22 minutes ago, WolfRider said:

Now that's very surprising that with two specialisations you can do better than with only one. I'm really baffled by that.

As far as I know if you start with the Jedi career you can not take a signature ability from the Warrior Career. But I don't own RotS and CotR, yet. Did the rule changed in those book to allow a Jedi to choose a signature ability in one of the F&D careers ?

Nope. Jedi can only take their own signature ability. They only have one, but I'm sure they'll release a second one plus two more specialisations to bring them up to the full six eventually.

6 hours ago, WolfRider said:

Now that's very surprising that with two specialisations you can do better than with only one. I'm really baffled by that.

It shouldn't be a surprise as that was very much the intent from Day One of the EotE Beta being released, that characters will (with some very, very rare exceptions) do better with multiple specs as they gain XP. After all, consider just the Heroes of Yavin, with Han being a Smuggler with the Pilot and Scoundrel specs, Leia as a Diplomat with Agitator and Figurehead as well as Force Emergent later on, Luke as either an Ace/Pilot/Force Emergent (eventually into Padawan after training with Yoda and then into Knight and finally Master by the time of TFA). Lando is a Smuggler/Gambler/Charmer/Pilot.

8 hours ago, WolfRider said:

Now that's very surprising that with two specialisations you can do better than with only one. I'm really baffled by that.

As far as I know if you start with the Jedi career you can not take a signature ability from the Warrior Career. But I don't own RotS and CotR, yet. Did the rule changed in those book to allow a Jedi to choose a signature ability in one of the F&D careers ?

Sarcasm noted. Btw knight with unmatched interception does soresu far better than soresu, knight does soresu about as well as soresu thanks to circle of shelter and guardian of the republic.

Auto complete/mis-correct on my phone must have put "ferocity" in between "unmatched" and "interception"

17 hours ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

t shouldn't be a surprise as that was very much the intent from Day One of the EotE Beta being released, that characters will (with some very, very rare exceptions) do better with multiple specs as they gain XP.

I was sarcastic even if I didn't put any smiley to show it.

14 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

Sarcasm noted. Btw knight with unmatched interception does soresu far better than soresu, knight does soresu about as well as soresu thanks to circle of shelter and guardian of the republic.

Auto complete/mis-correct on my phone must have put "ferocity" in between "unmatched" and "interception"

I missed the "interception", just read Unmatched Ferocity. I'm not sure any other specialisation could do Soresu better than the Soresu. It's the only spec to give Supreme Parry. And I think it's the specialisation that gives the most ranks in Parry in its tree. And It gives Improved Parry. If you want to be the best at parrying, Soresu Defender is the way to go.

From what I've seen since I started running a F&D campaign at the start of this year, all lightsaber specialisation do better with another specialisation, even Niman. 😉 Soresu match better with Shien than Niman, imo. The main advantage of Niman is the +1FR talent that no other lighsaber specialisation has. I don't know enough of the Jedi Career Specialisations to have an opinion on how they match with any of the lightsaber specialisations.

1 hour ago, WolfRider said:

I was sarcastic even if I didn't put any smiley to show it.

Well, given your own repeated admittance to not fully grasping the English language, especially where it comes to distinctions of definition and past instances of being far too literal in interpretation of what the game's designers have written...

8 hours ago, WolfRider said:

I was sarcastic even if I didn't put any smiley to show it.

I missed the "interception", just read Unmatched Ferocity. I'm not sure any other specialisation could do Soresu better than the Soresu. It's the only spec to give Supreme Parry. And I think it's the specialisation that gives the most ranks in Parry in its tree. And It gives Improved Parry. If you want to be the best at parrying, Soresu Defender is the way to go.

From what I've seen since I started running a F&D campaign at the start of this year, all lightsaber specialisation do better with another specialisation, even Niman. 😉 Soresu match better with Shien than Niman, imo. The main advantage of Niman is the +1FR talent that no other lighsaber specialisation has. I don't know enough of the Jedi Career Specialisations to have an opinion on how they match with any of the lightsaber specialisations.

Circle of shelter let's you use parry and reflect to defend an adjacent ally. Couple that with guardian of the republic (after you use circle of shelter that ally can't be attacked again for the rest of the round). That's hugely better than defensive circle. It only has 2 ranks of parry and 2 of reflect but it has balance to make up for the extra strain and the spec has both improved parry and reflect. But the unmatched interception signature ability, bumps parry and reflects stopping power by force rating (and you can get fr 3 from just starting [and filling out] with the knight spec which will require the quick path to power rule) with upgrades you can only pay for the first use of parry and reflect per round, get one free activations of improved parry/reflect per turn, activate a critical hit on an improved parry/reflect activated by a triumph, and activate the weapons special qualities, along with decreasing the destiny point cost and use it twice per session) so the signature ability really trumps soresu.

Dude, it was super obviously sarcasm. Own up and move on.

18 hours ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Well, given your own repeated admittance to not fully grasping the English language, especially where it comes to distinctions of definition and past instances of being far too literal in interpretation of what the game's designers have written...

On 1/27/2016 at 7:42 PM, Absol197 said:

I've recently gotten into reading up on the vast body of lore regarding the various Lightsaber styles, and I really like them. I also really like how well the different Lightsaber specializations were able to capture the distinct feel of each, within the limits of the system.

However, one thing I've noticed is that I feel the Soresu Defender should have Supreme Reflect, to convey the focus on defense at the expense of offense.

As it stands, Shien Expert is the only specialization that has Supreme Reflect, ands I can understand the desire not to have the two stepping on each other's toes. So here was the tweak I was thinking of: replace Improved Reflect in the Soresu Defender tree with Supreme Reflect.

Off the bat, of course, this seems odd: how can you have Supreme if you don't have Improved? But I can't find anywhere where it says that you can't do so, nor anywhere where it says Supreme doesn't function without Improved. Other than being based off the same base talent (Reflect), the two function differently enough that, if presented with the effects without the titles I don't think I would feel any necessity for one to come before the other. I've looked in the general talent rules and the individual descriptions, and it seems to work.

So with that said, it feels like it gives us what we (or at least I) want: Soresu becomes a better defensive form at the expense of an offensive option, and now the unique ability Shien has is Improved Reflect, which is what it's best known for, anyways.

So, thoughts? Comments? Criticisms? Have I finally lost my marbles?

Honestly I've been playing soresu for a while, I think Shien is far superior because they gave it good defenses by giving it supreme reflect and its has offense stuff in it making it just all around better than soresu. I think personally thats where they messed up. Shien is supposed to be some offense and some defense but they gave it one of the best defensive abilities in supreme reflect making it a far better form than soresu in this game. Most of the soresu defensive abilities are kind of mediocre. But then again I've had supreme parry and never have been in a fight where I can use it because usually if I'm in a melee fight I have usually already used an attack before I ever see enough threat or despares to were supreme parry every comes into play. I have used improved parry once and it worked well, but almost every other fight when improved parry can be activated my opponent can easily soak that lightsaber hit cause its base damage only. Pretty weak if you ask me. While improved reflect doesnt have that problem.

Usually if someone who uses shien usually used a second lightsaber form so they shouldnt have a problem when it comes to parry and reflects being low. I think you only get 3 of each. Soresu gets 4 parry's and 3 reflects. Shien is just a better made lightsaber form in this game period than soresu.

On 1/27/2016 at 9:26 PM, BeastmanJenkins said:

Soresu specializes in defending from blaster fire as well as lightsaber/melee attacks, so it makes sense that it wouldn't have the supreme reflect. Kind of a jack of all trades, master of none concept. It would take away from Shien to give it to Soresu also.

Not really Shien has allot of good offensive attacks that also buff its defenses. Shien is just a stronger lightsaber form both defensively and offensivley than soresu period. On top of it getting better defensive abilities peroid when it comes to reflecting blaster fire. My character got easily owned by a shien user because they do a good job negating my defensives pretty well while still being very good offensively. If you go soresu you really need to get an offensive spec to make up for its glaring weaknesses and that should help buff its deffensives better. I would go with ataru or shien as a second lightsaber spec. Or just better off making an agility/cunning character and using both ataru and shien. Just ignore soresu peroid. They made it a very weak spec in this game. Supreme parry I have found to be totally useless and improved parry not that great unless you are fighting weak enemies and your game is just starting. Stronger enemies can easily soak improved parry.

On 1/28/2016 at 7:10 AM, Donovan Morningfire said:

So what are you planning on having Soresu Defender give up in order to make room for Supreme Reflect?

Part of the issue is that Soresu Defender is already one of the best specs for "tanking" out there, thanks in no small part to Defensive Circle providing multiple setback dice, and that since it's not a combat check to activate, means that a Soresu Defender PC can get a lot of benefit from Supreme Reflect simply because ranged attacks happen far more often, and with Defensive Circle going the chances of getting the 3 threat necessary to use Improved Reflect is going to be much higher, which in turns makes the PC a monster in combat, as anyohe that attacks him with a blaster stands a very good chance of getting shot back in return, and the PC is suffering minimal strain for doing so, to the point you'd need to seriously overwhelm the PC in order to get him to burn through his strain at a rate where overusing Reflect would be a concern.

Supreme Parry isn't too big of a worry, since Improved Parry doesn't have the raw damage potential that Improved Reflect does, and that melee attacks are far less common, except in duels where Soresu actually excels in its defensive focus, perhaps more so than Makashi, which itself has more of an offensive focus than Soresu. In the novelization of RotS, it was explained that the reason Obi-Wan was sent to confront Grievous on Utapau was that Obi-Wan's mastery of the ultimate defensive Form made him the perfect counter to the Grievous' highly unorthodox dueling techniques.

Soresu has nothing on Shien when it comes to best defensive talents. Shien has Disruptive strike which is probably the best defensive talent in the game when it comes to using a lightsaber. All Shien has to do is spam that every turn against a Soresu defender or any lightsaber form user and eventually the Soresu defender will just either die or pass out and the Soresu defender will never be able to get one hit on the Shien user. Soresu is just weak period in this game and the most bottom tier out of all the forms. Its not a well thought out form I think. In fact I think disruptive strike should have been given to soresu and not Shien. That was a big mistake on the creators of this game. I find defensive Circle weak in this game as well as some of the other talents it has. Even its defensive stance is pretty subpare since it only works against melee and you have to activate it during your turn and cant do it out of turn as an incidental. Dodge is allot better it works for both melee and range attacks and you can activate it out of turn.

22 hours ago, Metalghost said:

Honestly I've been playing soresu for a while, I think Shien is far superior because they gave it good defenses by giving it supreme reflect and its has offense stuff in it making it just all around better than soresu. I think personally thats where they messed up. Shien is supposed to be some offense and some defense but they gave it one of the best defensive abilities in supreme reflect making it a far better form than soresu in this game. Most of the soresu defensive abilities are kind of mediocre. But then again I've had supreme parry and never have been in a fight where I can use it because usually if I'm in a melee fight I have usually already used an attack before I ever see enough threat or despares to were supreme parry every comes into play. I have used improved parry once and it worked well, but almost every other fight when improved parry can be activated my opponent can easily soak that lightsaber hit cause its base damage only . Pretty weak if you ask me. While improved reflect doesnt have that problem.

Usually if someone who uses shien usually used a second lightsaber form so they shouldnt have a problem when it comes to parry and reflects being low. I think you only get 3 of each. Soresu gets 4 parry's and 3 reflects. Shien is just a better made lightsaber form in this game period than soresu.

Lightsabers have breach so ignore 10 points of soak, unless the opponent has 16+ points of soak or the cortosis quality or you're using a weird lightsaber without breach (e.g. kimber stone crystal or the damping emitter, which you could switch to lethal as a maneuver) they shouldn't be s ok sking the damage. If you have a lightsaber without breach that's probably on you, if you're fighting opponents with 16+ soak or that have cortosis, that's on your gm. But the biggest weakness of improved parry is how in frequently it activates but it's not that hard to get a 2 red 4 black defense pool to give odds of activating it maybe once an encounter or twice every three encounters (depending on encounter length, other assumptions about the GM building encounters so that you have an opportunity to use your talents apply). The long story short if you're not getting use out of improved parry, then someone in your group is doing something .... I'll say less than optimally rather than "wrong" because I don't want to be overly critical.

3 minutes ago, EliasWindrider said:

Lightsabers have breach so ignore 10 points of soak, unless the opponent has 16+ points of soak or the cortosis quality or you're using a weird lightsaber without breach (e.g. kimber stone crystal or the damping emitter, which you could switch to lethal as a maneuver) they shouldn't be s ok sking the damage. If you have a lightsaber without breach that's probably on you, if you're fighting opponents with 16+ soak or that have cortosis, that's on your gm. But the biggest weakness of improved parry is how in frequently it activates but it's not that hard to get a 2 red 4 black defense pool to give odds of activating it maybe once an encounter or twice every three encounters (depending on encounter length, other assumptions about the GM building encounters so that you have an opportunity to use your talents apply). The long story short if you're not getting use out of improved parry, then someone in your group is doing something .... I'll say less than optimally rather than "wrong" because I don't want to be overly critical.

Most of the guys we fight have cortosis, I've only been able to successfully use improved parry like once in the past 2 years. GM has no choice but to make the guys we face stronger cause we have some strong offensive characters in the group. Also allot of the fights are range as well. Earlier in our campaign we were doing some covert operations in the heart of the empire so we had to be careful on what we used. So never really got to enjoy improved parry before we got too strong. Once cortosis comes into play which can happen really fast improved parry becomes useless by design unless your are fighting minions. When you do they die so fast you never have a chance to use improved parry against them.

A GM has a houserule that I have since appropriated where Improved Parry/Reflect costs less against Minions and Rivals than it does against Nemesis. only need 1 Threat against Minions, 2 against Rivals, and 3 against Nemesis and it can be harder depending on ranks in Adversary. It makes the talent more functional especially against the bulk minions which is where you see it shine in all the movies/shows.

On 10/14/2019 at 9:11 AM, Metalghost said:

But then again I've had supreme parry and never have been in a fight where I can use it because usually if I'm in a melee fight I have usually already used an attack before I ever see enough threat or despares to were supreme parry every comes into play.

I've played a lot of Soresu as well, and GMed a lot of Shien, and I think I can say with some confidence that you're missing some important facts.

Both of the Supremes are really only good for a specific type of character, and that is: a character that has a lot of Defense/Difficulty upgrades, and who has other effective things to do in combat besides deal damage.

If you've never had the opportunity to use Supreme Parry, you would not likely have opportunities to use Supreme Reflect. Any Supreme X, as offense, is very unlikely to be better than staging your own attack, as it's dependent on Threat/Despair - and possibly (likely?) does less damage than your own attack (if you're good at your chosen type of attack), so you're very unlikely to do nothing with your Action in combat just so you can possibly trigger Supreme X. Never seen it done in I don't know how many hours of play.

So what's it good for?

Either Supreme Talent is really only good for healers, and Force "wizards", or "fear" builds and the like - OR niche(?) situations where you have other goals to achieve during combat besides killing ppl.

Those Talents are best employed to use your non-combat check Force Powers (Heal/Harm, Influence, Battle Med., Misdirect, Move if you're complicating terrain/creating cover for allies, etc.) or Talent/Skills to do awesome stuff (which don't have huge overlap with Lightsaber specs until maybe when you're on your 2nd Spec), while waiting for the attacks to come to you, in which case you might generate a little offense from your defense, but again, less than had you attacked.

Improved Reflect is all you really need (and Ebb/Flow? or other Strain management strategies), unless you're a Force wizard, for the ultimate defense character.

Soresu is a fantastic Spec in my experience primarily as you can do a Brawn-based build for that extra tankiness, and still get all the awesome stuff from it without having to take Soresu Technique.

After 500+ earned-XP of play from my Soresu, she only ever got knocked unconscious once, and that was from a fall from Medium Range. Her combat Difficulty to be hit was generally, minimally RRBBBB (often RRRBBBB in melee) between Sense and a heavily modded saber, and topped out one time when Allies were giving her bennies from narrative symbols while she was single handedly tanking a BBEG Inquisitor at something like RRRPBBBBBB (yes, at the time we didn't know the max was 4 Setbacks). Soaked like 14 Wounds in Lightsaber combat with her modded cortosis armor and Parry, only a little less in ranged. Beast.

While throwing YYYYY Lightsaber attacks. She and our Gunslinger Critted that BBEG to death.

ShiiCho can do just as well in Lightsaber combat but can't touch a Soresu's ranged defense, and Shien gets left behind in saber combat. Soresu is the best all-around tank, hands down.

Is it a "better" Spec than any other? All depends on what your play style goals are. But in my experience it's harder to survive combat than it is to generate offense/damage. And you can't beat Soresu for survivability.

22 hours ago, emsquared said:

I've played a lot of Soresu as well, and GMed a lot of Shien, and I think I can say with some confidence that you're missing some important facts.

Both of the Supremes are really only good for a specific type of character, and that is: a character that has a lot of Defense/Difficulty upgrades, and who has other effective things to do in combat besides deal damage.

If you've never had the opportunity to use Supreme Parry, you would not likely have opportunities to use Supreme Reflect. Any Supreme X, as offense, is very unlikely to be better than staging your own attack, as it's dependent on Threat/Despair - and possibly (likely?) does less damage than your own attack (if you're good at your chosen type of attack), so you're very unlikely to do nothing with your Action in combat just so you can possibly trigger Supreme X. Never seen it done in I don't know how many hours of play.

So what's it good for?

Either Supreme Talent is really only good for healers, and Force "wizards", or "fear" builds and the like - OR niche(?) situations where you have other goals to achieve during combat besides killing ppl.

Those Talents are best employed to use your non-combat check Force Powers (Heal/Harm, Influence, Battle Med., Misdirect, Move if you're complicating terrain/creating cover for allies, etc.) or Talent/Skills to do awesome stuff (which don't have huge overlap with Lightsaber specs until maybe when you're on your 2nd Spec), while waiting for the attacks to come to you, in which case you might generate a little offense from your defense, but again, less than had you attacked.

Improved Reflect is all you really need (and Ebb/Flow? or other Strain management strategies), unless you're a Force wizard, for the ultimate defense character.

Soresu is a fantastic Spec in my experience primarily as you can do a Brawn-based build for that extra tankiness, and still get all the awesome stuff from it without having to take Soresu Technique.

After 500+ earned-XP of play from my Soresu, she only ever got knocked unconscious once, and that was from a fall from Medium Range. Her combat Difficulty to be hit was generally, minimally RRBBBB (often RRRBBBB in melee) between Sense and a heavily modded saber, and topped out one time when Allies were giving her bennies from narrative symbols while she was single handedly tanking a BBEG Inquisitor at something like RRRPBBBBBB (yes, at the time we didn't know the max was 4 Setbacks). Soaked like 14 Wounds in Lightsaber combat with her modded cortosis armor and Parry, only a little less in ranged. Beast.

While throwing YYYYY Lightsaber attacks. She and our Gunslinger Critted that BBEG to death.

ShiiCho can do just as well in Lightsaber combat but can't touch a Soresu's ranged defense, and Shien gets left behind in saber combat. Soresu is the best all-around tank, hands down.

Is it a "better" Spec than any other? All depends on what your play style goals are. But in my experience it's harder to survive combat than it is to generate offense/damage. And you can't beat Soresu for survivability.

I usually have 3 defense and six upgrades when I fight and I still find improved parry extremely situational to where its only worked once. Now we are starting to have more range type of encounters, but I have had the gm roll despairs on me from range. I usually have them run out of ammo depending on the situation. Soon I'll just reflect the blaster fire back at them. i usually find more clever ways to approach them than just letting them spam us with blaster fire.

But my problem is with improved parry being pretty weak where it only does base damage. Thats great if you are in a low xp game and they guys your fighting dont have cortsis, which most battles I had were always at range. Also good luck with improved parry on inquisitors they usually all have cortosis and aslo the ability to ignore your defenses. So if you get an improved parry off on them it wont do anything but maybe anoy them.

Each game is different. In our game I've only seen improved parry work well with my lightsaber only once and I killed a xenomorph with an improved parry. It was pretty week though and didnt have a cortosis type of armor. Also in our game the first 130xp to 500xp we were under the microscope of the empire so we just couldnt run around fighting with our lightsabers. Or light foils at the time. Also couldnt enhance our senses or reflexes by using the force or else we would be exposed. That made it much harder to get a good defense going besides what we had for armor. So much less opportunities to use improved parries in our fights since we usually had an inquisitor or two being entertained by the fights.

BTW I got crushed in a lightsaber match using the soresu form in the begining. Since I couldnt beef up my defense with the force in any way cause of the situation I didnt have to much of a defense when the guy fighting me has 5 yellow dies to use in his lightsaber attacks. He pretty much disarmed me forced me to move out of range to pick up my lightsaber. By the second round where I was finally able to attack my strain was so low I was done. Couldnt generate much advantages to get strain back at the time. Soresu is good when the battle is in your favor when you have allot of defense and upgrades then it really shines, but I find that to be the same with other forms too. Soresu has no defense against duelest who can knock away your lightsaber. Soresu if you use it is best paired with shien I think. Shien has probably one of the strongest defensive lightsaber skills to use in a duel that is also almost offensive. You can spam it every turn and make it to where the Soresu defender will fail every lightsaber attack. If used correctly. Soresu can't compete with it.

5 hours ago, Metalghost said:

Soresu can't compete with it.

Your initial assertion was that Shien was the better/best defensive Spec because it had Supreme Reflect, and "other" defensive abilities - which seemed like you must be referencing Side Step and Disruptive Strike, while also maybe trying to spin Djem Deflect and/or Counter Strike as defensive, despite them both actually being offensive buffs.

Well, I've completely disarmed your notion that Supreme Reflect is such a great defensive Talent. It's no better than Imp. Reflect for the vast majority of PCs, and completely useless in Lightsaber combat which is of course where Shien lacks anyway. At best it's a wash with Sup. Parry.

So let's look at the other trade-offs.

A rank in Side Step for a rank in Defensive Stance. More ranged for less melee.

Djem Deflection of course takes a Destiny, and at best will cause your enemy to not be able to Aim as they move a Range Band away and blast you again. And notable, again, useless in Lightsaber combat. Very minimal (even zero, when you consider what else a Destiny can do) ranged defensive gain here.

Counter Strike is an offensive Talent, and at worst just takes away narrative symbols expenditures that could go to defense. This Talent doesn't help your argument.

So what we're really looking at the crux of your superior defensive is Shien's Disruptive Strike. Right?

Well, for that singular ability - which usually will take you a Destiny flip, Conflict, AND Strain to use - a Soresu can: do an optimal Brawn build and thereby gain +3 or more Soak, it has +2 more ranks in Parry, Imp. Parry, AND can use Force Sense with the left side of the tree Control Upgrades. (Oh, and a Grit.)

Which your Shien cannot use the Sense Power because of course using Disruptive Strike pre-empts you from committing that Force Die. Not to mention Dis. Strike is not as spammable as you would like everyone to believe, because, as mentioned you're likely going to have to be flipping Destiny to do it (and taking Conflict, AND Strain).

So you're literally trying to assert that trading 1 possible failure on your target's next attack (IF you can/will pay the cost 7 out of 12 times), for two upgrades to Difficulty and all that other defensive stuff Soresu has going for it, is better?

I'm sorry you're just wrong.

Shien is a great Spec, nice mic of offense and defense, and I've wanted to play a Force wizard battlefield controller that could really get some good out of Supreme Reflect, ever since I figured out that Talent's best application. But it's not the best defensive Spec. Not by a good margin by any rational mechanical measure.

On 10/16/2019 at 7:40 PM, emsquared said:

Your initial assertion was that Shien was the better/best defensive Spec because it had Supreme Reflect, and "other" defensive abilities - which seemed like you must be referencing Side Step and Disruptive Strike, while also maybe trying to spin Djem Deflect and/or Counter Strike as defensive, despite them both actually being offensive buffs.

Well, I've completely disarmed your notion that Supreme Reflect is such a great defensive Talent. It's no better than Imp. Reflect for the vast majority of PCs, and completely useless in Lightsaber combat which is of course where Shien lacks anyway. At best it's a wash with Sup. Parry.

So let's look at the other trade-offs.

A rank in Side Step for a rank in Defensive Stance. More ranged for less melee.

Djem Deflection of course takes a Destiny, and at best will cause your enemy to not be able to Aim as they move a Range Band away and blast you again. And notable, again, useless in Lightsaber combat. Very minimal (even zero, when you consider what else a Destiny can do) ranged defensive gain here.

Counter Strike is an offensive Talent, and at worst just takes away narrative symbols expenditures that could go to defense. This Talent doesn't help your argument.

So what we're really looking at the crux of your superior defensive is Shien's Disruptive Strike. Right?

Well, for that singular ability - which usually will take you a Destiny flip, Conflict, AND Strain to use - a Soresu can: do an optimal Brawn build and thereby gain +3 or more Soak, it has +2 more ranks in Parry, Imp. Parry, AND can use Force Sense with the left side of the tree Control Upgrades. (Oh, and a Grit.)

Which your Shien cannot use the Sense Power because of course using Disruptive Strike pre-empts you from committing that Force Die. Not to mention Dis. Strike is not as spammable as you would like everyone to believe, because, as mentioned you're likely going to have to be flipping Destiny to do it (and taking Conflict, AND Strain).

So you're literally trying to assert that trading 1 possible failure on your target's next attack (IF you can/will pay the cost 7 out of 12 times), for two upgrades to Difficulty and all that other defensive stuff Soresu has going for it, is better?

I'm sorry you're just wrong.

Shien is a great Spec, nice mic of offense and defense, and I've wanted to play a Force wizard battlefield controller that could really get some good out of Supreme Reflect, ever since I figured out that Talent's best application. But it's not the best defensive Spec. Not by a good margin by any rational mechanical measure.

Any form can stack strength and buff their soak shoot our Ataru form user has more strength than my character. Dont know why but she wanted to build her character like that. She has great agility as well but isnt good at much else outside of those. Disruptive strike does not require a destiny flip, strain. Pg. 95 force and destiny. That would only be optional. If you dont have much force die then you probably wont need it anyways. Its more for more experienced character battles. Also you can use the sense power to buff your defense on the left tree. That just means you cant use those specific force die for disruptive strike but the others you have not committed to another force power is freed up to use each round. The book is very clear than you dont lose access to your remainder force die that you have not committed, they are still free to be used.

For instance my character has 4 force die about to have my fifth. He will have no problem spamming disruptive strike each round and I garantee you I will be rolling white pips. But for a low xp character honestly most forms specials wont help you much anyways since you have a low force rating. (Better off committing that force die to your sense defense if you have it if your trying to go defensive.) They get really good once you get 3 or more force die as long as they are not committed to something else. You have to pick your poison, until you get allot more force die.

Remember when committing force die to a force power that requires it you only need to commit it once as long as it has the ongoing effect in the control box which the sense tree does on the left side for both offense and defense. So after that characters turn your free to attack and still have it up and It stays as an ongoing effect till you release it. Now how many thats up to your GM. Our Gm only lets us commit one die to the offensive control box and 2 to the defensive control box. I usually only commit die to the defensive giving me 4 upgrades total. I have a 5 skill rating in lightsabers. I would do that allot when I was a lower xp character because 2 force die isnt going to help you much. Better off just using it to buff your difficulty rating. I have allot more force die now so I'm free to do other stuff.

Also your comment on supreme reflect I think is right it really isnt that powerful, and solidifies my stance on why soresu should have it. It wont be game breaking in any way and fits it I think. I can understand though why they just wanted shien to have it because shien is supposed to specialize in reflecting blaster bolts unlike all the other forms except maybe soresu where Sien was pulled from in canon.

Also dont understand where counterstrike came from, if I mentioned it then sorry I just don't remember doing that. Yes it wouldnt make sense for seresu to have it.

Soak and difficulty upgrades are king in defense in this game. Any form can stack that. Defense is garbage but having that black die wont hurt. I've seen plenty of black blank die being rolled plenty of times. Seems to have a high chance. Parry is decent and probably good starting out but goes through strain like crazy just like reflect. Better off having a high soak and high difficulty to avoid getting hit and use parry and reflect sparingly. Your parry and reflect will never get high enough to keep up with the offensive builds in this game. And if you try you will collapse real fast do to the massive amount of strain you will be using. See below about our offensives hitting you 4 to 5 times in one turn.

There is a reason why Soresu in this game is rated lower than most other forms. It just doesnt live up to what it is supposed to do. Also offense is king in this game. I'm really thinking the devs made it like that so combat will go fast and jedi or force users cant make themselves almost invulnerable like they were in the d20 games. This is what I have heard.

All that parry will not help you when an ataru form user hits you four to five times in one turn doing 15 - 20 damage on each hit. Either you will fall from lack of health or you will collapse from lack of strain. The offensive builds in this game is sick and almost impossible to defend against unless you have so many upgrades to where they are rolling against 6 red dice. Good luck getting that. Our ataru form user usually roles with 3 blues and 6 yellow die. Goes through strain but she decimates almost all defensives. And I wont even get to our assassin droid (pc character) who can do almost the same with his repeating rifle. I just witnessed him kill 4 guys at once in a turn. Frustrating cause I didnt get a chance to fight. They were not minions he killed.

Honestly soresu's defense isnt that great compared to the offensive builds and what they can put out damage wise in this game and you should mainly use it more for a back up form I think. This has been my experience with it. I love my armorer and mechanical guy but intel is my strength and thats why I use soresu. Would have went Shien but we already had a character like that. Wanted to make sure we had a diverse group and its worked out great that way.

Now this is all numbers stacking. The game is probably allot more enjoyable not worrying about all this crap and playing it because its a story. Once you hit over 1k xp. All these numbers become unavoidable.

Soresu was developed before the usage of blaster pistosl and rifles became common. Soresu was developed to counter Makashi and then Ataru was developed to strike through the Soresu Defense. All the forms numbered 1 to 4 weren't developed with fighting agains people shouting at you with blasters but against people fighting you with swords, be them tradition or laser ones.

It's the 5th form Shien that was developed to counter blaster shooting and that's why it's the best form for Reflect and it's the only form with Supreme Reflect. Other forms included some Reflect capacity after it was developed, but unlike Shien reflecting blaster shots isn't their focus, so they can't have the Supreme Reflect talent.

That means Soresu is mostly useful in melee fights and not so much in ranged fights. And only when the GM isn't abusing cortosis on his NPC. Cortosis should be very very rare to the point that you only met it on a Nemesis level opoent and once out 10 or more game sessions. Don't say a Talent Tree is useless and should be modified heavily because your GM make it useless. Modify your GM not the Talent Tree. 😄

On 10/21/2019 at 10:55 AM, WolfRider said:

Soresu was developed before the usage of blaster pistosl and rifles became common. Soresu was developed to counter Makashi and then Ataru was developed to strike through the Soresu Defense. All the forms numbered 1 to 4 weren't developed with fighting agains people shouting at you with blasters but against people fighting you with swords, be them tradition or laser ones.

It's the 5th form Shien that was developed to counter blaster shooting and that's why it's the best form for Reflect and it's the only form with Supreme Reflect. Other forms included some Reflect capacity after it was developed, but unlike Shien reflecting blaster shots isn't their focus, so they can't have the Supreme Reflect talent.

That means Soresu is mostly useful in melee fights and not so much in ranged fights. And only when the GM isn't abusing cortosis on his NPC. Cortosis should be very very rare to the point that you only met it on a Nemesis level opoent and once out 10 or more game sessions. Don't say a Talent Tree is useless and should be modified heavily because your GM make it useless. Modify your GM not the Talent Tree. 😄

Exactly. The only other foes that should have armor with the Cortosis quality is Mandalorians wearing their signature Beskar'gam (made from Mandalorian Iron).

On 10/23/2019 at 2:21 AM, Tramp Graphics said:

Exactly. The only other foes that should have armor with the Cortosis quality is Mandalorians wearing their signature Beskar'gam (made from Mandalorian Iron).

Vader's shoulder pad deflects a lightsaber blow in RoTJ, which has the added benefit of also being canon.

2 hours ago, penpenpen said:

Vader's shoulder pad deflects a lightsaber blow in RoTJ, which has the added benefit of also being canon.

Canon, or just the limits of FX at the time?

2 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

Canon, or just the limits of FX at the time?

If it's on screen, it's canon.

One could argue that turbolasers turning asteroids into fiery explosions are a FX limitation, and perhaps they're right. But unless it's adressed or contradicted, turbolasers do turn space rocks into fireballs.

6 minutes ago, penpenpen said:

If it's on screen, it's canon.

One could argue that turbolasers turning asteroids into fiery explosions are a FX limitation, and perhaps they're right. But unless it's adressed or contradicted, turbolasers do turn space rocks into fireballs.

Eh, that's too much Wookieepedia literalism for me. Gotta activate the brain somewhere in the viewing process.

7 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

Eh, that's too much Wookieepedia literalism for me. Gotta activate the brain somewhere in the viewing process.

Oh, I agree, but sometimes, with people , who are sticklers for details and perhaps have tendency to be overly literal , need a taste of their own medicine .

33 minutes ago, penpenpen said:

Oh, I agree, but sometimes, with people , who are sticklers for details and perhaps have tendency to be overly literal , need a taste of their own medicine .

Fighting fire with fire, or gazing too deeply into the abyss? Careful 😁