Tech Revolution Playtest: Organized Play

HUZZAH!!!!

Also, as a volunteer GM for Starfinder games at GenCon I am now *cramming* this information, HARD.

I can't be mad though, I 100% dropped a L1 Moonscared Barbarian on a GM at GenCon the day it went legal and they had no idea WTF was going on because they didn't have the book yet :D

I am hype as heck for this, and am only a *litle* sad at no Mechs in SFS Playtesting :D

I am pretty darn happy that I did not elect to offer Starfinder games at Gencon if I am honest, I am plenty busy preparing for my tables without trying to cram a playtest into my head.

I am pretty darn happy that I did not elect to offer Starfinder games at Gencon if I am honest, I am plenty busy preparing for my tables without trying to cram a playtest into my head.

Ha, we already have enough with the APG ;) but will def have to consider it AFTER Gen Con

Coolness abounds!

Hey, I recognize that art! Sebastian Rodriguez did such a lovely job with it!

Hmm

How does investment work (carry over between sessions?) in society play?

How does investment work (carry over between sessions?) in society play?

Not that I suppose it matters for the playtest because they function as pregens. I guess it would work similar to the Utility Belt exploit (which I also am not sure how that works in Society play)?

"Did someone ask about a Utility Belt exploit?" A bright yellow skittermander comes in, wearing a snappy looking suit and sporting a gold Abadar Corp Key. "As a ship-to-ship salesrep for the largest corporation in the Pact Worlds, it's important for me to carry my sample case with me. This belt is my sample case! When I pull something out of it, it pulls credit from an account that I keep with Abadar Corps, but then I have to keep the item because I took it out of its original packaging."

The Utility Belt is a flexible purchasing plan. If you load it up with enough credits, you'll always have that oddball consumable you need, but each of those is a permanent purchase. You're just getting to do that purchase ANYWHERE. No returns for dissatisfied customers, so you need to be certain before you pull the item out of that belt!

That Vesk drill Sargent appears to be canceling an apocalypse.

"Did someone ask about a Utility Belt exploit?" A bright yellow skittermander comes in, wearing a snappy looking suit and sporting a gold Abadar Corp Key. "As a ship-to-ship salesrep for the largest corporation in the Pact Worlds, it's important for me to carry my sample case with me. This belt is my sample case! When I pull something out of it, it pulls credit from an account that I keep with Abadar Corps, but then I have to keep the item because I took it out of its original packaging."

The Utility Belt is a flexible purchasing plan. If you load it up with enough credits, you'll always have that oddball consumable you need, but each of those is a permanent purchase. You're just getting to do that purchase ANYWHERE. No returns for dissatisfied customers, so you need to be certain before you pull the item out of that belt!

What I meant was that stuff doesn't generally carry over from game to game in society play. So do we just mark on our chronicle sheet how much is in the Utility Belt at the end of each session, or what?

More on topic, for building a Nanocyte at a higher level, how do we determine minor/major forms, since in theory the chosen forms at each level are based on a combination of level at the time you took the form as well as how much your Nanite Investment was at those times?

A tall lean man with obvious cybernetic parts walks into the room. He looks over the blog post and smiles. He takes out a cigar, uses his nanites to form a blowtorch. He lights the cigar.

Hell...it's about time.

More on topic, for building a Nanocyte at a higher level, how do we determine minor/major forms, since in theory the chosen forms at each level are based on a combination of level at the time you took the form as well as how much your Nanite Investment was at those times?

Also with the addendum in the playtest forum about being allowed to add starting wealth to your investment... for a 4th or 8th level character, "starting wealth" is a bit of an odd thing.

I feel like the investment should be fixed on the level table instead of relying on eating found weapons, because it will just result in the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found during a session, which is greedy and I'm not sure is the intent of the ability.

I feel like the investment should be fixed on the level table instead of relying on eating found weapons, because it will just result in the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found during a session, which is greedy and I'm not sure is the intent of the ability.

If they did it that way it would basically just be giving the nanocyte a free weapon of his level + 1 every time he levels up (e.g. when he hits level 5 his investment is automatically high enough to choose a level 6 weapon) otherwise the whole system would be pointless. The way it's currently written it sounds like nanite investment is based on the price of a single weapon you consume plus the optional 10% worth of UPBs you can contribute, which will of course lead to the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found in any given session.

I think they should change it to the nanocyte can consume any number of weapons and other technological items to increase his nanite investment. Now instead of eating the most expensive item in any encounter, he can eat the outdated weapons and tech items his party members no longer need when they upgrade. For example, the nanocyte's party are all level 13 and they all have level 10 weapons. They go see a vendor and they each replace their level 10 weapons with level 14 weapons. Instead of consuming one expensive piece of equipment, the nanocyte can consume their discarded level 10 weapons and raise his investment to the value of all weapons consumed, allowing him to make his own level 14 piece of equipment.

What the heck? Now they're doing a Starfinder Second Edition?!

"Did someone ask about a Utility Belt exploit?"

I just have a bottomless cheek pouch.

Dracomicron wrote:

I feel like the investment should be fixed on the level table instead of relying on eating found weapons, because it will just result in the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found during a session, which is greedy and I'm not sure is the intent of the ability.

If they did it that way it would basically just be giving the nanocyte a free weapon of his level + 1 every time he levels up (e.g. when he hits level 5 his investment is automatically high enough to choose a level 6 weapon) otherwise the whole system would be pointless. The way it's currently written it sounds like nanite investment is based on the price of a single weapon you consume plus the optional 10% worth of UPBs you can contribute, which will of course lead to the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found in any given session.

"A free weapon" is basically what Vanguards and Solarians get; further, the amount doesn't HAVE to be enough to buy a level+1 weapon. It can be less. It could be modified by Knacks, Faculties, or other effects.

Tying this class feature directly to destroying in-game items could lead to unforeseen circumstances ("While house-sitting, I absorb the planetary governor's Blue Star Plasma Cannon, worth 950,000 credits, and never need to absorb another item, ever. Come at me, bro" or, for a less absurd option, "I eat this high-level item we were given. Whoops, it was important to the plot! Eh, worth it").

Making GMs constantly monitor the value, level, and necessity to the plot of items provided in the game does not seem worth it for society play. I'm not even sure how bookkeeping on that would go, session to session.

What the heck? Now they're doing a Starfinder Second Edition?!

... no? We're getting another Class and rules for Mechs.

can anyone explain how playing as a playtest nanocyte would work in terms of xp? I understand you can apply credits and reputation/fame earned as a playtest nanocyte to an existing society character of lower level, but am I correct that you don't get to apply any xp? couldn't see an answer in the society guide but I may just be missing something

I'd like to test out the class and feed into the playtest but I also don't want to lose out on ma xp for my main!

can anyone explain how playing as a playtest nanocyte would work in terms of xp? I understand you can apply credits and reputation/fame earned as a playtest nanocyte to an existing society character of lower level, but am I correct that you don't get to apply any xp? couldn't see an answer in the society guide but I may just be missing something

I'd like to test out the class and feed into the playtest but I also don't want to lose out on ma xp for my main!

"Apply credit" includes XP. It's just like the lower level character had played the adventure, except that the money is fixed.

I'm a little confused as to how one could apply credit to a character of lower than 1st level, though.

CaptainTrips27 wrote:

Dracomicron wrote:

I feel like the investment should be fixed on the level table instead of relying on eating found weapons, because it will just result in the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found during a session, which is greedy and I'm not sure is the intent of the ability.

If they did it that way it would basically just be giving the nanocyte a free weapon of his level + 1 every time he levels up (e.g. when he hits level 5 his investment is automatically high enough to choose a level 6 weapon) otherwise the whole system would be pointless. The way it's currently written it sounds like nanite investment is based on the price of a single weapon you consume plus the optional 10% worth of UPBs you can contribute, which will of course lead to the nanocyte eating the most expensive item found in any given session.

"A free weapon" is basically what Vanguards and Solarians get; further, the amount doesn't HAVE to be enough to buy a level+1 weapon. It can be less. It could be modified by Knacks, Faculties, or other effects.

Tying this class feature directly to destroying in-game items could lead to unforeseen circumstances ("While house-sitting, I absorb the planetary governor's Blue Star Plasma Cannon, worth 950,000 credits, and never need to absorb another item, ever. Come at me, bro" or, for a less absurd option, "I eat this high-level item we were given. Whoops, it was important to the plot! Eh, worth it").

Making GMs constantly monitor the value, level, and necessity to the plot of items provided in the game does not seem worth it for society play. I'm not even sure how bookkeeping on that would go, session to session.

Actually I stand corrected. Since you learn (or switch) your forms at level-up, and level-up never happens during a Society session (except maybe in campaign mode for an AP, but I digress), increasing your nanite investment, at least during the playtest, is utterly meaningless. You can't DO anything with the stuff you ate.

When Nanocyte goes live, I can't imagine that we'd be allowed to keep our investment, session to session, for things that we eat that we didn't already own.

I'm having the problem now trying to create a 4th level Nanocyte, that the order in which you get investment compared to when you can change your forms means that even at 4th level, I'm stuck with a 3rd level advanced melee weapon, because I can't increase my investment to a significant degree to buy my level+1 before I get my forms, and it doesn't say you can "save" your forms for when you have the juice to buy something good.

You get major forms at 3rd and 5th, but you can only buy items at your level+1 (or level for Additional Resources sources) after you get to a level. So, for a 4th level character, any item that I want as a gear array I have to "buy" with the investment of an item I bought at 2nd level. Doesn't really feel good.

Seems like we should not have to wait to 5th level to start swapping out forms.

This will be fun to test out.

That Vesk drill Sargent appears to be canceling an apocalypse.

Haha I got the same vibe!

I am liking what I have played so far in SFS. It is pretty easy to make a list of my forms. It is not like the damage scales greatly ever level with weapons so saving money for when I want to buy something for my Nanite investment and recording what I did seems super simple.

Of course, I guess it is easier for me as I don't look at always using the gear array as the other two offers good reasons for them also. I can't even think of what I would want bad enough to be trying to get "weapon/tech +1" every level. I have seen level 4 characters still using level 1 weapons and doing just fine.

Hey, I recognize that art! Sebastian Rodriguez did such a lovely job with it!

Now that it is the 30th, I can say where that art is from. It's the Vesk Spell Sergeant from my "Magical Academies" article in Threefold Conspiracy, Puppets without Strings!

“So, you want more in-depth magical theory and spellwork? Fine. Here's a hypothesis for you: If you don't use your magic to kill your enemy, he will he shoot you in the face! Care to test that one in the field? Look, you want to waste months fine-tuning a bit of spellcode? Go to the Arcanamirium, SENOT, or the Prit. If you wash out, maybe Nerundel Halls will let you bask in First World auras. But you're here, where my job's to teach you to kill and survive, and that's what you will learn!”

— Spell Sergeant Vaya Bodgusk, Karchizara Battle Magic Academy on Vesk Prime

I guess it's time to break out the MIU and rejoin the Collegia Titanica again ;)

So..I've looked over the Tech Revolution Playtest stuff again and something just occurred to me. And again, I am trying to be sure what is in my head is not an abuse of that system.

-----
Applying Credit: As we want to encourage extra play of the higher-level versions of the nanocyte, we're also going to open up the rules for applying credit when playing a playtest character. A player using a non-1st-level playtest character may choose to apply the earned Chronicle Sheet to an existing Organized Play character. To do so, simply replace the credits earned on the Chronicle Sheet with credits from the list below that match the level range of the existing player character.

Levels 1-2: 720 credits (2,160 credits for Adventure Path module)
Levels 3-4: 1,460 credits (4,380 credits for Adventure Path module)
Levels 5-6: 4,085 credits (12,255 credits for Adventure Path module)
Levels 7-8: 5,835 credits (17,505 credits for Adventure Path module)
-----

So reading this, a question hit me. From the wording, does that mean one could play a 1-4 Scenario with a 4th level Nanocyte and then apply that credit to a higher level character, such as a level 5-6, and gain the listed credit amount in the process?

Because while I do know it mentioned the intent is to encourage people to playtest the Nanocyte, I worry this sounds a bit abuseable to pump up a character.

Credit: The credit earned for playing a playtest character follows the same rules and guidelines as presented on page 7 of the Guide to Organized Play: Starfinder Society. This means that you must choose which of your characters will receive the credit at the beginning of the adventure. Credit must be assigned to characters of lower level than the playtest character.

If you're not doing a level 1, you have to apply credit to a lower level character.

Gotcha, thank you for clarifying.