Envoy Directive "Get 'Em" Level Scaling (and other misc observations)

[Razavn]

Greetings all,

This is my first post on these forums and I'll freely admit, I'm brand new to the Starfinder/Pathfinder system(s) as a whole. Played some D&D 5E and Shadowrun 5E and been excited to try Starfinder, participating as a part of the 2E playtest. I'm currently playing a fresh Level 1 Envoy just a handful (three) sessions into a campaign.

Overall, I've very much enjoyed the process of character creation. In particular, the sheer versatility and variety in builds that can be made, both at chargen and as characters level up. I've spent a good bit of time in Herolab theory crafting different Envoy, Soldier, Operative, and Solarian builds and had a blast doing so.

From that time spent, I've a few thoughts and observations, namely regarding the Envoy class that I wanted to share. I apologize in advance if anything I point out is a "feature" and not a "bug." As I mentioned, I'm brand new to the SF/PF systems and anything I point out could very well be the desired design.

1. Envoy Directives - Late Game Scaling

Each of the 6 classes involved in the playtest, has some type of "main class feature" (MCF) or "action" that their class heavily revolves around. They are as follows.

Envoy - Directives (Get 'em)
Mystic - Vitality Network & Bonds
Operative - Aim & Exploits
Solarian - Attunement & Solar Weapons
Soldier - Area Fire/Auto Fire & Fighting Style
Witchwarper - Quantum Field & Anchoring

Now, from what I've ready of the playtest rules, I can't really comment on the magical classes, I'm already trying to wrap my head around the "easier" martial classes without adding the complexities of spellcasting and of spells themselves. That being said, just considering the "martials" it seems that the Envoy's starting Directive doesn't really scale well as their level increases. I personally believe this makes the Envoy's main/starting Directive most powerful in the early game, petering out once their relative value decreases later on.

GET 'EM - A single action Directive that debuffs a single enemy target with a -1 circumstance penalty to AC and Reflex saves. In addition, if the Envoy, "Leads by Example" (LBE), nominally by attacking the target, then the Envoy gets a Circumstance damage bonus to their attacks (1 + 1/2 Charisma) and the Envoy's allies get 1/2/3/4/5 depending on the Envoy's level.

As it stands this is currently very useful in what little I've experienced at level one. We don't currently have a way to take advantage of the Reflex save penalty, but the reduction in AC HAS been useful at both landing hits and allowing a few normal hits to be critical. However, while the ally damage scales with level, the debuff does not. Something I feel should change.

At later levels, a -1 AC/Reflex penalty does not scale nearly so well and compared to another class's MCF, that of the Operative's "Aim," seems somewhat lackluster. While Aim solely benefits the Operative, it DOES get a scaling level bonus to both the AC reduction from Cover AND a bonus to the number of Damage Dice. The Solarian and Soldier mainly benefit as their level increases from better Save DCs. Though there are also Class actions that the Solarian gets in particular that gets its damage boosted by increasing level.

I'd like to propose that "Get 'em" gets an increase to the debuff it applies that increases by Envoy level. Not necessarily to the same power that Aim has, but perhaps something more thematic.

Suggested Changes:

Lvl 5 - When choosing a target with "Get 'Em" also attempt to Demoralize the target.
Lvl 10 - The AC/Reflex Circumstance Penalty increases to -2.
Lvl 15 - Once per round if you damage the target with a LBE Strike, you gain the effects of "Got 'Em" (Gain 1/2 Lvl temp HP on a normal hit and Lvl temp HP on a critical hit)
Lvl 20 - The AC/Reflex Circumstance Penalty increases to -3.

I feel this synergizes well with some of the other Class Feats that the Envoy can take (Supressing Insults and Cut 'Em Deep for example), while also maintaining the "role" of the Envoy in buffing allies and debuffing enemies.

As I've not even reached level 2 yet I can't really comment on the other two Directives, but, at first glance, they seem fine...

There's a few other things I've noticed with the Envoy that concern me slightly but I'll withhold judgement for how they'll impact gameplay until I get a bit more experience under my belt. I also have some thoughts for Starting Gear economy, but this may not be the best thread for that.

Anyways, thoughts on if "Get 'Em" needs some type of additional scaling buff? Is the damage buff for allies sufficient? Does it need a bit of extra "oomph?" Should the damage buff be removed and the rest of the debuff improved?

Looking forward to playing more of SF 2nd ED. In the meantime, I should probably stop making characters...it's just so fun.

[HolyFlamingo!]

On scaling: PC and enemy stats actually scale at about the same rate as each other, so a +1 at level 20 is just as valuable as a +1 at level 2.

[Squiggit]

Agree with the above. While improvements are nice, the reason damage abilities tend to scale more than accuracy modifiers is because the latter maintain relative value. HP scales constantly, so damage needs to increase in some proportion in order to just keep up.

Enemy AC also scales, but so does your accuracy, which means that a +1 is still granting you the same accuracy bonus across the whole game.

It's also worth noting the scaling damage isn't usually in the damage's favor. Using the Pathfinder creature building rules as a guideline, Aim quadruples in damage from 1d4 to 4d4 over 17 levels, at the same time monster HP grows 15 times larger.

So if anything rather than 'not scaling', the accuracy values grow more relatively valuable than damage steroids at higher levels.

... The bigger problem with get 'em imo is that since it's a circumstance penalty it gets absorbed and outclassed by off-guard.

[Karmagator]

As stated by the others, the scaling is not really an issue. But I would still say the basic premise is otherwise correct. It should be better and more interesting and get moreso with level, given that that ability is a solid 50-90% of your combat impact.

But as Squiggit said, the AC penalty being circumstance remains far more impactful than the actual numbers. I would add the damage bonus being circumstance as an issue on top of that. Mostly for future-proofing given that such abilities are not common in SF2 yet.

Having a class that is made substantially worse by common choices from teammates is a recipie for disappointment and conflict. Especially a core class.

[Ascalaphus]

From playing Cosmic Birthday I found that Get 'Em worked pretty well (so level 1-4). You're a martial yourself and the Lead By Example damage bonus is quite okay.

Also most of us did go heavy on ranged weapons, so not that much flanking, so not really that much competition for circumstance penalties to AC. And the circumstance penalty to Reflex worked well with the soldier doing area attacks. So I don't think this is such a problem as it might look like on paper.

[Teridax]

Ascalaphus wrote:

Also most of us did go heavy on ranged weapons, so not that much flanking, so not really that much competition for circumstance penalties to AC. And the circumstance penalty to Reflex worked well with the soldier doing area attacks. So I don't think this is such a problem as it might look like on paper.

"X has no issues if you go for a very specific party composition" I don't think is a very solid argument. In practice, when I playtested my Envoy, enemies were off-guard much less frequently than in Pathfinder, but the fact remains that this penalty does become much less valuable the moment off-guard comes more into play, which can happen from skill feats, class feats, or just Pathfinder classes in the case of cross-play. I don't think it's terribly unrealistic for a Soldier to help flank for a Solarian either or the like, so it might be better to implement Get'Em! in such a way that it doesn't dramatically lose value the moment a fairly common condition comes into play. I don't think the ability needs to scale with level or anything, but there are likely other ways of implementing it that avoid this risk.

[Ascalaphus]

Well our party was a mystic (spells, guns: ranged), envoy (guns: ranged), operative (guns: ranged) and soldier (guns and tentacles). So we only had one melee oriented PC in the party, so flanking wasn't going to be all that common.

I don't think this is a really obscure party composition either. There are more ranged-first classes in SF than in PF and the need to have multiple melee PCs to cope with monsters, also didn't feel so strong like it does in PF2.

[Teridax]

Flanking isn't the only way of applying off-guard, far from it: if just one of your party members were an ysoki with Cornered Fury, if your Operative were a Striker or used the Hampering Shot feat, or if your Mystic used the stumble cantrip or wisp ally spell, you would similarly have been able to apply the condition from a distance. These are but a few of many more ways of applying off-guard, including a Solarian critting with a sword, higher-level feats like Dance! or Fish in a Barrel, and a host of different spells. If you're in zero-g, you will also be off-guard.

Even in Starfinder, where flanking is much less common, off-guard therefore remains a common enough condition that there are many new feats available to players just to counter it, and it is a powerful enough condition that if it's not happening often enough, your party will want to invest in the means to trigger it more often, because who wouldn't want a +2 to their attack rolls. All of these effects diminish the Envoy's key contribution to their team, when classes that revolve around a specific ability like this tend to avoid this sort of clash (see the playtest Guardian and Taunt being typed as a circumstance penalty so that it can stack with common conditions like frightened or sickened). Thus, I maintain that you need to specifically avoid applying the off-guard condition for it to not clash with the Envoy, in this particular case by ignoring all of the options that were available to the party composition you listed. The risk is present, and so without even factoring in Pathfinder crossovers, so we might as well start acknowledging it.

[Razavn]

Hmm, it somewhat disappoints me that, if what has been stated is true, that the "hit rate" remains somewhat consistent in PF as the opposition scales at the same rate of the players. That being said...so be it I suppose.

To avoid the -1 Circumstance bonus being outclassed, should it instead be perhaps a "modifier" or an "untyped" malus instead? Meaning it will always apply even on top of other Circumstance/Status/Item bonuses?

[Teridax]

Razavn wrote:

To avoid the -1 Circumstance bonus being outclassed, should it instead be perhaps a "modifier" or an "untyped" malus instead? Meaning it will always apply even on top of other Circumstance/Status/Item bonuses?

An untyped penalty would certainly avoid overlap with other penalties, though 2e generally tries to avoid untyped modifiers in order to avoid 1e's issue of often having to track lots of modifiers at a time. One of the alternatives could be to have the directive instead make the Envoy really good at Aiding other teammates' attack rolls against a specific target, and you'll be pleased to know that Aid's circumstance bonus does scale as the game goes on. Aid typically only affects one ally at a time, but that could be a fair tradeoff as well as a point of decision-making (e.g. "whose attack do I buff this round?"), and something to be at least partially remediated by giving the Envoy an extra reaction to play with when activating the directive.

[Ascalaphus]

Razavn wrote:

Hmm, it somewhat disappoints me that, if what has been stated is true, that the "hit rate" remains somewhat consistent in PF as the opposition scales at the same rate of the players. That being said...so be it I suppose.

So to be a bit more precise about this.

You add your level to hit, and enemies have an AC that's also going up with their level.

So at level 1, putting a -1 on enemy AC is good, and at level 10 it's still good.

Now, the hit rate does not stay exactly the same. Monster numbers tend to go up by 1-1/3rd per level. So in three levels, monster AC will have gone up by about 4.

However, your to-hit also goes up by more than 1 per level; you get weapon upgrades that give a to-hit bonus, you increase your Dexterity/Strength, you become Expert, Master and maybe Legendary at your weapon. And the party gets a couple more ways to buff itself and debuff the enemy. This goes up faster than enemy AC.

So the game is actually a bit easier at high level than at level 1. A Moderate fight at level 1 is pretty hairy. At level 10 it's more casual. To feel like "that was REALLY hard", the GM needs Severe fights more and more, and the party has a better chance of succeeding at Extreme fights.

It might seem a bit weird - shouldn't you let people get used to the game on easy mode at level 1, and ramp up the difficulty at higher levels? Yeah, but how would your character feel like they get more powerful at higher level, if everything they're fighting gets more powerful even faster?

So does that mean a -1 AC isn't so impressive at later level? Not really. It shifts a bit, because more often it's going to turn a hit into a crit, while at low level it was more about turning a miss into a hit.