| 1 person marked this as FAQ candidate. |
There's a debate going in another thread about what gear is available for a starting PC.
The book States on Page 16: "At 1st level, your character has 1,000 credits to spend on armor, weapons, and other supplies (though your GM may give you alternative instructions for how to choose your gear)."
On page 167, it reads, "Rather than meticulously track every arms dealer, contact, guild, and license a character has access to, the game assumes that in typical settlements you can find and purchase anything with an item level no greater than your character level + 1, and at major settlements items up to your character level + 2. The GM can restrict access to some items (even those of an appropriate level) or make items of a higher level available for purchase (possibly at a greatly increased price or in return for a favor done for the seller)."
From these two quote, we derive the heart of the two arguments.
One side says, "The book doesn't specifically state what you can and can't buy, therefore it's campaign dependent and you have to ask your GM."
The other side says, "A typical settlement is L+1, therefore you should always be able to start the game with L+1. A GM is free to change that just like a GM is free to ban the Solarion class from the game."
Is starting gear campaign/GM dependent, or is it L+1 and changing it is a Houserule? Or do you have a different idea?
What is your opinion?
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I believe it's the second one. While your GM is free to make whatever changes he deems appropriate for his game, the game itself assumes +2 is the highest you can buy. This is backed up by the way that items seem to get progressively better as their level increases. It also makes it much easier to buy starting gear as there's only so much available.
In my first campaign, I'm going to let them buy anything they can afford. We'll see if that breaks things.
Since I read that passage and thought "Yeah, OK, but what level gear are you allowed to start with?", the CRB seems to me to leave it completely open, which supports the first take described above.
(Or, to make the same point another way: if the CRB did have a passage somewhere else saying "Starting characters are assumed to start with equipment whose tier is no higher than their level", I wouldn't bat an eye. I certainly wouldn't think "WTF?! These two parts of the CRB contradict one another!" Again, that suggests to me that the CRB leaves it completely open, which again suggests the first take sketched above.)
That said, that's just going by the CRB. But we have more information than that, because we know SFS allows characters to start with gear up to their level+1. And given the amount of interaction between the design team and the Starfinder team, that lends itself to thinking that something like the second take was intended, even if the CRB itself doesn't make that clear.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
...or maybe we should just be thinking of everything SFS says as a set of codified house rules that should play no role in our interpretation of the CRB. Which would suggest the first take again.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I mean, Absalom Station would be considered a Major Settlement, right? If you're from there or another major settlement, you'd theoretically have access to Item Level 3 stuff. Not like you can really afford anything though.
Due to the prohibitive cost, I'm going with Interpretation 2.
I don't recall seeing any 3rd level gear that cost less than 1000 credits, so the question of whether you can buy 3rd level equipment with your starting money is moot unless I missed something.
Unless you let players pool their money or have higher starting resources it really doesn't matter, the only items above level 2 under 1000 credits are level 4 grenades, 2nd level spell gems, ammo and manacles. If a players want to spend 75% of there starting credits for a one shot 1d12 grenade I see no reason to stop them.
Yeah, the question is whether (according to the CRB) they should even be able to start with 2nd (not 3rd) tier equipment w/o asking the GM whether it's permitted.
I.e., should the CRB be understood as saying "the default is that you can start with up to lvl+1 gear, so unless the GM changes things, that's what you can get during character creation"? (That's the second take described in the OP.)
Or does the CRB just not say anything about this, and so require PCs to ask their GMs to let them know what equipment they can start with? (The first take described in the OP.)
I read that as "You can safely assume you start with level+1 equipment unless your GM indicates otherwise".