One of my players is a Trandoshan and tends more towards brawn than anything. Probably no great surprise. Anyway, she was curious about the potential for using brawn for some mechanics checks in the 'if it doesn't work, try hitting it' school of fixing things. Important to note that there isn't another player who has shown much interest in trying to fix things, so it isn't a case of taking away an Engineer's time to shine.

This is what I came up with as a starting point, any input would be appreciated. Excuse the wordy wording

Forceful Mechanic 5 or 10xp

You may use brawn for mechanics checks, and upgrade the check once per rank of Forceful Mechanic. Upgrade the difficulty of the check once for the 1st, 3rd and 5th level of difficulty and add a setback for the 2nd and 4th.

so if it is a simple check it'll be a red, for average, red, purple, setback and so on. Basically rolling a despair will result in some sort of breakage

An upgrade in difficulty in exchange for using Brawn seems reasonable, but I think it's better suited as narrative flair.

"Brute Force" is probably better than "Forceful" because in-universe "Forceful" means someone who is strong in the Force.

It's well within your power to let your players mix skills or you can rule that other skills can work.

Fix something? Average mechanics

Force the same thing together? Hard athletics.with setback.

Using brawn with mechanics average upgraded once.

If you feel it is reasonable, give him another skill or let him use another characteristic with that skill, giving the appropriate penalties.

The terms I ussually see for this is percussive mechanics or percussive maintenance.

I would still keep it on INT because it's not a factor of hitting it really hard, but of hitting it on just the right spot, at just the right angle, with just the required amount of strength.

Just a quick side-note. The "Manual Repair" starship action checks Athletics, so there's already such a thing as Brawn-based repairs

On 7/9/2020 at 7:58 PM, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

An upgrade in difficulty in exchange for using Brawn seems reasonable, but I think it's better suited as narrative flair.

"Brute Force" is probably better than "Forceful" because in-universe "Forceful" means someone who is strong in the Force.

Haha, oh my P-47

I'm sure Forceful also means what it means in the real world.

14 minutes ago, CloudyLemonade92 said:

I'm sure Forceful also means what it means in the real world.

Sure, but it carries that connotation. So someone reading that talent (e.g. me) might first read it as "talent that allows you to use the Force on Mechanics checks."

It isn't especially important, but I find clarity in language a fairly important thing, especially in this sort of game. Since it is only "skin deep" it doesn't matter as much in this case.

5 hours ago, P-47 Thunderbolt said:

"talent that allows you to use the Force on Mechanics checks."

Personally I let Force users add Force dice to any checks and use the Force pips generated as success or (but not and) advantages. I think it simulates well how Luke use the Force to fire the torpedo in that tiny hole to destroy the Death Star in the 1st movie, or how Anakin use the Force, through not conscientiously, to win podd races. Or how all Force users seems to be naturally skilled with piloting anything.

On 7/9/2020 at 11:02 PM, Rimsen said:

Using brawn with mechanics average upgraded once.

This is what I would do. Just make it a combined Mechanics/Brawn check, Upgrading a Difficulty die to a Challenge die (because sometimes when you force things, they break).

2 hours ago, WolfRider said:

Personally I let Force users add Force dice to any checks and use the Force pips generated as success or (but not and) advantages. I think it simulates well how Luke use the Force to fire the torpedo in that tiny hole to destroy the Death Star in the 1st movie, or how Anakin use the Force, through not conscientiously, to win podd races. Or how all Force users seems to be naturally skilled with piloting anything.

What do you do with all of the Enhance powers which do exactly that for specific skills?

On 7/10/2020 at 6:36 PM, angelman2 said:

Just a quick side-note. The "Manual Repair" starship action checks Athletics, so there's already such a thing as Brawn-based repairs

Oh good pick up. I hadn't noticed that

Thanks for the input everyone. Looks like I was probably over-engineering it a bit

13 hours ago, Vorzakk said:

What do you do with all of the Enhance powers which do exactly that for specific skills?

I've made this houserule because I think Enhance basic power is too restrictive. But I forgot to add it costs 2 strain per Force die used. I allow any Force user to use any Basic Force Power at this same cost if it isn't possessed.

Rather than a permanent substitution, this sort of thing strikes me as being a good candidate for a "once per session, use Brawn in place of Intellect when making a Mechanics check" talent. There are lots of those in the system already, so it isn't breaking any precedents.

5 hours ago, Garran said:

Rather than a permanent substitution, this sort of thing strikes me as being a good candidate for a "once per session, use Brawn in place of Intellect when making a Mechanics check" talent. There are lots of those in the system already, so it isn't breaking any precedents.

Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense