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I used to be a PC like you, until I took a trick shot to the knee.


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Ravingdork wrote:

When you're in dire straights, why would you waste time and resources waiting for it to fall from orbit just so you can spend even MORE time putting it on when it arrives? You live in a world of MAGIC! Instead, have it teleport from your ship and assemble itself onto your person!

Much faster, far fewer resources/effort expended.

Beamed down from an orbiting ship, becoming PC and machine, power Xtreme!


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Zoggy Grav wrote:

I usually tell the solarian to end up behind me, the vesk soldier tank. I can take the hits with bleeding edge heavy armor, DR, and energy resistances.

Honestly giving solarians some sort of early access to Spring Attack or something similar to allow them to end turns behind cover would solve a lot of their mortality issues.

Play with solar armor and use a reach weapon, stellar rush is a standard action that includes an attack, the reach weapon keeps you out of their threatened area and you have a move action leftover to get to cover with.


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Sounds neat, looking forward to seeing the new and clarified rules for them!

... cant shake the feeling though, that stagstep suit looks oftely familiar somehow. Destiny maybe?


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I think some people are confused due to the book using a mix of game terms and setting terms for ship weapons. I find it best to describe ships as having five arcs with the turret arc just being treated as any other arc. Then describe the mount limit per arc per size. Nice and sinple.


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Ravingdork wrote:
Though the BP system is a bit handwavium, it is a lot easier to manage and helps maintain system balance. Otherwise, nothing would be stopping the PCs from selling their ship and spending the fortune on hookers and blow an early retirement.

Oh, totally, BP saves you from a weird headache of trying to balance use of wealth and massive debt over a scaling level and value system. How can you justify buying a new particle beam, and turret mount for it no less, when your basic ship still has a 25 million credit loan on it?

But it is also somewhat limiting, you generally have one, maaayybee two weapon rolls each round; the game doesn't model scale at all with an interceptor not being too different from a destroyer until you get around tier 8 or so when the twin linked plasma from the smallest ship falls behind the firepower of a ship around twenty times its size; The PCs don't have any easy by the book way of piloting Large+ ships which puts an artificial cap on how much firepower they can bring to a fight... I would say a tier 20 ship for a party of 4-5 isn't bringing much more dakka to the table than a tier 12. The higher level just gets better shields and a few extra hexes of movement or a small boost in computer bonuses. And as always, you cant readily model a light carrier or squadron based game in the current rules, even with a sensor net and launch tubes you are going to need a lot of GM fiat... and tiny ships stop being a threat to large ships after a certain point due to weapon restrictions.

Still, all things considered, the ship system is in a good place for how little there is for it so far.


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Ciaran Barnes wrote:
Brofessor X wrote:

I have a player who is pissed because he made a melee grappling character with 18 STR, Combat Maneuver Focus (Grapple), and +1 BAB. He has a +9 to grapple opponents. With ncs having and average 22 combat maneuver defense, he has to roll a 14 or higher to grapple. Thats a 30% chance to succeed when he spent a feat to be the best at this. That's so silly. I was mad for him.

The CMD and CMB system in Pathfinder worked way better than this. What is the reasoning for such a ridiculous DC?

I recommend changing CMD from KAC +8 to KAC +5.

So that a skittermander with a feat and a grapple weapon can grapple at KAC-3?


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I think this should maybe be moved to the homebrew section, it was never really a rules question, more of a game design philosophy question.

Otherwise, yes, if you completely rework the wealth by level and item cost you can make ships far more difficult, expensive and time consuming to maintain. It just seems to be a lot to do to add a grittier feel to an abstract system.


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Do you expect your players to ever fight in ship combat if it costs 1,000 UPBs to repair after every flight? It throws wealth expectations out of the door. Maybe the UPBs used for hull points just bulk up and are otherwise inert metal instead of complex capacitors and zero point singularity modules such as what are used in hand held plasma weapons? You can fluff it to make sense without nearly as much impact on the game as one bad roll bankrupting the party.


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Egyptoid wrote:

Brock the Android is created, in a legit Pact foundry. He is wearing a teal paper jumpsuit.

===
As of that moment, he has ZERO skills and (let's say) no obligations. He can sign a form, be released right then (as basically a homeless person), wearing teal paper flip-flops.
---
Or he can consent to training, housing, clothing, and feeding, while working;
and be released in 4 years, with some stat mods, skills, a theme, and a class.
~~~
Please describe how this is unfair and unscrupulous.

You've conspired to put them into a situation of indentured servitude or being destitute. That sounds like a great example of LE behaviour, you are acting with obvious intent to put them in debt to you for purposes of exploitation. As a side note, society at large probably hates you for creating all these hateful burdens to society for any that don't sign your slave contracts. Also, you've probably got a lot of problems with the AAF blowing up your stuff all the time.


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baggageboy wrote:
You know what would work very well to alleviate the pinch many classes feel when taking archetypes, a feat that lets you take features that you missed. Kinda like the extra talent sort of feats, but limited to only recovering lost features not granting extras. That would level the cost playing field and set a really solid definition on what power level archetype features should have. And there is a precedent for this in that feats are what the soldier gives up to take an archetype. If you did this everyone could give up feats if they wanted, and though they would still be delayed in getting their features they could still get them.

This is something we saw in the kineticist, they could spend a feat for an extra talent but their talent cap was current level -2 when buying the talent with a feat. In Starfinder this would let you start buying back your talents at level five, which would hurt but not be as bad as waiting until level eight at least.


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I think it's already been discussed pretty well but what each glass gives up to take an archetype isn't exactly equal. As it stands Soldiers get a lot more than they give up to take archetypes since there are so few combat feats that are really competitive. Worst case scenario the Solider delays a feat for one level it seems. And sometimes what they get is greater than a single feat i.e. getting improved unarmed strike and a combat maneuver feat in exchange for one feat is pretty nice. It's hard to balance something as useful and dynamic as mechanic tricks and operative exploits against generic combat feats though so I kinda of expect the situation to continue moving forward.


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Metaphysician wrote:
Shisumo wrote:
How do khizars avoid walking into walls?
Blindsight ( Vibration ) doesn't require that the object actually be making vibrations, anymore than Sight requires that the object actually be emitting light.

though it might not he that great in a vacuum...


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Okami Atari wrote:

The RACE looks interesting, bug It is the worst playable race i have ever read in any RPG. You are forfeiting half roleplayers Who play mostly for the rules:: Darkvision, stand from prone, inmunity to stinky cloud and 10 extra move with almost no drawback at all because there is no special rule for having no proper hands, head or feet. Seriously?

Everyhting you have done well in core starfinder regarding game balance you have screewed up with some features in this book, It looks as you are trying to lure back munchkings into the game

I have read this a few times and still can't figure out if you are being serious. The species is quirky but I wouldn't think anything about them is over powered. Swift action to stand prevents full attacks, not that amazing but neat. Immune to an extremely small selection of smell based hazards? Mweh, have you seen SROs resistances? Those seem much more useful if you just want mechanical advantage. Bas edd speed of 40 when you could just take any race with blitz soldier and fleet for speed of 50 at level 1? Ok, so the Bantrid can get to 60, still not that extreme of a difference. What about the naturally flying/floating races who ignore rough terrain and can't set off floor traps?

What build are you thinking of where the Bantrid breaks the game?


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I don't think it's as cut and dry as that... technology incorporates magic seamlessly, there does get to be a point where it's more magic than tech but even the most apparently tech based item could have a lot of magic theory powering it. And education is so much more common that just as anyone who grows up in the society knows basic computer use, they would also know basic magic interactions I would think. Historical value is lilely the main driver of cost for things from old golarion, a side from special artifacts that are functional beyond their significance, the relics from book 1 of the AP goes into this all somewhat doesn't it? It also seems to establish that they can easily replicate many of the functions of those purely magical relics with tech based fusions as well.

As common as the trope is in other settings, I don't think that "the past was greater" is a part of this one anymore.


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Micheal Smith wrote:
Everyone says that the soldier loses very little. I am sorry giving up the feats IS HUGE. This gives the solider a lot of versatility. To me the feats are just as important as the mechanics tricks or operative talents and so on. While it may not be as impactful, I feel it is more impactful then, i think, most people give credit for.

Here's this though, those feats you give up aren't special ones that bypass prerequisites, they are just restricted feats. You still get a boat load of them even with the archetype. The soldier has the lowest opportunity cost to take an archetype. So, yes, there is a trade off for soldiers, they can make up for it far, far easier than any other class can.


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Pax Rafkin wrote:

Not every droid has a soul correct? Is there a way to prevent a soul from entering a droid?

Say I really just want a droid that knows the binary language of moisture vaporators, pay some Jawa a bunch of money, two days later he gets a soul and now I have to free it.

SROs have the shortest write up of any race so far, it sounds like some are purpose built AIs while others spontaneously attract souls due to the complexity of their design giving them a mind. It is extrapolating a bit but the impression i have is that once you have something that actually thinks, it becomes capable of housing a soul and one will eventually inhabit the device. So, a security bot, an old sweeper bot, and astromech repair unit, an interactive library... they are all potential SROs.

Edit: for instance, I have a concept I am working on for a SRO Icon Envoy, started life as a limited AI to make pop music, after exposure to new genres and rounds of upgrades it became self aware and downloaded itself into a mobile DJ rig, it is now a highly in demand artist that can play itself at parties. Starts out with a voice amplifier mod. Signed on with the company that originally developed it but is considering buying out it's contract and going solo.


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You would think so but how effective are inhaled toxins in a game where every armor has environmental protections? You have to set up situations specifically to make them possible. This seems to be about the same to me


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No worries, I wish I could remember real world history as well as make believe stuff.


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pithica42 wrote:
First Ones is the Anacite name/title for the beings that originally created them and the Androffan androids. They're a 'progenitor' race of some sort. They came to PW space a long time ago, they're tied heavily into Anacite culture and the ruins of their ancient cities are scattered across Aballon. They're in the PF lore somewhere, but I'm not very versed on that.

The First Ones is the term the Anacites use for their creators but they have no link to the term Androffan. Androffa is a world in another galaxy from the pact world. It had no magic used in its dominant societies and relied solely on science. Among their many technological wonders were the first known Androids which were made primarily of artificial components that mimicked human biology and nanites. A massive Androffan ship had an accident with a wormhole generator and ended up crashing on Golarian tens of thousands of year prior to the start of the Pathfinder APs. Even after the crash some parts of the ship were able to function and new Androids would occasionally emerge from the wastes. Androids from Pathfinder are called Androffan to differentiate them from the race of the same name in Starfinder which are not explicitly derived from the Androffan ones and which exhibit different racial characteristics.


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I like to play it as a range of those options. Inertial dampness are standard but of various quality so you may feel some G's if they are slow to respond. Artificial gravity is super common and boot cheap in the standard setting, you can run them with a wrecked power core I think, but I still like to think it can be turned off in the lounge or flicker when the ship takes damage. Jacking in is also just one of many options for UI, along with holographic, tactile, haptic screens, joysticks, immersion pods... what ever the players want.


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It is in the plain text for the level 3 class feature, "You gain the Weapon Specialization feat as a bonus feat for each weapon type this class grants you proficiency with."

If you gain proficiency from anything other than the basic class granted proficiencies than this does not apply, you were granted the proficiency from something other than the basic class, whether that was a dip in another class, spending a feat or a talent/trick/hack ability.


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Hearts, minds, lungs, centers of mass or other vital organs as the shot is available.


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gustavo iglesias wrote:
There are no rules for forceful boarding of a space station. However, there are no rules for peaceful boarding a space station, which means that if you follow the rules to the letter, and are guided by the principle of "if it's not stated in the rules, can't happen", then once players leave Absalom Station they can't go back, ever. Making stations pretty useless and the game a bit dissapointing.

While what you say is true, the way most groups run (from personal experience) I would be surprised if any adventurers felt they could ever go back to a previously visited station anyways.


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pithica42 wrote:
Wow, so both undead and androids in canon refer to 'normal' humanoids as "breathers" as a derogatory term, but somehow an android that becomes undead suddenly has to start breathing? WTW? That can't be right.

Double negative makes a positive?


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I would really like to see grippli and tengu updates but I think what could be the most interesting for a new race is a race tied to the drift, either intentionally or as an accident, to be a sci-fa counter part of tieflings and aissimar. Natural navigators or extremely logical minded?


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I think people have a tendency to compare their numbers against other players. Or even their own, you can have a +3 to hit and an AC of 16 at level one... which looks like a bad situation if you have to fight yourself. But monsters aren't build like PCs so it can mess with your expectations.


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I love that starfinder makes cover and teamwork significant tactics to consider though and the AC and accuracy rates do a lot to make that happen.


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:p if it is compatible enough than this is how we get full casters.


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Paris Crenshaw wrote:
Torbyne wrote:
I feel like it makes more sense for the ripping and tearing of planar chunks to be when you exit the drift, the entire trip is building up with this planar drag that pops when you complete the trip.
That's interesting. My vision was that it happens every time a ship jumps. Jumping into the Drift tears off relatively small chunks. Jumping out can pull in much larger pieces.

That works just as well, I even have the ap but haven't actually read it yet... but in my head I've got this whole thing built up about triune and the drift. Unless is starts to conflict with adventures, entering the drift will tie the drift engine to an outer plane on entry, build up a cross planar charge just based on the duration of the connection and then tear a chunk of that plane when the drift engine returns to the material plane. An entirely unintended side effect but in my theory the drift wasn't meant for mass travel anyways, it's closer to ian m banks' minds, in that it moves most of their processes to a sub dimension to think faster and increase their power. Beacons push outer planes away to try to get a clearer connection to the material, this also means travel between beacons will reduce the charge across the planes.


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Farlanghn wrote:
It says it reduces it to 3 for small arms or operative weapons. Sneaking an additional weapon in to still get the benefit is gaming the system. This goes against the wording.

That is not what is says, that is what you infer. it says, "reduce the penalty for making a full attack by 1" so if the penalty was -4 it would be down to -3. If it was at -3 it would reduce it to -2. and it activates so long as at least two qualifying weapons are used.

Interestingly you cant mix up one small arm and one operative melee weapon to get the benefit, though the situations where you would want to mix firing ranged and melee in the same turn seem limited.

mixing two pistols with a plasma canon does not faze me, what is far more likely to come up in the future is if any other abilities that introduce a reduction to the penalties. Say some future feat that also reduces penalties when full attacking against the same enemy or when using the same kind of weapon in each hand.


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Pantshandshake wrote:

Apologies in advance if this has been brought up before, but... are we not assuming you go buy your power armor, and then mount a gun on there, and now there's a gun mounted there until you say otherwise?

I don't think I'd be holding my gun ever again, unless I was going somewhere without power armor.

I think the idea is you may have to exit the armor quickly and want to take the dakka with you.


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kaid wrote:
I think it may be worth noting that a lot of the armor makes use of minor force fields for environmental protection. It would not be a huge leap to do something like mass effect omni tools where you can program it to do various different tool forms using force field type technology. So its not a hologram screw it is a forcefield that looks kinda like a hologram screwdriver. Probably liberal use of nano tech as well.

Pfft. Why cant i have bio-mechincal spiders pour out of my eyes and mouth to do my bidding?


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pithica42 wrote:
Yup. Was about to post. It now says, "Coming Soon".

"soon" in the Eoxian sense of the world.


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pithica42 wrote:

If you look under Base Frames, it says the listed mounts are their "starting weapon mounts". It also has a line in there about how the "size and expansion bay capacity of a base frame cannot be increased without DM permission".

If the designer intended for us to be unable to add a turret to a base frame that doesn't start with one, they would have said so. Change "starting" to "available" and change "size and expansion" to "size, mounts, and expansion" and you're done.

It doesn't say anything about not adding new weapon mounts, and in fact, under Refitting and Upgrading Starships > New Weapon Mounts, it just lists prices for the new mounts, based on ship size, without any caveats about not adding mounts in given positions to frames that don't already have mounts in those positions. It just gives you a max number of mounts per position, again based on ship size.

** spoiler omitted **

I had a nice long reply to this that was eaten by the internet (Curse you Ajit, this is your fault... somehow!)

Let me try again.

I fully believe in this interpretation: When the rules refer to "a turret" or "turret mount" these are just flavorful ways of describing the Turret Arc that all ships have. Every ship has the front, back, port, starboard and turret arcs. the cost to add a turret mount to the turret arc is 5 BP, no matter if the frame lists a turret or not and the only limit is the number of mounts that can be in an arc based on frame size.

The problem, and the reason why i expect table variation, is that this is all inferred. The way the rules actually read states, "By spending 3 BP, the crew can fit a new light weapon mount in any of the aft, forward, port, or starboard arcs with enough free space. By spending 5 BP, the crew can fit a new light weapon mount on a turret that has enough free space." which implies the frame must already have a turret listed in order to add a new mount onto it; it doesn't have enough free space if it doesn't exist in the first place. The way the frames are written up with many not having turrets and the way turrets are spoken of as physical things vice a conceptual arc creates gray space in the interpretation. An AP featuring something that breaks rules or following a different interpretation than an official ruling is nothing new and is unlikely to change many hearts and minds.


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dats a right an proper orky analysis you don there. Itz all about the dakka, the mor free dakka da betta the ship!


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the idea of a close in weapon/point defense that cant cover massive arcs around a ship is far more head scratching to me.


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Predictive analytics and voice interface does not make for a true AI but if the two are good enough than it could fool most casual observers, no? Think of Alexis, the amazon thing, but actually working. you ask it to do things and it does them and even lets you know if it was able to do it successfully or if it believes it messed something up. It knows your preferences well enough to take some actions on your behalf to assist you unless you specifically forbid it from taking actions without your directive. Its a great tool for the GM to use too, "your cortex chimes in to let you know that a series of discreet alarms seem to have been triggered in the local area of the station, it believes this is due to the large volume of high explosives you have recently employed and it wants your permission to try to alter records enough to make this seem like a routine systems check that does not need an active response."


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Metaphysician wrote:

Indeed. Its not that full blown sentient AI doesn't exist, it totally does. Its just not on the item charts, because sentient AI isn't an item. Its a person. You don't just buy one off the shelf, not if you want to claim to have a non-evil alignment.

Could you have a ship with a true AI? Sure, those certainly exist. . . but they aren't the default, because having a sentient ship both requires the proper context to recruit one, and also more rules than the basic for a ship that is also a character. I imagine most Aballonian ships are sentient, for example. . . of course, this means the ship doesn't have a captain, the ship *is* the captain.

... I want to play as the humanoid animal companion to a sentient ship. It wants to help its little buddy and its friends learn and grow so it takes them out on field trips to get new experiences. sometimes it doesnt end well and it needs to clone up a new little buddy from the vats using the most recent memory back ups available though.


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Hazrond wrote:
Torbyne wrote:
Hazrond wrote:
Torbyne wrote:
Hazrond wrote:
I'm confused by all this comparisons to slavery, why can't AI just, ya know, be considered a standard part of the crew for a ship? I don't quite understand how it's considered slavery when reasonably the AI would have to be moved around either way? Or else built directly into the ship's systems?
If the ship has a true AI onboard than can the ship be bought and sold? what if the AI wants to stay in port to finish an armor upgrade but the crew want to use the ship to ram into an enemy dreadnought, just to make a beachhead to start clearing their way through and save the day? If the ship is effectively the body of the AI is even "just a vote" enough to say it has full freedom? If the program is not fully free thinking and self improving than is it really an AI?

I mean, the ship is less their body and more like their apartment. They can leave at pretty much any port as long as they have something they could ride around like a Robot or have the help of a friendly Mechanic.

Sure they are more connected to the ship than most of the crew but fundamentally the death of the ship is usually the death of the crew as well, so they are pretty much on the same footing there.

I think you are assuming that the AI has an alternate body by default than? If the AI is built in as part of a ship or bought and installed into the ship than it doesnt have much say about things though, does it? if it can download or transfer to a new network, are AIs allowed to freely move through the infosphere? do they need to pay a residence fee for storage space for a thing that is effectively both their body and their apartment?
AI being able to move freely through cyberspace is a pretty well-documented Sci-fi trope so yeah, and i could see AI either paying legitimate cloudhosting (cause really, why wouldn't there be cloud servers like Google Drive or something?) or just straight pulling the digital equivalent of squatting and...

So if the AI is free to leave, through moving in networks or downloading to a body, why spend all the time and effort to make it and assign it critical roles in running a ship when it will likely eventually decide it wants to move on or not put itself into such ludicrously dangerous situations? Imagine having to buy an new OS every time the old one just gets too disgusted with your browsing habits? I think AIs arent worth it for most applications if they are true AIs with free will and all.


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That ship sounds... excessive. 20 miles by 4 miles? that would dwarf Absalom station. We are getting close to Death Star sized with this thing. If it was built pre-artificial gravity than is it subject to normal inertia and such? by the time the populated planet is aware of it, it is probably too late to slow it down or significantly alter its course. time to evacuate the planet! :P or more likely, park that thing in orbit and become a new regional super power by slowly chipping off bits to build the largest fleet in the known galaxy and leave the last quarter or so to still be the largest station in known space. I like the idea of a runaway ecosystem on board and setting an adventure on a ship like that but clearing through literal miles of shipboard fighting? That could be a very long campaign.

lastly, and please dont take this too personnally; i post it because i feel it should be posted in every thread about super huge spacecraft:

"Maiden Flight, SDSD Freudian Nightmare

Imperial Weapons Development Center, Coruscant

To Whom it May Concern:

Gentlemen, let me start by saying that I am greatly honored to be chosen for command of such a magnificent vessel. That said, our insystem shakedown cruise has turned up a few minor issues that I would like to see remedied as soon as possible.

1) We understand your desire to continue the classical stylized lines of the first star destroyer class vessels, and we appreciate your asthetic sense in that regard. However, strictly speaking, was it absolutely necessary to scale up the bridge tower directly? I must confess the foreward bridge window is a great distraction. Militarily, we feel that as is, the three kilometer tall window pane may provide too tempting a target for enemy forces we may engage. We've lost four helmsmen so far to vertigo as well, and we don't think this is in the best interests of the vessel's well-being.

2) The sheer size of our vessel, while a glorious symbol of the mighty Emperor, which we all appreciate completely, has become apparent to us all. My initial briefing tour of the vessel took six days to complete, and the travel tubes were based on the design in use aboard the slightly smaller Executor-class vessels. Travel time being prohibitive, we were forced to camp out in the corridors of the major sectors when we stopped for the night. Furthermore, since our crew quarters sections are located entirely within the aft dorsal sectors, both our Engineering crew and ground forces complements have built tent cities within their own sections, and are living there. Fire hazard has become nearly intolerable and the hydroponics department has sent me six hundred messages insisting that the smoke from the camp-fires is ruining their crop, and that we have enough food left aboard for only another three weeks.

2) Our vessel's own gravity is not being handled as well as could be done, with some minor problematical consequences. Our plumbers called my attention to the fact that the sewage from our 6 million-man crew backwashed through the air vents in Sections 42 to 78, decks 258 through 532. Malaria and dysentary broke out in those sections, and we were forced to cordon it off to prevent an epidemic. Our first Chief Medical Officer unfortunately was killed when he requested the paperwork on those affected, and upon receiving e-mailed reports from all 739 of his senior doctors, the computer screen in his quarters self-destructed, propelling shrapnel throughout his quarters. All droids who enter the area have failed to return, and a remote camera probe sent in, recorded images of the survivors in the affected area where they were flinging their own feces at each other, warring with sharpened pieces of metal, and attempting to eat the dismembered limbs of the aforementioned droids.

3) On a similar note, regarding the unfortunate loss of our last CMO, we have finally decided that the staff requirements of this vessel are creating further problems. For instance, our Chief Engineer has begun the habit of signing his reports, "Chief Marshal, Sovereign Nation of Ree'Ak'tor." He has since sealed off those decks, and started a war. The war in question is against his apparent rival, the commander of our ground forces near the main flightdeck, who has taken to calling himself "Bringer of the Apocalypse." Surveillance records indicate that they have since stopped wearing their armor, and have begun smearing their bodies with industrial cleaning fluid and lubricants before launching raids upon the Engineering department. We believe that they have begun ritualistically sacrificing one of our TIE-fighter pilots before each attack to bring them luck.

Aside from a minor note that some of our turbolaser turret gunners may have starved to death when their food shipments were cut off by the warzone, there is little else to remark on, save that in our first tactical drill, during the course of a two-hour right turn, we failed to halt our rotation with the result of the subsequent and very unfortunate destruction of the entire Coruscant 4th Defensive Fleet. I've made a note to send out letters of regret the moment we reacquire contact with our communications room at the bow of the vessel. That of course is the reason why this message had to be sent to your offices via pen, paper, and one of our probe droids. I beg forgivness for the clerical difficulties that may cause.

Signed,
Grand Admiral
SDSD Freudian Nightmare"


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1) It is possible that true AIs will be covered in future material but was not included in the core book for space or other reasons. perhaps they are meant to be beyond the PCs ability to make?

2) The Setting book in March might clarify a political or religious reason that they arent made.

3) the ascension of a melded multi AI god may have declared all AIs to be subservient or representatives of itself and as such they are no longer in play.

4) *spoilers for Iron Gods i suppose* The Numerian tech is really Androffan tech that was something like 14,000 years old at the time of Pathfinder and is probably closer to 20,000 years old by the time of Starfinder. That society itself was a super science culture that could very well have been more advanced than the current standard of Starfinder. The two systems are mechanically different enough that it is hard to directly compare them. Also, Starfinder assumes most tech is at least partly blended with magic while Androffans did everything through pure tech, it is possible that Starfinder assume a short cut to AIs that makes them less super minded than a pure tech approach would create, something like building modern AIs to mimic organic minds or soul patterns that makes them more fallible than a super machine intelligence?

We dont actually know how Pathfinder progressed into Starfinder, it is possible that Androffan tech never caught on or wasnt enough to provide direct blueprints on how to advance technology so that by the time Golarian was able to start producing industrial technology and move into a computer age, there were no functional examples of Androffan counterparts left. Perhaps a series of wars over usable super tech that could be reverse engineered or some such?


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David knott 242 wrote:

If "Vesk are always considered armed" does not mean that they threaten even when wielding no other weapons, then what does it mean?

... That PCs should always assume any Vesk they encounter has both biological limbs still attached without having to ask the GM for clarification?


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The APs has some enemies you might use.

As for gear... what kind of ship are you going to put them on? are they the full crew or only survivors? its entirely believable that there are gear lockers on the ship, throw in 4-8 sets of light and 4-8 sets of heavy armor, a like number of one handed and two handed weapons and then let the PCs decide for themselves what they'll use. the sell price for all of the excess is very low but it can serve as the "treasure" for their first adventure or two as they explore their ship and figure out how to get it fully functional.


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Ravingdork wrote:
Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
Kamin_Majere wrote:

Well I guess an acid spear is pretty nice. I'm still saddened by the lack of acidic weapons. The dart guns are fine I guess but I was hoping to eventually get some that could use batteries like the cryo guns.

I super like acid damage and was sad that only dart guns gave me that option overall. But at least i can have a melee weapon now so thats cool

An upcoming Adventure Path article may help with that desire. :)
D20s for damage!?

Now i just need to scour sources for "reroll a D20" or "+X to a D20" abilities... :p


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captain yesterday wrote:

Yes, my assumption is I would be the first to die.

But, that's why you bring a backup.

Pulls out his Contemplative Technomancer named Orko.

What a curious game you are playing at Captain Yesterday, the only winning move is not to play.


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Malefactor wrote:
Torbyne wrote:
Barbarossa Rotbart wrote:

The huge difference is that the Drow were never gender dimorphic as the pre-Gap Lashuntas were. And you should not forget, that most Golarian cultures had gender euqality, something that did not change during the Gap. So it is only natural that the Drow in the Pact Worlds are still matriarchal (but there could be a patriarchal Drow society outside the Pact Worlds).

Wouldn't the boni on Dex and Cha make them good ranged Solarians?

Not as extremeley dimorphic but Drow females were about a foot taller than males, werent they? Or was that not brought over from Forgotten Realms?

And at even greater risk of starting a fire, how would the gap not result in a re-setting of gender power dynamics in a society that forgot its entire history?

ARG Table 5-8 wrote:

Drow, Male Base Height 5'4", modifier 2d6

Drow Female Base Height 5'4" modifier 2d8
Wight mod for both x3 amount rolled on height modifier
On average a drow woman would be 2 inches taller than a male drow and 6 pounds heavier. A bit of a physical advantage, but not much.

Well dang. i have this weird notion that females were supposed to be noticeably taller and thought it came from a stat block somewhere, but there are the Pathfinder entries and i actually have contradictory wiki entries saying, "while there was no average height difference between male and female drow, males were on average a bit heavier." and this entry of "Females tend to be bigger and stronger than males". Memory is weird...


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captain yesterday wrote:
I wonder what would happen if I show up to a game with a Drow Solarian named Drizz't Du'Skywalker.

a quick chuckle and quicker push out of an airlock?


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Barbarossa Rotbart wrote:

The huge difference is that the Drow were never gender dimorphic as the pre-Gap Lashuntas were. And you should not forget, that most Golarian cultures had gender euqality, something that did not change during the Gap. So it is only natural that the Drow in the Pact Worlds are still matriarchal (but there could be a patriarchal Drow society outside the Pact Worlds).

Wouldn't the boni on Dex and Cha make them good ranged Solarians?

Not as extremeley dimorphic but Drow females were about a foot taller than males, werent they? Or was that not brought over from Forgotten Realms?

And at even greater risk of starting a fire, how would the gap not result in a re-setting of gender power dynamics in a society that forgot its entire history?


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Matthew Downie wrote:
Jimbles the Mediocre wrote:
I've picked up from a few different places that the developers really, really don't want you mixing starship and PC combat, and I understand why. PCs on the ground have such a minimal chance of affecting a starship, and starships are massive hazards to PCs.
But fighting a battle on board a spaceship that's locked in combat sounds like the sort of exciting thing that should be allowed. You've boarded the enemy destroyer! They're attacking the rebel flagship! Explosions are going off all around you! Can you capture the enemy commander before the flagship is destroyed?

I love the idea of PCs fighting their way off a ship or coducting a boarding action to take one out/over. I would not run ship combat simultaneously though, instead have a table of random events to occur every round, a few spots of "make no more rolls on this table for D4 rounds" but also, things like "artificial gravity fluctuates, increase/decrease/no gravity for this round" or "What's a fuse? electrical explosions from bulkheads damage all combatants (REF negates)" thinking about it now and i want to build a full table, with hull breaches or even Drift seepage as the worst possible outcomes...

Running that sort of thing on the PCs ship would be a lot more difficult, i like the idea of half the party having to deal with the void zombies that just broke in but it leaves a split party running a combat encounter and a split party running a ship combat encounter... i would probably run them sequentially, first they get out of the frying pan of ship combat and then they investigate the alarms going off about an intruder or fuel leak that started after the shooting stopped. I dont think the current rules would support the PCs splitting their attention even if the timescale was locked down as both systems are built under the idea of having a full team of PCs.

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