In terms of gaming, Tabletop or otherwise, should Star Wars lightsabers be gravely threatening or treated as no more than a regular (maybe powerful) weapon?
in a D&D like game, where a character’s health increases, a lightsaber becomes less and less threatening. Is that good or bad?
Or would you rather use a system where your health doesn’t increase and a lightsaber retains its deadliness (like Chaosium’s BRP System) #ttrpg #dnd #dnd5e #brp
@DMDan I think there's a balance. In terms of any physical damage, light saber hits should always dismember or kill. Stronger characters may survive more dismemberment, but most of their survivability should come from using the force to dodge/deflect (if all Jedis otherwise some sort of bonus from combat to dodge.) I am not fond of dramatically increasing HP, and would prefer a hit negation system of say 1-3 hits can be negated (this is sort of how the force works with its future sense.)
@motbackwards that’s why I’ve been thinking the basic roleplaying system might work well with Star Wars. Your Hp doesn’t increase, just your skills
@DMDan BRP should work fine.
Imo light saber combat should look something like:
Predict (aka Initiative) -> Test Strike (vs skill):
A. -> Hit (injury) -> Finisher/Escape
B. -> Dodge/Deflect (consume stamina, HP, force, whatever you want to call it) -> Repeat
C. -> Reversal -> A or B
Such that really only equals would ever need to drain each other's "HP" (A corresponding to a success, B a partial, and C a failure.)