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Good day! I need some help cancelling all of my paid subscriptions for physical products, thank you!

So this came up in the last few SFS games we had, and I was looking for a clarification.

The section on starship critical hits does not indicate anywhere that damage is doubled the way it is from personal combat, but instead causes a critical starship damage effect *if* the attack does any hull damage.

Because each phase has things happening simultaneously and without a true initiative (except the pilots), this became a bit confusing when we had more than one gunner.

1 Gunner: Critical 20 rolled, rolls out normal damage for 7 points, hits shields at 8, 1 shield left, no damage to hull, no crit effect. bummer.

1 Gunner: Critical 20 rolled, rolls out normal damage for 7 points, hits shields at 5, 2 points to hull, critical % effect rolled. huzzah!

2 Gunners: One hits, One crits, normal hit does 6 points of damage, crit does 7 points of damage, both targeting shield with 8 points. Hmmm

If I pool the damage together they clearly break through the shields, and the fact that one was a crit triggers the % roll. If I apply them in order, and the crit is handled first, then it wouldn't be enough on its own to break through the shields, so no crit effect occurs.

The pooling method seems to be the best way to handle this since everything is supposed to happen at the same time, and it doesn't seem right to penalize a player just because he rolled his crit *before* another player, but I wanted to see if there had been any discussion on this?

OK, so in my nearly never ending list of Pathfinder -> Starfinder changes, we noted a change to the way cover works in Starfinder.

In Pathfinder:
Melee cover is determined by drawing lines from EVERY corner of the attacker square to EVERY corner of the target square.

Ranged cover is determined by drawing lines from ONE corner of the attacker square to EVERY corner of the target square. (this allows a person to shoot around a hard corner and not provoke from an opponent on the other side of the corner)

In Starfinder:
The cover section doesn't specify melee vs ranged, it simple states to draw from ONE corner of the attacker square to EVERY corner of the target square. Which means the concept of hiding around the corner and shooting a target wouldn't prevent them from taking the AOO as the melee target was still threatening you without cover.

That seems straight forward enough as written, I don't think the change was needed, but that's the only thing I found on the matter.

HOWEVER, in the example diagram directly below the cover rules... they contradict themselves with verbage and explanation that don't make sense with what's written above. They refer to drawing lines from EVERY corner of the attacker to EVERY corner of the target and thus preventing the melee creature from taking an AOO because of the corner... essentially referencing the rule the way ti worked in Pathfinder, but the text in the Starfinder book doesn't make any reference to this at all.

So which is correct? Is the example callout just flat out wrong and this was an intentional change so that hard corners no longer protect you from AOOs, or is this another editing error and the section on cover that separates melee from ranged just ended up on the editing room floor?

So something I came across when building an Operative PC...

My idea was to build a super fast high initiative space cowboy quick draw gunfighter that could trick attack like in a duel... except it doesn't work that way thanks to how swift actions work.

A Full Action (like Trick Attack) consumes the Swift, Move, and Standard action. So the fastest I can currently find to draw a weapon is as a swift action, either through the Quick Draw Feat, or the Quick Release Sheath Armor Upgrade. So if when the fight starts the weapon isn't already in hand, you wouldn't be able to full attack or trick attack.

It just seems like something that could easily be overlooked by Pathfinder players due to the changes for the Quick Draw Feat, and that swift actions are now consumed as part of a full Action, when they used to be in addition to a full-round action in pathfinder.

The only work around I've found so far to be able to trick attack in round one and not be constantly walking around holding or twirling my pistol like an accident waiting to happen... was to use the glamered weapon fusion to make the pistol look like a pack of cards or something else that I could walk around with.

Ok, so this came up in a game yesterday, and I really dislike how Nonlethal damage is handled in Starfinder compared to Pathfinder.

Here's the rule:

Dealing Nonlethal Damage
"Most attacks that deal nonlethal damage work like any other attacks, and they deal damage to your Stamina Points or Hit Points as normal. However, when nonlethal damage would reduce you to 0 or fewer Hit Points, you are reduced to exactly 0 HP and fall unconscious, but you are stable instead of dying."

So to me this reads like the ONLY time its important to differentiate between lethal and nonlethal is during the final "killing blow" that drops a foe to 0 HP. "when nonlethal damage would reduce you to 0 or fewer Hit Points..." It's reinforced by another reference:

Monster and NPC Death
"A monster or NPC reduced to 0 HP is dead, unless the last bit of damage it took was nonlethal damage, in which case it is knocked unconscious."

So call me crazy, but I could on my own do 14 points of nonlethal damage using my stun weapon to a foe NPC with 15 HP as I'm trying to take him alive, and then another PC uses a basic pistol and does 1 point of lethal damage, the target is now dying instead of being unconscious... This seems like a terrible implementation compared to Pathfinder that uses the sum of lethal and nonlethal damage compared to HP to determine when a target falls unconscious or dies outright.

And even worse, in the off-chance the foe NPC happens to have resolve points... if they were knocked unconscious successfully, they can just spend a RP to regain consciousness and stay in the fight one round later.

I just wish I could understand the reasoning behind the change, because it seems unnecessary and less realistic.

Ok, so I'm a little concerned and confused on the wording for the Exo-Guardian Tier 1 Boon "Theoretical Historian" Since it has a cost of 0 and I have Tier 1 status with the Exo-Guardians, I "purchased" it for my -1 character.

Benefit: If you run a scenario as a GM that you have already run as a GM, you can take a Chronicle sheet from that scenario and apply it to this character. This Chronicle sheet provides no rewards (such as XP, credits, or boons), except that you can mark the chronicle sheet as being completed as part of this boon and earn 1 additional Fame and 1 additional Reputation with the Exo-Guardians Faction for your associated character.

So here's my situation, I played 1-00 and applied the lessened rewards to the character and I played 1-01. I then GM'ed the Quest Pack and applied it to the character.

So here's the issue, I then ran the Commencement twice, so the second run would trigger the requirement of running a scenario as a GM that i have already run.

Can I "apply" that chronicle to this character for the +1 Fame / +1 Rep , or does "apply" in this context count just like applying a chronicle as a GM but minus the rewards? If it's applied just like a GM chronicle, that would in some cases further prevent the character from ever playing in that game, or having a regular GM chronicle applied in a case where a replay credit could be used from a GM Nova. If there is no restriction on the chronicle itself to the point where somebody could "apply" the same scenario chronicle to the character over and over, once per tier, is it possible to word this a little better like the Digital Presence boon or the other ones that allow the 1 Fame / 1 Rep bump for unique circumstances?

So now that we have the official ruling: Batteries recharge for free in certain cases.

The counter argument we saw coming was from the users of weapons that have kinetic ammo. I have two policy proposals that I think work out well enough to maybe not be perfectly the same as free battery recharges, but will close to balance the wealth gap that will develop over time.

Option A: You can loot and KEEP any ammunition you find in a scenario, not to exceed the max you started with.
***Ex. I have 40 bullets for my sniper rifle, I fire 5 during a fight and find 7 more on the mercenary we defeated. I can take them with me, if I use 4 more during the scenario I am left with 3 extra bullets, which I am then allowed to keep as it does not exceed my starting number of 40. If I end the scenario with more than 40, the excess go to the Society like other found equipment.

Option B: Same as Option A, and additionally at the end of any scenario, your magazines are "topped off" by the Society, replacing any rounds you used during the scenario, not to exceed the max you started with. This restocking is made possible by the various contributions of excess ammo turned over after missions, and the usage of UPBs from broken down gear that was unnecessary.

With either option Special Ammunition (missiles and such) are never kept beyond the end of the scenario when found, and would not be replenished by the Society.

I like Option B because it is very simple and reduces the book keeping and tracking that goes with Option A. "how many rounds did I find, were they the right kind, I'm still under my max at the end so I need to buy X more to top off as an expense." It feels simpler and in the spirit of what the battery recharging rules are trying to accomplish. With the way UPB's work I don't think it's too much of a stretch for the setting either.

Thoughts?

So I'm not sure if anybody else has come up with a good solution for this, but as a VO that has to do all of the printing of scenarios because the local shops don't want to, it's getting tedious. not because of the effort of printing a scenario, I could care less. It's the absolute waste of ink having a 1 inch solid black border around the whole pdf page.

I've tried playing around with printing the pages at a 110% scale to alleviate some of the border issue, but really this just seems like an easy fix to save a ton of ink by just leaving the page background white.

Ia there any plan for this in the future from the designers? I'd imagine there are plans to change the general border colors for each set, yellow for skulls and shackles, red maybe for wrath of the righteous, etc, which would still serve as a simple indicator to help break them up and recognize what's what at a glance.

Recently in our area more stores have been getting interested in the ACG and want to have direct access to the digital downloads for scenarios that the VO's normally receive. My question, how do they go about setting that up? I can't seem to find it mentioned anywhere and the guide tells them to talk to me as the area VC...

So far I had been keeping a copy of the game at our largest local store and printing out all of the scenarios and keeping them with a binder at the store, but I can't make it out to every area every week. If there's a better way for them to have direct access (as I recall was one of the original points of having the games playable only at retailers in the month they are released) what is the process for them?

Please join me in welcoming Zane Nietiedt as the new Venture-Lieutenant for Columbia, MD. Zane has been coordinating weekly PFS games at the nearby Family Game Store in Savage Mill for over a year, and has been a great volunteer to the Pathfinder Society community across Maryland. Zane has a lifetime of experience across multiple roleplaying game platforms that brings a unique flavor to each game he runs, making them all the more entertaining, and all the more memorable. He will be assisting primarily with the future coordination efforts on the south-west side of Maryland and also in the other venues across MD as his schedule allows. Welcome to the family!