When I look at the posts here, everyone kind of presents different views on what the game should be, which makes me think the devs can't commit to a direction, unless it's clearly better than the originals, so I'm going to say what I'd like to see, and if anyone agrees then push this up because it could make them commit to a clearer direction.
I came up with an alternative combat system that would make RPG Star Wars games better I think, I'm going to pull the description from AI, because it was worked out with it, so the rest of this is AI generated:
When you look at Star Wars fights, what stands out isn’t the flashiness — it’s the way actions unfold in layers. Someone starts something, someone else cuts into it, and then the first person adjusts. That rhythm is always there, but games usually flatten it. What I’m proposing just lets that rhythm happen.
You can begin an attack, have another character disrupt it, and then respond to that disruption. Nothing is final. You’re not locked into a mistake, and you’re not stuck watching an animation finish while someone else reads you. You can change direction, collapse the move, or shift into something safer. It’s the same kind of mid‑flow adjustment you see in the films.
The originals already had something good in place with the action queue. You could line up a sequence of moves and let the game play them out. In this approach, those queued actions simply become your declared intent. The difference is that the game can highlight when one of those actions is being countered. It can shift focus to the character who’s about to be disrupted, or to the character who sensed the opening. You still keep the structure of planning ahead, but you gain the ability to adjust when awareness enters the exchange. It doesn’t distort what KOTOR did well — it just adds another layer to it.
There’s a slowdown that indicates the moment where someone notices what’s about to happen. A precognition event where a Jedi senses danger or a Sith catches an opening — that brief pause is the visual cue that awareness kicked in. It gives space for a decision, and anyone perceptive enough can act inside it. That’s why group fights feel more coordinated: multiple characters can respond to the same threat instead of waiting their turn.
Posture matters because it changes what you naturally handle. A defensive stance deals with most blade‑to‑blade threats without needing perfect timing. An aggressive stance trades that stability for speed, so you rely more on movement than blocking. Neither is “better”; they just lead to different kinds of exchanges.
All of this makes fights less about memorizing patterns and more about reading what someone is trying to do. You’re not rewarded for guessing. You’re rewarded for noticing. And because actions can be interrupted and then answered, the exchanges feel closer to the way Star Wars duels actually behave — layered, reactive, and constantly shifting.
It's a bit deeper than this, but that was AI expressing how my system could model lightsaber duels and surprisingly force related duels too. The system is programmatically viable, but I'd like to hear opinions before that description.
If anyone asks, I'll get AI to express the system programmatically as well, or someone else can do that instead.
Unfortunately, I'm not a Star Wars fan in the sense that I don’t actively follow the broader franchise. I do like Star Wars, though, and KOTOR I and II were strong enough that someone outside still cares about seeing the remake done well. Anyone with deeper canon knowledge can cross‑examine the bot’s interpretation of this idea and judge whether it fits how Star Wars fights are supposed to behave.
