I was just reading through the talent trees and something really odd struck me.

Niman is based off Willpower. Soresu is based off Intellect.

Shouldn't this be the other way around? Consulars have a huge mess of Intellect abilities and they care about knowledge and understanding above all things. Guardians are all about being physically and mentally resilient and being perpetually vigilant for signs of danger, which is all about Willpower. In fact, Guardians have very little in the way of Intellect abilities and it comes off as their dump stat.

Am I the only one who thinks this doesn't make any sense? All the other careers seem to be pretty much on the ball in terms of their lightsaber style characteristic.

I think it could have gone either way. To be a Force wizard requires Willpower and that is what consulars do. Also to be a Jedi general which many protectors do requires intelligence.

Honestly if a player of mine justifies something different and it makes sense I don't mind changing, but as a general rule again could have gone either way

I think part of the reason is game balance. The huge collection of Int based skills makes a character very potent in the support roles of the game.

Astrogation, medicine, mechanics, computers, and all the knowledge skills tie directly to a high Int. Adding the Int based lightsaber skill cheaply makes the Counselor class excell at support and combat quickly. It's not a huge delay, but making a Counselor go cross class to get the skill adds a bit more balance.

I was just reading through the talent trees and something really odd struck me.

Niman is based off Willpower. Soresu is based off Intellect.

Shouldn't this be the other way around? Consulars have a huge mess of Intellect abilities and they care about knowledge and understanding above all things. Guardians are all about being physically and mentally resilient and being perpetually vigilant for signs of danger, which is all about Willpower. In fact, Guardians have very little in the way of Intellect abilities and it comes off as their dump stat.

Am I the only one who thinks this doesn't make any sense? All the other careers seem to be pretty much on the ball in terms of their lightsaber style characteristic.

I don't know the background well enough to say (book is not yet out in the UK), but from a rules-balance point of view it sounds sensible. You don't want a character to be able to use one stat for all their best stuff.

No single Attribute is a perfect match for any trait especially when you only have six to choose from. None of the Forms are strictly any single Attribute, it's only an artefact of game mechanics. Think of it more like that particular Attribute is slightly more applicable than any other when it comes to channelling the Force for that style/Form in this system and be done with it.

Oh I agree ... and most careers have a range of characteristics they need to use, including their lightsaber style. But in the case of the Guardian, none of his core skills are Int based, and only one of each in two trees. Seems kinda gimpy as pretty much any other characteristic would have been better. In my opinion, of course.

As you know each Career and Specialization has it's inherent strengths and weaknesses but they are really only a guide. There is no reason other than Min-Maxing to not build a smart Guardian. Sure it will weaken them a bit combat wise but so what, it's not about being a tank it's about how you want to play.

The attributes that were chosen to match with the different lightsaber forms fit fairly well, in my opinion, with how those forms are presented and described in Star Wars lore.

Are they ideal for min-maxing concerns? No, not really, but I find it hard to believe that was anything but by design.

All except Shien which should be brawn based.

The Djem-So side of the tree is pretty much Brawn-based. Cunning fits the rest of Shien just fine. Remember, Anakin "was a cunning warrior."

As for Willpower and Niman, it fits well. Niman was all about adding telekinetic Force use to your attacks, and that sounds like Willpower to me.

Intellect for Soresu fits, too. There was much talk about this during the beta testing period, so I am loathe to rehash old arguments, but IMO it fits best. Consider also that the Guardian splatbook is the first to be published and will contain the Armorer, a specialization almost certain to be Mechanics-focused. Add to that consideration the fact that the Protector specialization is a deft hand at Medicine, and you've got some pretty nice in-career synergy options.

It takes intelligence to analyze your opponent's battle strategy and develop the perfect defense against it, which is the basis for Soresu. It wasn't about standing tall against a ton of attacks and seeing your way through by sheer tenacity, the idea was you had practiced and planned and knew how to counter each opposing style.

While I agree ... there's no actual skill in the game for strategy and planning. The closest to that would be Cool for planned initiative, and that's Presence, not Intellect. In fact, Presence also comes up quite a bit for Guardians given their leadership roles. There is no logical reason whatsoever why Intellect is the stat of choice for Soresu. It really gives the impression that the designers were trying to make all styles have a separate stat, regardless of whether it made sense or not.

In fact, I'm pretty sure even internally there's some dissent ... check out the article:

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2015/7/23/the-elegant-weapon/

You'll notice that every style has an explanation as to WHY they use a different stat than Brawn EXCEPT the Guardian (Warriors already use Brawn). They simply avoided bringing it up. In my opinion, because Guardian was ALSO meant to use Brawn. Athletics and Resilience are both core skills for them. And given they are meant to act as 'tanks', Brawn also adds to Soak. Thematically, it fits.

I realize that this may be rehashed arguments from the Beta days. Some of us weren't involved in that, so we're pretty confused by this. And saying that it'll make sense in a future sourcebook doesn't really hold up ... you shouldn't have to buy a sourcebook so that the core book makes sense, right?

So here's a question:

Obviously, you can choose to still use Brawn as your default Lightsaber stat, right? Does this mean that active talents dependent on the Lightsaber skill can also use that as default? Or are Defensive Circle and Strategic form *required* to use Intellect?

While I agree ... there's no actual skill in the game for strategy and planning. The closest to that would be Cool for planned initiative, and that's Presence, not Intellect. In fact, Presence also comes up quite a bit for Guardians given their leadership roles. There is no logical reason whatsoever why Intellect is the stat of choice for Soresu. It really gives the impression that the designers were trying to make all styles have a separate stat, regardless of whether it made sense or not.

[...]

So here's a question:

Obviously, you can choose to still use Brawn as your default Lightsaber stat, right? Does this mean that active talents dependent on the Lightsaber skill can also use that as default? Or are Defensive Circle and Strategic form *required* to use Intellect?

Knowledge (Warfare), to an extent, covers battle-based strategies and planning.

And no, it has to be the Characteristic listed, and you must get (and be able to use) the talent to be able to use that Characteristics first. Pg. 152

Knowledge (Warfare)? Doesn't seem to be in the Core book.

And thanks for the clarification regarding the talents, Lathrop!

Knowledge (Warfare)? Doesn't seem to be in the Core book.

It's in Age of Rebellion. Beta update has it, page 2-3 .

It is in the Age of Rebellion Core book.

Again I'm a firm believer in house rules being ok if they are good for your game and don't limit that only one player gets a say in changes. Usually I will discuss with all players in current campaign

I believe that intellect makes sense for Soresu. A Soresu defender relies on the defensive qualities of the technique while analyzing the opposition's own technique and exploiting a weakness. It's not a perfect fit, but It makes a lot of sense to me.

Niman relies on willpower because it's often touted as a form in which a Jedi will find easiest since it relies on skills a Jedi should already have acquired. Force powers already rely heavily on the Discipline skill, and thus on Willpower, so a well-rounded Jedi who's already investing in Force powers will find Niman a natural fit.

Not sure who said it, but I think they were trying to have a different attribute for every form when they should have gone with a feel or based on form even if it mean one attribute wasn't used. That or have one of two choices for a few of them when you chose the technique, but your choice was final.

Niman relies on willpower because it's often touted as a form in which a Jedi will find easiest since it relies on skills a Jedi should already have acquired. Force powers already rely heavily on the Discipline skill, and thus on Willpower, so a well-rounded Jedi who's already investing in Force powers will find Niman a natural fit.

But see, that's the thing. Exactly as you said, Niman does make sense with Willpower due to the amount of Discipline rolls involved in using force powers. In fact, all of the other careers, the characteristics are tied to their way of doing things. Seekers are pilots and trackers who need agility to survive (with three core skills that use it). Sentinels are cunning and sneaky (with three core skills that use Cunning). Warriors are all about brute force (with three core skills that use Brawn). Mystics are very charismatic beings with lots of presence (with Charm being a core skill ... a weaker example, but still better than Guardian given one of their talent trees).

Now in terms of Guardians, *none* of their core skills uses Intellect. Peacekeeper is all about Discipline (Willpower) and Leadership (Presence). Protector is the only one with Medicine ... and even then, only one talent involves using the Medicine skill, whereas three are boosts to stimpacks that don't require a roll! See, that's why Intellect makes no sense for Guardians as they rarely if ever use Intellect outside of their lightsaber tree. There is basically zero synergy between the Intellect characteristic and the Guardian's play style. They DO use Brawn for a ton of skills and soak. They DO use Presence in their role as leaders. They DO use Willpower quite a bit for Discipline and Vigilance checks, and the added Strain they use to Parry and Reflect.

The impression I have is that, really, at some point the designers focused on the idea of each lightsaber style being dependent on a different characteristic, and were so stubbornly insistent on it that they got to Guardians last, only had Intellect left, and gave it to them ... without ever giving them any core skills or talents that actually *used* Intellect. It's an oversight. And I'm absolutely positive that they'll probably be adding a bunch of Intellect based talent trees in the Guardian sourcebook to correct this epic fail.

I am not arguing against the idea that Guardians are calculating strategists. In fact, I agree with that assessment. What I dislike is that they gave Guardians no usage of that focus *whatsoever* in the core book. No Computer skill, no Mechanics, no Knowledges of any kind in their core skills. The Medicine skill is an afterthought in the Protector tree (Consular's Healer is THE healing tree), and Knowledge (Lore) in the Soresu tree has no talents whatsoever that boosts it (The Consular is also the best when it comes to Knowledge).

I wasn't involved during the beta. But I really have a hard time understanding how this lack of synergy survived until now. Again, it makes no sense.

P.S: It should be noted that I'm otherwise in love with the Guardian. It's very flavorful and I love their tanky self-sacrificing approach to things. I just wish they would have the lightsaber synergy all the other classes have. As it stands, all they would ever use Intellect for is to swing a lightsaber, while still having a good Brawn score for several of their skills ... but that they can't use when actually swinging a lightsaber. :\

So just beef up your Brawn. That is the practical answer to all of these "this Ability doesn't go with that Form" objections. You won't gimp your melee character by focusing on Brawn and relying on your awesome Lightsaber skill to carry those 2 talents that require the alternative Ability.

Again what's wrong with making it work for your campaign. Change the stat to Willpower or Brawn since I believe either work well even though Brawn makes more sense after reading these replies. Then just give them a toughness talent instead of the technique since that won't break the specialization.

So just beef up your Brawn. That is the practical answer to all of these "this Ability doesn't go with that Form" objections. You won't gimp your melee character by focusing on Brawn and relying on your awesome Lightsaber skill to carry those 2 talents that require the alternative Ability.

Exactly. Only those two talents require you to use Int. If you wanted to use Brawn for most of your attacks, nothing is stopping you. With a good lightsaber skill, you will still be rolling decent with a low int for those two. (3-4 skill).

I think Int actually works well for an analytic defensive style, which is what Soresu is.

That's a tidbit that may be getting overlooked or forgotten in this discussion: Guardians MAY use intellect with that talent. They also MAY still use Brawn, if they want. In this way, Guardians may be the best of the lightsaber users, as they have two viable attributes that can be used for their saber that synergize with their characters. Brawn, as stated, will be used for about half their important skills, and Intellect is important for any jack-of-trades character, as it governs medicine, computers, and mechanics, among other skills. You can reasonably make Soresu a second spec for any jack character and have that character excel at melee combat, or you can use it as a second for a tanky, brawn-based brawler (though better specs exist for that.)

Eruletho, due to the wording of the black box on page 152, there seems to be a consensus that the active talents in the Soresu tree *must* use Intellect. I had that same question earlier. If you can still use Brawn, this whole discuss would have been a no-starter. As it stands, you can use Brawn overall, but are forced to use a dump stat for two of their defining abilities, which would suck.

By the way, anyone else here notice that Cereans seem custom made to be Guardians?