Step 1.Get Sense!

Step 2. Upgrade Sense down the left column!

Step 3: .....

Step 4: Profit!

No, seriously, just get Sense. This thread is basically a love letter to all the people new to the system, who feel that it's no fun being a Force user at the beginning, because you are awful at everything. Seriously, this is mentioned a lot in these forums.

"I want to do stuff like Luke and Obi-Wan! I want to be like in the movies!"

Great! You totally can Just...buy...Sense! You don't even have to roll anything! Just upgrade it a bit, and commit the Force die

It's really that easy, allow me to asplain!

From the movies, and we'll stick to the Original Trilogy, because that's honestly the best comparison (Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon are so NOT starting characters). But let's focus on Luke.

Episode 4. He didn't really do anything Force related. He blocked a few blaster shots (after failing several times), and then pulled off a 1/1,000,000 shot without a targeting computer. He also was able to dodge lots of incoming fire, to the point where Vader commented on his piloting skills and his connection to the Force Congrats! You can totally do this with Sense. The bottom of the left column, Control upgrade, allows you to upgrade a combat check, once per round. So Luke basically had put some points into his Sense over the course of that campaign, and by the final climactic fight, he was able to upgrade his shot! Congrats! You have successfully replicated what we see a Force user do in Episode 4! It also lets you be tougher to hit, which is something else he did in Episode 4.

Now! On to Episode 5!

Again, we see Luke able to fly very well, and avoid (mostly) being shot by the AT-AT's. Nothing a good bit of Piloting Planetary couldn't account for, but having 2 incoming attacks targeting you upgraded twice each (which basically translates to giving yourself Adversary 2 twice a turn), certainly wouldn't hurt things!

Then we see him try (and fail several times) to pull his saber out of the snow. Well he could easily do that (including the fails!) with an FR of 1, and the basic Move power. No upgrades needed! We never once see him Force move anything bigger than Silhouette 1 (R2-D2) by the end of the movie. He tries to move his Sil 3 X-Wing, but fails. The fact that it kind of went up is just flavor text.

But no worries! We see him fighting Vader! And he's again, really hard to hit! There's that Sense power, upgraded, and committed, chugging away at keeping him alive!

In fact, most of the stuff we see the Jedi do in the movies (prequels included) is lots of crazy acrobatics while fighting, which is easily explained as they all had Sense fully upgraded, committed and were throwing a glow stick dance party!

So honestly, when people say "I want to be a badass Jedi like in the movies!" what they are actually saying, based on the majority of what we actually see them do (Luke specifically, again, he's the best comparison for a starting PC), is Sense! Make yourself crazy hard to hit! Give yourself a bit of help to hit back! No rolls, just commit and go!

So my little Padawan-lings, buy Sense! And you will be 90% of the way to being "like in the movies" from the start. Then, you can do like the rest of them do in the movies, and train up with more xp over the course of the adventure!

Or Enhance, but yes, commit that force dice, its the best bang for your buck with a single die.

Or Enhance, but yes, commit that force dice, its the best bang for your buck with a single die.

True, but committing for Enhance only helps your Brawn or Agility, which would mostly be useful for classes using those characteristics. Whereas the Adversary 2 from Sense is good for anybody, combat monkey or no.

But those enhance upgrades have different uses out of combat, just saying those 2 Powers, plus ill add Foresee and Influence now, are the best ways to use 1 Force Dice. There truely is something for every character at the start.

Yeah, committing for some ongoing effect or adding the Force Die to another roll are probably the best ways of using a single die, much better than just rolling a lonely d12 which 7 out of 12 times will disappoint you.

Does Sense work with vehicular combat? They're targeting your ship not you, no?

If I'm wrong (a reasonable possibility ) are there published limits? Silhouette-based maybe?

Does Sense work with vehicular combat? They're targeting your ship not you, no?

If I'm wrong (a reasonable possibility ) are there published limits? Silhouette-based maybe?

When you say limits, do you mean "how big of a ship can I be piloting and still get my defense" ? Now that I'm not sure, as I have almost zero knowledge about space combat (not really an area of the mechanics I find interesting). But I believe, as long as it would be an opposed check, the Sense would count towards their difficulty.

I think the last dev answer on whether Sense's defensive control upgrade works with vehicles/starships was "No, it does not."

Which makes sense as the Starfighter Ace spec has a talent that specifically allows a PC to commit a Force die to upgrade the difficulty of getting shot when piloting a vehicle.

Though previously (long before the FaD Beta) I believe Sam had said that it was kosher, so long as it's a small craft and the Force user is the one piloting the ship. But with Starfighter Ace out there, that's no longer the case.

If you wanted to, you could let the two stack. Something like this maybe?

Sense

Activation: Action;

Commit: 1 Die (can be uncommitted at the end of your turn);

Effect: Once per round, upgrade the difficulty of an attack that targets the ship or vehicle you are piloting once. This can only be used on vehicle-scale (Sil 1-4) ships or vehicles;

UPGRADES

Duration: Sense can be used twice per round;

Strength: Upgrade the difficulty of the attack twice.

Intuitive Evasion

Activation: Maneuver;

Commit: Up to 1 Die per rank (can be uncommitted at the start of your turn);

Cost: 1 strain to activate, 1 strain at the start of your turn to keep committed;

Effect: Upgrade the difficulty of all attacks targeting the ship or vehicle you are piloting once per committed Force Die;

Max Ranks: 2

This means that any Force user can benefit from their abilities in space combat, at least if they're in a small enough ship, but a Starfighter Ace can potentially get 4 upgrades to a couple of hits per round. Also, the maneuver activation and being able to uncommit at the start of the turn means they can use their Force Dice for their action, then put them back towards defense (at the cost of a maneuver each round).

I know this obviously isn't RAW, but a way to make it work for more people while still giving Starfighter Aces their cool trick.

This sort of thing, incidentally, is why I let someone with both Enhanced Leader and the final Influence upgrade add a Success and an Advantage to leadership checks, so that a universally-available upgrade doesn't make a specific spec's cool unique power less than obsolete.