“Force Wizard” usually covers FFG SWRPG’s Force powers. Today, however, I am looking at the new Jedi Career presented in Rise of the Separatists and Collapse of the Republic.
Before Force & Destiny beta was released, I hoped for an actual Jedi Career, although I ended up pretty happy with the variety of careers and specs presented. Still, these aren’t specifically Jedi, even though they are explicitly stated to be usable (Rise, p. 124). The Jedi specs in Rise and Collapse however are designed for the Clone Wars era and probably the decades just before, such as Episode I’s timeframe. This is especially true of the Jedi General (JG) spec, although it might work in Tales of the Jedi games as well.
The one and only Jedi Signature Ability, Peerless Interception, is a dream come true for anyone who loves playing lightsaber masters. It ups your Parry and Reflect games, decreasing damage by your Parry/Reflect rank plus your Force Rating. For a PC with only the JP and JK specs, that drops an attack’s damage by another 2 or 3 points, for 2 rounds. In addition to the usual Destiny, Increase Duration, and Increase Frequency upgrades, Peerless Interception offers 3 upgrades to work with the Improved Parry/Reflect talents–inflict a critical, activate an item quality, use without spending Threat/Despair. Buying the Reduce Strain upgrade means you only take strain the first time you use Parry or Reflect in a round. So a PC with Parry 1 and Reflect 1 will take a maximum of 6 Strain for using both in a round, regardless of the number of times they reflect or parry. Now I want to play with a house rule that Peerless Interception can be taken with any lightsaber F&D spec. (Yes, it seems I do have an Inner Munchkin, after all.)
There are many new talents for Force users between the 4 Jedi specs and the Force Sensitive Outcast universal spec and I found the specs themed, for lack of a better word. Most of the Padawan talents, old and new, are clearly meant for someone who is learning new things, and is perhaps eager to show off what they’ve learned, for example. (I am not going through all these new talents here, just calling out a few here and there.) Temple Training, 25XP, and Well-Rounded, 10XP, show up along with the 5 new talents, unique to this spec–Adaptable, Beginner’s Luck, Learning Opportunity, Sincerest Flattery, Something to Prove.
Jedi Knight is the closest the Jedi career comes to a “Lightsaber Spec.” Eight of the talents are either Reflect or Parry instances or talents that affect how one or both work, such as the Improved versions and the new 25XP Guardian of the Republic, which means that an ally you protect with Reflect/Parry can’t be targeted at all for that round. That’s better than most buffs! The description of the 20XP Side By Side puts me in mind of the Order’s stand in the Battle of Geonosis,. Side by Side adds 1 Threat to combat checks against you and your lightsaber-wielding engaged allies.
Jedi General, of all the Jedi specs, drives home the Dark turn the galaxy is taking, on the personal level; being so involved in war is taking you farther from the Light. Two of the tree’s talents, the 25XP Knowledge is Power and the chillingly-named new Inspiring Kill (20XP) are auto-Conflict, which I didn’t expect. Did you? I should note, however, that you can heal Strain with Inspiring Kill by “only” inflicting a Critical, not just by killing. Still, that puts me in mind of the Harm aspects of the Heal/Harm Force power. The “Darkness clouds” not just visions, but your own path since you can’t reach the JG Dedication instance &/or the Jedi Sig Ability without buying at least Knowledge is Power.
The “theme” of the Jedi Master tree is social talents and Force talents that aid allies and/or emphasize a Master’s deeper connections to the Force. My longtime favorite, The Force Is My Ally, is one of the weaker ones here–and you should buy it if you don’t already have it from the Mystic F&D career. As is appropriate for Masters, there are a couple talents that are brand new upgrades to older, unranked talents. Supreme Center of Being, 25 XP, lets the maneuver affect ranged attacks. The other is Improved Nobody’s Fool, 10XP, letting a Master inflict strain by spending Threat/Despair from incoming social checks.
Advancing in the Jedi career can take quite a while, a whole campaign, if players want to make the whole, or most, of the journey from apprentice/Padawan to Knight or General to Master. While not quite the Quick and Easy Path to the Darkside, there are ways to speed advancement up. “The Short Path to Power” sidebar (Collapse, p. 17) offers the option, with GM permission, to spend 30 of your starting XP to purchase a second Force Rating rank (FR1 is “free” with the Jedi career), enabling a PC to take JG or JK as their starting spec. This might also work with the F&D specs, if a player plans to start with one of those and then buy into Knight/General after several sessions. Be mindful, that if this is a starting PC, you will only have 80XP at most to spend on other abilities like characteristics. This is the same cost as buying up a characteristic from 2 to 3, so probably is more “cost effective” for games which start at Heroic/Knight Level. (If your GM interprets “Starting XP” as including the additional 150XP, since the text doesn’t say whether the +1 FR counts as a characteristic.)
If your GM doesn’t allow the FR2 option (or you want to spend the 30XP elsewhere), you could start in Padawan and take the fastest route to the JP Force Rating talent (40XP for Quick Draw > Well Rounded > Sense Danger > Force Rating) and then spend the 20XP for Knight. If it’s a Heroic Level campaign, you can do this and have plenty of XP for both skills and Knight talents before the game begins. However, there are drawbacks to this route. Or, from a different point of view, there are advantages to spending more time and XP in Padawan.
Namely, that you will miss out on a number of talents, and not just the new ones only found in this tree. There are older talents like Quick Draw and Valuable Facts that also aren’t in the other Jedi specs. You can pick up ranks of some talents cheaper–the earliest instances of Parry and Reflect are on the top and second tiers of the JP tree versus second and/or third in JK or JG. Two ranks of Toughened is a total of 15XP in JP versus 25XP in JG–and it’s not in the Knight tree. Maybe it’s worth it to you, to take the fastest paths to Master and/or Peerless Interception. It may well be the right choice for the story you and your GM are telling. And or course, you can still advance in the Padawan tree later on.
Although not part of the Jedi career, we have yet another universal Force spec, the Force Sensitive Outcast. How is this one different from earlier Universal Force-user specs? Unlike the post-Order 66 specific Padawan Survivor (Dawn of Rebellion), it’s aimed at concepts for Clone Wars and earlier eras, mainly Jedi (and Sith!) apprentices who struck out on their own. Since it assumes the PC has probably either retained, replaced, or even stole a ‘saber, Outcast has a number of melee/lightsaber talents in addition to the Uncanny Reactions/Senses and Sense Emotions familiar from the Exile and Emergent specs. The new Renegade Form talent, analogous to talents in the F&D lightsaber specs, allows the Outcast to pick a characteristic to substitute for Brawn when using the Lightsaber skill.
Finally, some advice about the Jedi Council and Code. Clone Wars is the first official FFGSW setting where there is an active Jedi Council. Although not really covered in the two sourcebooks, this is something to be mindful of when the Conflict/Morality system is used with Rise and Collapse. Why? The GM might want to consider Council oversight when using this system. Keith Kappel, in an interview he did with me, suggested that in eras where there’s an active Jedi Order/Council, doing things that aren’t actually evil or wrong but violate the Jedi Code, may also be grounds for giving Conflict. The classic example is, of course, Love:
“[T]he Jedi of that era consider [Love] forbidden. So when a Jedi does it anyway, it requires being dishonest with allies and the Council, and generates a lot of guilt and other emotions and feelings. So I might add that to the Conflict generation chart to give it more of a feeling of that era.”
I can see this applying to many other Code violations or acting against the Council’s orders and rulings as well. For Keith’s full thoughts on the Jedi Code/Council and Conflict/Morality, see question 4 of this Interrogation Droid.
There’s so much material in these two books for creating a Prequel Era Jedi PC–or one from an earlier era, such as Tales of the Jedi or the video game-inspired KotOR and Old Republic settings. I’ve only touched on some of the things that stood out to me. May the Force be with you always!
Force Wizard Index (Book/s)
Alter (Unlimited Power)
Battle Meditation (F&D)
Bind (F&D, Rise of the Separatists)
Conjure (Unlimited Power)
Ebb/Flow (Disciples of Harmony)
Endure (Knights of Fate)
Enhance (AoR, F&D, Rise of the Separatists)
Farsight (Savage Spirits)
Foresee (AoR, F&D)
Heal/Harm (F&D)
Imbue (Disciples of Harmony)
Influence (EotE, F&D)
Jerserra’s Influence (Ghosts of Dathomir)
Manipulate (Endless Vigil)
Misdirect (F&D)
Move (AoR, EotE, F&D)
Protect / Unleash (F&D) – Part 1 (Intro & Protect) and Part 2 (Unleash)
Seek (F&D)
Sense (EotE, F&D)
Suppress (Keeping the Peace)
Warde’s Foresight (Chronicles of the Gatekeeper)
Linda Whitson
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