I acknowledge we have the 7 lightsaber styles and believe me when I say I am really digging the F&D Beta. Our GM is allowing us to use those rules in conjunction with our fellow players who are using EoD and AoR. What I find lacking is offensive oomph. Each represented Lightsaber style has some decent defense talents in there, which is much appreciated, but there is no style that leaps out at me as offensive. I am not saying FFG should copy word for word the Marauder tree, but I would like to see something that doesn't focus so much on defense. If you are a Guardian sure....makes sense. Heck many of the styles are defensive in nature. But for example, Shien/Djem So are offensive styles. When I look at Shien Expert....I see Reflect, Parry, Defensive Stance, Djem So deflection, Supreme reflect, etc....its not until you get all the way to the bottom that you get Falling Avalanche...and you have to pay strain to activate which is ok if you have decent Brawn. However, for an offensive lightsaber style its pretty much all defense. The only real differences between these styles are what ability they key off of which is not different enough. My hope is that in an expansion they will bring out Juyo and Vapaad or that in the final print they add more offensive talents (increased damage...+10 to crit score, etc). I am just disappointed that pretty much all of the styles focus on defense.

Any thoughts?

It's important to consider the fact that lightsabers cut through 10 (or 20) soak and has a base damage that can go up to 10 on the default crystals. So it's not quite like Marauder, where the extra damage output is needed since it's based more off your Brawn.

It's also important to remember that much of the lightsaber forms are focusing on fighting against other lightsaber forms, so if you're not even using 1 rank of Parry, you're going down pretty fast.

In terms of offensive forms, there's a number. Makashi Duelist's Makashi Finish helps rack up high criticals by spending Force Points and can really assist in having the potential to down anyone with a high enough crit roll. Niman Disciple uses Draw Closer to use Force Points to add more successes to an attack to not only make sure it succeeds, but that it does more damage. Ataru Striker has a combo with Saber Swarm and Hawk Bat Swoop. Linked will let you get a number of additional hits in, which is particularly useful if you're only using a single lightsaber (or are only using one to attack with), and Hawk Bat Swoop lets you spend Force Points to actually activate those additional hits. And, you could just use additional advantage to re-activate criticals to boost them higher or score multiple criticals across the numerous hits.

So there are offensive options, it's just not as straight-forward as flat +1 damage.

Adding to that... If they were called Poodleplap style and Midicholribang style would you be as interested in making this argument?

The saber trees that appear in the book are there to serve a purpose in-game first and foremost, that the names applied to them are just there to help integrate them into the universe. Don't take them so seriously in regard to the names and how those style are described in some novel.

If it helps, I once asked a friend of mine who runs a kendo dojo about different Styles and he laughed. There's really only 7 ways to swing a sword, and all seven are in every style, everything else is just flourishes and personal preference, with no style providing any actual benefit over another. If anything it's actually a little discouraged to learn multiple styles simply because you're more likely to cross contaminate and end up actually mastering neither.

Just a sensation but, probably the 7th form (Vaapad?) will be released on a Force suplement. Until the moment the most agressive forms seems to be Makashi and Ataru. Critical and Linked gives a lot of potential damage and deadly criticals.

Or are you looking for something more specific?

Astsu style, gain linked equal to force rating.

This is probably as offensive as you can get with a lightsaber

As Lathrop said, the lightsaber in and of itself is a highly offensive weapon, as even the basic version with an unmodded Ilum crystal is bypassing 10 points of soak, which is far more than most adversaries will have. Against minions and rivals, a lightsaber can be murder, as a single hit ensures at least one dispatched minion per swing and will chew through at least half of a rival's wound threshold. And as the 'saber crystal gets modified, the weapon just gets deadlier and deadlier.

I've played a few different 'saber users, from an Ataru Striker to a Shii-Cho Knight as well as seen a couple different Makashi Duelist and Soresu Defender builds in play. And the main thrust of their offense is the lightsaber, at least in the early going. Each of the LS Form specs has what you might call "signature moves" that add an offensive flourish to their arsenal, though Soresu's interestingly enough is based around making it more likely that enemies will roll enough Threat for you to use Improved Parry or Improved Reflect (which is very much fitting with the mindset of the Form from the EU lore).

Ataru Striker is very much a glass cannon, in that it's all about "hit first, hit fast, hit hard" thanks to Quick Strike, Hawk-Bat Swoop, and particularly Saber Swarm, but it burns through strain like a madman if faced with multiple foes. I've seen this first hand with a PC that was nearly knocked out simply from burning 3 strain on 6 activations of Reflect over the course of two rounds; only reason he didn't drop is that I got an attack in during each of those rounds was was able to spend some of the uncancelled Advantage from my combat checks to recover lost strain.

Shii-Cho Knight has Sarlacc Sweep, which I can tell you from personal experience is great to mow through groups of bad guys, such as tearing down two minion groups of 5 baddies down to only a couple each with one attack (having a decently modded Ilum crystal certainly helps), plus the Multiple Opponents talent for a boost die comes in handy when dealing with minion groups.

Makashi Duelist is very much a "one-on-one" dueling style, and is built around that. As written, Feint isn't so great against "lesser" foes since it only triggers if you miss, so the spec is very much reliant upon Parry to negate damage from melee attacks when dealing with the rank and file.

In my games I have a player with a FR 4 (on combat) with Makashi... I fear for Critical hits as GM XDD He killed my Nemesis Quarren pirate captain with just one decapitating hit XD Crit +80 and a 70 on the roll (It was a good roll, this doesn't always happen )

Aside from the way the trees are laid out(Looking at you Shien Expert!) the saber styles are fine enough to me after getting to fool around with them. As stated, sabers are still deadly, the forms marginally make them more so.

And honestly all the parrys and reflects are just there to pad out the unique talents, so don't freak too much about them.

I've yet to see the book here, but If I remember form 5 was a decidedly brutal, hammering form that would batter through defenses. is it like that in the game?

Some of this is more my experience, but I have witnessed way too many people I play games with gravitate to something just because it blatantly adds to damage, and combat is the only thing that matters in that game. This last bit was never actually true, but they liked to build like it was. Having the forms overall NOT just be damage amplifiers increases the likelihood of them all being viable, giving you the option of taking what you want thematically, rather than min-maxing damage. This may not be what your goal is, but from a writer's perspective, it often WILL be the goal of many players. As they said, also, the original lightsabers were a weapon almost apart from the others, able to carve through most things an equal opponent can wear, with a great damage that didn't depend on your Brawn, allowing you to pick Agility, and be evasive. Now, they are slightly more lackluster, until you find some time to polish them up, but they are still armorbane, still let you choose any Attribute you want (now any, because of the Form trees, with a small fee), and their damage can approach what it once did, as well as gaining some other options, thanks to the implementation of KOTOR crystals. However, lightsabers possess some unique other qualities, such as those defensive options you mentioned, so the trees cover them.

As for Juyo and Vaapad, I actually hope they don't see much press. Juyo is a dangerous form, often causing practitioners to fall to darkness, just because they followed the path, and the system would either have to skip that important aspect, or incorporate a "yeah, this will possibly ruin your character, but YOU chose it" element, which sometimes hurts the game for you, and also your teammates. Vaapad...is only for Samuel L. Jackson. In most of EU history, three? people have passed far enough along Juyo to practice Vaapad. One was Mace Windu, and the others, I believe, were apprentices of Mace Windu, and they both fell to the Dark Side (a fitting reward for avoiding it on Juyo, for that long ). Depending on how you view the fluff (the way I do follows), this is why Mace was able to battle Palpatine, while Yoda bowed down, and got hammered by the Emperor; he was able to use the Dark Side to repel the Emp's Dark Side debuffs, something Yoda could not, and so had to fight off the Emperor's machinations, and multiple spirits, stuff. Still, even Windu is at risk, as the Dark Side took him enough that he couldn't stop, and Anakin had to emo him, letting the Emperor finish him off (and later give Mara his saber; but that's also just me). Vaapad is not widespread, so I personally wouldn't mind if they say "Mace Windu had it, but died before he could pass it on to a worthy successor, while Juyo could come along, but should need a wicked potential price tag, which might make it seem unworth it, to many players. Samuel L. Lackson was cool, but he did insist on a few "unique to me" perks to do the part, so purple lightsabers are very rare, while Vaapad, a whole "new" form of lightsaber combat, is practically unique to him, and two other people he taught it to, and then had to hunt down, as they were not strong enough. For that, you had to be Darth Shaft, Grand Moff of S.H.I.E.L.D.

I've yet to see the book here, but If I remember form 5 was a decidedly brutal, hammering form that would batter through defenses. is it like that in the game?

Depends on how you look at it... Really though as before, if you expect each saber tree to match what some novel said, you're probably gonna be disappointed. Each tree serves a purpose in game, and if the name matches, great, if not... oh well it's just a game, the purpose is more important than matching the fluff exactly.

To answer your question though:

Shien is under the Sentinel Career (along with Shadow and Artisan), it allows you to use Cunning as your Lightsaber Ability and includes talents like Counterstrike, (missed enemy attacks with threat can be used to upgrade your next attack), Djem So Deflection (After a refelct can spend a Dpoint to move into range of an enemy), and Falling Avalanche (Spend strain to add brawn damage to an attack), and Disruptive strike (use Force pips to add failures to your opponents next attack). The Tree is split in 2, with the left two columns focusing on parry and melee attacks, the right side focuses more on reflection, disruption and has a ranged option. The Shien Style Talent is on the right, though interesting Djem So Deflection is on the left...

Soooo take that as you will.

I've complained about Djem So/Shien before I could go on, but long story short flavorwise they split up abilities in such a way where if you want to master both sides of the tree before it "feels" like either aspect of Form V. Eventually yes though, between disruptive strike, Falling Avalance, and counterstrike you'll really feel like a melee powerhouse.

What if someone took their lightsaber and waved it around at their crotch level as a style?

I'd find that offensive.

What if someone took their lightsaber and waved it around at their crotch level as a style?

I'd find that offensive.

It's really more of just a tactic to compare sizes.

What if someone took their lightsaber and waved it around at their crotch level as a style?

I'd find that offensive.

It's really more of just a tactic to compare sizes.

Dark Helmet : You have the ring, and I see your Schwartz is as big as mine. Now let's see how well you handle it.

From Spaceballs, by Mel Brooks

Yogurt would be great as an NPC in any game. Fact.

Honestly I'm not a huge fan of FFG's lightsaber talent trees.

Shien is a brawn based fighting style that uses two handed power attacks. (Reverse Grip Shien is another story a one handed style using wide sweeping slashes putting the full body rotation to build up power and making it incredibly difficult to parry/reflect frontal attacks.)

Ataru is an agility based use your entire body as a weapon acrobatic style which like Vapaad works with or without a lightsaber.

Juyo is just plain weird its a less fluid form of Ataru that uses short erratic off tempo attacks and lots of rage.

Vapaad is basically Juyo without any of the weaknesses its less about fueling the attacks with your rage and more about fueling them with your opponents rage and has actual defense I guess its best described as an Akkido lightsaber style.

I don't mind individual stats for light saber trees, but I think they really should be Univeral specs. Ataru isn't something they teach to padawan's because its not a defensive style and requires a great deal of perfection in its forms to work properly. That and it has enough weaknesses to make it a bad thing to only know Ataru.

Jedi and Sith are supposed to pick up multiple lightsaber forms as they grow up and switch between them so pigeon holing them to a single profession is not the best idea especially when Shien got the congratulations an entire form about dominating your opponent with pure brute force is all about the cunning...

Jedi and Sith are supposed to pick up multiple lightsaber forms as they grow up and switch between them so pigeon holing them to a single profession is not the best idea especially when Shien got the congratulations an entire form about dominating your opponent with pure brute force is all about the cunning...

I will say that this is the reason that I don't like how the active talents for the trees are forced into their respective form Characteristic (e.g. Ataru talents must use Lightsaber (Agility), etc). It really discourages the use of multiple forms.

Having them just use Lightsaber rather than Lightsaber(specific characteristic) would encourage much more diversity in form use.

Adding to that... If they were called Poodleplap style and Midicholribang style would you be as interested in making this argument?

The arguments above are kind of why I wish they'd used these instead of the Forms that came from Legends. People get so wrapped up in specialization names and the supposed finer points of forms one quickly starts loosing the freeform that was found in the previous two games (EtoE and AoR). Of course, I thought there should only be one lightsaber tree anyway.

I've yet to see the book here, but If I remember form 5 was a decidedly brutal, hammering form that would batter through defenses. is it like that in the game?

Some of this is more my experience, but I have witnessed way too many people I play games with gravitate to something just because it blatantly adds to damage, and combat is the only thing that matters in that game. This last bit was never actually true, but they liked to build like it was. Having the forms overall NOT just be damage amplifiers increases the likelihood of them all being viable, giving you the option of taking what you want thematically, rather than min-maxing damage. This may not be what your goal is, but from a writer's perspective, it often WILL be the goal of many players. As they said, also, the original lightsabers were a weapon almost apart from the others, able to carve through most things an equal opponent can wear, with a great damage that didn't depend on your Brawn, allowing you to pick Agility, and be evasive. Now, they are slightly more lackluster, until you find some time to polish them up, but they are still armorbane, still let you choose any Attribute you want (now any, because of the Form trees, with a small fee), and their damage can approach what it once did, as well as gaining some other options, thanks to the implementation of KOTOR crystals. However, lightsabers possess some unique other qualities, such as those defensive options you mentioned, so the trees cover them.

As for Juyo and Vaapad, I actually hope they don't see much press. Juyo is a dangerous form, often causing practitioners to fall to darkness, just because they followed the path, and the system would either have to skip that important aspect, or incorporate a "yeah, this will possibly ruin your character, but YOU chose it" element, which sometimes hurts the game for you, and also your teammates. Vaapad...is only for Samuel L. Jackson. In most of EU history, three? people have passed far enough along Juyo to practice Vaapad. One was Mace Windu, and the others, I believe, were apprentices of Mace Windu, and they both fell to the Dark Side (a fitting reward for avoiding it on Juyo, for that long ). Depending on how you view the fluff (the way I do follows), this is why Mace was able to battle Palpatine, while Yoda bowed down, and got hammered by the Emperor; he was able to use the Dark Side to repel the Emp's Dark Side debuffs, something Yoda could not, and so had to fight off the Emperor's machinations, and multiple spirits, stuff. Still, even Windu is at risk, as the Dark Side took him enough that he couldn't stop, and Anakin had to emo him, letting the Emperor finish him off (and later give Mara his saber; but that's also just me). Vaapad is not widespread, so I personally wouldn't mind if they say "Mace Windu had it, but died before he could pass it on to a worthy successor, while Juyo could come along, but should need a wicked potential price tag, which might make it seem unworth it, to many players. Samuel L. Lackson was cool, but he did insist on a few "unique to me" perks to do the part, so purple lightsabers are very rare, while Vaapad, a whole "new" form of lightsaber combat, is practically unique to him, and two other people he taught it to, and then had to hunt down, as they were not strong enough. For that, you had to be Darth Shaft, Grand Moff of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Actually there where probably a lot of Jedi who were taught Juyo.Considering Vapaad was invented by mace windu developed the form than horded knowledge like a Sith.Also considering that pcs are unaligned force users it would make sense to have traditional sith disciplines and in fact I want ffg to publish that information.Saying you know it was in both previous systems that punished someone for playing a dark sider(which you know a significant portion of the population has no problem playing as.)

Adding to that... If they were called Poodleplap style and Midicholribang style would you be as interested in making this argument?

The arguments above are kind of why I wish they'd used these instead of the Forms that came from Legends. People get so wrapped up in specialization names and the supposed finer points of forms one quickly starts loosing the freeform that was found in the previous two games (EtoE and AoR). Of course, I thought there should only be one lightsaber tree anyway.

The lightsaber forms aren't legends they are Canon as they appear in the films.

Soresu = Obi Wan

Shien = Darth Vader Luke SkyWalker

Makashi = Count Dooku

Ataru = Qui Gon Yoda

Niman = Yoda

Juyo = Darth Maul

Vapaad = Mace Windu

You see Annakin use multiple forms while fighting Dooku in the second movie.

You also see Obi Wan do the same in the first film.

The forms are meant to be switched between depending on the situation as each one has certain advantages and disadvantages that make them highly situational.

Soresu is great at defending, but is pretty much useless on offense.

Ataru is great offense in open spaces, but sucks when fighting multiple people or in tight spaces.

Juyo is great offense and very good for breaking somones defense, but has no defense at all.

Makashi is awesome for one on one lightsaber dueling, but is almost useless against blaster fire and has serious short issues fighting multiple opponents.

Soresu is great at defending, but is pretty much useless on offense.

Ataru is great offense in open spaces, but sucks when fighting multiple people or in tight spaces.

Juyo is great offense and very good for breaking somones defense, but has no defense at all.

Makashi is awesome for one on one lightsaber dueling, but is almost useless against blaster fire and has serious short issues fighting multiple opponents.

This part is legends now - indeed I think Jar'Kai and possibly Soresu are the only one specifically named in canon sources. I mean, not that that doesn't mean FFG can't use them, but it's bringing up a point.

Still, the super focus of these 'forms' also makes almost no sense from a martial arts perspective, where one would never design a combat art that is designed to deal with exactly one of thing. One might have a set of techniques for a particular type of opponent, but it wouldn't matter what it's weak against, because you'd never use it against that.

Regardless of whether you take forms at a more basic or extreme level the point I originally made, that some people go talent-crazy when you link forms to trees, remains my point. I think very few people will say that you can't be a Mercenary in EotE without taking Mercenary Soldier, but we come to Force and Destiny and suddenly if you don't take Ataru striker, you've never learned Form IV.

Canonically, we know there's a "Form III" and we know Kanan and his mistress Depa Billaba practiced it. I can't recall lightsaber forms being mentioned in any canon source besides that.

I'm pretty sure the movie books are still canon which means all the lightsaber forms are still canon. Since they are mentioned in them.

If I remember correctly, the novelizations are canon except when explicitly contradicted by the films and comics. Which is to say they're canon but the new batch of writers don't have to give a darn about them.

So I suppose...