Rising Angel's page

I would suggest using the opportunities that Themes present to make the Tau.

Tau racially are +2 Dex (no negs) with a bonus to perception checks at distance to represent their keen eyes, low-light vision, and other common traits.

Then use the Themes to represent Air, Fire, Earth, Water and Ethereal Castes. Each would have the associated ability bonus (Dex for Air, Con for Fire, Int for Earth, Cha for Water, and Wis for Ethereal). You then have their leveling abilities represent the skill bonuses you listed.

This creates the race and represents the choosing, without needing to over complicate the racial aspect.

Doctor Everec wrote:

Delightful wrote:

This isn't really about adapting the Mass Effect races to Starfinder but would Solarians, Mystics, and Technomancers work in the Mass Effect universe? I suppose calling them biotics would be a simple way of doing it.

Personally, I like to think of Technomancers being a bit like biotics. So I think that could work. Same with Mystics as well. You might need to re-flavour, replace or remove some spells though, as some of them just don't fit. Solarians probably have the most biotic-like abilities out of the three classes, so you'd likely be able to leave that class the way it is and just change the fluff behind it.

Yeah, I think if you're willing to do some reskinning you could match the ME and Starfinder classes passably. I'd say;

Adept=Mystic
Soldier=Soldier
Engineer=Mechanic
Vanguard=Solarian
Sentinel=Technomancer
Infiltrator=Operative/Envoy

That's the exact breakdown I came up with, too!

Also, here are my takes on some of the other races:

Batarian: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5ytBajSy3DbYUtVQkRDVGdsLWM/view?usp=shari ng

Drell:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5ytBajSy3DbSThPbVFjZWdHZjA/view?usp=shari ng

Krogan:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5ytBajSy3DbbXpVTlVKR09ZTDg/view?usp=shari ng

If you like them, I have Asari, Quarian, Salarian and Turian as well. I also have guidelines on flavoring the Starfinder game to better fit Mass Effect. I have a guide available on my Patreon if anyone is interested. The first part is only the player material (themes, races, and classes). In the next few months I'm going to be adding Equipment, Vehicles, Aliens, and eventually full scale adventure modules. You can check it out here;

https://www.patreon.com/bomberchick

The thing that I think represents "Mythic" is 'mysterious.' I think the act of assigning stats to the variable acts of Fate is too much like looking behind Oz's curtain.

Point of fact; being awesome 24/7 isn't mysterious, mythic or heroic
Point of fact; having no framework to reference when determining the outcome of battles between Gods allows for awful storytelling
Point of fact; having too much framework to reference when determining the outcome of battles between Gods allows for awful storytelling

I was thinking that it's great to have the framework for these abilities, but the best way to keep them inspiring awe might be to not let players take them!

As a GM, assigning the mythic roles to the character in secret would let me apply those abilities and skills behind the GM Screen (Oz's curtain) when they're most needed; letting the player make that extra move, or get that additional d6 to their roll to save the day. Savvy players will eventually figure it out; but at that point the story can develop around the growth and discovery of those powers. If I see what I can do on the sheet, then there's no wonder to it ...

I think that mysterious element takes 'rules' and turns them into 'magic.'

Maybe not unusual, but sometimes overlooked: Truestrike + any Combat Maneuver. The +20 means that a wizard can usually auto-succeed any check. Sure, the AOOs suck, but thats what Mirror Image is for. My favorite maneuvers are Bull-Rush (into an enviromental hazard) or Disarm (while I am not using a weapon.)

My Cleric made my DM cry with this combo - I had an adamantine returning shield and the "Ricochet Shield" equipment trick. With a -2 for each 'bounce' and the total distance traveled in range increments the +20 really helped. We wound up fighting the big baddie in a round stone tower. Cast stoneskin on him (making him a hard surface) and bounced the shield off the wall onto him, then off him onto the wall, off the wall and then onto him again ... it was evil.

King of Vrock wrote:

$10 bucks for a character you're likely playing for at least a year is well worth it.

Player Character Portfolio: $10.

Being able to say your character sheet has its own table of contents: priceless.

I love this! Frankly, my group loses someone's character sheet about every week ... something like this that is more hefty and easily shelve-able with the books (without sticking them inside the cover for days on end) is exactly what I want!

I agree with Jim on all counts!

The inherent necessity of the birth of a new goddess (imho) is that the universe *Needs* the new goddess. Remember, the workings of the universe are vast and unknowable I think that has to be spoken of first and foremost.

I think this need has to be worked into the basic aspects of the Test of the Starstone, for instance;

Cayden got drunk and can't remember how he did it ... but there was no patron that fulfilled his niche in the universe, so the question then becomes who dared him? Was it maybe a representative from the deities that realized an imbalance existed in the universe and then sought out someone that could fill that role? Maybe the patron even went to other lucky folks and gently nudged them towards the role, but some were too meek to attempt it, others tried but their luck didn't hold, etc.

Any adventure I would see as forcing a deficiency in the universe that the universe as a whole seeks to balance, then, through direct or indirect means, the PC's become embroiled. As they answer the call of the adventure they are drawn inexplicably into the Test, and at the conclusion of the adventure the one destined to fill the emptiness meets the goal. This could be an NPC who the PC's have been helping (a la Amieko from Jade Regent) or it might be the PC's. Wouldn't it be interesting if it were only one of the PC's? Maybe only one could meet the challenge, maybe they were there to challenge the antagonist and through doing so convert him to a protagonist, thereby maturing him into the candidate the universe needed ... so many possibilities!

Thanks for the reply! I posted here because I did all the mathhammer I could before my head started to spin, and so I implemented it in my game to test.

Even though my test is going well, I admit that my players aren't exactly the abusive type, so I doubt they would intentionally break the system I gave them and kinda wanted help from the community to see any problems with it!

Hiya Everyone! I've come up with a method in my campaign of allowing players 100% creativity with their characters, yet still maintaining an even power level. I've play tested this using the Serpent's Skull adventure path, and it's working pretty well!

Let me start with my logic;

Picking up the Advanced Race Guide, I reviewed the RP costs for existing core races, and developed the following conclusions;

Each Core Race is generated with between 8 and 11 RP
Each Core Race is balanced with the other Races in the Advanced Race Guide
Alternate Racial Traits are equal to an option in the Race Builder
Any Core Race is allowed for standard point buy character creation
An Advanced Trait costs 4RP for a +2 to a base stat
The cost of raising a 10 to a 12 would cost 2 ASP
The average cost of raising any stat from any number 2 lower is 3.4 ASP

If the above is true, then the average value of 1 RP and 1 ASP is 3.7, meaning that one could consider 1 RP to roughly be equal to 1 ASP.

So ... what I did was increase the amount of base points for a standard point buy character by the maximum point value of the Core Race and simply called them "Character Creation Points." By doing this, I still guaranty that someone could get the same stats using the Standard Point Buy for the highest costing core race. It (on average) would allow someone who took one of the 'lesser' core races and get a slight upper hand on stats (3 CCP, or a total +1 modifier if used to raise a stat from 10~12).

If a player didn't want to play one of the core races, but rather one of the featured or uncommon races, then they simply paid the appropriate amount of CCP (equal the the RP cost listed in the Advanced Race Guide) and used any remaining CCP to then buy their ability scores. Likewise, if they wanted to modify a race to have other specific abilities, or even create their own, then all they had to do was use the CCP as RP to generate the race or buy the trait.

So far, I have a smattering of Core and Featured races with a race completely created through the Race Builder, and the campaign is very balanced, both against each other and against the adventure path as written. This also allows me to establish a point system for my NPC's, wherein I use the CCP's I gave the PC's and can make evil nemesis' (nemesi?) for them to battle.

The CCP I use are based off of the same structure, so Low Fantasy would be 21 CCP, Standard Fantasy 26 CCP, High Fantasy 31 CCP, and Epic Fantasy is 36 CCP. You can see that this means that no one could play a Drow Noble (yay!) without increasing the CCP available to all players.