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Normally GMs are allowed to pick any boons on the chronicle sheet (except for faction specific boons for which they are not a member of that faction). Can a GM select both boons on this chronicle sheet as normal or is this an exception.
I thought I had read something about choice boons like this the GM having to choose but I can't find it now.
Additionally, if the boon which has a negative consequence spelled out in the scenario is taken does a GM take on that negative consequence.
Venture-Captain, Texas—Austin
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Another question about the Bone Sages Respect.
It notes that your Racial adjustment should be +2 CON, -2 CHA, -2 WIS.
In pact worlds the racial adjustment for the Borais is +2 CON, +2 CHA, -2 WIS.
Is this boon meant to be a significantly weaker version of the race, or is that just a typo?
Starfinder Society Developer
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Another question about the Bone Sages Respect.
It notes that your Racial adjustment should be +2 CON, -2 CHA, -2 WIS.
In pact worlds the racial adjustment for the Borais is +2 CON, +2 CHA, -2 WIS.
Is this boon meant to be a significantly weaker version of the race, or is that just a typo?
Typo, apologies for that sneaking in, but it should match the Pact Worlds version.
Venture-Agent, Georgia—Atlanta
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Typo, apologies for that sneaking in, but it should match the Pact Worlds version.Another question about the Bone Sages Respect.
It notes that your Racial adjustment should be +2 CON, -2 CHA, -2 WIS.
In pact worlds the racial adjustment for the Borais is +2 CON, +2 CHA, -2 WIS.
Is this boon meant to be a significantly weaker version of the race, or is that just a typo?
Thanks for the Quick response, Thursty!
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The way I'm reading this, there are 3 potential outcomes; Mutual Accord w/ successful Diplomacy check (Sarcesian Admittance boon), helping the Eoxians by tricking the Sarcesians w/ successful Bluff check (Bone Sages Respect boon, +1 infamy), or any other outcome in-between which results in neither boon.
Is that correct?
To echo Shaudius's query, can a GM choose both or must we choose only one or the other? If choosing the Bone Sages Respect boon, must the GM's PC take the infamy?
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I liked most of the scenario and i know they wanted to add some more maps that favored snipers...
but sweet polyhedral gods that shooting alley was a SLOG. 3 or four rounds would have been more than enough for a sniper to show off their skills at a full on sprint its what... 6..7 ? rounds to get into reasonable rifle distance.
Venture-Agent, Illinois—Chicago
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Speaking of snipers, they have tactical Diasporan rifle and in their gear it says that those weapons have "tactical Diasporan rifle(AA) with
1 battery (20 charges)", but the Alien Archives the (AA) this weapon has 10 charges max. Was the rifle errata somewhere? which is right?
My interpretation of how it works is that, because the smallest battery in the game has 20 charges, the rifle would need to be "reloaded" with the same battery after ten shots, like taking it out and flipping it around or something. That's how I ran it when I GM'd it, but it might not be accurate.
Relatedly, the only remotely-ranged person in our party was our technomancer with longarm proficiency, but he had an incredibly creative solution: cast a thin holographic image in front of and above the group that looked like a picture of empty scenery, and have everyone move with it. The snipers kept failing their Will saves, which meant that they once they started that, they got through it without too much trouble.
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Yeah, the distance rules for perception are non-existent. I just went with it and let them see the snipers.
Another wonky thing, the scenario says that Mengian uses his inspiring boost on his allies, but as baddies they don't have any SP?
Good point on the SP, but since monster don't follow the same rules as PC I'll just heal their HP by the amount they would get on stamina
As per the perception, it does say it is up to the GM to determine what the PC can and ca't see. I decided that on round 1 they get a -30 to perception to pinpoint the sniper (but know the general direction), then -20 and -10, so if nothing else by round 3 they should be able to pinpoint the snipers. Got to keep in mind that they start 780 feet away from each other more or less
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Ran this a bunch at GenCon. Each canyon fight was different. Some groups did better than others (smoke grenades FTW!).
During the negotiations each and every table asked “What’s in it for us?” There’s nothing in there regarding how to handle this question. I told the players the sarcesians would alert the Society first if the Bone Sages break their pact.
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My table made good use of cover, run action, falling prone, harrying fire, and covering fire. Also the Vesk soldier got a nat 20 on his first shot from range which gave them confidence that they could hit them. Plus the fingers offer good protection as well. It was the longest combat I ever ran, but we kept it fast paced and exciting and the cheer when they downed the last sniper was heard across the Sag Im sure!
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Venture-Agent, Australia—QLD—Brisbane
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First off, loved the canyon fight - it's cool to see some different stuff!
However, I had a few of questions about how Mengian's inspiring boost should work...as someone else pointed out, the NPCs don't have Stamina Points, so instead, I restored Hit Points. But Inspiring Boost's effect is based on level, and NPC's don't have a level, or even Hit Dice any more...how should this or other NPC abilities be determined? By CR? Something else?
In my case, I reverse-engineered from his damage output, and his other improvisation, that he had to be at least level 4, and that also matched his CR.
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And stays at the end of the canyon hiding and doing nothing? Or you run all the way through the alley then drop it?
The PC hides in the smoke.
Ally shoots it, then you run to it. Or move and drop it on yourself.
It takes several, but you create islands of smoke where you and your allies can hide as you move up the corridor. A single grenade is going to be marginally useful.
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Venture-Agent, Australia—QLD—Brisbane
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I do not have access to it at the moment and will try to check later, but the Alien Archive covers class templates and should have the answer. Should.
You were correct, sir, the answers are provided in the Class Graft section of Alien Archive, and indeed use CR for character level. Thanks for the pointer.
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Venture-Agent, Australia—QLD—Brisbane
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And stays at the end of the canyon hiding and doing nothing? Or you run all the way through the alley then drop it?
The PC hides in the smoke.
If you read the abstraction details, you'll also note that characters can also totally break line of sight with the pillars section of the canyon. So, realistically, the characters only need to be visible for about the first and last third of the run.
In the group I ran through this, it also helped that the 'tank' Soldier, at high tier, had fire resistance, and was firing his plasma cannon as he slowly walked along the length of the canyon. The combat went for 12 rounds, meaning that the tank AND the deadeye both had to reload. And even with the booby trap going off, nobody in the player group fell down.
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If you read the abstraction details, you'll also note that characters can also totally break line of sight with the pillars section of the canyon. So, realistically, the characters only need to be visible for about the first and last third of the run.
At a quick count that would be 18 smoke bombs. Running from smoke bomb to smoke bomb wouldn't be helpful , they'd just ready an action to shoot you when you popped out in between them.
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Venture-Agent, Australia—QLD—Brisbane
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The encounter proper doesn't start until you hit the ruins. Ruins to the pillars is about 180'. Even at a 20' move rate, you could sprint that in 2 rounds, so you need one round in the open, which could be covered by a single smoke grenade, thrown by an ally. You could then stay completely out of LoS for the next 150' (by hugging the pillars), which is about 2 rounds at slow speed.
The longest open space is up the slope, which is about 300'. A 30' move character can sprint this in 3 rounds. Even with only double moves, you can do it in 5 rounds.
Also...one of my players DID stay in his start spot, hiding among the ruins, firing his own sniper rifle back at the bad guys. So, this is totally a legitimate option.
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The encounter proper doesn't start until you hit the ruins. Ruins to the pillars is about 180'. Even at a 20' move rate, you could sprint that in 2 rounds, so you need one round in the open, which could be covered by a single smoke grenade
That math does not work. At all. A smoke grenade covers an ill defined area, but even the vehicle mounted version is only 20 by 20. It does not cover "a round" of running when that round is 120 feet.
Even at a 20' move rate, you could sprint that (180 feet) in 2 rounds
A run is times four. So on round 1 you move 80, round 2 160, so thats three round of running and taking damage for the first third.
People can argue that they needed a map to give snipers a chance to show of but the advice to use smoke grenades to cover your run up either requires some interesting interpretation as to their area or just not reading the scale of the map.
Have a sniper weapon or run for 7 rounds really doesn't provide a lot of agency or player choice. Which is to say playing the game.
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Ill-defined? They make a 20 ft radius cloud of smoke that lasts 1 minute.
That's enough to fill one 30x30 square with cover if you're strict, two with available cover if you're generous.
It's like you don't want the players to be creative.
Just because the squares are 30x30 doesn't mean a PC suddenly became a 30 ft cube.
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Ill-defined? They make a 20 ft radius cloud of smoke that lasts 1 minute.
AHHH its in the chart. I was looking in the description. That was driving me nuts.
It's like you don't want the players to be creative.
The bad guys aren't idiots. If there's a smoke cloud at point A, Cover at point D and you're standing at point Z you ready an action for when they get to B or C and shoot them.
I love players to be able to get creative. I love players having options. But 7 rounds of running into range is the only option here for non snipers.
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One note on that: You can't ready an action to shoot at point B or C; you need to pick one.
Now, that doesn't mean nobody ever gets shot at, but it also doesn't mean that Smoke Grenades don't provide some benefit. And, no, not every group is going to have even 1 smoke grenade.
But if you do have a smoke grenade, you can choose who gets shot at as you break cover (or try to). "Everyone in cover? Good. Tanky McTankster, break cover and run."
You need maybe 6 smoke grenades and one grenade launcher to make it really easy, but not everyone's going to have that in the collective inventory.
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One note on that: You can't ready an action to shoot at point B or C; you need to pick one.
You do not. You move action aim you standard action ready to shoot the first person you see. Field of vision is a thing but I don't think its likely to matter at those distances.
Now, that doesn't mean nobody ever gets shot at, but it also doesn't mean that Smoke Grenades don't provide some benefit. And, no, not every group is going to have even 1 smoke grenade.
Its really not about people getting shot at, its about the players having what I consider an unreasonable number of rounds of getting shot at with no means to retaliate or fight back. This is a level 1-4 scenatio. Having a ranged weapon just in case is almost mandatory from 1. Just having a spare sniper rifle lying around is not.
But if you do have a smoke grenade, you can choose who gets shot at as you break cover (or try to). "Everyone in cover? Good. Tanky McTankster, break cover and run."
You can kind of do that anyway. (they shoot at the person in the front )
You need maybe 6 smoke grenades and one grenade launcher to make it really easy, but not everyone's going to have that in the collective inventory.
You need a LOT more than 6 to prevent so much as a single shot against your party. I have shown why this is the case repeatedly. Insisting that it is the case despite the evidence to the contrary is not discussing in good faith.
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It was a particularly terrifying slog when I played it. We didn't even consider smoke grenades or using anything other than the natural cover that the map provided us. So, yes, it can be a rough experience if the PCs are not equipped for it, and I don't recall any forewarning beyond "laser marks on the wall" to make us prepared for running down a sniper alley.
However, I would pose that entering a discussion having determined that there is no way to mitigate or moderate the challenge and countering any suggestion to the otherwise with "I already said that won't work" is not discussing in good faith.
At Tier 1-2 there are, at a minimum: barricade, smoke grenades, grenade launchers, holographic image, summon monster I.
A Tier 3-4, you have: fog cloud, invisibility, mirror image, summon monster II, force shields, and who knows what other equipment.
I don't want to see sniper alleys appearing with any frequency in scenarios, but this was a scenario where the enemies were using their traditional weapons in a traditional tactic in a place you would expect to find them.
I have a rebuttal on the readying an action with a sniper weapon, but that goes into the weeds and reasonable people can disagree with the interpretation of the rules.
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If the radius is 20 feet you can cover 40 feet of your move with 1. So you need 3 to cover your run of 120 feet. So I'm not sure where you're getting more than 6 BNW.
You can do better than that: Create a wall of smoke at maximum grenade launcher range then move behind those smoke clouds. -2 to hit per range increment to hit an AC 5, and if you miss, it'll still have a useful effect for the purpose of conceal an approach. Move into those clouds and then fire another wall.
Also where in the rules does it say how to adjudicate something if the square measurement is other than 5 feet.
I would use zoom maps: 6 x 6 squares to represent what's going on within the big square.
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Starfinder Society Developer
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Have a sniper weapon or run for 7 rounds really doesn't provide a lot of agency or player choice. Which is to say playing the game.
I want to step in and address this particular concern.
One of the things we knew early on about Starfinder was that it was going to be a different type of game from Pathfinder. An emphasis on guns and ranged weapons makes the game different. Snipers were something I wanted to explore early on, and it's a difficult element to explore using Organized Play rules, especially where we typically use maps that can barely allow weapons to fire over one range increment, let alone take advantage of sniping weapons. This encounter was entirely intended to address a "player choice" concern, which is that players who wanted to build a sniper character never really had a good moment to shine and take advantage of their weapon choice. From all the feedback I received about this scenario from live convention games, the PCs who did have snipers felt rewarded in a way they'd never been rewarded in the campaign thus far.
Does this mean we're going to keep including sniper encounters all the time? No, certainly not. This was just a very basic approach that gave snipers a really cool method of getting involved. It wasn't quite as ideal for characters with more close-range options, but that was also intentional. I want players to recognize that the basic flip-map distances aren't always going to be the size for encounters. I want people to consider including some longer range options or means of protection/healing while under long-range fire in order to close the gap.
On my end, I'll see what I can do for future encounters like this to provide some further options for PCs without long-range options to better contribute. That being said, it might be a good idea for PCs who felt useless in this encounter to look at ways they could change their characters to be prepared for encounters like this in the future—after all, that's what being a Starfinder is all about! I mean, look at how Pathfinder taught us to be ready for swarms... ;)
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Regional Venture-Coordinator, Central Europe
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Have a sniper weapon or run for 7 rounds really doesn't provide a lot of agency or player choice. Which is to say playing the game.I want to step in and address this particular concern.
One of the things we knew early on about Starfinder was that it was going to be a different type of game from Pathfinder. An emphasis on guns and ranged weapons makes the game different. Snipers were something I wanted to explore early on, and it's a difficult element to explore using Organized Play rules, especially where we typically use maps that can barely allow weapons to fire over one range increment, let alone take advantage of sniping weapons. This encounter was entirely intended to address a "player choice" concern, which is that players who wanted to build a sniper character never really had a good moment to shine and take advantage of their weapon choice. From all the feedback I received about this scenario from live convention games, the PCs who did have snipers felt rewarded in a way they'd never been rewarded in the campaign thus far.
Does this mean we're going to keep including sniper encounters all the time? No, certainly not. This was just a very basic approach that gave snipers a really cool method of getting involved. It wasn't quite as ideal for characters with more close-range options, but that was also intentional. I want players to recognize that the basic flip-map distances aren't always going to be the size for encounters. I want people to consider including some longer range options or means of protection/healing while under long-range fire in order to close the gap.
On my end, I'll see what I can do for future encounters like this to provide some further options for PCs without long-range options to better contribute. That being said, it might be a good idea for PCs who felt useless in this encounter to look at ways they could change their characters to be prepared for encounters like this in the future—after all, that's what being a Starfinder is all about!...
I just GMed this yesterday and the players really liked that encounter. They appreciated that range increments mattered for once.
Personally i love encounters that force players to think a bit outside of the box.
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My players reacted in various ways. The technomancer took cover in the ruins and started scanning for enemy snipers. When he found them, there was a little "yes!", and he happily started counterfire against them with a sniper rifle of his own, with very few hits at the beginning. The blitz dwarf took one look at his called starknife, grunted, and began running towards opposite canyon, trusting his armor. The others pretty much went "hey the dwarf is running, let's follow". The bombardier and the mystic took a detour at the bodies, triggering the mines. The wrestler faithfully followed the dwarf's every step. The sharpshooter got tired of running in the middle of the canyon and started using his artillery laser.
The snipers scored various hits on various characters but couldn't drop the dwarf, who eventually got to throwing range with the starknife. At that point, everyone's dice turned. The dwarf got critted and hit, both snipers were struck, and in the next round they were dropped by a sniper crit and combined damage from the artillery laser and other weapons.
A couple of players were ambivalent toward the encounter. A couple of them liked the chance to shine. I don't think anyone disliked it. The bombardier soldier is getting infamous for attracting traps and explosions (mostly his own), though.
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Venture-Agent, Netherlands—Utrecht
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Quick report from me:
I'm relatively new to Starfinder. I have a level 2 Envoy with 3 scenarios below his belt. Made more for support than actual damage. There were 6 players, two of whom were brand new level 1s. The others were level 3 or 4, and we needed them for the sniper fight. Only two of our characters were proficient with snipers, but none of them carried one. It was an absolute slog to get to the top of that thing. Two Technomancers quickly realised they were useless as they only had close-combat magic, I had no options at all (apart from a 30 ft pistol and a DEX of 12). One character fell prone on turn one and decided to pray for nat 20s while he full attacked every turn (he did, twice, during 10 rounds of combat). We were lucky we had the level 3s with us, as they managed to tank most of the shorts while we sprinted out in the open.
In the end, we managed to defeat them, but it was an absolute slog. Two of us effectively did absolutely nothing, two just drew fire away from the rest, and two did actual damage. None of us were really happy with the combat, including the GM.
I appreciate the fact that you want a different kind of combats and emphasise different aspects, but I think it could've been done in a better way. The problem with sniper battles is that they pull in two different directions. On the first hand, you want to make snipers feel useful and relevant, but on the other hand, it makes getting to them a pain. We literally had no agency in the fight. There were no interesting choices to make. It was just a matter of surviving. I don't mean to come across as if I know better than professional scenario writers, but one way to potentially improve this fight is if the player could take advantage of the terrain, rather than just running in an open field. Make an obstacle course where you have to dash from cover to cover, rather than being in the open for multiple rounds on end. Or have a fight in a semi-open environment, where positioning actually mattered. Say there were a few melee people waiting for us at the start of that combat, while a sniper keeps firing at the party at, say, 200 feet away. Those melee dudes are just there to prevent the party from getting to the snipers. Now the party has to make an interesting choice: how do we take care of this fight? People have to strategically move around the map, shielding themselves from sniper fire while being harassed by those melee guys. Does the party take care of the melees first, or try to get the sniper fist (either through sniping back, or running past the melee grunts). The fight wouldn't have lasted 10 rounds or so, but still get the message across equally well.
All that said, I don't think it's a bad fight. I just think it could have been improved a lot.