Eratta and lightsabers

[Emperor Norton 397]

I still think against lightsabers giving a BBEG a talent to up the required advantage to crit is not a bad idea. I mean, otherwise you can easily have a lightsaber focused character doing +20-30 Crits on a good roll, and a couple of ranks in durable only softens it so much. And if they have a lightsaber with vicious it only gets worse.

[mouthymerc 4,483]

One thing you can do for a big baddy is give him the Adversary talent at a certain rank but increase it by the amount of enemies attacking him. For instance say you give Adversary 3 to your BBG but e is ganged up by the party of 4 characters. His Adversary rank could go up by one for each character beyond the first bringing it to Adversary 6. His Adversary rank could vary depending on how many characters try to attack him. If it just one on one he is back to normal, but as more engage he becomes more difficult. It also increases the chances of something going disastrously wrong for the characters attacking.

[mouthymerc 4,483]

I still think against lightsabers giving a BBEG a talent to up the required advantage to crit is not a bad idea. I mean, otherwise you can easily have a lightsaber focused character doing +20-30 Crits on a good roll, and a couple of ranks in durable only softens it so much. And if they have a lightsaber with vicious it only gets worse.

Maybe a talent or ability like Massive for NPCs.

 

RELENTLESS

Activation: Passive

Ranked: Yes

Trees: NPC Nemesis only

When making an attack targeting this character, the critical rating of any weapons used counts as the character has ranks in this talent higher.

 

(Or is name Relentless already in use? Can't recall.)

Edited July 26, 2015 by mouthymerc

[Rakaydos 4,236]

 

I still think against lightsabers giving a BBEG a talent to up the required advantage to crit is not a bad idea. I mean, otherwise you can easily have a lightsaber focused character doing +20-30 Crits on a good roll, and a couple of ranks in durable only softens it so much. And if they have a lightsaber with vicious it only gets worse.

Maybe a talent or ability like Massive for NPCs.

 

RELENTLESS

Activation: Passive

Ranked: Yes

Trees: NPC Nemesis only

When making an attack targeting this character, the critical rating of any weapons used counts as the character has ranks in this talent higher.

 

(Or is name Relentless already in use? Can't recall.)

 

That's the Massive talent from starship combat, or Center of Being the Force talent.

[Emperor Norton 397]

Center of Being either costs strain(with improved) or a maneuver, and only applies to melee (so tricked out crit blasters still work) attacks.

 

I just find that with an outnumbered nemesis already bein outaction/maneuvered, it would be easier just to appy it to him naturally.

 

Also, if I made a Sith Hutt, I guess we could just use the term from Starship combat and call it Massive . (The whole idea with a Sith Hutt with enhance upgrades to force leap just frightens me.)

[Ghostofman 8,319]

 A custom ability that is 1/session flip a destiny point to reroll a crit result, to lower the likelihood of a few truly debilitating crit results.

That's kinda interesting.. I may try that one.

[Angelalex242 101]

As long as fair is fair. A PC has but one character, the GM always has another villain.

 

I can see Players wanting to flip a destiny point to save themselves from a villain crit.

[EldritchFire 499]

You could just flip a Destiny Point to Deus ex machina the "they get away somehow!"

-EF

[Emperor Norton 397]

As long as fair is fair. A PC has but one character, the GM always has another villain.

 

I can see Players wanting to flip a destiny point to save themselves from a villain crit.

The point is to keep one roll from ending a climactic fight. If you are doing 1vMany, a good villain crit isn't going to immediately end the entire fight. (plus I don't generally build villain characters around Vicious and getting 2-3 crits in one roll anyway)

[Ahrimon 1,211]

I'm all for allowing ranks of nemesis increase the number of advantage required to critical that person by 1 per rank. It fits with the nemesis theme.

I'm also firmly in the camp, that as a GM, never put anything I front of players that you are not prepared to have them kill. Players are a crazy and inventive bunch.

I also don't buy into the NPC/Jedi worship. They were all Mary Sue's with lots of plot armor in their stories but they are in mine now and not some super God to be worshiped (or seviced) on bended knees.

[Wonderduck 70]

I give my villains a special ability for managing crits:

 

When my players take on a Big Bad and get a crit I roll the 2 10 sided dice and go with the lower result. For instance if I rolled a 9 and a 2 I go with 29 not 92. Then I modify with vicious and the like as per the attacker. This tends to get you an extra few rounds in my experience.

[Alderaan Crumbs 441]

I didn't read every post, so apologies if this was covered...

I also look at near misses as a narrative deflection. If an opponent misses on, say, 1 successes versus 7 failures, that's a wide shot. If they miss from 5 and 5, that could be seen as a near miss that was deflected. To me, Reflect is a mechanical "boost" to the deflection we've seen so often, but it shouldn't be the only way to represent deflecting blaster bolts.

The one thing that might seem a bit off is that your skill with a lightsaber doesn't manifest outside talents. You can have 5 yellow but an opponent only has to contend with two purple, barring the Force. In the end I don't mind because it perhaps keeps things from becoming too crunchy and the aforementioned talents can go quite far in keeping you alive.

[Vondy 1,460]

 

 

Games like HERO/Champions ... are notorious for starting characters needing to roll 12+ six-sided dice as part of their action, and the dice pools only going up from there.

 

 

 

As someone who has played Hero since 1983, I'm going to declare shenanigans. Hero is not a dice pool system. All success / failure tests are based on a 3d6 bell curve roll against stated, or calculated, target numbers. The only time you roll large numbers of dice (xd6) in hero is for damage. That number, always known in advance, is just result - defense = damage.

Edited January 16, 2016 by Vondy

[Donovan Morningfire 10,200]

 

 

 

Games like HERO/Champions ... are notorious for starting characters needing to roll 12+ six-sided dice as part of their action, and the dice pools only going up from there.

 

 

 

As someone who has played Hero since 1983, I'm going to declare shenanigans. Hero is not a dice pool system. All success / failure tests are based on a 3d6 bell curve roll against stated, or calculated, target numbers. The only time you roll large numbers of dice (xd6) in hero is for damage. That number, always known in advance, is just result - defense = damage.

 

Note I said as part of their action, which under most people's definitions, resolving damage is part of their character's action during a combat round.  A HERO system PC that's focused on damage can be rolling handfuls of dice to determine the damage result of a successful attack.  And it's not that difficult to build a character that is highly accurate, ensuring that you're rolling those handfuls of dice multiple times in a combat round.

[TalosX 184]

If you really want dice pools, join me in a game of Exalted 2E.  We can happily throw 10+ D10 dice pools at each other without much difficulty! 

[Donovan Morningfire 10,200]

If you really want dice pools, join me in a game of Exalted 2E.  We can happily throw 10+ D10 dice pools at each other without much difficulty! 

Nah, Shadowrun, where a starting PC is tossing at least 12 six-siders for their key skills, and it only going up from there

 

Or heck, just old WEG Star Wars d6, where spending a Force Point with an experienced character (or just a Jedi using the Lightsaber Combat power) could potentially result in dice pools exceeding 20 six-siders.

 

In spite of what problems it may or may not have had, one nice thing about AEG's Roll&Keep system was that it capped the dice pool to a maximum of 10 dice, with anything over that being converted to either more kept dice or a flat bonus to the roll.

[TalosX 184]

Nah, Shadowrun, where a starting PC is tossing at least 12 six-siders for their key skills, and it only going up from there

 

Or heck, just old WEG Star Wars d6, where spending a Force Point with an experienced character (or just a Jedi using the Lightsaber Combat power) could potentially result in dice pools exceeding 20 six-siders.

 

In spite of what problems it may or may not have had, one nice thing about AEG's Roll&Keep system was that it capped the dice pool to a maximum of 10 dice, with anything over that being converted to either more kept dice or a flat bonus to the roll.

 

 

Ahh L5R!  It's been a few years since I got to participate in a game.  I haven't kept up on the story to much.  I've heard that the Spider are no longer a proper clan again, and that the Empire is preparing to crush them!  So good news mostly!    

[Donovan Morningfire 10,200]

 

Nah, Shadowrun, where a starting PC is tossing at least 12 six-siders for their key skills, and it only going up from there

 

Or heck, just old WEG Star Wars d6, where spending a Force Point with an experienced character (or just a Jedi using the Lightsaber Combat power) could potentially result in dice pools exceeding 20 six-siders.

 

In spite of what problems it may or may not have had, one nice thing about AEG's Roll&Keep system was that it capped the dice pool to a maximum of 10 dice, with anything over that being converted to either more kept dice or a flat bonus to the roll.

 

 

Ahh L5R!  It's been a few years since I got to participate in a game.  I haven't kept up on the story to much.  I've heard that the Spider are no longer a proper clan again, and that the Empire is preparing to crush them!  So good news mostly!  

 

As far as the L5R story goes... do yourself a favor and pretty much ignore anything that occurs after the Second Day of Thunder and the coronation of Toturi.  It's worked pretty darn well for the various L5R games that I've played in under both 3rd and 4th edition.

 

If you do get a hankering to run/play L5R and are in need of books, go for the 4th edition corebook.  It's got plenty to run a game with, including minor clan support as well as monks (not much for true ronin though). and the mechanics are a solid improvement over 1st and 2nd edition while not being as bloated or cumbersome or broken as 3nd edition could be.

 

But I digress, as we've sidetracked this thread long enough.

Edited January 18, 2016 by Donovan Morningfire

[Jace911 207]

Deflect is one thing, but I'm rather iffy on people needing a special Talent for the complex act of "block sword with sword". It seems rather absurd that I can have four dots in wielding a lightsaber yet be completely unable to defend myself against a similarly-armed opponent, or rather be just as defenseless as if I shut off my weapon (Melee is always Difficulty 2).

 

For that I have a houserule dueling system where two opponents with melee weapons/lightsabers make opposed skill checks, and whoever succeeds deals Strain damage equal to the number of Successes generated (Triumphs deal Wounds). That way there's much more of the traditional back and forth, with the occasional incidental wounds from lucky hits thrown in, until one side beats the other down and either kills, maims, or disarms them.

[Laurefindel 43]

Deflect is one thing, but I'm rather iffy on people needing a special Talent for the complex act of "block sword with sword". It seems rather absurd that I can have four dots in wielding a lightsaber yet be completely unable to defend myself against a similarly-armed opponent, or rather be just as defenseless as if I shut off my weapon (Melee is always Difficulty 2).

The way I see it, the opponent without the Parry talent does bloc incoming blows effectively, that's why he/she is not sliced in half. It's all in the narrative. Only, he/she must spend great resources to "not die" (i.e. wounds), which the character has a finite amount.

 

The opponent with the Parry talent spends as much resources to bloc incoming blows, but some of those come from a renewable pool of resource points (i.e. Strain).

 

So narratively speaking, the opponent without the Parry talent parries blows just as well as the person possessing the talent, but at a greater resource cost.

[Jace911 207]

 

Deflect is one thing, but I'm rather iffy on people needing a special Talent for the complex act of "block sword with sword". It seems rather absurd that I can have four dots in wielding a lightsaber yet be completely unable to defend myself against a similarly-armed opponent, or rather be just as defenseless as if I shut off my weapon (Melee is always Difficulty 2).

The way I see it, the opponent without the Parry talent does bloc incoming blows effectively, that's why he/she is not sliced in half. It's all in the narrative. Only, he/she must spend great resources to "not die" (i.e. wounds), which the character has a finite amount.

 

The opponent with the Parry talent spends as much resources to bloc incoming blows, but some of those come from a renewable pool of resource points (i.e. Strain).

 

So narratively speaking, the opponent without the Parry talent parries blows just as well as the person possessing the talent, but at a greater resource cost.

 

Except when it comes to lightsaber duels you can take one, maybe two hits from a saber before you are KTFO. That's depressingly anticlimactic, especially given the aforementioned issue where a Jedi Master with 5 ranks in lightsaber is just as easy to hit as a Force-blind child who barely knows which end of the saber to hold. There's no mechanical difference between the two because all melee attacks are Average, it's all decided with the attacker's pool.

 

I mean yes, you can declare via narrative that those two hits happen among several attacks which were parried but in real-time it still feels very short and abrupt, and that's not dramatic at all unless your intent is to show how one duelist brutally wrecked the other, or how one got in an early lucky hit. If you tried to model the Luke and Vader duel from Empire with this system Luke wouldn't have made it out of the carbon freeze chamber, much less survived an extended duel that led to new areas and inflicted incidental wounds on both combatants. He would've made one attack and then Vader would've shanked him.

[Vondy 1,460]

 

 

Deflect is one thing, but I'm rather iffy on people needing a special Talent for the complex act of "block sword with sword". It seems rather absurd that I can have four dots in wielding a lightsaber yet be completely unable to defend myself against a similarly-armed opponent, or rather be just as defenseless as if I shut off my weapon (Melee is always Difficulty 2).

The way I see it, the opponent without the Parry talent does bloc incoming blows effectively, that's why he/she is not sliced in half. It's all in the narrative. Only, he/she must spend great resources to "not die" (i.e. wounds), which the character has a finite amount.

 

The opponent with the Parry talent spends as much resources to bloc incoming blows, but some of those come from a renewable pool of resource points (i.e. Strain).

 

So narratively speaking, the opponent without the Parry talent parries blows just as well as the person possessing the talent, but at a greater resource cost.

 

Except when it comes to lightsaber duels you can take one, maybe two hits from a saber before you are KTFO. That's depressingly anticlimactic, especially given the aforementioned issue where a Jedi Master with 5 ranks in lightsaber is just as easy to hit as a Force-blind child who barely knows which end of the saber to hold. There's no mechanical difference between the two because all melee attacks are Average, it's all decided with the attacker's pool.

 

I mean yes, you can declare via narrative that those two hits happen among several attacks which were parried but in real-time it still feels very short and abrupt, and that's not dramatic at all unless your intent is to show how one duelist brutally wrecked the other, or how one got in an early lucky hit. If you tried to model the Luke and Vader duel from Empire with this system Luke wouldn't have made it out of the carbon freeze chamber, much less survived an extended duel that led to new areas and inflicted incidental wounds on both combatants. He would've made one attack and then Vader would've shanked him.

 

 

The more I look at this the more Defensive Training - or anything that increases your defense rating and upgrades your opponent's pool difficulty - far outstrip parry in a lightsaber duel.

[Bromide Hadral 5]

It is funny that "reflect" and "parry" are not as good as they should be.  Things like Quigon and Obi-one taking on 20-30 battle droids would not happen as there is a little damage added overtime... I understand that they have toned down the jedi's to let the other classes shine a little more, but sorry they are not jedi... 

 

I would be interested to see one of the master jedi's trees to better understand their ranks in these skills.

I always saw jedi as never having a stat below 3 and starting the game with minimum 500 points so that a jedi may have the ability to be great with many things.

[GMPercy 28]

You're also looking at it from the perspective that each droid gets an attack. Using battle droids as say 4-6 minion groups of 5 would net similar results to what we saw in the prequels I think.