I want to start this off by stating that I adore Plated Vesk. It's the one thing in the entirety of the Starfinder playtest PDF that grabbed me and held onto my brain the entire time I was reading through the book. It created my first character idea, and every time I looked at an option following the decision to play a plated vesk was made in reference to how it would work with such a character.
So let's take a moment to examine its fun mechanics and what's weird about them
First off, the mechanical points about Plated Vesk's armoring. A dex cap of +1 and a base armor of +4 puts it at the highest level of medium armor. Heavy armor could theoretically be better, but having the Comfort trait would be a good tradeoff on another armor of this type, and falling under the plate armor type is good stuff. It appears to have 0 bulk, no speed penalty, a standard check penalty, and, naturally, can't be removed from you.
The good traits that you can't get anywhere else - the complete lack of bulk, no speed penalty, and the fact that it can't be removed - are in a tradeoff with the fact that you're totally unable to benefit from any armor worthy of the word. You can put on a flight suit, but that's it. Instead, you're stuck using a type of armor upgrade that's rather obscure in modern times - armor runes - directly etched into your hide. This means you're reliant on finding an enchanter or becoming one yourself; that's something that isn't impossible to do, but might be more difficult. This is an extremely cool tradeoff, putting you in a different realm of upgrades than other characters. You also can't rely on the GM to give you anything cool; a super awesome armor drop in a dungeon or while adventuring can't be used by you because of your plated armor.
The weird part about it is the way it interacts with certain things, though. Specifically, it doesn't have the exposed trait, which means technically you're totally protected from a vacuum even while completely nude, which obviates the need for the specially allowed Flight Suit. It also lacks the Analog tag, so technically your natural plated scales count as a target for technological-affecting systems. Can someone hack your natural armor? Apparently!
In conclusion;
The racial trait is absolutely stellar. It has tradeoffs which are appropriate to its narrative role, with stats good enough that you're not suffering because of that fact. The benefits it gives by being part of your body are excellent, and it plays extremely well into the fantasy of being an 'unarmored' warrior that doesn't exclusively rely on dodging like a monk would. The only changes I'd make to it are adding the Exposed and Analog traits, since without those it's got some strange stuff going on. By default Analog equipment can't be affected by armor runes, but specific trumps general, and the skin of a Plated Vesk has a rule in specific allowing it to use armor runes, so it's a non-issue.
I'm still not sure if this class offers up enough to be competitive with druids or hunters in terms of "shifting", but I've said from the get-go that I don't think they could without a radical redesign, and I would assume that'd be too much.
That in particular was why I figured adding in chimeric forms you could wildshape into by mixing your aspects was a good idea; Druids and Feral Hunters have better wildshaping mechanics overall right now simply because they have the ability to choose from a much wider range of animals. If Shifters have a smaller range of animals, but can layer them two or three at once, it gives them a unique way of operating that no other class in the game can match.
So, I was discussing things with a friend of mine, and we both came to the conclusion that AIs should be a playable option in Starfinder, and I'm going to quickly go over how that'd work. Note, I'm writing this on the basic assumption that, since Starfinder will still run on the D20 system and will be 'conversion friendly', the same things that'd work in basic Pathfinder would work in Starfinder for this. I'd like feedback and thoughts on the idea, but I think it works pretty well as-is.
Ability Scores:
Spoiler:
Now, I'm aware of the issue here; AIs are not physical beings, and thus have no physical stats, and thus only have the mental attributes; Intelligence, Wisdom, and charisma, and their statistics are based on the body or system they're currently inhabiting. this is actually very workable; you just need to cut their stats buy (or rolls) in half and allow them to buy or craft bodies.
For example, in Pathfinder, the standard six-stat loadout is generally used with a 15, 20, or 25 point buy. In this method, you'd be moving forward with 8, 10, or 12, which isn't even enough to get a stat up to 18 without sacrificing something for a dump stat but has decent ability to be spread. Ten would let you get one stat up to 16, while 12 would let you have a 16 and a 12 somewhere, which, if you look at most existent builds outside of heavy duty optimization or SAD classes, is a pair of stats most people are generally going to have, yet nothing stops you in a 12 point buy from dumping one stat (probably charisma; you know you've done it before) for up to an extra four points, in which case you can set one stat to 18, one to 10, and one to 7.
This is about the same level most standard heroes sit at. In the high powered version, you're looking at a standard character generally having a stat array of 16, 16, 12, 12, 10, and 10 if they're a multiple attribute dependent character (such as monks, paladins, fighters, or rogues) or 18, 15, 14, 10, 10, 7 for a single attribute character such as a wizard or sorcerer, which makes this fit the paradigm that's already present. Add in a stat modifier for being a specially built kind of AI (Logical, Observant, Charismatic...) and you fit in with the standard races. Make it a player choice bonus like the human +2 stats so you don't have to write three entries and you're golden.
System Transference:
Spoiler:
I'll admit, this one can be a bit of an issue, but it's solved by a system already present in the game; wealth. So you're an AI, and can upload yourself to a variety of things, such as uninhabited robotic bodies, ship systems, and the local security grid. This takes three things however - the system you wish to insert yourself into, an uplink (whether physical or wireless) that lets you interface with the target system, and time.
We'll start with the simplest one; time. Time is a factor in basically everything you can do in the d20 system, whether you like it or not. Action economy is paramount, so I believe making it take 1-5 minutes is reasonable. This means that a player can reasonably, with any level of downtime, interface with just about any system they come across, which is good, as hacking in onsite is a pretty standard science fiction trope, but prevents players from doing it in the heat of combat unless they have a very good team watching their backs. Pretty simple, all told.
A full transference (Moving from one body to another system, such as leaving your robot body to inhabit your party's starship) would likely take hours; 4-8 would be good for downtime stuff, as it means it can be done while the rest of the party is sleeping, and also prevents casual use in a (space-)dungeon. your systems would likely also be vulnerable in this time, so you'd have to make sure your target system isn't fighting you (you could subdue any issues like that through basic interfacing and purging the programs designed to keep your AI character from transferring) and you aren't in any personal danger, as interrupting the transference could corrupt a severe amount of your data - not good for you.
The next bit is the uplink, which can also be handled relatively simply. It's a piece of equipment, as integral to the AI's function as a spellbook is to a wizard, so it can't really be skimped on, but it does mean we can have fun with it. There'd likely be three types of uplinks; Port, Wireless, and Multi. A Port Uplink would require physical connection to the target system in through a port, and would easily be the cheapest. Wireless would be a bit expensive, comparatively, and would be able to interface with any system that has its own wireless uplink, such as most security grids, though unlikely robots. A multi uplink would have both, and would be the most expensive and most worth getting of the three. Higher quality uplinks would guard against corruption from interruptions in transference, have firewalls to prevent attacks from a system you're interfacing with, and contain programs that let you assault other systems more easily. Some might also make it so that interfacing and transference take less time.
The target system would generally be one of four things; a robotic body, a vehicle's computer, a general object with onboard computer, or a security system. The AI character would use the physical statistics of the body they inhabit; hardness, armor, physical attributes, all that good stuff. If there's an existing program - AI or no - inside the target system, then to transfer into it, shut things down, or exert any kind of control, one would have to interface and either subdue, bypass, or destroy them.
The Robot Body - Obtaining
Spoiler:
This is probably the hardest part to get right, but I think it's doable, possibly not even that difficult. Just like the Uplink, this is a thing that'd be covered by the wealth your character has, and would be subject to limitations based on that. Typically, an AI character would attain a robotic body one of three ways; Buying it, crafting it, or stealing it.
In buying a robotic body, there'd likely be places you can order an off-the-shelf model from. These'd be cheap, replacable, and low quality due to mass production. you could likely order a custom body, but no doubt that'd cost quite a few more credits than a basic off-the-shelf model, none of which are likely to be that great. Relatively low physical stats on these, and while you could mod them up to increase statistics, it'd be costly.
The second way, crafting it yourself, would of course require proper facilities to allow for the building process such as an assembly device or a lab where you can work in peace. All of these bodies would be custom, but would likely cost less than a mass-produced body would due to the fact that you only need to purchase the parts for it and then assemble them properly. Creating your own mods for a body would also bypass some of the unfortunate cost of such a venture. +6 strength hydraulic limbs aren't cheap, you know.
And the third way to get such a body would be what adventurers everywhere already do - stab something in the face and ransack its corpse. Chances are that in the process of taking down a robotic enemy, you'll have destroyed most of its primary systems, but assuming you didn't turn it into giblets it should be reasonable to replace the destroyed parts and rework any programs remaining inside the robot's own systems to your purposes. Cheaper than any of the other two options, but at the whim of the GM. Though there's theoretically nothing stopping you from making off with an inactive body and transfering to it while it's intact at your leisure.
The Robot Body - Stats and Level
Spoiler:
Here comes the biggest hiccups when working with robotic bodies; what about stats? Isn't hit dice supposed to be determined by level?
AIs need a couple of considerations here. First off, while an AI character could easily level up without issue (Optimizing their own programming, for instance) what this would grant them is the abilities of their chosen class, so BAB, saving throw bonuses, special abilities, spellcasting if any, companion characters, all that good stuff. What it would not do is increase HD or HP. I know the separation of HD and BAB is unusual, but there's nothing stopping it from working here.
Your chosen robotic body, no matter how you obtained it, covers three things primarily. First, your physical stats, Strength, Dexterity, and Constitution. This actually makes a fair amount of sense, and is the other side of the stats, the reason why you didn't have as much in the way of point buy to begin with; with enough cash, luck, or skill, you can get them as high as you like, assuming you work a little for it.
Second is your HD and HP. This shouldn't really take much explanation, but here I go anyways. Essentially, just how tough your robot is is a fair shake at things like the size, materials used, and general sturdiness of construction. These aren't things that an AI can really contribute to - a robotic body that can take a gravity cannon to the torso and keep coming at you isn't going to change from that when an AI is actually driving it - if anything, the AI will learn how to dodge the blast, but won't be able to directly upgrade just how tanky it is themselves.
Finally, the body determines what it's equipped with. For example, a simple mannequin body bought off the shelf would likely have a pair of standard arms, working eyes, mouth, nose, ears, the works. It would, for most intents and purposes, be a low-grade android body with maybe 2 HD. Meanwhile, a Rhino Class Destroyer comes equipped with four legs under its humanoid torso, a laser cannon in place of a right hand, a large plasma sword in place of the left hand, steel plate construction giving it 15 HD, and a shoulder mounted chaingun, but lacks olfactory and tactile sensors, hands, and is likely to scare the crap out of the local police if you try and bring such a monstrosity into a civilian area. Another option would be an Chrysanthemum Shield Drone, meant to act as a mobile forcefield generator for a team but lacking in strength, constitution, and weapon systems in exchange for a built-in wireless uplink, a hologram emitter, a pair of small hands and, well, a shield generator.
The same AI can run around in any of the three bodies. Say we have three AIs, one a mechanic, one a technomancer, and the other a soldier. The soldier, in the mannequin body, can manipulate weaponry and physical objects the same way a human or android might do so. At level 10, he's really quite skilled with his equipment, capable of wielding most guns well, but the body is fragile, and has a ten in every physical stat, which feels terrible for a big meaty fighter type. He doesn't like it because of this. The shield drone is even worse - low overall HD and HP, and the gimmicks it can do don't play to his strenghts; the weaponry on this thing is minimal, the the shield generator is useful but too defensive for his tastes and he has no idea what he's even supposed to do with the hologram emitter. The Rhino class destroyer though, that's his jam. Let the meatbags open doors and interact with computers - he's too busy firing lasers and chainguns and cutting apart anything that comes too close to his allies. With strong HD and good weaponry, he can make use of all his abilities.
Then we get to the Technomancer. She can store her magical information in her databanks so that it follows her through a transfer. The Rhino has no hands, which is a serious problem for a caster of any sort, and she doesn't have the programming to properly make use of the weaponry, so she can only parrot what she's seen other guns do... and do it poorly, suffering nonproficiency penalties. the mannequin and the shield drone are more her speed, however. The lack in physical abilities isn't as much of an issue due to the fact that she can use her magic to interact with most things. The drone has too many things she doesn't have the proper programming (Feat) to use in it once again, but it at least has hands to let her cast things, and is flying in the air consistently, out of reach of dangerous melee enemies though a sitting duck for those with ranged weaponry.
Finally, we get to the mechanic. Like the technomancer before him, the mechanic AI dislikes the Rhino for its lack of hands, and who needs this many damned weapons? The mannequin is a better fit due to having hands and not so much in the way of armor plating slowing it down, but it's lacking in tools. the shield Drone, however? excellent - that hologram projector can be used to show the biological members of the team the layout of the building he extracted from the local servers, the forcefield projector lets him contribute in a fight where he doesn't have any skill with weaponry, and the very dexterous small hands allow him to manipulate small objects without risk of breaking something or screwing up.
This system would also let the players prioritize; do they splurge on better armor plating to give themselves greater hardness and HD? What kind of weapon attachments are appropriate for your character? All this and more.
Miscellaneous Concerns:
Spoiler:
What about rest periods? The d20 system lives and breathes on having 'per day' abilities.
Easy enough, just add in a sleep analogue. I recommend a 4 hour debugging session that they start taking penalties if they don't enact every 24 hours - similar to sleep fatigue. Glitches, runtime errors, and the like account for where the penalties come from.
So bodies cost money? Isn't that prohibitive?
Not really. Using Pathfinder gold for the moment (as I don't know what monetary system Starfinder will use yet) a basic crappy mannequin body would likely cost you around 50 gold - completely mediocre if not bad stats, no armor plating, likely even only has 1 HD. Basically, the same position a standard human is in right from the get-go, but with less customizable stats. Later on the AI makes up for the fact that it didn't get to customize its physical statistics by running around in a custom robot that it did have the opportunity to customize the stats of. Money becomes the balancing factor here; armor costs money, mods cost money, size increase, more HD, better stats, all of it costs money. But if you've ever built a two-weapon fighter in Pathfinder, you'll know that that's not as much of an issue as you might think; parties look out for one another and the communal pool being devoted to a snazzy new body for your AI helps the entire team out as it'll let you do your job better, and the monetary price should be around the same cost as a suit of normal armor before you start getting into mods and weapon systems, which of course will have a standard price compared to their nonrobotic counterparts. If there's an issue with this, I'm not seeing it.
Wouldn't this take quite a bit of development time?
It might, if it was being developed in a vacuum. Instead, we already have AI rules in Pathfinder, and confirmation that AIs are going to be front and center in Starfinder; the Mechanic class gets one as a companion, to say nothing for enemies. A PC AI would just have more sense of self than the majority of them and be capable of making their own decisions, having grown beyond their original programing through self-edits or emergent intelligence situations.
What's stopping an AI from spending everything on an awesome body and crushing the campaign, or stealing an awesome one?
What's stopping the fighter from spending everything on an awesome sword? The GM, primarily. If it's gotten to the point where the robot's body is causing issues for party balance, chances are the GM would have caused such an imbalance by granting the players too much money in the first place; a well trained human with a set of artifact equipment is just as dangerous, if not more, as an AI with the same. As for the theft of a superior body, I have no doubt that a more expensive set up body is going to have anti-tampering features, such as electrocution, lockdown procedures, and self-destruction for whomever is cheeky enough to try hacking the thing. These sorts of countermeasures might be overcome with a few proper skill checks, and if the GM is smart they'll make the players work pretty hard to get the body, which eliminates most of the issue.
What about the Mechanic's robot companion? Couldn't an AI just inhabit that body?
Is there a problem with that? It's a class feature and he'd be actively sacrificing action economy by only having a single body on the field. It's an actively weaker choice than getting his own body and letting the robot companion do its own thing, and in exchange the Mechanic gets more money to spend on things that aren't a body. I'd say that's a decently balanced choice, as anybody who's played high level Pathfinder will tell you that Action Economy is king.
Isn't magic an act of will? How would an AI be able to use magic?
The same way an android might, I think. At some point, the AI has moved beyond its original parameters, and become not just a smart program, but sapient. This is what separates the Player Character AI from standard robots; it's capable of creativity, of learning, and modding itself to be better. At some point, it may have even gained a soul.
How would AIs interact with mind-affecting effects?
Well, I'm willing to bet the old "same as Androids" idea applies here. The trick is that it isn't just a set of programs running routines; it's made of code, but it's a true mind at this point, thus making it vulnerable to illusions, phantasms, patterns, and all that snazzy stuff unless it has specific abilities or items that block those out.
What about other immunities, like poison and disease?
It's true, a robot would be immune to these perrenially underused hazards. It's also be immune to the vacuum of space or hostile atmospheres (which would probably fall under poison, now that I think of it) but their setup also results in a variety of vulnerabilities. ever seen the "Anti-tech field" spell in Pathfinder? How about Heat Metal? Rusting Grasp? And robotics are more vulnerable to electricity than other creatures types as well. They can avoid some general hazards but have to deal with others more than biological characters as well.
Erastil, cares about families he doesn't care who stays home to watch the kids, he just wants to make sure that somebody is. Erastil isn't a god for adventurers, and an adventuring heroes who worship Erastil are probably angsting about not having a family, or the family they had to leave behind to adventure for.
My boyfriend actually ran a cleric of Erastil character not too long ago and I feel he did it well and gave a solid reason for such a character being an adventurer.
Part of Erastil's portfolio is protection; the whole thing was making sure people were safe, providing healing, giving marriage counselling to people we came across, and that sort of thing. He was basically the quintessential traveling do-gooder with a focus on making certain that everybody was happy and making babies (or taking care of babies, at least). The campaign died, but it was decided between me and him the cleric eventually settled down and raised a family once his adventuring days were done. Devotees of Erastil can work as PCs, you're just looking at a different sort of character.
Malficus wrote:
If a god holds and promotes bigoted and harmful beliefs, but is well meaning and wants to help others, I consider that god to be neutral. If they, with more information or a catalyst to change their opinion down the road, would correct their bigotry, they are neutral until that point. Their effect on the world is not good, and to say they are good is to say that people wanting to be good should emulate them, including that bigotry.
So if say, a god thinks tradition is more important than goodness, and their 'tradition' sacrifices good values to be attained, that is a (probably Lawful) Neutral god. Because they care more about tradition, or some other thing, than the well being of everyone. Even if that other thing is "Small town livin" or "Families" or "the well-being of Dwarvenkind"
I feel we're just talking in circles now. we've said our piece to each other; we agree broadly speaking but are getting into a debate about the details, and that doesn't really help anybody.
We have a different view on this Malficus. What you're doing is treating "Good" and "Evil" as objective forces. with the outer planes, they might be. But the gods are treated as individuals with their own foibles, prejudices, and thoughts. With those thoughts and prejudices come different ways of thinking what the real "good" for the world is. they have expanded viewpoints, but they are very much people, and should be treated as having their own personalities, rather than be homogenized like Dragonlance. I know that a lot of people hated how homogenized Dragonlance deities were; my old GM wouldn't shut up about it when the setting was brought up.
we're speaking from different viewpoints here. you're addressing objective good. DP and I are addressing subjective good. Until we can agree which to discuss, we're not going to make headway.
I think we've hit a miscommunication, Malficius. I'm not advocating Bigotry as a trait a lot of Good aligned people should have. I'm advocating internal consistency to prevent suspension of disbelief from being shattered, and for some level of strife, even between good characters, to be present because it creates good roleplaying opportunities. If there's no conflict, everything is boring.
Additionally, I'm disliking what feels like a large amount of author tract being dragged into the game.
One other note though; "Indiscriminate" and "Racist" are mutually exclusive. Just... pointing that out.
I think at this point the thread is devolving a bit.
By and large though, we all seem to be on the same page; this isn't a matter of bigotry being bad or not. It's a matter of the double-standard that's been presented to us. Why? Why is hating goblins okay, or dragons, or orcs, or whatever, but even having a gentle dislike over trans people not?
Like I said before, I'm a trans girl, so I'm of the minority this kind of change would (perceivably) be presented in order to appease and keep safe, but I'm arguing that blatant inconsistencies like this make the world less believable, less immersive, and most importantly, less fun. I don't want perfectly safe. I want strife. I want interesting. I want situations I have to think my way out of because not everything is handed to me on a silver plate. That's boring and can be in some cases sycophantic.
Either Torag's asking some kind of zen contradiction-riddle of his followers or he's pretty on board with Dwarves giving no quarter to goblins whether they're ALL tiny, psychotic pyromaniacs who kill for fun and aren't averse to eating babies every now and then or not.
I'm reminded of my last alchemist character, a goblin Winged Marauder Alchemist who operated as the group's scout, artillery, and magic item provider (man I love Master Craftsman as a feat).
Part of a character arc was when she came to terms with the dwarven barbarian in the group; a worshipper of Torag who got into a lot of fights with my characters over perceived problems. We enjoyed that aspect of the characters, their petty jibes and their grudging respect for one another.
If Torag suddenly can't be bigoted, and thus his followers can't be, that eliminates a huge aspect of what can make roleplaying fun. Conflict, even minor conflict such as an argument, is part of what makes the game enjoyable, or we wouldn't have fun being challenged by interesting encounters and puzzles.
Since people seem to like my ideas on Erastil, here's my thoughts on Asmodeus: We see in Book of the Damned volume 1 he's basically one of the first beings, having been born from whatever the Seal was. If anything, this puts him in the same position as Erastil as old and stuck in his ways.
Now, consider this idea for a moment. They share a position, both thinking that women should be the folk that tend to the young while the men are breaking faces to make sure the women can do so. the difference is in the details though; in my interpretation of Erastil, he's been thinking that way for a long long time, and as anybody who knows really old people can tell you the older they get the harder it is for them to change the way they think, due to years (in this case centuries) of reinforced thinking. The difference is in their agendas and the way they view the world.
Erastil is concerned with families. You cannot have a family without some level of comraderie, of love. Love is understanding, accepting, even if it doesn't always understand the core of the other person's philosophy. It's about support and coming together as a group to deal with problems.
Asmodeus, on the other hand, is specifically concerned with hierarchies, and you need look no further than the hells to understand how he organizes things. The reason he's misogynistic isn't because he's doing it for no reason, but because he's placing males above females in the pecking order due to an inherent limitation women have in the course of procreation; they have to actually carry, grow, and tend the infant before it's capable of being on its own. Additionally, men are much more likely and biologically suited to developing the relevant muscle mass for hard work, giving them power, and to Asmodeus that means they're higher up in the hierarchy. It's not a matter of him hating women for it's own sake, it's because he's stuck in his worldview from a time before modern equality became a reasonable thing. It's also why he respects powerful women just the same; the matriarch of House Thrune being a good example, as well as Sarenrae. Yes they're women, but the way he sees it, they are powerful anyways so meh, whatever.
They're two sides of the same coin, but while one is selfish, focused on power bases and the like, the other is focused on support and community.
Aside from the more personal opinions regarding JJ, I agree with bundil and coyote6; Having Erastil as someone who can be related as the "old guy who doesn't quite get these young folk" is sensible, and I feel that there's a lot of merit here.
Cultures the world over in real life that never had any sort of interaction with one another generated the same gender roles as one another; women stayed at home, tended things and took care of the kids, while the men went out and brought home the (sometimes literal) bacon. I'm a trans girl myself, so I understand the necessity for appearances, particularly with some of the more, uh, toxic members of the LGBT community latching onto anything they might perceive as a hint of betrayal, but Some people, good people, my mother included, just don't get it.
I think Erastil makes a good position for that. I imagine him like a dad who loves his kids but isn't quite sure what to do with them. At some point he'd sit down and go "alright, look. I won't tell you how to live your life, that's on you, but I don't really know how to respond to this. Are you willing to help me on that?"
The point is that it creates an interesting dynamic and leaves a wider spectrum of interesting clerical personalities for those that follow Erastil, as well as perceptive changes for him for a GM who runs with his characterization. Additionally, it's based on inherent roles that biology supports; it's not far-fetched to think that Erastil, being an old dude who is working off a time before more modern concepts of equality came about, is trying to be progressive and having a hard time of it.
