Star Wars SAGA: Armor user don't seem to get much.

[HamHam]

I just started playing a Soldier and other than the Armor Specialist talent tree (which is pretty badly designed to begin with) there is seems to be almost nothing that will let me do cool stuff with armor. None of the splat books seem to have anything either. Are there any official feats or talents that leverage armor out there that I missed, or perhaps some homebrewed ones people know of?

[Bharg]

Err... what do you want to do with armor?

[Binks]

Scum and Villainy will let you mod your armor with some cool toys (weapon mounts, vacuumproofing, etc). The Clone Wars Campaign guide has a number of talents for Elite Troopers based around armor too. The Grand Army of the Republic training feat is nice if you can get it (Clone Wars), and the KOTOR campaign guide (one of the hardest to get, mind you) has some fun templates for armor.

Beyond that, what is it you want to do with the armor?

[Bharg]

Armor boosts Defenses pretty good, I guess...

[Starbuck_II]

I just started playing a Soldier and other than the Armor Specialist talent tree (which is pretty badly designed to begin with) there is seems to be almost nothing that will let me do cool stuff with armor. None of the splat books seem to have anything either. Are there any official feats or talents that leverage armor out there that I missed, or perhaps some homebrewed ones people know of?

I like the Jedi tradition that uses armor. They can embue it to get more bonus.

[Jarveiyan]

You mean the Jensaarai?

[Ranos]

Then again, that seems pretty in-universe for star wars. All those stormtroopers who got their elite armor pierced by one blaster shot would agree with me, if they weren't dead.

[IdleMuse]

Yeah, I'm just here to second the Clone Wars book as the most useful splatbook for armour users.

[Starbuck_II]

You mean the Jensaarai?

Correct, last time I played that was my character: Soldier 1/Jedi X
Was a lot of fun.

[urodivoi]

I don't know - I played a soldier in our campaign a couple of years ago & my AC was tons higher then the other players. I would stand in the middle of a fire fight to draw fire while the rest of the party took cover... of course I was pretty optimised for that. I had a jet pack & life support too which came in handy occasionally, but I don't know what books they came from (or if they were converted over the earlier edition.)

[The Big Dice]

Correct, last time I played that was my character: Soldier 1/Jedi X
Was a lot of fun.

Soldier 4 / Jedi X is better. That way you can get to add your full armour bonus to your Ref Defense. Otherwise you reach a point where your level based bonuses outstrip your gear and talent based ones.

[HamHam]

The Clone Wars Campaign guide has a number of talents for Elite Troopers based around armor too.

All I see are Melee Specialist and Republic Commando, neither of which has anything to do with armor.

Beyond that, what is it you want to do with the armor?

I'm not sure exactly. Specifically, I've got a Creation destiny based on my armor but right now can't find anything that I could even apply the fulfillment bonus to (using a FP twice in a round when using the created object).

In general though, weapons get a lot of feats to do specific tricks with them, but armor doesn't.

So, brainstorming time I guess. Any comments on the power level of the following would be helpful:

Armor Specialist Talent

While wearing armor you are proficient with, when you would take damage from an attack, you may spend a force point to increase your DR by the armor's armor bonus when calculating damage from that attack.


Feat

Armored Cover

Once per encounter, as a reaction, if you are wearing armor you are proficient with, you are treated as having cover.

[IdleMuse]

Ah, okay, I see more the kind of stuff that you want now;

Try having a peek through the Legacy Era book if you can get hold of it; Armored Guard is a nice Soldier talent for use with armor, and the Knight's Armor talent tree for Imperial Knight does pretty much exactly the kind of stuff you're trying to do above. If you aren't doing the kind of stuff which will let you qualify for Imperial Knight, try asking your GM for story-based access to that talent tree instead.

There's a Mandalorian (KOTOR CG) talent that works okay with armour, if you're an Elite Trooper.

Regards feats, there's really only one that I can find that deals decently with armour, the above-mentioned Grand Army of the Republic Training from Clone Wars CG.

[HamHam]

Ah, okay, I see more the kind of stuff that you want now;

Try having a peek through the Legacy Era book if you can get hold of it; Armored Guard is a nice Soldier talent for use with armor, and the Knight's Armor talent tree for Imperial Knight does pretty much exactly the kind of stuff you're trying to do above. If you aren't doing the kind of stuff which will let you qualify for Imperial Knight, try asking your GM for story-based access to that talent tree instead.

Thanks a lot! This is actually exactly what I want! My god, it even has something more or less exactly like what I came up with except more broken because it applies for the entire encounter. It's like an even better version of the DR 10 talent.

Okay, so I just need to get my DM to let me fold it into Elite Trooper and reflavor it, replacing "imbuing the armor with the Force" with "because Mandalorians are Awesome".