I can't speak for anyone else, but in either of these scenarios I'd be less concerned with balance than with narrative. I really don't want a Politico doing nothing but shouting their enemies unconscious every single fight. And if I present a sniper opponent at extreme range from the party, I'd rather have that lead to a dangerous run and gun chase than have a Jedi leap over a few skyscrapers immediately into melee range.

I can't speak for anyone else, but in either of these scenarios I'd be less concerned with balance than with narrative. I really don't want a Politico doing nothing but shouting their enemies unconscious every single fight. And if I present a sniper opponent at extreme range from the party, I'd rather have that lead to a dangerous run and gun chase than have a Jedi leap over a few skyscrapers immediately into melee range.

If a Jedi is doing that on a regular basis in my game, then the snipers at Extreme ranges will start turning into remotes.

And the Jedi jumping to take out that remote will find that they have just put themselves at the bullseye of another set of remote snipers — all at Extreme range from their new position, and also at Extreme range from each other.

IMO, if you spam and abuse a power like that, you should expect that there will be consequences.

I can't speak for anyone else, but in either of these scenarios I'd be less concerned with balance than with narrative. I really don't want a Politico doing nothing but shouting their enemies unconscious every single fight. And if I present a sniper opponent at extreme range from the party, I'd rather have that lead to a dangerous run and gun chase than have a Jedi leap over a few skyscrapers immediately into melee range.

If a Jedi is doing that on a regular basis in my game, then the snipers at Extreme ranges will start turning into remotes.

And the Jedi jumping to take out that remote will find that they have just put themselves at the bullseye of another set of remote snipers — all at Extreme range from their new position, and also at Extreme range from each other.

IMO, if you spam and abuse a power like that, you should expect that there will be consequences.

Yeah, it's partly up to the player to not be a jerk with their power. Not every situation can be solved with the same tool, when others would be more effective.

I think the best thing to try and minimize the overuse (aside from talking directly to the player about it), is for the Force Leap example, to give the player at least one "this is clearly a good time to try and some Force leaping" situation every other fight or so. For example:

Have 3 squads of minions, 2 that are on the same platform as the party, but another squad up on a balcony a few range bands away. If the player is smart, and not trying to always hog the spotlight, he can pull a Luke from Return of the Jedi speeder chase scene "You take that one I'll take these two!" And then go jumping up to deal with the threat that's easier for him to deal with. The rest of the party can then worry less about the advantage of high ground the other group has, knowing The Leaper is on it, and can then focus on the troops on their level, literally.

Perhaps introduce a form of cover simply from the elevation. "You can't see all of their bodies simply because of the angle of the flooring, so shooting up at them will incur a setback die. However, if someone were to leap up there with them, that setback would no longer apply" *knowing look at The Leaper"

I feel fairly confident that the player doesn't have to get their jollies by Force Leaping 3 times every encounter, and just want to have the knowledge that the upgrade was a good purchase. If the player gets to say every so often "Oh good, so glad I bought that upgrade!" Then everything should be fine in my book. They get to have their fun, you planned accordingly as a good GM should, and it didn't detract from the overall threat too much, and also gave the other players a chance to shine.

And the thing about "Shouting enemies unconscious", I've always played it that they don't pass out from your Sam Kinison inspired ranting, but were demoralized and ran away, which has the same end result, but also makes more sense biologically

And the thing about "Shouting enemies unconscious", I've always played it that they don't pass out from your Sam Kinison inspired ranting, but were demoralized and ran away, which has the same end result, but also makes more sense biologically

Far Horizons has a good section on this kind of thing: basically the GM is free to simply ignore the effects of overuse. If the only thing a Politico does during a combat encounter is yell things, it will have less and less effect each round. It's not really supposed to be a blaster-replacement weapon and, just MHO, using it that way is missing the point.

By default the force leap is an action in the first place.

By default, shooting your blaster is an action in the first place. It doesn't mean you can take two maneuvers, then downgrade your shooting to a maneuver and run again.

I'm not sure why anybody thinks other types of actions should somehow be treated differently. You get two maneuvers, and unless an ability specifically states "you can use this as a maneuver and do up to three per turn", then that's the end of the story.

And the thing about "Shouting enemies unconscious", I've always played it that they don't pass out from your Sam Kinison inspired ranting, but were demoralized and ran away, which has the same end result, but also makes more sense biologically

Far Horizons has a good section on this kind of thing: basically the GM is free to simply ignore the effects of overuse. If the only thing a Politico does during a combat encounter is yell things, it will have less and less effect each round. It's not really supposed to be a blaster-replacement weapon and, just MHO, using it that way is missing the point.

By default the force leap is an action in the first place.

By default, shooting your blaster is an action in the first place. It doesn't mean you can take two maneuvers, then downgrade your shooting to a maneuver and run again.

I'm not sure why anybody thinks other types of actions should somehow be treated differently. You get two maneuvers, and unless an ability specifically states "you can use this as a maneuver and do up to three per turn", then that's the end of the story.

Except it's not taking two maneuvers and then shooting your blaster as a maneuver. It's taking two maneuvers and then shooting the blaster as an action.

The triple force leap uses Force Leap as an action once by not applying the upgrade, and then downgrades it to a maneuver for the other two; instead of trying to do 3 moves as moves.

By default, shooting your blaster is an action in the first place. It doesn't mean you can take two maneuvers, then downgrade your shooting to a maneuver and run again.

I'm not sure why anybody thinks other types of actions should somehow be treated differently. You get two maneuvers, and unless an ability specifically states "you can use this as a maneuver and do up to three per turn", then that's the end of the story.

Your comparison here isnt exactly correct. If there were a talent (not that there ever would be) that allowed you to make an attack as a maneuver, then you would be able to attack 3 times per round. Using 2 maneuvers and 1 action. This is not downgrading your action at any point.

Prior to purchasing the enhance jump upgrade to use it as a maneuver, you can move twice, then jump as an action. Now after purchasing the upgrade he can also use that same ability as a maneuver, yes it does allow for 3 move maneuvers worth of range adjustment. If they had intended to limit this in any way they would have limited the ability to being used once per turn or round, as they have with other both force and non force abilities.

As for range - the basic leap ability allows you to move around in short range( which is actually the same as one of the move maneuvers ,note you arent able to go to medium range here, which you could do with the options for the move maneuver, so in effect the leap has a shorter range than the standard move maneuver)

Running it takes one maneuver to get from short range to medium range,with the range upgrade (which can only be activated once), leaping allows you to go from short range to medium range , so the speed is essentially the same as running, the advantage lies in avoiding rough terrain and being able to go vertical. The actual distance covered, even when using leap as both your action and both your maneuvers is no more than if you used quick movement or the explorer signature ability over normal terrain (and both of these still allow an action)

If you want to argue about the distance you can leap have a look at the identical wording in the move maneuver, in essence leap gives no advantage over the move maneuver at least where distance is concerned ( ie 1 leap = 1 move as long as there are no other factors involved), the original leap power only provides 1 of the 3 possibilities move offers. I hope that made sense.

Is there a dev ruling on this I missed? You may be right, but until there is one I'm simply not allowing it (barring excellent narrative explanations) at my table. It feels like munchkin territory, and an abuse of RAI.

Don't have access to my books at the moment, but in the Control Upgrade that lets one use Force Leap as a maneuver instead of as an action, does the say "must" or "may"? If the GM is really that stressed about a PC doing 3 consecutive Force Leaps in one round, maybe apply a house rule that the Control Upgrade is "must" use a maneuver, and thus putting it under the default rule of "limited to two maneuvers per round."

The tree blurb says "can," but the full description says "only needs to use a maneuver...instead of an action."

I'm still not sure, personally, what the problem is anyway. I mean, if the player does Force Leap 3 times in a turn, they aren't doing anything else . They're not causing damage, they're not effecting the environment in a positive way for the encounter. They're just moving their own location around. To me, if the player wants to act like Tigger, coil up his tail and go bouncing around giggling the whole time, go ahead. In the end the threat is still just as it was before the Flubberfest was initiated.

Is it under the concept of "well he can quickly close the distance and start taking on enemies that are at extreme range." mindset? If so, how is this any different from a sniper for example, who, with the right talents, can shoot stuff at long and extreme with little/no penalty? And they don't even need to spend an entire turn closing the distance. They can just aim and pow, death from afar. The Leaper at least has to do the following:

1. Spend an entire turn just moving to the fight

2. Isolating them from their group (and thus any support), since the PC leaves them in the dust.

3. Has to take an entire turn's worth of attacks, now that they've moved themselves into combat range of the enemy units.

4. Has to fight alone for at least a round or 2, while their allies close the distance.

Seems to me to be less in the PC's interest to do 3 Leaps in a turn at all.

Has he really to take any attacks, 3 Force Jumps into the opposite directing brings him basically out of range of attackers, if the group decides to give that player the ini he should basically always be able to make the run. Not that this would be a problem imo as jetpacks and vehicles can do the same and are actually even at speed 1 slightly faster than those force leaps … so bring a car against a leaper.

Quick point that I've seen mentioned a couple of times that may need clarification: the Quick Movement talent does not let you use a third maneuver per round. It specifically let's you use a MOVE maneuver after the action you add your Force dice to, and that may be your third maneuver for the round.

This means that, if you haven't already used two Maneuvers already, Quick Movement doesn't add anything. The exception to the normal 2 maneuver limit (as currently written) only applies if Quick Movement is the third maneuver you use (and it can only be a Move, not any other kind of maneuver). So, since Quick Movement always comes directly after your action, to get the benefit your turn must look like so: [Maneuver / Maneuver / Action (Quick Movement)]

Now, it's an easy houserule to say that Quick Movement, if successfully activated, Dumont doesn't count towards the normal limit, so your turn could look like: [Action (Quick Movement) / Maneuver Maneuver] or: [Maneuver / Action (Quick Movement) / Maneuver], but since this seems to be a mostly RAW discussion, I wanted to make sure it was clear that that is indeed a houserule.

Don't have access to my books at the moment, but in the Control Upgrade that lets one use Force Leap as a maneuver instead of as an action, does the say "must" or "may"? If the GM is really that stressed about a PC doing 3 consecutive Force Leaps in one round, maybe apply a house rule that the Control Upgrade is "must" use a maneuver, and thus putting it under the default rule of "limited to two maneuvers per round."

The tree blurb says "can," but the full description says "only needs to use a maneuver...instead of an action."

I'm still not sure, personally, what the problem is anyway. I mean, if the player does Force Leap 3 times in a turn, they aren't doing anything else . They're not causing damage, they're not effecting the environment in a positive way for the encounter. They're just moving their own location around. To me, if the player wants to act like Tigger, coil up his tail and go bouncing around giggling the whole time, go ahead. In the end the threat is still just as it was before the Flubberfest was initiated.

Is it under the concept of "well he can quickly close the distance and start taking on enemies that are at extreme range." mindset? If so, how is this any different from a sniper for example, who, with the right talents, can shoot stuff at long and extreme with little/no penalty? And they don't even need to spend an entire turn closing the distance. They can just aim and pow, death from afar. The Leaper at least has to do the following:

1. Spend an entire turn just moving to the fight

2. Isolating them from their group (and thus any support), since the PC leaves them in the dust.

3. Has to take an entire turn's worth of attacks, now that they've moved themselves into combat range of the enemy units.

4. Has to fight alone for at least a round or 2, while their allies close the distance.

Seems to me to be less in the PC's interest to do 3 Leaps in a turn at all.

Has he really to take any attacks, 3 Force Jumps into the opposite directing brings him basically out of range of attackers, if the group decides to give that player the ini he should basically always be able to make the run. Not that this would be a problem imo as jetpacks and vehicles can do the same and are actually even at speed 1 slightly faster than those force leaps … so bring a car against a leaper.

3 force leaps get the force user to long range of the target. See what I mentioned before. The original ability lets you move to somewhere else in short range and the range upgrade allows you to be able to move to medium range , both of these range adjustments can also be done by a simple move maneuver, at least where horizontal movement is concerned. Since, normally the maximum you can get is 3 move maneuvers worth of movent, you could move from short to medium with the first leap and medium to long with the last two.

I can't speak for anyone else, but in either of these scenarios I'd be less concerned with balance than with narrative. I really don't want a Politico doing nothing but shouting their enemies unconscious every single fight. And if I present a sniper opponent at extreme range from the party, I'd rather have that lead to a dangerous run and gun chase than have a Jedi leap over a few skyscrapers immediately into melee range.

If a Jedi is doing that on a regular basis in my game, then the snipers at Extreme ranges will start turning into remotes.

And the Jedi jumping to take out that remote will find that they have just put themselves at the bullseye of another set of remote snipers — all at Extreme range from their new position, and also at Extreme range from each other.

IMO, if you spam and abuse a power like that, you should expect that there will be consequences.

If you toss Snipers at extreme range at Jedi you can expect them to respond by learning how to do this.

What you are doing as a GM is forcing them to do it.

This is your own fault and escalation is never the solution.

So here is the wording from the full talent description:

'The Force User only needs to use a maneuver to perform a Force Leap, instead of an action."

The wording is vague enough to leave plenty of room for doubt, but for me there is enough here to make the 'leap' in logic that once you've taken this talent, there is no longer an option to use this power as an action; it is now activated as a maneuver only.

So no triple force leaping. Of course double force leaping is still pretty sweet.

If you have the upgrade that lets you leap a a maneuver, you could potentially Force Leap three times in a round: twice as a maneuver and once as an action.

So I need to sink more points into Enhance, apparently...

So here is the wording from the full talent description:

'The Force User only needs to use a maneuver to perform a Force Leap, instead of an action."

The wording is vague enough to leave plenty of room for doubt, but for me there is enough here to make the 'leap' in logic that once you've taken this talent, there is no longer an option to use this power as an action; it is now activated as a maneuver only.

So no triple force leaping. Of course double force leaping is still pretty sweet.

I dont see the problem in an ability that allows you to move from short to long range in one round, with a nearly fully upgraded force power (line) and requiring both your maneuvers and your action when a 20 xp talent allows you to move the same distance (quick movement), esp if when said talent allows you an action on top and the force power doesnt.

In fact you can cover even more distance with 2 move maneuvers and hawk bat swoop (simply because that would result in 2 move maneuvers worth of movement as normal, an additional maneuver with hawkbat, but it ends up with you engaged, which your triple leap doesn't, thereby generating 4 moves in one round, so it covers more distance than all of the above and allows you an attack)

Range band-wise, I would say count the effective maneuvers. If they're jumping to medium range each time, that's six effective maneuvers, so they could get to extreme range.If you're talking actual numerical distance traveled, that's a bit trickier.

Edit the following post to the one I quote mentioned going from close to medium is two maneuvers , although close is planetary range though engaged is the range band in personal scale.

If you are engaged with an opponent you can use the move maneuver to disengage , which is still necessary before you can use jump (according to the explanation Sam Stewart gave in a recent episode on order 66. If you are engaged with an ally then you do not need a maneuver to disengage either way it is still one maneuver to go from short to medium.

Disengaging is the effort of backing away and avoiding attacks and MUST be performed before moving to any other location (Age of Rebellion core book page 215), it doesn't really change your distance to anywhere, in fact the wording in the AoR book goes a long way to explaining the rules behind Sam's answer in the order66 episode. It's like backing off and turning to face your direction of movement safely, you would have to do it before leaping, change range by moving, or free running.

Has he really to take any attacks, 3 Force Jumps into the opposite directing brings him basically out of range of attackers, if the group decides to give that player the ini he should basically always be able to make the run. Not that this would be a problem imo as jetpacks and vehicles can do the same and are actually even at speed 1 slightly faster than those force leaps … so bring a car against a leaper.

Yeah but, what I think you are overlooking is, even if the Leaper always gets first go from the PC team, and he spends all of his actions that turn to just simply get close to the enemy, he can't attack them yet. His turn in the roster is done, and he would then have to endure every possible attack from all the enemy units before he can go again. And, if they were at such extreme ranges to start, it's very likely that he is now the ONLY viable target for the badguys to attack. Everyone else, where the Leaper started his action from, are in theory, still out of range, or at best, at the maximum range if they moved up a band or 2. This dude, who is likely a melee fighter since he's a Jedi, is intentionally trying to get into Engaged, and is doing so much faster than anyone else, and at the expense of an attack action that turn. Sure, if he survives the first salvo of attacks he can do an attack and leap away (using 2 maneuvers this time), but he likely didn't accomplish much other than being a damage sponge. And if he doesn't do an attack, and instead spends all 3 actions to triple leap away again...well, he basically accomplished nothing other than to jump in, yell something like "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!" and then leaps right back out, possibly with a few blaster holes in him. Which, while funny, isn't very practical in a combat scene. So I still don't really see what the issue is, from a balancing standpoint. The player is sacrificing all utility in combat, to simply be able to bounce around all day. Now, if his entire concept is to be some sort of bouncing tank, leap in, force them to attack him while he's the only viable target, then leap back out after his allies have closed ranks, fine. But I'm guessing that's not his battle strategy.

So I still don't really see what the problem is, other than the "It goes against the RAW". Which is a perfectly valid argument, but in the end, it seems trivial to me. Being able to triple jump with Enhance doesn't mean it translates to being smart/practical to triple jump.

Also, thank you for getting my Leaper reference there

Wrong direction Ferret. in case of running away you certainly never get in range for a melee attack anyway, you just force jump into the opposite direction, out of combat range. The ability to avoid any combat should never underestimated because it means that you will only engage in combat at your terms.

Though I don't see a real problem either. I just think 3 maneuvers per turn goes against the spirit of the game. It is no big deal either way. As mentioned jetpacks are way more powerful in this regard than force leap anyway.

I find it kind of stupid that one cannot engage/disengage with force leap. It's been done in the films.

Remember if you are engaged in combat you cannot just leap out (leap does not allow you to disengage from an opponent) so you would have to use your maneuver to disengage then a leap maneuver to get to medium range , a final leap maneuver would only get you 1 of the two maneuvers to get to long range, your opponent could then use a maneuver to short range (as you are still medium range)and another to engage again. Leaving me he action to attack. If your opponent has hawkbat swoop they can get engaged in even faster. If the terrain was classed as difficult leaping would help you here, but you would still be at short range if the opponent used 2 maneuvers to close with you. This is one of the reasons grapple is a tier 5 talent

Yep, your only option, in this situation is, if you have the Navigator Spec, The Preemptive Avoidance talent. Though, it requires the expenditure of a Destiny Point to use, it allows you to disengage with an opponent as an out of turn incidental .

Also, it's good to remember that when moving, you count down range bands between you and the intended destination, otherwise it get's kinda screwy.

For instance, using move maneuvers towards a target at long range. Your first 2 maneuvers would be going from long range to medium, as you are closing distance and should be counting downwards from long to medium, medium to short, short to engaged.

This means that under the way the rules seem to work with engage/disengage always requiring to be a maneuver on its own, that in trying to disengage 1 target and move towards another at extreme range, your first turn would look like this:

maneuver to disengage

2 strain to perform force leap as a maneuver, spend a 2nd force point to begin moving range bands as the base power only moves you to any location in short range (leap doesn't say you can actually change range bands until you pick up the range upgrade, which only allows you to move range bands equal to the upgrades purchased and cannot be activated multiple times. there is only 1 range upgrade so you're moving just as much as if you'd simply taken move maneuvers, the difference being with this you can leap over obstacles and people). You're halfway to long range of the target now.

action to force leap, spend a 2nd force point and now you end up at long range of the intended target.

So 2 maneuvers and an action and you moved only 1 step further than with normal move maneuvers and took 2 strain to do it. Doesn't seem as ridiculous as some think it is.

Remember if you are engaged in combat you cannot just leap out (leap does not allow you to disengage from an opponent) so you would have to use your maneuver to disengage then a leap maneuver to get to medium range , a final leap maneuver would only get you 1 of the two maneuvers to get to long range, your opponent could then use a maneuver to short range (as you are still medium range)and another to engage again. Leaving me he action to attack. If your opponent has hawkbat swoop they can get engaged in even faster. If the terrain was classed as difficult leaping would help you here, but you would still be at short range if the opponent used 2 maneuvers to close with you. This is one of the reasons grapple is a tier 5 talent

Actually, I thought Sam Stewart said the opposite, that you could use Force Leap to engage (and effectively disengage from) an opponent? It was on the Order 66 podcast that they discussed Endless Vigil, as it came up in regards to the Freerunning talent in the Racer spec.

The core difference being that the talent essentially lets you ignore difficult and impossible terrain when making a Move maneuver, while Force Leap lets you "leap" horizontally (or vertically with the next Control upgrade) to any point within range. The reasoning that Sam provided was that Force Leap was not in and of itself a Move maneuver, and thus didn't have to adhere to those rules, while Freerunning (regular and Improved) do adhere to the rules regarding Move maneuvers.

Remember if you are engaged in combat you cannot just leap out (leap does not allow you to disengage from an opponent) so you would have to use your maneuver to disengage then a leap maneuver to get to medium range , a final leap maneuver would only get you 1 of the two maneuvers to get to long range, your opponent could then use a maneuver to short range (as you are still medium range)and another to engage again. Leaving me he action to attack. If your opponent has hawkbat swoop they can get engaged in even faster. If the terrain was classed as difficult leaping would help you here, but you would still be at short range if the opponent used 2 maneuvers to close with you. This is one of the reasons grapple is a tier 5 talent

Actually, I thought Sam Stewart said the opposite, that you could use Force Leap to engage (and effectively disengage from) an opponent? It was on the Order 66 podcast that they discussed Endless Vigil, as it came up in regards to the Freerunning talent in the Racer spec.

The core difference being that the talent essentially lets you ignore difficult and impossible terrain when making a Move maneuver, while Force Leap lets you "leap" horizontally (or vertically with the next Control upgrade) to any point within range. The reasoning that Sam provided was that Force Leap was not in and of itself a Move maneuver, and thus didn't have to adhere to those rules, while Freerunning (regular and Improved) do adhere to the rules regarding Move maneuvers.

*** edit to clarify - in the same round

I find it kind of stupid that one cannot engage/disengage with force leap. It's been done in the films.

The preemptive avoidance talent (sage and seer) lets you to pay 1 destiny to disengage from an engaged opponent as an out of turn incidental. Combine it with a force leap maneuver and wallah!

The preemptive avoidance talent (sage and seer) lets you to pay 1 destiny to disengage from an engaged opponent as an out of turn incidental. Combine it with a force leap maneuver and wallah!

Did you mean “ voilà ”?