Picking a Fist 2 (Armory Edition)


Advice


So a little under a month ago I posed a question about whether I should take Pulse Gauntlets on a Solarian solar armor build, or instead make it a solar weapon build. The goal of the character being as much DR/ER as possible and using Antagonize to be a debuff/bullet sponge character.

A few weeks ago, we got Armory, and with it three new punching options (and new solar armor revelations). I figured to open the question again now, in terms of the viability of the different options on my Solarian.

My Solarian build starts 14, 14, 9, 12, 10, 14. So early Dex and Str are even, as well as Cha. I'm gonna run the comparisons at level 13, so we'll consider the personal mods +6 in Cha for increased DCs, and the +2 and +4 a toss up between Str and Dex. Level 13 stats will be as follows

Str 20/22, Dex 20/22, Con 11, Int 14, Wis 10, Cha 24

The build prefers Graviton mode, but we're going to try and just look at weapon merit. For the benchmark the solar weapon for 13 would be Gluon Crystal with that sweet new fusion for Cha, so it's the obvious high point at as follows.

Solar Weapon: 5d6 B + 2d6 + (Str) + 7 + 13
So 7d6 + 25/26 (Average 49.5/50.5 per hit)
W/ Severe Wound Critical

None of the other weapons will hit that high of course, but the build would lose out of DR/ER sources.

Ignoring Bone Blades or other augment options, the fist options are Unarmed, Battlegloves, Pulse Gauntlets, Shell Knuckles, Resonant Gauntlets, Polarity Gauntlets, Bone Cestus, and Electrovore Gloves.

We'll cut Unarmed out alrwady since the character is Drow and the archaic quality is going to make the option a no go. The Pulse Gauntlet at level 12 is 5d6 versus the Battleglove's 3d10 at 13, so same max means we'll drop Battleglove since it's min is lower. Shell Knuckles are nice but their shells quality would make them unfit due to the Solarian's Onslaught ability being three attacks, and for the same reason we'll disqualify the Resonant Gauntlet since we won't be able to move action activate the Boost quality with our Onslaught.

So that leaves us with the following.

Pulse Gauntlet: 5d6 B & So + (Str) + 13
So 5d6 + 18/19 (Average 35.5/36.5 per hit)
W/ Knockdown Critical

Bone Cestus: 3d6 P + (Str) + 13
So 3d6 + 18/19 (Average 28.5/29.5 per hit)
W/ Bleed 2d6 Critical

Electrovore Gloves: 6d6 P & E + (Str) + 13
So 6d6 + 18/19 (Average 39/40 per hit)

Polarity Gauntlets: 3d6 E + (Str) + 6*
*Polarize + 2d6 on subsequent hits
So 3d6 + 11/12 (Average 21.5/22.5 on the first hit)
5d6 + 11/12 (Average 28.5/29.5 per hit after the first)
W/ Polarize, Operative, and targets EAC

So with everything on the table, offensively the weapon crystal fist hands down outdoes the others, but you need to reach further for the DR sources (especially with the new revelations). Without it the Electrovore is the highest damage, Pulse has a critical effect, the Bone Cestus has a ton of potential with the DOT of the Bleed critical which gaps it's damage difference with the Pulse, and last Polarity but it's a question of if targetting EAC and the Polarity trait can outweigh the Operative Specialization hit. The additional part of the Polarity is the ability to instead of investing Str you invest Dex for +1 AC without sacrificing your to-hit.

So thoughts? The options are all viable for sure, but does Polarity and targetting EAC outweigh the Operative drop? Is 1d6 worth a losing critical effect for the Electrovore (it has recharge but that just creates more problem with if you wanted to purchase a crit fusion)? Can a 5% bleed chance actually make up the damage loss difference for the Cestus?

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