I am going to start mixed star wars game soon (a month or so) and i would like to know of the too powerful builds and combos so that i can be prepared (house rules, not using them accidentally against my players etc.).

I have read (a lot) about the autofire capable weapons + jury rig talent, droids who can reliably do insta death criticals, double bladed lightsabers, something about pressure points and niman users. From those the only one i understood how it worked and why it's powerful is the autofire + jury rig, can you explain to me how the other builds work?

A lot depends on how the GM runs the game, and what the GM allows.

So, a Wookiee Marauder/Doctor with very high Brawn, high Brawl skill, and the Pressure Point talent can potentially take down a Rancor all by themselves, if you allow Pressure Point to be used with Two Weapon Combat technique. That’s pretty insane. And even without TWC, that combination can get pretty crazy.

With regards to Force users, if they have the Move power and have spent lots of points with various upgrades, with just three Force points they can play Tiddly Winks with AT-ATs at Extreme Range (a.k.a., “AT-AT Skittles”). With a couple more Force points, they might be able to grab The Executor out of Orbit and cause it to be smashed down into the planet.

In terms of what your PCs might achieve relatively quickly, the one I think you want to watch out for is the Heavy with a Light Repeating Blaster that has been jury-rigged to have a lower auto-fire activation cost. Or, they could potentially modify a Heavy Blaster Rifle to do as much damage as an LRB, and be less conspicuous.

If you get a melee monster PC that just wipes the floor with your minions, that’s easy enough to counter in a variety of ways. For one, you could throw larger minion groups at them, more minion groups of the larger size, and those minion groups could each be more capable. There’s also area effect weapons (some non-lethal) that can be effective, like glop grenades, or stun grenades, or nets, etc….

The marauder has muiltple levels of leathal blows, combined with vibro weapon vicious, low crit (one), high dice pool (spec only uses brawn) leads to 100+ crits very quickly. Droid simply can focus more quicker.

Linked is op, it costs nothing (expect advantage) anything the lets you hit more than once a turn should watched closely.

Pressure points lets completly bypass soak and hit the usally mush shorter stun track. Fine on a standard doctor, high brawn, brawl focus characters not so much.

Just MHO, but if you're just starting out, it's a little early to worry. At most you might limit characters to characteristic no higher than 4 and encourage a broad range of skills, i.e.: don't let somebody jump straight to rank 4 or 5 in a single skill while everything else has only 1 or less. The best way to do that is pull characters out of their comfort zone, and encourage them to beef up things like Discipline, Resilience, Vigilance, and Cool. Also, don't make it too easy to get mods and credits too early.

It takes quite a bit of XP before you really have to worry about these situations, and you'll have plenty of time to learn the system and see it coming.

This system is BRILLIANT at running split parties, encourage it. This is because everyone can use every skill right out of the gate so you can easily design encounters that require people to do their specialty in different places.

Perhaps the Auto-Fire-monkey and 2-weapon-lawn-mower are holding back the swarms of rampaging dinosaurs at 2 seperate entrances to an ancient Library, while the Archeologist is trying to decrypt an ancient computer system, the mechanic is frantically repairing the sub-light engine damaged during landing with the assistance of the pilot.

other thing this system does very well is non-combat encounters; chases, social interactions, spying/infiltrating, scouting, smuggling ETC ETC. You can design encounters that restrict use of certain equipment, a Heavy weapon is certainly not allowed inside a Hutt palace for a negotiation, or the local bar for that matter. Showing a Lightsaber can result in Bounty Hunters coming from every which way to try and make a claim on your head. An army can not be fought with the force of just the party.

There are other ways to handle this sorta minmaxing - first off, if your player(s) are making these builds, it's a signal that this is what they want to do to have fun. This can be verified during Session Zero: "Hey, I see you made a wicked melee fighter, that sounds like you want to whoop on folks up close and personal." Having a frank discussion about how you all want to play and coming to a consensus before the story unfolds can save your group a lot of hassles down the road.

Now that you've determined how you want to play, you can easily find weaknesses to exploit - but I say that with a caveat: you're all there to have fun! It's a collaborative experience so I would caution against outright gunning for their weaknesses every session, but there should be ample rewards and challenges for all players at the table, even the minmaxers. If someone puts valuable XP into a skill, it's nice to allow them to use it by and by.

...first off, if your player(s) are making these builds, it's a signal that this is what they want to do to have fun.

I'm not sure that's always true. It certainly could be, but it could also be people coming from different games (...waves to D&D...) often assume that's the kind of build they have to make just to survive. I'm gearing up for this exact situation next weekend, introducing the game to a new player with those assumptions.

I think this game requires a bit of re-education to leverage its full potential. After that, if they still want to min-max then at least they'll know what they're getting into.

Player buy-in is important, them trusting you that sometimes things will go wrong for the party but it's all in the spirit of a fun time. You also need to trust them to use the Narative Dice rolls to make for a better story and fun time.

Edit: make sure they get to have their fun doing the 1 thing they are amazing at, but they need to be aware that method won't always be a solution, and may just make the situation worse.

There are other builds that dominate other aspects of the game than combat too, some pilots and social characters can absolutely dominate certain situations, leaving the rest of the party standing around with their hands in their pockets. Again diversity in Encounters and encounter design will often solve this.

In other systems (DnD) GM's spend hours balancing the threats in an encounter, that's not necessarily in this system. Get yourself the adversary decks then put your time into crafting the environment, the setup, the NPC reactions. Craft the story.

...first off, if your player(s) are making these builds, it's a signal that this is what they want to do to have fun.

I'm not sure that's always true. It certainly could be, but it could also be people coming from different games (...waves to D&D...) often assume that's the kind of build they have to make just to survive. I'm gearing up for this exact situation next weekend, introducing the game to a new player with those assumptions.

I think this game requires a bit of re-education to leverage its full potential. After that, if they still want to min-max then at least they'll know what they're getting into.

No argument to any of your points which are all valid, but just imagine the buy-in financially and time-wise it takes to truly exploit builds in this system- I think it somewhat self-regulates. Somewhat.

...first off, if your player(s) are making these builds, it's a signal that this is what they want to do to have fun.

I'm not sure that's always true. It certainly could be, but it could also be people coming from different games (...waves to D&D...) often assume that's the kind of build they have to make just to survive. I'm gearing up for this exact situation next weekend, introducing the game to a new player with those assumptions.

I think this game requires a bit of re-education to leverage its full potential. After that, if they still want to min-max then at least they'll know what they're getting into.

It's not only that, players might accidently build such a character without realising how powerful it is, the same could happen by the GM when he makes a Nemesis.

The marauder has muiltple levels of leathal blows, combined with vibro weapon vicious, low crit (one), high dice pool (spec only uses brawn) leads to 100+ crits very quickly. Droid simply can focus more quicker.

Linked is op, it costs nothing (expect advantage) anything the lets you hit more than once a turn should watched closely.

Pressure points lets completly bypass soak and hit the usally mush shorter stun track. Fine on a standard doctor, high brawn, brawl focus characters not so much.

Let's take one by one:

I think I am going to disallow pressure points + two weapon fighting and have the pressure points ignore medicine ranks of soak (or medicine ranks+1 I am not sure yet).

About the autofire, I think that I am going to say that it can't be lowered with jury rig.

About the linked on lightsabers, I can't see a way to make it more than linked 1,so am I missing something or is a second lightsaber attack so powerful?

In addition, is the linked a problem only in lightsabers or is it an issue in other weapons as well?

OK I can see the issue with marauders + mono vibro weapons and insta death criticals, I am not sure how I should house rule this.

What about Niman users and gunslingers? What's so powerful with those two builds?

About the linked on lightsabers, I can't see a way to make it more than linked 1,so am I missing something or is a second lightsaber attack so powerful?

It’s powerful, but IMO is nowhere near as bad as jury-rigged auto-fire. It’s a single additional activation, which may or may not happen. And it’s melee-only, which can be resolved in a variety of ways.

In addition, is the linked a problem only in lightsabers or is it an issue in other weapons as well?

It can be a problem anywhere, but I think the biggest issue is with lightsabers.

OK I can see the issue with marauders + mono vibro weapons and insta death criticals, I am not sure how I should house rule this.

There’s a number of threads on this board regarding how to deal with melee monsters, and most of that is as applicable to people with glowing beatsticks as it is to people with nasty vibroweapons.

I’m not sure I’d try to houserule this one out of existence, just be aware of this issue and be ready to deal with it if/when it crops up.

What about Niman users and gunslingers? What's so powerful with those two builds?

Haven’t heard about this one. Care to fill me in?

Isn't Linked being powerful kind of the whole point?

I've replaced Linked(1) with "Autofire 1"...basically if you want an extra hit, the difficulty is increased and still requires the 2A.

OK I can see the issue with marauders + mono vibro weapons and insta death criticals, I am not sure how I should house rule this.

There’s a number of threads on this board regarding how to deal with melee monsters, and most of that is as applicable to people with glowing beatsticks as it is to people with nasty vibroweapons.

I’m not sure I’d try to houserule this one out of existence, just be aware of this issue and be ready to deal with it if/when it crops up.

What about Niman users and gunslingers? What's so powerful with those two builds?

Haven’t heard about this one. Care to fill me in?

Can you point me in those threads regarding how to deal with melee monsters?

On the niman users and gunslingers: I don't know, i have read in these fora that they can be disruptive for the game like the jury rig + autofire.

Can you point me in those threads regarding how to deal with melee monsters?

There’s a lot of them. Most any thread with “melee” or “marauder” or “Wookiee” in the title will be relevant.

In short, ranged weapons are good against them — think snipers that are well out of melee range.

As are non-lethal weapons like glop grenades, stun grenades, nets, bolas, etc…. Anything that can immobilize them is good.

Also, multiple large minion groups will take a long time to whittle down, and in the meanwhile they can do substantial damage in return.

In addition, Rivals and Mini-Nemesis types that are built to be roughly a mirror of the melee monster in question, that’s almost always a tough fight.

On the niman users and gunslingers: I don't know, i have read in these fora that they can be disruptive for the game like the jury rig + autofire.

Where?

On another note (and this is something I'd been doing wrong for a year), only -one- minion can be removed from a group per critical per hit. So being able to activate multiple crits against a minion group isn't at all useful -- those advantages are best spent on other things.

That means it'll definitely take some time to whittle down minion groups with 5+ members...

On the niman users and gunslingers: I don't know, i have read in these fora that they can be disruptive for the game like the jury rig + autofire.

Where?

Here , post #25

On the niman users and gunslingers: I don't know, i have read in these fora that they can be disruptive for the game like the jury rig + autofire.

Where?

Here , post #25

Okay, so from the post at https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/191073-is-autofire-broken-if-so-can-it-be-fixed/page-2#entry1845764

I think there are lots of ways to generate massive damage output in this game. I can do it with a double lightsaber. I can do it with Niman. I could do it with a single lightsaber and Ataru. I can do it with pistols and the gunslinger. I can do it with rifles using autofire. Hell you can do it with any vehicle mounted weapon. I can do it with force lightning. I can do it with move.

With the double lightsaber (a.k.a., double-bladed lightsaber, a la Darth Maul), that weapon has Linked 1. Yes, it is somewhat dangerous, but this issue is addressed above.

With the single lightsaber and Ataru, I think he’s getting at the talent called Saber Swarm, which gives you a Linked ranking equal to your Force Rating. It is a maneuver, it costs one Strain to perform, and it can only be used with your next Lightsaber (Agility) attack. So, you’d have to have a pretty high Agility to make this worthwhile, and you’d also want to have a high Force Rating. Yeah, that’s a threat, but it’s well down the talent tree for Ataru, and ultimately it’s still just melee combat.

With pistols and the Gunslinger, that’s again Linked with Two Weapon Combat, but this time it’s ranged weapons. However, the amount of damage that can be done per shot is lower, so there is less threat there.

Autofire has already been addressed.

Vehicle mounted weapons are well-known.

Force Lightning and Move are also both well-known.

The only one that really puzzles me is the comment about Niman. I’m sorry, I just don’t see anything particularly dangerous there.

I have read about the force move power but what is the issue with the unleash force power?

I have read about the force move power but what is the issue with the unleash force power?

So, Force Lightning assumes that you have the Mastery Upgrade for Unleash, which is obviously at the bottom of that tree. So, it takes a while to get there.

But there are four Strength upgrades you can get, and with all of those plus the Mastery Upgrade, and the fact that you’re rolling Discipline against two purple dice to hit, if you’ve got a decent Will and a decent Discipline, then odds are you’re going to succeed and have a fair amount of Advantage left over. With Force Lightning having a Critical rating of 1, that means it would be easy to critically hurt someone.

With the Duration Upgrade to give the attack the Burn quality, and enough Force Rating to be generating a number of pips to spend on all those Strength upgrades, that could get really painful, really quickly.

But, it would take a fairly long time to build up to those Palpatine-scale levels of power.

I have read about the force move power but what is the issue with the unleash force power?

So, Force Lightning assumes that you have the Mastery Upgrade for Unleash, which is obviously at the bottom of that tree. So, it takes a while to get there.But there are four Strength upgrades you can get, and with all of those plus the Mastery Upgrade, and the fact that you’re rolling Discipline against two purple dice to hit, if you’ve got a decent Will and a decent Discipline, then odds are you’re going to succeed and have a fair amount of Advantage left over. With Force Lightning having a Critical rating of 1, that means it would be easy to critically hurt someone.With the Duration Upgrade to give the attack the Burn quality, and enough Force Rating to be generating a number of pips to spend on all those Strength upgrades, that could get really painful, really quickly.But, it would take a fairly long time to build up to those Palpatine-scale levels of power.

Or 10min for a GM to build a nasty Inquisitor

The only FaD Spec I can see benefiting from Pressure Point is The Aggressor; Terrify then Pressure Point+ Prey on the Weak + Crippling Blow + Anatomy Lessons = lots of Strain damage. But also a very large XP investment, not to mention the unfortunate amount of Conflict.

I've replaced Linked(1) with "Autofire 1"...basically if you want an extra hit, the difficulty is increased and still requires the 2A.

Linked requires 2 Adv. to activate anyway?

The only one that really puzzles me is the comment about Niman. I’m sorry, I just don’t see anything particularly dangerous there.

Could the reference be to the Draw Closer talent? The one that basically allows the Niman Disciple to add Force Dice equal to his Force Rating to his attack roll with a lightsaber and spend pips to move the target closer or on extra successes? Since you don't really need to spend any pips on moving people already in melee and can spend them all on damage that increases the damage somewhat.

If that is what is being referenced here I don't really see that as something too OP, to be honest...