One of my players' characters is getting ready to leave the Jedi Order in my Clone Wars game. Having grown disillusioned with the order's beliefs, and their rather dogmatic views on the light and dark sides of the Force, he's opted to explore the galaxy and broaden his understanding of the greater mystery.

Part of that decision means giving up his identity as a Jedi, and surrendering his lightsaber to the Jedi Council as he leaves. Now, he could strike out on his own and construct a new lightsaber, but both the player and I agree that it makes more sense for him to move on from such a tool. That being said, he's heavily invested his XP into using a lightsaber, and some of the skills he's taken aren't transferable to most melee weaponry.

With this in mind, I've looked to Legends for some inspiration, and settled upon the Velmorian Flamesword, an obscure weapon that's really only had two appearances (one in an old Marvel comic, one in the Coruscant Nights trilogy). The weapon appears to be like a less powerful version of a lightsaber. When inactive, it still has a metal blade, and appears to be a standard sword. Once ignited, ionized fire coats the weapon, giving it similar properties to a lightsaber.

As for stats, I'm thinking something along the lines of this:

Velmorian Flamesword: Lightsaber; Damage +2; Critical 2; Range (Engaged); Encumbrance 2; Hard Points 1; Cost 1,500; Cortosis, Defensive 1, Pierce 5, Sunder

In effect, it may as well be a vibrorapier that can sunder, with the inability to be sundered. It also uses the lightsaber skill, and can be used for Reflect and Improved Reflect. The single hardpoint should prevent him from being able to do anything too game-breaking with it.

What do you guys think? Is this relatively balanced? Is it underpowered, possibly? Or too strong, compared to the other options available?

To borrow some advice from the latest episode of the Foundry podcast (d20 Radio Network's show discussing both Genesys and products under the Forge header), Pierce 5 generally doesn't have a lot of benefit, given that most adversaries don't have a soak value that high. Perhaps lower the Pierce by 2 and increase the damage by 1? For the price, that's still a good weapon (especially if the PC has a Brawn of 3 or better) and will deal about the same damage per hit as a basic unmodded lightsaber.

It's a flamesword, so maybe add Burn? I'd increase the damage by one and keep Pierce 5, because the argument could be made in response to Donovan that most Adversaries don't have an Armor of 1. Since stormtroopers, clone troopers, B2s, and others have 5+ soak, I think that Pierce 5 makes sense from that perspective. I don't know what power level you're shooting for, so you should keep both our points in mind and see what balance works best.

Why not just use a phylaxian phase knife scaled up to a sword?

2 hours ago, Underachiever599 said:

One of my players' characters is getting ready to leave the Jedi Order in my Clone Wars game. Having grown disillusioned with the order's beliefs, and their rather dogmatic views on the light and dark sides of the Force, he's opted to explore the galaxy and broaden his understanding of the greater mystery.

Part of that decision means giving up his identity as a Jedi, and surrendering his lightsaber to the Jedi Council as he leaves. Now, he could strike out on his own and construct a new lightsaber, but both the player and I agree that it makes more sense for him to move on from such a tool. That being said, he's heavily invested his XP into using a lightsaber, and some of the skills he's taken aren't transferable to most melee weaponry.

With this in mind, I've looked to Legends for some inspiration, and settled upon the Velmorian Flamesword, an obscure weapon that's really only had two appearances (one in an old Marvel comic, one in the Coruscant Nights trilogy). The weapon appears to be like a less powerful version of a lightsaber. When inactive, it still has a metal blade, and appears to be a standard sword. Once ignited, ionized fire coats the weapon, giving it similar properties to a lightsaber.

As for stats, I'm thinking something along the lines of this:

Velmorian Flamesword: Lightsaber; Damage +2; Critical 2; Range (Engaged); Encumbrance 2; Hard Points 1; Cost 1,500; Cortosis, Defensive 1, Pierce 5, Sunder

In effect, it may as well be a vibrorapier that can sunder, with the inability to be sundered. It also uses the lightsaber skill, and can be used for Reflect and Improved Reflect. The single hardpoint should prevent him from being able to do anything too game-breaking with it.

What do you guys think? Is this relatively balanced? Is it underpowered, possibly? Or too strong, compared to the other options available?

51 minutes ago, Ahrimon said:

Why not just use a phylaxian phase knife scaled up to a sword?

Either that or an Ancient Sword . It's essentially a Katana, and, in fact, the ancient Jedi used them before the invention of the lightsaber, and back then they were referred to as "Jedi Katana".

2 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

It's a flamesword, so maybe add Burn?

I looked the weapon up on Wookieepedia and read the old WotC article that give RCR stats for the weapon before replying here, and really the flamesword is a bit of a misnomer as the weapon is really more of a less-refined version of a lightsaber.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you don't want this replacement weapon to be so good that the PC giving up using a lightsaber becomes a meaningless sacrifice. Yes, it's a cool narrative thing, and it's nice that you're giving the PC an option to let them still make use of skills and talents that they've invested significant XP into, but they're still giving up something for the sake of it being the narrative thing to do.

So whatever stats you settle on for this weapon, it definitely should not be comparable to even a basic lightsaber with an unmodded Ilum crystal, especially not at that low of a cost. Otherwise, what really was the point of giving up using a lightsaber if the character's just going to have a similar weapon with a different name?

As for the Pierce, that's ultimately going to depend on how much soak the adversaries you toss at your players have. If they're routinely in the 3 to 4 soak range, then Pierce 5 is generally going to be overkill, with at least one point of that Pierce 5 being useless since any Pierce value that exceeds the target's soak is lost. However, if you're routinely using adversaries that have a soak of 5 or more, then you're probably okay with keeping the Pierce at 5. However, in terms of most combats, the difference between Pierce 5 and Breach 1 is almost nil, since rarely do adversaries have a soak greater than 6 (unless you as the GM are deliberately creating super-tough bad guys), so in terms of combat performance the two are almost inter-changeable.

5 hours ago, Donovan Morningfire said:

Another thing to keep in mind is that you don't want this replacement weapon to be so good that the PC giving up using a lightsaber becomes a meaningless sacrifice. Yes, it's a cool narrative thing, and it's nice that you're giving the PC an option to let them still make use of skills and talents that they've invested significant XP into, but they're still giving up something for the sake of it being the narrative thing to do.

So whatever stats you settle on for this weapon, it definitely should not be comparable to even a basic lightsaber with an unmodded Ilum crystal, especially not at that low of a cost. Otherwise, what really was the point of giving up using a lightsaber if the character's just going to have a similar weapon with a different name?

As for the Pierce, that's ultimately going to depend on how much soak the adversaries you toss at your players have. If they're routinely in the 3 to 4 soak range, then Pierce 5 is generally going to be overkill, with at least one point of that Pierce 5 being useless since any Pierce value that exceeds the target's soak is lost. However, if you're routinely using adversaries that have a soak of 5 or more, then you're probably okay with keeping the Pierce at 5. However, in terms of most combats, the difference between Pierce 5 and Breach 1 is almost nil, since rarely do adversaries have a soak greater than 6 (unless you as the GM are deliberately creating super-tough bad guys), so in terms of combat performance the two are almost inter-changeable.

I'm regularly throwing rather beefy enemies at my players at this point in the game. Droideka, Crab Droids, Spider Droids, Octuptarra Tri Droids, ect. Pierce 5 is good, but breach is much, much better when dealing with soak 8+ at this point. For what it's worth, my players are around 450-500 XP, maybe closer to 550 after this last session. Their equipment has gotten pretty high end, they've bought most of the talents in their trees, and the Jedi characters have some pretty crazy Force capabilities. Most weaker rivals are almost a non-issue unless they're in large numbers at this point. The player giving up his rather heavily modded lightsaber for something with only Brawn+2 damage and Pierce 5 is a pretty significant loss for him.

On 10/1/2019 at 11:46 PM, Underachiever599 said:

Part of that decision means giving up his identity as a Jedi, and surrendering his lightsaber to the Jedi Council as he leaves. Now, he could strike out on his own and construct a new lightsaber, but both the player and I agree that it makes more sense for him to move on from such a tool. That being said, he's heavily invested his XP into using a lightsaber, and some of the skills he's taken aren't transferable to most melee weaponry.

I bet the sith wouldn't consider lightsabers to be jedi-only tools, nor would the saber rakes of the Tapani sector. Instead of bending over backwards to get something that's more or less a lightsaber, but not exactly a lightsaber, just get a lightsaber with some unorthodox attachments or styling. Something like the Darksaber, perhaps?

2 hours ago, penpenpen said:

I bet the sith wouldn't consider lightsabers to be jedi-only tools, nor would the saber rakes of the Tapani sector. Instead of bending over backwards to get something that's more or less a lightsaber, but not exactly a lightsaber, just get a lightsaber with some unorthodox attachments or styling. Something like the Darksaber, perhaps?

I never said lightsabers were Jedi-only tools. But the character associates the lightsaber with the Jedi Order, much like how most citizens of the galaxy immediately associate lightsabers with the Jedi. And again, this is a decision made by the player as well, not just me.

Honestly, I don't really consider homeruling the creation of a new weapon to be "bending over backward." It's just neat flavor, and I have fun creating homebrewed items/races/vehicles, ect. When one of my players asked me, "Is it possible to get a lightsaber-like weapon that isn't actually a lightsaber? Like an energy sword, or something?" I decided to make one, since it sounded fun. While I was at it, I figured I may as well share that idea here on the forum and see what other people thought.

2 hours ago, Underachiever599 said:

I never said lightsabers were Jedi-only tools. But the character associates the lightsaber with the Jedi Order, much like how most citizens of the galaxy immediately associate lightsabers with the Jedi. And again, this is a decision made by the player as well, not just me.

Here's the thing: 99% of the citizens of the galaxy, including the players, wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a lightsaber and a flamesword.

6 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

Here's the thing: 99% of the citizens of the galaxy, including the players, wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a lightsaber and a flamesword.

Thank you for making my point better and more politely than I apparently could.

8 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

Here's the thing: 99% of the citizens of the galaxy, including the players, wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a lightsaber and a flamesword.

Heck, most people in the galactic community who see someone doing Force-related stuff is going to call that person a Jedi. It's not unlike the real world trend of using "google it" to indicate performing a web search using quite possibly any number of search engines, for "xerox it" to make a photocopy of a document.

But yeah, if the player is looking to really set themselves as being truly distinct from the Jedi to the point of not using their traditional weapon, adopting a flamesword as their weapon of choice isn't going to help matters. Unless the character is intending to be a stereotypical hipster about it

2 hours ago, micheldebruyn said:

Here's the thing: 99% of the citizens of the galaxy, including the players, wouldn't be able to tell the difference between a lightsaber and a flamesword.

Then that's their problem for being uneducated pelebs. XD But even if the galaxy isn't interested in why the character has a "different lightsaber", that reason matters to both the player, the GM and the Universe these people are in. So in my eyes, making that decision to willingly take that knock is awesome.


I should know as someone who has something relatively similar; in a short, two shot side campaign featuring an apprentice/master type relationship coming to an end (well, more of a partnership. While one trained the other; both were really independent characters and agreed that kinda thing was demeaning, and that the power gap between the two was relatively insignificant), my character obtained an ancient sword with a special boon. Issue was, which I expressed to the GM, an acihcent sword in an AOR campaign that was already pretty high power level is pretty awful really, and my character only really had a brawn of 3 which made it's damage unlikely to stick. Basically, using the weapon was spending an entire turn doing relatively little damage to a character who already had a lot of better options, including a lightsaber. So we stuck 5 pierce on it and it sometimes sees use.

My thoughts? I wouldn't even dream of leading up a combat encounter with a 2+ pierce 5 weapon that couldn't reflect, while my comrades wield heavy blaster rifles, lightsabers and the like. It isn't a primary weapon for me and simply can't be in a campaign largely set around the galactic civil war. Of course it depends on the table and the level of play, but I wouldn't worry about the character being able to modify the weapon; if that weapon is a fundamental part of their identity I see no reason why they couldn't take something a big different and modify it up to a point where, practically it isn't all that different from a lightsaber in terms of effectiveness if they so desire.

On 10/1/2019 at 5:01 PM, Ahrimon said:

Why not just use a phylaxian phase knife scaled up to a sword?

Seconded... this has the advantage of not looking like a lightsaber which makes him a more distinct from jedi.

I say go for broke. Get him a quarter staff that has cortosis weave, and gives some slight bonus to force powers.

19 hours ago, Aggressor97 said:

I say go for broke. Get him a quarter staff that has cortosis weave, and gives some slight bonus to force powers.

I played around with something like this a bit.

Inlaid Kyber Crystal

A Kyber crystal can be incorporated in a more mundane weapon, giving a Force sensitive wielder greater control and awareness of it. The energy signature of the crystal tends to interfere with powered mechanisms not built around it, making it difficult to incorporate in powered weapons though.
Models Include: Various.
Base Modifiers: May use Lightsaber instead Melee for combat checks with the weapon. At the GMs discretion, may have base modifications available to the lightsaber crystal used, excluding those that are a direct effect of the lightsabers energy blade, such as damage rating, critical rating, or the weapon qualities, Breach, Burn, Concussive, Disorient, Sunder, Vicious.
Modification Options: 1 Innate Talent (Imbue Item) Mod
Hard points Required: 1 for simple unpowered weapons, 3 for powered weapons.
Cost: Same as the type of lightsaber crystal used.
Rarity: Same as the type of lightsaber crystal used.