TheSagaContinues

Note to self: lectrotickers aren't consumable. Also, heavy assault blaster rifle with a sniper switch.

Making some updates--Zombre over on Discord pointed out that the Wayfarer can explicitly carry two Gargantuan or smaller fighters, so there goes the pocket carrier idea.

Tion Jher: I appreciate the kind feedback! Regarding your points below:

A few things, I agree with you on the Vehicle Focus being amazing. Too bad I have a GM that has a very conservative approach to when Take 10/20 can be used. Meaning aspects during combat, he would never allow because he believes chance should always be a factor. So half of the Talent’s benefit would be lost. Lol

I'd definitely ask him what he thinks "otherwise unable to" means.

I was wondering why you had Elusive Dogfighter so high, then I looked at your explanation and it cleared some things up. From what I gathered Elusive Dogfighter makes it so people within your dogfight after you succeed in getting the dogfight they take a -10 instead of -5. Now that doesn’t apply to so much affect the enemy pilot because if they lose the dogfight they can’t attack anyway. What it effects is, if an enemy ship has gunners in it. Those would get -10 effect. So most Starfighters don’t have gunners so it would only affect other Transports that also have combat thrusters or the few Starfighters that have gunners.

Elusive Dogfighter specifically only effects enemy pilots, not gunners. So I'm still not totally sure what it does, but I think it basically means that succeeding on a dogfight check on your turn inflicts a -10 to hit. I might move this one to green.

3. I feel like Hyperdriven should be light blue or even gold. Yes, it only has one use per day, and lower levels it’s not great but currently I’m playing a game where I’m lv10. Being able to add 10 to a single devastating Hit, after I know I’ve gotten past the Ref. Def. can really change the outcome of an encounter. Or change the outcome of one of those clutch moments. If anything Hyperdriven has a lot of utility. Being able to save your ass after a flummox roll or putting the cherry on top of a good starship maneuver usage it’s very great.

The primary reason it's blue is that you're probably not already in Scoundrel due to it mostly having good-but-not-amazing talents. So this costs you a point of BAB, among other things.

4. Last thing, for your starship modifications I believe you have Jamming Array and Suite reversed. Suite is the one that cost 1 EP. Also thank you for making me second guess Jamming Suite.

Sure did! Thanks for the heads-up; I've corrected.

So there's a Saga Edition podcast releasing Tuesdays, and they just interviewed Rodney Thompson. Link is here: https://play.acast.com/s/62a7fa5e7a90a80012470c50/62fc59febca23500123a62c0

There is no official answer.

My comments are every bit as valid as yours.  Objective truth is that the game is set up with +5 steps for skills as is apparent everywhere and which is why Skill Focus as a fixed +5 is intended to work.

The second part of your comment disproves the first. The skill DC setups listed on the charts referenced do not all use uniform +5 steps. This is apparent on simply reading them.

In fact, you've more or less spent this entire thread ignoring the actual numbers listed on those tables and the implications thereof--which is the entire point of the post. Those are the numbers the game is balanced around.

That's because I do see the issues that are.

There's a wide gulf of difference between "easy" and "impossible to fail." If you don't see the gaping design issue there, I don't think there's any point in me continuing the conversation.

If you see Skill vs. Defense as a "bug" then altering Skill Focus doesn't change a thing with it. Skill Focus may amplify the issue with SvD but it is not the root cause of it so altering it to +1/2 level just nerfs it at low levels and unnecessarily amps it up at higher levels.  None of that is an issue.

Considering that skill modifiers with it are too high at low level and too low at high level, that is exactly the issue and exactly the correct resolution. Again, see the math above.

When looking at SvD just the starting +5 boost for skill training is enough to make that "attack" against a defense score much more effective than any weapon attack would be.  Focus makes it worse but it's not the total problem.  At higher levels just having a skill trained starts to fall behind when checked against Defense scores; Focus helps but shouldn't be totally necessary.

The Skill Attack Modifier is a whole system "fix" to SvD that uses a modifier similar to that of a full BAB which can then go up +1/level and keep pace with those heroic defense scores that also go up +1/level.

The actual fix trades a slightly-too-high modifier for a level or two for balanced play across all other levels, which is something that SAM can't offer. It's also a much simpler house rule that doesn't add an overly-complex system, so it's inherently better anyway. And again: SAM doesn't do anything to address the fact that skill modifiers at level 1 are too high even when not rolling against defenses, which the actual fix does. So all in all, it fails in comparison and doesn't even support the weight of the mechanics it's adding.