How much do we know of spaceships so far? I haven’t read every post on the forum.
I’m just worried because they always seem to be either priced outside of any PC’s possible ability to buy, require some kind of extreme number of crew members that it removes some/all the ships out of most games or even without thousands of crew you need to have 4-6 PC’s specialized in just running it. It can really throw a wrench into things especially when players start to just steal them.
I’m just hoping that people are thinking about and looking at that. It’s hard enough to rope 4-6 people together as a unit without them needing to know how to use sensors or things after all.
I hope you guys include examples of Fleet Class, Explorer Class, Freighter Class, and terrestrial class ships. Oh, and will you be adding an equipment/ship section in the adventure paths to include new ones?
I believe every group starts an adventure with a ship. At least that is what it has sounded like. During combat the PCs will have different jobs to do. The pilot steers the ship, the gunner fires the weapons, the engineer makes repairs. They wanted to do it that way to avoid ship combat becoming 1 player doing everything while the rest of the group sits around waiting for the fight to end.
I also read that ships will have customization options which players can use to upgrade their ship, or even potentially build the ship from the ground up.
Morgen wrote: How much do we know of spaceships so far? I haven’t read every post on the forum.
I’m just worried because they always seem to be either priced outside of any PC’s possible ability to buy, require some kind of extreme number of crew members that it removes some/all the ships out of most games or even without thousands of crew you need to have 4-6 PC’s specialized in just running it. It can really throw a wrench into things especially when players start to just steal them.
I’m just hoping that people are thinking about and looking at that. It’s hard enough to rope 4-6 people together as a unit without them needing to know how to use sensors or things after all.
For my take, they should only have small ships focused around catering to player teams.
They have specified that each group starts with a spacecraft. So, obtaining one to start is thankfully not an issue. But I agree that the old idea of making the duties split between multiple players is problematic. The same for extreme costs. I would even say it's a very bad idea. It would destroy the possibility of running games with single players or even splitting the party whenever needed.
As for the size of the crafts and crew, I think it is imperative to have many, many small crew crafts all the way from single operator to larger party groups. But I also think it is very important to have vastly larger crafts as well. Everything from large military crafts to motherships and planet-colonizing arks. At some point, even these massive ships will need some form of rules to help the players manipulate them in extreme circumstances (which are rather common in games like this). Perhaps not taking control and using them as the party's new craft, but I bet we will start seeing smaller portions of huge ships becoming key elements to tackle as a party.
Regardless, I am excited to learn more about every aspect!
nomotog wrote: Morgen wrote: How much do we know of spaceships so far? I haven’t read every post on the forum.
I’m just worried because they always seem to be either priced outside of any PC’s possible ability to buy, require some kind of extreme number of crew members that it removes some/all the ships out of most games or even without thousands of crew you need to have 4-6 PC’s specialized in just running it. It can really throw a wrench into things especially when players start to just steal them.
I’m just hoping that people are thinking about and looking at that. It’s hard enough to rope 4-6 people together as a unit without them needing to know how to use sensors or things after all.
For my take, they should only have small ships focused around catering to player teams. I think small PC-focused ships should be the primary concern, but there should also be some larger vessels. Yes to the Millennium Falcon, Serenity, T-65 X-Wings, Starbug and their like; but also yes to the SSV Normandy, USS Enterprise, Liberator and others.
even if just as antagonists, you need bigger and badder ships than the small fries the PCs are likely to start with.
The big problem I'm seeing is how they're going to handle groups with less or more people than 4. (or 5, or whatever the number of jobs is.) I have a group of 8 players in one game, which is maybe going to do starfinder, and adjusting challenges for 8 people is hard enough, I don't think I'll be able to pull 3 or so extra ship roles out of a hat.
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Captain collateral damage wrote: The big problem I'm seeing is how they're going to handle groups with less or more people than 4. (or 5, or whatever the number of jobs is.) I have a group of 8 players in one game, which is maybe going to do starfinder, and adjusting challenges for 8 people is hard enough, I don't think I'll be able to pull 3 or so extra ship roles out of a hat. I posted in another thread an idea for small or under sized parties, low level copies of their own minds acting as rudimentary AIs to let the players take on multiple rolls. Or have automation rules in general to allow ship functions to handle themselves. For larger than expected groups why not double up on gunners or engineers? Basically once ships get to a certain size put penalties in place for one gunner controlling too many guns or reduce the effectiveness of one engineer working across multiple engineering spaces. Smaller parties would need costly crews or AI cores to manage ships of those sizes but there are also "starter" level ships in those categories for larger groups to make use of.
Or, convoy it, have 3-4 players in the main ship and either a second ship of comparable size or the other players fly escort in single person fighters. If you can start with something like the Baleen class freighters from Star Wars Ep. VII than you could have a crew running the ship and launch quite a few fighters from the forward bay.
Well with ship roles, I imagine you can do the tried and true method and have NPCs fill in those roles. So if you only have 3 people, you can still have a couple that tag along. Also, aside from the pilot and engineer, most of the other positions aren't really necessary in smaller ships. How I've always run my SWN games is that for ships smaller than capital class, you only need a pilot and engineer (sometimes that's the same person!), and everything else (communications, medical bay) are irrelevant. That seems to work and get the feel of a Winnebago in Space for smaller ships (Eagle 5 wooo!!).
If you do have a capital ship style campaign, you can also go the Gundam/Macross/BSG route. The players are all pilots of their ships/mecha that protect their mothership as they travel to their goal/mission. That way, they can all do stuff in combat, and none of them need to have split duties as the comm officer or engineer and such. Works out well.
Of course, in the future, just about anything can be automated. So you can just have some parts automated by the AI. That said, I generally encourage players to make multiple characters in RPGs so it's not really an issue for me.
As for ships at level one, there are many ways you can handle it.
1: Ships are expensive, but that's because they are the current model. It's like buying a 2017 car vs one from the 90's. My gf's Audi is more expensive than my 93' Geo Prizm. So have used spaceships available to the players at a fraction of the cost. Sure, they aren't as fast and reliable as the latest stuff, but at level one, just having a spaceship is awesome enough. And being a used ship means it'll have personality flaws. Just like the Serenity or Millennium Falcon have mechanical issues, these can cause some interesting complications to travel and such and can lead to their own adventures.
2: They take out a loan and get the good ship, but now they have to pay the loan every month or two months. For a sandbox game, this is actually pretty good, as the players have a goal and an adventure hook they can fall back on when they are unsure what they want to do next. Need 2,000 credits this month? There's a bounty for the Space Pirate Captain Harlock for 5,000 credits! Or, there's a convoy guard job for a shady hypercorp dealing with enslaved uplifts. Or, a shift senator needs passage to his secret home-away-from home. All of these are pretty ripe for adventuring.
3. They stole it! Or won it via shady bets and lots of luck. But now, there's a soft bounty on their heads so they must be careful out there in space. Like the one before, this adds a good metaplot that's ripe for adventure. Though for this, I would bring it up sparingly. Having bounty hunters every session would get old hand pretty quickly. But this can add some great complications to the mission, or it's own great adventure.
Bluenose wrote: nomotog wrote: Morgen wrote: How much do we know of spaceships so far? I haven’t read every post on the forum.
I’m just worried because they always seem to be either priced outside of any PC’s possible ability to buy, require some kind of extreme number of crew members that it removes some/all the ships out of most games or even without thousands of crew you need to have 4-6 PC’s specialized in just running it. It can really throw a wrench into things especially when players start to just steal them.
I’m just hoping that people are thinking about and looking at that. It’s hard enough to rope 4-6 people together as a unit without them needing to know how to use sensors or things after all.
For my take, they should only have small ships focused around catering to player teams. I think small PC-focused ships should be the primary concern, but there should also be some larger vessels. Yes to the Millennium Falcon, Serenity, T-65 X-Wings, Starbug and their like; but also yes to the SSV Normandy, USS Enterprise, Liberator and others. I plan on running a Mass Effect inspired game, so I'd love stats for bigger ships like the Normandy or the Tempest.
Going back to traveller again, they have different tech levels that are still "sci-fi" territory. i think the real world is rated around Tech Level 9 or 10 and in Treveller you can find up to 14 or 15 in known space with small pockets of 16 in the most advanced research centers. and of course their ancient artifact levels were something like 19 or 20.
Anyways, i bring it up because you could use varying tech levels to reflect different costs and automation available.
And even if its an old design it might still be profitable to manufacture so the party could still have a "new" ship even if its a design thats been around for 30-40 years.
heck, if most battles are fought between energy beams and shields than the hull itself could be ancient with just new parts slotted in to keep it competitive.
Atrum Vita wrote: They have specified that each group starts with a spacecraft. So, obtaining one to start is thankfully not an issue. But I agree that the old idea of making the duties split between multiple players is problematic. The same for extreme costs. I would even say it's a very bad idea. It would destroy the possibility of running games with single players or even splitting the party whenever needed.
It wouldn't be any more of a problem than it was in Traveler. The standard space ship is the equivalent of the free Merchant in Traveler which NEEDS multiple people as crew.
However if you're hell bent on a solo game, presumably there will be scout and fighter type ships which cold be solo manned.... Just like the ship that could be obtained as the Scout mustering out benefit in Traveler.
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I want to see elven starships made of trees.
A certain tree aptly named the Starwood grows on Castrovel. It grows as large as the Californian Redwood and has been cultivated by the natives for hundreds of years. The Castrovese have made an art of accelerating a Starwood's growth, of causing the branches and trunk to grow into and around airspaces, and of preparing the tree's spirit to eventually walk among the stars by teaching it to grow an outer shell to lock in moisture and heat.
Some trees are allowed to grow larger and more fully than others, and are modified as needed to serve whatever mission is required. Some starwoods will become light craft, most will become transports, and a rare few have grown tall and grand enough to be worthy of being capital ships.
When a tree has reached its appointed size, the elves begin the work of fitting its roots with enchanted water and nutrient pods, and the finishing touches are made on the living spaces. The last stage involves installing the star drive and the booster rockets which will lift the starship into a decent orbit. From then on, the starwood lives the rest of its existence in space, fed continually by its root pods and carefully tended by its crew.
If the life of a starwood be doomed by injury or disease, it is given a burial in space via starfall, or if no star be near, by being burnt up in the atmosphere of a planet or (if no other option is available) by an broadside of incendiaries from another starwood.
Drahliana Moonrunner wrote: Atrum Vita wrote: They have specified that each group starts with a spacecraft. So, obtaining one to start is thankfully not an issue. But I agree that the old idea of making the duties split between multiple players is problematic. The same for extreme costs. I would even say it's a very bad idea. It would destroy the possibility of running games with single players or even splitting the party whenever needed.
It wouldn't be any more of a problem than it was in Traveler. The standard space ship is the equivalent of the free Merchant in Traveler which NEEDS multiple people as crew.
However if you're hell bent on a solo game, presumably there will be scout and fighter type ships which cold be solo manned.... Just like the ship that could be obtained as the Scout mustering out benefit in Traveler. All else fails, just have much of the stuff for the frigate automated or roll the duties of pilot and engineer into one person. That's what they do in SWN and it works out pretty alright.
Matthew Shelton wrote: I want to see elven starships made of trees. It feels more 'real' a thing if it's not called starwood. Chances are the wood would've been around for centuries or millenia before that particular use was discovered after all.
"Wait, they made the hull with what?"
"Turns out feetbreeze is really well suited to keeping an atmosphere in despite all the temperature changes, or something like that, they said"
"... the stuff we use to keep our soles from smelling rank?"
"who knows what they'll come up with next"
Just to note, on the subject of fighters/automation:
Often part of the cost (not counting the colossal markups caused by those writing up the offers still working for the companies they're contracting) of military vehicles comes precisely from the automation involved. Yes you save space, mass and manpower by having a computer handle it, but you *do* need to stick a better control system than if you can just have someone doing it. This extends from weapons (a guy in the back literally chucking bombs out the side was eventually replaced by mechanical hardpoints, and now electronically controlled internal bays or the automated defenses on large ships which can be set to freely engage at-will in an emergency) to navigation and everything else.
Thing is, you do have to pay for those functions. You CAN have a fighter with hyperdrives, but compared to having a dedicated engineer at his station, it's more expensive on initial purchase, and harder to fix in-flight. There's good, there's bad.
Cost is true. But again, the guy is looking for ideas to run a game with less than four people.
I think something to consider is that since it's the future, many of the automative processes would be cheaper than we realize if we make the assumption that it's been around for a bit. Like in real life when technology gets cheaper overall. Also, I think it'd make sense to have it mostly for smaller ships (fighters, shuttles, even frigates), since they are smaller and simpler to run than the capital and dreadnaught ships.
So if the GM wants to run a one person campaign and the players wants to fly their own Slave-1 or Samus's Gunship, then I think that's the best way to handle it. Automate the majority of it and let the player choose piloting, navigating, and engineering skills.
Or give them a droid/AI buddy. That works too.
There might be neural interfaces built into starships where it can "borrow CPU cycles" from humanoid brains to help maintain and run the ship during intense situations. The humanoids themselves are only as good as their brains are, though.
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Ship could have AI that replaces, say, the science officer. Replaces the scanning aspect and let's the dm give hints based on said scans could be offline if need be. Mechanic then fixes it. Tada!
A neat feature I saw in one game was giving classes starship components in their gear set. So your fighter gets a starship shield along with their armor and laser gun. The starship got it's core components like engines for free, but everything else was based on the classes of the party.
Torbyne wrote: Going back to traveller again, they have different tech levels that are still "sci-fi" territory. i think the real world is rated around Tech Level 9 or 10 and in Treveller you can find up to 14 or 15 in known space with small pockets of 16 in the most advanced research centers. and of course their ancient artifact levels were something like 19 or 20.
Anyways, i bring it up because you could use varying tech levels to reflect different costs and automation available.
And even if its an old design it might still be profitable to manufacture so the party could still have a "new" ship even if its a design thats been around for 30-40 years.
heck, if most battles are fought between energy beams and shields than the hull itself could be ancient with just new parts slotted in to keep it competitive.
I played Traveller and the Tech Levels translate to progress levels as follows:
0 => 0
1 => 1
2 => 2
3 => 3
4 => 3
5 => 4
6 => 5
7 => 5
8 => 6
9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 => 7
Tom Kalbfus wrote: Torbyne wrote: Going back to traveller again, they have different tech levels that are still "sci-fi" territory. i think the real world is rated around Tech Level 9 or 10 and in Treveller you can find up to 14 or 15 in known space with small pockets of 16 in the most advanced research centers. and of course their ancient artifact levels were something like 19 or 20.
Anyways, i bring it up because you could use varying tech levels to reflect different costs and automation available.
And even if its an old design it might still be profitable to manufacture so the party could still have a "new" ship even if its a design thats been around for 30-40 years.
heck, if most battles are fought between energy beams and shields than the hull itself could be ancient with just new parts slotted in to keep it competitive.
I played Traveller and the Tech Levels translate to progress levels as follows:
0 => 0
1 => 1
2 => 2
3 => 3
4 => 3
5 => 4
6 => 5
7 => 5
8 => 6
9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 => 7 I am not sure i follow, how is a tech level separate from progress level?
Tech Level is what Traveller uses, Progress Level is what Alternity, D20 Modern, and Starfinder uses. Dungeons & Dragons used a different system for measuring technology, as I recall.
Wait, Starfinder has officially broken planets out on progress levels? Where was that announced, i would like to go scour the article for more tidbits.
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Torbyne wrote: Wait, Starfinder has officially broken planets out on progress levels? Where was that announced, i would like to go scour the article for more tidbits. I think there was a forum thread using progress levels to discuss what might be found in Starfinder, but I don't think progress levels have been announced. I'm not sure progress levels will even be relevant in Starfinder. Here's my (admittedly extremely speculative) reasoning:
The kasatha have been announced as a playable race. They are not from our system and are hinted to have been fairly behind Golarion in terms of technological development. Even in the new Starfinder art, kasatha still have remainents of their (from a technological standpoint) primitive technology, in the form of clothing. This would imply that the kasatha did not evolve at the same rate as the races of the Golarion system. At the same time, those same kasatha are wielding futuristic guns I'd imagine did not develop on that planet. It does not appear that such a core race has been bared from the advancements of the Golarion system, so it seems that the system does not (or did not) have a restriction on advancing other cultures. It seems to me that the world of Starfinder has become less like Star Trek, and more like Star Wars. Not every world gained advanced technologies at the same point, but all the worlds of interest to the advanced societies have them now. There are exceptions (worlds like Endor) but possibly not enough to warrant a universal system of assessment now. That said, I hope there's one anyways because I like lore. A lot.
This is complete speculation. But it seems pretty logical from the kasatha art they've shown us so far.
i see, without a prime directive there is nothing to stop offworlders from trading lasers for diamonds or something. Basically there are three levels a planet is at, developed; under developed but trades with developed; primitive. Primitives would either be newly discovered or for whatever reason have not been officially contacted by an offworld agency yet. On the other two types of planets you have access to regular Pact World level goods, more or less, through basic plans and UPBs. and if a world is under developed and not yet in contact with star-farers than the GM can just set whatever limits they need for the story.
Another thought, vendors have a level cap on the items they can offer and include a table of pre-industrial gear for super low tech worlds and just leave it at that. "this nation has developed gun powder and can offer up to level 3 ballistic weapons but no energy based ones." No need to set a world wide tech level beyond what the PCs are interacting with i suppose.
Another issue is how can you define technological advancement in a world of magic. If it is possible (though rare) for a wizard to turn back time, talk to people over vast distances, and travel in the blink of an eye, what technological level is their society at. Obviously not everyone in a technologically advanced society has access to every technological advancement. So does the wizard then raise golarion what would normally be a progress level 3 planet to a progress level of 7 or higher? Present Golarion has many powerful heroes who could theoretically fight off laser wielding soldiers. Is their advanced magic then on the same level of progress as a society that blends technology and magic to get the same effects?
True, even in Traveller you could and would end up with super tech at the Spaceport (in that there even was a spaceport) but the rest of the world could be fairly primitive.
If you were to use a development chart in Starfinder i suppose it would either be a general remark to techno-magical development or a to letter digraph for a basic check on technology and magic, lots of stuff generally available? thats an A/A world. Primitive tech but fairly developed use of magic? thats a D/B world.
But in the end there may not be a chart at all and just leave it to GMs or APs to describe as they see fit.
Spaceships are kind background in a game really. Sure having spaceship is great but it's not different that having a ship in Pathfinder. It's mode of transportation over great distances in areas you can't just walk over. If you bump in to other ships you have ship based weapon to take the other ship out but it rarely comes up. 98% of sci-fi adventures occur at the destination. You can have some ship based adventures, like Skull and Shackles but those the exception not rule.
I used play Traveller, having a ship was the goal. Then we'd get it and was just way to go from point A to point B. Maybe make little credits on the journey. Then the adventure would at the space station or on the planet.
So I hope they don't put too much into space battles or focus too much on the space ship. I'll play SFB for that type of game.
voska66 wrote: Spaceships are kind background in a game really. Sure having spaceship is great but it's not different that having a ship in Pathfinder. It's mode of transportation over great distances in areas you can't just walk over. If you bump in to other ships you have ship based weapon to take the other ship out but it rarely comes up. 98% of sci-fi adventures occur at the destination. You can have some ship based adventures, like Skull and Shackles but those the exception not rule.
I used play Traveller, having a ship was the goal. Then we'd get it and was just way to go from point A to point B. Maybe make little credits on the journey. Then the adventure would at the space station or on the planet.
So I hope they don't put too much into space battles or focus too much on the space ship. I'll play SFB for that type of game.
What is SFB?
So the impression i have gotten so far is that every party will have ways to get a ship and options to keep the ship upgraded. They are not required to use it for anything and if they do choose to use it than it could just be a way of getting from point A to point B but they are also designing a segment of the game to take place with investigation, puzzle solving and combat all from inside the PCs ship. They have gone out of their way to make sure every class can do something to participate in the ship side of things and came up with a whole new ruleset for movement and facing. you can still choose not to use it but to me it being there is a big draw. i am very interested in seeing just how PCs can augment their ships and what creative uses for them there are.
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SFB = Star Fleet Battles?
How would crystal balls and the teleport spell affect space battles? Can starships have shields that would block hostile teleporters from boarding a ship and taking it over? What is the range of the teleport spell, can one teleport from planet to planet across interstellar distances. Can one gaze through a crystal ball and see what's going on light years away? How has is the FTL drive, does it take, hours, days, weeks, months, or years to cross the Galaxy? I think the Star Wars hyperdrive was a bit too fast, it may be good for a movie, but for an RPG, maybe weeks to months would be better.
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Teleport as we know it in Pathfinder probably wont work for combat in space, aside from range possibly being an issue there is also the concern for moving targets. i would also hazard a guess that the presence of a Drift Engine hampers other inter-dimensional efforts in its vicinity and attempts to teleport too close to one will instead shunt the teleporting object into the Drift. Otherwise we start teleporting nukes around to solve all of our problems.
I am also now amused by the idea of having an onboard Uncertainty Generator to spoof scrying attempts. Also known as an "Ugg" for the response they provoke from those doing the scrying.
Everything is moving in space, planets move!
Tom Kalbfus wrote: Everything is moving in space, planets move! True but i would think that teleporting from and to the same vessel, or planet in this case, would cancel out the targets inherent movement.
Interplanetary Teleport lands on its destination even across vast distance because that spell is smarter (i.e. the DracoScript code is more robust) than your lower-level Teleport which doesn't know how to deal with the relative motion of celestial objects.
But it's more than just Teleport spells that give the Laws of Relativity the middle finger. There are in fact few natural laws which seem immune to the shenanigans of pointy-hat folk. Time travel still seems beyond the ability of even 9th-level magic, meaning that Cause And Effect still applies. It would be extremely difficult to create a time loop or temporal paradox without involving an artifact (which is beyond 9th-level magic anyway, and beyond the scope of this topic).
How do you stop people from going ethereal and boarding your ship?
Remember the opening scene from Star Wars: A New Hope? If this scene occurred in the Starfinder setting, how would it be different? Would "Darth Vader" be polymorphing people into slugs and then stepping on them?
Tom Kalbfus wrote: How do you stop people from going ethereal and boarding your ship?
Remember the opening scene from Star Wars: A New Hope? If this scene occurred in the Starfinder setting, how would it be different? Would "Darth Vader" be polymorphing people into slugs and then stepping on them?
If I'm remembering correctly, movement speed while ethereal is half normal. I suspect a spaceship might be a little fast to catch up with.
I feel like this game doesn't have to have defenses against every possible spell a 9th level caster can cast just because it's a higher tech game. I've never seen a 9th level caster in just about every sci-fi I've ever seen, and honestly that's how it should be. Those are the types of beings that should be considered god-like, not as some nuisance like "ugh, those pesky magic users and their measly reality warping powers."
Makes it easier to use the gods in Dieties and Demigods then. Seems like Pathfinder and D&D gave up giving stats for Deities, I think we should bring back the tradition of having statted Deities that can be killed by mere mortals, just let the break the rules and have 9th level spells.
Tom Kalbfus wrote: Makes it easier to use the gods in Dieties and Demigods then. Seems like Pathfinder and D&D gave up giving stats for Deities, I think we should bring back the tradition of having statted Deities that can be killed by mere mortals, just let the break the rules and have 9th level spells. I don't see the benefit of either. What purpose would having gods wandering about getting killed by packs of adventurers serve? Especially in regards to starships?
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Statting things that *claim* to be gods is a thing i could get behind. Things that have actually crossed that threshold and are more than just demis or impostors though, that should be beyond the scale of most parties. trapping, sealing, banishing, fouling their plans? Sure. Actually perma-killing the divine? Not so much.
Torbyne wrote: Statting things that *claim* to be gods is a thing i could get behind. Things that have actually crossed that threshold and are more than just demis or impostors though, that should be beyond the scale of most parties. trapping, sealing, banishing, fouling their plans? Sure. Actually perma-killing the divine? Not so much. Yeah, but that could be anything. Any intelligent creature with powers could claim to be a god if the GM wanted it to. Also, I'm not sure what you mean by "the divine." If you mean godly beings and such, there are plenty of monsters that could fill that role by having a myriad of divine powers.
well maybe i could have used a big D for Divine, but in essence, true gods which have narrative powers second only to GMs.
Torbyne wrote: Statting things that *claim* to be gods is a thing i could get behind. Things that have actually crossed that threshold and are more than just demis or impostors though, that should be beyond the scale of most parties. trapping, sealing, banishing, fouling their plans? Sure. Actually perma-killing the divine? Not so much. That's how D&D started out, it was kind of fun, having players that could kill gods.
Torbyne wrote: well maybe i could have used a big D for Divine, but in essence, true gods which have narrative powers second only to GMs. What fun is that? I think players need something to look forward to when their characters reach high level, There were some articles in Dragon Magazine about killing gods and player characters taking their place through divine ascension. I one time DMed a player who had a character who killed Loki. I one time ran a character who went to Hell on a mission to kill Tiamat and grab her treasure, that one didn't go so well, but it was fun! I've talked to some players who said their characters killed Asmodius. In the old days, he as right there in the Monster Manual, had a treasure type and everything
This is interesting, as I have extensive experience playing in this type of setting.
So shall we go down the list?
Problem 1: Requirement to have a lot of money to build a ship.
Solution 1: Work for someone with a ship, that in exchange for x number of successful jobs done. The ship becomes the players.
Solution 2: Steal a ship.
Solution 3: Grant the players a bare bones ship to start with.
Solution 4: NPC the ship, leaving the players to do stuff like fight off boarding parties, explore planets on foot(using a smaller none space vessel)
Solution 5: Give them a large sum to start with, in order to buy/build a ship.
Problem 2: Requirement for players to specialize in tasks and work together in order to control/run the ship.
Solution 1: Robots...
Solution 2: AI flight, fire-control, Weapons control etc.
Solution 3: Use unrealistic skills like Science! that grants proficiency in all science related tasks.
Problem 3: Requirement of having large crews.
Solution 1: Hirelings
Solution 2: Robots
Solution 3: Computer controlled .. AI again.
Problem 4: Magic vs. Technological advancement.
Solution 1: Magic levels that run similar but separate from Tech levels. (this has a huge explanation but far to long to put here)
Solution 2: Use one or the other but not both. ( :( no mana drives)
Solution 3: Have Magic use a special resource that is rare and is gathered to be used by only the elite and privileged. (Magic wars!)
Solution 4: Advanced Tech dampens/enhances Magic, just as specialized tech centric magic can dampen/enhance Tech.
Remember just because one species can use magic on their world does not mean they can on another. Humans can use magic in Sol, but not in other places in the greater beyond.
Can't speak to having minions (whether flesh, robots or AI, which doesn't make any difference), but...
for Starfinder:
Problem 1. Not actually a problem. Party ship isn't on the cash economy. This may not to be everyone's taste as it makes interacting with the later economy kind of odd. You can get to point where you have 1 million+ credits/UPBs, but still can't buy ships for cash, and since UPBs (Universal Polymer Bases) are actually the building blocks used to build things, this comes off as kinda weird.
But, functionally, it means the party and GM can come up with whatever scenario they like for 'has/get ship,' and then maintenance and upgrades are folded into its own party-based virtual economy that can't be strip mined to gear up individual characters.
Problem 2: May well be a problem. Science! isn't, as there are several science skills akin to the Pathfinder knowledges, but I can easily see beyond being the gunner, spaceship combat has the potential to be dull. Several games have tried 'spaceship roles' with generally poor results.
Problem 3: No such requirement. Not a problem.
Problem 4: Nope. Magic and Tech are integrated. A few bits and bobs might be more tech than magic or more magic than tech, but there isn't an opposition in play. Which is good, because when tried, it often comes off as senseless metagame nonsense.
I'm not sure where the 'humans can use magic in Sol, but not other places' comes from, but it isn't a thing in Starfinder (neither, as far as I know, is Sol). Magic is presented as universal and not having magic and tech is going to be an odd exception, unless you're going to isolated worlds specifically to exploit backwards savages.
I don't know how you mass produce magic. Are their spellcasters on the assembly lines?
TheWalkerofDreams wrote: This is interesting, as I have extensive experience playing in this type of setting.
So shall we go down the list?
Problem 1: Requirement to have a lot of money to build a ship.
Solution 1: Work for someone with a ship, that in exchange for x number of successful jobs done. The ship becomes the players.
Solution 2: Steal a ship.
Solution 3: Grant the players a bare bones ship to start with.
Solution 4: NPC the ship, leaving the players to do stuff like fight off boarding parties, explore planets on foot(using a smaller none space vessel)
Solution 5: Give them a large sum to start with, in order to buy/build a ship.
Problem 2: Requirement for players to specialize in tasks and work together in order to control/run the ship.
Solution 1: Robots...
Solution 2: AI flight, fire-control, Weapons control etc.
Solution 3: Use unrealistic skills like Science! that grants proficiency in all science related tasks.
Problem 3: Requirement of having large crews.
Solution 1: Hirelings
Solution 2: Robots
Solution 3: Computer controlled .. AI again.
Problem 4: Magic vs. Technological advancement.
Solution 1: Magic levels that run similar but separate from Tech levels. (this has a huge explanation but far to long to put here)
Solution 2: Use one or the other but not both. ( :( no mana drives)
Solution 3: Have Magic use a special resource that is rare and is gathered to be used by only the elite and privileged. (Magic wars!)
Solution 4: Advanced Tech dampens/enhances Magic, just as specialized tech centric magic can dampen/enhance Tech.
Remember just because one species can use magic on their world does not mean they can on another. Humans can use magic in Sol, but not in other places in the greater beyond.
A lot of this has been addressed at least to some degree already though.
1) No, Starfinder does not require splitting any funds from PC gear to fund a ship. There is a separate pool of resources determined by APL to use in upgrading ships. Ships are available from level 1 to parties implying they are either issues by factions in game or old clunkers that are appropriate for level 1 parties are just dirt cheap and can be included in starting gear, something to that effect. (i could easily see a table listing party size and corresponding ship hull's available to start with)
2) No, there are not any "ship crew" classes. Anyone can participate in ship play in a few different roles regardless of their exact class. we havent seen exact examples of how this plays out but in all conversation so far they give the impression that PCs wont be focusing their builds on ship side to the detrement of away missions or vice versa.
3) The ships that parties normally acquire seem to be scaled to the party size. Optional rules or a way of focusing on a ship based campaign with capital ships would be awesome but we have nothing on how that may or may not be implemented yet. But at least with ships on the scale they have talked about there is no need for extra crew members or robot companions to take care of things. i suspect that much as a GM stealing your PC's special mount or denying access to spell components, GMs will be heavily discouraged from stealing the PCs ship just because they all wanted to explore the planet they just found.
4) Magic and Tech existing along side seems to be the status quo. I agree that having separate tracks for magic and tech levels on various worlds would be cool but it could also be handled with a note that on planet X there are no tech items available and on planet Y there are no magic based items available. likewise limit caster level of magic available on low magic or limit the level of tech items on low tech worlds. There has been some talk in interviews of magic based ships and at the assumed tech level magic and tech are commonly interworked into regular devices. There is nothing at all to indicate that magic runs on a limited resource that is being fought over, that would be a huge break from established setting material what with this being set in a future version of the Pathfinder Multiverse. Going back to comments they have already made, there is nothing that explicitly puts technology at odds with magic. In theory you could have a tech based anti-magic field in the game but there is nothing to indicate that anyone is interested in specifically stamping out the use of magic that would warrant investing into technology that just blanket suppresses magical effects. It could make for an interesting faction but it would be shocking if that played any significant role in the setting since there havent been any hints at it so far.
Even more so than in Pathfinder, magic has become magic with no fractious distinctions in where that magic comes from, it would be extremely odd for there to be regional magic now that doesnt work when you get too far from where it originates from. that would also work against PCs having magic since a major theme seems to be exploring light years away from the Absalom Station system. I can not think of any point of comparison in the known settting details for Pathfinder or Starfinder to support the idea that you could use an ability in one area but not another unless the ability is directly tied to an artifact that you dont take with you. So, perhaps there is room for a faction that gets spell like abilities from an artifact they built out of their home system star and the power of those abilities is tied to their proximity to that star... but that isnt magic and we have nothing to say such a scenario has even been considered.
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