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I've been a huge fan of playing with science fiction in Pathfinder for a while. on my blog I've talked about races, classes, and scifi 3pp on more than one occasion. Because of this I really hope that Starfinder is fully capable of having these elements come in so that I don't have to do any heavy conversion myself or have a set of Pathfinder space rules and a set of Starfinder space rules.
Fortunately from what I hear, Aethera, the recently kickstarted Pathfinder in space book is on board for Starfinder as well as d20pfsrd.com Publishing. Beyond that I've seen some chatter about working closely with 3pp to make sure we have plenty to play with soon after launch.
So lets talk about third party products in Starfinder. What companies do we expect to jump in and produce something. What products that already exist are likely to slap a Starfinder Compatibility logo on their product. What kind of products are you looking forward to? Are you even into buying third party products for Starfinder.
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A lot of the existing sci-fi related to Pathfinder (Aethera, Legendary Planet) is very pulpy, and it looks like Starfinder will fit in that mold to a degree too. I'd love to see Frog God's take on Starfinder. With that gritty, old school (but not grimdark, per se) feel, I think their interpretation of sci-fi would be absolutely fascinating. Something like Rappan Athuk as a Death Star sort of place? Or their newer stuff like The Blight and Northland that create really deep and complex stories and worlds, that same stance towards a space setting would be incredible.
Instead of a megadungeon you can fight to stop a Unicron-like world eating planet, fighting through it's 'antibodies' in order to get to the core and shut it down before it destroys your world. Entire civilizations have formed war colonies on it's surface as they campaign to get to it's core but it produces mechanical terrors to defend itself at an alarming rate to defend itself as it looms closer to its next meal.
I flipped my table, FWIW.
Is that in a good way or in a bad way. I can imagine either if you're a 3pp developer. If things are even slightly off then that means some of your material is less viable now.
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A derelict spaceship can serve as a megadungeon, too; just think of the scavenging scene in The Force Awakens.
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I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).
I'm suddenly reminded of the old 3D Chess they used to play on Star Trek: TNG, but with minis.
But yes, I've pondered the 3-dimensional combat in PF myself (when contemplating a scenario for Superstar the past couple of years; never got to that stage, so didn't need to try and solve it, though.)
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Both? It throws a huge wrench into what I was already working on, because I can't predict what Starfinder will look like or where the compatibility wrinkles will be, and I'm pessimistic about whether people will want fantasy-geared Pathfinder tech content once the New Shiny comes out.
I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).
Mostly, though, I was expecting something like this but thought it'd be a single Ultimate-style hardcover, not a new product line.
You may be right about that first part. A LOT of people don't go for third party products for reasons but it does have the allure of playing in a new way without having to port over to some new-fangled system, so this is a boon for anyone that goes 'I want pathfinder in space but I want Paizo to do it. 3pp is janky.' but for will tear a few customers from 3pp projects that deal with the same subject. Some products would probably survive the transition if they play it close to pathfinder as a while but anything that makes some significant liberties or introduces new rules will probably have huge chunks of their content basically unused. How deep this goes depends on how compatible it is. If it's only a matter of giving some classes the technologist feat and some extra skills to the character sheet then things will be allright but if it removes something significant or something works too differently then way more products will be stuck in Pathfinder instead of Starfinder. I already see it with the technology guide, where if you aren't compatible with that I may as well not even look at it for all the good its going to do for my space campaign.
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Both? It throws a huge wrench into what I was already working on, because I can't predict what Starfinder will look like or where the compatibility wrinkles will be, and I'm pessimistic about whether people will want fantasy-geared Pathfinder tech content once the New Shiny comes out.
I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).
Mostly, though, I was expecting something like this but thought it'd be a single Ultimate-style hardcover, not a new product line.
Argh, yeah, I totally understand. Also, if I'm ever going to start up my 3PP, I really need to get my butt in gear. ⊙﹏⊙
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I have already heard LJPD is doing something and as someone who buys 3rd party materials often I am glad to see this.
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Frankly the biggest surprise for me (which wasn't that Paizo would make Sci-finder - that has been telegraphed by the toe-dippings along the way - Iron Gods, Distant Worlds....Numeria [EDIT to add Technology Guide]), but the amazemement evinced by the fans -
"OMG I'm so surprised/excited, I have so many character ideas coming to me"
LIKE NO-ONE EVER SAW THE ENTIRE SCI-FI 3rd party output up until now
Necropunk.
Skybourne.
Aetherea.
Arcforge (the playtest).
Conquest of the Universe (playtest).
Legendary Planet.
or the legion of homebrew, the multitudinous Play by Post threads in an almost endless cavalcade of sci-fi genres from genetic-experiment prison-escape to bio-punk drow platoons.
So for me, the fate of the 3rd party is to keep on making interesting products, and to draw and support, as well as be supported by Starfinder.
So what do we do until then? Do we just stop buying or releasing scifi material until publishers get enough information to make it compatible? Do we just buy and release products and hope it's compatible?
Recently I picked up a product that had a TON of technological equipment. But they were all ported from d20 Modern so was not exactly compliant with the technological items from the Technology Guide despite being published after it. This caused a bunch of the items to overlap, and it's version of automatic and semi-automatic were different and it was passing on new damage types and all kinds of things that throw balace to the window in the context of the classes in Pathfinder and what they can do.
so there's definitely points where d20 Modern products can make themselves useless for Pathfinder so there it is possible for some things to not be able to make the jump from Pathfinder to Starfinder.
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Between now and August 2017 - oh, I see what you mean. It may mean a delay for some 3PPs with certain products, while others are far enough along, and feel differentiated enough (or aligned just so) that they need not wait.
For me, Starfinder is a two sided deal - one is the Sci-fi integration of Paizo's Golarion - Golarion-in-the-time-to-come. The other is the capturing of the market that can and will bear sci-fi meatballs in their fantasy gluten spaghetti. Whether there is an organised play component will remain to be seen.
Some folks have been talking about SF being a shadow upgrade PF 1.5, and sure there will be rules advancements and "upgrades" - but I don't think this will be a huge change to major components of the ruleset - likely more bolt on subsystems - piloting and ship to ship perhaps?
The Technology guide (will have to edit above post...) made certain things...."official" and some 3PPs embraced its rulest additions. So while I don't think Starfinder the Hardcover will expand on Technology Guide in terms of new rulesets majorly, it will codify Paizo's product approach to come - and that may effect some 3PPs own product go-aheads and schedules....
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A derelict spaceship can serve as a megadungeon, too; just think of the scavenging scene in The Force Awakens.
Likewise any of the "distress signal leads to seemingly abandoned ship drifting in space" stories or films. Those can be two phase dungeons, getting in to find out what happened and if anyone (or anything) survived, then escaping from whatever terrible presence is on the ship.
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A derelict spaceship can serve as a megadungeon, too; just think of the scavenging scene in The Force Awakens.Likewise any of the "distress signal leads to seemingly abandoned ship drifting in space" stories or films. Those can be two phase dungeons, getting in to find out what happened and if anyone (or anything) survived, then escaping from whatever terrible presence is on the ship.
Some glorious Magnetic Rose type shenanigans to be sure.
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Between now and August 2017 - oh, I see what you mean. It may mean a delay for some 3PPs with certain products, while others are far enough along, and feel differentiated enough (or aligned just so) that they need not wait.
For me, Starfinder is a two sided deal - one is the Sci-fi integration of Paizo's Golarion - Golarion-in-the-time-to-come. The other is the capturing of the market that can and will bear sci-fi meatballs in their fantasy gluten spaghetti. Whether there is an organised play component will remain to be seen.
Some folks have been talking about SF being a shadow upgrade PF 1.5, and sure there will be rules advancements and "upgrades" - but I don't think this will be a huge change to major components of the ruleset - likely more bolt on subsystems - piloting and ship to ship perhaps?
The Technology guide (will have to edit above post...) made certain things...."official" and some 3PPs embraced its rulest additions. So while I don't think Starfinder the Hardcover will expand on Technology Guide in terms of new rulesets majorly, it will codify Paizo's product approach to come - and that may effect some 3PPs own product go-aheads and schedules....
I think the best case scenario is that the technology guide really was a secret playtest for Starfinder and it functions mostly the same as how I've been playing it. That way Starfinder compantibility can be just a matter of slapping a new label on and calling it a day.
As I said in my blog, between the technology guide and a few third party bits, I didn't actually need to change much to get the game going.
Frankly the biggest surprise for me (which wasn't that Paizo would make Sci-finder - that has been telegraphed by the toe-dippings along the way - Iron Gods, Distant Worlds....Numeria [EDIT to add Technology Guide]), but the amazemement evinced by the fans -
"OMG I'm so surprised/excited, I have so many character ideas coming to me"
In agreement with the poster above, I expected a science fiction hardcover, but figured it would be something in the Adventures line. Not an entirely separate product line with AP's
As someone who, when they have money, does occasionally pick up third party products, I can say this will probably make me hesitate to pick up any 3pp science fiction/space material, until I can see what Paizo does. Not that my mental wishlist had any similar material to this on it that had already been released.
I am sure other consumers will feel similarly.
And yeah I am guessing a lot of the tech rules will be pretty close to technology guide, other than pricing.
Pricing can stay the same if you get more money per level.
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Some things may get delayed but I am sure it will be same as it is now. There will be good stuff and there will be crap. Certain publishers I see are going to be chomping at the bit to churn out material for and these are people to me with a proven track record of greatness. Like anything else it's a case of wait and see. They just announced the book this weekend people. It's going to be over a year till we get anything. For right now look at projects that already exist in this genre and get what looks interesting with an eye towards revamping things as needed when the time comes to convert. But that's what I plan on doing; the mileage of other people may vary.
Chief Technical Officer
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I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).
I would just like to point out that if you don't like our system, it's very likely you'll be able to publish your own under the compatibility license.
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I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).I would just like to point out that if you don't like our system, it's very likely you'll be able to publish your own under the compatibility license.
Not so much your "system," but do you know yet if the Starfinder will be portable to other Science Fantasy type settings?
Not so much your "system," but do you know yet if the Starfinder will be portable to other Science Fantasy type settings?I'm really, REALLY curious what Starfinder's space vehicle and zero-g combat will look like. That's been the biggest bear to wrestle with the built-for-2D Pathfinder rules, and I haven't seen anyone solve it particularly well. I haven't solved it very well, and now it looks like I won't have to (or get to).I would just like to point out that if you don't like our system, it's very likely you'll be able to publish your own under the compatibility license.
Found out in another thread that this is intended to be setting specific.
So lets talk about third party products in Starfinder.
As far as things I'd love to see? well an adventure path or setting that can pull a Subnautica meets Evolve mashup.
I imagine Dreamscarred Press may jump on, but I kinda hope they hold off until they at least get their Third Dawn campaign setting out. outside of the adventure path Third Dawn has basically just been a big 'what if there is no magic' setting.