I was wondering if there is anywhere in the cannon that makes this possible. Last night we had someone get crit and lose a limb, and we could have got him immiediate medical attention but were told the medical technology is not there in Star wars so we didn't bother.

Then we started wondering if there were any cases of this being done anywhere in star wars canon.

I figure if they can clone and grow an entire body, why couldn't they regrow a single limb on someone?

If they can interface cybernetic limbs, reattaching viable organic ones is basically the same process but more work. If I were GM i would allow it and give him some sort of setback dice for a period of time when using that limb in any task

Tricky call...

I checked the wookieepedia on this one: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cloning

I believe this is the answer about cloning anything:

"With the rise of the Galactic Empire, there were strict laws placed on cloning technology to prevent anti-Imperial factions from breeding their own army of clones, which then led to the Empire's attempts at seizing the technology from other civilizations."

So basically, the technology does exist. it is just outlawed; thus making cybernetic limbs cheaper to come by because cloning machines are illegal.

Limb re-attachment doesn't need to have anything to do with cloning... it's possible now, as long as certain criteria are met (i.e., within a certain time frame, the limb being in good condition, etc.). I'd say that bacta would make this procedure even more successful, and probably give much better functionality & lower recovery time than replantation does in real life.

I wouldn't allow limb re-attachment, and would give a reason such as suggested above. Why? If they could regrow a limb, why did Darth Vader not get 4 new limbs? Why did he previously, as Annikin, not get a new hand? Why did Luke not get a new hand? All of them ended up with robotics. Either the technology was not there (cloning was illegal and/or not known yet in the early cases) or the robotics were much more exceptional and/or cheaper to forego even desiring a real limb.

If you allow regrown limbs, you end up with something less then Star Wars. The rare critical loss of limb should be an opportunity to add some Star Wars cybernetic limb goodness.

My guess for that would be because his limbs were cut off and fell into a lava pit so they didnt exist anymore to reattach. Not to mention limb reattachment is a "time is of the essence" type thing, and annakin was not gotten to fast enough.

My guess for that would be because his limbs were cut off and fell into a lava pit so they didnt exist anymore to reattach. Not to mention limb reattachment is a "time is of the essence" type thing, and annakin was not gotten to fast enough.

Ok, but your original post said this....

I figure if they can clone and grow an entire body, why couldn't they regrow a single limb on someone?

My guess for that would be because his limbs were cut off and fell into a lava pit so they didnt exist anymore to reattach. Not to mention limb reattachment is a "time is of the essence" type thing, and annakin was not gotten to fast enough.

Ok, but your original post said this....

I figure if they can clone and grow an entire body, why couldn't they regrow a single limb on someone?

I wouldn't allow limb re-attachment, and would give a reason such as suggested above. Why? If they could regrow a limb, why did Darth Vader not get 4 new limbs? Why did he previously, as Annikin, not get a new hand? Why did Luke not get a new hand? All of them ended up with robotics. Either the technology was not there (cloning was illegal and/or not known yet in the early cases) or the robotics were much more exceptional and/or cheaper to forego even desiring a real limb.

Actually, with both Skywalkers, their limbs were instantly burned and cauterized (and probably partly incinerated). This means any nerve and muscle tissues at the ends of he cuts were destroyed and damaged to the point they wouldn't be able to match up to anything corresponding.(Especially if a centimeter or so was also missing)

But this post (and swheelock's response) also made me remember another thing; technological advancement is not linear.

Mass Effect actually focused on this; when civilizations found the Reapers' technology, their technology advanced, but only on a certain path. In Star Wars, it was the Rakata that created Hyperspace technology using Force-enabled drives and the Duros and Corellians reverse engineered it into technological versions. So who knows the extent that sort of leap-frogging can have? (other than what we see in the setting)

Also, the wookieepedia entry on cloning references that even with all the cloning that happened in the galaxy, it wasn't always perfect. For example:

99 was a defective clone of Jango Fett http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/99

Dorsk 81 & 82 were defective Khommite that had force sensitivity. The entire Khommite race was nothing but clones, they never reproduced in any form other than cloning. Not sure about Dorsk 83, but 1-80 were not force sensitive.

So if you have technology that can replicate a hand, is easier to attach and maintain than a real hand, and likely harder to damage; it only makes sense to use that as a prosthetic.

If you don't want easy limb-replacement via cloning in your campaign, but you're okay with replantation of original parts, then it's a pretty easy thing to get around as a GM. In our world, organ and limb transplantation requires loads of anti-rejection drugs and often fails. In SW, you could say that cybernetics are so advanced that anti-rejection drugs aren't necessary, and never fail, so it's the preferred method of replacing a limb. Or else rule that, for whatever reason, there aren't any anti-rejection drugs, and for some reason, using cloned parts doesn't work at all (while saving your own hand/eye/tooth does). This makes cybernetics the only option if the original limb isn't available (perhaps it's fallen into a gas giant somehow).

If you don't want easy limb-replacement via cloning in your campaign, but you're okay with replantation of original parts, then it's a pretty easy thing to get around as a GM. In our world, organ and limb transplantation requires loads of anti-rejection drugs and often fails. In SW, you could say that cybernetics are so advanced that anti-rejection drugs aren't necessary, and never fail, so it's the preferred method of replacing a limb. Or else rule that, for whatever reason, there aren't any anti-rejection drugs, and for some reason, using cloned parts doesn't work at all (while saving your own hand/eye/tooth does). This makes cybernetics the only option if the original limb isn't available (perhaps it's fallen into a gas giant somehow).

On the topic of using cloned limbs to replace a 'lost' appendage...

Q: How long does it take to grow a spare arm for an 18 year-old human?

A: Roughly 18 years. (See the problem?)

Q: Can it be sped up like the clones which were grown to be physically 20 years-old in about 10 years?

A: Sure, now you only have to wait for roughly 9 years for your replacement limb. And when you're 40, your limb will be 62. When you're 60, your limb will be 102. (See the problem?)

Q: Ok, you've grown and harvested the appendage for replacement. Now, what do you do with the *rest* of the clone?

A1: Divvy it up like a fresh corpse for transplants? (How does the galaxy at large feel about such arrangements? What happens when your clone resists before the surgery, or escapes?)

A2: Toss it in a dumpster across town, and watch as the cops swarm the area, and declare you dead; at which point you lose access to all your accounts, and your possessions (including the ship?) are auctioned off to pay our outstanding debts?

If you actually *have* the original appendage, then sure, you ought to be able to reattach it (at least sometimes). Otherwise, you're looking at *years* of waiting to get a suitable replacement grown for you. Compare that to the few days or a week you might have to wait to get a cybernetic prosthetic delivered and attached.

Q: Can it be sped up like the clones which were grown to be physically 20 years-old in about 10 years?

A: Sure, now you only have to wait for roughly 9 years for your replacement limb. And when you're 40, your limb will be 62. When you're 60, your limb will be 102. (See the problem?)

You wouldn't be upsetting any canon that I know of by saying you can speed up the process even more. You wouldn't have wanted your clone warriors to age at x10 rate since you would have less time to train them (in 2 years they are 20) and less time to enjoy them on the battlefield (in 3 more years they are 50). But for limbs and organs, it wouldn't matter at all. Unless of course the limb keeps aging at an accelerated rate even when pulled out of the vat and attached to the player. That could be cool. You don't want your players to use cloned parts, but cybernetics? You let them get a cloned arm in a fraudulent black lab. Later, they notice their arm is starting to quickly age and wrinkle....

Q: Ok, you've grown and harvested the appendage for replacement. Now, what do you do with the *rest* of the clone?

A1: Divvy it up like a fresh corpse for transplants? (How does the galaxy at large feel about such arrangements? What happens when your clone resists before the surgery, or escapes?)

A2: Toss it in a dumpster across town, and watch as the cops swarm the area, and declare you dead; at which point you lose access to all your accounts, and your possessions (including the ship?) are auctioned off to pay our outstanding debts?

First, this sounds like yet another good reason this is not done and cybernetics are more common - the ethical reasons.

Second, if you do allow such in black labs someplace, it could make for a cool adventure. You could call it, "The Planet" (a reference to the movie The Island ).

Q: Can it be sped up like the clones which were grown to be physically 20 years-old in about 10 years?

A: Sure, now you only have to wait for roughly 9 years for your replacement limb. And when you're 40, your limb will be 62. When you're 60, your limb will be 102. (See the problem?)

You wouldn't be upsetting any canon that I know of by saying you can speed up the process even more. You wouldn't have wanted your clone warriors to age at x10 rate since you would have less time to train them (in 2 years they are 20) and less time to enjoy them on the battlefield (in 3 more years they are 50). But for limbs and organs, it wouldn't matter at all. Unless of course the limb keeps aging at an accelerated rate even when pulled out of the vat and attached to the player. That could be cool. You don't want your players to use cloned parts, but cybernetics? You let them get a cloned arm in a fraudulent black lab. Later, they notice their arm is starting to quickly age and wrinkle....

No argument that it may not be possible to speed it up even more, but that makes the end result of the accelerated aging even more pronounced. Since the modifications to do the accelerated aging seem to be genetic, rather than environmental, there's no reason to suspect that the increased rate of aging would slow down once it was severed from the cloned host. (The clones themselves didn't suddenly start aging at the normal rate once they were 'decanted'.) If you speed up the time to get a 20 year-old arm to a week or so (to make it competitive with cybernetics), the thing is going to age at a rate of 20+ years per week, so by the end of the month, it would be 100+ years old.

Q: Ok, you've grown and harvested the appendage for replacement. Now, what do you do with the *rest* of the clone?

A1: Divvy it up like a fresh corpse for transplants? (How does the galaxy at large feel about such arrangements? What happens when your clone resists before the surgery, or escapes?)

A2: Toss it in a dumpster across town, and watch as the cops swarm the area, and declare you dead; at which point you lose access to all your accounts, and your possessions (including the ship?) are auctioned off to pay our outstanding debts?

First, this sounds like yet another good reason this is not done and cybernetics are more common - the ethical reasons.

Second, if you do allow such in black labs someplace, it could make for a cool adventure. You could call it, "The Planet" (a reference to the movie The Island ).

Hmm. Talk about an interesting way to introduce a party to one another...

Your character happens to be friends with a medical clone of a particularly accident prone individual, and they've cycled through clones of this fellow at all of their facilities, and needed to prep another, so they decant another copy of him, but due to a records glitch they place him in a 'pod' where he had already existed.

"Your rodian friend Joe won the lottery last year, but you just ran into him in the hall. Strangely, he didn't recognize you, and now the security staff are treating you strangely. A couple of your other friends have noticed the same thing, and yesterday one of *them* didn't recognize you anymore either."

The "ethics" bit about simply growing cloned body parts is probably one worth considering.

The galaxy is probably still reeling from the shake-ups caused by the Clone Wars, with the Clone Troopers carrying a number of unpalatable connotations seeing as how it was the Clone Troopers' victory that lead to the formation of the Galactic Empire, with those same Clone Troopers becoming the Imperial Stormtrooper, an iconic and feared representation of the Empire's might.

If you've read the MedStar duology (set during the Clone Wars and centered around a M.A.S.H.-type field hospital), there's some pretty unsettling revelations regarding how Clone Trooper injuries, particularly "replacement body parts" was handled. it could be that enough Republic field surgeons that worked in these places got the word out, and the galactic populace suddenly took a very dim view to using cloning for replacement body parts when the far less disturbing option of cybernetics was out there. There's still some bias against those with cybernetics (particularly of the obvious variety), but it's less of a moral quandary for the recipient than having clone replacement parts grown for you.

On the subject of cloning replacement limbs, a thought occurred to me: while Luke didn't have a new hand cloned for him, Luke was cloned with his severed hand .

A few people have brought up very interesting points about the ethics and (in-universe) morality associations with the idea of cloning body parts. I know it's already been mentioned, but one of the most unsettling things about the MedStar duology is the fact that clones who were deemed to have been "too far gone" were "euthenized" and immediately harvested for replacement parts. I spent some time doing casualty evacuation in Afghanistan- the sort of thing where you'd pick up seriously wounded soldiers and try to get them to a field hospital within an hour. The thought that someone, even in Star Wars, would determine that a wounded soldier's life was simply not worth saving never sat well with me. Perhaps there's something to be said about how far "gone" the Republic and by extension, the Jedi were at that point. Assuming you acknowledge EU sources, of course.

That said, if you have a mature group, you could introduce these ideas and moral/ethical quandries for excellent roleplaying opportunities. Your character has an opportunity to have a new arm grown for him, (technical issues aside, for the moment) but the character finds out either before or during the process that it would require a living, breathing being to be killed or maimed in order to harvest the arm. What does your character do? What if by the time this is discovered, the clone is already very much alive and self-aware?

Or maybe, just maybe, you've found someone whose cloning technology has advanced to the point where an individual arm can be grown in a relatively short period of time, but such technology is already extremely illegal in the Empire. How do you know it's not a sting operation? How do you know it's going to work? How do you pay for it?

Reattaching your own limbs is different, obviously, and probably wouldn't be difficult if you could get the person to a vat of bacta within a fairly short period of time- provided that the limb was recovered and still in good enough condition to be reattached. On the Outer Rim, those are very big 'ifs.' Most war-wounds are not conducive to reattaching limbs.

So while I personally would probably avoid the idea of cloning on technological grounds, I think there are definitely some very promising adventure hooks to be found in the subject, assuming your group is abe to deal with the subject maturely.

The wookieepedia entry for cybernetics has some info about why its more popular than cloning and such.

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Cybernetics

I also looked at the wikipedia entry for replantation.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Replantation

The only way bacta would really help would be with the recovery of getting a limb reattached.

With the way fights go in my games I just don't see how a limb would be recoverable. Especially in the fringe areas they are fighting in. I doubt any of the places there would have medical facilities capable of reattaching a limb.

Perhaps there's something to be said about how far "gone" the Republic and by extension, the Jedi were at that point. Assuming you acknowledge EU sources, of course.

Just the use of the clones, even if you limit yourself to the movies, kinda makes the Republic look pretty far "gone" to me. What you're talking about makes it look even worse. As to the Jedi, even going along with it looks pretty bad, though at the point that the war was really going, maybe they didn't have much choice, but that feels like apologism.

On the actual topic, ultimately, I think that cybernetics instead of clone-transplant just feels more like Star Wars , and that justifies the mental gymnastics to get us there, though I don't know that it really takes much in the way of mental gymnastics because a lot of what people are suggesting already makes sense.

To return to the OP's initial question: There's no reason why it shouldn't be possible to re-attach a severed limb. This is a medical procedure that is frequently undertaken in our world today (with varying degrees of success), so the SW universe would certainly have the technology and know-how.

Of course, the same conditions would apply as in the real world. The cut would have to be recent, with no necrosis setting in. The edges would have to be fairly smooth and even, with no cauterization. And even with bacta treatments there's no guarantee it would ever work perfectly again (something to consider when the surgeon rolls some Threat).

But yes, it's certainly doable.

I was wondering if there is anywhere in the cannon that makes this possible. Last night we had someone get crit and lose a limb, and we could have got him immiediate medical attention but were told the medical technology is not there in Star wars so we didn't bother.

Then we started wondering if there were any cases of this being done anywhere in star wars canon.

I figure if they can clone and grow an entire body, why couldn't they regrow a single limb on someone?

I'd allow reattachment, but it depends on how it was lost.

I'd limit it to sword, or axe work. Not light sabers, blasters or thermal detonators.