So I am currently playing a Colonist Doctor and am about ready to get pressure point. However Brawl just seems so lackluster compared to Melee. It is a little disheartening. I am going to keep on because it fits the character more BUT am I missing something? It just seems like the weapons get much better toys when you get to the vibrating weapons.

Yeah, Melee is more effective than Brawl. But it's rarer for someone to steal your fists than your axe, you get to give your fists Irish fighting names, and Brass Knucks are more concealable than a Vibroknife (Shock Gloves look like regular gloves).

With Pressure Point you will be ignoring soak with your Brawl strain damage. And look at shock gloves (which are Brawl attacks). With a good brawl skill you can active Stun 3 one or more times (all avoiding soak). This can add up. It's a good attack with Aim (or double Aim) and after your teammates have passed you a few Boost dice. Some rivals are easier to take down by doing strain + pressure point becasue their strain is lower and/or their soak is high.

One problem with Brawl is closing range can get you torn up and you can get hit by ranged teammate fire once engaged. But do remember if you are engaged with the attacker ranged attacks against you add dice and if you attacked them they add a Setback die.

With Pressure Point you will be ignoring soak with your Brawl strain damage. And look at shock gloves (which are Brawl attacks). With a good brawl skill you can active Stun 3 one or more times (all avoiding soak). This can add up. It's a good attack with Aim (or double Aim) and after your teammates have passed you a few Boost dice. Some rivals are easier to take down by doing strain + pressure point becasue their strain is lower and/or their soak is high.

One problem with Brawl is closing range can get you torn up and you can get hit by ranged teammate fire once engaged. But do remember if you are engaged with the attacker ranged attacks against you upgrade and if you attacked them they add a Setback die.

You can't activate the stun on gloves more than once.

With Pressure Point you will be ignoring soak with your Brawl strain damage. And look at shock gloves (which are Brawl attacks). With a good brawl skill you can active Stun 3 one or more times (all avoiding soak). This can add up. It's a good attack with Aim (or double Aim) and after your teammates have passed you a few Boost dice. Some rivals are easier to take down by doing strain + pressure point becasue their strain is lower and/or their soak is high.

One problem with Brawl is closing range can get you torn up and you can get hit by ranged teammate fire once engaged. But do remember if you are engaged with the attacker ranged attacks against you upgrade and if you attacked them they add a Setback die.

You can't activate the stun on gloves more than once.

Didn't realize that. Still it's an effective attack. Guess I'd spend extra advantage to remove my strain from the double aim anyway.

Some places might be distrustful of someone walking in with a giant axe over their shoulder, and in a cramped hallway attacking with that giant axe will impose Setback dice for certain (not to mention on other checks like Stealth). Brawl attacks also have the Knockdown quality, and with enough Advantage results using shockgloves can bring an opponent's strain down in one or two hits. Plus, with the Tinkerer talent you can add a weighted head attachment to shockgloves and gain access to the Staggering quality (although I'm positive that the Hired Gun book will have vibro-hammers and power hammers able to make use of weighted heads as well).

Ultimately, it comes down to being descriptive. In real life Brawl attacks aren't as effective as Melee attacks, but there ARE some situations where Melee attacks aren't available, or when Brawl is just better (for instance, when Darth Vader hurled Darth Sidious to his "death" at the end of Episode VI).

Brawl-based attacks all benefit from being able to damage either Wounds or Strain at the option of the attacker.

I saw one player talking about having Shock Gloves on his Bounty Hunter (Gadgeteer). He plans to use Tinkerer on them to make them Superior and use Jury Rigged to reduce the activation cost on Stun to 1 Advantage (which Superior will provide on any hit). Combined with a high Brawn (4) and Brawl (4) and Deadly Accuracy - Melee, the guy can punch out many enemies in one hit (base Damage 9 plus Stun 3) with a weapon that is almost always available to him.

Personally, I've ruled that the Stun property can be activated more than once. Why not?

Personally, I've ruled that the Stun property can be activated more than once. Why not?

Because it's FAR too powerful. With the character I mentioned above, each Advantage becomes 3 unsoakable Strain, amking every Advantage three times as powerful as each Success.

There's also a need for a dash of realism...just a little though. If you don't use lethal measures (blasters, vibro weapons, etc) most enemies wouldn't want to die. This is a thing that most gm's forget. The enemies should want to survive above all other things. A brawl could end with a cracked rib and some bruised on both sides. A gunfight (knife-fight) ends with a death.. And that can result in revenge scenarios from loved ones or associates.

There's also a need for a dash of realism...just a little though. If you don't use lethal measures (blasters, vibro weapons, etc) most enemies wouldn't want to die. This is a thing that most gm's forget. The enemies should want to survive above all other things. A brawl could end with a cracked rib and some bruised on both sides. A gunfight (knife-fight) ends with a death.. And that can result in revenge scenarios from loved ones or associates.

Well, there's very little reason for most gunfights in Star Wars to end in death, considering that most personal weapons have a rather effective Stun Setting.

I actually didn't know that Jury-Rigger could be used to lower the activation cost of different qualities, although upon rereading it I can see that that's definitely the case (usually, players use it to add extra soak to armor or lower the crit range of a weapon, so it didn't occur to me that there were other uses). With that in mind, I'm restricting Stun to a single activation.

Lethal force is often met with lethal force, and it's hard to tell if a weapon is on stun in the middle of a fight. If you are in a barfight and someone pulls a blaster, others will probably assume it is set to kill. Also, some players still have a bit of the murder-hobo in them.

Lethal force is often met with lethal force, and it's hard to tell if a weapon is on stun in the middle of a fight. If you are in a barfight and someone pulls a blaster, others will probably assume it is set to kill. Also, some players still have a bit of the murder-hobo in them.

Stun weapons shoot blue bolts that often look like a series of rings. There's no mistaking stun vs. kill, even in the middle of a firefight. I've NEVER seen a blue blaster bolt in Star Wars that was anything but a stun or ion blast.

Lethal force is often met with lethal force, and it's hard to tell if a weapon is on stun in the middle of a fight. If you are in a barfight and someone pulls a blaster, others will probably assume it is set to kill. Also, some players still have a bit of the murder-hobo in them.

According to Wookieepedia, the discharge of a weapon on Stun Setting is visually (and possibly audibly) distinct from one on lethal setting. Of course, this only matters after a shot is taken...

Exactly.. if I'm running a game I can have the badguys move for cover and draw blasters. If a player reacts to this by drawing their blaster, or lethal weapons, and attacking with intent to kill THEY have escalated the fight, and altered how the fight could have gone.

Brawl-based attacks all benefit from being able to damage either Wounds or Strain at the option of the attacker.

I saw one player talking about having Shock Gloves on his Bounty Hunter (Gadgeteer). He plans to use Tinkerer on them to make them Superior and use Jury Rigged to reduce the activation cost on Stun to 1 Advantage (which Superior will provide on any hit). Combined with a high Brawn (4) and Brawl (4) and Deadly Accuracy - Melee, the guy can punch out many enemies in one hit (base Damage 9 plus Stun 3) with a weapon that is almost always available to him.

How do you get Shock Gloves to a 9 base damage with a 4 Brawn? (Not trying to be obtuse.)

Our marauder/doctor pretty much uses his fists exclusively. The fact you can bypass all soak and armour can knock out a tough opponent in a single blow (str 7 and a couple of levels of feral strength help)

Brawl-based attacks all benefit from being able to damage either Wounds or Strain at the option of the attacker.

I saw one player talking about having Shock Gloves on his Bounty Hunter (Gadgeteer). He plans to use Tinkerer on them to make them Superior and use Jury Rigged to reduce the activation cost on Stun to 1 Advantage (which Superior will provide on any hit). Combined with a high Brawn (4) and Brawl (4) and Deadly Accuracy - Melee, the guy can punch out many enemies in one hit (base Damage 9 plus Stun 3) with a weapon that is almost always available to him.

How do you get Shock Gloves to a 9 base damage with a 4 Brawn? (Not trying to be obtuse.)

Superior (only possible with Tinkerer giving it a Hard Point) gives +1 Damage that is added to Brawn. Deadly Accuracy - Brawl adds 4 from the ranks of Brawl skill for a total of 9. That can be Wounds or Strain, and then you can do 3 Strain with the Stun (which, with Jury Rigged, requires only 1 Advantage and, with Superior, you get a free Advantage).

Our marauder/doctor pretty much uses his fists exclusively. The fact you can bypass all soak and armour can knock out a tough opponent in a single blow (str 7 and a couple of levels of feral strength help)

Yes, Pressure Point is at or near the top of the list for easily abusive Talents.

To be fair, abusing Pressure Point requires either cross-career ranks in Brawl or access to a specialization with Brawl, namely Marauder, to be uber-effective. Also, the way I'm reading the full description from the talent chapter, ONLY the ranks in Medicine are unaffected by soak. The rest is reduced as normal; the text is there in case you don't do enough damage to bypass soak.

Hardly call it "abusing" pressure points, even in the best case scenario (said marauder) if still not as good as shooting someone the face repeatedly with an auto fire weapon.

"When making a Brawl
check against an opponent,
instead of dealing damage,
may deal equivalent strain
plus additional strain equal
to ranks of Medicine (this
ignores soak) ."

Seems like we're reading different talents.

Hardly call it "abusing" pressure points, even in the best case scenario (said marauder) if still not as good as shooting someone the face repeatedly with an auto fire weapon.

"When making a Brawl

check against an opponent,

instead of dealing damage,

may deal equivalent strain

plus additional strain equal

to ranks of Medicine (this

ignores soak) ."

Seems like we're reading different talents.

It reads to me that the additional Strain equal to the (sic.) ranks of Medicine ignore Soak, not all of the damage.

Hardly call it "abusing" pressure points, even in the best case scenario (said marauder) if still not as good as shooting someone the face repeatedly with an auto fire weapon.

"When making a Brawl

check against an opponent,

instead of dealing damage,

may deal equivalent strain

plus additional strain equal

to ranks of Medicine (this

ignores soak) ."

Seems like we're reading different talents.

It reads to me that the additional Strain equal to the (sic.) ranks of Medicine ignore Soak, not all of the damage.

This was my interpretation as well.

It seems to me if that is what was meant it would have indicated as such, in the nice clear manner that you did.