Scenario:

A party of five is busy searching a room. So busy, that the party barely has time to react as two thermal detonators dramatically roll into the center of the room. The GM calls for Vigilance checks. The Vanguard rolls a Triumph and decides to take one for the team and uses Supreme Body Guard (4 Ranks in Resilience). Another player, playing a Force Wielder, decides to flip a Destiny Point to use there Protect Power as an incidental. And then rolls epically well on their Discipline Check. So epic that not only is the Force Wielder able to maximize the soak value of the Vanguard, but has enough to use Protect – Mastery as well. The thermal detonators explode. Neither grenade does enough damage to bypass the soak of the Vanguard. And therefore, are reflected back. However, there was enough advantage to activate Blast for both thermal detonators.

Does Supreme Body Guard protect the rest of the party from Blast?

If so, and the Blast damage is reduced to zero, does the Blast get reflected?

If so, and there were two adversaries responsible for the thermal detonators, do the both received the effects of Blast?

Would you allow all of this to stack, and narratively how would you explain it?

And yes, this did come up my campaign the other night. I did allow it all to work as I did not see anything game breaking but more importantly I thought it was an awesome display of working together.

Two thermal detonators roll into a bar. One turns to the bartender and says, "I want to get blasted". Bartender says, "Hey, don't get ticked off..."

Lame, I know, but it's all I could think of.

Supreme Bodyguard: You could say that the character jumps on the detonator, thus absorbing damage that would otherwise have hit everyone in the room. I'd let him take damage for each person separately, though.

Reflecting Blast: Maybe; see below.

Adversaries: If I allowed it in principle I'd rule that the NPCs who threw the detonators could only be hit by the reflected damage if they were dumb enough to stand around in plain view to look at the pretty explosion. Full disclosure: No NPC of mine would ever be that stupid.

I have to ask, though: You say "Neither grenade does enough damage to bypass the soak of the Vanguard." You're aware that with a Blast value of 15 and Breach 1 the Vanguard would have to have 26 or more Soak in order to avoid damage, right? How much did he start with, and what did the guy with Protect roll? Even with a 6 Willpower he'd need an awful lot of successes to get the Vanguard's soak up that high. And now I'm assuming that the guys who threw the TDs barely rolled 1 success on their Ranged (light) checks.

Maybe he has Cortosis Weave on his armor?

He dived on not one but TWO thermal detonators? What a guy!

They had better smoked him a kipper for breakfast for that!

The campaign is in the 4 digits of earned experience so the Vanguard's gear/soak is very much higher than average. Base soak is 14 with cortsis. The force wielder has bought deep into protect and got 8 light pips on 5 force die. Has 5 proficiency dice for disciple and got a good amount of success and advantage. It was really just one of those rolls.

My main question is does Supreme Body Guard protect against Blast?

Man, you're a much nicer GM than I am. After all of that epic protection stuff going on, I would have just said the bed guys rolled them in unprimed hoping to make the PCs run.

@ Benjan: And negate all the players awesomeness? Thats pretty mean...
​Since the group is "high level" and needs quite something to feel challenged
​i´d propably give their enemies an advantage bc the group focussed on the grenade,
​but i´d feel honestly pissed as a player if I roll super high vigilance and am then not
​vigilant enough to notice the grenades are unprimed...

Okay, this is definitely “Epic”, with a capital-E.

But, for me, I think it follows the same rules as I would use in less epic encounters — what is the narrative? How do they/we/you explain the effects?

How does Supreme Bodyguard reflect the damage, if it gets reduced to zero?

If you can explain that, then I think the explanation of the Blast reflection is likely to follow.

Also what about collateral damage from the building taking 2 dam 15 breach 1 hits?

So, there’s one thing about grenades — if you’re the primary target, then the damage you take includes both blast and shrapnel effects wrapped up in one number, and you don’t take the blast damage again on top of that. If you’re not the primary target, then you only take damage if the Blast effect is activated, and you’re within the blast radius.

So, if Blast was activated, then everyone within the blast radius would take the blast damage, as appropriate — that wouldn’t have been stopped or reflected by the Supreme Body Guard action.

As for getting both grenades in one action, the question I would have to ask is whether those grenades were dropped in basically right on top of each other? I.e., within Engaged range of each other?

If so, then I could imagine a circumstance where a single Supreme Body Guard action might be able to cover both grenades, but otherwise not.

If that action did cover both grenades, then I would have to wonder what the effect would be of having both grenades going off at the same time — would the Soak of the target be cut in half for the second explosion? Would the two grenades add their damage together and be counted as one larger explosion? Maybe there’s an additive effect with Thermal Detonators, like there is with Detonite and Proton Grenades (see “Dangerous Covenants”)?

Now, as for reflecting the blast+shrapnel damage back to the attackers, the only way I can think of that happening is if the person doing the Supreme Body Guard action were to lay in front of the grenade in a “v” formation, with the top of the “v” pointed back towards the attackers. Under the right circumstances, I can imagine that might reflect the attack back to them.

I think the biggest danger here is that if you allow this situation to occur as you have described, then I think you have set a precedent, and the players would be well within their rights to expect that exactly the same technique would work exactly the same way next time.

What was extraordinary and epic one time could become common and routine the next time, and then what happens to the game?

Precedents can be a very dangerous thing to set….

Man, you're a much nicer GM than I am. After all of that epic protection stuff going on, I would have just said the bed guys rolled them in unprimed hoping to make the PCs run.

At which point you have a group of very dangerous and pissed off people, two free Thermal Detonators and a target.

Something I would like to point out....

Thermal detonators deal damage planetary scale just like starship cannons. However, they have a relatively small blast radius. I don't think supreme bodyguard covers getting hit with that....

Something I would like to point out....

Thermal detonators deal damage planetary scale just like starship cannons. However, they have a relatively small blast radius. I don't think supreme bodyguard covers getting hit with that....

The damage code does imply something else. If they were dealing 20 hull instead of wounds, i'd suggest your replacing the PT launcher with a TD catapult.

According to rules they are personal scale, but have an exceptionally large Blast radius, hitting everyone in close range (instead of only engaged)...
​As for the precedent I totally agree with bradknowles that this can be a huge problem,
​maybe if players want to recreate the same action tell them it was bound to the triumph as well as to them not being in combat?
​You usually don´t get a vigilance roll to jump on a grenade if an enemy uses one in combat...
​Also improved bodyguard (the one that makes the character take the damage instead of his ally) is a once per session talent,
​so if the enemy throws their grenades one at a time next encounter the character will only be able to cover one grenade,
​and only if he hasn´t used his power yet.
​Unfortunately I have no book with the supreme bodyguard rules in it but the way improved bodyguard is written I would say you can´t
​combine it with supreme bodyguard in a way that every engaged characters blast hits are redirected to the bodyguard bc he expended
​his talent by taking the original hit.

Man, you're a much nicer GM than I am. After all of that epic protection stuff going on, I would have just said the bed guys rolled them in unprimed hoping to make the PCs run.

At which point you have a group of very dangerous and pissed off people, two free Thermal Detonators and a target.

Which makes for some very entertaining scenarios!

So, there’s one thing about grenades — if you’re the primary target, then the damage you take includes both blast and shrapnel effects wrapped up in one number, and you don’t take the blast damage again on top of that. If you’re not the primary target, then you only take damage if the Blast effect is activated, and you’re within the blast radius.

So, if Blast was activated, then everyone within the blast radius would take the blast damage, as appropriate — that wouldn’t have been stopped or reflected by the Supreme Body Guard action.

​Unfortunately I have no book with the supreme bodyguard rules in it but the way improved bodyguard is written I would say you can´t

​combine it with supreme bodyguard in a way that every engaged characters blast hits are redirected to the bodyguard bc he expended

​his talent by taking the original hit.

Body Guard

Once per round, perform the Body Guard maneuver to guard an engaged character. Suffer a number of strain no greater than ranks of Body Guard, then until the beginning of the next turn upgrade the difficulty of combat checks targeting the character by that number.

Body Guard (Improved)

Once per session, when an ally protected by the character's Body Guard maneuver would suffer a hit from a combat check, the character may choose to suffer that hit instead of the ally.

Body Guard (Supreme)

When the character uses the Body Guard maneuver, he may protect a number of engaged characters up to his ranks in Resilience instead of just one.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4).

Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

If that action did cover both grenades, then I would have to wonder what the effect would be of having both grenades going off at the same time — would the Soak of the target be cut in half for the second explosion? Would the two grenades add their damage together and be counted as one larger explosion? Maybe there’s an additive effect with Thermal Detonators, like there is with Detonite and Proton Grenades (see “Dangerous Covenants”)?

Thermal Detonators do not have an additive affect. And yes, there were rolled in basically right next to each other. As if someone rolled two small ball toys, one in each hand.

I think the biggest danger here is that if you allow this situation to occur as you have described, then I think you have set a precedent, and the players would be well within their rights to expect that exactly the same technique would work exactly the same way next time.

What was extraordinary and epic one time could become common and routine the next time, and then what happens to the game?

Precedents can be a very dangerous thing to set….

True, and that is on me as the GM to monitor that. However, at the same time, to not let something like this happen, despite being supported by the rolls, description of the talents, and narrative, then that is setting the playing environment up to be a "me vs them". Which then could lead to an even uglier precedent.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4).

Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

Given what you have told us so far about the situation, and re-reading the descriptions of the talents (not quoted), I think I would allow the Body Guard maneuver to be applied to Blast damage as well as the primary damage. The character in question would have been able to protect up to four party members (based on his ranks of Resilience), assuming they were all within Engaged range of him at the time he was performing the Body Guard maneuver.

Thermal Detonators do not have an additive affect. And yes, there were rolled in basically right next to each other. As if someone rolled two small ball toys, one in each hand.

Not bright on the part of the attackers, but certainly not outside the realm of possibility.

True, and that is on me as the GM to monitor that. However, at the same time, to not let something like this happen, despite being supported by the rolls, description of the talents, and narrative, then that is setting the playing environment up to be a "me vs them". Which then could lead to an even uglier precedent.

Agreed. There are times when the dice rolls and the player narrative is so exceptional that you just have to go with it.

The one thing that is still nagging me about this situation is how to explain all that damage being soaked by the one guy — primary damage from two thermal detonators plus the blast damage on top of that. Even with a very high Soak to begin with, and being enhanced by the Force, that’s still a tremendous amount of explosive damage to just hand-wave away.

That’s what is baking my noodle right now.

Body Guard

Once per round, perform the Body Guard maneuver to guard an engaged character. Suffer a number of strain no greater than ranks of Body Guard, then until the beginning of the next turn upgrade the difficulty of combat checks targeting the character by that number.

Body Guard (Improved)

Once per session, when an ally protected by the character's Body Guard maneuver would suffer a hit from a combat check, the character may choose to suffer that hit instead of the ally.

Body Guard (Supreme)

When the character uses the Body Guard maneuver, he may protect a number of engaged characters up to his ranks in Resilience instead of just one.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4).

Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

First of all, yes, it is debatable, whether damage by Blast is considered a hit; I, myself, don't think so.

But, it does not actually matter: Improved Body Guard is about ONE hit per session, explicitly, and Body Guard does only affect combat checks. So,...

Body Guard (Regular/Supreme): No use against Blast, whatsoever. It did only upgrade the initial attack(s).

Improved Body Guard: Of the multiple (debatable) hits by two initial attacks and two Blasts for each character, but the initial target, only ONE can be redirected to the body guard themself.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4). Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

Given what you have told us so far about the situation, and re-reading the descriptions of the talents (not quoted), I think I would allow the Body Guard maneuver to be applied to Blast damage as well as the primary damage. The character in question would have been able to protect up to four party members (based on his ranks of Resilience), assuming they were all within Engaged range of him at the time he was performing the Body Guard maneuver.

Thermal Detonators do not have an additive affect. And yes, there were rolled in basically right next to each other. As if someone rolled two small ball toys, one in each hand.

Not bright on the part of the attackers, but certainly not outside the realm of possibility.

True, and that is on me as the GM to monitor that. However, at the same time, to not let something like this happen, despite being supported by the rolls, description of the talents, and narrative, then that is setting the playing environment up to be a "me vs them". Which then could lead to an even uglier precedent.

Agreed. There are times when the dice rolls and the player narrative is so exceptional that you just have to go with it.The one thing that is still nagging me about this situation is how to explain all that damage being soaked by the one guy — primary damage from two thermal detonators plus the blast damage on top of that. Even with a very high Soak to begin with, and being enhanced by the Force, that’s still a tremendous amount of explosive damage to just hand-wave away.That’s what is baking my noodle right now.

I once had a party member want to make a force illusion with misdirection that he technically couldn't do yet. It involved his beloved pet that had been nearly killed by the pirate that was trying to rob them. Because of the narrative setup i allowed him to make a discipline check with his force die. He got at least a triumph and flipped a Destiney for it. So he made a very powerful force illusion that drove the pirate bananas. He was so amazed at what had happened he spent all of his XP from the session upgrading misdirection.

Here's the other side of the equation.

We're talking about Thermal Detonators!!!!

I used to think that they were just big hand grenades, but they aren't. They're bigger, badder, and a whole lot scarier.

Sure if you jump on a hand grenade In Real Life (IRL) your human body will absorb all of the energy from the explosion . . . and kill you instantly, whether or not you are wearing body armor or not. (Your armor would turn into deadly shrapnel).

And a Thermal Detonator is more powerful.

So In My Star Wars Universe (IMSWU) the blast damage for a Thermal Detonator could not be absorbed or deflected in the manner that you described by the Body Guard advantage. I think that if you are going to throw yourself onto a Thermal Detonator, you're only going to help redecorate the room.

However the spectacular dice results that your players got, should be successful enough to save the players. Practically speaking, that means making sure the Thermal Detonators are not where the players are when they explode.

For a Body Guard that means catching the explosive and tossing it somewhere "safe." Like back at the enemy.

For a Jedi, the technique might be different but the end result would be the same.

Other options would be to toss them down a ventilation shaft, a garbage chute, laundry chute, window, door, etc. ANYTHING that gets as much real estate between you and the blast.

As a point of reference we had a thermal detonator crop up in one of our recent battles.

We were ambushed by a bunch of Hutt goons who were collecting the local protection insurance premiums, which we decided we weren't going to pay.

One of the Player Characters pulls out a Thermal Detonator and says, "I prepare it!"

The rest of the Player Characters freak out and start encouraging the guy to put that thing away! You're going to get us all killed!!!!

Literally, if he'd thrown the bomb at his intended target, EVERYONE in the combat (including the enemy 'sniper') would have been affected by the blast.

On the plus side, we "won" as most of the Hutt goons fled for their lives (smart chaps them) and we were able to advance the plot without loss of life on either side.

The moral of the story is that these Thermal Detonators are scary!

Body Guard

Once per round, perform the Body Guard maneuver to guard an engaged character. Suffer a number of strain no greater than ranks of Body Guard, then until the beginning of the next turn upgrade the difficulty of combat checks targeting the character by that number.

Body Guard (Improved)

Once per session, when an ally protected by the character's Body Guard maneuver would suffer a hit from a combat check, the character may choose to suffer that hit instead of the ally.

Body Guard (Supreme)

When the character uses the Body Guard maneuver, he may protect a number of engaged characters up to his ranks in Resilience instead of just one.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4).

Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

First of all, yes, it is debatable, whether damage by Blast is considered a hit; I, myself, don't think so.

But, it does not actually matter: Improved Body Guard is about ONE hit per session, explicitly, and Body Guard does only affect combat checks. So,...

Body Guard (Regular/Supreme): No use against Blast, whatsoever. It did only upgrade the initial attack(s).

Improved Body Guard: Of the multiple (debatable) hits by two initial attacks and two Blasts for each character, but the initial target, only ONE can be redirected to the body guard themself.

Not sure I agree with the ONE hit per session for Body Guard (Improved). I agree the ability can only be used once per session. However, I think the ability is indented to last until the beginning of the next round.

I see the talents, when activated all at once, working as such:

Once per session, perform the Body Guard maneuver to guard a number of engaged characters up to ranks in Resilience. Suffer a number of strain no greater than ranks of Body Guard, then until the beginning of the next turn, when an ally protect by the character's Body Guard maneuver would suffer a hit from a combat check, the character may choose to suffer that hit instead of the ally.

I think the big indicator for this lasting longer than one hit, is the "choose". If it was for only ONE hit, why would a activate the ability, and then choose not to take the hit. Seems, clunky.

However the spectacular dice results that your players got, should be successful enough to save the players. Practically speaking, that means making sure the Thermal Detonators are not where the players are when they explode.

For a Body Guard that means catching the explosive and tossing it somewhere "safe." Like back at the enemy.

For a Jedi, the technique might be different but the end result would be the same.

Other options would be to toss them down a ventilation shaft, a garbage chute, laundry chute, window, door, etc. ANYTHING that gets as much real estate between you and the blast.

Agreed, that would have been the better narrative way to work it. Will have to keep that in mind for next time.

Body Guard

Once per round, perform the Body Guard maneuver to guard an engaged character. Suffer a number of strain no greater than ranks of Body Guard, then until the beginning of the next turn upgrade the difficulty of combat checks targeting the character by that number.

Body Guard (Improved)

Once per session, when an ally protected by the character's Body Guard maneuver would suffer a hit from a combat check, the character may choose to suffer that hit instead of the ally.

Body Guard (Supreme)

When the character uses the Body Guard maneuver, he may protect a number of engaged characters up to his ranks in Resilience instead of just one.

I am curious to know what makes people think that these talents could not be used in tandem for that one round? All that Body Guard (Supreme) does is change the "one" ally into "multiple allies equal to ranks in Resilience" (in this case, 4).

Where my group was puzzled was in the language for Body Guard (Improved), specifically "would suffer a hit from a combat check". The question is, does indirect damage, in this case from Blast which is triggered from a combat check, satisfy the Body Guard (Improved) condition, and allow the player to protect his allies?

First of all, yes, it is debatable, whether damage by Blast is considered a hit; I, myself, don't think so.

But, it does not actually matter: Improved Body Guard is about ONE hit per session, explicitly, and Body Guard does only affect combat checks. So,...

Body Guard (Regular/Supreme): No use against Blast, whatsoever. It did only upgrade the initial attack(s).

Improved Body Guard: Of the multiple (debatable) hits by two initial attacks and two Blasts for each character, but the initial target, only ONE can be redirected to the body guard themself.

Not sure I agree with the ONE hit per session for Body Guard (Improved). I agree the ability can only be used once per session. However, I think the ability is indented to last until the beginning of the next round.

Semantics, then.

Main clause: "Once per session [...] the character may choose to suffer [a] hit instead of [an] ally." - Nothing else.

The dependent clause does not change the meaning of the main clause; it is only indicating the conditions for its validity.

well I guess you could read the when as whenever, so it´s intentions aren´t really that clear...
​But even then, I have to agree with Grimmerling that the semantics make the rules as written to be one hit only.

I think the big indicator for this lasting longer than one hit, is the "choose". If it was for only ONE hit, why would a activate the ability, and then choose not to take the hit. Seems, clunky.

You activate on choosing though, as an incidental, and not during your round, so
​you don´t actually expend your once per session talent if you don´t use it.
​