On 5/20/2017 at 7:29 AM, Stan Fresh said:

I thought the problem was the lightsaber's blue blade pretty much vanished against the blue desert sky, and that's why his second saber was colored green.

...but he never used it in the desert? Are you referring to something from the movies? Because the only time he used it on a desert planet, he was indoors. Every other time was in Empire, and it was either in a murky swamp, or indoors.

On 5/21/2017 at 4:42 PM, Stan Fresh said:

Why do the Jedi only have two saber colors? Because their teachings have calcified to the point of dogma.

Why does Windu get another color? Because he's a hypocrite.

Boom, problem solved.

Which is why the "the crystals already have colors, and we harvest them, and these colors are the most common" makes so much more sense to me.

in my game ive got a d10 list of colors, when a fs cha finds a crystal he rolls. its got the whole spectrum of colors plus white[silver] and black. then if he rolls a 10 he gets to pick his color. i know im a little dogmatic [tyranical] about this but i was raised old school, when the crystals were set colors. and the reason that most jedi had green or blue crystals, was that like most jedi they went to illum to get their crystal and those were the only two colors in the caves. now this by no means should be taken as any kind of slight, i simply profess my views on the matter. i enoy this debate, and i appreciate everybodies oppinions.

On Sunday, May 21, 2017 at 9:13 AM, venkelos said:

All I know is, in may games, unless more than half the players really complain, I'd stick to the old way; crystals have a color, as part of their nature, and aren't pseudo-aware, Force-sensitive; they just have the proper qualities for making the plasma beam work. It just seems wholly impossible, to me, with all the diversity of thought, form, and more, in the galaxy, that the only color most people can manage is blue, and then a small number green. I prefer that most of the crystals that are suitable come in those colors, while the Sith don't have to play Mum-Ra, dropping the Sword of Omens into a well of Ancient Evil (bleed/bend them), to make it work for them. The reason Luke's is green is because Kenobi figured out how to get the impurity out of the skill the Sith used (blue didn't show up against the African sky), or he found a spare, planning for he, or Luke, to one day need it, if he had trained the young boy, and Mace's was purple, where no one else's was, because the source of that crystal was one no one else had ever tapped; part of living, crystalline creature (a Hurrikan), who he saved, but it died, and lent him a piece of itself (Sam Jackson wanted a special saber because he's Sam Jackson, he likes purple, and George Lucas said "in the long list of impossible things people have demanded, to be in movies, this is cake!", and agreed). If Mara had a purple one, like Legends often illustrates, I like to imagine Palpy recovered it, and presented it to his Hand, to use clandestinely, in her missions, Leia had a red lightsaber, despite not having the crystal be fake, or bending it to her evil will, though she almost never used it, and the Imperial Knights are all the same color, silver, because they are also artificial. As for Anakin, he went through enough lightsabers (and limbs) in the Clone Wars that it would surprise me greatly, as he kept teetering more and more on the brink of emo...the Dark Side, that every new saber he kept making turned out to be blue, unless most of the crystals just came that way. Sorry, I went EU there, but I will; it's still relevant to me.

I get that there is new stuff, for some, their first stuff, and they want to embrace it; it's even cool, but not something I intend to use, unless forced. While I'm not so old, I guess I'm nerd-old, stuck in my ways, enough to not like this change. To each their own, though. If you do prefer the mysticism angle (even if NOT the D&D wizard angle Jedi once went to), use this, as it does add something, and sort of an option, for the player, to get the saber color they want, when they finally find that one rare crystal they'll never be able to replace. When I played SWTOR, I, too, wanted a purple crystal, purely for cosmetic reasons, and it was impossible; they were all Level 50, super-expensive crystals, despite ONLY being cosmetic. Even once I beat three stories, and had the money, it was nigh-impossible, and certainly not worth it.

Okay, sorry to do the old curmudgeon thing. Everybody please continue.

sorry for the repost , i hit something i shoudnt have ... i think.

1 hour ago, KungFuFerret said:

On 20.5.2017 at 2:29 PM, Stan Fresh said:

I thought the problem was the lightsaber's blue blade pretty much vanished against the blue desert sky, and that's why his second saber was colored green.

...but he never used it in the desert? Are you referring to something from the movies? Because the only time he used it on a desert planet, he was indoors. Every other time was in Empire, and it was either in a murky swamp, or indoors.

In Empire he only used the lightsaber out in the snow or indoors, therefore blue was no problem. In Jedi, where he got a new lightsaber anyway, they decided to make it green, so it would be visible against the blue sky on Tatooine when Luke opposes Jabba. At least that's what I heard in some commentary as well.

52 minutes ago, GM Fred said:

In Empire he only used the lightsaber out in the snow or indoors, therefore blue was no problem. In Jedi, where he got a new lightsaber anyway, they decided to make it green, so it would be visible against the blue sky on Tatooine when Luke opposes Jabba. At least that's what I heard in some commentary as well.

Oh, ok, so you're saying they initially did it in blue, but in the Jabba scenes it blended so they changed it? Ok I can see that. I mean, I guess it depends on how many up angle shots they would do, with the sky in the background. Otherwise sand would contrast blue pretty well.

I always just chalked it up to he found a different colored crystal when he made his saber, and that was that.

Yeah, I remember reading a fairly long time ago that in some of the early shots of that scene, when they did the rotoscoping for Luke's lightsaber in blue, it either didn't look right or was much more difficult to track against the blue sky, depending on the scene. Thus, the swap to green to make it easier to track during the fight scenes, and possibly to further inform the audience that this is a brand new lightsaber and that Luke hadn't magically gotten his old one back or somehow gotten ahold of Ben Kenobi's lightsaber (the hilts do have degrees of similarity on a casual glance), especially as a filmed scene of Luke building a brand new lightsaber in RotJ had hit the cutting room floor.

Vader mentions that Luke built his own lightsaber, IIRC. When they're on Endor.

I don't know that audience confusion would have been a concern during the scenes on Tatooine.

Possibly, because they never SHOW us him, making a lightsaber. You can sort of imply that, during one level in Shadows of the Empire, that notorious racing scene, when you are going to save him, he is busily making the green lightsaber, and you need to hurry because it isn't ready yet, but in RotJ, they just surprise us with "he's got a different lightsaber!" ignoring that they are intricately complicated, in their design, and yet, Luke somehow knew how to fabricate one. We're led to believe he found a holocron in Obi-Wan's hut, which contained the info, as well as info on how to make a crystal, without the red impurity, and possibly even some of the needed parts were "just lying around", if Kenobi ever intended to help Luke build his own, but they never got to that point, but that's all other authors, too; Lucas never cared to elaborate, and it probably didn't really matter, anyway. Some people might've wanted to know where it came from, as it was new, same as those who wondered if Mara Jade's main saber was Windu's, recovered by the Emperor , or if the art just chose purple for kicks (actually, well before Sam Jackson asked for a purple lightsaber, in AotC)? We were nerdy, and needy for info, back then, what can I say?

As for the creators caring, no, I agree with you; they wouldn't, probably, have cared if the fans were curious. They were making a movie, and the blue saber wasn't working, so they changed it. They threw a bit of babble in, to cover it up, and later material started to assign colors to meanings, and on we go.

Well, it should be noted that there is a deleted scene from RotJ of Luke finishing the construction of his lightsaber.

https://youtu.be/_ayT0EZwbks

5 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

Vader mentions that Luke built his own lightsaber, IIRC. When they're on Endor.

I don't know that audience confusion would have been a concern during the scenes on Tatooine.

Never underestimate the audience's ability to nitpick, especially if the audience are self-proclaimed "major fans" of a franchise.

Just look at all the nitpicking that was done over The Force Awakens simply because it didn't spoon feed all of the answers that a portion of the fanbase felt they were entitled to have.

Oh, in well aware of the hilariously terrible wrath of the fan. But I'm thinking from the perspective of competent storytellers. The makers knew that audiences would ask themselves where he'd got the saber, and they knew they'd answer the question later on.

11 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

Oh, in well aware of the hilariously terrible wrath of the fan. But I'm thinking from the perspective of competent storytellers. The makers knew that audiences would ask themselves where he'd got the saber, and they knew they'd answer the question later on.

Given how often re-shoots and last minute script changes occur, it's entirely possibly that Vader's line about Luke having constructed a new lightsaber was added after the decision was made to use green instead of blue.

No movie script, no matter how good the script writer or how good the director, ever survives unchanged between when shooting starts and when the film goes to print.

It's possible, but is there any reason to think so besides the general trend?

Thank you tramp ... that video was something I hadn't seen before.

7 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

It's possible, but is there any reason to think so besides the general trend?

Apart from the fact that it actually had happened with all three of the films to one degree or another?

I'm asking about the specific scene, not the general practice of ADR.

6 hours ago, Aftermath13 said:

Thank you tramp ... that video was something I hadn't seen before.

You're welcome. I couldn't figure out how to properly embed the video, unfortunately.

In addition, not sure if there was a holocron but there was a journal Obi-Wan left behind that Luke acquired in the canon.

OK, so it's canon now ... disciples of harmony has a corrupted crystal and how to redeem it. So my argument about composition and color is moot. Apparently now your individual connection to the force colors your crystal. Which is now why all darksider's sabers are red.

Oh, you have to become a light side paragon to redeem the crystal.