With the new unified caster level make caster 'dips' be more attractive?


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Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

It makes you adept with phrenics!

It's a class that adds spell-like mental powers, better access to some Psychic Power feats, and gives you some unique mental abilities.

FINALLY I KNOW!


Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
Spells that aren't spell-like abilities are almost exclusively available as a result of a class, which represents your mastery of that class. "Spells" are a learned skill, and spell casters are the ones who are good at it.

So innate magic won't be allowed as fluff for casting classes? That's what that sounds like to me.

It also sounds like it penalizes dipping into casting classes and forces players to take the phrenic archetype and psychic feats if they want one to two 1st level spells that are not stuck at CL 1.


IonutRO wrote:
Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
Spells that aren't spell-like abilities are almost exclusively available as a result of a class, which represents your mastery of that class. "Spells" are a learned skill, and spell casters are the ones who are good at it.

So innate magic won't be allowed as fluff for casting classes? That's what that sounds like to me.

It also sounds like it penalizes dipping into casting classes and forces players to take the phrenic archetype and psychic feats if they want one to two 1st level spells that are not stuck at CL 1.

In universe, its probably more a question of complexity than it is one of "how natural this is". For example, imagine if a Sorcerer was in Starfinder, some of the bloodlines have got both Spell-Like abilities and Spells.

The Spell-Like abilities they have are often a direct application of their being. Like throwing a proto-plasmic lump of their own being at someone, its not only innate, its trivially innate, as it requires zero shaping and the force of which would only be limited by how much of themselves, how much of their willpower and sense of self they have to throw at them.

... Conversely, their regular spells have very little to do with their natural being; or rather, the abilities of their natural being. Even with a Sorcerer using Form of the Dragon, its not an innate ability of a dragon to turn into a dragon, and being part dragon at best just means they can ignore certain parameters, such as providing an itemized genome of the dragon you want to become. It still leaves you with "how do I turn a thing into another thing?" and even if we went by the logic of "but dragons can shapeshift into humans", well... A human wanting to turn into a dragon would still have to reverse engineer the process.

Meanwhile, if we were to turn the analogy on its head and assume "learned" spell-like abilities that are NOT innate (such as some conceptions of psychic powers), then it would be like the difference between learning to ride a motorcycle, and learning to use a motorcycle as a blunt weapon, or playing card games on motor cycles. One's a natural use for a motorcycle that comes naturally to anyone with a sense of balance riding one... And the other two are unnatural occurrences that while awesome and pragmatic are certainly going to require extensive remodelling of the Motorcycle and requirement to alter how you ride it to compensate.

Does that work for you?


Ventnor wrote:
I could easily see a house rule being scaling the caster level of each class you have levels in with your character level. What taking more levels in Mystic or Technomancer would get you is more spell slots and higher spell levels.

Why though? Would a soldier 1/mystic 9 be treated as an 10th level soldier for specialization in all the things and soldier class abilities? Would a mechanic 5/technomancer 5 have CL 10 and have a 10th level AI?

Just having innate abilities haven't ever changed how your class abilities function. I'm not clear on why they would or even how they would, or even where the impetuous is suddenly coming from. Race and feat based spell-likes have been around for decades, I don't think I've ever seen an argument that they mean the character should get a free class boost if they're a caster.


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
IonutRO wrote:

So innate magic won't be allowed as fluff for casting classes? That's what that sounds like to me.

It also sounds like it penalizes dipping into casting classes and forces players to take the phrenic archetype and psychic feats if they want one to two 1st level spells that are not stuck at CL 1.

This isn't really a penalty for a 1 level dip into a casting class, this is a boon for a dip into a class with the phrenic adept archetype. After all, in PF, a 1 level dip would result in a few 1st level spells stuck at CL 1, so I don't see how this is different.

Also, I don't see why innate magic wouldn't be allowed as fluff for casting classes. You could have a feat that allows a caster to choose one spell as a SLA (and the SLA could use character level as caster level); that feat would surely have a minimum CL prerequisite, just as they do in PF.


Jimbles the Mediocre wrote:
After all, in PF, a 1 level dip would result in a few 1st level spells stuck at CL 1, so I don't see how this is different.

There isn't one, and that's the problem. In d20, dips into martial classes always give you abilities and bonuses that remain relevant all the way throughout the campaign, but dipping into caster classes always gives you abilities that fall behind and become nearly useless after only a few levels.

A 1 level dip into Soldier can give a Mystic a total of four proficiencies (one of which would normally be unavailable until 5th level for non soldiers), a +1 BAB boost, and a permanent boost to HP and SP, at the loss of a single spellcasting progression level.

A 1 level dip into Mystic gives a Soldier two 1st level spells which will become useless in two to four levels. And he has to sacrifice BAB progression, HP, SP, and class feature progression for this very minor and short term benefit.

Jimbles the Mediocre wrote:
Also, I don't see why innate magic wouldn't be allowed as fluff for casting classes. You could have a feat that allows a caster to choose one spell as a SLA (and the SLA could use character level as caster level); that feat would surely have a minimum CL prerequisite, just as they do in PF.

I'm criticising the statement that spellcasting is always something learned, which relegates innate magic to the realm of spell-like abilities.


Quote:
In d20, dips into martial classes always give you abilities and bonuses that remain relevant all the way throughout the campaign

I would say that is a flaw, not a positive.

NB, one that 5th edition somewhat rectifies.


So wait, you're saying that 1 level dips should always give you abilities that become useless after a few levels? Because that's not how 5e works at all, level 1 dips in 5e tend to be really good.


I said 5th edition "somewhat" rectifies. It doesn't go far enough.

Ideally, dipping one level in another class should give you no more than taking a level in your current class. So (for example) Medium and Heavy armour proficiency, Martial Weapon proficiency, +1 BAB and more hp is too much. Far far too much. Three feats worth of too much. 5e cuts it down to two feats worth of too much.


Fardragon wrote:

I said 5th edition "somewhat" rectifies. It doesn't go far enough.

Ideally, dipping one level in another class should give you no more than taking a level in your current class. So (for example) Medium and Heavy armour proficiency, Martial Weapon proficiency, +1 BAB and more hp is too much. Far far too much. Three feats worth of too much. 5e cuts it down to two feats worth of too much.

For some reason, my first instinct solution to this would be to make levels of most classes past one better in general.

... Or you know... Give an alternative option for getting these things without needing to deal with multi-classing, so you're not spending a level on those things.

For some reason, this actually feels like something that the new Starfinder Archetype structure can fix by adding a sort of "Soldier Light" archetype, which would give staggered benefits that the first level or three of Soldier would normally give; spread out over the course of several levels. All without having to invest levels into Soldier.

Similarly, I think the specifics of the Phrenic Adept Archetype may be somewhat intended as a better alternative to dipping into a Caster for a "magical effect". Especially given the new details on how Spell-Like abilities work.

In any case, I suspect the developers have a similar line of thought: If people are only taking 1 level in a class and using all the rest on a main class, then something has gone wrong. In the sense that the multi-classing mechanic isn't being used as intended.


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
IonutRO wrote:

In d20, dips into martial classes always give you abilities and bonuses that remain relevant all the way throughout the campaign, but dipping into caster classes always gives you abilities that fall behind and become nearly useless after only a few levels.

A 1 level dip into Soldier can give a Mystic a total of four proficiencies (one of which would normally be unavailable until 5th level for non soldiers), a +1 BAB boost, and a permanent boost to HP and SP, at the loss of a single spellcasting progression level.

A 1 level dip into Mystic gives a Soldier two 1st level spells which will become useless in two to four levels. And he has to sacrifice BAB progression, HP, SP, and class feature progression for this very minor and short term benefit.

I'm not gonna disagree with the lopsidedness of martial dips vs. caster dips, but I will suggest that martial dips are not quite as powerful in Starfinder as they are in Pathfinder.

My reasoning is that, in order to stay relevant, a martial needs weapon specialization as well as weapon proficiency to keep up, and specialization doesn't kick in until third level. Without it, that 1 level dip in martial may be useless in four to six levels.

Obviously, you're right, there's an "imbalance of the dips" (chips, anyone?), but I don't think it's as bad as it was in PF.


You underestimate how powerful a 1 level dip into soldier is, as it lets you get Heavy Weapons specialization as early as 3rd level. Normally any other class would need to go Longarm Proficiency > Longarm Specialization > Heavy Weapons Proficiency > Heavy Weapon Specialization as feats, which would take till 7th level and use up all their feats. By getting Heavy Weapons Proficiency from the dip, they skip all those steps except for the last, and can just spend one feat to nab Heavy Weapons Specialization.


IonutRO wrote:
You underestimate how powerful a 1 level dip into soldier is, as it lets you get Heavy Weapons specialization as early as 3rd level. Normally any other class would need to go Longarm Proficiency > Longarm Specialization > Heavy Weapons Proficiency > Heavy Weapon Specialization as feats, which would take till 7th level and use up all their feats. By getting Heavy Weapons Proficiency from the dip, they skip all those steps except for the last, and can just spend one feat to nab Heavy Weapons Specialization.

You also get Heavy Armor, and there's no spell failure chance in SF, so your Technomancer can totally wander around in the heaviest armor they're proficient with. As an aside, though, Heavy Weapons have a strength requirement to free fire. If you don't have high enough strength, you need to mount them on a tripod, so most casters would likely be better off just stopping at long arms as their damage option, unless they want to add Strength to their build.


The Arnie feat lets you duel wield heavy weapons.

Scarab Sages Developer, Starfinder Team

IonutRO wrote:
Normally any other class would need to go Longarm Proficiency > Longarm Specialization > Heavy Weapons Proficiency > Heavy Weapon Specialization as feats, which would take till 7th level and use up all their feats.

Actually you CAN go Longarm Proficiency > Heavy Weapon Proficiency (which does have a Str 13 prerequisite, since heavy weapons have a Strength minimum to use them without penalty) >Heavy Weapon Proficiency, as long as you are okay to not be specialized with longarms.


I swear that about a month ago we were told that Heavy Weapon Proficiency requires Longarm Specialization.


Pathfinder Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber
Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
Actually you CAN go Longarm Proficiency > Heavy Weapon Proficiency (which does have a Str 13 prerequisite, since heavy weapons have a Strength minimum to use them without penalty) >Heavy Weapon Proficiency, as long as you are okay to not be specialized with longarms.

Assuming humans get a bonus feat at character creation, that's heavy weapons specialization at 3rd level (if you devote all your feats) without needing a martial dip at all.

A heavy weapons wielding, spell-slinging ball of boom sounds like a very fun character indeed. The only question that remains is choice of build: Technomancer with investments in Str and weapons feats, or Soldier (arcane assailant), possibly with the Phrenic adept archetype? Man, I suppose it's a question of which boom is your favorite boom and which boom is your backup boom.

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