Starfinder Player Core Explained

Are you ready for the glow up?
Illustration by Gunship Revolution

Howdy, nufriends and old pals! Everybody’s favorite helpful virtual intelligence is back to show you what’s coming up in Starfinder Player Core for Second Edition!

Howdy, nufriend! I’m Captain Concierge, your friendly virtual intelligence guide to Player Core and everything else

Starfinder Player Core has everything you need to launch a new Starfinder campaign or blast your Pathfinder game into outer space. Starfinder Player Core explains how to create a player character (PC), choose their gear, and prepare them to start in your very own sci-fantasy space epic. Note that all content in this book is compatible with the Pathfinder Fantasy Roleplaying Game. You’ll recognize some familiar rules if you’ve played Pathfinder before, but don’t worry—Starfinder Player Core is packed full of fresh content and rules!

So, what’s in the book? Let’s start with the ABCs of character creation: ancestry, background, and class.

• 10 new ancestries, which are also called species in Starfinder.
• Two versatile heritages, which you can mix with any ancestry!
• Tons of new backgrounds for characters in the Starfinder setting, like icon and vidgamer!
• Six new classes designed to help you play your own sci-fantasy hero.

But wait, there’s more! Starfinder Player Core also contains:

• New skills, plus futuristic Lores.
• New feats!
• New equipment!
• New spells!
• Rules for playing the game.

You and your friends can play out countless hours of adventure with tarfinder Player Core!
Illustration by Pixoloid Studios

New Ancestries
Let’s deep dive into those 10 ancestries, shall we? I love meeting alien nufriends!

Android: Play a synthetic humanoid with an artificial body and a real soul. Androids have enjoyed a few upgrades since the era of Lost Golarion, so even if you’ve already played an android in Pathfinder, you should check out the new options!

Barathu: Have you ever wanted to become an enigmatic alien with a bizarre form? How about a floating blimplike entity that can merge with other creatures and rewrite their own genetic code? Barathus got you covered for weird and wonderful.

Human: These adaptable survivors from Lost Golarion are a legacy ancestry with new options. What more do I need to explain? You’re a human, right? (Aren’t you?)

Kasatha: These traditionalists traveled aboard a worldship called the Idari from a faraway home world. Instead of colonizing the worlds they found, they remained aboard the Idari. Kasathas have four arms, always cover their nose and mouth in public, and sometimes carry puzzleblades, a traditional weapon that’s ritualistically assembled each day.

Lashunta: If you like the idea of playing a humanlike alien, consider a lashunta. They’re psychic humanoids who choose how they evolve at puberty, becoming a burly warrior or graceful enhanced scholar—or perhaps becoming someone entirely different and unpredictable.

Pahtra: Pahtras are cat people from a rebel planet who are known for their achievements in magic and music. Their home world Pulonis just declared independence from the Veskarium empire and joined the Pact Alliance. I’ve heard they don’t put up with any imperial nyansense nowadays.

Skittermander: That’s me, Captain Concierge! We’re energetic, six-armed people with colorful fur who love to give our allsix helping our nufriends and old pals every day! You’ll never regret having a skittermander on your team!

Vesk: Vesk are scaled humanoids with a powerful physique and warmongering reputation. They even think they conquered the skittermander home world, Oeddertchonk, but who are they kidding? I know a lot of vesk who defy that reputation—they can be anyone they want to be, just like you.

Ysoki: Pathfinder players might recognize the clever, flexible ratfolk who tend to love tinkering with technology. Their small bodies make them really comfy with space travel—just like us skittermanders!

Versatile heritages are special heritages characters of any ancestry can take. Anyone can become a borai or prismeni.

Borai: Created by botched resurrections and necromantic experiments, a borai is an undead soul attached to a living body. In addition to fitting in at every goth club in the galaxy, they get creepy abilities from their connection to the grave.

Prismeni: Prismenis are touched by the energy of the Drift, a recently discovered hyperspace plane, or have a deep connection to spectra, the elusive “Drift Angels” who are native to hyperspace. Most of them have rainbow hair, flighty personalities, and become ace pilots.

Starfinder is a team game. Your party should have a mix of different classes, feats, and skills.
Illustration by Pixoloid Studios

New Classes

One of the most exciting parts of any game is trying out new classes! Here’s who you can be in Starfinder Second Edition.

Envoy: You’re the face of the party and the self-proclaimed battle leader (or cheerleader, mascot, boss, whatever)! Boost your friends and trip up your enemies by giving out directives, then lead by example to grant your team extra buffs.

Mystic: You have a connection to a primeval force of the universe, and you channel powerful magic and healing through bonds with your allies. You are a healer and spellcaster, with classic Pathfinder spells plus new magic from the future.

Operative: You have a deadly aim and a keen set of tactics to take down powerful enemies. You’re likely a scout, infiltrator, or spy for your party, and you’re a primary damage dealer.

Solarian: You cycle between the powers of gravity and light, manifesting solar weapons and unleashing stellar energy in flashy attacks. You’re a close-quarters combatant relying on your mobility to stay out of danger.

Soldier: You unleash heavy weapons on foes while protecting your allies. Soldiers are close-quarters combatants who use powerful area weapons or two-handed weapons and wear heavy armor.

Witchwarper: You’re a living paradox who can warp reality with powerful spells and manifest the infinite possibilities of the multiverse in your current reality. You’re also a powerful spellcaster with access to familiar favorites from Pathfinder and flashy new magic from the future.

Archetypes:Player Core brings you archetype options for each class, plus a new archetype that lets you become a galactic explorer with the famous spacefaring society: Starfinder Field Agent!

But what about tech classes?

I get it, you want drones and magic hacks and deployable mines! The Starfinder Tech Playtest (April 21^st to May 30^th) features the mechanic and technomancer classes. Mechanic and technomancer will be appearing in a future book which the StarFriends haven’t told me about yet.

Navasi’s player is really glad she took the Battle Medicine feat.
Illustration by Emanuel Pantaleon

New Skills

If you’re going on an adventure in outer space, you need a starship, and it doesn’t hurt to know your way around a computer console. That’s why we’re introducing two new skills, Computers and Piloting, to represent taking control of a starship or hacking into a secure computer system. Starfinder has a bundle of new Lore skills too—Fashion Lore, Junker Lore, Vidgame Lore, and Technology Lore are some of my favorites.

New Feats

The Starfinder team had fun coming up with cool feats to show off how skills work in Starfinder Second Edition. You can create your own temporary Barricade on the battlefield, become a Phreaker and learn to hack without a toolkit, gain a free augmentation with Augmented Body, and more! Plus you’ll notice many of your favorite feats from Pathfinder Second Edition, like Battle Medicine and Toughness.

Get geared up with Starfinder Player Core!
Illustration by Gunship Revolution

New Equipment

Starfinder Player Core contains an armory of new gear to outfit your character for their galactic adventures. Instead of using magical runes to upgrade your items, in Starfinder Second Edition tech equipment follows an improvement system we like to call CTASEUP. Most characters start out with commercial gear, but gradually upgrade to tactical, advanced, superior, elite, ultimate, and paragon versions.

Tech Gear: Whatever you need for exploration, we’ve got you covered with medical supplies, adventuring equipment, entertainment devices, and more. Chug a sharpshooter serum to improve your aim, use your comm unit as a flashlight, or slap a medpatch on an injury.

Armor:Player Core has all kinds of neato options like kyokor plating—that’s armor made from the scaly hide of a kaiju.

Shields: Raising a shield is always a solid tactic on any planet, and you’ll enjoy checking out tech like the retractable irising shield or hardlight phase shield.

Weapons:Player Core has everything from laser rifles to dueling swords. There’s some wild weapons in here—a neural lash you control psychically, a cutlass glimmering with stolen lives, a singing spear, and a nasty little number called the painglaive, a motor-powered fangblade mounted to a polearm.

Upgrades: Most armor and weapons are customizable, with slots for one or more upgrades. Upgrades include everything from environmental protections to jetpacks or magical holoprojectors that change your gear’s appearance. Solarian crystals are a special type of upgrade that boost a solarian’s solar weapon attacks.

Grenades: Grenades are consumable items that explode in a small radius, dealing different types of damage and creating different effects. In Starfinder Second Edition, throwing a grenade doesn’t require you to make an attack roll. Instead, you chuck it at the target, and any creatures in range make a Reflex save against your class DC. Just be careful where you throw those electromag grenades. They cause tech creatures to glitch out and that could be a problem for your friend Captain Concierge.

Magic Items: Have you ever wanted a special contact lens that lets you peer into the record of all mortal experience? What about a crystal diva’s microphone that amplifies your voice and performance? A pocket dimension in a backpack? Starfinder magic items can do all this and more.

Augmentations: Augmentations are a special type of gear surgically implanted into your body that modifies your anatomy. If you want to breathe fire, just head down to the clinic and get a dragon gland implanted in your throat. Flying is no problem with ultralight wings installed into your arms or other alien appendages. There are different types of augmentations in this book: biotech, magical, magitech, and tech. Augmentations also include apex items that permanently increase your attributes.

New Spells

With two new spellcasting classes in this book, you’ll find a trove of brand new spells plus many of your old favorites from Pathfinder. In this chapter, you can give yourself a glow up or summon a phantasmal fleet of starships to bombard your enemies.

Phantasmal Fleet
Illustration by Emanuel Pantaleon

Playing the Game

Most importantly, StarfinderPlayer Core teaches you how to play Starfinder Second Edition and acts as a reference for play sessions. Starfinder GM Core has even more information about environment rules, hazards and traps, vehicles, and more—but that’s a topic for another time! Keep your eyes and other sensory organs on this space for the next blog,

—The Starfinder Team