@Claxon
That's one thing the following oculd fixLet solarians add their key ability modifier to ac when only in light armor but cap it like they do with dex
coupled with that and being able to use their solar armor at the same time, they will have the AC to be viable in melee but not outshine the soldier in terms of ac (who will often still edge out ahead of them)
That would be brillaint, it would reduce the MAD nature of the class by letting melee characters basically leave dex at 10 and substitute their charisma instead.
Combined with a feat that lets you get both Solar Weapon and Solar Armor I honestly think would still be very balanced and more thematic than the current bevy of heavy armor solarions.
The obsession with maths and perfectly balanced classes also delivered 4th edition.
That turned out a little differently than the devs expected, despite addressing nearly every issue that folks were complaining about for 3.5
Ehhh there was more to it than that. I could get into a heavy rant about hasbro's attempt at turning D&D into a boardgame while forgetting the reasons the game got popular to begin with (5th ed. is soooo much better because they remembered). About it's aggravating marketing, bear trap OGL, false promises and seeming distaste for its own community.
But neither the time and place for it.
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The obsession with maths and perfectly balanced classes also delivered 4th edition.
That turned out a little differently than the devs expected, despite addressing nearly every issue that folks were complaining about for 3.5
Ehhh there was more to it than that. I could get into a heavy rant about hasbro's attempt at turning D&D into a boardgame while forgetting the reasons the game got popular to begin with (5th ed. is soooo much better because they remembered). About it's aggravating marketing, bear trap OGL, false promises and seeming distaste for its own community.
But neither the time and place for it.
Yeah, I was there for all of it. The way they treated us like we were idiots and hadn’t been having fun because our game sucked was the worst of it.
But ultimately, it was the feel of each class being the same with just a different name attached that really killed it.
If the game had been good, it could have survived those initial faux pas marketing stunts. But it was all balanced numbers and so many uses per day to ensure balance was maintained . There was no soul to,it, just maths.
Which is why I feel HWalsh’s approach is fraught with traps. Maths is just a part of designing a good game.
Which is why I feel HWalsh’s approach is fraught with traps. Maths is just a part of designing a good game.
Especially when part of the math is world building.
They could have said everyone has full jet packs as a cheap technological item (250 credits) and then flight would have been the normal way to get around, I am actually surprised that there are no zero G maneuvering jets like are used in EVA. Just another place where the tech seems to be missing.
Change the price of getting something and you change a number of assumptions. Interpret something or value it differently and you will get widely divergent answers as well.
I've been posting play reports in the Dead Suns forum. One of my players is a Solarian that dipped Blitz Soldier at the start. Several points I can comment on...
I am quite fully in the group of people that plays published material mostly untouched. I modify treasure frequently so that it delivers things people will find useful. I also closely monitor the original values and stick fairly close to wealth by level. That's still pretty much 100% "as published" as far as the rules are concerned. In ye olden days when we played by candlelight with pencils and graph paper, I had a lot more free time and could tailor or even custom-craft a campaign. I don't think the tailors and custom-crafters are the main audience anymore. If they were, I'd be playing with a far younger crowd than I am. But again, that's my experience. I've been told by a store owner that Society play has a slightly younger demographic, but I have no direct experience with that, and even then, it's just one store.
Combats lasting more than three rounds have been a great minority so far for my group. The Solarian is a fighter. He's not a hybrid. He hasn't invested in the control-type options, nor has he had any occasion yet to regret doing so. He hasn't yet regretted having a sub-standard Charisma, as the powers he finds most useful don't have or make use of a DC. The group in general hasn't found much value in "utility" or "control" so far. The general consensus seems to be "reduce the number of targets as quickly as possible" and "focus fire". Cover hasn't been a thing. Either it hasn't been available or easily exploitable, or the excessive movement speeds have made it easily bypassed. I am not at all surprised to see different valuations of the Solarian from groups that are seeing longer combats.
What has the Solarian missed? Lack of usefulness in the skill department. He knew this going in, and wasn't surprised by it. Secondly, he just started noticing the difference in saves near the end of the last module and is regretting his stat allocation a little. I'm expecting him to ask for a revision of sorts before playing the next installment, but who knows.
Can all of that be laid at the feet of the Dead Suns AP? Maybe... I'm not prepared to argue either way really. The group will, at most, be playing one more module before ending their excursion with Starfinder.
The Solarian is not gimped. Its also not bad, terrible, or unplayable. Is it a little lackluster. In our experience, yes. If you want to focus on Charisma and make use of the utility aspects of the class, you will give *something* up, either offensively or defensively. As HWalsh has pointed out, no other class has to suffer that choice. The Mystic has some less-optimal path choices and the Operative can certainly chose a less effective (than Ghost) specialization, but neither will take a hit as significant as the Solarian does. That may very well be intended... and after next month, my group won't care either way.
Oh, and the Solarian player is, for 99% of the time, having great fun as well, in case that matters.
In our experience, yes. If you want to focus on Charisma and make use of the utility aspects of the class, you will give *something* up, either offensively or defensively. As HWalsh has pointed out, no other class has to suffer that choice.
I guess the question of whether it really constitutes "suffering" in any larger sense is highly situational. It depends on what kinds of opponents you face, and whether leveraging control and other DC and Resolve-dependent abilities compensates, which seems to be quite specific. I don't even know that one could lay this at the feet of any particular AP since people run them so differently. (For example, a Solarian could've reshaped the Zero-G combat encounters in Roll For Combat's playthrough of Dead Suns in a way that other groups might never have found relevant, because they just bypassed the Zero-G rules.)
Oh, and the Solarian player is, for 99% of the time, having great fun as well, in case that matters.
I feel like it's what should *mainly* matter, but this doesn't mean the class can't be improved. I'm sure it can be.
It makes a good blaster(photon) or stealth(graviton) character. Yes it needs more revelations, so I'm back to homebrew to look for or create a topic.