Starfinder's Solarian

[KitKate]

Hi everyone! I'm taking a crack at homebrew/conversion with my own take on a class I always adored from Starfinder, the Solarian!

For anyone here who isn't familiar with Starfinder, the Solarian is a cosmic monk who can wield weapons and armor manifested out of pure light or darkness. They’re a martial class with a variety of powers inspired by gravity, light, heat, and energy, and I’ve done my best to capture the feel of them in Pathfinder’s rules.

Class Features

The Solarian has a few unique abilities that help it to stand out from other martial characters. The standout feature they bring with them is their Solar Manifestation, which lets them wield a weapon, shield, or armor made out of pure energy. The solarian chooses the shape and some of the effects of this equipment, and always has it at hand. This manifestation grows stronger as they level, and has several feat options to further improve it.

The other core feature of the Solarian is their Stellar Mode, which asks them to choose to align themselves with either graviton energies or photon energies, allowing them to draw on unique abilities depending on which mode they are in. Unlike in Starfinder, I moved away from multiple levels of this mode and instead have a simple free choice of which mode you’re in at the start of your turn. With the nature of feats, it felt punishing to expect players to maintain a balance of graviton and photon options. Instead most abilities require you to be in one of these two forms to be used and the balance is represented through changing between modes for the best tool at any moment.

Core Chassis

As a martial character who emphasized focus spells, I looked to both Monk and Champion for how to develop this class. As of right now, they don’t reach legendary in any of their proficiencies, though they do hit master with their weapons, armor, will and fortitude saves. This is currently, hopefully, offset by the boost to skills from sidereal influence, the flashing strikes class feature, and some baked in bonuses to stellar mode and manifestations.

Feat Design

I worked hard to pull every stellar revelation and class feature from Starfinder’s Core Rulebook and give it a home in this first pass. Some of these are based on or spun off existing feats and focus spells. The manifestation feat lines looked to champion divine spirits and the bastion, sentinel, and arcane archer archetypes for ideas on how to improve.

Focus Spells

Focus Spells, or Revelation Spells felt like an immediate solution to how a Solarian would work in their stellar and zenith revelations. In practice, I found myself surprised just how many revelations didn’t need to be a Focus Spell. That said, I still feel Revelation Spells are a key part of the Solarian, such that right now they are a martial who has access to the 3 focus point recovery feat at level 18.

TLDR: This is my first attempt at a homebrew class, a conversion of the Solarian class from Starfinder. I’d love any balance feedback you have, I know there’s a few places I am personally unsure of still.

[Kyrone]

I can't find the link to see the class in the post.

[WatersLethe]

You might be interested in the Starfinder 2e effort being done on discord. People are working on converting Starfinder over as a PF2 add-on. Right now the Solarian hasn't been developed yet.

Here's the work in progress:
Google Drive Link

My conversion concept that contains a rough draft of what the Solarian might look like

[KitKate]

@Kyron

I ABSOLUTELY DID HERE'S THE LINK

That's what I get for handling like 6 posts more or less simultaneously in different places: Solarian 2e Homebrew

@WatersLethe

I'm familiar with the project. Most of those first drafts -are- credited to KitKate afterall.

[WatersLethe]

KitKate wrote:

@Kyron

I ABSOLUTELY DID HERE'S THE LINK

That's what I get for handling like 6 posts more or less simultaneously in different places: Solarian 2e Homebrew

@WatersLethe

I'm familiar with the project. Most of those first drafts -are- credited to KitKate afterall.

Haha I didn't even read your name! Hi KitKate XD

[KitKate]

Hi Waters, hope you're doing well. Let me know what you think of this. :)

[AnimatedPaper]

Reacting as I come across stuff:

-The ability counts, HP, skills, proficiencies, and feats all look perfect. Possibly consider allowing expert perception off the bat, you seem to have the budget for it, but it's not a huge deal either way.
While neither Champions nor Monks gain that, they and fighters are the only martial classes that don't, and all three have a higher effective AC through either Expert Unarmored or Heavy Armor.
-I like Primal as their spell source. Fits them very well, but is entirely different than any other primal class.
-Your choice, but I'd just give all Solarians the shield block feat. Leaving it as part of the Solar Shield option is fine though.
-All solar manifestations except the shield appear at first glance to be undertuned.
-It might be better to just say "you can only enter Stellar Mode during Encounter Mode" to make it easier to adjudicate when you can and cannot use those abilities.
-Also, as written, once you become unattuned, you cannot enter either photon or graviton mode. Since technically "unattuned" is also a mode, your choice once you're unattuned is to either "maintain your current {unattuned} mode or become unattuned." Consider changing the last sentence to: "At the start of each subsequent turn, you choose to either maintain your current mode or switch to a different one. You cannot switch directly from photon to graviton mode, or vise versa."
-Major thumbs up making Zenith abilities focus spells. That's a perfect use of that mechanic for this class.
-I'd make Sidereal Influence a level 1 ability. Do you only gain the benefit of that feature while in the appropriate Stellar Mode, or all the time? I assume all the time.
-No later than level 3, there needs to be an ability to apply appropriate runes and talismans to your stellar mote. It would be fine to make it part of the level 1 ability, but if not level 3 would be a good place to park a class feature that gives that ability.
-Great job with Empowered Manifestation.
-I'm not sure I can correctly evaluate the class feats. At first glance they seem a bit strong, but I could very well be incorrect.

Overall, I really love this homebrew. You took the best parts of the class and made them accessible to Pathfinder 2. I particularly enjoy the translation of Zenith spells, and making Stellar Mode effectively a stance.

...Actually it just now occurred to me as I typed that last sentence that you might be able to just make those stances, and let the various class feats improve those basic stances. I'd have to think more on it, but as it is your current implementation seems fine.

[AnimatedPaper]

After a shower, I had further thoughts:

-Solar Armor: As written, it is really the only one worth taking. If you take my suggestion to allow runes/talismans, you can either skip this one or be sure to specify that you can apply runes to either the mote, or the base armor, but not both. I personally really like the idea of letting the mote take runes, because this could be a way for unarmored characters to take advantage of runes that require a certain armor type.
-Solar Shield: I'm unsure of how this one should scale, though I am sure it should scale somehow. Your Empowered Manifestation ability might be all it needs.
-Instead of moving Expert perception to level 1, you can consider a 5th manifest type: the Augur.
Solar Augur
You are even more attuned to the ebb and flow of the universe than most Solarians. This manifests as either a soft glowing or solidly dark aura that surrounds and trails behind your body as you move, as determined by the appearance of your solar manifestation. A small round shape appears on your forehead.
You gain Incredible initiative as a bonus feat, and the Manifest Augur action.
Manifest Augur <*>
{Solarian}
You manifest your solar augur around and through your body, centering on your forehead. While manifested, you are considered to have Expert proficiency in perception.

And then of course the Empowered version gives you Master Perception. Perhaps legendary can be a level 14 or 16 class feat? I'd also tie Astrological Sense to this manifestation. The level 10 ability can be gaining Guidance, Detect Magic, and Know Direction as primal innate cantrips.

[Perpdepog]

You know, I wish the SF solarian had language to the tune of getting to be in a stellar mode when in encounter mode rather than combat. Then you could use your super cool gravity jumping powers to clear a chasm, and not have to ask your buddy to punch you in the face first.

[WatersLethe]

KitKate, I'm trying to find stuff to constructively criticize but the whole thing just gets me so pumped I just want to play it. I would hazard that it's very playable as is.

[Cellion]

From a read-through, this looks like a great rendition of the solarian in PF2E! I haven't gone and dug deep into the balance of the class against others, but nothing jumped out to me as completely unreasonable at first glance.

I do have some editing/rules mechanics feedback for you though:

Solar Manifestations As written, Manifest Armor permanently increases the item bonus of the armor by 1. Since its not a typed bonus, players could potentially think it stacks with itself (rules as written, I think it actually does, since its an increase rather than a bonus). Obviously not intended, but the language needs to be clear. Additionally, nothing currently stops people from using Manifest Armor, taking the armor off and giving it to an ally, and then using Manifest Armor again on a new set of armor. Same issue with Manifest Flare, Shield and Weapon, in that you can form multiple copies of their associated object simultaneously and hand them off to people. You may want to also define bulk for these manifested items.

Manifest Flare You haven't defined if it's ranged or melee (though you imply it with the range 60') or its Reload time.

Manifest Weapon You haven't defined if it's ranged or melee (though you imply it by not including info needed for a ranged weapon).

Stellar Mode Though its possible I've missed a key bit of wording, it appears that once you've picked a stellar mode at the start of combat, you can only either maintain that mode or become unattuned - you can never switch from one mode to another.

Zenith Spells In the text of this ability, you mention "The full rules (for focus spells) can be found here." but don't include a link or page reference.

Empowered Manifestation When do you get to choose the resistance provided by your solar armor. Once ever? Every time you manifest it?

Flashing Strikes This has the stance trait but doesn't specify an action to start it. Its not clear exactly what this does, as written. I'm not sure if you are granting a special attack that can be used with your solar weapon (similar to monk special unarmed strikes) or if you're adjusting the statistics of the solar weapon. You may want to consider a wording change to "While in this stance decrease the damage die of your solar weapon by one step. Your solar weapon gains the agile trait".

Stellar Rush talks about wreathing yourself in stellar fire, but it no longer deals any fire damage in this version, which makes the flavor odd.

Gravity Anchor Since it lasts until the end of your next turn, it sounds like it should take an action to activate. What action should that be?

Radiation Is written weirdly. What does it mean to take a -1 status penalty to saving throws against sickened? Is that specifically a penalty to the Fort save to recover from sickened? Is it a penalty to saves against effects that would make you sickened? Also you've defined the photon trait as "Actions with this trait require you to be in
photon mode in order to activate them." but you don't need to activate this one. Does that mean it functions regardless of whether you're photon attuned?

Corona Is a stance but you haven't defined the action to enter it.

Crush Probably my only piece of balance feedback, but comparing to other at-will control effects, this should at the very least have the incapacitation trait.

Gravity Surge currently would still use your athletics skill to disarm or trip. Is that what you want?

Quick Block You can gain this right now even if you don't have access to Shield Block. Might benefit from a prerequisite.

Soul Furnace Which poison, disease or curse can you counteract? Only those affecting you? Or those affecting others too? Not clear as written.

Armor Fission As written, you can use this even if your solar armor is not manifested.

Starmetal Shot One, silver and cold iron are not starmetals, so the flavor is a bit odd. Two, the rules wording needs to specify that it affects your solar flare's Strike, ie. "Choose cold iron or silver; the next Strike you make with your solar flare before the end of your turn counts as that material."

Ray of Light Once per round frequency seems unneeded since its already two actions.

Gravity Shield How do you center a 15ft line on yourself? Does this fill squares? Does it protect you too? Not obvious to me.

Ultimate Photon and Ultimate Graviton Shouldn't have the metamagic trait, because it doesn't use the rules for metamagic actions (which have specific mechanics and assume anything with the metamagic trait is an action that you use prior to casting a spell). Should probably also specify for each of these that "photon abilities" means feats or zenith spells with the photon trait, and likewise for graviton.

Sunbolt Needs the attack trait.