This talent is cheap, but strange. Committing a Force Die is a big deal, even for short periods of time. 24 hours is a HUGE investment for a simple few wounds. It doesn't make much sense to me, given that in all of the examples I know of people using a Healing Trance that they didn't do so for days at a time. Plus, how do you stay in a trance and run around shooting things? Committing a Force Die doesn't make you stationary and it doesn't seem like much of a trance. I'm a huge fan of this book, but the Healing Trance talent doesn't seem worthwhile or fit the mechanics to the narrative. Any agreements or rebuttals?

It definitely needs some clarification. I could see arguments for either forcing a player to do be stationary and do this narratively only (maybe while in hyperspace or sleeping?); or simply saying that a part of your Force talent is occupied but it's a subliminal activity that allows one to do other things at the same time, a bit like breathing or digesting food.

Perhaps in future supplements they'll have other Force powers that require committing a Force Die for days on end, and then you'll have to choose how many die to commit for each power...? My current party has a bacta tank in our ship, and I guess it can be a pain to take turns in there after a big battle.

If you have a crap medic or just a basic medical kit, you can probably earn more wounds in 24 hours. I know it is supposed to supplement your natural healing abilities, but 24 hours is pretty abysmal in terms of usability. An hour? Sure, that could help with a handwave of some wounds, but not 24. The fact that you can do it while still up and around just isn't in the spirit of the trance.

I have two thoughts on this.

First, I would prefer to see this changed to grant 24 hours' worth of healing in a shorter period of time (maybe 6 hours) per Force die committed.

Second, I think there are a few places in the EU where someone, usually Luke, is described as keeping themselves going with the Force, pushing themselves despite their injuries, some of which are fairly severe. In light of that, I'd think that committing dice to Healing Trance while up and about makes some sense, but should probably have some variation to the rules.

How about this?

Healing Trance : You may commit a Force die (up to your Force rating) to regain Wounds over the course of 6 hours as though you had rested for 24 per die committed. Normally, characters enter a meditative state to facilitate this healing, but one may maintain this ability while up and about as well, though doing so is more taxing. For every Force die you have committed to Healing Trance, reduce your maximum Strain Threshold by 1 for as long as you maintain the Healing Trance.

This way, if someone is meditating, it allows them to heal up faster than normal, and the Strain is irrelevant, but if they're walking around and fighting, it becomes increasingly difficult to maintain this focus, and either you need to drop the Healing Trance, or find a quiet place to rest for a while.

I would also increase the difficulty of healing critical injuries with the Improved version of the talent.

It's no so much of a trance as it is Force regeneration. There is nothing in the long-form description of the talent that says you're actually meditating or otherwise immobile. I think it's just a bad choice of words.

You commit the Force die, and after 24hrs regain a few wound points, that's all it does (unless you get the upgraded version, in which case you can also attempt to recover a critical injury).

-EF

My kneejerk reaction is "It's getting tossed in my game". It's not a part of the Original Trilogy, it's out.

However I'm considering a way to "keep" but dial it back a tad. I wish to emphasize Medical Technology, but possible allow Force Users to overcome their bodies physical limits (through the Force with that hint of 'eastern mysticism" flavor).

Right now I'm thinking that entering a Healing Trance will allow the user to ignore BRAWNxHealing Trance ranks of Wounds/Strains, acting as though they simply weren't there. They'll still need healing, and may simply fall down dead if they push it.

Not sure exactly how to make it work yet, but it's something simmering on my back burner.

I remember reading in Edge or AoR that it talked about Force Users possibly ignoring the effects of strain. This would be a good place to put some rules like that.

My kneejerk reaction is "It's getting tossed in my game". It's not a part of the Original Trilogy, it's out.

Well, I dunno what you think of novelizations, but unless I'm going crazy, I'm pretty sure there's a thing in the novelization of Empire that states that Vader typically goes into a healing trance when he's in his chamber. It's the only way to keep his body from rejecting all the cybernetics, or something like that. It's been way too long, and I may be mistaken (it may have been in the Radio Play, or an old script, or an EU novel, or I just made it up and didn't realize it).

EDIT: Wait, no, I'm pretty sure it was in Shadows of the Empire, not The Empire Strikes Back. Nevermind, feel free to ignore it.

Well, I dunno what you think of novelizations, but unless I'm going crazy, I'm pretty sure there's a thing in the novelization of Empire that states that Vader typically goes into a healing trance when he's in his chamber. It's the only way to keep his body from rejecting all the cybernetics, or something like that. It's been way too long, and I may be mistaken (it may have been in the Radio Play, or an old script, or an EU novel, or I just made it up and didn't realize it).

EDIT: Wait, no, I'm pretty sure it was in Shadows of the Empire, not The Empire Strikes Back. Nevermind, feel free to ignore it.

Specially the one where Chewie gets hit with a moon. It's out twice.

My kneejerk reaction is "It's getting tossed in my game".

Isn't that your default reaction to everything in this book?

I've yet to see a post of yours that says "Hey, this was a pretty good idea on FFG's part." Instead, you lambast the book at every turn, and your posts here can all be distilled into "The design team are idiots, here's my far better solution" when said "solutions" (and I use that term very loosely) often violate the notion of K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Stupid) and add several unnecessary degrees of complexity that provide no actual benefit to the game as a whole, beyond possibly fueling a superiority complex on your part.

If you want to implement house rules to satisfy your need for an overly-complex game system, that's your call and your group is willing to play under those rules, that's their decision. But don't be surprised if the FFG design team simply puts said notions into the trash bin because they honestly feel that the core systems work quite well as-is.

I've yet to see a post of yours that says "Hey, this was a pretty good idea on FFG's part."

You could try reading them a bit more carefully then.

I like the dice mechanics. Like 'em so much I'm going to run a Star Wars(ish) game in the system instead of just running using GURPS .

I also like the Force Power Tree and the Lightsaber Trees. Mostly. Like 98% of those particular trees.

Healing Trance is nice, but really really situationnal.... so much that you almost won't ever see it's usefullness....

Maybe if you changed the way it worked... like healing not everyday, but every scene ? That way, you commit your force die, but can reap the benefits almost immediately after the first encounter, and the next... making it a power that could be use very often.

So healing trance would read :

Commit Force Dice ; For each full scene Force Dice remains committed, heal 1 wound per rank of Healing Trance.

I think it's a good compromise.

What do you guys think ?

My kneejerk reaction is "It's getting tossed in my game".

Isn't that your default reaction to everything in this book?

I've yet to see a post of yours that says "Hey, this was a pretty good idea on FFG's part." Instead, you lambast the book at every turn, and your posts here can all be distilled into "The design team are idiots, here's my far better solution" when said "solutions" (and I use that term very loosely) often violate the notion of K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple Stupid) and add several unnecessary degrees of complexity that provide no actual benefit to the game as a whole, beyond possibly fueling a superiority complex on your part.

If you want to implement house rules to satisfy your need for an overly-complex game system, that's your call and your group is willing to play under those rules, that's their decision. But don't be surprised if the FFG design team simply puts said notions into the trash bin because they honestly feel that the core systems work quite well as-is.

I just wanted to see this one more time.

I just wanted to see this one more time.

Forgive the thread necromancy, but I just got the book, and this was the first thing that jumped out at me as "Wow, that seems very harsh and/or broken." I don't know about how well it balances against non-Force talents (my EotE book is WAY out of reach presently), but it clearly doesn't balance well against the Consular/Healer's Surgeon talent, right next to it in the tree. Surgeon gives the same benefit immediately at a cost of 2 extra difficulty dice. Those costs would be pretty close, but I think Surgeon leapfrogs it because it can benefit other characters AND it scales per rank in the talent.

Personally, I wouldn't have a problem if it just said "provided the Healer is conscious, for every day of natural healing, they recover 1 extra wound."

Forgive the thread necromancy, but I just got the book, and this was the first thing that jumped out at me as "Wow, that seems very harsh and/or broken." I don't know about how well it balances against non-Force talents (my EotE book is WAY out of reach presently), but it clearly doesn't balance well against the Consular/Healer's Surgeon talent, right next to it in the tree. Surgeon gives the same benefit immediately at a cost of 2 extra difficulty dice. Those costs would be pretty close, but I think Surgeon leapfrogs it because it can benefit other characters AND it scales per rank in the talent.

Personally, I wouldn't have a problem if it just said "provided the Healer is conscious, for every day of natural healing, they recover 1 extra wound."

I can't help but feel the Trance is Iconic. It needs to be fixed with something more playable.

I just got F&D last night, and was also puzzled. I don't know the real point of it. Don't you regain a wound per day anyway? If you're a neophyte, and you commit your single Force die, you then gain a second wound, but you can't use the Force for anything else all day. I suppose in an extremely lean campaign, where the PCs had no credits and were far from anywhere with a medical facility or a stimpack and were hiking across trackless wastes, it might have some flavour. But I suspect most games aren't like that long enough to make a difference. Just buy a stimpack, you're better off. And that's a lot of space in a Talent tree for little gain.

I can't help but feel the Trance is Iconic. It needs to be fixed with something more playable.

I totally misunderstood this Talent, I thought you had to commit a Force die per wound. However, you only have to commit one die...I think the talent is fine.

I can't help but feel the Trance is Iconic. It needs to be fixed with something more playable.

It is? I don't remember it from the 6 movies.

Have you entertained the possibility that other people might have different criteria than you? For some, like you, the only "iconic" and relevant data is the 6 films... for others it could include lots of different Legends stuff... for some it's only the original trilogy... some prefer Old Republic stuff and so on... If you haven't considered this possibility (and it doesn't seem like you have, if your behaviour is anything to go by) you should, you might become conscious and gain awareness, a first step into a larger world.

As for the talent itself, I can see that it works well as is, but perhaps not as good as one could prefer. Reducing the required time for the force die to remain committed to 12 or 6 hours could help improve it a lot. Perhaps a difference between a meditation trance and an "awake" trance could be added to it, but that sort of breaks with simplicity...

Have you entertained the possibility that other people might have different criteria than you?

However when one says "Iconic" they're lumping in what everyone who knows about the thing your discussing would consider as Iconic. Thus the larger population who probably know nothing beyond the mass media of the Movies and maybe The Clone Wars cartoon show.

You know, all the non-gamers, non-Star Wars "fanatics".

Now, imagine one of them and imagine what they see as Iconic. Keep in mind, they out number you.

Thus Iconic Force Powers: Sense, Move, Influence, "Enhance" (Running and Leaping), Foresight, and Reflecting Blaster Bolts with a lightsaber. That's what Jedi do.

Iconic Sith Powers; Force Lightning, Reflecting Blaster Bolts with their hand, losing to the Good Guys.

My point is that the definition of "iconic" is fluid, much for same reasons you list up. Which means that silly questioning as you come with does not help or add anything to the discussion, it's basically rude and unnecessary.

Perhaps I think people are more intelligent than they actually are, but I do think that most people - with a little use of the brain nature gave them - can understand that people use terms in a subjective manner. Whether you're a fanboy fanatic, gamer fanatic, or not, it shouldn't be too hard to act civilised and avoid being prepubescent and confrontational just for the sake of it. So, perhaps it's not iconic for you, but does that really matter? This game is for a whole community of different types of gamers and fans, based on a universe originating from three films and expanded by three more (and more to come), tv-series, and a whole bunch of novels, comics and computer games. So whether or not I'm outnumbered by fans with less knowledge, interest or whatever in the game itself and/or the universe, doesn't really matter. The fact of the matter is that Star Wars is more than most of us would care to admit and include in our games (and personal canon.) So whatever you define as iconic is iconic to you - and you may assume rightly or wrongly that this applies to a large or small majority, but it is basically speculation and anecdotal at best, hence without much merit or value, nor is it a particularly good argument, it's merely an opinion based on biased assumptions.

A modicum of intellectual and emotional distance shouldn't be too hard nor unfair to expect from testers of a game. Right?

I was thinking about this talent yesterday as I pondered the development of my sage/healer. It's nice in concept, and thematically it fits, but the talent actually seems a bit weak. You can commit 1 force die for 24 hours to gain between 1 and 3 extra wounds depending on rank, or you could use a stimpack. That doesn't even get into the fact that most Healers are probably going to have the Heal/Harm power, which renders the healing trance even more redundant.

There are certainly situations where I could see it being handy. Those rare situations when technology is unavailable, or you've already blown through 5 stimpacks that day, but generally speaking the talent seems lacking.

I might modify it so the power works as written if the character just commits a force die and continues activities as normal, but if the character actually stops and meditates they can increase the speed to ever 6 or 8 hours. They must take no major physical or mental actions during that time, just rest and meditate.

It's not a huge deal, as let's face it, there's a lot of dubiously useful talents floating around assorted talent tree's. Overall the healer tree seems fairly balanced, but I think this would be a decent tweak that wouldn't unbalance the whole talent tree.

@Jegergryte: I don't think you're giving people too much credit for being smart, but way too much credit for taking the effort to learn another POV.

And I disagree slightly that Iconic is fluid. If we're speaking most iconic, yes, there will be some discrepencies, but Iconic things are kinda like the family feud board.

Like name the 5 most iconic things about the sith. I'm sure you'd get a general list something like: wears black, lightning, chokes people, red sabers, something something dark side.

I jest a little, but my point is that iconic derives it's status through a sort of universal translation that transcends to a limited extent the subjectivity of the perceiver to arrive at a sort of shared experience of what this thing means. (oh man am I having flashbacks to difference and differance).

I'm not trying to argue semantics, just saying that if we're talking iconic parts of the fils and clone wars series, healing trances aren't it. Now, since eeyore has condemned all EU (a narrow view, but his to be sure, and probably the most popular in raw numbers, as most people haven't read the EU or experienced it much) he may be right in terms of his iconic. but neither does that invalidate the subjective or even objective inclusion of non-iconic things.

So... you're both right?

In any case, I agree with scaling's above post. it seems weak, but it's not so weak it couldn't be used, and I'm sure somewhere there are less useful talents (duelist training comes to mind)

Now, since eeyore has condemned all EU (a narrow view, but his to be sure...) ...

I decided to condemn the Eu when 3 things happened:

1 - Some Jedi Froce Pushed an entire Fleet out of a Star System,

2 - Boba Fett climbed out the Sarlacc (as much as I like that chump),

3 - Someone threw a Moon at Chewie.

Actually it was #3 that did it. No one throws a Moon at Chewie. No one.

(Though I still like the 3 Han Solo books from waaaay back in the day, The Star Wars Holiday Special, the Ewok movies and cartoon, Droids, the Clone Wars shorts, and most of The Clone Wars).