Since we're talking about force powers here, I thought I'd posit a theoretical situation. It's only theoretical, because I don't think it can happen with the current batch of force powers.

Say, you have a force ability that lets you add force pips as successes to a skill roll. I believe the Enhance power has several of those, as does Influence. Now, let's say there's another force ability that let's you do the same thing and there's an overlap in the skills that can be augmented. Does this mean that you can make more than one power check for the specified skill?

In other words, let's say you have the second Control ability of Influence that lets you make a power check for a batch of social skills (Coercion, Charm, Deception, etc). Then, in some other supplement, they include a power that allows you to do the same thing with another batch of skills, but, say, Charm is in both abilities. Does this mean you can make two power checks for Charm and add your light pips as successes? So, if you have a force rating of 3, does that mean you can roll 6 force dice, since you have two separate abilities that affect Charm (assuming you don't have any dice committed to an ongoing effect)?

My guess would be that you can only roll it once and that they'll never include any powers that have overlaps like that. But...

My main impetus in asking this is that I'm going to be including force dice for skills in an upcoming version of my character generator. I'm only going to show a single force dice, since that would represent a force power check with however many dice you have available to use. However, if you can make multiple checks, then I should be allowing for more than one force die to be displayed, each representing a power check.

Your force dice/rating is limited per roll.

So if you've got 3 force rating, and you've got one committed to Agility through Enhance, and you try and make a Coordination check boosted by Enhance's base power. Then if you had 0 skill in Coordination, but 3 Agility, you'd be making a roll with 4 greens (3 base Agility +1 from the Agility increase from Enhance) and up to 2 force dice (since 1 is currently committed, you only have 2 available).

Going a bit more complicated: Let's say you're trying to Charm somebody and you, for whatever reason, want to use the Overwhelm Emotions talent at the same time as using the Influence power with the left-side's control upgrade. We'll say that you've got 3 force rating as well. When making the check, you do whatever for the typical roll - getting your greens, yellows, and boosts, and all the difficulty dice together. Then you decide how you want to split up your 3 force dice - we'll say 2 for Influence's power, and 1 for Overwhelm Emotions; you cannot use 3 force dice for each power you're activating in the same roll, they must be split up - so no 3 dice for Influence and 3 for Overwhelm Emotions. And that's how you'd set up your roll.

There's also the issue that multiple powers cannot be activated at once.

So, what you're saying is that it's just like using any other multiple force abilities: you have to spread your force dice between them, and you can never have more than what your force rating allows.

I'll buy that

Going a bit more complicated: Let's say you're trying to Charm somebody and you, for whatever reason, want to use the Overwhelm Emotions talent at the same time as using the Influence power with the left-side's control upgrade.

That would amount to two actions wouldn't it?

I guess it depends on circumstances, but I think a player would have to choose which to use.

Going a bit more complicated: Let's say you're trying to Charm somebody and you, for whatever reason, want to use the Overwhelm Emotions talent at the same time as using the Influence power with the left-side's control upgrade.

That would amount to two actions wouldn't it?

I guess it depends on circumstances, but I think a player would have to choose which to use.

I think you are correct.

And I believe someone submitted this question through the official process and was told they can't be used at the same time? Don't recall exactly but I thought it was Donovan. I could be completely wrong, just going off of half-remembered memories of another thread.

There's also the issue that multiple powers cannot be activated at once.

I don't have by book on me, but unless I misunderstand you, I'm not sure that is the case.

My understanding is that you can't activate multiple powers on the same turn, but can eventually have a few going at once – activating them in successive turns over time.

Anyone have a page reference for this one?

I am not entirely certain if this aspect has already been addressed, I read a few pages but skimmed a lot. Has anyone considered the way the Influence tree could greatly affect the game with the stacking of upgrades and a greater
Force rating?

In my group that I GM for we have a couple bounty hunters that just beat everything with melee, a pilot who is practically useless, a Jawa slicer that overcomes any kind of tech obstacle, and a Force Sensitive Exile that specializes in the Influence tree. This FSE is quite adept in helping the party overcoming some seemingly ridiculous challenges, in and out of combat. With his Force Power he can inflict strain without any danger to himself, which greatly hinders mobs of minions and impedes rivals and nemeses easily. But besides the strain side-effect, he loves to mess with their heads. Supplemented with Deception, Charm, and Coercion skills the FSE can make a rival or nemesis forget what their mission was or turn on his allies. With a few more upgrades he has been able to turn a simple skill such as deceiving the enemy, like thinking that there was something behind him and opening up a weakness for the bounty hunters, to now being able to mentally dominate them and attain the capabilities of something similar to Force Fear, Horror, Confusion, Illusion, and more.

Now as GM's you could throw some morally obtrusive challenges at an FSE, since the Force Die roll affects what state of emotions and influencing can be done. However, if your FSE is tip-toeing being a Gray Jedi, such as mine, then it is more difficult to hinder their power. I wouldn't be surprised to see him pick up the specialization in AoR when we get it and F&D, too. With these to increase his Rating there wouldn't be much to prohibit him later doing something akin to Morichro, Crucitorn, or other intense Mind-related Force Powers. I come from the camp that if there is backing and canon to it then let it be attainable.

I was just trying to bring another perspective into the evaluation of Force Powers because it seems that a lot of people tend to overlook the Mind powers and go straight to the physical manifestations. I mean why not let a Force-user get really good at Influence, supplement their Leadership and Discipline to do Battle Meditation and help some Rebels to turn the tide? Or let the Force-user dominate a minions mind to control it for a spying job or assassination? It's possible and more ridiculous things have happened. Ever see a Jawa take out a squad of stormtroopers with an restraining bolts and stun grenades? It's pretty awesome.

There's also the issue that multiple powers cannot be activated at once.

I don't have by book on me, but unless I misunderstand you, I'm not sure that is the case.

My understanding is that you can't activate multiple powers on the same turn, but can eventually have a few going at once – activating them in successive turns over time.

Anyone have a page reference for this one?

Correct, no multiple activations in one turn. A Force power is still an Action. You could assign dice to an ongoing effect one round, have them still in place, and do something else a following round with unassigned leftover dice.

I am not entirely certain if this aspect has already been addressed, I read a few pages but skimmed a lot. Has anyone considered the way the Influence tree could greatly affect the game with the stacking of upgrades and a greater

Force rating?

In my group that I GM for we have a couple bounty hunters that just beat everything with melee, a pilot who is practically useless, a Jawa slicer that overcomes any kind of tech obstacle, and a Force Sensitive Exile that specializes in the Influence tree. This FSE is quite adept in helping the party overcoming some seemingly ridiculous challenges, in and out of combat. With his Force Power he can inflict strain without any danger to himself, which greatly hinders mobs of minions and impedes rivals and nemeses easily. But besides the strain side-effect, he loves to mess with their heads. Supplemented with Deception, Charm, and Coercion skills the FSE can make a rival or nemesis forget what their mission was or turn on his allies. With a few more upgrades he has been able to turn a simple skill such as deceiving the enemy, like thinking that there was something behind him and opening up a weakness for the bounty hunters, to now being able to mentally dominate them and attain the capabilities of something similar to Force Fear, Horror, Confusion, Illusion, and more.

Now as GM's you could throw some morally obtrusive challenges at an FSE, since the Force Die roll affects what state of emotions and influencing can be done. However, if your FSE is tip-toeing being a Gray Jedi, such as mine, then it is more difficult to hinder their power. I wouldn't be surprised to see him pick up the specialization in AoR when we get it and F&D, too. With these to increase his Rating there wouldn't be much to prohibit him later doing something akin to Morichro, Crucitorn, or other intense Mind-related Force Powers. I come from the camp that if there is backing and canon to it then let it be attainable.

I was just trying to bring another perspective into the evaluation of Force Powers because it seems that a lot of people tend to overlook the Mind powers and go straight to the physical manifestations. I mean why not let a Force-user get really good at Influence, supplement their Leadership and Discipline to do Battle Meditation and help some Rebels to turn the tide? Or let the Force-user dominate a minions mind to control it for a spying job or assassination? It's possible and more ridiculous things have happened. Ever see a Jawa take out a squad of stormtroopers with an restraining bolts and stun grenades? It's pretty awesome.

There's a lot of difference of opinion about what a Star Wars game should allow in terms of force powers and I hope that F&D strikes a good middle ground allowing for what you describe rather than trying to reign in the use to strictly what's seen in the movies.

I'm more of a movie guy myself and don't care for it when using the force to manipulate people's minds goes into domination, mind control, or illusion territory. But I also want other groups to experience the kind of game they want - just because my tastes are different doesn't mean you shouldn't have support for the game you want. It's much easier for me as a GM to limit options or house rule things or do whatever is needed to pull some powers back a little in my own game than it is for another GM to add material to the game to get the effects they want.

I hope that F&D "errs" on the side of offering more and letting GMs reign in things at the edges.

There's also the issue that multiple powers cannot be activated at once.

I don't have by book on me, but unless I misunderstand you, I'm not sure that is the case.

My understanding is that you can't activate multiple powers on the same turn, but can eventually have a few going at once – activating them in successive turns over time.

Anyone have a page reference for this one?

Yes, what you said. When I say activated I meant it as a verb. You can't activate multiple powers at the same time.

So, what you're saying is that it's just like using any other multiple force abilities: you have to spread your force dice between them, and you can never have more than what your force rating allows.

I'll buy that

Pretty close.

As I've mentioned in a number of other threads, Jay Little had the idea of "resource management" being one of the core elements of the game, with each resource (be it Strain, Force Points, or Destiny Points) only being able to be allocated a certain number of times per turn.

In the case of Force Points, you can't "double dip" in that you couldn't spend them to activate both the Overwhelm Emotions talent and use the Control Upgrade for Influence that lets you add successes/advantages to most social skill checks; you'd have to pick one or the other. Same would hold true of Enhance and any possible future power or talent that allows the Force user to spend their Force Points to augment one of their own skill checks.

In both cases, the Force Point is a limited resource that the player has to manage and decide where to allocate each round. However, the caveat comes in that the player has to declare which power they are going to activate before they roll. So for Enhance, the player would have to declare they are using the Enhance power before they make any sort of skill check roll, be it Athletics, Coordination, Brawl, or Piloting (Space). So a player couldn't roll for an Enhance related effect, and then decide on a whim to devote a Force Point or two to triggering the effects of a different Force Power, aside from the fact that (currently) all the Force Powers provided require an Action to activate, and a character generally gets only one of those each turn.

There's also the issue that multiple powers cannot be activated at once.

I don't have by book on me, but unless I misunderstand you, I'm not sure that is the case.

My understanding is that you can't activate multiple powers on the same turn, but can eventually have a few going at once – activating them in successive turns over time.

Anyone have a page reference for this one?

For anything that as a duration (such as Influence) or an Ongoing Effect (Sense and Enhance), you could conceivably have multiple powers going at one time.

Such as having both of Sense's Control Upgrades activated and then triggering Move to hurl an object, which would constitute using two Force powers at the same time. Or after having used Influence to mind trick an Imperial agent and triggering a Duration Upgrade, then using Influence to stress the mind of a different Imperial agent while the first guy is still under the effects of the mind trick, which again might constitute "multiple Force effects active at the same time." Or using the initiative boosting aspects of Foresee at the start of combat before going onto to using other Force powers, since Foresee's effects would last through the entire encounter, and could be seen as the Force user using a form of low-grade battle meditation to guide and direct their allies.

armlessbaby,

You've got a good point. A sufficiently potent Force user could simply trigger the Magnitude Upgrades multiple times to affect the thoughts of larger crowds, and could easily have it last for a while with enough Duration Upgrades. It could easily be used to make a bunch of enemy NPCs flee the scene (affect thoughts to instill feelings of fear/terror) or simply stop fighting as they now think the Force user and allies are their friends.

The reason I didn't mention this in my initial post was that it's already something allowed even before the clarification, as the game text for Influence's Magnitude Upgrades cites that it can be triggered multiple times. But it is a good point of how a Force user can make what should be a challenging encounter into a simple cakewalk with a single Force power activation check, particularly if they're rolling lots of Force dice (3 or more).

On a similar note, there's also the initiative manipulation abilities of Foresee, which with enough Force dice rolled could ensure the PCs always get to go first even if otherwise caught in a textbook perfect ambush, and even have a Force Point left over to ensure everyone gets a free maneuver to draw their weapons or Aim before tearing into their opponents.

I have been following this thread with interest as we are just about to get heavily in to using the force, so for clarification I had the opportunity to ask Sam Stewart the question directly. My question was;

"Also, there is an ongoing debate on the forum about how powerful force powers actually are. The main question is can the same upgrade be activated multiple times based on the number of force points rolled? so if you have bought two range upgrades for move, if you roll 3 force points could you activate the move power and then activate the move upgrade twice, increasing the range by 4 (by 2 for each range upgrade activation)? I am asking this as the answer will be crucial to ensure that we have the right understanding for how force powers actually work."

His answer surprised me somewhat; "And that is correct; as long as it says you can trigger the upgrade multiple times, it works the way you describe." Which contradicts Dono's first post?

I have followed this up with a question citing the discrepancy but I haven't heard anything back yet, I will update when I hear anything.

His answer surprised me somewhat; "And that is correct; as long as it says you can trigger the upgrade multiple times, it works the way you describe." Which contradicts Dono's first post?

I have followed this up with a question citing the discrepancy but I haven't heard anything back yet, I will update when I hear anything.

Well, could be that he's changed his view on the matter, or something's been clarified/revised in light of Force & Destiny since he replied to my question. Who knows, maybe this thread's very existence lead to him re-thinking and revising his answer?

Still doesn't change the Influence or Foresee scenarios I posted just recently, as those upgrades all have the "can be activated multiple times" verbiage. Unless those are going to be revised, either in F&D (under the notion that the five powers we've gotten so far will be collected there) or AoR (for Foresee anyway).

His answer surprised me somewhat; "And that is correct; as long as it says you can trigger the upgrade multiple times, it works the way you describe." Which contradicts Dono's first post?

I have followed this up with a question citing the discrepancy but I haven't heard anything back yet, I will update when I hear anything.

Well, could be that he's changed his view on the matter, or something's been clarified/revised in light of Force & Destiny since he replied to my question. Who knows, maybe this thread's very existence lead to him re-thinking and revising his answer?

Still doesn't change the Influence or Foresee scenarios I posted just recently, as those upgrades all have the "can be activated multiple times" verbiage. Unless those are going to be revised, either in F&D (under the notion that the five powers we've gotten so far will be collected there) or AoR (for Foresee anyway).

Yes, I agree Dono. The aspects of Foresee and Influence are very potent. In my opinion, more so than Move or Enhance. The beauty of this thread is the dialogue we are having can shape the next set of rules.

We have mentioned how these powers are entirely limited by the character's Force Rating, being hypothesized as 6 after F&D, but for those such as I the number grows much larger because we create our own Force Specializations or adapt those others created. For instance, the Force Mystic and Dark Acolyte are real specializations that exist in the universe at the time of EotE and AoR, so why not include them? Of course, a Force-user can't be all of them. But more of my concern isn't that the PC may be more powerful than intended, however, instead that GMs and Players may be limiting the options.

We all know that it is very well in the realm of possibility to use more than one power simultaneously. But, I think some are forgetting that the reason some can't be is the school or category the power belongs to. In general, there are three areas of Force Powers Sense, Alter, and Control. It's possible for powers of different schools to be used together. Such as, Mace Windu using Push while being in Vapaad. Which Vapaad was reliant on the Control area of the Force and honed the user's perception to the point of precognition, which Master Windu used to see "shatterpoints" in the Force to be successful in combat. The real obstacles are finding balance and staying true to the Star Wars Universe. That's another piece of input I have.

Aye, because I'm planning on going force senstivity. But pretty much much of my powers are intended to play off sense as I am a weak force user. Sense to "feel" my sarroundings, which leads to farsight as I begin to precieve and feel actions that are likely to happen. I debate where influence sits within that, since that is something fundimentally different from perception unless I twist the logic to make them "feel" what I want them to feel. To throw up a perception of me or a suggestion that is slightly differnet to reality.

That being said I do like the schools of force, though I don't think it really exists like that in star wars. Everyone can kind of do anything on anyone without the Force. I felt that the exact extent of the force was kept purposely vague so that peoples capabilities were largely the same, just what exactly they used it for was fundimentally different. I treat lightsaber forms in the same way, though those actually need training with muscle memory to actually excute them routinely enough to be useful.

For instance, the Force Mystic and Dark Acolyte are real specializations that exist in the universe at the time of EotE and AoR, so why not include them? Of course, a Force-user can't be all of them. But more of my concern isn't that the PC may be more powerful than intended, however, instead that GMs and Players may be limiting the options.

I'd say they're descriptors or even titles rather than specializations. We need to be careful to draw the distinction between FFG's Career/Specialization system and what we might perceive to be one. After all, in the EU Quinlan Vos was a Dark Acolyte for a time, but then ceased to be. Dark Acolyte is what one chooses to do with the career and specialization... It's a path not a profession.

That having been said, I can see a mystic being a possible career choice, with specializations being built off of it... But even then I'm planning to wait and see what the development team comes up with for F&D. I even expect that most of it is already in the can by now in order for the Beta to be released by GenCon.

Would everyone be happy if the Force Rating was hard capped at 5 or 6 and only powers/upgrades that mentioned they can be used multiple times could be?

I'm a movie guy, but I think I would personally be fine with that. Powerful force users should be able to do some really impressive things. There just needs to be some limit on it. There also needs to be somewhere for Signature Abilities to go, and maybe that's where the limits get broken a little.

Would everyone be happy if the Force Rating was hard capped at 5 or 6 and only powers/upgrades that mentioned they can be used multiple times could be?

I'm a movie guy, but I think I would personally be fine with that. Powerful force users should be able to do some really impressive things. There just needs to be some limit on it. There also needs to be somewhere for Signature Abilities to go, and maybe that's where the limits get broken a little.

I can dig that. Honestly I was content with how force powers were before the rules confusion Donovan shared. I think I am going to keep them that way.

I spoke to my FS:Em already about what others are saying and he wants to keep it how I interpreted the rules originally. We both love TFU, but we really we don't want Starkiller antics in our game.

Would everyone be happy if the Force Rating was hard capped at 5 or 6 and only powers/upgrades that mentioned they can be used multiple times could be?

I'm a movie guy, but I think I would personally be fine with that. Powerful force users should be able to do some really impressive things. There just needs to be some limit on it. There also needs to be somewhere for Signature Abilities to go, and maybe that's where the limits get broken a little.

I'd be fine with only upgrades that mention they can be activated as much as you want, be stuck at that. In regards to activating the same base power multiple times in the same turn, I'd be fine either way - keeping it that way, or reverting it to how we originally thought of it with only one base activation per action.

For Force Rating, it really depends on how they handle it in Force & Destiny. A hard cap may not be necessary. Even if you get tress with multiple force rating increase talents in it, if the tree forces you to wrap around it like how the Slicer tree is set up, it could already be a considerable experience sink as it is.

The way I see it, you keep things more reasonable and closer to what the book is trying to be - a way of emulating the films, then if GMs want to cut the limits and let players do some Star Destroyer-tossing nonsense or shooting force lightning from the other side of the planet, they can just shrug off a couple of the RAW's rules as they please.

Would everyone be happy if the Force Rating was hard capped at 5 or 6 and only powers/upgrades that mentioned they can be used multiple times could be?

I'm a movie guy, but I think I would personally be fine with that. Powerful force users should be able to do some really impressive things. There just needs to be some limit on it. There also needs to be somewhere for Signature Abilities to go, and maybe that's where the limits get broken a little.

Going by the old Force Rating chart from the EotE Beta, a hard cap of 6 on Force Rating make sense, as that was the level of senior Jedi Masters or powerful Sith Lords, with Force Rating 7 being reserved for a very select group of exceptionally powerful/gifted Force users, such as Grand Master Luke Skywalker or what Anakin might have achieved had he not been mutilated at Mustafar. Yoda and Palps would certainly be examples of Force Rating 6, with folks such as Dooku and Windu maybe being included (though I'm more inclined to peg them at Force Rating 5).

Yes, I believe a hard cap on this Characteristic, like all Characteristics, is completely reasonable.

I'm torn.

On one hand I think there should be a difference between a self-taught outcast and a Jedi master when it comes to throwing around X-Wings with the Force.

... on the other hand, there is a small voice in my head that says, "No! No different. Only different in your mind."

When the book is out, I suspect that we will have to unlearn what we have learned.