Hello fellow gamers,

Im about to run my first FFG Star Wars campaign starting with the AoR BB (we're all newbies).

One of my players wants to use the F&D beta to make a Jedi padawan that escaped O66.

He wants to be a dual-wielding lightsaber type with the ability to leap across the battlefield to get in melee as quickly as possible. Along those lines, I was thinking a Jedi Warrior - Aggressor. So, with him being a human (110xp) and the 10xp when choosing morality, I am wondering: Do we get him down the tree to get a Force Rating of 2 or should we spend the xp mainly on boosting those characteristics? Which would be more useful (FR or characteristics)? Any ideas crafting a new Jedi would be most helpful.

Help me FFG community, you're my only hope...

-JTDS

If you're planning on it being a decent length of campaign, I'd spend all or nearly all starting XP on characteristics.

Note the double-bladed lightsaber just wrecks dual-wielding mechanically.

Also, with anything F&D beta, don't forget to look at the beta update.

By the sound of it, The only thing he'll need a decent force rating for will be to activate enhance. He'll only need 2 force pips. one to activate the control upgrade, and another to activate the range upgrade. So he won't need a huge Force rating.

One of my players has a similar conundrum with his Makashi Duelist. You should ask him which is more important for his character at first , being an elite swordsman, or being the powerful space magician. His answer will make the choice more obvious.

You don't need FR2 to leap across the battlefield, you need Enhance with a few upgrades. It's generally a good idea to spend all your starting XP on characteristics because you can't boost them easily otherwise. So unless you start with Knight level play (an extra 150XP) the PC will need a few sessions before being able to jump around and be any good with his lightsaber. Also note that the double lightsaber has an Unwieldy 3 rating, so he'll need Agility 3 to use it without a setback.

I'd suggest spending the XP to boost the PC's Characteristics.

As others have noted, using a double-bladed lightsaber is generally better than dual-wielding, but the PC will need Agility 3 to offset the Unwieldy quality. The book lists it as 2, but the Beta Updates changed it to a 3 over concerns of the double-saber being too good in comparison to a basic lightsaber. However, unless you're making a specific exception or playing at Knight level, the character still has to purchase their starting lightsaber, and with only 500 credits the best he can hope for is a basic training lightsaber at 300 credits.

As for "leaping about the battlefield" a lot of that can be handled in a narrative sense, though picking up at least the Enhance basic power and a rank of Athletics will help with navigating obstacles quickly. The Control Upgrades to get the "Force Leap" ability are nice, but not essential, particularly as using a Force Leap requires an action, meaning the PC would be able to leap in, but not be able to strike until the next turn; at least until they spend the XP to get the final Force Leap Control Upgrade that makes using that effect a maneuver instead.

By the sound of it, The only thing he'll need a decent force rating for will be to activate enhance. He'll only need 2 force pips. one to activate the control upgrade, and another to activate the range upgrade. So he won't need a huge Force rating.

Are you sure he needs 2 pips? There isn't really a "base power" to activate with Enhance, it seems to me a leap only needs 1 pip (and 2 if you want to increase range).

By the sound of it, The only thing he'll need a decent force rating for will be to activate enhance. He'll only need 2 force pips. one to activate the control upgrade, and another to activate the range upgrade. So he won't need a huge Force rating.

Are you sure he needs 2 pips? There isn't really a "base power" to activate with Enhance, it seems to me a leap only needs 1 pip (and 2 if you want to increase range).

Right. I was including the range upgrade in my calculations. Otherwise moving from Short to engaged uses the same amount of maneuvers as just advancing a range band. That's assuming no terrain issues and the upgrade that allows you to use enhance as a maneuver rather than an action.

Uh...wow. Yeah, that's what you said. I must have forgotten to engage my reading comprehension module this morning, aka, coffee...

As others have said: If you're going to be playing more then a couple sessions, it'll be more advantageous in the long run to boost characteristics. You can always buy up more talents down the road, but your Characteristics are much harder to improve.

Honestly it sounds like the player is either going to be really happy, or really unhappy when he finds out that his basic concept isn't all that complicated in this system. If anything the hardest part is just getting his grubby paws on two lightsabers...

However, unless you're making a specific exception or playing at Knight level, the character still has to purchase their starting lightsaber, and with only 500 credits the best he can hope for is a basic training lightsaber at 300 credits.

Select +credits from Morality. Can get a double-bladed hilt for 600 (though the cost of the fully built double-bladed lightsaber suggests you need to buy that twice paying 1200) then 100 for the training saber emitter for a total cost of 700 (or 1300) for your double-bladed training saber. Or, if he's set on dual-wielding, buy 2 training sabers at 400 each.

Note that if you want to start with a double-bladed saber, he'd usually have to be Knight Level, take the 9,000 credit option, and then take the +2,500 credits option when choosing Morality. That would give him enough cash to buy the saber plus a modest loadout of armor & sundries.

Or as Alatar suggested, you could do the hilt + training emitter combo. That's a good idea A few hundred credits for Linked 1, best credits ever spent

As to the FR, I don't think it's necessary for a starting character. Just give him some decent characteristics (I am happy with three 3's as a human), Toughened and Sense Advantage, and the Enhance power. This will require 5 more XP than a human has starting, so take the +5 XP and +1,000 credits option and buy him that double-bladed stun saber.

However, unless you're making a specific exception or playing at Knight level, the character still has to purchase their starting lightsaber, and with only 500 credits the best he can hope for is a basic training lightsaber at 300 credits.

Select +credits from Morality. Can get a double-bladed hilt for 600 (though the cost of the fully built double-bladed lightsaber suggests you need to buy that twice paying 1200) then 100 for the training saber emitter for a total cost of 700 (or 1300) for your double-bladed training saber. Or, if he's set on dual-wielding, buy 2 training sabers at 400 each.

Well, OP had said that he's going for the +10XP bonus instead of increasing his starting credits. So unless he changes his mind opts to go for either +5XP/+1000 credits or the +2500 credits, he's got a very restricted budget.

He wants to be a dual-wielding lightsaber type with the ability to leap across the battlefield to get in melee as quickly as possible. Along those lines, I was thinking a Jedi Warrior - Aggressor.

Narratively speaking Ataru is the Jumpy McJumperson style. Just FYI.

As far as FR goes, the saber-wielder has less use for FR (not none, just less) than the force-wielder. Given that the difficulty of raising characteristics post-chargen is equal to the difficulty of raising FR, I'd spend the points on characteristics for the saber wielder. He can still purchase and make use of the basic Enhance ability with 1 FR. And if he purchases the upgrades, he can still get two pips on one die. It just means delaying the frequent (still not guaranteed) multi-band jumps a little while. And if he can't hit anything or take his lumps when he gets there, what does that matter?

However, unless you're making a specific exception or playing at Knight level, the character still has to purchase their starting lightsaber, and with only 500 credits the best he can hope for is a basic training lightsaber at 300 credits.

Select +credits from Morality. Can get a double-bladed hilt for 600 (though the cost of the fully built double-bladed lightsaber suggests you need to buy that twice paying 1200) then 100 for the training saber emitter for a total cost of 700 (or 1300) for your double-bladed training saber. Or, if he's set on dual-wielding, buy 2 training sabers at 400 each.

Well, OP had said that he's going for the +10XP bonus instead of increasing his starting credits. So unless he changes his mind opts to go for either +5XP/+1000 credits or the +2500 credits, he's got a very restricted budget.

Oh yeah I saw that, but I figure the option is still open since it's not like he had that 10XP budgeted for something specific; he was just saying he'd have around that much XP due to the +10XP. Unless he's tight on starting XP, he could just drop it to go for the double-bladed. My players tend to like the credit option because we do 4+ hour weekly sessions so I drop 20XP on them each time. That 10XP gets smaller and smaller unless you managed to spend every last bit of starting XP, including that 10, on characteristics.

And yeah T3CHN0Shaman, I love Ataru for exactly that. Not only does it fit that theme, it also has native Agility to overcome Unwieldy 3 on the double-bladed saber.