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I've been slogging through running the AP for 3 1/2 books now. If it weren't for the incredible hassle of getting it set up for VTT thanks to the terrible pdf compression that splits the images and text randomly, I'd think it was a middle-of-the-road AP. It has some things it is trying to do, and while they don't really work out well, I can see what they were trying to do.
Book 4, however, has really driven home how little the authors and editors seem to know about how the game actually works. Some examples:
The "duel" with Kantir Sursa. A solo, level 9 Vanguard is supposed to take on a full team of PCs. He specifically says its fine to take him on all at once. The fight takes place in a 15' x 15' boxing ring. Sursa's suggested tactics are to use Entropic Charge to trip the strongest-looking opponent, then make full attacks "to maintain his entropic pool" (?). "If he has trouble hitting an opponent, he attempts to trip them." None of this makes sense: he's far too close to charge; tripping when you are the only combatant on your side effectively does nothing, as standing doesn't provoke; Energy (which he has) only gives 1 Entropy once per combat when making a full attack, hardly "maintaining his entropic pool" every round; even with Improved Trip, it is much harder to trip an enemy than it is just to hit them, and they'd just stand up before you could hit them on your next turn. I did the best I could, but this poor chump went down in round 2 after getting two hits in. I just don't know what rules the author thought they were writing toward, but it certainly isn't Starfinder.
The assassination of Severanna Pilos. Setting aside how dumb it is for a skilled assassin to decide to take out their target in a small room with 4(!) witnesses in addition to the target, why use a super rifle for a shot that is, at most, 40'? Elemar, the assassin, doesn't have the exploit to trick attack with a sniper rifle; he'd do a lot more damage with his pistol, and can't even throw a debilitation on with the rifle. His tactics are to "stay mobile to keep an escape route open," but he starts in a small room with no exits, the only escape is to go through the room with his victim and all the PCs.
The driftdead malefactors. To be clear, all of chapters 2 and 3 occur on a space station in the Drift. The author even acknowledges this in the description of where these creatures came from: they died on the station, and rose as driftdead (makes sense, as dying in the Drift is kinda the pre-requisite to become driftdead). Their tactics are to "engage their opponents in melee range, relying on their incorporeality to protect them" which would be great, except driftdead are only incorporeal when they are NOT in the Drift.
I know that as GM I am fully empowered to change things to suit my game, and to adjudicate rules, and all that, but the basic Starfinder rule set isn't that hard to grasp. Anyone who has GMed a few games knows that these tactics make no sense, so why are they presented at all? Is there nobody whose job it is to just, like, read the adventure as if they were going to GM it and point these things out? I know the writers have a lot to do on a short time frame, but it really makes me lose faith in a product line when those creating content for it just don't seem to know how the game works.
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Even if your post is a little bit passive aggressive, I totally agree with you.
The Star/Pathfinder APs are really poorly written from a Game Design point of view.
I'm did AotS for a group of three players (Solarian, Mythic, Soldier) who aren't really into the more compley rules of SF, so we basically run a CRB only game) and they stompt almost every encounter if I dun then by the book. I basically tweak almost every encounter in the AP (most times by adding some "goons" or simply increase the combat area and make it a little more interessting then the "arena" style areas from the AP).
There are so many basic "DM Mistakes" in the APs; from 2x3 square room encounters with "the enemy try to stay at reach" (which even became a "expression for bad design in my group" to "Boss fights with only one BBEG vs. 4-5 players".
Don't get wrong, I really like the APs for their story, development etc. BUT the encounter design is really f**ked up!
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I think this is only because how you interprete the Starfinder setting.
For me it's not Cyberpunk/Shadowrun/Modern Society/Setting, but more a medival/wild west society with Spaceships & Lasers. ;)
But if I remember correct, you have more the "as close to reality/cyberpunk" view for Starfinde; and yes if you approach it from this point of view, it didn't hold up at all ;)
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A medieval/wild west society would never be able to build starships in any large capacity. High technology requires too much coordination and structure to build and maintain.
That's why Starfinder is Science-Fantasy and not Hard-Science-Fiction. ;)
It's more "Treasure Planet" then "The Expanse" - but I kown (from your previous posts) that you have an issue with this and so this is probably not the game/setting for you. ;)
But we are moving away from the topic. :)
I hope that Paizo can build up some better game-design in the future APs, maybe with a dedicated game-designer who works with the writers to build more interessting and more rule-fitting encounters.
An idea would be a more itterative and collaborate approach:
1. Head-Writer set up rough main story for the AP
2. Writers work on the story of the AP, sketch out the encounters
3. Game Designer creates the encounters based on this
4. Map-Art will be ordered
5. Writers adapt their stories to the now completed encounters
The problem: this would be much more expansive and would probably also needs more time. The second COULD be tackled with a more AGILE workflow (similar to computer game production), but this would only increase the costs again, which would lead to more expensive APs...
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I can understand you; and at the same time can also understand Paizo.
Starfinder is/was a new IP, one where they wanted to create a complete galaxy as a sandbox playground from the scratch. This is a monumental task.
Take a look at other Scifi IPs, most of them started very small and only evolved over time. Unfortunately with the goal and the expectations of the fans this is not an possibility.
Every planet, when not every continent on each planet has enough space to build a complete setting from it. Bringing this all together only works if you leave parts unexplained and vague, otherwise you have to write a complete "Encyclopedia Britanica" to cover everything.
And on top of this you have the "level based" system with an exponential economy system on top which you also have to work with.
Keeping this into consideration, I think Paizo did a great job in creating a sandbox framework of a setting where everyone can add his own ideas and expectation into it and at the same time allows people to use official content.
And yes I know Ixal you will disagree with me and elaborate on how bad Paizos worldbuilding is etc. but to that I only say: You don't have to play it and if you think you can, make a better one!
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This discussion again, lol.
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I can't say anything on the topic, still in book 2.
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My issue isn't the story, or the believability of characters motivations, or anything like that. My problem is that an author decided to make a solo enemy who focused on tripping, despite the fact that tripping in Starfinder is only useful if you have allies to take advantage of it, and double down by specifically saying "if he has trouble hitting a character, he tries to trip them," even though even with Improved Trip it is 4 harder to hit with a trip than a regular strike.
Then an editor (I assume) read over the initial draft; a layout person arranged the text, and nowhere in the process did anyone say "tripping in Starfinder doesn't work like that." The same goes for recommending the enemy charge when they start in the same 3x3 box as the rest of the combatants. The same goes for saying that Driftdead rely on their incorporeality for defense, even though they don't have that quality in the Drift. Just basic, simple stuff that a slightly experience GM would pick up on right away. Several different people had to have seen this text, and not one of them seems to know how the game actually works. That is my complaint, that such blatantly incorrect material is released.
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Sometimes monsters or npcs have a synergistic schtick that isn't immediately obviopus for how they're supposed to come together (and sometimes something means that they don't...)
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It would just be nice if, at some point before the book was finished, someone who had run a few games read through it as if they were prepping to run, and flagged the glaringly bad ideas, the 100% incorrect rules interpretations, and the utter nonsense for review. It would only take an hour or two. It's so disheartening to pay for material that the writers and editors just don't care enough about to actually read over.
I just finished Part IV today and basically felt that almost all the encounters were incredibly undertuned to the point I was actually like "damnit, time to run an encounter" when I encountered them.
The Shimreen at the end you run into get cut through like paper. The Driftdead Gremlins I skipped entirely because it seemed counter to the themes of the scene (Don't draw attention to yourself) and seemed to break verisimilitude (you get attacked by SIX security robots the moment that someone dimes you out five minutes later...where were they when the Gremlins showed up?) as well as just slowing down the climax.
The only thing that actually threatened the party was the Shantaks in part 1.