Bardic Buffs could easily be represented with the Aid Another line of thought, and get some Class Feats that let Aid Another power up for them, allowing them to inspire more from others as levels increase. (If that is how these so called "Class Feats" work?) Feels an easy way to make them naturally a "Support" class, without relying on magic to do that, nor another mechanic.
I would like to see Prestige Classes condensed into 3 or 5 levels that provide a new high level set of abilities that are worth dipping into for those that meet the relevant requirements. Prestige Classes as presented in the CRB are mostly just bad archetypes (or hybrid classes), and most of the others are NPC bloat. Athaleon's idea of separating high level archetypes with low level ones would effectively be very similar, and I would totally be on board there. This is a great opportunity for an underused system to be revitalized, a way to strengthen the modular choices that we love from Pathfinder, and make our 10+ level characters feel distinguished from the bottom half.
Mark Seifter wrote: You guys have figured it out. I will admit: Figuring out a way to handle save or lose effects that was more fun to play with than "Your monster/PC either wastes the turn or instantly wins" is what initially led me to formulate the design doc for the four degrees of success in the first place. That way, you can do something that's still somewhat useful even if they make the save (though not if they critically succeed) and then something powerful but not instawin if they fail and something more extreme on a critical fail. This also has the added benefit of dealing double damage from spells like fireball when the enemies get a critical failure! Firstly, thank you for all the awesome insight you are spreading across this forum, every answer you give makes me more hopeful for a no brainer decision towards transitioning. Secondly though, does this mean we are expected to see quite a large disparity between what a player would have as a save, and what a monster would receive? In Pathfinder, if I ever found myself in a position where I was regularly failing a typical encounters DC's by more than 10, I would feel there was a fundamental problem with my character that I needed to address! Or am I just incorrectly assuming that 10 is the boundary here, hence my confusion?
I would like to see a natural 20 stay as critical hit, for combat at least, but would rather get rid of that than see a natural 1 mean failure in skill checks. I also have some confusion about this, if as Jason Bulmahn said, Lesser minions are very "hitable" with that -10 3rd attack in a round, that means your attack -10 is likely to still hit, therefore incredibly likely to crit succeed on the first attack, and impossible to miss? I haven't seen the numbers, so I don't want to get too worked up over it, but this system seems to punish players who want to attempt to challenge an unreasonable CR creature with expert tactics, and trivialises low CR fights. Some of my favourite P1 moments are when my party got serious, planned out a way to exploit an opponents weakness and beat an encounter over 7 levels higher than we should have. This system suggests to me that P2 encounters will be much more hard limited than P1 in terms of what is considered a "challenging" encounter, and reducing options is going to be a hard sell for many. (Worth mentioning, I am still hella excited to see and play this system, but that doesn't stop me from being anxious as well!)
Kain Dragonhand wrote:
Anecdote, but I built a Cipher Investigator that was strong skill wise but only supported in combat. I was trying to see how I could help the most, in an already full party, and ended up building an aid another build needing Bodyguard, Combat Reflexes, Gloves of Arcane Striking, and A Commander's Helm. Those two items were just as important as the two feats, and with them all I built one of the most memorable characters who filled an iconic role in our group. Not having the ability to shop around would have left that character neutered, and I would have enjoyed playing them much less. I think to remove static bonuses from items is the right way to go, and I think more scaling items, as those introduced in Unchained, could be the way to make magic items last more levels worth of play. A the fringe idea though, magic item slots could work with something similar to the Mythic Intelligent Items, and you get to choose what abilities they provide?
ryric wrote:
I am somewhere between the two of you. I dislike Crit Failure effects (especially on skills), but don't mind the idea of 10+ being a crit. But I worry, being used to P1 numbers, that a level one character would never attempt a DC15 diplomacy out of fear of causing the Guard to murder them. I realise though, if this was the case, the developers would have caught this problem? So I find myself worrying about the rules, but expecting to be proven wrong. I would say baseless speculation is not worth our times, but really, I know I'm not going to be able to do anything else until spring at this rate! Back on topic: Critical spells can double the length if they don't do damage maybe? (and most SoD don't). Then a higher level wizard is likely going to daze a peasant for longer on average?
If we are wishing, I want a bit more of a modular nature from the class system, so we don't "need" a magus, or any of the hybrid classes to do what we want, and can actually Multiclass with more flexibility. Rebuilding the class system so Multiclassing (and even Prestige Classes) can be viable outside of dipping a level would be a tremendous boon. Remove the great big list of "Knowledge" Skills, I was very happy with how Starfinder handled this, so I hope they are already looking to this. And while I mentioned it, Prestige Classes. Don't get rid of them, but make them 3-5 levels, give them special abilities to reward you that are hard to qualify for, but as good or better than just continuing your main class abilities. edit: spelling.
I think I agree with the idea of less rules for this. Especially facing. I worry that this would open up a dangerous precedent for combat, as facing in all regards has always been ignored; Characters have 360 degree vision, and face all directions at once. So keep it simple, No facing in the game. I do think that maybe removing certain checks for magical flying might work though. Limiting movement actions based on fly type doesn't sound like the right answer, as I would think a level 20 character with maximum dexterity and full ranks (however skills work in this) in "Fly" would be able to do a flip, even if their movement was "poor".
technarken wrote:
I couldn't agree more. I am desperately hoping (but not optimistic) that you still will get multiple reactions a turn. The Starfinder system is: a) One reaction a turn.
This Severely limits the options and enjoyability of combat in Starfinder. We have already seen there are going to be different ways to use reactions (shields being one of the few things revealed) so point c) I am not worried about, but not having any way to take more than one reaction, or disrupt spells, disappoints me immensely. Keep Combat Reflexes, or something similar. An X number of reactions at each level would be fine as well, feat locked or otherwise. |