So I'm GMing a game and one of my players want to be a drone mechanic with a riding saddle. I've looked over the rules and some things are a bit hazy for me. Can anyone give me a tutorial on how this will all end up functioning in layman's terms? Any help Is appreciated.
First and foremost as GM you're going to have to parse out what "You can direct your drone mount in battle without attempting Survival checks" actually means. Does it mean you don't need Survival checks in general for riding, or does it simply mean that "Guiding" type actions don't require checks. This will be important.
So, to begin with, mounting a creature (or a Drone) is a Move Action. Once mounted you can use a Move Action to "Ride", which is basically the same as using a Move Action to move but instead of your own speed you use the mount's. And then if you want to dismount that is also a Move Action. None of these require a Survival check. Then we get into the stuff that would normally require checks, and like I said this is where you need to get into parsing the line up there. I'm going to leave some suggestions on whether I would apply the line or not but as GM that's up to you.
Cover - DC 15 - Personally wouldn't apply line - As a Swift Action you start using your mount as Cover. As long as you're doing this you can't attack or cast spells. Undoing this requires a Move Action but does not need a check.
Fast Mount/Dismount - DC 20 - Personally wouldn't apply - Mount or Dismount as a Swift Action instead of a Move.
Fight from a Combat-Trained Mount - DC 10 - This is where I would start applying, the description literally calls out "When you direct a mount..." here - Burn a Swift Action to let both rider and mount make attacks. If you fail it's either-or for attacking. Note that you have to do this to get the mount to attack by RAW so a mounted character will never get a full-round action on a round where their mount attacks.
Leap - DC 15 - Would apply - As part of a Move action you can tell your mount to jump over an obstacle. If you succeed the check the mount can make an Acrobatics check (or, you know, use Jump Jets if it has them probably) but it can use your Survival ranks instead of its own Acrobatics if higher. If you fail the check (if they even have to make it) you fall off mid-leap and take the greater of appropriate fall damage or 1d6 fall damage.
Soft Fall - DC 15 - Doesn't actually have anything to do with the mount itself so I wouldn't apply - If you fall from your mount you can use a Reaction to make a Survival check, and if you succeed you reduce fall damage by 1d6. Good for if you screw up a Leap Check (if they're even needed). Bit broken to be automatic so really think carefully before you apply the line to this one.
Spur Mount - DC 15 - Probably the one I'm most iffy on, but I probably wouldn't apply it - As part of a Move Action you spur your mount to go faster. Deals 1d3 regardless of whether you succeed or fail. A successful check increases speed by 5 for that move action, but failing by 5 or more Fatigues a mount. I don't know if Constructs can be fatigued though, and I suspect probably not. But in any case, can't be used on a Fatigued mount, though it can be used as often as desired otherwise.
Stay Mounted - DC 5 - Another one I'm kinda iffy on if it applies or not, but then it almost doesn't matter. If you have a non-negative Wis mod and make Survival a class skill a single rank makes this an auto-succeed anyways - If your mount rears suddenly, bolts suddenly, or if you take damage you need to make this check or else you fall off your mount.
Other mounted rules that don't really apply to this but are probably good to know anyways in case the party wants a horse or something:
Control Mount in Battle - DC 20 - If riding a non-Combat Trained mount (given the size limitations I'm guessing the Mechanic's drone is probably a Combat Drone, and in any case I'd consider a Drone combat trained) when in combat you have to make this check to make your mount do literally anything. Non-combat trained mounts tend to be skittish around combat.
When dealing with exotic or awkward mounts (being intentionally designed for riding I wouldn't count a Drone with riding saddle as such) the GM can increase the riding Survival DCs by 2 to 10 (or more at GM discretion of course)
When riding bareback (again, Riding Saddle means this will never apply to a drone) you take a -5 to all riding Survival checks.
Each round on your turn, after you have acted, your drone ... (your drone doesn’t make a separate initiative roll).The mechanic/rider takes his turn; then the drone takes its turn. If the mechanic wants to attack after the drone has moved, the mechanic must "ready an action" to do so.
Mounted action economy with Limited AI:
The mechanic/rider uses his move and swift actions to control the drone. He uses his standard action to ready an attack. The drone can then charge, make a full attack, or move and make a standard-action attack (in either order). The readied attack goes off when its condition is met.
Except that the mounted combat is very clear about requiring your Swift action to command your mount to attack. Even if you don't require a check for it, the action economy of this would be unchanged. As such, you can't use your Swift for Master Control if you're also commanding it to attack. So basically if mounted neither of you can actually full attack until you get Expert AI.
Honestly mounted combat (especially where Drones are involved) is largely an inference-heavy mess right now, hopefully a future splat book will expand and clarify it.
Yeah, the rules are manageable for a mount that isn't the mechanics drone, but once you start adding that in...it gets sticky. Mostly because drones don't get a full amount of actions until high levels, which would put a mechanic character in a position where they cannot full attack (and possibly not even attack with both characters) until they get Expert AI.
First of all thank you to all for helping me with this. I had looked through the rules, but this helps a lot.
I do have a concern regarding encumbrance. I think you have to consider some amount of encumbrance otherwise you can be a small character and put a riding saddle on the hover drone for flight ability at level 1 which is kinda over powered. There is a table giving a range of weights for the base races, but nothing that gives the bulk of a character. I think this is particularly bad oversight as without this information a lot of things are unknown, like can my ysoki pick up my vesk buddy and carry him? I spoke with my player and I think we are going to have him have a bulk equal to his weight/20. So as a lightweight ysoki he'll weigh 3 bulk, plus the bulk of any equipment he has.
AS far as action economy, from what I can tell he basically will get to move and he and his mount attack in a single round, but with no penalties, move to move, swift to direct mount to attack, standard to attack (drone) and standard to attack (mechanic). Did I parse that correctly?
Bulk is supposed to be 5-10lbs of weight, per bulk, right? I kind of assumed that smaller and more uniform shapes are at the high end per bulk and larger less uniform shapes are at the low end of bulk. Because it's generally easier to carry something the smaller and more evenly balanced it is.
Estimating Bulk
As a general rule, an item that weighs around 5 to 10 pounds is 1 bulk (and every multiple of 10 is an additional bulk), an item weighing a few ounces is negligible, and anything in between is light. An awkward or unwieldy item might have a higher bulk.
So I'd guess that a conscious character actively trying to stay balanced is somewhere in the 10lbs/bulk range, while an unconscious and relaxed one is in the 5lbs/bulk range. Someone actively trying not to be carried would be even more bulky.
If you do 10lbs/bulk for a creature drones can't really be serviceable mounts at level 1 as the max strength is 14 for a combat drone at level 1 with a riding saddle. so a creature that weighs 60-100 which is the range for a ysoki, plus it's gear would end up at a reasonable minimum of like 8.
I do have a concern regarding encumbrance. I think you have to consider some amount of encumbrance otherwise you can be a small character and put a riding saddle on the hover drone for flight ability at level 1 which is kinda over powered.
Fortunately this isn't an issue.
If you ride your drone, it must be at least your size or larger.
Given that hover drones are size Tiny there is no current playable race I know of that can ride one of those.
AS far as action economy, from what I can tell he basically will get to move and he and his mount attack in a single round, but with no penalties, move to move, swift to direct mount to attack, standard to attack (drone) and standard to attack (mechanic). Did I parse that correctly?
Yes... as far as we know with trying to mash together the Drone and Mount rules. And each will get only a single attack until bare minimum level 7. And it may require readied actions. As compared to a non-mount Combat Drone that could get them 3 attacks (full attack from one, normal attack from the other) without any weird rule interactions, as well as having an extra mod to work on stuff like better weapons or something.
Good catch on the size, for some reason I was thinking the hover drone was small even though I know it isn't. Still encumbrance is an issue that needs some rules for it otherwise all sorts of shenanigans could be managed.
I don't remember seeing it in the SF book anywhere, and I don't expect it's there since they simplified carrying, but in PF, a medium quadruped could carry 1.5x the listed carrying capacity and a large could carry 3x. (In 3.5 it was 2x and 3x). I would argue that something similar should work that way in SF with bulk. If the drone looks like this...
I'd argue that it should be able to carry more than a humanoid robot, and if he's putting a literal saddle on it, that would make sense. Same thing would be true if it were running on 4 wheels or treads. The more it can spread the weight around, the more it should be able to carry, at least assuming SF physics works at least nominally like normal physics.
(That'd be how I'd house-rule it.)
As there are no rules regarding what a drone looks like other than size I think it could be anything you want. From a single legged pogo stick thing to what would be a millipede. Currently I don't believe there are any rules that differentiate between creatures based on number of legs. Ans how would to treat treads or wheels or rolling like BB-8? I think the rules for encumbrance need to be uniform regardless just to keep things simple and to prevent gaming the system while allowing players to have an aesthetic they want.
I understand where you're coming from, and I think you're right and it's intentionally kept simple and the shape of a creature's body has no effect on how much it can carry.
I was just saying how I'd rule it. If a med-quadraped has a carrying capacity of 1.5x and it's base strength is 14, that means it can carry 21 bulk, which should be plenty for a small character and their gear (and the drone's own weapon(s)) at 10lbs/bulk per the normal equipment rule.
That's just how I'd rule it, rather than messing with the rules for bulk, to make the numbers work. If you make it 20lbs/bulk for characters, that's gameable by your players too.
It's true, but bulk is an abstraction already that we know is only a rough guestimation of how hard to carry something is. I very dense object would generally have low bulk for the weight, how much so is... flexible.
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I brought up the encumbrance issue when the Starfinder Design Team was doing their Q&A during the 24 hour marathon and the consensus opinion was that the rider's weight counted.
The second thing I think is worth mentioning is that moving the mount requires a move action, which seems to make it so even when you gain master control at level 7 you seem to still have to commit your move action to moving the drone eliminating a lot of potential utility. I agree that the whole thing is a jumbled mess that needs clarification but none seems to be forthcoming.
Its worth noting that Owen Stevens homebrewed more complex mounted rules for Starfinder on his blog. But that doesn't solve the issue for, for instance, society. I'm personally not optimistic for anything soon because threads like this one have been coming up for months with apparently even acknowledgment of the issues by anyone with any say on the official rules.
Can you post a link to Owen's homebrew mount rules? Did they happen to say how a character's weight was calculated as bulk?
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I didn't see him mentioning it. But the provided mounts only have an 18 and 20 strength, respectively, so either he's using the multiplier for large quadrupeds or mucking with the bulk rules for riders.
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As someone who plays a mounted mechanic in Society play, let me tell you, it's obnoxious. Core races (the only thing you can play without boons) are all pretty terrible for this concept. Thiccboi Ysoki is 60 pounds when starved and naked, so basic starter gear and a couple of guns will put you over the limit of a combat drone.
It's worth noting that Gnomes and Halflings weigh in at an average of 40 and 30 respectively, giving non Society players (and Society players with the Legacy Race boon) some options. Mine is a bleachling gnome and it's pretty functional so far, nebulous rules notwithstanding.
I would be surprised of Paizo didn't release a new drone topy built specifically for being mounted (medium size with saddle and a mod that works like storage rack but for riders, perhaps?) within the next few moths. I would be utterly shocked if 3rd party devs didn't take a crack at it otherwise.
Honestly, if they release a Mounted drone chassis I hope it's Large so that we can actually use the rules for carrying a passenger with more than just a couple of races.
