Custom talent/spec workshopping

By GroggyGolem, in Game Masters

As the title says, I'm considering some custom talents/specs.

I'd like to create a custom Echani spec and Teras Kasi spec. I know there is the Steel Hand Adept spec in the Warrior career but that feels more Force User related than I would prefer, considering the lore on Teras Kasi was that it was meant to fight against Force Users, Jedi specifically. Echani I want to create mainly because I like the idea of Unarmed fighters that gain benefits for fighting without weapons and without armor.

There seem to be a couple barriers I am coming across.

1. These specs need to be different from one another. If they are not different enough from one another then there's no need to make 2 entire spec trees.

2. These specs need to be different from the official spec trees. If these specs just take all the cool talents from specs like Marauder, Martial Artist and Steel Hand Adept, then what is the point in creating them?

At the moment, the way I see it, it might be best to keep it simple and just provide a single talent to represent either of those martial arts that can be purchased outside of a spec/career as long as the character has had the appropriate training narratively.

For Echani, I'm thinking something like gaining a rank of Dodge when unarmored, and additionally gaining +1 damage when using no weapons.

For Teras Kasi I'm thinking something like a flat +1 damage to melee (that's Brawl, Melee & Lightsaber), additionally another +1 if the target has a Force Rating of 1 or higher.

Both talents would cost 25xp.

I'm not particularly sold on the benefits of Teras Kasi yet, it seems somewhat weak considering the cheap cost of other talents that increase Brawl/Melee damage. The main intent for both is to provide some benefit to brawl/unarmed characters that increases their ability to fight armed opponents, besides the Pressure Point talent.

Teras Kasi by lore as much about willpower and discipline as combat (it's a martial art, duh)

The easiest way to approach it to make a signature talent and build around it. You could emphasise it's training with talents that give boost to discipline for example, or setbacks, difficulty dice to resist force powers (Will of the Fight, Improved will of the fight).

Divide the spec for 2 parts, 1 route is focusing on increasing brawl/melee dmg (would not include Lightsaber for balance), the 2nd could play around strengthened resolve, willpower, martial artist spirit

Echani could have a couple of talents;

Improved Dodge:

If you are not wearing armour that increases your Soak value you may choose to add automatic failure or threat (players choice) to an opponents attack instead of upgrading the difficulty, this is instead of the usual benefit of dodge.

Supreme Dodge:

If you are not wearing armour that increases your Soak value then once per round reduce the strain suffered to perform a Dodge incidental by your ranks in Coordination.

On 7/17/2019 at 8:34 PM, Richardbuxton said:

Echani could have a couple of talents;

Improved Dodge:

If you are not wearing armour that increases your Soak value you may choose to add automatic failure or threat (players choice) to an opponents attack instead of upgrading the difficulty, this is instead of the usual benefit of dodge.

Supreme Dodge:

If you are not wearing armour that increases your Soak value then once per round reduce the strain suffered to perform a Dodge incidental by your ranks in Coordination.

Improved dodge already exists in the steel hand adept tree and it gives you a free move maneuver as an out of turn incidental.

9 hours ago, EliasWindrider said:

Improved dodge already exists in the steel hand adept tree and it gives you a free move maneuver as an out of turn incidental.

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