This is a criticism based on theme and class fantasy not the mechanics, the mechanics given are suggestions.
when I read the biohacker I thought of Ana from Overwatch or Medic from Team Fortress 2, but when I read the flavor text and listen to the developers it feels off from the direction of the class. they are supposed to be mad scientists with Physical Science as a skill but they don't have any abilities that go even near physics and material or energy sciences, they only get abilities relating to biology and other life sciences and medicines.
plus to me reading the class has alot of mechanical abilities that do "math" to other characters but not alot of flavor like "You become immune to toxins" or "Gain Regeneration *blank*" so the class fantasy wise feels a little flat.
To me the problem is while recognizing you can't put exact real science into the class you still tried to fit it to real science instead of letting players really mix and match them like a real MAD scientist would.
The things I liked that work for this class and should stay,
1.Custom Scanner (Could use advanced medkit upgrade, maybe with charges)
2.Injection Expert
3.Scientific Method class feature
4.The Superserum Capstone
In my opinion what this class feels like it should be more like is a mix of Starfinder Mechanic and Pathfinder 2nd edition end of the playtest version Alchemist.
1.Give the class a focus towards Medicine and Life Science instead of Physical Science. Adjust the custom scanner accordingly and give the character a bonus to their Life Science and Medicine checks.
2.Let their injections function like Alchemical tools and let the Biohacker make a selection of Drugs(Counteragents), Toxins(Poisons), and medical serums(restoratives) every day that become inherit if never used and cannot be sold as they are your mad concoctions (Like Infusions from the Alchemist).
3.Fields of study should not be scientific fields, they feel way to limited and give way to little to the class to have real impact. I would suggest making them like the Alchemist research fields with focuses towards certain styles of play.
a.Toxicology: Poisons and debuffing drugs to use on enemies with a variety of effects.
b.Enhancer:Buffing Drugs and a Mutagen-like injections and focuses.
c.Chirurgeon:Healer and restorative focused character.
d."Needle-gunner:Gives many of the Biohacker Theorems for Needle guns.
A character starts with one field of study at level one and as they level up (8th & 16th) they get access to more(for a total of three of four, or more should they be developed down the road).
4.Keep biohacker theorems but make more of them that fit more of a variety of options for the biohacker similar to alchemist discoveries then just ones that add or feel required for certain playstyles from the version of fields of studies I suggested.
If these changes are made I believe the class would feel more consistent with it's fantasy and flexible with options.
I really can't follow what you're saying here. Everything you're saying it should be doing it is doing or doesn't make any sense
2.Let their injections function like Alchemical tools
Starfinder doesn't have alchemical tools. So in what way should it work like alchemical tools?
and let the Biohacker make a selection of Drugs(Counteragents), Toxins(Poisons), and medical serums(restoratives) every day that become inherit if never used and cannot be sold as they are your mad concoctions (Like Infusions from the Alchemist).
This is exactly what they do. If you want to pass it off to a party member there's a theorem for that.
3.Fields of study should not be scientific fields, they feel way to limited and give way to little to the class to have real impact. I would suggest making them like the Alchemist research fields with focuses towards certain styles of play.
This is really disjointed. You're complaining that thematically the mad scientist... shouldn't have scientific fields.
a.Toxicology: Poisons and debuffing drugs to use on enemies with a variety of effects.
b.Enhancer:Buffing Drugs and a Mutagen-like injections and focuses.
c.Chirurgeon:Healer and restorative focused character.
d."Needle-gunner:Gives many of the Biohacker Theorems for Needle guns.
A character starts with one field of study at level one and as they level up (8th & 16th) they get access to more(for a total of three of four, or more should they be developed down the road).
Everything you're describing is an ability of the biohacker one way or another.
Debilitating poisons inculde penalties to AC, damaging pain, penalties to fort saves, vulnerability to the elment of your choice, penalties to will saves, and confusion.
Buffing your ally includes 10 feet of movement, +1 ac, adding gills (it could use a few more options along those lines)
It has a healing touch that heals both HP and staminia as needed, as well as the ability to deliver healing serums across the battlefield.
They have a +1 to hit with needle guns (that goes up as you level), almost full BAB with them, you can get a +3 to shoot your allies, your allies are considered flat footed to your gun, and you can select your ammo as you fire it.
I guess what I was trying to say was the way the class is written wasn’t as well laid out as I would like, so some of it was lost in the reading. And my main concern with the fields of study was that they didn’t feel strong enough to be what they feel like they should do to the Biohacker’s playstyle.
However I still believe the class should have less to do with the physical science skill and more to do with the medicine skill.
Hard to focus on playtesting when your working Peak Month at Amazon doing 50-60 hours a week, 10 hour work day overtime shifts for 5-6 weeks in a row. I am very tired sorry for the confusion I’m just trying to figure out why I feel like the class itself seems off kilter.
Hopefully the final version will make more sense to me.
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It sounds to me that you are saying that your issues with the biohacker are
35% - "Not all biohacker options are created equal"
55% - "I don't like the flavor that has been coupled with the mechanics".
10% - "If the biohacker is basically only going to deal with medicinal/life sciencey things, maybe give them a bonus to that?"
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I don’t think they are too heavily invested in physical science. They have it as a class skill, sure, along with engineering, but the only real time that they meet in flavor is one line where it says you ‘tinker with your injection guns’ to make them shoot farther.
I think it makes sense for them to have physical science and engineering as options, but not focus on them. As I discussed with Dr. Cupi, if you are on the bleeding edge of bio-science, you may need to build your own machines. And microbiologists/biochemists/biophysicists (they are a thing, look them up) need to know about how and why bonds are formed and the properties of matter which is, I would argue, physical science.
Biohackers are, I would argue, the biological cousin of mechanics. Starfinder Mechanics are meant to represent a wide range of physical science based tinkerers. Engineers, cybernetic augmentation designers, physicists, etc. Biohackers are life science specialists, biophysicists, microbiologists, organic chemists. There is a lot of overlap there.
It sounds to me that you are saying that your issues with the biohacker are
35% - "Not all biohacker options are created equal"
55% - "I don't like the flavor that has been coupled with the mechanics".
10% - "If the biohacker is basically only going to deal with medicinal/life sciencey things, maybe give them a bonus to that?"
I think that is definitely the direction I was going for, the flavor they kept referring to didn't 100% match the mechanics. The options did seem to go from must haves to why bothers in their choices pretty heavily.
I think the developers really should focus in a little on what fantasy they are trying to do a bit more.It's great to start with a broad design for the class, but I do hope they focus the fantasy so it feels more in line with the mechanics a bit more.
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I do think there's a little bit of a disconnect between flavor and mechanics. The class as is makes for a cool combat medic or field scientist, but when I hear "biohacker", I think of the sort of scientists you see in Bioshock, or Prey. People working on cutting edge biotechnology, with questionable ethics and a penchant for self-experimentation.
To facilitate these sorts of characters, I think the Biohacker would need more theorems in the vein of Toxic Skin or Strange Anatomy. Options that give bizarre mutations and abilities not available to the average biotech enthusiast.
keep in mind his is just the playtest-those may be just hints of what is to come.
keep in mind his is just the playtest-those may be just hints of what is to come.
Of course, and I'm confident that that will be the case. Still, I think it's good to let the devs know the kind of things we're hoping to see.
keep in mind his is just the playtest-those may be just hints of what is to come....or they're using the playtest to find out what people are missing, so they know what they should be adding to the final product.
It's probably a bit of both. I seriously doubt the classes as they're written now would be what goes to print in the final release even without a playtest. That being said, this playtest comes at a critical point before finalizing the classes into what they will be when the official release comes.