Hi there,

After a good few years my group is about to encounter full of force using badasses! Now the biggest, hardest PC is a Commando with Brawn 6, Soak of 9, 23 WT and a love for knives! As GM, im wondering how to challenge but not murder him easily and it seems a decent lightsabre wielding baddie could end this PC pretty quickly. With a sabre with Crit 1; all i need is to do 1 would damage (which is pretty easy) and roll a tonne of advantage to give this guy a +loads critical roll and make his day sad.

Am i connect here?

Also, the opposite applied. In a fight against two force users with LS, the movies have long exchanges of blows, whereas the rules seem to have one strike and death by critical roll (thats with soak, parry/deflect et al reducing the damage) - ie a parry 5 talent can take 7 off the damage, soak 5 makes a 12 reduction but all i need is 1 wound and its +**** loads critical.

What am i missing?

Thanks in advance!

Don't bring knives to a Lightsaber fight.
Lightsabers should be deadly. You didn't miss anything.

If I'd try to keep them alive, I either woulnd't throw LS user against them or I'd use disarm, or other non-lethal ways.

Also, you could see those bad-*** duelling scenes that last for minutes as simply narrative. Just once every so often in the attack-parry-attack-parry-attack-parry duels can one open up an opportunity i which that one combat check represents a long exchange of nothing, followed by that one strike to pierce the defenses, one blow to that breaks free from the mold of the attack-parry-attack-parry-attack-parry duel.

Have the players roll their combat check, and if they hit (once, presumably), don't describe this as you strike and hit. Make it a mad dash from one end of the room to the other, as the opponent frantically bashes his lightsaber into that of the PC. Then, when the PC blocks that one last, deparate blow from the enemy, he batters the opponent's lightsaber aside and uses the opening in their guard to get a piercing strike through their shoulder.

(One combat check for 12 damage and a crit indicating a limb hit, for example.)

7 hours ago, mwknowles said:

With a sabre with Crit 1; all i need is to do 1 would damage (which is pretty easy) and roll a tonne of advantage to give this guy a +loads critical roll and make his day sad.

To be pedantic...all you have to do is hit, since Breach gets through all the PC's Soak.

For this game to have any hope of reflecting the movies, a muggle would have to have tons of defensive options (Dodge, etc) and several ranks in Parry. Force wielders would add to that Sense turned up high.

Just going to echo @Xcapobl 's post. This system does not encourage the "one attack = one strike" mentality that's prominent in D&D and other games. Particularly in lightsaber duels but also blaster fights, each combat check by a character can incorporate a number of individual actions. One attack with a lightsaber can be a flurry of blows that the opponent parries...until the last hit slips past their defenses on a success. A healthy dose of narrative flavour helps pad out fights that are a lot shorter and deadlier in this system.

In our death trooper commando game, we murdered the last jedi we encountered in 1 round. Nothing better than a heavy riffle to stop a threat.

Something also to consider is that a round is about a minute long, and as other people have said, a combat check is not a single attack. A five minute lightsaber duel where they are moving around the room could be 5 rounds of:
Player: I attack with my lightsaber, then take a move away.
GM: He moves to engage, then attacks with his lightsaber.
Player: I attack with my lightsaber, then take a move away...
(You get the idea. This for 5 rounds)
...GM: He moves to engage, then attacks with his lightsaber, doing a crit for 103 and cutting off your arm.

I could be wrong, but my understanding is you get to inflict one crit per attack (assuming you have the advantages). I don’t think you can score a hit with a Lightsaber, score 6 advantages and inflict 6 crits, with the last one at +50 on the roll. Even so, Breach and all the other Lightsaber mods and talents make them plenty deadly.

18 minutes ago, Mike J said:

I could be wrong, but my understanding is you get to inflict one crit per attack (assuming you have the advantages). I don’t think you can score a hit with a Lightsaber, score 6 advantages and inflict 6 crits, with the last one at +50 on the roll. Even so, Breach and all the other Lightsaber mods and talents make them plenty deadly.

You don't inflict 6 crits, but you can trigger the critical rating again to add +10 to the result, meaning you end up adding +50 to thertoll. AoR CRB page 171:

Quote

...a character can only generate one Critical roll per hit on a target. However, if the roll generates enough [ADVANTAGE] to trigger the critical rating of the weapon multiple times, the character can choose to add +10 to the Critical Injury roll for each subsequent trigger.