The Jedi Marksman
And now for something completely different. With this build, I wanted to do several things that I rarely, if ever, do. First, rather than using lightsabers, melee weapons, or even blaster pistols, I used rifles and heavy weapons, switching between the two whenever I felt like it. Second, instead of using robes when I became a Jedi, I stuck with armor the whole playthrough, boosting my defense but limiting the number of force powers I could use. Third, I became a Sentinel for my Jedi class (I almost always go Guardian or Consular). Finally, skills were a notable part of this build, though not the primary focus.
The basic battle plan for the Jedi Marksman has you blasting enemies with Rapid Shot from the rear while your other two party members handle the frontlines. You’ll also want to cast any defensive force powers as necessary. Simple enough, but it can be quite engaging.
Class: Scout -> Sentinel. Both Soldier and Scout offer some nice free feats as well as plenty of feats on levelups, but Scout has better class skills (for this build’s purposes, anyway), better saving throws, and more skill points. You’ll want to be in this class all the way to level 8. As for your Jedi class, like I said earlier, I went with Sentinel for the sake of doing something different, but it also complements the build nicely by having the best saving throws and most skill points of any Jedi class as well as some nice immunities.
Alignment: Light Side. The Jedi Marksman isn’t particularly adept with the force, so you may as well go with the buffing powers of the light side rather than watching enemies constantly resist your dark side offensive force powers.
Teammates: Ordinarily, I’d go with Bastila and Juhani, but this time, I thought I’d switch things up a little and go with Zaalbar and Juhani. With Juhani, just make sure she gets Master Power Attack, Master Speed, and a Double-Bladed Lightsaber and she’s set. With Zaalbar, make sure he gets Master Flurry and the best double-bladed melee weapon you can find. I also recommend keeping his Awareness skill maxed out. Since I’d usually explore by controlling him (thus putting him in the lead), he had to be the one to spot the mines for my main character to disarm. If you want more details on how to develop these party members, this guide has good builds for both of them.
A note for the earlygame: Since this character will obviously be hanging in back, I recommend having Carth use a melee weapon and take care of the frontlines. You’ll want to swap him out for more capable frontliners as soon as you can though.
Attributes
STR:8 DEX:16 CON:14 INT:14 WIS:14 CHA:10
That’s what you’ll want your starting stats to look like. Put whatever attribute points you get on levelups into Dexterity. Seeing as it factors into both your defense and your accuracy with ranged weapons, it’ll be your primary attribute. You’ll also want good Constitution and Intelligence for a good pool of health and skill points respectively. Finally, investing the remainder into Wisdom and Charisma will give you some more force points to work with. Since this is a ranged weapon build, Strength is useless.
Skills
Treat Injury: Until you become a Jedi, medpacs will be your only means of healing, and even after you do, your force point pool will be rather small, limiting the amount of times you can use Cure/Heal. Thus, being able to heal more with each medpac is pretty useful, though I would give this skill the least priority out of all the ones you’re using.
Demolitions: Recovering mines and selling them is a nice way to earn some cash. Also, this build does terribly against the final boss, so planting a shit ton of mines is an effective way of dealing with him.
Computer Use: Lets you use less computer spikes when hacking, can’t really complain there.
Repair: It’s nice being able to repair HK-47 (though unfortunately he doesn’t make a good party member to use with this build), and repairing droids to use in combat is a nice way to spice battles up.
Important Note: As a Scout, you’ll be able to max out all four of these skills with each level and still have leftover points. Save them. Once you become a Sentinel, you won’t be getting as many skill points, at which point the stockpile you’ve built up will start coming into play.
Feats
Listed in order of priority. All should be maxed out except Heavy Weapons Proficiency.
Heavy Weapons Proficiency: Like I said, this build uses heavy weapons, and you need this feat to use heavy weapons, so…
Heavy Armor Proficiency: Even with high Dexterity builds, I prefer to use heavy armor, and you’ll have a feat to spare for this, so I went ahead and picked this up.
Rapid Shot: It’s superior to its rivals (Power Blast and Sniper Shot) and great for boosting damage output. Easily one of the best feats for this build.
Toughness: Extra health never hurts.
Conditioning: You’re gonna have great saving throws, and this will boost them even further.
Force Powers
Listed in order of priority. All of them should be maxed out unless indicated otherwise.
Affect/Dominate Mind: As you might’ve noticed in the Skills section, this build doesn’t use Persuade. Thus, you’ll want to pick this up so you can persuade others a little more… “directly”.
Cure/Heal: Personally, I have all my light side characters pick this up ASAP, as it’s the most convenient way to heal.
Energy Resistance: This is a weird one. Judging by its name, you’d think it would provide resistance against energy-based attacks, but according to its description, it doesn’t. However, if you actually use it, you’ll see that it does, thus making it a very useful power.
Destroy Droid: Name says it all. This power wrecks droids like no other.
Force Push: Force Push is nice for keeping enemies away from you, while Force Whirlwind can more or less disable them. Lategame, Force Wave is a great power to use if you get surrounded. It’s also, if I recall correctly, one of the few powers that can be used effectively on the final boss.
Force Resistance: By level 19, you will have gotten all the other force powers listed above, so for your last one, you can go with whatever tickles your fancy. Personally, I went with Force Resistance.
Equipment
Weapon: For your rifle, you’ll want to go with Jamoh Hogra’s Carbine. For your heavy weapon, you’ll want to go with either Ordo’s Repeating Blaster or, if you have access to Yavin Station, the Baragwin Heavy Repeating Blaster. Until you get these weapons, just go with whatever blaster rifle and/or heavy weapon you can find.
Head: In the early going, go with whatever you find that gives immunity to mind-affecting powers and/or boosts to saving throws. Ultimately though you’ll want to use the Heavy Targeting Optics. These give the weapon focus/specialization feats to both blaster rifles and heavy weapons.
Body: In the early going, just stick with whatever armor you come across. My personal recommendation for endgame armor though is Calo Nord’s Battle Armor.
Implant: Since you’ll be taking Scout all the way to level 8, you’ll get all three levels of Implants for free. For most of the game, you can go with whatever you come across, but the best implant for this build is the Gordulan Reaction System.
Belt: For most of the game you can just stick with using save-boosting belts. The absolute best belt for this build though is the Adrenaline Stimulator.
Hands: Brejik’s Gloves are a good choice for most of the game. For endgame you can go with the Karakan Gauntlets.
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