On 9/4/2018 at 1:38 PM, Stan Fresh said:

Commands don't have to be long and involved to qualify for Speaks Binary, no? Yelling KILL THEM ALL doesn't take an action.

On 9/5/2018 at 1:27 AM, Stan Fresh said:

No it doesn't. Checks aren't for simple run-of-the-mill commands. That's like requiring a Mechanics check to press a single button to open a door.

3 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:

Would you make other player characters forego their action for telling someone "shoot them", "get to the thing", "fix it"?

1 hour ago, Stan Fresh said:

But the talent doesn't require the latter kind of explanation.

1 hour ago, Stan Fresh said:

They don't, though.

"with a series of orders" is part of the rules text.

Where is the series of orders in "stop them"? In "climb up there"?

54 minutes ago, Stan Fresh said:

Speaks Binary has other limitations that make up for it. You can have your personal preference, but that's not what the rules say.

Not seeing anything in any of your posts that consists of more than "no, it doesn't." Sure, you talk about quick little sentence fragments not requiring an action, on which point I agree with you, but no reason why such a sentence fragment qualifies for a bonus to a check. You say "the rules don't say that," except they quite clearly do, and offer no counter-rule to explain your position. And then accuse me of trolling you because I honestly don't see your point out of a grand total of twelve sentences?

3 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

The other balancing factor is the credits cost of droids. NPC droids don't have the same safety gap as PC droids. When they go down, the GM can rule them destroyed. This can start to eat up a lot of credits, especially in a game that otherwise is pretty minimal about upkeep costs. Even an Antiquated Battle Droid (the now-classic B1) costs 6,500 credits to replace. A Minion group of 4 B1s costs more than any lightsaber crystal and is far more vulnerable to being lost in battle. If you have bottomless pockets, this doesn't matter much, but I have yet to see such a game.

I'm thinking more in terms by the time a PC has 4 ranks of the Talent that's a pretty advanced character so money isn't much of an impediment likely. They'll have their crazy nemesis chasis with whatever mondo gun they can whip up to hand it. Throw 4 Boosts on top of aiming and a modded gun, I doubt it'll lose much. The PC is essentially making a walking gun turret.

1 hour ago, ErikModi said:

Not seeing anything in any of your posts that consists of more than "no, it doesn't." Sure, you talk about quick little sentence fragments not requiring an action, on which point I agree with you, but no reason why such a sentence fragment qualifies for a bonus to a check. You say "the rules don't say that," except they quite clearly do, and offer no counter-rule to explain your position. And then accuse me of trolling you because I honestly don't see your point out of a grand total of twelve sentences?

Giving commands isn't just screaming 'slay them all!' and then cackling maniacally. You can blurt things quickly as an incidental, the Action means you're giving direction as things are unfolding. Combat is supposed to be near simultaneous so as the battle unfolds you're selecting new targets, telling them where to aim, etc.

This Talent lies in trees where you can literally make an AT-AT with a name between the gun and droid you can potentially craft. Making Speaks Binary stick to the rules and have giving commands an Action is completely fair and appropriate.

3 minutes ago, 2P51 said:

Giving commands isn't just screaming 'slay them all!' and then cackling maniacally. You can blurt things quickly as an incidental, the Action means you're giving direction as things are unfolding. Combat is supposed to be near simultaneous so as the battle unfolds you're selecting new targets, telling them where to aim, etc.

This Talent lies in trees where you can literally make an AT-AT with a name between the gun and droid you can potentially craft. Making Speaks Binary stick to the rules and have giving commands an Action is completely fair and appropriate.

Exactly my thinking here.

Also, noticed it specifically says "a non-player droid." So the player could only use it on of the two droid followers he currently has, I would think?

Correct. This is for the player that wants to be a drone operator and attack with them as opposed to getting their own hands dirty.

42 minutes ago, 2P51 said:

Giving commands isn't just screaming 'slay them all!' and then cackling maniacally    . 

In a pulp space opera it absolutely can be.

I would think that Speaks Binary would have indicated it requires an Action or a Maneuver if that's how it's intended to work. Besides, there's no good reason the guy with Speaks Binary can't have intricate plans presented to the droids ahead of time and then merely say *Attack Pattern Aura" or "Evasive Pattern Besh" as incidentals when in combat.

Why would it need to say that when the section on Actions already says giving allies commands is an Action? Plus as always, no plan survives first contact with the enemy. You say attack pattern zeta, and then the enemy zigs when you expected them to zag. Now you've got to say evasive pattern mad dog. Then they fall back and take cover. Then reinforcements arrive....

Because all talents that require actions are listed as active talents. This would be the first exception.

6 minutes ago, TheShard said:

Because all talents that require actions are listed as active talents. This would be the first exception.

There are tons of passive Talents that modify an Action, I have no idea what point you are trying to make.

That this would just be written up specifically mentioning the command action. Its says instruct which is deliberately more vague. Its for a gm's discretion but by raw it may take an action or it may not.

There are tons of Talents that don't repeat the details of the section they are applied to. Inventor doesn't say crafting an item is an Action, but it is. Solid Repairs doesn't say repairing something requires an Action, but it does. Loads of Talents talk about modifying a check, and you know that's an Action by looking at the Section that explains a Skill check is an Action. There is no difference. The rules aren't ambiguous, whether people want to follow them I leave up to them.

Okay, here I can see a point. Speaks Binary doesn't appear to require any kind of skill check or intrinsically invoke another kind of action, so there could be a grey area there (exactly what I was confused about with it's wording when I made the original post). However, it seems the intent is for it to fall under the "command allies" action, even if it doesn't require an actual check, though that gets us into arguing Rules-As-Written versus Rules-As-Intended.

I did find what 2P51 is referring to: There is a list of Actions that includes giving detailed orders/instructions. This doesn't appear under it's own header in the actions section, but it is clearly given as an example. Based on this, I fully believe that this talent does require such an action to be taken to initiate it, but I do not believe that it needs to be repeated unless the situation changes. If you give the orders to "kill them all" then you spend an action but shouldn't need to do so again until the bad guys have all been killed unless you want the droids to do something different.

See below

18 minutes ago, ErikModi said:

Okay, here I can see a point. Speaks Binary doesn't appear to require any kind of skill check or intrinsically invoke another kind of action, so there could be a grey area there (exactly what I was confused about with it's wording when I made the original post). However, it seems the intent is for it to fall under the "command allies" action, even if it doesn't require an actual check, though that gets us into arguing Rules-As-Written versus Rules-As-Intended.

No it doesn't, but when you look for information on giving commands that's listed under Actions. Solid Repairs doesn't say it's a Mechanics Action check, but it is, and you know that by reading Mechanics and Skill checks in general, rinse repeat for any number of Talents.

So, related question:

If using the mass combat rules and commanding droid forces, would Speaks Binary add to the Mass Combat checks?

3 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

I did find what 2P51 is referring to: There is a list of Actions that includes giving detailed orders/instructions. This doesn't appear under it's own header in the actions section, but it is clearly given as an example. Based on this, I fully believe that this talent does require such an action to be taken to initiate it, but I do not believe that it needs to be repeated unless the situation changes. If you give the orders to "kill them all" then you spend an action but shouldn't need to do so again until the bad guys have all been killed unless you want the droids to do something different.

Whether people want to repeat the Action I leave to each table, I would because it's simply too good not to. Combat is also too dynamic and fluid and I would say that giving commands involves giving direction throughout more detailed than 'shoot them'. Narratively when they get those Advantages and Successes from those Boost dice that's a result of the direction they've received from their controller and that needs to be more than a simple phrase and needs to be ongoing for my comfort level.

1 minute ago, 2P51 said:

No it doesn't, but when you look for information on giving commands that's listed under Actions. Solid Repairs doesn't say it's a Mechanics Action check, but it is, and you know that by reading Mechanics and Skill checks in general, rinse repeat for any number of Talents.

I agree, since without any kind of "combat resource" cost it would get pretty overpowered pretty quickly, especially once you get the advanced versions that let you give them your skill ranks (though, that raises the question of why you'd want to have a droid do something instead of just doing it yourself, if the roll and action cost would be identical).

I'd also think you'd need to keep using it as long as you want them to benefit from the boosts. Just saying "kill them" or "fix that" and leaving it isn't good enough, you need to respond as the situation changes, which it does constantly in a situation where you're tracking actions (narratively, if not by the actual rules, at least).

3 hours ago, 2P51 said:

I'm thinking more in terms by the time a PC has 4 ranks of the Talent that's a pretty advanced character so money isn't much of an impediment likely. They'll have their crazy nemesis chasis with whatever mondo gun they can whip up to hand it. Throw 4 Boosts on top of aiming and a modded gun, I doubt it'll lose much. The PC is essentially making a walking gun turret.

Yeah, but unless the character is built that way and dropped full grown at high-XP, they probably lost a lot of droids--and credits--along the way.

I agree, by billing an Action the level of control is more involved than a simple one line command imo. It's ongoing direction based on how the battle or task unfolds in real time. Handing out piles of Boost dice and only billing an incidental is not acceptable.

Do any of you play your Stormtrooper SGTs as spending all of their actions to direct their squads?

2 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Yeah, but unless the character is built that way and dropped full grown at high-XP, they probably lost a lot of droids--and credits--along the way.

Even if you didn't want to blow lots of credit, the labor model would be an acceptable Melee bot and for cheap. Give em a heavily modded cheese slicer and with the pile of Boost dice and that's a bargain.

4 minutes ago, HappyDaze said:

Do any of you play your Stormtrooper SGTs as spending all of their actions to direct their squads?

No, but that's adversaries so apples and oranges. This isn't so much style as something that's actually written so three cheers for specificity imo.

2 minutes ago, 2P51 said:

Even if you didn't want to blow lots of credit, the labor model would be an acceptable Melee bot and for cheap. Give em a heavily modded cheese slicer and with the pile of Boost dice and that's a bargain.

I forget about those since I loathe the crafting rules almost as much as I hate TFA & TLJ.