collecting LS's from downed opponents... got caught with 7 of them when 'vader came a calling" and he had a the gall to ask Vader if he could add his LS to his collection...
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Matthias777
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 4:39 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Esoomian wrote:
So with these rules LSC is no longer a power and anyone with sufficient skill can wield a Lightsaber as effectively as a Jedi?

Well, everyone's not necessarily in agreement on everything here, but I don't think anyone's wanting to do away with Lightsaber Combat (the power). There are some that would like to do away with the Lightsaber skill (Dexterity skill) and fold it into Melee Combat (and Melee Parry, if you're not of a mind to combine Melee Combat and Melee Parry into one skill). I am leaning toward the latter viewpoint myself, though I feel that, if this is done, there needs to be some adjustment to compensate for the fact that you're not spending CP to raise a skill just for using lightsabers (see the bottom of this post for my idea on that).

Esoomian wrote:
Matthias777 wrote:
Lightsaber
Type: Lightsaber
Scale: Character
Skill: Lightsaber/Melee Combat (whichever your house rules uses for lightsabers)
Cost: Not available for sale
Availability: 4, X
Difficulty: Difficult
Damage: 8D
Game Notes: If the lightsaber's damage total does not beat the roll to resist damage, the remainder by which the damage total was beaten is the additional time taken (in rounds) for the lightsaber to cut through the object or material resisting damage. When attacking with a lightsaber, if a character misses the difficulty number by more than 10 points (the base difficulty, not their opponent's parry total), the character has injured themselves with the blade. Apply normal damage to the character wielding the lightsaber.


Does this (the section in bold) mean that it is possible for a character to kill both themself and their opponent with a poor attack roll if the opponent makes a terrible parry roll?

I never noticed that, but yes. FYI, the part you are referring to is WEG's original Game Notes for lightsabers; I just included it in my version.

For those of you against folding Lightsaber into Melee Combat, would the idea be more palatable if the Game Notes said that the wielder injured themselves if they missed the difficulty by 5 or more, instead of 11 or more? A difficulty of Difficult is 16-20, so this means that if they rolled an 11 or lower (assuming the GM picked the lowest difficulty possible), they might just chop themselves in half. Even with a fairly high Melee Combat skill, you could still end up in a couple of pieces if you got a bad roll. This definitely appeals to me more than my initial stat block (quoted above in this post), and I feel that it restores some of (dare I say, "fixes") the game balance that having a standalone Lightsaber skill was designed to bring to the system, while making the game more closely match the Star Wars universe. It is still a melee weapon...it just has a very steep, very dangerous learning curve.

Lightsaber v2.1
Type: Lightsaber
Scale: Character
Skill: Lightsaber/Melee Combat (whichever your house rules uses for lightsabers)
Cost: Not available for sale
Availability: 4, X
Difficulty: Difficult
Damage: 8D
Game Notes: If the lightsaber's damage total does not beat the roll to resist damage, the remainder by which the damage total was beaten is the additional time taken (in rounds) for the lightsaber to cut through the object or material resisting damage. When attacking with a lightsaber, if a character misses the difficulty number by 5 points or more (the base difficulty, not their opponent's parry total), the character has injured themselves with the blade. Apply normal damage to the character wielding the lightsaber.

In keeping with the movies, how would you roll using the lightsaber as a tool (cutting open a tauntaun, for instance)? Seems that someone with either zero Lightsaber skill (if you're keeping it as a standalone skill) or a pretty low Melee Combat skill (if you're folding Lightsaber into Melee Combat) should be able to do something like that without much danger of injuring themselves.
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ZzaphodD
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 1:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Well, perhaps you missed a point.. Wink

If you use Melee as a skill the whole point why lighsabers are not used by other users (especially before the Empire) because of the high self-damage risk is void..(which the latest discussion is all about) Laughing
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Bren
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 6:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Matthias777 wrote:
I might houserule lightfoils a bit so that a one on the Wild Die means that the beam flickers and fades, but it can be turned back on again. But every time that this happens, the Gamemaster rolls 1D, and a one on that Wild Die results in the lightfoil being rendered inoperable until repaired.
That is an improvement. Though it still seems too common a result for my taste. But then one could point out that I am not a bored, jaded, noble who is not in the main line to inherit. Laughing

Matthias777 wrote:
Lightfoil
Damage: 3D to 4D damage, depending on the quality of construction.

Lightsaber
Damage: 8D

The damage difference of 3D/4D to 8D is equivalent to the difference between a holdout blaster and a heavy repeating blaster. That seesm far to extreme a difference for weapons that are suppose to operate on the same principle. If the lightsaber is 8D then something like 5D seems about right for the lightfoil to me.
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Matthias777
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 6:38 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

ZzaphodD wrote:
Well, perhaps you missed a point.. Wink

If you use Melee as a skill the whole point why lighsabers are not used by other users (especially before the Empire) because of the high self-damage risk is void..(which the latest discussion is all about) Laughing

I didn't miss that point. Let me try to re-explain what I'm trying to do.

A lightsaber is a melee weapon that is difficult to get the hang of using properly. To me, it makes sense to have one Melee Combat skill, and construct the stats of a lightsaber in such a way that those stats themselves enforce the fact that lightsabers are very difficult to master. That's what the "Difficulty" line in a stat is for, right? I don't think any other melee weapon has a difficulty above Moderate (though I don't have time to flip through Gundark's right now to check). The Difficulty line in the lightsaber's stats should indicate how difficult it is to wield (the RAW states difficult), and the Game Notes line should indicate that a user accidentally injures themselves when they miss that difficulty by whatever amount.

With those game mechanics already in place, it negates the need to have a standalone skill, in my opinion. If a base difficulty of Difficult is too low for you, make it Very Difficult; this would make most people require a specialization to handle the weapon and not hack off something. If that solution doesn't suit you, keep the difficulty of Difficult and add a +5 modifier to the difficulty in the Game Notes for characters without a Melee Combat: Lightsaber specialization. There are a lot of different ways to solve the problem without having a standalone skill.

Just think about this for a moment: what if it were an odd homebrew weapon we came up with here on the Pit? A normal-looking sword that is incredibly heavy but does STR+4D damage and delivers a stun charge, or something We'd still put it in with Melee Combat, and fiddle with the Difficulty and Game Notes lines to achieve the desired effect on gameplay. That's what those mechanics are for, right?
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Esoomian
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 6:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

There are actually a few difficult melee weapons. I recall at least one Strength + 3D vibroblade with a difficulty of difficult.
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Matthias777
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 7:32 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bren wrote:
But then one could point out that I am not a bored, jaded, noble who is not in the main line to inherit. Laughing

Yeah, and I think that's why they put it like they did in the text. If not for that, I'd reduce it to a one in thirty-six chance as well.

Bren wrote:
The damage difference of 3D/4D to 8D is equivalent to the difference between a holdout blaster and a heavy repeating blaster. That seesm far to extreme a difference for weapons that are suppose to operate on the same principle. If the lightsaber is 8D then something like 5D seems about right for the lightfoil to me.

You're absolutely right. I meant to put that in, and forgot. I'd change the range to 4D-5D, if it were me. Probably 4D-6D, actually.

Also, I think that GMs have to keep in mind what kind of weapons these are, and anything like a lightsaber/lightfoil or vibro-axe is going to hack limbs off a good bit of the time (instead of outright killing someone, though it's likely they could die of shock)...the burden lies on the GM to remember this and impose the "maiming" rule on a "Killed" result some of the time. Not saying you won't cut a guy in half or decapitate him, but you might just chop a leg or arm off. It's up to the GM to not forget that sort of thing, and flex a bit from the basic wound table.

Esoomian wrote:
There are actually a few difficult melee weapons. I recall at least one Strength + 3D vibroblade with a difficulty of difficult.

Really? I know the basic vibroblade in the 2R&E rulebook is STR+3D with a Moderate difficulty.
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Bren
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 7:34 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

In addition to one or two vibroblades, the Sat'Skar (the Coynite war sword roughly analogous to a katana or b@st@rd* sword) has a difficulty of Difficult when used two-handed and Very Difficult when used one-handed. The Coyn'Skar, a Coynite polearm, has a difficulty of Moderate for a blade strike and Very Difficult for a disarming (the opponent's weapon, not his arm Wink ) strike.



Edited to correct Sat'Skar and Coyn'Skar. I had the names reversed. Embarassed Bren's Coynite "brother" would be very disappointed.


Last edited by Bren on Wed Jan 18, 2012 8:52 pm; edited 1 time in total
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Matthias777
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PostPosted: Wed Jan 18, 2012 7:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I wish I'd had time to check Gundark's before I left the house. In light of this, I propose a difficulty of Very Difficult for lightsabers and lightfoils. Maybe even in conjunction with the unskilled (read: unspecialized) penalty mentioned above.
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