I'm wary of opening this can of worms, but I respect many opinions here so I'll risk the potential firestorm...

How would you handle Conflict for a Force-sensitive shooting an unaware enemy at range? (assuming the target is an enemy, not a mark for assassination)? Was the target helpless? If the shooter is a Rebel "doing his job", what then?

I know how I feel about it ("Jedi shouldn't be snipers") but am interested in how others view "taking the long shot" as a Force-sensitive.

Pulls out 100 feet of rope and backs away even further.

Would you give conflict for a character popping out of the shadows and lightsabering the guy before he knows what's happening? Is the guy involved in any wrongdoing, or does he just happen to be wearing the wrong colored uniform? As far as conflict goes, if this guy is of no harm to you and there's no evidence that he's an evil guy, I'd say the player would get some.

Is it a Stormtrooper? Hutt Enforcer? Other enemy of the group? Yeah, not an issue. Otherwise Luke should've fell to the Dark Side for taking out the Death Star. Plenty of people on that 'just doing their job and wearing the wrong uniform.'

Assassinating some person just because? Differet issue. But Rebel trooper doing his job? Them's the breaks.

Pulls out 100 feet of rope and backs away even further.

I'll tie my rope to yours! I had a friend ask about this and, as I didn't want to have my thoughts on it exist in a vacuum, I felt getting other views might give me more insight.

I am of the mind that certain actions will always garner conflict but it can be mitigated due to circumstances.

Is it a Stormtrooper? Hutt Enforcer? Other enemy of the group? Yeah, not an issue. Otherwise Luke should've fell to the Dark Side for taking out the Death Star. Plenty of people on that 'just doing their job and wearing the wrong uniform.'

Assassinating some person just because? Differet issue. But Rebel trooper doing his job? Them's the breaks.

Great point about the Death Star.

I am of the mind that certain actions will always garner conflict but it can be mitigated due to circumstances.

Of course, unless I'm way off, the Alliance doesn't generally condone assassination as it can hurt their cause if painted as terrorism. That's a different argument, though.

Man, I love the themes in Star Wars!

I'd say a big part of it depends on whether or not they're using their Force powers to do it. I might give Conflict for an assassination, but the only time I'd do it for military sniping is if the target was unsuspectingly engaged in some mundane activity the character might empathize with (i.e., if they shoot someone taking a bathroom break, or while showing a buddy a holo of their kids, or who is a noncombatant like a medic or injured being).

On the other hand, if the PC is actively using their Force powers to assist with the shot, or even to lull the target into a false sense of security, I'd almost certainly give Conflict for that. Especially if Force Power: Influence was involved, since they'd have touched the target's mind just before killing them.

I am of the mind that certain actions will always garner conflict but it can be mitigated due to circumstances.

Good point, as well. I generally try to take my own advice and use the Morality/Conflict systems as guidelines. Sniping random strangers for fun and profit? Conflict and a lot of it. Sniping an Imperial governor who's terrorizing the populace? Probably Conflict, but not a lot.

Of course, unless I'm way off, the Alliance doesn't generally condone assassination as it can hurt their cause if painted as terrorism. That's a different argument, though.

Man, I love the themes in Star Wars!

Yeah, in a lot of cases it's not that they wouldn't like to; there's some pretty monstrous Moffs out there. But they need the support of the galaxy's populace, and with the capabilities of Star Wars technology there's a fine line between interstellar guerrilla warfare and galactic terrorism.

Maybe it's my poor memory but wasn't there some things in the novels/comics that focused specifically on them dealing with the immense loss of life blowing up the Death Star caused and the need to focus on how much death was prevented to deal with it?

Anyways, I would treat the force-sensitive no differently than any other character. It depends on the situation, the reasoning, and the act. Keep in mind, even a valid bounty target doesn't mean no conflict and conflict doesn't equate to morality drop.

Moral Conflict generally means s ituations in which morality s eems to demand opposite things. One of the most gripping is the so-called dirty hands problem, where someone — in this situation the Sniper — has to do something that is wrong to do what she thinks is the right

My Rule of Thumb on Conflict/Morality issues in F&D is that if you have to ask then there is some Conflict. Remember it's not the Conflict itself that is the problem but the PC's Morality rating, Conflict is inevitable when in a war so it is up to the PC to balance his deeds to avoid falling to the Dark Side.

The given scenario, as many have pointed out already, lacks enough definition to give a complete answer. There are a lot of things that could mitigate or remove the conflict being gained in this case.

Did the sniping force sensitive kill the target or wound/injure him enough to stop him from doing what he was doing? Was there a good, solid reason for doing this at the time. Examples, he is a sniper for his rebel squad trying to break into a base and he is incapacitating a guard before they try breaking in.

I mean, if he shot a someone with no real provocation and killed him then I would most likely award conflict. If he uses a stun setting and/or there's a reasonable reason for shooting vs just trying to sneak around or move on and ignore the guy then that changes things. Most scenarios are likely to warrant some conflict unless it is known for a fact that a fight with this guy is going to be unavoidable and the force sensitive makes attempts to not kill him outright (Called shot to the leg, stun setting, etc).

Perhaps your game is outside of the default setting as well but in general it should be remembered that the PCs are NOT playing Jedi. They are playing force sensitives who very likely have no real clue of the Jedi or their code without some kind of specific IC source for this information. I make my best effort to evaluate things not on 'a jedi should or should not do this' and more on 'would a good guy do this'. Especially, as it has been pointed out in various topics before, the Jedi Code is not infallible especially as it often requires interpretation towards a given situation.

What if some dumb farmboy drops a torpedo down a space station's exhaust port and kills everyone on board? Again, so long as it's all conducted jus in bello , no Conflict per the ancient Jedi scholar, Toma Aqui-Nas.

If the character upholds the sanctity of life, then having to take that shot should prey on their mind (much as it would if they were face-to-face) - though the greater good might override this and help them squeeze the trigger. There's something inherently sly and arguably ruthless (or cowardly, depending on one's POV) about the act of sniping - qualities which all knock on the door of the dark side. I suppose by standing toe-to-toe with the enemy, the net result might be the same (i.e. a corpse), but at least when in person, the assailant has the opportunity to "turn" their target - even if from a meta POV, the player knows their attempts would fall on deaf ears. I'd award a couple of conflict points.

Edit: what does the character hear in their mind when they're lining up the shot? How does the dark side manifest itself in their head, in that quiet moment before they pull the trigger?

Part of it, for me, would be "how does the sniper view it?" Certainly, there are events that are always going to be seen as "bad", but how you view it has to be the arbiter. Are you killing? Are they enemies? Did you do it to save your loved ones? You're a real Special Forces Army Ranger sniper. Is it any more evil that you killed the terrorist , but in a way that he couldn't take you with him? Certainly, there have always been vocal people who argued that this is so; snipers didn't get the same parades other returning veterans did, and medals were rarer, as well as dangerous to present, as it told everyone who you were, and they already have contracts out on snipers in some parts of the world. All that aside, to you, is there a difference? The Force is neutral, regardless of what the Emperor, Yoda, or anyone else says; it is your feelings, in many ways, that color how things happen. If you were going to off that enemy, quickly, quietly, and painlessly, no one should say "you did it with Force-augmented sniping, not the up close and personal lightsaber, so that was bad. How it colors your feelings down the line, that matters. Do you start to value those people's lives less? Do you give up on trying to show them the rightness of the Rebellion? Do you even think about them, ever again? If doing it, over time, slowly erodes your ability to respect life, and value people, even those who don't agree with you, especially those who violently oppose you, that will be the Conflict. The first, single shot? No, I'd say not, and especially not compared to the saber-swinging one.

I'd argue that this is one of the reasons I don't like the Clone Wars. It took away the Jedi's need to value life when they could carve through whole armies of unthinking machines, but the feelings of the people who felt that the Separatist cause was just, and not only the rich people at the top, who were protecting their bottom line, is never seen, nor do the Jedi have to regret the war. In the old days, when clones fought other clones, there was more of a price they paid, and the Jedi could be more seen as monsters, which the people who saw them then more easily forgot about, when the Purge happened. Thanks ClonWars movies

I'd argue that this is one of the reasons I don't like the Clone Wars. It took away the Jedi's need to value life when they could carve through whole armies of unthinking machines, but the feelings of the people who felt that the Separatist cause was just, and not only the rich people at the top, who were protecting their bottom line, is never seen, nor do the Jedi have to regret the war. In the old days, when clones fought other clones, there was more of a price they paid, and the Jedi could be more seen as monsters, which the people who saw them then more easily forgot about, when the Purge happened. Thanks ClonWars movies

Blame Lucas for pitting disposable droids against disposable clones. The Clone Wars writers probably did the best they could with a bad hand, and they did try to at least humanize the clone soldiers, but it's not their fault that the Clone Wars feels less like WWII and more like a video game.

I think the issue centres around the activity at the time. If the sniper is defending a position, and stormtroopers are attacking, fire away. If the sniper is waiting to ambush a stormtrooper squad on patrol, then conflict might be warranted.

What if some dumb farmboy drops a torpedo down a space station's exhaust port and kills everyone on board? Again, so long as it's all conducted jus in bello , no Conflict per the ancient Jedi scholar, Toma Aqui-Nas.

Agreed, the space station was going to destroy a planet, and there was no time to find the guy who was about to push the button, so...fire away.

What if some dumb farmboy drops a torpedo down a space station's exhaust port and kills everyone on board? Again, so long as it's all conducted jus in bello , no Conflict per the ancient Jedi scholar, Toma Aqui-Nas.

If said dumb farmboy was a PC in AoR, then he'd get a potato sack full of Duty and a chocolate medallion.

If he was a PC in F&D and I was GMing, then in the run-up to him firing the torpedo, we'd see that his thoughts are a mish-mash of desperation to get the job done, desperation to stay alive, fear for his surviving friends and the Alliance cause, rage over his dead friends and family, terror over the possibility of failure, terror over Vader and Black Squadron breathing down his neck, reassurance and confusion over Obi-Wan's voice (prompting reminiscences of what happened to him on the Death Star, and consequently rage and a desire for vengeance) - all of which makes good inner conflict and fertile ground for dark side whisperings. I might even ask for a fear check to face down these emotions, with assistance from Obi-Wan in the form of a bonus die.

I think scale matters as well. If you press a button and thousands of people die, can you even process that? Is the death star explosion something Luke is even capable of dealing with? Can you even emphasise with tens of thousands you barely new beyond the bare minimum? Those are some questions I don't think any game system can really answer, nor would I feel it fair to rule on them at all one way or the other.

Now, assassination, that's something much more personal. If you do it properly, you are going to study your target for a time, get to know their routine, their habits and develope some sort of rapport. Unless you have a complete disconnect for the task that then follows, it definitely is going to affect you. For quick, in combat snap shots, well, maybe, eventually. A lot of things factor in: Can you see their faces when they go down? Can you hear them screaming? Or is it just another monster in white armour? How do you see your enemy? Are your past experiences such that you demonise them, which makes things easier, or have you seen their human side and possibly emphasise them?

A lot of things factor into this scenario. So many, I really have to say: Handle it on a case by case basis for each character and discuss it with the player, too. If you find them very reluctant to take such drawbacks into account, maybe promise a dramatic resolution and possible reward somewhere down the line, or point out it's something they can speak of with veterans of the clone wars and find common ground with some of the few remaining jedi masters in the galaxy. It wasn't "just" droids the jedi faced there, after all. Plenty of independant militias and people died on both sides. At least, if one goes by the series itself.

Taking the head off the snake, a long shot to take out the corrupt planetary governor or a Moff, or a bad Imperial captain, or an evil gangster... -probably- ok. If you compare the loss of life from one well aimed shot verses a frontal assault into a fortified position especially if the guy getting his melon split is handlebar mustache twisting evil, then even if he is technically caught by surprise and defenseless It's a "lesser of two evils" situation. By that same token in a more abstract sense, using any of the Force powers to cause strain is basically using the Force to attack which is clearly against "A jedi uses the Force for Knowledge and Defense, never Attack," but if you are force choking a guy to knock him out instead of killing him... well, that has to mitigate any sort of moral penalty.

The further you get away from someone who is clearly an evil, evil badguy, the more of a moral grey area you get into and then the character's intent and emotional state really come into play much more. At the end of the day, it's the kind of thing that I think really has to be dealt with on a case by case basis.

Hope this helps and adds something to the discussion!

I think scale matters as well. If you press a button and thousands of people die, can you even process that? Is the death star explosion something Luke is even capable of dealing with? Can you even emphasise with tens of thousands you barely new beyond the bare minimum? Those are some questions I don't think any game system can really answer, nor would I feel it fair to rule on them at all one way or the other.

Now, assassination, that's something much more personal. If you do it properly, you are going to study your target for a time, get to know their routine, their habits and develope some sort of rapport. Unless you have a complete disconnect for the task that then follows, it definitely is going to affect you. For quick, in combat snap shots, well, maybe, eventually. A lot of things factor in: Can you see their faces when they go down? Can you hear them screaming? Or is it just another monster in white armour? How do you see your enemy? Are your past experiences such that you demonise them, which makes things easier, or have you seen their human side and possibly emphasise them?

A lot of things factor into this scenario. So many, I really have to say: Handle it on a case by case basis for each character.

I think it was Marilyn Manson who was the first to say, "the death of one is a tragedy / the death of millions is just a statistic" I think conflict should be handed out for the example of blowing up the Death Star - not to try and drag the character into the Dark Side, but to represent the ordeal of what they went through and the imprint such an act would leave on their psyche, despite everyone's back-at-the-base post-rationalisations. If we don't want to touch upon that with the Morality/Conflict mechanics then perhaps it would be better to treat it as AoR territory.

Just reading pg.324 in F&D.

"10+ (conflict) - Murder: The PCs murder a character. In this case, murder is killing someone who is helpless or no threat to the PCs."

Now, is the target a threat to the PCs? Not in that moment, but they may represent a threat in the long term, so we might let that slide. Are they helpless? Is it a stretch to argue that them being unaware of the red dot on the back of their head might label them helpless? What do you guys think?

I think it was Marilyn Manson who was the first to say, "the death of one is a tragedy / the death of millions is just a statistic"

I think it was Marilyn Manson who was the first to say, "the death of one is a tragedy / the death of millions is just a statistic"

Perhaps I need to pick a better irony face from the smiley bank.

The Death Star is an interesting example. In part because it has a lot of peer reinforcement. Luke gets hailed as a hero, he gets a lot of people telling him he did the right thing and it's certainly easier for him himself to think along those lines. I also don't think the negative impacts or implications hit him at the moment he fired the shot. He's in the thick of things, hyped up on adrenaline and fighting for his own life along with everyone else's. I would see conflict dice coming into play much later, if at all, after a dramatic point where he is confronted with the actual impact of his actions, perhaps on Dagobah, where his prior conceptions of what a Jedi are are overturned. At the same time, in this specific example, the conflict comes with the opportunity to learn and grow from it, beyond what he was.

On the other hand, up until that point, Luke isn't exactly a jedi either. His connection with the force is fleeting at best, and it is doubtful if he's even close to in tune with it as much as your average player jedi. Before Dagobah, the force is pretty much a useful, but clumsy tool to him to make sure he and the people he cares about survive. He has little control and it's possible he isolates himself emotionally in combat simply to remain functional. Conflict, and growth from it, only comes when he gains a new way of looking at the universe.