TBF thats how it is in most rpgs. Very few RPGs make any HP above 1 meaningful. Most of the time you are totally fine until you are totally not.Starfinder combat is a lot like shooting each other with Nerf guns, right up until the last shot. And even then it's not that bad most of the time.There's also the problem that 'IRL' getting shot usually removes you from combat. Most people stop fighting after being shot, usually to get treatment for their wound.
In Pathfinder and Starfinder, you typically don't stop being a threat until you go unconscious, which usually takes significantly more than 1 successful shot to accomplish.
I recall playing some games back in the 90s that gave greater penalties the more wounds you took, but it's been too long to remember what games they were. Maybe VtM, Rifts, or Shadowrun - those were the only non D&D-like games I played back then that I can remember.
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This problem is primarily in organized play. Outside of that the GM has nearly infinite leeway with what they'd like to do, even if that includes having the enemies act on info they don't have or such. The players can always object by not letting that person GM again, and they presumably chose to do so in the first place.
But in the organized play the GM is supposed to use those tactics, if they feel they're stupid and suboptimal then it's quite possible they've just failed to see it from the right perspective. It may be suboptimal, but they might be that way for a reason, and just because the GM can't figure that reason out doesn't mean the players should be punished. Organized play players don't get to get their GM beforehand in the same way, they rely on the structure of the adventures to limit what problems they cause. There are several encounters in PFS that if run "optimally" instead of the way they're supposed to be run will kill a party. Off the top of my head there's an encounter in a 3-7 that if run right would wipe 90% of 11-12 level parties. And I expect these to happen more in SFS with the new way they've chosen to balance players vs NPCs. If as a GM you can't make yourself use the tactics put forth then you probably shouldn't be GMing in that setting. Nothing wrong like that, doesn't make you a bad GM, just a GM bad with organized play.
Though of course the players will also need to do their part and learn the quirks of this new system and how to not make themselves die in it. It's a new system and a few of the things often taken for granted don't work the same anymore. You're heavily armored character will get hit regularly, you're incredibly damage focused guy probably won't drop everyone they breath on outside of lucky rolls.
Learning needs to happen, and neither side is blameless.
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Starfinder combat is a lot like shooting each other with Nerf guns, right up until the last shot. And even then it's not that bad most of the time.There's also the problem that 'IRL' getting shot usually removes you from combat. Most people stop fighting after being shot, usually to get treatment for their wound.
In Pathfinder and Starfinder, you typically don't stop being a threat until you go unconscious, which usually takes significantly more than 1 successful shot to accomplish.
Indeed.
TBF thats how it is in most rpgs. Very few RPGs make any HP above 1 meaningful. Most of the time you are totally fine until you are totally not.Starfinder combat is a lot like shooting each other with Nerf guns, right up until the last shot. And even then it's not that bad most of the time.There's also the problem that 'IRL' getting shot usually removes you from combat. Most people stop fighting after being shot, usually to get treatment for their wound.
In Pathfinder and Starfinder, you typically don't stop being a threat until you go unconscious, which usually takes significantly more than 1 successful shot to accomplish.
But that's exactly my point.
"Realism" doesn't factor in to tactics when your opponents continue to stand and fight after being shot.
In a normal fight you get hit most people stop fighting and seek medical attention, or require someone else to get them medical aid.
In Starfinder (and PAthfidner), you don't stop being a threat until you're unconscious. There's no reduced effectiveness (and I wouldn't want there to be) but it also means that doing things like "Everybody target different enemies" is also a really dumb thing to do.
So anytime I see someone arguing about a point of realism for how anything should function in this game...it just makes no sense.
CR of the encounter comes from the stat block and the environment/situation advantage.
NPC behavior does not effect CR.
The GM is not obligated to run the NPCs as outlined in APs. If you want that, then play a video game.
If the APs depend on moronic NPC behavior, then they are poorly designed.
Tactics are part of the stat block though.CR of the encounter comes from the stat block and the environment/situation advantage.
NPC behavior does not effect CR.
The alien archive is not out yet.
Tactics are at most GM suggestions when in stat blocks. In APs, suggesting bad tactics (like don't focus the melee PC) is just the admission of bad design. Paizo made melee the hardmode of this game and they don't want their ap making that apparent.
It doesn't matter if Paizo puts tactics as part of the CR in the alien archive. Dictating NPC actions to the GM to that degree isn't what pen and paper RPGs are about. The GM gets to play too and no amount of rules or intentions are going to stop that. If tactics are part of CR, then all that was accomplished was to make the CR meaningless.
Being given tactical advantageous position changes CR even if the GM chooses to not use that advantage. CR is calculated before actions are taken and any infringement on that truth just succeeds to muddle what CR means and any of its use.
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I think we're conflating what we mean by "CR." It seems some of us are talking about Encounter CR and some of us are talking about Creature CR.
The CR of a creature need not take into account tactics, but the CR of an encounter definitely should. If you're going to design an encounter, an inclusion of the motivations and tactics of the creatures involved should definitely be included.
Having tactical options because of the environment (cover) or situation (surprise round/pre buffing) do effect CR if one side is at a disadvantage.
NPC actions (such as focus fire) don't effect CR.
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In the game world nothing knows how tough you actually are. As far as they're concerned, you're just a guy in a suit of armour.
Imagine a situation where you have space pirates. They attack ships filed with normal citizens in general, and maybe occasionally they run into some security guys who are mostly overpaid thugs.
If they fire a gun at a normal citizen, it generally kills them. So focus firing is in fact a waste of actions because your just overkilling some one.
Except this time the PCs are on board and they're not expecting that at all. They don't suddenly become tactical experts, they do what they've always done.
Another example, baddies are in a room. One of the PCs charges in and engages in melee. The enemies not in combat still keep firing through the door because they don't want anyone else to get in and engage in melee! They let their companion deal,with the fight while they try to stop the position being over run. This is not bad tactics.
Lastly, to re direct to the original post. It's important to also remember that low level characters are super fragile. It only takes one or two really good rolls from the DM to drop a first level character. That's been the same for as long as I've played roll play games.
It doesn't matter how aweful the tactics are. I remember running two orcs in a combat with a 3.5 group. They had great axes (standard equipment ). I rolled two crits in that fight. 2d12+4 damage pretty much kills a first level player. It's not hard to TPK a party if the dice are against them.
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Tactics are at most GM suggestions when in stat blocks. In APs, suggesting bad tactics (like don't focus the melee PC) is just the admission of bad design. Paizo made melee the hardmode of this game and they don't want their ap making that apparent.
If melee character design is bad because they get focused-fired and encounter design is bad because NPCs are state not to use focus fire... maybe these cancel out and the design is fine?
It doesn't matter if Paizo puts tactics as part of the CR in the alien archive. Dictating NPC actions to the GM to that degree isn't what pen and paper RPGs are about. The GM gets to play too and no amount of rules or intentions are going to stop that. If tactics are part of CR, then all that was accomplished was to make the CR meaningless.
CR is for GMs to build balanced encounters. GMs in organized play don't build encounters, they run printed encounters. So I'm not to concerned about the instructions in organized play violating the sanctity of the CR system.
Being given tactical advantageous position changes CR even if the GM chooses to not use that advantage. CR is calculated before actions are taken and any infringement on that truth just succeeds to muddle what CR means and any of its use.
So, CR is accurate on an infinite featureless plain, and less accurate when terrain and positioning come into play. I agree with that idea, I'm just not sure we're drawing the same conclusion from it.
I've totally been in Pathfinder society scenarios where an enemy deals enough damage with initiative to drop a character in a single hit. One had something to do with an undead knight charging and spirited charge with a lance dealing 70+ damage or so to a level 7 character after winning initiative against the entire party. Said character was in plate mail+2 and had a shield spell up. Not much they could have done. We still won the fight.
To be honest, in a home campaign, you base encounters on the optimization skills and combat savvy of your players. And what your players want out of those encounters. Which is going to vary, a lot. Guidelines are nice, but Paizo doesn't know the GM's players.
I mean, I've GM'd an Eberon campaign for players who were master optimizers. They used to go on the old D&D forums for wizards of the coast (called the "Core Coliseum" sub-board) and run fights between character builds based on submitted tactics to a neutral 3rd party. They had seen and used every trick in the core rulebook. I've also GM'd for 12 year old kids. I used very different levels of tactics optimization for those groups, but gave out the same effective rewards based on the "official" CR of the opponents.
Tactics are at most GM suggestions when in stat blocks. In APs, suggesting bad tactics (like don't focus the melee PC) is just the admission of bad design. Paizo made melee the hardmode of this game and they don't want their ap making that apparent.
I'll note the tactics Hwalsh reference from the Quests and Incident at Abasalom Station say nothing about melee. They are simply saying not to focus fire in general.
I don't believe melee is hard mode in Starfinder. The situation everyone keeps thinking of is the lone melee up in front, while the rest of their ranged allies hanging back in cover without providing support in any way. That is a result of decisions made by players, not the design of any of the classes or overall system.
If the party is 2 melee and 2 ranged, which melee do the enemies focus fire? The melee in that particular enemy's face, or the one you have to take an AoO to hit? I would argue such a player group prevents focus fire in a way that a 4 ranged player setup can't.
Now imagine a party of 4 melee. If they want, they can force enemies to either take AoOs (doubling their already increased damage output), or force them to spread their attacks. At levels 1-2 they're typically dealing 1d6+2 to 1d12+4 kinds of damage, versus 1d4 to 1d10 of ranged options. Doubling on already doubled damage results in a very short encounter.
Someone pointed out that I couldn't have the scenario work with humans... They're right... Humans would act differently. I don't want my players to feel that all of the enemies they encounter behave the same way once combat starts.
I do think tactics can (and should) increase (or decrease) the CR of the encounter.
To use a pathfinder analogy:
If the party encounters an enemy group of drow with class levels, 2 Rogues, 1 Sorcerer, and 1 Fighter, I can ratchet the difficulty of the encounter by changing tactics. If the Rogues, for example, go one after the other, they can do the following:
Not Smart:
Split up and hit 2 separate targets.Average:
One moves into melee range with a target, and attacks. The other moves into melee range to flank the target, attacks with flank + Sneak Attack.Very Smart:
One moves into melee range with a target, uses a ready action to attack when the opponent is flanked. The other moves into melee range to flank the target. Readied action from Rogue 1 goes off with Flank + Sneak Attack. Rogue 2 attacks with Flank + Sneak attack.If the target is level 1-2? Congrats, you just dropped a PC, potentially in round 1. This is actually similar (save they aren't Drow) to an encounter for *level 2* in the Shattered Star AP. The AP behavior,...
And see, I'm okay with not using the Very Smart scenario, I'm not suggesting you need to pull these sorts of maneuvers with players.
What I'm not okay with is the not smart maneuver. It shouldn't be on the table (IMO) unless your facing very stupid adversaries (like goblins). Most enemies should probably use the average tactic. Especially clever enemies might use something like the Very Smart tactic, but you need to be careful when doing such a thing as a GM because it could potentially kill a PC or easily knock them out making it very unfun for the targeted player.
Honestly, the reason I think most people default to the lone melee guy and not 2+ is because...well melee is simply much rarer in SF. Aside from Soldiers and Solarians, pretty much all the other classes "default" into ranged combatants/supporters and when constructing a "generic" 4 man party, odds are not great you're going to get x2 CC Soldier/Solarian or Soldier+Solarian.
True! Melee envoys are niche, operatives do better at range, and taking anything else into melee is masochism outside touch spell delivery.
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And see, I'm okay with not using the Very Smart scenario, I'm not suggesting you need to pull these sorts of maneuvers with players.
What I'm not okay with is the not smart maneuver. It shouldn't be on the table (IMO) unless your facing very stupid adversaries (like goblins). Most enemies should probably use the average tactic. Especially clever enemies might use something like the Very Smart tactic, but you need to be careful when doing such a thing as a GM because it could potentially kill a PC or easily knock them out making it very unfun for the targeted player.
I agree with basically all of this. I basically just think the part you bolded should maybe be a bit more common than you do. I think that's the extent of the disagreement here, really.
Honestly, the reason I think most people default to the lone melee guy and not 2+ is because...well melee is simply much rarer in SF. Aside from Soldiers and Solarians, pretty much all the other classes "default" into ranged combatants/supporters and when constructing a "generic" 4 man party, odds are not great you're going to get x2 CC Soldier/Solarian or Soldier+Solarian.True! Melee envoys are niche, operatives do better at range, and taking anything else into melee is masochism outside touch spell delivery.
Eh. Operatives do fine in melee and melee Envoys are fine. More than two melee guys is gonna be rare, but two, especially in a five or six person party, seems very possible.
That sounds pretty reasonably Deadmanwalking.
For sapient creatures I would mostly expect about 15% to use stupid tactics, 70% to use average tactics, and 15% to use very smart tactics.
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That sounds pretty reasonably Deadmanwalking.
For sapient creatures I would mostly expect about 15% to use stupid tactics, 70% to use average tactics, and 15% to use very smart tactics.
I think it should vary by CR, as that's a general measure of competence/experience.
I'd expect the average to be more like 10% stupid, 70% average and 20% smart at really high CR...but more like at least 50% stupid, 45% average, 5% smart if we're talking creatures of less than CR 1 without a skilled leader. The competence should escalate quickly from there, but generic gang members, say, to use an example from Dead Suns, are not generally great tactical thinkers.
And, in fairness, those sorts of foes are most of the encounters being actually discussed in SFS and Dead Suns, what with those all being discussions of minions in low level adventures.
There is also the matter of goals. One of the examples mentioned earlier was an Envoy whose actions are searching for cover, using gem em, and then only shooting if shot at. If that guy's goal is to survive the combat rather than to win...that's not actually a bad strategy. I'd peg it solidly into the 'average' category in terms of tactical thinking despite being suboptimal from a 'win this fight' perspective.
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Are those percentages per person or per group?
It'd be pretty funny per person.
5 guys attack. One is very smart and trying to outline the tactics for the group. Three are average and patiently listening. One runs in screaming and draws all the attention of the enemy back to the other four.
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Are those percentages per person or per group?
It'd be pretty funny per person.
5 guys attack. One is very smart and trying to outline the tactics for the group. Three are average and patiently listening. One runs in screaming and draws all the attention of the enemy back to the other four.
Probably per group mostly, after all if one person is smart enough to do the average level they can probably get folks to go along with them. Individual exceptions (the smart guy with terrible Cha, for example) might well exist and result in the scenario described, though.
Trying to envisage a 'typical' encounter with one melee PC involved, and everyone else using guns:
During round one, the melee guy charges in half-way through and hits an enemy.
The guy he hit retreats, provoking an AoO, and then fires at him. The melee guy now has no cover.
By the time the melee guy gets to act again, he's been shot, say, three times. If he's cautious, he'll spend the round retreating around the nearest corner. If he's more of a risk taker, he'll probably go down next round, but hopefully won't actually die.
Once the melee guy is out the way, the focus-firing NPCs have to switch targets to an uninjured PC. But by this time, the PCs should have done a fair amount of damage to them already.
Does that sound plausible?
And what if the statblocks are wrong? That was the issue I seen with GMs. They read a scenario and noticed that the math doesn't add up.
Trying to envisage a 'typical' encounter with one melee PC involved, and everyone else using guns:
During round one, the melee guy charges in half-way through and hits an enemy.
The guy he hit retreats, provoking an AoO, and then fires at him. The melee guy now has no cover.
By the time the melee guy gets to act again, he's been shot, say, three times. If he's cautious, he'll spend the round retreating around the nearest corner. If he's more of a risk taker, he'll probably go down next round, but hopefully won't actually die.
Once the melee guy is out the way, the focus-firing NPCs have to switch targets to an uninjured PC. But by this time, the PCs should have done a fair amount of damage to them already.Does that sound plausible?
That's pretty much exactly how I see it happening.
Melee characters should probably expect to be knocked out in a lot of combat, but thanks to the changes in the HP system probably wont die (unless you get a TPK).
Basically I imagine it like this: What if in Pathfinder all the enemies were archers or spell casters and every PC party were archers or spell casters except one guy? What do you think happens? Yeah...the same thing that would happen in Starfinder. The same thing that happened when guns became commonplace on the battlefield in real life.
Remember this scene? There's a reason we stopped using pointy sticks, and that's because we started being able to throw tiny pointy sticks really far and really fast. Honestly melee combat is the purview of the foolhardy and stupid in any setting where guns are pervasive. There are scenarios in which it's useful to have a backup melee weapon, but it shouldn't be your primary weapon.
In Starfinder, if you want to be a dedicated melee person you should probably still have some backup ranged ability, if you want to stay conscious each fight be aware of the challenges you're going to face by doing what amounts to the stupidest thing you could on a battlefield.
What if in Pathfinder all the enemies were archers or spell casters and every PC party were archers or spell casters except one guy? What do you think happens?
The melee PC probably turns out to have an Armor Class of 40 and takes no damage.
Remember this scene?
Wow, those machine-gunners were really careful not to shoot any of the horses...
Wow, those machine-gunners were really careful not to shoot any of the horses...
Looked like quite a few horses were taken down to me.
I saw horses fall over, but they generally got up and walked away.
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Trying to envisage a 'typical' encounter with one melee PC involved, and everyone else using guns:
During round one, the melee guy charges in half-way through and hits an enemy.
The guy he hit retreats, provoking an AoO, and then fires at him. The melee guy now has no cover.
By the time the melee guy gets to act again, he's been shot, say, three times. If he's cautious, he'll spend the round retreating around the nearest corner. If he's more of a risk taker, he'll probably go down next round, but hopefully won't actually die.
Once the melee guy is out the way, the focus-firing NPCs have to switch targets to an uninjured PC. But by this time, the PCs should have done a fair amount of damage to them already.Does that sound plausible?
Given that two attacks from a devoted melee guy probably kill most enemies you meet in groups dead, I'm not sure if provoking an AoO is a bright move on the guy in melee's part. Also...how would he know the melee guy has Step Up?
I'd be more inclined to expect him to Guarded Step away, get followed, pull a melee weapon and attack the melee guy back with that.
That said, he'd presumably step to get out of his friends' firing lines, so the melee guy is still getting shot.
So yeah, a melee guy who just charges into a pile of guys is probably getting shot a fair bit. Though maybe not more than they can handle.
Let's look at this assuming an encounter in Dead Suns with 6 CR 1/2 thugs. A tough encounter by the CR rules. Assuming EAC 15 for our melee guy, and noting the enemies have a ranged +6 to hit at 1st, even with our melee guy charging the enemy needs a 7 to hit. That's a 70% shot. So two thirds. Rounding up (and assuming the melee guy misses with his +3 vs. KAC), that's 4 hits. 4d4+4 damage. An average of 14.
A 1st level melee character can take that, having something like Stm 7 and 11 HP. Possibly more.
And that assumes he charges in before they all go and before his friends take any of them out. Playing the odds I'd expect that to not be the case at all, and them to not necessarily focus fire on him before he's actually among them. That'd be odd.
He'd usually be much better served by waiting until his friends have whittled them down a little with their own focused fire, then going in. And only charging if he can't reach them otherwise.
Really, charging into a mess of guys like that is poor tactics most of the time unless you're, say, immune to their weapons. Which can happen, but not at low levels.
So, yeah, I'd expect that scenario to usually go poorly. Which is why I advise not doing that very specific thing (charging in the open directly towards a group of people with guns).
Trying to envisage a 'typical' encounter with one melee PC involved, and everyone else using guns:
During round one, the melee guy charges in half-way through and hits an enemy.
The guy he hit retreats, provoking an AoO, and then fires at him. The melee guy now has no cover.
By the time the melee guy gets to act again, he's been shot, say, three times. If he's cautious, he'll spend the round retreating around the nearest corner. If he's more of a risk taker, he'll probably go down next round, but hopefully won't actually die.
Once the melee guy is out the way, the focus-firing NPCs have to switch targets to an uninjured PC. But by this time, the PCs should have done a fair amount of damage to them already.Does that sound plausible?
Yes, it sounds plausible. Although remember, if there are 3 or 4 enemies, they are at most the same level as the characters, and likely less. If they're the same level, its like APL+3 or APL+4, which would tend to force you to use some tactics.
My literal 1st encounter as a Solarian melee in SFS went like this: There were 4 of us (Light Armor Solarian, Sharpshooter Soldier, Ghost Operative, Navasi Envoy pregen). 3 enemies on a bridge in a park.
1) I proceeded to move 40 feet and position myself such that my reach weapon covered all enemies. Hit target. (I later learned after the scenario I had 65% hit chance, and my average melee damage would drop one in 2 hits).
2) The target I hit get gets to go, tries that move and shoot thing. Drops from my AoO (2 melee hits is like 4 hits from ranged).
3) Allies and enemies shoot. Allies hit twice, enemy hits me once.
4) 2nd round I attack the injured target, hit, they drop.
5) I get shot again.
6) Ranged allies hit once or twice
7) Round 3, I could supernova, but we decide to try to keep them alive by stabilizing, so I miss with pike, enemy switches to melee, hits.
8) Operative finishes target off, soldier stabilizes first dropped enemy. We proceed to stabilize remaining enemies next round.
I'll note the GM (who is a great GM) made a slight mistake and ran the 5-6 encounter instead of the 4 man encounter. Clearly if enemies get lucky, I'll go down, but intelligent enemies will tend to change targets at that point (if they want to win).
On average, it would have taken 7-8 successful hits to actually drop my character from those particular enemy's ranged weapons. So I figured I had at least 3 rounds of engagement (as I won initiative).
If I felt I was dangerously low, I would have taken the full defense action and moved behind an ally for a net +8 to AC, making them need 18's or higher to hit.
My second session ended up being the same party (except Navasi had turned into a home grown envoy). No problems.
Third session had a switch hitter soldier, a 2nd level Kasatha switch hitter Soldier/Solarian, Technomancer, Operative, and my Solarian. We had 3/5 melee. In person combats literally lasted 2 rounds with that last party.
Edit: I'll note 6 CR 1/2 enemies is a CR 5 encounter. A 4 character 1st level group should never encounter that unless the GM knows the players are completely optimized combat machines. If we're talking about a 6-7 character group, then I think its more likely than not you've got 2 melee to spread the damage on (or at least provide cover for each other).
It seems like they're saying the final number might not be appropriate.
One thing I will say about that is the Devs have mentioned that NPC math is not the same as PC math, so until we have NPC building rules I would be careful about believing an enemy statblock is wrong.