And if they do, would you allow them to use their ranks in Inventor on the check?
Edited by StriderZesseiGMs, would you object to your PCs doing Knowledge [Lore] checks to mod their lightsaber attachments?
I'm of the opinion that lightsaber crafting is more of a religious experience then a mechanical assembly. Not unlike this:
So yes I believe Knowledge Lore is a better choice for that reason especially when communing with a crystal...
Inventor adds a boost or removes a setback and makes no mention of mechanics in the short description so yes I'd allow inventor.
In the GM Kit, PCs have the option of using Knowledge (Lore) to build a lightsaber (basic hilt only though), rolling against a Hard difficulty. If successful, then they get to install the first mod on their 'saber crystal for free (no credits cost, no check required), with advantages and threat modifying the cost (hilt's base cost) and/or time (3 days) required to build the 'saber. You could probably swap out the base difficulty and use the base availability rating of the stock hilt (i.e. the versions with no kyber crystal installed) to allow the PCs to build something other than basic hilts without it causing too much problem.
Per the core rulebook, no check is even required to assemble a lightsaber, just a Streetwise check to find/gather the necessary parts. After that, it's treated as "plug and play" and the PC builds the desired hilt. In that
I probably wouldn't allow them to use Knowledge (Lore) with the Endless Vigil lightsaber build rules, as that gives a lot of favoritism to Niman Disciple and Soresu Defender, both of whom have Knowledge (Loe) as a career skill, and they're already doing better than the other Lightsaber Form specs as Niman and Soresu PCs already benefit from having a higher-than-average Intellect (Niman to feed into other career skills, Soresu for Lightsaber checks thanks to their technique talent). Also, if you've got Dawn of Rebellion, the Padawan Survivor spec has a talent that give a bonus to building lightsabers that is based upon ranks of Knowledge (Lore), making it even easier for a PC with both of those talents to really abuse the Endless Vigil build rules to potentially create some extremely powerful hilt builds as they're going to have more Advantages with which to customize the hilt.
As for the Inventor talent, it'd be applicable per RAW as neither the short description or the long description says it has to be used with any specific skill, just that you have to be constructing or modifying something.
Is it abuse when you focus on Intellect and do something that benefits from high Intellect?
I'd be perfectly ok with it. Mechanics is usable over a huge range of different item types, allowing lore on one is not stealing it's thunder significantly.
I’d allow it.
Thanks for the replies everyone! I was concerned that making it a lore check would mean Inventor wouldn't be applicable.
4 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:Is it abuse when you focus on Intellect and do something that benefits from high Intellect?
A lot of people who post here seem to think anything that makes your character actually good at something is abusing the system.
Honestly characters who craft things have a high intelligence plus talents that actually let them be really good at crafting.
I'd like to point out your more likely to find a Sentinel or Guardian or Mystic who is good at crafting then a Consular. Niman has skills that synergize with Intelligence, but most of them will go higher willpower for you know actually using the force with Niman and maximizing how effective the actual tree is.
4 hours ago, Stan Fresh said:Is it abuse when you focus on Intellect and do something that benefits from high Intellect?
Maybe not abuse, but using Knowledge (Lore) for the skill in combination with the Endless Vigil skews the odds very much in the favor of two specific specs far more so than just having a high Intellect would already do, especially if they don't have to pay anything specifically for that privilege.
It also helps the Padawan Survivor immensely, as they not only get a bonus to the build/mod rolls from having ranks in Know (Lore) thanks to two of their talents, which I presume were written under the assumption the GM is requiring the player to use Mechanics to craft/modify a lightsaber. Using Know (Lore) in this instance with the Endless Vigil build rules simply means the GM should be prepared for that PC with both of those talents to have a lot more Advantages to use to add various bells and whistles to any lightsabers they build, given they'll be rolling against a lower difficulty, as well as for getting more mods out of their lightsaber crystals, even opening up the potential to have a fully modded Ilum crystal, which can be fairly difficult for most PCs to accomplish.
Deadly Accuracy is a case where having a high rank in a combat skill (let's say Ranged [Heavy] for example) does double the benefit of having high ranks in the selected skill, since the PC not only gets a better dice pool from having those ranks, but also gets a kicker to damage that only gets sweeter as the PC gets more ranks. However, Deadly Accuracy is something the PC has to purchase, and in the specs it shows up in it's generally not a talent that a PC can begin play with (a Knight Level Soldier/Sharpshooter from AoR could probably do it, but I think that's it).
Using Knowledge (Lore) and the Endless Vigil build rules isn't necessarily abusive (trying to argue that Pierce means automatic damage on a hit no matter what the target's soak value would an instance of rules abuse), it's just that if the GM is going to go that route, they should be prepared for some of the PCs to make out better than they would under the normal rules.
It's akin to changing Intimidate to work with Brawn instead of Willpower, and then being surprised that species like Wookiees and Trandoshans and Whiphids (all species that start with Brawn 3) are now far more effective at intimidation than they'd be under the normal rules.
9 hours ago, StriderZessei said:And if they do, would you allow them to use their ranks in Inventor on the check?
Yup. Never liked Mechanics for it all the way back through the playtest.
Wookies, Trandoshans and Whiphids are extremely intimidating I mean have you seen them?
Coercion is one of those skills I'd allow Brawn, Willpower or Presence to be rolled with depending on the approach which will also lead to different difficulties based on the npc they are attempting it on. Since people react differently to threats, bribes, glares and brute force. So I really don't see the problem with letting them use physical actions to coerce someone into doing what they want especially when its the least optimal way to make it work. C3-PO will fold quite quickly to such brute force tactics, but HK-49 would likely mention how inferior the meatbag is to him before shooting him in the face for the attempt.
So to put it simply using brawn for coercion only seems to give them an advantage, but could in fact in the long run be bad for the player if you handle it correctly. Planning for a game is a lot like planning for a war you spend 10% of your time putting together a plan and 90% of the time trying to cover all the ways it can go horribly wrong when it meets the players. Flow charts can be key...
I personally like to find ways to encourage people to spread out.
We use varying rules but...long short i'm happy for them to use it on construction but not with the endless vigil ruleset. Effectively they're using their knowledge of lore to make a more simplified version than would be possible for a tech head. Anakin is a designer so he would use his mech as he's able to pull of cooler stuff effectively.
If you're down to do it then I personally wouldn't discourage it just in my game/experience its good to encourage people and reward them for investing in multiple places. Otherwise a bookworm can create a masterpiece lightsaber without actually understanding mechanical function.
On 9/3/2018 at 4:14 AM, StriderZessei said:And if they do, would you allow them to use their ranks in Inventor on the check?
That's a link to my houserules. I altered modifying lightsaber crystals to be more accurate to the canon lore, in that it's about your knowledge, bond and use of the Force that enhances your connection to the crystal. Discipline, Lore or Lightsaber all work for modifying crystal attachments. For other attachments and for maintenance/repair of the hilt itself, it is the standard Mechanics skill used.
Its RAW. Using Lore to make sabers is RAW. There's lots of more widely useful skills that are catered to. Having a few specs that you can focus on making saber checks easier isn't game breaking.
No, I don't have a problem with it. I might make the check a little bit harder, to keep it from being too much of a single "I Win" skill for anything Force related. But honestly, given how limited the Knowledge skills can be in their actual utilization in a campaign (if you're not doing anything related to Underworld for example, it's kind of useless to you), giving them something else to do with it, seems fine to me.
Its way way easier to make a mechanics check into an i win button. There's no need to arbitrary increase difficulty for game balance. If somone specializes in forging an Excalibur than they've not optimized elsewhere. They spent the xp they should get their reward.
And absolutely inventor stacks by RAW.
Again if they go artisan, armorer or worse yet scientist or outlaw tech to max inventor+padawan s. Or force adherent for maxing lore, the incredible saber they build with almost no difficulty at all comes at the price of lightsaber specs or fr...