Darth Hater

Very nice update again. I was especially interested to read about the different types of consulars. Never heard about that before, and here I thought myself quite knowledgeable in Jedi lore... :-)

Good article, nice follow up to the saber forms one last week!

I do like the notion that BioWare is putting forward of the Consular not just being Yoda, but also being Princess Leia as a Jedi. I remember before the announced all of the classes, people were interested in the idea of a "Republic Senator/Diplomat"-type story. Then they put out Threat of Peace where you had Satele Shan drawn very similarly to Princess Leia.

It's interesting in how BioWare and Wizards of the Coast fed off each other.

You had the WoTC Star Wars edition that introduced the concept of Jedi Guardians and Jedi Consulars.

BioWare took that and added the Jedi Sentinel to the mix.

WoTC added the notion of D&D prestige classes creating all of the sub-specialties.

Then you had Obsidian incorporate the prestige classes into gameplay.

Then Bioware decides to fold the Sentinel back into two main Jedi Classes, giving the Sentinel the the Knight and giving the Shadow to the consular.

As dumb as it sounds I'd almost like to see a tabletop version of TOR using a newer rules set. I'm not sold that 4th ed D&D would be a good fit, but I'm not convinced that d20 SAGA/Pathfinder would work either. I know people tend to look at d6 as the gold standard for the SW:RPG but I'm not sure that's ideal either.

I'd say this is becouse in lore and in general teher is no Jedi Consular or Jedi Guardian. Luke wasn newer trained to be a sentinel or whatever but a Jedi Knight, as Obi-wan or Yoda, or his father was long ago...
RPG systems are always a simulation of an "imaginary realism" and such an abstraction. In "reality" jedi as individuals are different, some are better with phyiscal parts, other with analitycal thinking or social skills. All of them are to improve all of their abilities, and the ultimate goal is to learn the ways of the Force but they have differenth paths.
Ingame you have to draw saparations, and make rules to handle the differences and ways, so there comes the classes and prestige(advanced) classes. So ultimately we could say the game only has Jedi/Sith classes, with 2/2 advanced class and 4/4 extra-advanced classes ;)
I always find funny and starnge when people try to drag down movie characters to the rule systems, and say classes of them :)

But in SWTOR and simply version:
Consulars are the _smart_ jedi, knights are who likes to think with their glowsticks :)

which illustrates the futility/absurdity of trying to shoehorn them into the limitations of a class-based system in the first place. they should've made it a skill-based system so we wouldn't need to try and make everything fit into (not so) "neat" little boxes.

Funny you mention that... I've ran two Star Wars RPGs on Forums in the past, and both have used a d20 hybrid system where rather than choosing a "class", you choose skills, and eventually your class "evolves" from what you've chosen.
Been looking to do a new round of that, actually - each one has been a hit, and I keep getting emails from previous players asking if I'm running another one. :)

My biggest gripe with the d20 system has always been Out-of-Combat non-magical healing and how certain classes lose effectiveness over the course of a day while others do not. (Fighter vs. Wizard) It screws up the narrative since a typical day might be 1 or 2 combat encounters and then the party needs to rest for the rest of the day.

I can see why people don't like the class system, but I find it useful as shorthand. Having played Champions Online I've seen the problems that can arise with freeform ability systems in an Online game.

The thing with character creation is that it's usually an exercise in efficiency. You have limited resources (talent points/whatever) to create a character to perform optimally to your playstyle. Sure, you're going to want to have character quirks, hobbies, and talents but do you need to simulate them with any detail?

And to hell with story I suppose?

"However, how they handle the most iconic Star Wars archetypes could be considered the most important challenge in class design."

All I think they did was design the Assassin to be like Darth Maul, the Sorceror to be like Darth Sidious and then just mirrored that, although under the circumstances it is ironic to read Wookieepedia's line about "Palpatine's formidable lightsaber style and technique."

The notion that a Jedi or Sith could wield a saber as nothing more than a defensive tool dragged limply behind them throws away a huge opportunity to fully exploit one of the most iconic weapons in pop culture.

Although they are masters of this point in the timeline, this determination to make every AC use only one saber style for whatever reason does not help the appeal of the game to the casual fan aware only of the movies or TV show where 99% of Force users wield one blade.

but the difference is that after the rule of two, the sith dont seem to have "classes" any more, but just try to be the best at everything so they can beat their masters.

and to top it off they authorize a game trailer (the opening one at that) where the LS combatants blatantly violate their hardline rule set regarding weapon restrictions.

Who wants to bet that Friday's update is the Jedi Consular progression video? The Haters called it two weeks ago with the bounty hunter lore update.

the armor progression videos are the last friday of every month.

it would be great but as it is the third friday it's going to be a "fan" friday -.-

Great Article, I really want to be a Jedi Researcher now!