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After rereading about Solarians and looking deeper into their options, I realize now that Solar Armor combined with light armor is pretty potent, almost like a Sentinel's Tech Armor from Mass Effect 2 and 3, my all-time favorite class to play in those games.
The thing is, light armor works best with a high Dexterity, and it appears that Dexterity can ONLY be used for ranged attacks in Starfinder, as there's no equivalent of the Weapon Finesse feat allowing you to use your Dexterity instead of Strength for melee attacks, and the Solarian's powers are primarily centered around melee combat.
So...if I want to get the most out of an Armor Solarian, am I basically stuck being MAD as I have to keep Strength AND Dexterity high, or is there anything that lets me use my Dexterity to do melee? Or should I just go Weapon Solarian and use feats to get Heavy Armor so I focus solely on Strength?
Operative melee weapons are automatically finessable, you can use Dexterity modifier for attack rolls instead of strength. They also only add half character level to damage via the Weapon Specialization feat though.
Operative weapons are a basic melee weapons that can use dexterity for attack rolls instead of strength. However, weapon specialization only gives them half your level to damage instead of your full level, and they have very low base weapon damage - they're all daggers and batons at this point, and that isn't likely to change. Since they can use Trick Attack with such weapons, this is a worthwhile trade for the Operative, which shouldn't be a surprise considering the name. For other classes, it may not be.
It is possible the solarian may want to be a ranged combatant instead of melee in which case the armor would be the better option but I think most who go solarian want their (totally not a light saber).
So...if I want to get the most out of an Armor Solarian, am I basically stuck being MAD as I have to keep Strength AND Dexterity high
MAD is the new normal in Starfinder. It is well supported by the character advancement rules.
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Really?MAD is the new normal in Starfinder. It is well supported by the character advancement rules.
So...if I want to get the most out of an Armor Solarian, am I basically stuck being MAD as I have to keep Strength AND Dexterity high
Yeah.
Every 5 levels (at 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th levels), you get to
increase and customize your ability scores. Each time you reach
one of these level thresholds, choose four of your ability scores to
increase. If that ability score is 17 or higher (excluding any ability
increases from personal upgrades—see page 212), it increases
permanently by 1. If it’s 16 or lower, it increases permanently
by 2.
At 5th level, four ability scores get increased. If they are 16 or below, they go up by 2. Very supportive of MAD builds.
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You're both right as far as I can tell. I'll probably wait until some actual Solarian guides are written, but right now it looks like it's mostly go Weapon or go home.
Nah. Grabbing Longarm Proficiency (and maybe eventually Heavy Weapons) and doing a ranged Solarian is perfectly viable, and obviously strongly benefits from the armor. Very few of the Graviton Revelations require melee combat. Half your level in DR is, for example, pretty nice for a ranged character.
You're not the highest damage character ever, but you're not bad.
Really?MAD is the new normal in Starfinder. It is well supported by the character advancement rules.
So...if I want to get the most out of an Armor Solarian, am I basically stuck being MAD as I have to keep Strength AND Dexterity high
Really. But probably not to the extent necessary to make a melee Solarian taking the armor a good plan.
The fact that in Starfinder you get as much as +2 to four different abilities every 5 levels takes a lot of the sting out of being MAD...but not enough to keep Dex and Str maxed and keep Cha high enough for Resolve. Not at very high levels anyway.
You'd pretty much have to be a Korasha Lashunta, too, since you need racial bonuses to two of Str, Dex, and Chr and no penalty to any of them.
By 10th it's possible to manage Str 23, Dex 20, Cha 18 by that route which is viable and maxes out Dex mod to AC at that level. By 20th, make that Str 26, Dex 24, Cha 22, and your AC has fallen a point behind.
But it's not worth the investment. One Feat for Heavy Armor Proficieny gets you the same with lower Dex and thus plenty of Ability points to go elsewhere. One Feat is a pretty small price to pay for that.
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0_o
This...this changes EVERYTHING! 8D
One slightly related question: suppose I go Solar Armor and want a plasma sword with a holy fusion or something. Will I need a backup weapon that deals kinetic damage against enemies with energy resistance?
From what it looks like, Starfinder REALLY encourages you to carry more than one weapon unless you add an elemental fusion to a kinetic weapon, or you go Solar Weapon Solarian and use your powers to add fire damage to it.
0_o
This...this changes EVERYTHING! 8D
One slightly related question: suppose I go Solar Armor and want a plasma sword with a holy fusion or something. Will I need a backup weapon that deals kinetic damage against enemies with energy resistance?
From what it looks like, Starfinder REALLY encourages you to carry more than one weapon unless you add an elemental fusion to a kinetic weapon, or you go Solar Weapon Solarian and use your powers to add fire damage to it.
Yes. Have backup weapons. Wield a battleglove if the aesthetic of extra weapons does not appeal to you. Carry a ranged weapon of some sort though for hard to reach (let's say vertically) enemies.
Fun fact: the Photon Stellar Mode's bonus damage applies to all damage rolls you make, not just melee. This also applies to those melee solarions who keep a pistol or a grenade on hand for those rounds when they can't close to close range for whatever reason.
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Really. But probably not to the extent necessary to make a melee Solarian taking the armor a good plan.
The fact that in Starfinder you get as much as +2 to four different abilities every 5 levels takes a lot of the sting out of being MAD...but not enough to keep Dex and Str maxed and keep Cha high enough for Resolve. Not at very high levels anyway.
You'd pretty much have to be a Korasha Lashunta, too, since you need racial bonuses to two of Str, Dex, and Chr and no penalty to any of them.
By 10th it's possible to manage Str 23, Dex 20, Cha 18 by that route which is viable and maxes out Dex mod to AC at that level. By 20th, make that Str 26, Dex 24, Cha 22, and your AC has fallen a point behind.
But it's not worth the investment. One Feat for Heavy Armor Proficieny gets you the same with lower Dex and thus plenty of Ability points to go elsewhere. One Feat is a pretty small price to pay for that.
I see. Out of curiosity, is this an instance of "It's not completely optimized but is solid enough that you'll have fun with it" or more "If you go with this build, you're setting yourself up to be useless?"
I find that a lot of builds even if they're not OPTIMAL optimal are at least enjoyable when the rest of your party is well-balanced.
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I see. Out of curiosity, is this an instance of "It's not completely optimized but is solid enough that you'll have fun with it" or more "If you go with this build, you're setting yourself up to be useless?"
I find that a lot of builds even if they're not OPTIMAL optimal are at least enjoyable when the rest of your party is well-balanced.
It's a matter of stat investment. In combat you'll do just as well offensively and be, at most, a point or two behind in AC. You won't be quite optimal, but you'll do fine.
Out of combat, you've got a really heavy investment in Dex, enough so that you'll be worse at non Dex-based stuff. If most of what you do in non-combat roles is Dex based (Pilot, Stealth, and Sleight of Hand for example), with a side order of Chr stuff, you'll probably be fine. If you wanted more skills in other areas...not so much.
It does also rather necessitate being a Korasha Lashunta (and very specifically having Str 16, Dex 14, Con 10, Int 10, Wis 8, Cha 14) or it gets a whole lot less doable.
Really?MAD is the new normal in Starfinder. It is well supported by the character advancement rules.
So...if I want to get the most out of an Armor Solarian, am I basically stuck being MAD as I have to keep Strength AND Dexterity high
Yeah.
At 5th level, four ability scores get increased. If they are 16 or below, they go up by 2. Very supportive of MAD builds.Every 5 levels (at 5th, 10th, 15th, and 20th levels), you get to
increase and customize your ability scores. Each time you reach
one of these level thresholds, choose four of your ability scores to
increase. If that ability score is 17 or higher (excluding any ability
increases from personal upgrades—see page 212), it increases
permanently by 1. If it’s 16 or lower, it increases permanently
by 2.
Something to add is there's also Personal Upgrades available. At 14th level (If you're willing to drop the dough which isn't unreasonable for a Solarion considering you can save money on equipment) you can have +2, +4, and +6 to 3 different ability scores.
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Since my first instinct after finishing my initial readthrough of the Corebook was a cool, angsty paladin-like elf Solarian who worships Sarenrae, it sounds like Solar Weapon is the way to go if I wanna afford things like these personal upgrades and stuff.
Thanks everyone! This thread has been...enlightening! ; )
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Booooooooooooo
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Solarians with:
16 dex and chr, left over points into str seem fine on paper. photon bonus damage, flashing strikes, plasma sheath, Weapon focus, multi weapon fighting... I like the look of it.
You also get out of combat skills, combat tricks, and the ability to make accurate ranged attacks when desired.
Edit: If anyone has tried this, let me know how it played please!
The nice thing about starfinder is that, due to the way weapons scale their damage up with level, even a seemingly less optimal option like doing a more ranged-focused Solarian still works pretty well.
Starfinder does seem to be designed specifically to discourage pathfinder's long-running trend of accidentally encouraging melee combat builds to be dex-focused, by making the finessable weapons very specifically oriented toward the Operative class. But it makes up for that with way better ranged weapons, i suppose!