Abraham spalding's page

So got playing around with the Tian Xia options and realized that if you take the Leungli heritage sprites, go monk, then take Kaiju stance you basically have the magikarp to gyarados evolution. Since sprites can get permanent flight and Leungli heritage gives amphibious and a swim speed this matches Gyarados as well. A couple of ki focus spells and you can thrash around to your heart's content, and even utilize ki blast as your breath weapon.

Anyways, felt that should be shared.

When you pick one of the spells, you lose access to the other two, so only the spell you picked for that day is added to your repertoire. They are not added as signature spells, but to your repertoire at the same level you would normally be able to cast them as innate spells.

Good point, I mixed my words up on signature and repertoire thank you. I thought it would work like you stated but wasn't certain.

Kitsune gain several "choose one of these spells during your daily preparation" feats. When combined with Ancestral Mage do they gain all the choices as signature spells or only the choice they made for the day?

For example would a Kitsune with Kitsune spell Expertise have Death Ward, Confusion, and Illusory Scene as signature spells?

Or if the Kitsune chose Death Ward for the day would that be the only spell they gain as a signature spell for the day, and when they chose confusion the next day that would be the signature spell?

That is what I expected the answer to be. I will admit to being a bit disappointed, as it seems a clunky mechanic that means any time a feat or ability comes up they have to spell out if it has to specifically mention all the move speeds.

Thank you for your responses!

I might have missed something:

Fly is it's own action. Can I use step or stride while flying?

Specifically I am looking at using something like running reload while flying and how this interact.

Abraham spalding wrote:

I like the fact ancestry is a thing that is not simply a quick skin at level one and then rarely matters from that point forward. I like the general set up of the action economy in combat. I do not like the "everything scales" nature of proficiency, but otherwise like the proficiency system.

If you're not a fan of how dramatic the proficiency system scales, might I suggest these rules? It may still not be entirely what you're looking for, but still.

Abraham spolding wrote:

I do like how healing has generally been handled and every class having a subclass system (except you fighter, you get nothing, sorry).

For what it's worth, I think that this was intentional. The lack of a clear style path or whatever, plus the fighter's ability to get more class feats than any other class, strongly point to an emphasis on mixing up tactics as the situation requires, which feels a lot more fightery to me than previous iterations tended to. This also has the side-effect of making the fighter one of the friendlier classes to slap archetypes on, which I think is another good niche to have.

I am a fan of the non-scaling proficiency alternate rules. I get why they did what they did with fighter, it just stands out compared to everyone else. I think there was a little room for a main focus for the fighter but at the end of the day I will still play one on occasion so maybe they were right.

Heck they probably were, they are selling books and I am not so what do I know?

All in all it is a solid system that I have minor issues with, so a great effort.

The issue is that our group (currently level 7) gets wiped a LOT. Despite having 6 PCs going up against encounters set up for four players, we can never bring down enemies.

The bard never deals any damage; the healer never deals any damage. The skirmisher only uses trip maneuvers; the arcane caster throws out attack spells that always fail. And that leaves two melee warriors hoping for lots of crits. End result is we can't deal enough damage to bring anybody down, and the GM just offers free "reset" mass resurrections and moves on to the next stage of the story to keep the game going. Sometimes he cuts the next encounter in half to make sure we survive it.

I have to ask what the rest of you are doing that you cannot seem to wipe anything or succeed. Honestly sounds at this point like the bard is the only one actually being successful.

Hydraulic Torrent is normally a fourth level spell and nothing states that that specific spell would be heightened so it should be fourth level.

From what I can see any spell cast should be at the standard DC for the hag finishing the spell unless it is the control weather ritual which should be DC 23.

Caster level is not a thing anymore but all hags currently use the occult tradition.

I like the fact ancestry is a thing that is not simply a quick skin at level one and then rarely matters from that point forward. I like the general set up of the action economy in combat. I do not like the "everything scales" nature of proficiency, but otherwise like the proficiency system.

I do not appreciate how little stats seem to matter and how little impact stats have for spells and how few spells casters get. However I like the increase in cantrips for their usefulness, and focus powers are a neat way to handle regular use abilities that get fatigued in combat.

I do like how healing has generally been handled and every class having a subclass system (except you fighter, you get nothing, sorry).

So I saw the Coven monster ability and it inspired me to develop some teamwork feats for players. I only have five so far but more ideas are welcome. Until I have it further along I am building it in a google document.

Document here

MREs are not rations in the traditional sense.

Each package of MRE is 1250(ish) calories. A "typical" diet could survive on 3 MREs every 2 days (3700 calories) easily.

MREs are rather bulky because they aren't preserved in the ways traditional rations are; a beef stew MRE when opened is already stew, not a concentrate to be mixed, and fully cooked. In addition you will have some form of drink mix, eating utensils, a wet wipe, coffee, some gum, a desert, et al.

Dracorage wrote:

When the prices of valuable items, like weapons, armor or elixiers, drop significally but the income stays the same, the relative worth of the income rises. In this case (from 1e to 2e) by about the factor 10 - 15! And I don't think that was intended by Paizo.

Why not? It happened in our society. Maybe unskilled laborers are finally making a tolerable living due to recent economic reforms and the savings brought on by the recent decline in goblin attacks.

This is why I asked the questions I did.

Basically none of the development of society/civilization can happen if you don't have a stable and growing industrial set up.

If you are going to have kingdoms and civilization you literally can't have a savior-based game.

Thread for first edition on this.

Basically if everyone is simply a goblin attack away from being wiped out then you would never have enough luck or time to actually get to where the setting is today.

A base level of assumed competence in the world is mandatory or everyone would have already been wiped out.

A society where people latch on to the super-competent and build life around these superior beings would be vastly different than anything we see in Golarion.

Spoiler Alert: I have not completely read the second rules yet.

Has anyone sat down and done an analysis of the new economy yet?

Other than what is in the skill/crafting/items section, has Paizo put out more information about NPC expectations/setting economics?

In addition to the fine reasons above:

If they are summoned they don't have a choice.

If they are bound to a task they might not have much choice.

Abraham spalding wrote:

Kinjar wrote:

Red Griffyn wrote:

What this shows is that the "Canny Acumen" feat is fairly pointless. All classes get minimally expert in Perception/Reflex/Fortitude/Will saves. That means the feat is really only useful at L17+ to get one of those to Master proficiency, which means it gets taken at L15 for no mechanical benefit for 2 levels or L19 (only mechanical benefit for 2 levels).

From what I see Wizard/Champion/Sorcerer get expert Perception at lvl 11 and Cleric get expert Reflex at 11 so Canny Acumen (Perception) should be rather useful.

I was thinking to take it for fortitude on a sorcerer, and retrain it at 5 to perception. Eventually I would retrain it again back to fortitude for the master proficiency around 17 if the game lasts that long.

It all depends on the opportunity cost. Are you wasting 2-3 retrains during downtime that might otherwise earn your GP, retrain something more critical, craft item X, etc.? Its probably less of a concern with a home campaign. However, for something like PFS, where timeframes will be standardized, shuffling a feat around like that could be bothersome. I'm just not sure what the overall opportunity cost is at this point as things are too new. The fact is that most of the classes get expert in all of those things within the first 3, 5, 7, or 9 levels and so the feat is only useful for a small fraction of PCs for a small amount of time. Its a very strange outcome for a feat that previously was intended to allow PCs to shore up their weaknesses so they don't get 'wrecked' by save related mechanics. Not sustaining the feats mechanical proficiency bump just because the class feature finally catches up just make the feat something that is either a dead feat or taking further resources away from the PC down the line.

Yeah my other thought was to represent his 'unnatural toughness' with the fast healing feat and toughness and then wait until much higher level and take it if I felt I needed to.

Anything I play will likely be homebrew so the timeline would be squishy. I do dislike that it's basically a trap for anyone to take and is so wasted for most levels.

Red Griffyn wrote:

What this shows is that the "Canny Acumen" feat is fairly pointless. All classes get minimally expert in Perception/Reflex/Fortitude/Will saves. That means the feat is really only useful at L17+ to get one of those to Master proficiency, which means it gets taken at L15 for no mechanical benefit for 2 levels or L19 (only mechanical benefit for 2 levels).

From what I see Wizard/Champion/Sorcerer get expert Perception at lvl 11 and Cleric get expert Reflex at 11 so Canny Acumen (Perception) should be rather useful.

I was thinking to take it for fortitude on a sorcerer, and retrain it at 5 to perception. Eventually I would retrain it again back to fortitude for the master proficiency around 17 if the game lasts that long.

good stuff

So one of my primary campaign settings assumes a positive energy linked star Central to a system sized negative energy dyson sphere dragnet.

The planets are artificial with onyx cores that prevent souls and energies from "sliding off" out to the sphere (basically providing a magical equivalent to the magnetosphere).

The planets are each tied to a school of magic with divination being tied to the system as a whole.

The interactions of the energies between the system prevents interaction with the Divine.

Mythic level creatures/NPCs provide a "natural law" equivalent maintaining the system.

Being caught between planets lower background magic availability and heightens the danger of becoming undead/ having something nasty happen.

/CSB

Spells are a class ability.

Use Unhindering Shield that should get you there.

Normal cast (spell 1)
Quicken cast (spell 2)
Familiar spell (spell 3)
Quicken familiar spell (spell 4)

What you dirty heathens call "the drift" is simply the warp, and your "starstone" beacon simply yet another cheap heretical chaos copy of the true Emporer!

It's quite frankly the one bit I am most disappointed in that Paizo has done with starfinder.

There are feats to help with that now though.

I don't hate the idea, but it certainly seems a bit unfair.

If I bring my weight set and powerlift during the game do I get a bonus on all str checks? A bonus on sleight of hand if I do a cardtrick? That's the main argument I generally see against this; why do social skills get rewarded for being good at them IRL but not other types of skills?

I tend to run with, "If you can find an example of someone doing stunt (x), and it's in line with the character you can try to pull it off too."

Even some of the stuff that's likely camera/wire magic.

You do understand that the statement, "Something might happen so I take precaution (x)."

Is logical while the position, "well you don't always take precaution (x) so it doesn't matter if I don't take it in the same circumstances." Is not?

Again there are easy work arounds for the common worries in existing regularly in the environments without clothes in the setting (life bubble lasts days per level and handles 99+% of mentioned concerns). And of course these potential dangers can be ignored too as you pointed out.

Heck there are options to not rely on worn equipment for dangerous situations as well.

Regardless you asked for opinions. Most have been "you can, it may or may not be weird for those around you based on their norms, also there are some safety considerations to think about outside of extreme dangerous environments."

I make no assumptions about what form of nudism applies to you or your characters. I simply point out some considerations that might come up, as well as some of the mitigations for those considerations.

Abraham spalding wrote:

My counter argument is even on a space station/artificial environment you have to worry about the potential blow out or atmosphere lost/ accidental space exposure.

For a plot device I could see someone utilizing the knowledge that their target is a nudist in their quarters to engineer such a disaster.

Otherwise I would suggest a fusion on armor to call in the case of an emergency.

I'd honestly be shocked if everyone on station wore full space armor at all times. How often do such things happen?

I mean, if you're on some aging rattletrap station or ship that's always breaking down, sure. If you're in luxury quarters on Absalom station? (Or the poor in the slums, for that matter.)

Do you bathe in your armor? Do you sleep in it? Do you have sex in it? Do babies live in armor?

I really doubt there's any safety difference between a nudist in their quarters and the average person in theirs.

Points worth considering. I would image that with everyone having light armor proficiency and the stationware being so cheap that it would not be odd for that to be a regular clothing option for most people in normal circumstances.

I do agree that it's unlikely that private quarters where personal activities happen would likely have additional protections in place to prevent a lack of emergency gear being on being immediately fatal.

In fact I would rely on those extra safety protocols being disabled as a data point for potentially tracking the murderer in my previous scenario.

I do think that saying that because there are situations that someone would be exposed to additional risks means that there is no reason to take precautions the rest of the time.

Now does this mean there are not nudist? Of course not. We have environmental dangers on Earth and people still go nude. I simply offer that there are still such considerations with station life.

An easy work around include the star shaman mystic though, so it's not like these are impossible considerations especially with magic to replace technology options that clothes might normally cover.

Claxon wrote:

I imagine most humanoid cultures probably endorse the wearing of clothes. Mostly because most cultures/races are still pretty much humans of a different variety, and are probably going to regard nudist the same way a majority of cultures tend to regard it.

Even if it's not an issue of modest clothing provides some great benefits:
1) Protection from the elements (whether it be rain, cold, or space) armor/clothes help with this.
2) Pockets. Clothes can be very useful for carrying around stuff.

With regard to skittermanders specifically, they probably get a pass due to being covered in fur despite being humanoid.

All in all, regardless of whether or not your character wears clothing, I would expect almost all adventurers to wear a space armor 99% of the time for protection.

Protection from elements doesn't really factor in if you're spending most of your life aboard a climate-controlled space ship or station. Skittermanders was just one example of races that can go sans-clothing. Dragonkin, Greys, Barathu, Formians... There are many races who don't wear clothing.

Also, I'm talking about strictly clothing for every-day wear. Not armor or protective clothing. Obviously if I'm going somewhere that'll kill me without protective wear, I'm gonna put it on.

Honestly, those kinds of answers always make me imagine that people just assume us nudists are fine standing knee-deep in snow while naked.

My counter argument is even on a space station/artificial environment you have to worry about the potential blow out or atmosphere lost/ accidental space exposure.

For a plot device I could see someone utilizing the knowledge that their target is a nudist in their quarters to engineer such a disaster.

Otherwise I would suggest a fusion on armor to call in the case of an emergency.

I do want to get there at some point, however I felt that the best starting point was what is already known.

Extending range and adding new options is in the future somewhere, but I felt this is a good stopping point while I address armor.

Well until I do an actual weapon building system I went along the lines of existing underbarrel weapons.

I do need to add a line about a single combo limit. I don't think there is any cheese to be had but for aesthetic reasons I don't think a 3 in 1 is going to fly well.

To some extent I understand if why the last couple of +1~2 costs so much (law of diminishing returns), but even so the armors are simply too much alike for there to be reason for.

Weapon upgrades

It drove me crazy that if I wanted a shotgun toting dwarf I had so many levels between better gear.

And no underbarrel grenade launcher? In fact I want lightning spewing guns, and Sonic wobblers that hit a cone... Cryo weapons that entangle you in a layer of ice...

So I make a system for developing such.

Next I am going to revamp the light and heavy armor because it's video game +1 chasing bad right now.

I am going to use this and when the damage doesn't carry shout, "I'M NOT TOUCHING YOU, BECAUSE YOU AREN'T TOUCHING ME!"

Seems it's mostly the GMs preference to not simply plop down a bunch of bonuses to stats all at one time at level 5 (as the OP said) so it's not a necessity as you say but more a feel and continuity thing for the GM.

I don't think it should cause any huge issues.

I don't know why I had thought that you only gained HP at character creation, and everything else was stamina gain thereafter.

To be fair when I was first learning the system I assumed it would be that way because HP damage was supposed to be the deadly stuff.

But I read the rules and realized my assumption was wrong.

Combination Weapons have been added to the document.

Barring feedback from other people I am likely done with my upgrading weapons document. The only thing I have left is to adjust the damage progression chart to account for the different dice in Starfinder. Next will be a rebuild/upgrade document for armors.

I really hate how starfinder armors are literally just "spend money get another +X" my intent will be to have different armors be focused on different areas and include a section on upgrading armors much like this does for weapons.

Next up: combo weapons. Underbarrel grenade launcher, etc.

Expect update tonight.

The cost is supposed to scale but I see how I failed to word it correctly. Say I am upgrading an azimuth laser pistol. Upgrading to level 2 costs 350 credits. Upgrading to level 3 is supposed to cost 700 credits. Upgrading to level 4 will cost 1,400 credits. The final upgrade to level 5 will be 2800 credits. This means a fully upgraded azimuth laser pistol is going to cost you about 5,600 credits. You will get 14 points total for upgrading.

Line, and burst are already explained in the base rules, I don't have to repeat that in the document, but I can put in a link so there is no confusion. Please note if you do upgrade to one of those properties you will only be getting that one property. But I do agree that the range for a burst upgrade needs reduced; a level 2 azimuth laser pistol shouldn't be producing an 80 from cone. Probably adding the burst ability should quarter the normal range of the weapons and probably the same with the line.

EDIT

I have updated the document to reflect these changes and added bit about upgrading ammunition.

For those interested I have put a link to a google document where I have my prototype rules for upgrading weapons. It's rough, but should be a starting point for getting to a better place.

Link

Any comments or ideas should be left there.

First off this is very much a work in progress. So use as you like, but if something doesn't really work let me know.

Second the why I made this. I didn't like buying a shotgun at level 1 and not having another avialable until so much later. With all the tech available and skill it seems really odd to me that there is no way to actually improve an item. I imagine that Paizo will eventually get to this but for the time being I figure this should help.

Finally as I mentioned its still not finished. I have not put in a DC for skill check because I am uncertain what it should be. I am thinking the (new item level x 1.5) + 10.

Now I apologize for taking so long but here it is: Upgrading Weapons (for fun and profit).

It's a level 1 item.

Each weapon fusion has an item level, and a fusion can’t be placed on a weapon that has a lower level than the fusion’s item level. Once it is attached to a weapon, a weapon fusion uses the weapon’s item level for any of the weapon fusion’s level-based effects.

You can place multiple fusions on the same weapon, but only if the weapon’s item level is equal to or greater than the combined total of all the fusions’ item levels. A weapon cannot hold or benefit from additional fusions beyond this limit. A fusion that applies an effect to attacks applies it to all targets for spread weapons, automatic fire, explode weapons, and other effects with multiple targets.

So no, not really.

However my personal short term solution is simply to use the weapon design system from Pathfinder.

My homerule is you can upgrade an item to the next item level for the cost of the item. This gives you a points you can use to improve the weapon characteristics of the weapon (improving the damage or such). Each weapon can only be upgraded 4 levels over it's original item level.

This will also allow better/more fusions to be added on.

I intend to do something similar for armor.

There's also a lack of room for the upgrades, or the funds to spend on them. Try finding a decent armor at 3rd level that is affordable and can hold the force field mod.

Heavy armors have hardly any slots until mid levels while these almost skin level lights have room. It's nonsensical.

I feel like I like/love 75-80% of what they have made. That last but though is almost enough to make me scream.

I have big hopes for the armory to help fix some of this.

I should not have to put off having an upgrade for shotgun from level 1 to level 6-7 for example.

I do find some of the costs odd too. "wait to go up like 2 points in armor, this now costs half a million credits?"

The economy of equipment in Starfinder is killing me. The prices are wonky as you pointed out, it's literally MMO incrementalism, the armors are bland with little to nothing distinguishing them from each other. There is no real difference between total protection from heavy or light armor (just how you get that protection), the weapons start at wet noodle, and grow from there and you can't actually expect a weapon style to he something you can stick with if you want to stay in the mix correctly.

It's just one big mess.

The drone definitely beats out the exocortex on action economy and damage output, but as a fan of Ender, I just can't resist.

My intent for my exocortex is toughness and unexpected action/abilities. Mine is an android and I intend to pack extra equipment in him and take the shield ability and pack one of those charging upgrades as well. I am considering the makeshift baracade and the overcharge abilities, but the extra drain might not be worth it.

All in all it will be interesting to see how it comes out.

Personally I think moving the multitasking down and having the third tier add an attack would balance out exocortex just right.

Dragonborn3 wrote:

Omnius wrote:

UnArcaneElection wrote:

+1 on Paladin (and Antipaladin) being converted to a prestige class. Also do this for Inquisitor. What deity or religion in their right mind is going to let some random person off the street be their holy champion or beyond-the-rules troubleshooter if they haven't been tested yet? Note: This would require prestige class archetypes (why haven't we seen any of these yet)?

If you are a first level hero, you are not some random person off the street. Even at level 1, you are exceptional.

To echo this, of course you've been tested. That's why you have the class level instead of commoner.

There are limits to trusting untapped/untrained/untamed potential.

Look if it's good enough for the force, it should be fine for some good.

It isn't odd, but it is relatively uncommon. Walk from the city gate all the way through to the local viscount's audience chamber and the number of PC-class NPCs will be utterly dwarfed by commoners, experts, warriors, and aristocrats.

It has been a minute since I dug through it, but if I recall correctly the number of generic NPCs with non-npc class levels wasn't low. Granted most NPCs still had at least one NPC class level. Purely non-npc class NPCs tend to be really rare, but still, a level 2-5 expert, warrior, or aristocrat isn't in bar shape compared to level 1-3 PCs typically. Granted there is a gap and it grows (intentionally) the higher the levels get, but as the levels grow the tendency is to find more of those more effective NPC builds.

TL:DR, my main qualm was about the idea that level 1 PCs were much better off than NPCs and that a 13 was very high for the average NPC.

Not to mention that PC's typically have way better stats than NPC's. To an average person a 13 is considered a high attribute.

The standard array for non-heroic NPCs is 13,12,11,10,9,8 which is to say a 3 point buy before race. So while 13 starts as the high 15 is easily done, and we could see 2~3 thirteen plus stats.

The heroic array is 15,14,13,12,10,8, which is a 15 point buy, or "standard".

Also it isn't odd to see NPCs with standard class levels either. So while I agree most NPCs have at least some class levels. Indeed the "average person" level range is 1-5. So it is actually quite likely that while a level 1 PC has great potential, the NPCs are not typically going to be looking at someone that is literally head and shoulders above anything they have ever seen.

Listed under "Rounds, longarm and sniper" in the item list so I would suggest that is the pocket used.

Also theoretically there could be a creature that casts spells like one of those two classes and has a higher than PC possible stat.

Something similar to the true dragons in Pathfinder (to grab a quick easy example).

Murdock Mudeater wrote:

Abraham spalding wrote:

You could also put the merciful fusion on it if you are worried about killing people while trying to help them.

I've been unclear on this. Needler Pistol has an Item Level of 1, so I can't apply a Merciful Fusion (Fusion level 2) because it exceeds my item level. Right?

Correct. One of the biggest "missing" rules right now is how to up-level an item for a fair price - you ought to be able to make an L2 Needle Pistol, even if it's not sold on the market, with no stat improvements at all beyond being L2, once you have 2 ranks in Engineering, but we have no idea what the UPB cost would be.

Yeah this is actually something I am working through on homebrew. The equipment section is hopelessly convoluted and simply bad.

Abraham spalding wrote:

You could also put the merciful fusion on it if you are worried about killing people while trying to help them.

I've been unclear on this. Needler Pistol has an Item Level of 1, so I can't apply a Merciful Fusion (Fusion level 2) because it exceeds my item level. Right?

Actually I think you are correct. I am still getting use to the item levels and their various interactions.

I don't disagree with people about cleric, but sorcerer has the same problem (no choices, poor choices that are not as good) only worse. The sorcerer gets to make one actual choice, which bloodline to take. Most of its archetypes are junk.

I would argue the oracle shows just how much sorcerers need a rebuild. It is not that there is no power in the class, it's the fact the class is boring, has little room for customization, and needs updated.