I've realized (after 2 years) that I have never understood how Force Power upgrades work. Maybe.

If I pick MISDIRECT it states:

Quote

Range Upgrade: Spend [FORCE POINTS] to increase the maximum range at which the Force user can affect targets with this power by a number of range bands equal to the number of Range upgrades purchased. The user may activate this multiple times, increasing the range by this number each time.

Originally I thought that I had to use 2 force points to affect a target at the "second range band". Reading the forum it seems that it should be like this:

- I actually can use 2 force points (because "The user may activate this multiple times" )

but/or

- I can use only 1 force point if I have a Range Upgrade with rank 2 (because i can "Spend [FORCE POINTS] to increase [...] by a number of range bands equal to the number of Range upgrades purchased" )

Right?

OK, assuming I'm right... is it the same for Move?

If I pick MOVE it states:

Quote

Range Upgrade: Spend [FORCE POINTS] to increase the maximum range at which the user can move objects by a number of range bands equal to the number of Range upgrades purchased. The user may activate this multiple times, increasing the range by this number each time. However, remember the user must still spend Force points to activate the power’s actual effects .

What does it mean?

Can I use 2 force points to increase the range by 2 even if I have only Range upgrade at rank 1?

Can I still use only 1 force point to increase the range by 2 if I have Range upgrade at rank 2?

Why it is stated " However, remember the user must still spend Force points to activate the power’s actual effects ." here?

Thanks for any help (and sorry for my bad English)

I think the Move one is saying that if you have Range 2 then you can increase the range by two bands per FP spent. That's what the "may activate this multiple times..." line means. So you have a base range of 1, and buy two ranks of Range. You can spend a FP to increase your range to 3, or spent 2 FP to increase your range to 5. The difference from Misdirect is that the Move power's effects - like causing damage if you Hurl your opponent or something into your opponent, for example, still need FP to activate.

I think ...but I've never been very good at reading the Force power rules...we tend to just wing it.

You always need to read the full description of the upgrades ranged or otherwise because they do function differently in different powers. For example the range upgrades in move say they can be triggered multiple times. But the range upgrade for leaping in the enhance tree specifically says it can only be activated once giving you a maximum jump of 2 range bands.

So let's say you are going to use move and you have 1 range upgrade. You roll 3 light pips, spend 1 pip to activate move, you then have the option to activate the range upgrade twice by spending the 2 remaining pips, letting you upgrade from short to long range. Now here's where it get crazy. Same scenario but you have bought 3 range upgrades. Now each time you activate the range upgrade it is 3x. So for one pip you get 3 range band upgrades and you can do this until you run out of pips.

Yes the same named upgrade in the force power can be different. Example the force powed Enhance:Leap doesnt allow you to move range bands at all in its basic iteration, you can only move to another location in short range. The upgrade ( which can only be activated once , unlike the other ones):only allows the increase to let you move from short to medium range. This causes confusion as people think you can travel farther than a maneuver when it takes the range upgrade to travel as far as a maneuver can let you.

7 hours ago, Ziro said:

But the range upgrade for leaping in the enhance tree specifically says it can only be activated once giving you a maximum jump of 2 range bands.

Sorry wrong!

1 hour ago, syrath said:

Example the force powed Enhance:Leap doesnt allow you to move range bands at all in its basic iteration, you can only move to another location in short range. The upgrade ( which can only be activated once , unlike the other ones):only allows the increase to let you move from short to medium range. This causes confusion as people think you can travel farther than a maneuver when it takes the range upgrade to travel as far as a maneuver can let you.

Correct!

Took me half a session to hamer this into the heads of my players... and it comes always back and tries to wreck havoc with my players thougths....

So to answer the question of the OP:

yes Range-Upgrades can be different within the different powers. Always read the full description first the shorties in the "trees" are only ment as a help to remember.

Thanks for your replies!

5 hours ago, Nightone said:

So to answer the question of the OP:

yes Range-Upgrades can be different within the different powers. Always read the full description first the shorties in the "trees" are only ment as a help to remember.

12 hours ago, Ziro said:

You always need to read the full description of the upgrades ranged or otherwise because they do function differently in different powers.

Yes I agree and I read (and quoted) them. But you compared MOVE to ENHANCE: they have different description.

In my example MOVE and MISDIRECT have the same description with only a difference: However, remember the user must still spend Force points to activate the power’s actual effects .

So... in both MOVE and MISDIRECT I can increase the range of the force power by 2 (just an example):

1. by using 2 force points with Range upgrade level 1
2. by using 1 force point with Range upgrade level 2

Same thing, both in MOVE and MISDIRECT. It's like "If I'm more trained I can spend less Force in it" . Right? You all confirm this?

If all I said is okay... why MOVE specifies " However, remember the user must still spend Force points to activate the power’s actual effects "?

12 hours ago, Daronil said:

The difference from Misdirect is that the Move power's effects - like causing damage if you Hurl your opponent or something into your opponent, for example, still need FP to activate.

It's only because of this? I don't understand... I mean, if you want to MISDIRECT someone you still need FP to activate, don't you?

27 minutes ago, spad85 said:

If all I said is okay... why MOVE specifies " However, remember the user must still spend Force points to activate the power’s actual effects "?

I think because it comes from the same wording as in EotE, which predates F&D by a couple years and needed to be more clear. Whoever wrote Misdirect figured everybody already knew that you have to still spend pips to active the power's actual effects. You need to spend at least two pips in both cases, once for the initial power and once for the range upgrade.

yep thats the reason.

There are some powers that change due to the use of an control Upgrade so that the initial basis power doesn't need to be activated, like with sense the "always a triumph" control Upgrade for wich you roll your force dice and than use 3 FP on the target. there you won't need to put in the initial base FP since the power totaly changes.

On other things like move, misdirect, harm and so on you need the initials FP to activate the base effect and then use range, strength, special controls, effcets to utilizes even more out of the power.

25 minutes ago, whafrog said:

I think because it comes from the same wording as in EotE, which predates F&D by a couple years and needed to be more clear. Whoever wrote Misdirect figured everybody already knew that you have to still spend pips to active the power's actual effects. You need to spend at least two pips in both cases, once for the initial power and once for the range upgrade.

Pretty much this. A lot of people confused if you still had to spend the initial pip to activate the power, or if that could be the same pip as activating an upgrade. So if, for example, you only roll 1 pip, some people thought, this meant you could both activate the basic power, AND a single upgrade. So they clarified in the full description, given how much feedback they got before the F&D publication.

So, bottom line, if you have upgrades of a power, and you want to trigger any of those upgrades, you need at least 2 pips. 1 to activate the power itself, and the other pip to trigger whatever upgrade you have in mind.

However, to your more general question about upgrades being different. Yes, sometimes they can be. Maybe not the Range one specifically, but some powers let you trigger Magnitude as much as you like, while others only let you do it once. Similar with Strength upgrades. So it's really dependent on the power in question, how the upgrades function.

Thanks!

Yes, I forgot the basic power activation in my example.

Keeping an example with move: you can increase the range of the Move force power from short (base value) to long range (2 "levels")

1) by using 3 force points (1 to activate basic power + 2 if you have Range upgrade level 1)

or

2) by using 2 force points (1 to activate basic power + 1 if you have Range upgrade level 2)

18 minutes ago, spad85 said:

Thanks!

Yes, I forgot the basic power activation in my example.

Keeping an example with move: you can increase the range of the Move force power from short (base value) to long range (2 "levels")

1) by using 3 force points (1 to activate basic power + 2 if you have Range upgrade level 1)

or

2) by using 2 force points (1 to activate basic power + 1 if you have Range upgrade level 2)

That looks correct yes. And that basic math is the same for most Force powers. Unless it specifically states otherwise, it's safe to assume you can activate multiple times.

Though from what I've seen, they've done a pretty good job lately in specifying either way, with language saying "You can activate this multiple times" or "You can only activate this once" on just about every Upgrade description. You might have an issue if you are using an Edge or Age book for reference, but I think if you are using F&D sources, by that point in the line, they were aware of the need for clarification.

As others have already mentioned, the upgrades are at least slightly different between different powers, relying on the force trees alone is insufficient.

I have a similar issue, but with the various upgrades of move (the strength one in particular).

All of the move upgrades are described with the " You can activate this multiple times" clause.

Assuming that all 4 strength upgrades are purchased, RAW one can:

1) use 1 fp to activate the base power

2) use 1 fp to increase the silhouette from 0 to 4, a second one fp to increase it to 8, and a third to bring it up to 12 (in the books the largest capital ships and stations are described as sil 10).

So, in theory, 4 fp to perform a short range move of an object of up to sil 12. With a bit of luck, a FR 2 would be enough to pull it off. With FR 3 and some range upgrades, things get even more extreme. Considering the applications of move we see in the movies, this should be impossible.

Our interpretation is that each upgrade can indeed be activated multiple times, but only once per object that is to be simultaneously moved. This makes move much less broken, as it would cap the sil at 4, which is the size of a typical YT freighter. Still a very impressive feat, but at the same time in line with the movies.