Focused Feedback: A comprehensive Biohacker review

[Kuzcoburra]

Hey guys, I've hunkered down with the new Biohacker class since the playtest documents dropped and I've been going through line-by-line looking for feedback. New to the Paizo boards, so sorry if a single person's all-in-one thread is faux-pas here. I'll try to keep it neatly formatted so it's not an unreadable wall of text.

So, jumping into it: my direct feedback on the Biohacker.

Core Chassis: 6HP/6SP, 3/4BAB, Good FORT, Poor REF/WILL. Relatively par-for-the-course chassis, but this is the only non-spellcasting class in the game that only has one good saving throw. Biohacker is pseudo-good at Will saves, with Will saves being keyed to the classes' Key Ability score (either INT or WIS) and many Will-boosting bonuses with breakthroughs, but recommend additional ways to access +Reflex saves beyond only Endocrinology restorative. Class does not make effective use of Swift actions and Reactions.

Class features very heavily depend on KAS for utility/availability, not just effectiveness, which will heavily push characters into the “Max your KAS at all cost” levels of SAD-ness that Starfinder worked hard to avoid (and then released the Operative, but that’s another thread). Does not interact with some Starfinder-unique mechanics, like Short Rests, to control the adventuring day.

Skills: 6+INT, mostly INT and WIS class skills. Many class skills to choose from, and most seem suitable to the class at hand. Gaining other class skills (for environmental/social benefits) in other skills is a feat away with skill synergy. INT-Biohackers definitely get much better mileage out of skills: the WIS-bonuses requires the Biohacker to spend half of their intrinsic skill budget on skills that don't provide material mechanical benefits (aside from Medicine for in-combat healing).

Scientific Method: Lets the player choose to be either INT-based or WIS-based.

• • Instinctive: Lets you add WIS to Life Sci, Medicine, and Phys. Sci checks. You already get fewer skill ranks than an INT-based Biohacker, and now you have to spend half of your intrinsic skill ranks on skills without tangible utility (i.e., non-combat, non-environmental, non-social skills) to benefit from this class feature (not saying medicine isn’t useful, but in this context it IS a tax). You effectively have 3+INT skill ranks per level to customize with.
  
• • Studious: Lots of skill ranks, lets you use INT for Will saves, and for Perception – one of the best skills in the game. And Sense Motive. Simply better than a WIS-based Biohacker
  
• • Recommend a change to this and the classes' skills
  
• • Design should be reconsidered: What is the WIS-Biohacker supposed to be good at that the Studios Biohacker isn’t? Because right now, the answer is “Mysticism and Survival” in the entirety of its scope, and the two most common uses of Mysticism were removed from WIS-specific relevant (identification and crafting serums were replaced with other skills) Is it supposed to be “A Studious Biohacker is dependent on the tools he’s learned (Fields of study), and an Intuitive Biohacker is broadly flexible and independent of his fields of study”? Should it affect the injections or the rest of the class?.
  
• • What if each Field of Study had an associated skill, and selecting that associated skill gave you a free rank in that skill each level (can’t go over max). You can replace the keyed ability score of each skill with your KAS for the class. This lowers the skill burden on WIS-biohackers, and provides a real benefit for picking WIS over INT (skill ability substitution, instead of Will ability substitution). Probably needs to be coupled with a lowering of skill ranks to 5+INT or 4+INT.

Custom Scanner: A small tool that functions as a medkit and a chemalyzer.

• • Functionss as a basic medkit and chemalyzer, but never as any other basic piece of equipment (such as a Comm Unit), and doesn't upgrade to also function as other more specialized kits, like and Advanced Medkit. Comparably, the Mechanic's Custom Rig starts off counting as a larger range of tool kits + a comm unit. At 7th level, it upgrades to functioning as a specialty tool kit, and gains the benefits of and can be upgraded as a full-on computer. A comparable upgrade to the custom scanner's ability to function as a medkit to that of an Advanced Medkit when you get an Improved Scanner at 9th level seems appropriate.
  
• • Allows you to make a special skill check as a move action to identify a nearby creature, only requiring you to invest in two skills, not three as normal. However, no class features ever INTERACT with the ability to identify a creature. See suggested Biohacker Theorems.

Improved Scanner/Expert Scanner:

• • Are the range increases on Improved Scanner and Expert Scanner meaningful? Going from 50ft to 80ft as a benefit at level 17 seems really... lame. Especially with no other ways to upgrade it: it’s not a computer so it can’t really do anything with the Range I/II/III upgrades. It currently can’t be used in conjunction with other range-increasing items like weapon scopes, etc.
  
• • Surprisingly no relation to Starship Combat, given that it's based around scanning?
  
• • What if it provided a 'Scanner' bonus to a selection of abilities? A scaling insight bonus, +0 with Custom Scanner, +2 with Improved Scanner, +4 with Expert Scanner. This bonus applies to all checks you make with the custom scanner: knowledge checks to identify creatures (they'll get one more piece of info out of a knowledge check), its current functions as a medkit, other tasks available to an Advanced medkit (and it doesn't stack with the intrinsic bonus that the Adv. Medkit provides, so no double-dipping), any checks you use the Starship's sensors to scan for (i.e., 'Active Sensors' actions in CRB p.301, including perception checks made with the sensors), and Scan actions as the Science Officer. Basically, in addition to upgrading to an Advanced Medkit, it takes the Medkit's +2 bonus and spreads it to other related checks you might take with the Custom Scanner.

Injection Expert: Provides proficiency and other benefits in weapons with the [Injection] Special Property.

• • Currently, there are a suite of Small Arms, Advanced Melee Weapons, Snipers, a Special weapon, and a single level 2 Long Arm with the Injection property. I think upgrades to the Needler Rifle are needed to allow for characters who might want a Longarm-focused character (for the purposes of Weapon Focus, and other such feats). No higher-base-damage weapons exist to support a selfish-ranged playstyle, but I’m sure that will come naturally with time.
  
• • Provides a pseudo-Weapon Focus, that stacks with Weapon Focus (but “Injection” is not a weapon group, so they can't double down across the board and just get Weapon Focus(Injection)). How should this interact with Versatile Focus? Should characters still get a regular Weapon Focus feat, and then Versatile Focus to spread it to “all weapons with which you are proficient”, getting a total of a +4 to attacks with Injection weapons? What if you wanted to be an Advanced Melee Biohacker? Do you need to take Weapon Focus(Small Arms) and then versatile focus to get weapon focus for just your melee weapons, since you’re not proficient with Advanced Melee Weapons? Or should this count as the Weapon Focus feat, preventing the stacking, but relieving a feat tax for non-small arm builds?

  Worth noting – Most Injection weapons target KAC, so it's possible that this doubling on accuracy bounses may be necessary for a ¾ BAB class to reliably participate without relying on Quickdraw.
  

• • No HP/RP damage to endangered allies when firing an injection is very useful for needler/Mk1 Healing Serums since the Nonlethal fusion is IL2 and the Needler Pistol is IL1.

• • Says “by the effects of the drug, poison, medicinal compound, counteragent, restorative, or other substance that was loaded into the injection weapon” - is the expansion of the Injection property beyond what's enumerated in the CRB part of the class feature, or a modification to the property itself to account for expanded game content? This is important if the Biohacker takes the Stable Injection Theorem – allies would not be able to fire Injections from weapons (even those with the injection property) since they don't have this class feature.

  Also, is the expansion of the scope of “injury poison” to “poison” intentional? Can inhaled/ingested/contact poisons now be loaded into injection weapons with this change?

Versatile Specialization: The usual, plus special rules for injection weapons you wouldn’t normally be proficient with.

• • How does this interact with Versatile Specialization? Since V.S. gives you Specialization in all weapons you’re proficient with, do you get +Lv to Injection Longarms, or are you stuck with the + ½ Lv that this feat granted? What if you separately gained proficiency with a weapon, such as spending a feat or a level dip in solder to pick up Weapon Proficiency(Longarms), and then took Versatile Specialization? What Specialization Bonus does a Soldier 3/Biohacker 3 have to Longarms with the Injection property?

Injections: Daily supply of consumables that allies you to buff allies or hamper foes.

• It gets confusion clarifying Injection (the class feature), Injections (one of the consumables granted by the class feature), and Injection (the weapon property). Maybe a sight name tweak is in order.

• “An injection that is not in your possession becomes inert until you pick it up again” - the phrasing of this seems borrowed from the Alchemist from PF. Without the whole “using your own magical aura” thing, though, this phrasing makes no sense. A slight rewording, such as “is treated as inert until it's in your possession again” might make more internal sense.

• When you regain daily uses, all previous injections become inert. Could a Biohacker choose to only regain some daily uses and intentionally leave specific other injections active? Or is this intended to be a soft “24 hour duration” for the injections?

• “You must hit an unwilling creature with a melee attack to inject them with an injection” - is this against EAC or KAC? We're only told that it's considered a consumable basic melee weapon for this attack, and it's presumably against KAC with a STR-based attack since it's not powered, but it's good to be clear.

• How do injections interact with damage reduction? “Whenever damage reduction completely negates the damage from an attack, it also negates most special effects that accompany the attack, [..]” Since the basic injection with a syringe deals no damage, DR1/- would negate the entirety of the injection.

• This is the first class that has multiple limited daily pools (as opposed to interacting with other mechanics like X-per-short rest) as a major class feature (aside from spellcasting, obviously). It’s a comparatively new mechanic to Starfinder, and one they intentionally shied from in the CRB. Its influence on game design should be considered carefully.

• Maybe I’m just too used to PF, but I’m not comfortable with all of these bonuses from injections and related existing items (medicinals, etc.) being untyped. I’d much rather have an analogue to “alchemical bonus” that functions like an “item bonus” in PF 2e. Magic effects have Enhancement bonuses, Divine effects have Divine Bonuses, Trained effects have Insight bonuses, Mental effects have Morale Bonuses. I think equipment-granted effects need a non-stacking bonus type, like “chemical bonus” or “equipment bonus” or something. It, of course, would require retconning a number of small items across several hardcover books (always a strike against it), but I think it’s important for the long-term health of the system.[/list]
Counteragents: 3 Basic effects that you can use to impose on an enemy.

• • -2 penalty to AC is nice and effective throughout the game with linear accuracy.
  
• • I like the design of scaling removal of DR/ER: It’s a nice way to increase the class’ damage (and the party’s damage) in a flavorful way without just adding a pile of stats for no reason.

• • Duration seems short: half MOD (min 1) round REALLY forces the characters to try to hit an 18 in their key ability ASAP. Starfinder was nice in that it encouraged characters to spread out their stats instead of over-specializing in one stat. This design seems to go against that. Especially since it grows so slowly (2 rounds at 18, 3 rounds at 22, 4 rounds at 26, the max duration character can reach).

  Short duration isn’t the problem – it’s the slow, stat-based scaling incentivizing SAD (on top of all the benefits of Scientific Method). Even if it’s changed to INT-1 rounds (min 1) or INT-2 rounds (min 1), it’d be a good bit better. That way it only soft-requires a 14 or 16 in INT to get the benefit of the scaling.

Restorative: 3 Basic effects that you can use to aid yourself or allies

• • The effects are all nice, especially at low levels. It’s a little annoying that none of them scale, especially the skill bonus/speed bonus.
  
• • The action economy of restoratives is concerning: it’s never better than a standard action. If you want to Restorative and attack in the same turn, you’re going to have to full attack and then spend one of those attacks hitting yourself (and hope you hit your own AC, even though this should be easy).
  
• • If the scanner won’t be changed to get a small bonus applicable to Starship combat, then the +2 skill bonus should be rewritten in a way that lets a character use it in combat. Since there’s no “rounds of tactical time” to “turns of starship time” conversion, and the duration isn’t long enough to pre-buff, it’s honestly fair to say “it takes an action to use in starship combat” (making the player miss a round) “but then applies for INT turns of starship combat” (or INT/2, or something). (or WIS as appropriate)
  
• • Should the +Speed be worded in a way that it only applies to non-technological speeds (or some similar restriction)? I don’t see an injection making your Jetpack fly any faster, but if you had cybernetic tank treads for legs from an augmentation, I can see that going faster. Is there a good way to distinguish between the two?

Spark of Ingenuity: Modify the effects of your injections to do additional things at once.
Intuitive Spark of Ingenuity: Flexibly add minor conditions to your counteragents, or remove conditions with your restoratives

• • The 9th level upgrade should be reworded to clarify that the Flat Footed / remove of dazzled, etc., are in addition to the counteragent/restorative’s normal effects, like the others. The lower level clarifies. This might be an additional “in addition to” line for each of them or a “add the following conditions to the list of conditions you can remove with your restoratives”, for example.
  
• • This Spark never improves past 9th level. Adding a bigger list at 15th level (off-target / exhausted, nauseated, etc.) makes it feel better.

Studious Spark of Ingenuity: Combine two injections simultaneously.

• • Is fun and rewards creative combinations to the effect – perfect for the flavor of the ability. Ideas abound!
  
• • This doubles the duration of counteragents (INT rounds instead of INT/2 rounds).
  
• • Progresses in power as your injections progress in power
  
• • Genetic Counteragent + remove ER basic counteragent to bring a creature from “Immunity to X” to “normal damage to X” immediately is a standout-powerful option, even if it’s only 3/day at best.

Resolve Analysis: Regain Resolve as you use Spark of Ingenuity.

• • Seems on-par in power with other abilities, and it’s a fun way to do it.

Superserum: Gain an extra-powerful Serum

• • Another “Use KAS/day” ability. Would not “Once per short rest” help encourage them to be spaced out and still indirectly incorporate the KAS (since Resolve scales off of KAS).
  
• • Since no Injections improve after 13th level, aside from getting your 3rd breakthrough, your Fields of Study feel stagnant. Would it not be better to have FoS-specific Super-Serums?
  
• • In
  p5,col2,para1 wrote:

  “It removes all effects magically altering the target’s memory, even instantaneous effects, and it can restore a memory to perfect clarity”

  , what is “a memory”? All memory? One specific memory? If it’s a specific memory, who chooses? Does the Biohacker choose (And if so, must he choose when he takes the standard action to determine the serum’s effect?)? Does the patient choose? Can the Biohacker deceive a patient into regaining a particular memory (such as by saying “I’ll make you remember your wife” which the patient consents to, but then targeting a traumatic event, such as the wife’s murder)?

****

Biohacker Theorems: Just going to go through these one-by-one in the order they’re presented.
2nd Level Theorems:

• • Aquatic Adaptation: Cool, niche ability. It might be worth a broadening of scope to “Environmental Adaptation”, so that adaptations to High Altitudes, Thin Atmospheres, Heavy Gravity, etc., are possible.
  
• • Field Dressing : Here’s that “Biohackers should probably be able to heal” ability. Is this meant to replace the advancement of the Custom Scanner to an Advanced Medkit as a “healing teammates” options? I feel like that’s a waste of Starfinder’s empowerment of base skills.
  
• • Friendly Aim: Between this and your allies always being flat-footed, and the +1/+2 to attacks with injection weapons, you’re at a total +6/+7 on your accuracy vs. allies. Good stuff! If you’re spending a standard action (or part of a full action) to use a modest, limited-daily ability on an ally, it better have a good chance of hitting!
  
• • Hampering Counteragent : Good for counteragent-focused characters. Reword to “in addition to its normal effects”, since Spark of Creativity can add more than one ‘effect’ to a counteragent.
  
• • Limber Restorative: Good for defensive Biohackers, since this lets you 5FS on difficult terrain. Same wording problem as Hampering Counteragent.
  
• • Painful Injection: Worded poorly, open to a lot of questions:
  
• • o Does the additional damage also apply to attacks with weapons that deal “—“ damage, like the Wraith-sting rifles?
  
• • o The slow-scaling damage based on KAS as problems I’ve outlined above. I feel like this should be an Insight bonus to damage based on level, like a Soldier’s Gear Boost.
  
• • o “Does not stack” needs clarification. Is this meant to be “a creature can only take this extra damage from you once per turn. This is a [pain] effect”? If so, say that. Otherwise, how does this bonus damage possibly “stack” if there’s no other source of damage.
  
• • o I don’t think Biohackers need yet another reason to not full attack with this class. They’re already shoe-horned into attacking once per turn with gimped damage scaling by all the other class features.
  
• • Quick Load: Useful tool, expect to see this a lot. Shame it can’t be used with Spring Attack or Shot on the Run. Should this work with non-Injections that function in Injection property weapons, like poisons?
  
• • Speedy Serum: Seems fine.

• • Strange Anatomy: An excellent choice for a character that wants to get hit. Not a lot of other support for a tankier, frontline Biohacker.
  
• • Toxic Skin: As the racial feature, with a better saving throw. Works well against monsters, but characters expecting to put themselves in danger of getting hit by humanoid enemies still have few tools at their disposal.
  
• • Treat Condition: The condition equivalent of Field Dressing. Useful, especially when improved, but not going to be as appealing to the general player.
  
• • Treatment Master: Good for the uses of the medicine skill. The “you can use this without a medkit” part has a chance of being misleading, given that you probably have your Custom Scanner. Might make people forget about the scanner’s benefit go “I don’t have a medkit, crap” and forgo the bonus. But, given that text is at a premium in these things, it’s probably fair to assume basic competence and not include it.

8th Level Theorems:

• • Arms Expert: Finally, an offensive option for selfish characters. Needs to clarify interaction with Versatile Specialization, though. If you spend the feat, you’ll already have +Lv to damage with everything except [Operative] and Small Arms weapons. While this still helps those, is it just redundant with the feat for other weapons, or should there be a replacement benefit (additional +1/2 Lv, flat +2 damage, etc) – keeping in mind that the class pushes characters to 1 attack/round in most cases.
  
• • Bleeding Injection: Sounds good to me.
  
• • Extend Injection: Seems kind of short to me for the RP cost, but will especially be useful with Counteragents or not wasting standard actions on using a restorative on yourself.
  
• • Far Injection: How does this interact with the sniper weapon property, or Weapon Mods? This + the IL14 Wraith-sting rifle has a range increment of half a mile. Does this need to be future-proofed in case Grenades with the Injection Property ever exist, since this will significantly affect the DCs on those grenades?
  
• • Improved Quick Load: Further improves quick load so it’s not a “need to every turn” thing, and finally allows you to attack yourself with a restorative + attack an enemy with a counter agent on the same turn (but not the same turn you use this class feature, the turn after)
  
• • Improved Treat Condition: Improves it to now be able to treat action-denying conditions. Very useful.
  
• • Protective Restorative: Looks to be very useful for a defensive character, but has a few questions:
  
• • o Does the player have to pick DR/ER upon choosing the feat or when applying the restorative?
  
• • o What kind of DR does it grant? DR/-? Pick one kind of DR (i.e., DR/slashing and bludgeoning to grant it DR vs piercing)?
  
• • Stable Injection: Basically functions as infusion for PF alchemists. But your allies won’t have the Injection Expert or Injections class feature: can they load Injections into weapons with the Injection property, even though Biohacker Injections are not enumerated as something that can be loaded into an Injection Weapon as per the property without that class feature. Injections are also “held in a physical syringe” – can an ally make a melee attack with the syringe without the Injections class feature? Is there any additional action cost/free hands requirement to transferring the injection from the syringe to an injection weapon?
  
• • Tranq Dart: Fort save vs. Asleep or Slow. Enemies might prefer to be treated as a lower CR so that they can just fall asleep and then immediately be woken up by an ally, instead of being slowed for a minute or two. Not that they have a choice, but it’s strange that it’s *better* to be lower CR than higher CR. Maybe “asleep for one round per level and then can be woken up normally”, although I guess that’d technically be “unconscious for one round per level, and then the condition is replaced with asleep”.
  
• • Versatile Injections: This can affect unliving creatures now, but there’s still no way to deal with immunity to poison. Constructs are unliving, crap, immune to poison. Undead are unliving, crap, still immune to poison. Good for making your restorations affect unliving allies, but largely ineffective for helping counteragents land on enemies they couldn’t already affect, since most counteragents with the [unliving] line are also poison effects.

14th level Theorems:

• • Energetic Restorative: Grants your choice of Agile Casting, Shot on the Run, or Spring Attack in addition to Restorative effects. Obviously helps allies, but few of the class features that lubricate the Biohacker’s action economy (like Quick Load) are compatible with this class feature, so a Biohacker can’t Energetic restorative himself and then load up a counteragent to shot on the run with next turn.
  
• • Greater Field Dressing: greatly improves the healing of Field Dressing. Hard to say numbers for balance, but it’s slightly better than an extra Treat Deadly Wounds per day, especially for smaller parties.
  
• • Heart Stopper: A slow save-or-die. It’s not clear how a character can identify the effect to know how do anything about it. How do you go from “looks like Bob’s having another heart attack” to knowing “I can stop this with a casting of Remove Affliction”? DC 15 Medicine check as a free action to just learn what to do? Especially if the injectioan is delivered with a subtle weapon, so nobody knows that there is a foreign substance afflicting the target.
  
• • Liquid Bravery: Retaining control over your own actions, even if you’re still facing penalties, is a powerful effect. Immunity to the shaken condition will prevent a lot of fear stacking.
  
• • Stunning Counteragent: Not the biggest fan of the wording, but it’s clear enough.
  
• • Synaptic Deadening: Adds a useful anti-caster tool to the kit, certainly sounds and feels fun. Fort save is in a weird spot – it’s very useful for targeting a caster’s weak save, but then it synergizes with Im-munology rather than the more flavor-appropriate Neurochemistry. But at this point, the character has 3 Fields of Study so that shouldn’t be a big problem.

Suggested Biohacker Theorems: There are a few things that I think are missing from the repertoire of the Biohacker – mostly interactions with parts of the game you’d EXPECT the Biohacker to interact with, so here’s a couple suggested additions:

• • An ability that modifies a full attack: one of your attacks can be substituted for injecting a restorative already loaded into an injection weapon on yourself (basically replaces an attack on a guaranteed hit, because full attacking yourself is currently the only way to restorative yourself + attack an enemy). Unless specifically loaded in a prepared way in advance, this means it can’t be used to restorative yourself + counteragent an enemy, but it does allow you to restorative + attack for some damage.
  
• • Something that interacts with Identifying Creatures using the Custom Scanner. Kind of like how the Alien Archive Operative Exploit grants a bonus on the Trick Attack skill check against an identified creature. Perhaps improve the duration of a Counteragent by 1 round, increase the benefit of a restorative against identified creatures by +1, spend two uses of your Injection ability to grant all allies in an AoE the benefits of a restorative, but it only functions against that one creature. Obviously not all of those suggestions are 2nd level theorems, but something is needed.
  
• • Something that interacts with Drugs, such as a +insight bonus on saves vs addictions, and a benefit to using drugs more frequently in combat without killing yourself via poison tracks
  
• • Something that interacts with Medicinals (like anaglesiacs or antitoxins), like “infuse a medicinal with one of your daily injections as you apply it to treat it like a medicinal of the same kind with an item level up to your biohacker level”, letting characters’ craft low-level consumables on the cheap but still be able to pull them out for niche uses at CR-level effectiveness. Not OP – can’t be shared/sold, and they already get as strong/stronger abilities from their class. Anything to help players want to invest in consumables and use them.

  Fields of Study: None of these improve past level 13. Between this and no new hacker theorems after 14, class seems light on ‘cool new content’ at high levels.

  Also, that suggestion up above about each specialization having a key skill? I’ve included my guess for each specialization’s key skill in its section.

  Breakthroughs: Breakthroughs in Fields of Study are very uniform. While the effects are different and specialized to their fields, they don’t FEEL that way.
  

• • 6/7 Breakthroughs are defensive buffs, only 1 is an offensive buff
  
• • 3/7 fields of study have the same copy-paste effects, except applying to different descriptors (+4/reroll with +2 upgrading to +6/r w/ +4)
  
• • 2 out of the remaining 4 fields of study are “stop an affliction track before the worst step” applying to different types of afflictions

I’m not saying any of these are weak. They’re all actually really strong. But they don’t make me FEEL different than that other guy playing a Biohacker. Should breakthroughs have an offensive/defensive use like Counteragents/Restoratives? Or should some simply be offensive breakthroughs?

Endocrinology: Use of hormones (stress, fight-or-flight) in combat

• Counteragent: Off-Target is a good offensive debuff, but flavor-wise doesn’t feel like it makes sense here.

• Restorative: Fits well in flavor, a good defensive bonus to have on hand (since reflex is likely your weakest save).

• Breakthrough: Powerful but generic (for this class) buff/reroll vs. fear. Ability to directly relieve action-denying conditions is quite powerful. It’s clearly based on the Fight-or-Flight response, but it’d be nice if the power reflected the “flight” a little bit more. Maybe a movement speed buff, or an immunity to the cowering condition so you can always try to run away? Careful that an asymmetric movement speed buff means that if you take two turns running away it means three turns to get back in the fight.

• Key Skill: Sense Motive – Sense Motive passively interacts with fear effects (like demoralize), and these hormones are regulated by the part of your brain analyzing the world for threats.

Enzymology: Use of enzymes to control reaction rates/metabolisis.

• Counteragent: Good flavor, fair debuff.

• Restorative: Good flavor, parallels well.

• Breakthrough: Notably the only offensive breakthrough. Functions like a super-haste granting a full move action, letting the Biohacker do critical functions like load injections or other move-action heavy things for the class. Scales with the general power of the action economy of the player, so functions well at high levels.

• Key Skill: Physical Science – Thermodynamics all day, baby.

Genetics: Using gene therapy to bolster allies or strip defenses.

• Counteragent : Makes an enemy more vulnerable to an energy type. It’s ability to remove immunity is very notable, especially in conjunction with Spark of Ingenuity + the ER-reducing basic Counter Agent: make an enemy go from Immune to X to 0 protection from X with no save. This will be a go-to choice for the class, and should have its power gated. Note that Biohackers are limited in their ability to take advantage of this with their injection weapons, but as part of a team? Holy Cow.

• Restorative: Power is fine, but it seems out of place. Not being universally useful is a good balance to the comparative power of the counteragent.

• Breakthrough: Interesting, not always useful power but hot damn you’ll be happy if you need it.

• Key Skill: Life Science – Seems like a straight-forward connection to me.

Immunology : Affect a creatures ability to fight off negative effects.

• Counteragent: Exactly what I’d expect. Works well mechanically and flavorfully. Just surprising that Immunology is the go-to choice for a poison-focused character over Toxicology.

• Restorative: Again, exactly what I’d expect. Works well and pairs well.

• Breakthrough: Applicability to disease is flavorfully affected, especially with how nasty diseases can be. Grants immunity to the worst, action-denying parts of a disease. Note: “Ignores the effects” – does this mean that a character still makes saves as normal, and if it were to fail a save, it could progress even to the end state (so a character ignore the effects of Comatose could still progress to Dead?). Is there any intended interaction between this effect lasting 1 week and the number of breakthroughs you can use a day?

• Key Skill: Survival – Seems like a sensible connection to me.

Neurochemistry : Screw with brain-chemicals.

• Counteragent: -2 penalty on Will saves. I get that this fits with the whole ‘mental’ aspect, but mechanically no Biohacker anything ever involves a Will save (still allows it to be used to support other characters, like friendly mages). I think it might be better if this did something with synapses, like a [pain] descriptor off-target condition.

• Restorative: Works well for a defensive effect that should boost the Mind.

• Breakthrough: Another generic boost/reroll effect, except this time the descriptor the bonus affects is so broad that it subsumes every another class ability (e.g., Endocrinology only affects Fear, but fear effects are mind-affecting).

• Key Skill: Culture – you study the brain and its influences on how people function and behave.

Pharmacology: The “drugs help the body” specialization. Players looking at this class for the first time will expect this field of study to be the “I want to play a healer” Field of Study and will be sorely disappointed.

• Counteragent: I can see it – many useful drugs do this – but wasn’t the kind of ability I’d expect from this specialization.

• Restorative: End the bleeding condition. This is so weak on its own. This takes a standard action – the Biohacker has plenty of ways to force the bleeding condition to end with a standard action, even at range (mk1 healing serum, etc). It’s only the only one-and-done Injective. Needs a power boost and to conform to the other similar abilities. Something like “immediately gains +(Biohacker Lv+KAS) Stamina and gains immunity to the bleeding condition”, it’d make a bit more sense and be more appealing.

• Breakthrough : Another “I can see it, it’s mechanically on par with the power level, but this wasn’t what I was expecting from this Field of Study”. Flavor-wise, alleviating pain and nausea are what most medical drugs do. At home, in a hospital, behind the scenes.

• Key Skill: Medicine – now it finally provides the benefit to “I want to heal” that this specialization needs.

Toxicology: “Poisons are cool!” Players who want to create poisons will be attracted to this choice, and find the options related to their concept but not directly applicable

• Counteragent: A save-free, money free, minor poison effect. It’s nice and powerful, but it doesn’t really help you with the poisons you crafted.

• Restorative: A defensive buff! The only real support a melee-Biohacker gets. Except basically every humanoid enemy is going to be in their environmentally sealed armor and immune to the inhaled poison. Tweaking the mechanics of this to be more melee-friendly in practice is needed. A contact poison, granting a penalty on any melee attack after the first until the poison wears off?

• Breakthrough: Given how every other breakthrough is defensive, this is what you’re lead to expect from this. But I’ve taken the Toxicology specialization and I’m no better with my poisons than when I started. Maybe if this was like Genetics and removed an immunity to Poison effects (replacing it with a +2 bonus on saves vs poison), since the class has a way to get around “unliving” things, but not “immune to poison” things. Or if it was like the Bombard Soldier and allowed a 1/short rest actual poison.

• Key Skill: Sleight of Hand – Poison others, avoid poisoning yourselves, hide your poisons and your implements, and so on.

Suggested Fields of Study: I feel the class is lacking in some role-diversifying options. I think increased support for social skills and combat prowess

Pheromone-based Social-skill Field of Study: fits the “Pheromone Seducer” fantasy of Poison Ivy (Batman), Kilgrave (Jessica Jones), or even just a more generic “Calming Diplomat”.

• Possible Counteragent : Increase bonus from aid-another-like actions against the target (covering fire, harrying fire, aid another, etc) by +1 – like how insects use pheromones to coordinate other allies.

• Possible Restorative: Provides an enhancement bonus to mental social skills (duration long enough to be able to reasonably handle negotiations without having to shoot up drugs every couple of rounds). This is an inhaled poison effect – actually makes sense now, because people don't have their environment-sealed armor on and active during social encounters

• Possible Breakthrough : a [charm, compulsion] effect, like Charm Person, upgrading to Dominate Person at high levels. Possibly Suggestion > Charm Person at 7th level > Dominate at 13th level via inhaled poison.

• Key skill: Diplomacy

Disguise-based Social-skill Field of Study: creates a “Social Chameleon”, able to manipulate hormones to alter appearance. Provides non-magical characters a way to effectively disguise themselves without magic or playing a weird race.

• Possible Counteragent: Penalty on perception checks, maybe? Helps disguises with Subtle weapons, helps stealthy play – opens up new doors for Biohackers.

• Possible Restorative: Mitigates the DC increases for disguise checks (for different race, gender, etc), would need to last longer than normal disguises to function effectively.

• Possible Breakthrough: instant disguise, as per Disguise Self but (Ex)? Maybe slightly more powerful?

• Key Skill: Disguise

Chemically-enhanced Super-Soldier: Chemically enhanced super-soldiers are a staple of sci-fi (Captain America, etc.) and aren’t well-supported in the current system. Might be better suited to a drug-based Soldier Fighting Style. But could provide a drug-based analogue to the Exocortex Mechanic. But right now, nothing that the Biohacker does interacts with the benefits of taking Drugs, and few options let a Biohacker be rewarded for playing aggressively instead of supportingly. A specialization that focuses on that seems appropriate.

Sorry if this isn’t as fleshed out with the other two suggested Fields of Study.

Anyway, WOW that was long. But I love Starfinder and enjoy the class and wanted to make this as good as it could be.