Hello everyone,

I recently had my first session and I have to say that this game is awesome,

however I have some questions just to make some things clear,

(this is also my DM's first time in this game, so I can't ask him as he is lacking experience).

Here we go!!

I have made a Human Niman Disciple, his stats are all 2 besides his Willpower which is 5.

My first question is: After character creation, how can one upgrade one of his characteristics (without commiting a dice for Enhance etc.)?

Second: I am planning on making my character a "defender", meaning I will max parry - deflect/reflect and pick specializations based on that while at the same time being a strong force user, hence having a 5 in Willpower.

Is a full-defense character viable?

Well, I will be dealing some damage because I have put ranks in "Lightsaber" plus I use Willpower for the Lightsaber check and will later be using Unleash etc, but is it a good idea?

-If so, can you suggest me the way I should multi-..specialize(?) a Niman Disciple and optimize those Parries etc?

Third: Can one be a Gray Jedi? I mean, is there a way I be using Dark Side powers without falling to the Dark Side?

In other words, how can I be increasing my Morality the same ammount as I will be gaining conflict due to use of those powers?

Thanks in advance!!

1) The Dedication talent (found at the bottom of almost every specialisation's talent tree) is the only way to increase characteristics with XP.

2) With 5 Will and ranks of Lightsaber you will be doing a lot of damage. Remember Lightsabers have Breach 1, so at personal scale they ignore the first 10 points of Soak (from armour and Brawn).

3a) You can, but there's no mechanical benefit for it at present. Sounds like a path you can build with your GM though*.

3b) You are correct. Dark Side powers can be used by any user, but they gain Conflict for doing so - so you can't use them too much if you want to avoid losing Morality. You're going to have a heck of a balancing act to perform, not using them during some adventures to get your Morality up, then letting rip in others.

* Perhaps while your Morality is at 45-55, changes to Morality are halved. From 35-44 or 56-65 Morality shifts by one less than indicated. Full Morality shift otherwise.

RAW so far you gain Conflict for doing dark side things. When you roll for morality (end of session, end of story arc, whenever your GM tells you to) you roll a d10 and subtract your current Conflict. The end result is added to your Morality. There are no RAW to give your character Morality, or to remove Conflict before this roll. So, if you want to run around as a lightning slinging space wizard, you will most likely end up at Morality 0. It's 1 Conflict just to use the power and your GM could impose the 10 conflict for torture each time as well (IMO), if you go the Force Lightning route. Combine that with gaining Conflict for each dark side pip used each time you use any force power and you will most assuredly end up in the full grip of the dark side.

That being said, if you want to become more defensive, pick up the Force Sense power, take its left side upgrades, and commit one force die to it to upgrade incoming attacks. Force Misdirect has a control upgrade that lets you commit force dice to give people targeting you automatic threats. While this won't cause them to miss, it does limit the amount of advantages they will have to do things like trigger critical injuries, autofire or burn. Force Foresee has a control upgrade that grants you two more defense in the first round of combat. If you don't get a Lorrdian lightsaber crystal, Niman Disciple's Defensive Training Talents are helpful in melee. An energy gauntlet can be used to make up for some ranged defense (it has the Deflection quality). The Seer specialization from Mystic has some nifty defensive abilities such as Forewarning, Preemptive Avoidance and Dodge, as well as two Force Rating talents. The new Keeping the Peace book has the Armorer specialization. It can really ramp up your defensive abilities while still providing a Dedication and Force Rating talent with the Armor Master talent tree. Plus it has Saber Throw.

First of all I want to thank you both for answering (and in a very understandable way).

I gave it a thought and decided that it should be better for me if I avoid the Dark Side powers (only if I absolutely have to use one) in order to avoid conflict.

Well, 1 isn't a lot, but what Werewyvernx said (I mean the -10 for torturing) seems quite the <unbalanced> trade off

This has made me think of another question though, would it be worth spending xp towards Force Rating 3 just for the Protect/Unleash?

(do you get any other bonus by your Force Rating?)

Plus, I still don't know what to multi-class (spec) with.

Niman seems pretty solid to me, nice defenses, disarming, Force Rating and Dedication, but I can't really think of what to multi it with..

Probably because I am lacking experience, I guess that's why the forums exist after all.

I will probably go with the Force Sense tree though, seems great for what I am looking for.

If you have any suggestion for the above, feel free to comment

Raising your Force Rating gives you more force dice. So, whenever you would roll force dice, you have more to roll. This increases your abilities to activate powers more often with more effects.

I wouldn't take 5 willpower just to max out strain at character generation. Buy strain upgrade talents.

Have more rounded out characteristics. If you want to be more defensive, at least get 3 brawn.

The Seeker specialization from Mystic has some nifty defensive abilities such as Forewarning, Preemptive Avoidance and Dodge, as well as two Force Rating talents.

I think you meant Seer specialization from Mystic. Confused me for a moment because I don't have my book in front of me. Seer's definitely got some nice defensive bonuses, plus some of them can help the entire group (always a plus)!

The Seeker specialization from Mystic has some nifty defensive abilities such as Forewarning, Preemptive Avoidance and Dodge, as well as two Force Rating talents.

I think you meant Seer specialization from Mystic. Confused me for a moment because I don't have my book in front of me. Seer's definitely got some nice defensive bonuses, plus some of them can help the entire group (always a plus)!

Crap. I will go fix that now, thanks for the backup. I read my post after I write before I post it to catch things like this, but I'm not perfect.

Once again thanks for the answers, I will take into account what you guys proposed and will reduce my Willpower to 4, increasing my Brawn to 3.

As for the defender types, I am more into the Avoid one.

I will also check the Seer.

I think soresu defender is king of the avoid types personally though they function off int, none the less they get a lot of fun abilities that make it really tough to hit them whilst forcing opponents near by to attack them none the less

Hmm I see.. However I don't think it can work with Niman, I mean, I just have 2 Intelligence.

Well, I have enough time ahead of me, I want to get both Dedication and Force Rating from Niman, so I think I will have made my mind by then.