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I'm a bit confused about the text differences between Aware of Presence and Awareness of Location (both on page 260 of the Core book) with regard imprecise senses and blindsense.

The text for Aware of Presence seems to suggest succeeding at a Perception check with an imprecise sense makes you Aware of Presence, while succeeding a Perception check with blindsense makes you Aware of location.

The text for Awareness of Location, on the other hand, implies success at a Perception check to detect a hidden person with an imprecise sense makes you gives you Awareness of Location, whereas blindsense apparently doesn't require you to make a check.

These seem almost contradictory?

The Enhanced Senses operative exploit is designed to be the second tier of the Nightvision - Enhanced Senses - Uncanny Senses array of exploits. Each subsequent exploit requires the previous exploit to qualify.

However, the Enhanced Senses exploit offers an alternative method of qualifying for it: possessing both Dark Vision and Low-Light Vision. Obviously any character who had these would find the Nightvision exploit useless, so this makes sense.

It seems fairly clear that possessing these abilities racially should allow a character to qualify. Androids currently are the only race that can take this route (and I believe the iconic Operative is an android). However, the text does not specify the nature of the source.

Can the character qualify for Enhanced Senses with cybernetics? Advanced Darkvision Capacitors provide both darkvision and low-light vision.

What about the Adaptive Biochains version of Advanced Darkvision Capacitors? Adaptive Biochains creates organic bodyparts that function like cybernetics, so this would essentially like being given the racial characteristics...except that they might be removed for another eye upgrade.

If non-biochains cybernetics do qualify, what about a Vesk (with racial low-light vision) wearing armor with infra-red sensors?

If any of these range of semi-permanent alternatives allow the character to qualify, what happens to Enhanced senses when the technology in question is removed? The text regrettably says you require darkvision and low-light vision to "learn this exploit", so the blindsense should remain, but common sense would imply you lose blindsense until those other senses are returned to you!

However, before you claim "Rules as Written", you should know that Chapter 8's Senses section includes the following text:

"Creatures with blindsense or blindsight typically perceive using a specific sense mechanism, indicated in parentheses after blindsense or blindsight in the creature’s statistics. If this sense somehow becomes unusable, the creature loses access entirely to its blindsense or blindsight."

Which makes sense, until you realize other applications of blindsense specify the underlying sense in this form: blindsense (other sense). Enhanced Senses has no such specification.

To make things even more complicated, Uncanny Senses requires Enhanced Senses to qualify for. However, it doesn't require low-light vision or darkvision. Even if your Enhanced Senses ceased to function because you lost your low-light vision or darkvision, you would you still have the exploit itself. Do you lose Uncanny Senses? Before you answer, you should know that despite the chain of exploits requiring you to in some way have acquired darkvision at some point, Uncanny Senses states:

"If you have darkvision, its range increases by 30 feet". :O

And lastly, what if you have a permanent, or semi-permanent sense, that must be turned on to use? Advanced Darkvision provides both darkvision and low-light vision, but when darkvision is active, it emits lasers that can be seen by advanced optics, and might give the character away. When a character possess Advanced Darkvision, but has elected to turn the lasers off, do you still have Enhanced Senses?

The FAQ has explained that the base Trick Attack causes the target to be flat-footed only for the one attack the Trick Attack allows. This allows the attack to be made when the target is flat footed, which generally understood to benefit the attack by lowering the target's AC by two. However, the flat-footed condition also prevents reaction actions.

1) If a Trick Attack is performed with a ranged weapon while in a threatened square of the target, does the flat-footed condition prevent the Attack of Opportunity? The Core rules specify the skill roll is made 'just before' the attack, so this seems to suggest it does prevent the AoO, but the FAQ explains they are flat-footed 'only against the single attack roll', so this is unclear.

2) The trick attack is one full action, which includes movement, the skill roll to cause the flat-footed condition, and the attack itself. If the Operative is in a threatened square and successfully Trick Attacks the target threatening that square, then moves out of the square using the Shot On The Run or Spring Attack feats, does the flat-footed condition prevent the Attack of Opportunity this move provokes? The Core rule book seems to suggest it does, while the FAQ wording might mean it doesn't.

The 'Shot on the Run' and 'Spring Attack' feats have baked-in synergy with an Operative's Trick Attack class feature. Basically, they improve the Trick Attack action in the way that they normally improve other classes base attack action. Both these feats have a Mobility feat requirement.

However, Operatives also have access to an Operative Exploit called Uncanny Mobility that is obviously a modification of the Mobility feat for Operative-specific uses. It's arguable whether it's better or worse than the Mobility feat, but its obviously designed to be specifically useful for things an Operative would want to do. It is also very redundant to the Mobility feat, as it completely negates one target's ability to get an Attack of Opportunity on you for moving out of its threatened squares, whereas Mobility would give you a bonus to avoid getting hit by that AoO.

My question is whether or not the Uncanny Mobility class feature should be an alternate qualifier for the Shot on the Run and Spring Attack feats, seeing as Operatives probably would have less reason to have regular Mobility if they have Uncanny Mobility.

It seems possible that, considering the similarity in names, that it originally existed as an option and was removed. Or was that an oversight? Considering both those second-tier feats are Operative-friendly, so it must have been in the designers' minds.

I'm trying to figure out a way to teleport back to the party's ship. It doesn't seem like there's a safe way to do it, as Teleport (via a Tiara of Translocation or Teleport spell) always carries a risk of being off-target, which in all probability involves someone dying in the vacuum of space.

Interplanetary teleport is apparently safer (there's no risk of a mishap, though you end up somewhere random if you don't have a familiar place in mind) but the wording seems to imply you can strictly only target planetary surfaces.

Telepathic jaunt is safe, and actually can go between systems, but it wouldn't work in the standard situation: all the party members teleporting down, Star Trek style.

Is this an oversight, and the wording meant to include any familiar locations in-system, but only unseen areas on planet surfaces, or is that strictly off-limits?

And if so, is there any way of teleporting to your own ship safely? It seems like there should be, like, some kind of beacon you can put down to allow you to teleport back after you teleport to the surface, but I can't find anything in the rules.

Nonlethal damage seems to have changed significantly in Starfinder, but the rules are very short and open to interpretation.

If I'm reading the rules correctly (p. 252), the only time the difference between lethal and nonlethal occurs is when the total pushes you to 0 hp. If this is correct, doing 99 points of nonlethal damage to a 100 hp creature and then 1 of lethal kills it. However, doing the reverse order would not.

The reason I'm not sure if this is the case is because the falling damage rules (p. 400) appear to be the same as Pathfinder, and in them deliberately jumping turns the first 1d6 of damage to nonlethal...which would have no effect in the new rules! Even assuming we applied the nonlethal last, in contradiction to the text, unless that damage was the amount that killed the person, it would also have no effect.

Is Nonlethal no longer tracked separately from lethal damage? If so, the falling rules need to be corrected.