We are getting ready to start an FaD campaign and one of my players wants a new character. He wants his character to start with a Lightsaber. Is that possible or are there restrictions?

It's possible if you want to go Knight Level. Otherwise, just have him purchase the training lightsaber. It is basically a weaker blade that can only cause stun, but otherwise functions just like a lightsaber (blade of pure energy, skill usage, parry/reflect, etc).

What is the difference for Knight Level?

+150XP after awarded after character creation
Free Lightsaber or 9,000cr worth of starting gear.

Unlike prior Star Wars RPGs, a standard lightsaber in this game is a very powerful weapon, primarily due to them all having Breach 1, meaning that for the majority of threats a party of starting PCs is going to face, each lightsaber attack is going to totally ignore their soak value. It'd be akin to handing a starting PC a disruptor rifle and letting them go to town. It'd be one thing if the entire party were using lightsabers, but will be problematic to balancing combat encounters if you've got one PC using such a potent weapon while the rest of the group are using blaster pistols with the occasional blaster rifle.

That being said, if your player really wants to begin play with a lightsaber, there is the training lightsaber for 400 credits. And since it's pretty much a lightsaber hilt + training emitter attachment, the PC can easily swap out the training emitter once they acquire a proper kyber crystal. At Damage 6, it's still a decent weapon, and unless you're fighting a Nemesis (who's got a strain threshold), there's not that much difference mechanically between stun damage and regular damage.

As for obtaining the kyber crystal, that's up to the GM when it occurs. The FaD Beta introductory adventure gave the PCs kyber crystals (a bit weaker than the norm), so that they'd have proper lightsabers by the end of their second session at the latest, and the GM Kit adventure is all about obtaining kyber crystals and can be run as a starting adventure for the PCs.

13 hours ago, HistoryGuy said:

We are getting ready to start an FaD campaign and one of my players wants a new character. He wants his character to start with a Lightsaber. Is that possible or are there restrictions?

That is entirely up to you. If you want a player to start with a fleet of Star Destroyers you can do that. What the books say is irrelevant if you want to change it.

The thing is that a lightsaber is a powerful weapon. If the player is making a build to maximize lightsaber combat, he could get really nasty fast, and make combats almost pointless, in that everyone else just watches him kill everything.

3 hours ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Unlike prior Star Wars RPGs, a standard lightsaber in this game is a very powerful weapon, primarily due to them all having Breach 1, meaning that for the majority of threats a party of starting PCs is going to face, each lightsaber attack is going to totally ignore their soak value. It'd be akin to handing a starting PC a disruptor rifle and letting them go to town. It'd be one thing if the entire party were using lightsabers, but will be problematic to balancing combat encounters if you've got one PC using such a potent weapon while the rest of the group are using blaster pistols with the occasional blaster rifle.

Also unlike previous editions of the game, starting characters aren't really meant to be "Jedi" in any proper sense. Understanding this should be helpful in deciding what kind of game you want to play, and what feel you want your game to have. The main difference between Jedi and starting characters is a crap-ton* of XP, and the weapon of the Jedi is likewise representative of great power in the game (to say nothing of the lore and setting of the game world).

*English, not Metric.

Well it is a little more balanced in the fact that it looks like i only have one player creating a new character. The rest of them are keeping their old ones that have +250 or more xp. To restart him at 0 I'm afraid would make him too much of a liability.

16 hours ago, HistoryGuy said:

We are getting ready to start an FaD campaign and one of my players wants a new character. He wants his character to start with a Lightsaber. Is that possible or are there restrictions?

Give him the saber. Most PCs find out really quickly if they run in head first, swing their glow rod, and that's their only plan, it ends badly for them. It's easy enough to scale up encounters regardless of weapons the PCs use. This game tends to create glass cannons for characters. They get massively offensive but nearly always have to pay attention to their own defense.

Yeah, if the new PC is going to be joining a bunch of experienced PC's he should also get an Exp boost and at +250 a basic lightsaber shouldn't be too out of balance.

5 hours ago, 2P51 said:

Give him the saber. Most PCs find out really quickly if they run in head first, swing their glow rod, and that's their only plan, it ends badly for them. It's easy enough to scale up encounters regardless of weapons the PCs use. This game tends to create glass cannons for characters. They get massively offensive but nearly always have to pay attention to their own defense.

Also space out the enemies. Oh sure, you can utterly destroy Minion Group 1, but when you have to spend two maneuvers to get over to Minion Group 2 and two more to get to group 3, you are starting to get into your strain big.

A little off topic: He wants to be a Chiss. Are there stats for that?

Yup. In Enter the Unknown, the Explorer splatbook.

I've got a player with a Chiss right now.

I don't have that one. Can someone post the stats for me?

3 and 1 in inti and pressense. 1 rank cool, 100 exp if I recall correctly

On 2017-03-21 at 10:20 AM, HistoryGuy said:

Well it is a little more balanced in the fact that it looks like i only have one player creating a new character. The rest of them are keeping their old ones that have +250 or more xp. To restart him at 0 I'm afraid would make him too much of a liability.

"Knight Level" is arbitrary. No reason he can't have the lightsaber, and +250 XP as well.

How much wealth have the other players acquired as well? If the PCs have over 250xp, that would indicate a pretty sizable amount of wealth.

Is this -purely- a matter of allowing a player to start with a high rarity/illegal item? If so, I wouldn't prevent the PC from having one. Their loss for not doing the in-game stuff to acquire their own saber.

I can't remember, do these rules prevent characters from starting with restricted items by default, or is it just that most restricted goods are normally so expensive they just aren't normal "starting" gear?

Restricted goods require a knowledge underworld or streetwise check to find and have ramifications if discovered on boarding/lawful world, otherwise they may be brought as normal

i don't see why not, I generally discourge people starting as full blooded Jedi as it cultivates unrealistic expectations, and often I would encourage a more deversified lineup so that they can grow into the hero then already being one, this I leave to personal taste.