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I didn't think this would happen before August, but my group just had its first serious stab at playing SF2. Sometimes a cancelled "normal" session can lead to cool stuff like this. I bashed the whole thing together in less than two hours (including four more characters than were actually played) on Foundry, that was stressful :D. Then running it was positively cathartic XD
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Anyway, the party was:
- Dogmeat, awakened dog, Armor Storm Soldier extraordinaire with his big solar cannon
- This Guy, human, Mystic (and prime target, apparently)
- WIR (= WE), fish man, ranged Fighter
- El Diablo (my GMPC), android, kitbashed Operative and honorary worst shot of the Pact Worlds
Dogmeat had selected Warning Shot as his 1st level feat and wore full plate as a substitute. Given the information I had, we used the "enemies are still suppressed even if they succeed" adjustment (all Soldiers seem to get it now) and the suppressed condition inflicted -10 Speed, not -5. And ofc the "Primary Target is a free, additional roll" thing, very important!
This Guy had a bunch of stuff, but only used bless, vitalize, divine lance, his vitality net work (purely on himself :D) and his laser pistol. No adjustments were made.
WIR was just a Fighter with Point Blank Stance, we needed something basic that the player could throw together quickly. He used a custom martial laser rifle I made: two-handed, d8 fire damage, 15 shots per battery, 80ft range. Basically the aeon dudes' rifle minus the traits, but with 20ft more range. The name puns don't translate perfectly, but we had such gems as "we are going over there", followed by confusion until the rest of us got the joke XD
El Diablo (ED from now on), my kitbashed Operative, used that same laser rifle. I based him purely on info I knew from earlier posts and the preview snippet we saw at Paizocon, so this one was even more "experimental" than the others XD. Proficiencies as listed in the snippet, Running Reload, Aim (one action, + 1d4 precision damage and -1 cover bonus for the enemy you aim at, lasts until the start of your next turn), and Peek (1 action, Strike then Take Cover) as the 1st level feat.
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The opposition was the basic first encounter of FT5, Grex and his two corpse fleet infantry buddies, which I named Bill and John.
My party started stacked behind this console-thing north of the holo-projector. It was a bit wider on our semi-improvised map version that I got off of reddit. About half a square in each direction, so it provided much better cover than probably intended, which I felt played a major role in how this played out. Initiative was very mixed, John went first, then in sequence Dogmeat - WIR - ED - Grex - This Guy and last and definitely least, Bill.
What followed was more of a comedy XD. Dogmeat let off a Warning Shot at the start, suppressing both Bill and John. This dropped their speed to 15 ft, so their reaction-shuffle was literally 5ft. John went to the left pillar and let off a bad shot, Bill - very slowly - shuffling behind. Dogmeat gets off a somewhat disappointing area fire, but still suppresses them and Bill takes some damage. Next, WIR relocates, turns on PBS and gets a decent shot in at Bill (who's not looking so good now). ED runs to the door to the left, Aims at Bill, Peeks and misses horribly (this will be a running theme). This Guy casts Bless. Grex, the damn trooper, tries his best and shuffles forward, ironically faster than his buddies. Takes a shot at the holo-projector and deals 4 damage.
Round two, John gets off a shot with Fusilade, nice. Nat 20, immediately takes This Guy to 1 HP! Dogmeat gets off a much better area fire and nearly nails Bill. WIR flanks to the top-right pillar, gets a 16 damage crit on Bill. Who ofc is at a solid 5 HP. But hey, it worked ^^. ED hits his first and only shot of the entire encounter, dealing like 6 damage. Grex, still a trooper, shuffles forward once and gets enough damage to exactly blow up the holo-projector! And since nobody is within 15 ft of it, it is just a nice light show XD. His first task completed with great gusto, he horribly misses Dogmeat on the second shot, who is the next target he can see. This Guy is chugging that vitalize and I think also used some of his vitality network? Bill is dead.
Round three, John gets some damage into This Guy again and flanks (slowly) to the left to get a better shot. Dogmeat successfully Demoralizes John and John critically succeeds at the area fire save. However! Because of the -1 from frightened, he critically hits him with the Primary Target roll XD. True heaven and hell. John is not looking so good now, either. WIR gets some damage into John, but not enough to kill him. ED misses horribly, the lore has already been established at this point, so it was just funny :D. Grex gets some decent damage into Dogmeat, but far from enough to kill him. The good boy is holding the front! This guy drains some of the sippy cup and then nails John with a revenge-crit from his laser pistol! Bill is still a disappointment and dead.
Now that it is just Grex, the real silliness begins. Since I showed the name tags of the enemies, my players had started joking about how they knew the names. WIR's player came up with Grex wearing a name tag like a super-market employee. The resulting joke - er war 100 Jahre Kassierer bei Aldi - unfortunately doesn't translate. Anyway, this ended with people trying to shoot off letters from the tag. The first one was the "G", so he was now "rex". Given that that is a much more regal name, rex naturally got given the elite template. When the "r" was shot off, the only thing that fit "ex" was - obviously - the weak template. The final and fatal shot took of the "e", making him truly "x".
We all had a lot of fun with this and really liked how it looked like SF2 might play. The second encounter and maybe more will probably be next Friday!
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The only complaint we had was the absurd Reflex save on the corpse fleet infantry. +11 (the extreme value for level 1!) doesn't fit the idea of the enemy, imo. Why is a zombie, military or not, better than a literal air elemental (air scamp) at the same level? In any case it is completely unfair at level 1 in a meta where aoe weapons are supposed to be viable weapons. Changing that to +9 and maybe bumping the AC to 16 to account for their military training would be much more fitting.
Justice for Grex