My problem with Technomancy

[gnoams]

So I decided to try a technomancer, haven't tried any of the spellcasting classes for starfinder yet. I'm looking through all the spells and feeling like meh, why even bother, spells are terrible.

Here's my problem. Pretty much every spell is readily replicatable via technology. In a fantasy setting shooting flames out of your hands is cool, but in a futuristic one you can just buy a flamethrower. I could cast illusions, or get a holographic projector. Flight? go buy a jetpack, or some antigrav stabilizers. Detect spells? We got handheld scanners. Life bubble? everyone's wearing a space suit. I could go on. There's just, not much magical about being a technomancer, and to top it off, you get the worst base stats of any class (saves, skills, hp, & sp).

I'm still going to try it and have fun with it. I made an elven technomancer icon who is a DJ (she puts the techno in technomancy).

Tell me what I'm missing. What do you see as the role of a technomancer? What unique things does a technomancer bring to the table?

[Albatoonoe]

Summoning robots from thin air is a big one. And I think the appeal is that, while you can replicate just about anything with technogy, the technomancer doesn't need to. This makes them way more flexible and versatile as they aren't limited by what equipment they have on hand. You need to an explosive? This technomancer just magics one together. This robot is rampaging? Technomancer shuts down it systems.

[Xenocrat]

You can use technology, but not as sustainably and you can't afford it all. Think of your spells known and slots as a huge pool of extra wealth that doesn't cost bulk.

For example, you can use a spell to replace all the armor slots that you'd otherwise need for energy resistance, or to replace a jet pack, or to avoid filling a particular augmentation body slot with something, etc. Knowing Interplanetary Teleport is A LOT cheaper than buying a bunch of those teleportation circlets.

[Toxicsyn]

I highly recommend using spell chips and spell gems. You could pretty much almost replicate a spellbook using your datapad with spell chips for utility spells. This allows you to focus on combat spells for your known spells. (You could also re-flavor the spell chips as program Apps and AbadarCorp as the Google Play App Store).

[Nathan Monson]

There are also a few things (Comprehend Languages and plane shift come to mind) that technology can't readily replicate and there is always the fact that magic, unlike gear is very hard to take away from you; but yeah this is a problem with magic in general in Starfinder.

[Master Han Del of the Web]

According to Arthur C Clarke, this is inevitable.

[Senko]

What annoy's me is a lot of pure "magic" spells have either been moved to the mystic or removed entirely.

[Foeclan]

I think the only spells I used through 5th level (when our campaign was prematurely ended by a pandemic) were Holographic Image, Jolting Surge, and Inject Nanobots. Everything else that looked cool was very situational. I think the problem is going into it thinking it's 'space wizard', when really it's closer to 'space alchemist', or 'space second fiddle to the mechanic who doesn't roll 5 or less on every skill check so he's consistently better at computers'.

[Cyrad]

This criticism intrigues me because my biggest problem with the technmancer is that they actually do very little technomancy. They have no central class features related to interacting with technology aside from a little skill bonus. Most spells are just replications of Pathfinder spells. The most you have are the situational abilities you get from their talent pool.

[Senko]

What I'd like to see is a class based on the wizard/arcanist who regains that versatility of spell swapping. Wrong spells known and your hurting, time to rearrange to get what you need and you're benefiting the party. Even if your limited to the current technomancer list you remove one of the big problems. Which is as you said aside from a few spells everything's situational. Right situation and its cool/useful, rest of the time its a wasted slot.

Even houseruling the technomancer to work like the arcanist would fix it. You can buy/learn all the spells on your list and store them into your spell cache (no mechanical benefit their just in long term archiving). Then with X time you can rearrange your spells known to say swap out flight for life bubble or holographic projection or polymorph or anything you know. Sure you need time but it means you can bring those situational spells to play meaning that your contributing more to the party instead of playing second fiddle a lot of the time because most of your stats are amongst the worst of any class and you duplicate functions with them.

[Xenocrat]

Cyrad wrote:

This criticism intrigues me because my biggest problem with the technmancer is that they actually do very little technomancy. They have no central class features related to interacting with technology aside from a little skill bonus. Most spells are just replications of Pathfinder spells. The most you have are the situational abilities you get from their talent pool.

Post-COM I think there are plenty of spells and magic hacks (surely a core class feature) that allow you to directly interact with technology via magic.

[gnoams]

So what spells do people like to use?

[Senko]

gnoams wrote:

So what spells do people like to use?

I'm a fan of life bubble, holographic projection and polymorph thought the last is largely useless I just like it. Interplanetary teleport could be nice if it weren't for the need to spend resolve at a highly expensive rate. A potential 30 resolve for anywhere in the vast and if you don't have enough you not only fail the spell but use all your resolve. For one teleport.

[gnoams]

While I like the idea of holograms, the gm I'm going to be playing with... well I tried using holo grenades in a few other games he ran and he ignored them every time, like everything automatically saw through them and they had no effect. So I'm thinking holograms will be useless playing with him.

[Senko]

gnoams wrote:

While I like the idea of holograms, the gm I'm going to be playing with... well I tried using holo grenades in a few other games he ran and he ignored them every time, like everything automatically saw through them and they had no effect. So I'm thinking holograms will be useless playing with him.

To each their GM, though I prefer it more for the out of combat options enhancing performances or demonstrating things your talking about. Not something I can often or at lower level but I'm the fan of "create an illusion demonstrating concept X".

[kadance]

I think part of the problem might be that 'tech' in starfinder is one-dimensional. There's no depth to that aspect of the system; it's either a single engineering check or a computers check. Which means there's not a lot for technomancy to do.

[Transbot9]

Technomancers are more swiss-magic knives than glass cannons, and they can be very useful when you have no time to craft/buy all this other stuff. Or running short of funds. With the "Sell/UPB value = 10%" rule it is easy for a party to end up very broke getting appropriate gear for their levels that they don't get as treasure.

[HammerJack]

With optons like Fabricate Tech and Instant Upgrade, the increasing number if tech solutions increases the possible range of technomantic solutions.

I don't see the conflict, here. I see synergy.

[Metaphysician]

Honestly, how many Mystic and Witchwarper spells actually do things that technology can't, either? Its not like you can't even outright cast spells themselves as a non-spellcaster, thanks to spell gems and the spell thrower fusion.