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Dotting with intense interest! I'm thinking about a Half-Elf ranger with the Lantern Informant trait (who may know nothing about their organization now, but will eventually take the Lantern Bearer archetype and prestige class). I've always thought that was a particularly cool group and this is sure the campaign to play one in. I've got a couple of other ideas in consideration too, but that's the one that jumps to mind.
All the inspiration I had for my Akashic mystic drained out of my head in the last few months and I've been beating my head against a wall for the last few days trying to come up with something I like as much. I finally settled on a Star Shaman Mystic who is a Divine Champion of Weydan. Their divine powers and connection to the deity leads them to believe they could be one of Weydan's many mortal avatars, and who knows - they just might be right. Build, a bit more fluff, and post will be up as soon as I can write them.
The Arcanamirium Sage basically lets you understand magic items, use spell gems better, and equip greater numbers of magical items. Divine Champion gives you the effect of a ring of resistance for free, lets you do a pseudo-smite effect for a resolve point, and lets you cast a few spells from a single Mystic connection, at roughly the levels a Mystic would gain them. Skyfire Centurion is all about teamwork with a single bonded ally, gaining bonuses to covering/harrying fire, sharing combat feats, and sharing each others' rolls for simultaneous attacks. Star Knight gets heavy armor, a move+attack+intimidate action, and some choices of Order-specific options depending on what kind of knight you are. Starfinder Data Jockey is a super-elite hacker and user of computers, able to scan enemies for weaknesses and letting you use your Computers skill instead of many other skills, so long as you have access to an infosphere. Steward Officer gets a little martial training but mostly is a diplomat and negotiator, able to demand surrender from enemies.
Themes:
Each theme has a planet they're inspired by, but none of them are restricted to any specific location.
Solar Disciple (Wis) - The Sun
Archetypes:
Arcanamirium Sage
Of course, envoys, mechanics, operatives, and solarians of all types can benefit from being able to wear more than the standard number of hybrid and magic items at later levels. Along with mystics and technomancers, solarians receive Mysticism as a class skill (as does any character with the priest theme), allowing them to take full advantage of the magic item scholar alternate class feature. A character who takes this archetype can benefit from the mercenary theme’s increase to bulk limit and the xenoarchaeologist theme’s (see page 137) innate familiarity with magic items of unknown provenance. Divine Champion
Skyfire Centurion
Star Knight
Starfinder Data Jockey
Steward Officer
I am strongly considering playing a Divine Champion now. They are sort of like paladins.
Been preoccupied with other things, this slipped my mind for a few days. I do think I've got a character picked out though. After originally dismissing the connection as uninteresting, I've been struck by a sudden interest in playing an Akashic Mystic. I'll get back to you with details once I've picked a race and put the character together.
I adore Envoys, I'm glad we'll have one aboard. So what do we have picked out so far? If we have no spellcasters I think I'm gonna play one of those instead of a second/third mechanic. The fluff of a Star Shaman Mystic captivates me but I have to take a look at the other ones to really decide more based on crunch.
Pilot means I need to max out my dex so Operative seemed the obvious choice, though I have played one of those before. Piloting checks are the most crucial element of starship combat and getting them as high as possible is essential to success. Though if you want to take the pilot role as our Operative I could take another role on our ship. I've been tossing around the idea of a Dwarven Exo-Cortex Mechanic, using the racial proficiency in advanced melee weapons to be a master of ranged and melee. Heavy armor, combat tracking, advanced melee and even heavy weapons at higher levels.
I think the closest way to sum up what I like would probably be a combination of the style of Firefly (a crew and a ship against the world and the camaraderie and humor and fun had between its members) with the elements of an overarching and perhaps epic plot of, say, Star Wars and Babylon 5 (a bit of space opera and Big Bad thrown in, important plot elements being discovered now and then and here and there, the scale of the adventures and stakes slowly becoming greater, etc), and I do like a bit of horror just to spice things up now and then (but not too often or it loses its... bite). Basically the whole trope of small-time guys and girls being thrust into something world-changing and through which they become (appropriately or adequately high-level) legends or at least well-known enough to maybe once in a while be bought a drink in some bar or other.This works for me! Couldn't have put it better myself. Thirded!
Oh hell yeah. Glad to see this starting up! I will have a LOT more free time in January, as my contract is up at the end of the year. I'm a fan of lots of kinds of sci-fi, but the Star Wars universe is a particular favorite. I happen to really enjoy the pilot role but it'll depend on the class I choose to play. They're all fun - I'll want to pick which one I'm interested in once we know more about the game we're going to be playing.
That is not correct in Starfinder. Ship encounters are very different from monster encounters, and tier is not to be used like Challenge Rating. Metaphysician is correct - as the Starship Combat chapter confirms.
None of that alleviates the problem that the only grenade specialist, the Bombard soldier, is heavily Strength based. And it's highly illogical. Presumably, a grenade is harder to avoid (higher DC) because its throw placed it in an advantageous location. Why this is based on Dexterity, an ability score which is in no way used to determine the accuracy of a thrown grenade, I have no idea.
What an incredibly disappointing decision. They're for some inexplicable reason forcing grenade users to be MAD. If your accuracy is what adds to the DC, then you should use the same stat for the DC as your accuracy. What is the reason for using Dex here? House rules will have to correct that outside of SFS, I suppose.
I've noticed a few inconsistencies in the chapter on weapons, specifically thrown weapons and grenades.
So in Starfinder, thrown weapons use Str to hit and damage. So far, so good.
This appears to contradict the above, by implying that Dex is used to hit with thrown weapons (most likely a mistake due to a holdover from Pathfinder).
And again here, Dex is used.
Found a typo. Page 18: If no PC wants to purchase the item, the PC must sell the item back for 10% value, reimbursing each PC for half of what she paid into the pool. I suspect that the players are not intended to receive more money back than was recovered from the sale of the item.
This bit really surprised me. Page 248: "Attacking on a Charge: After moving, you can make a single melee attack. You take a –2 penalty to the attack roll and a –2 penalty to your AC until the start of your next turn. You can’t move any farther after the attack. Some classes, including solarian and soldier, grant abilities that modify attacks made on charges." Is it just that they want charges to only really be great for soldiers and solarians? Is it just that double moving and attacking is more valuable now that full attacks are limited to only two attacks?
Many years ago I played in a very unusual D&D campaign as a noble from a creepy, "Addams Family" style evil family. The most memorable of the characters was Grandfather Vossler, an ancient and decrepit warlock who never moved from his hidden chamber within the family manor, but who used his warlock powers to detach his hand and eyeball to roam about the manor (and beyond), spying on the outside world and letting him use his magic through the detached body parts. With the addition of Possessed Hand, the GM and I have managed to recreate the wizened grandfather as an Eyebiter Mesmerist with levels in Beast-Bonded Witch.
I don't see how Silksworn can't though. One level of monk fixes a lot of their issues and your really not missing much in terms of progression especially if you want to hit stuff. What would a monk dip give you? You basically get Wisdom to your AC, on a class that needs to be heavily invested in intelligence AND charisma. If you're expecting to be in melee too, you also need strength (to hit, and add to damage) and dex (to have a useful armor class) - not to mention con, which you need anyway, for hit points as a front-liner. That's all six ability scores you now need to be high. And as Isabelle said, even if you go Scaled Fist, you need to focus on five of your six ability scores and you're gaining at most a few points of AC, while delaying your casting, your implements, your mental focus, and reducing the power of all your other class features.
It's certainly better at spellcasting than a normal occultist - but spellcasting (and its focus powers, which are very much like spellcasting) is all it does. And it's worse at spellcasting than a wizard, a sorcerer, or an arcanist. These arguments never come down to being better than a full caster (because nothing ever will). It overshadows the base Occultist too much. An occultist gets a lot of mileage out of being able to go toe-to-toe in melee. Lacking that means you're basically a caster - without the raw power of a full 9/9 caster. Just because it's better at magic than the base class (while paying a large price - all armor is gone), doesn't make it better than the base class overall. Trading some armor and weapon proficiency is nothing. Many races can even get stuff like that back at no cost, many items will grant it, you can just take a feat etc. This is not a sacrifice to the class' martial ability. Get it back? On an arcane spellcaster who now suffers arcane spell failure chance? I don't think you'd want to, even if you could.
I was also very confused to see this archetype not make the cut! I looked at it closely when I first got my hands on the book and I was very much hoping I'd get the chance to make one. It's a specialist - it trades away much of the Occultist's defenses and melee combat capability in exchange for increased spellcasting ability, which seems to me the perfect role for an archetype (trading away one feature to specialize in another). The Silksworn plays like an unconventional wizard - but certainly won't overshadow one. With only six spell levels and a reduced collection of spell schools, this archetype certainly won't be breaking the power curve, but it does add a unique and fun twist on how to play what is one of the most unique and stimulating classes from Occult Adventures. I feel strongly that it does not present any power concerns and would not impact the balance of gameplay or be disruptive at a PFS table. I fully recognize that sometimes the Additional Resources process goes in waves, erring on the side of "ban now, legalize when we're sure" so I'm hopeful this archetype will be able to find its place in Pathfinder Society in the future. To anyone on the PFS team on the fence about this one, I wholeheartedly support its inclusion as both a player and a GM.
Round 1: Straightforward. You grapple as a standard action. Round 2: You decide to maintain the grapple, which is a standard action. You have no actions remaining with which to attack, so you get no attacks. However, if you chose to damage the target of your grapple instead of to move or pin them, you at least get to deal some damage. Round 3: Same as before. Maintaining is a standard action, so you have no actions left to spend attacking them.
I actually had a vague "little girl and giant golem" idea in mind (Hat-Trick and I are old friends, and we both like the idea of a duo). Giant golem with an adorable (but dangerous) little girl riding on its shoulder. Master Blaster! I think that my character will definitely be friends with whatever big, scary monsters also live in/around the tower. I imagine Albarath keeps his "students" separated from the goblins for the most part, but she'd think his right-hand wyrm or his giant clay golem were friendly playmates.
I'm already building a character in the hopes of serving the glorious tower. I'm going to make a young girl - one of the children kidnapped by the goblins - who has the inborn potential of a sorcerous bloodline. Under the tutelage and influence of Albarath, however, she has gained power as an Arcanist, blending her inherent sorcerous talents with the arcane traditions of wizardry, passed onto her by the mysterious voice of the Tower. However, lacking the intellectual might (and maturity) of an adult wizard, she relies heavily on the magical power of the deceased Wizard's enchanted headband of vast intelligence +6. Without it boosting her childlike mind to superhuman levels of intelligence, her magical power is restricted to first-and-second level spells at best, and she loses all her ranks in Spellcraft and Knowledge (Arcana). This is good news for a party of adventurers seeking to subdue the innocent child without causing her harm - once they figure out the source of her strange intelligence for a young child. She serves Albarath because he is the only teacher she knows, and doesn't understand the full implications of her actions. Much of the challenge of defeating her is inherent in the need to not let her come to harm, for she is as much a victim as any other kidnapped prisoner.
Oh! Here's another reason Albarath has little to fear from siege weapons. From the rules on Idols: Difficult to Destroy: An idol can’t be destroyed by normal means. Though it has hit points and can be broken like other objects, it can’t be completely destroyed by taking additional hit point damage. Idols are instead destroyed when a creature successfully performs a very specific and often difficult task. The GM should determine what action is necessary to destroy an idol when she designs the idol, and these destruction requirements should be thematic to the idol’s background, abilities, and role. Even if an army of gathered nations topple the tower with brute force, it will persist, somehow still able to bring its dark magic to bear. Only a team of brave heroes can end its reign by discovering its hidden weakness and putting an end to it once and for all.
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