Or is this line of thinking wrong?

Would the item mods be increasing the static value of the weapons defensive quality?

So cover is defense 1

Lorrdiran crystal with defensive 1 +1 defensive mod + curved hilt defensive mod: Defensive 3

Armored clothing with improved armor master for defense of 2.

So this character would not benefit from gaining cover, as that static bonus would never be better than the static bonus of the weapon with defensive 3 or the armor (which provides defense of 2).

Or is this line of thinking wrong?

The weapon quality Defensive increases Melee Defense by it's rank. So in your exemple, the Lorrdian gemstone with curved hilt has Defensive 3, so increases Melee Defense by 3.

A character in cover with your gear would have to choose between the cover's defense value or the armor's defense value, then add 3 to Melee Defense because of the Lorrdian Gemstone curved hilt Lightsaber. So if he choose the defense value from the armor, then he would have 5 melee defense and 2 ranged defense.

What I'm wondering now is if the Mods bonus apply before or after the talents... I'm thinking like the World of Warcraft TCG where some modifiers where constantly looking for a trigger.... if the mod is constantly looking for a trigger, then it would stack with Defensive Training...

Here is a curved hilt lightsaber with the Defensive +1 mod : the Lightsaber has no rank in Defensive, so the mod gives Defensive 1 to the Lightsaber.... then the wielder has Defensive Training, giving 1 rank in Defensive to the LS, so the mod now gives Defensive +1, raising it to Defensive 2.

So the question is if the mod triggers only at creation or always.

Would the item mods be increasing the static value of the weapons defensive quality?

So cover is defense 1

Lorrdiran crystal with defensive 1 +1 defensive mod + curved hilt defensive mod: Defensive 3

Armored clothing with improved armor master for defense of 2.

So this character would not benefit from gaining cover, as that static bonus would never be better than the static bonus of the weapon with defensive 3 or the armor (which provides defense of 2).

Or is this line of thinking wrong?

Well, cover only provides a bonus to ranged defense, so it'd never interact with Defensive in the first place, which is strictly a bonus to melee defense.

So in the case of the armor vs. cover using the values you provided, it'd be the armor since it's the better of the two.

The Deflection quality would stack with either cover or armor, since the weapon quality is noted as adding to the user's ranged defense. That's also typically true with Deflection, thus why the exception wording in Deflection Training becomes problematic. The way that the lightsaber attachment/mods to add Defensive are generally seen to operate is they add those ranks to the weapon itself, giving it Defensive X, and then the talent overrides that.

While the easiest solution would be to simply let the two qualities stack, you run into problems with PCs that have opted top pick up all the available ranks of Defensive Training, which when stacked with a Lorrdian Gemstone and curved hilt leads to a melee defense boost of +8, plus bonus from armor, plus the guarded stance maneuver... it's got the potential to be rather beefy, which is something that the designers have said up front that they're trying to avoid.

I think the better solution would be to change the talent to simply apply a Threat to an opponent's attack roll, ranged or melee. It avoids the clashing with Defensive trait from weapons that's the core issue, avoids the potential for bloating the difficulty pool, makes the talent useful in both melee and ranged combat, as well as helping the Shien Expert have a better shot at triggering the Improved Reflect talent since it doesn't seem FFG is going to make any alterations to that tree at the given time.

I'm assuming you meant defensive and not deflection in all those sentences correct? Otherwise I'm terribly confused as this whole thread is about defensive training. Unless you were just using that as an explanation in association with cover...

I reread the edge rules (away from beta) and realized we've been playing the defensive quality wrong, namely we were treating it as a static defensive trait and not an additive one. This makes defensive (and deflection) pretty powerful IMO, as weapon traits go.

I think the talent is probably fine as is (though changing it to threat would also be fine, but I might want to see a strain cost as with 2-4 ranks that can get impressive). The only real conflict with sabers is when defensive training is combined with a lorrdiran stones, as those conflict, but lorrdiran stones give you the added benefit of deflection, which even if it conflicts with defensive is probably going to be more useful. and if you had defensive training 3 you could instead of using the curved hilt throw on the extended hilt and dual phase array.

meh. Interesting to know we've been misinterpreting that defensive quality though.

Makashi, Shien and Shii-Cho have both Defensive Training and Improved Reflect/Parry.... Changing Defensive Training to give an automatic threat might be a good idea. Unfortunately, it would be almost useless for Niman which doesnt have either Improved Reflect or Improved Parry.

Looking at gear that gives a talent trait, the gear is usually subpar from the talent....
If you take Quick Draw... gear that gives this trait are limited to that one piece of gear, not everything like the talent does.

Same for almost every other talent giving trought mods.

Defensive Training is fine as is... it's just that Lorrdian Gemstone (gear) is way better...

And even if lorrdiran 'a deffensive mods are wasted, I'd be getting it for it's deflection mods personally. That is useful for most anyone.

Or is this line of thinking wrong?

That is exactly how I take it.

Yes, but what exactly leads you to that conclusion? I have yet to see a reference that states that example or specifies that order of addition. We can all agree to disagree, that's cool. I would just like to be sure there isn't a clear rule that's overlooked verses differences in application because the wording is unclear.

I'm assuming you meant defensive and not deflection in all those sentences correct? Otherwise I'm terribly confused as this whole thread is about defensive training. Unless you were just using that as an explanation in association with cover...

I reread the edge rules (away from beta) and realized we've been playing the defensive quality wrong, namely we were treating it as a static defensive trait and not an additive one. This makes defensive (and deflection) pretty powerful IMO, as weapon traits go.

I think the talent is probably fine as is (though changing it to threat would also be fine, but I might want to see a strain cost as with 2-4 ranks that can get impressive). The only real conflict with sabers is when defensive training is combined with a lorrdiran stones, as those conflict, but lorrdiran stones give you the added benefit of deflection, which even if it conflicts with defensive is probably going to be more useful. and if you had defensive training 3 you could instead of using the curved hilt throw on the extended hilt and dual phase array.

meh. Interesting to know we've been misinterpreting that defensive quality though.

Right, that example shows how defense sources stack, so Lorridan and Defensive training would only conflict with the inherent 1 defensive provided by the Gemstone and the Talent that overrides a static defensive value, after that the mods should still add, thus making Defensive Training useful longer term and is not weak at all. otherwise it isn't terribly good being only useful for brawn and melee weapons and makeshift weapons.

I agree with the interpretation that the "+1 Defensive Mod" item quality stacks with your weapon's Defensive rating, wherever it may come from - be it talent or attachment. Since different ratings of Defensive don't stack, you have to decide which Defensive rating you choose before applying the "+1 Defensive Mod".

I think what convinced me this was the correct line of reasoning was the wording of the talent that explicitly gives the weapon the Defensive rating. So it's not the character who has some sort of floating Defensive rating, it's the weapon. I see no reason why the attachment Mods shouldn't apply to the weapon's Defensive rating.

I actually don't mind having a variety of ways to get Defense. I also don't mind not breaking the game by not having all these methods stack. Am I missing something?

This is where I'm at. I personally chose to allow defense to stack with a few small caveats simply to incentivize characters in armor continuing to use cover and otherwise employ cinematic tactics rather than simply standing there and taking it. The game is also pretty dangerous, and I don't mind giving the PCs some extra padding in the form of additional defense dice.