Solar Rampart and Armor Specilization

[Decorpsed]

The Solarian's Armor Expertise explicitly calls out the specialization for light an medium armor.

Solar Rampart talks about gaining proficiency. But does not mention anything about also gaining the Armor Specialization. So you would not get Armor Specialization with heavy armor, even though you can wear it.

Seems like an oversight

[Mangaholic13]

Decorpsed wrote:

The Solarian's Armor Expertise explicitly calls out the specialization for light an medium armor.

Solar Rampart talks about gaining proficiency. But does not mention anything about also gaining the Armor Specialization. So you would not get Armor Specialization with heavy armor, even though you can wear it.

Seems like an oversight

I think the bigger issue is the following:

Armor Expertise let's you use the specializations of Light and Medium armor... yet the Armor Specialization Effects area claims that only Medium and Heavy armors have specialization effects...

[Perpdepog]

Looks like solarian armor specialization was just removed in the latest wave of errata.

[DMurnett]

Yeah that's what Solarian needed. A nerf. To survivability, no less. I know they also got buffed a little but it's still funny to me

[Teridax]

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I'd say it's okay for the Solarian to not have armor specialization. Armor specialization is only rarely given out in 2e, and mainly to classes whose theme specifically involves training with armor. What I find more problematic is for the Solarian, a Strength-based melee class, to not be proficient in heavy armor as a baseline and be feat-taxed for that proficiency with Solar Rampart (and at level 2, so you have a gap level where you're stuck with medium armor). It pushes the class even more to pick Dex as their fourth score when they could so easily have the freedom to pick Charisma or even Intelligence instead, as well as have more AC from the get-go. At this stage I see little reason not to just give heavy armor proficiency to the base Solarian and nix Solar Rampart.

[Perpdepog]

Teridax wrote:

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I'd say it's okay for the Solarian to not have armor specialization. Armor specialization is only rarely given out in 2e, and mainly to classes whose theme specifically involves training with armor. What I find more problematic is for the Solarian, a Strength-based melee class, to not be proficient in heavy armor as a baseline and be feat-taxed for that proficiency with Solar Rampart (and at level 2, so you have a gap level where you're stuck with medium armor). It pushes the class even more to pick Dex as their fourth score when they could so easily have the freedom to pick Charisma or even Intelligence instead, as well as have more AC from the get-go. At this stage I see little reason not to just give heavy armor proficiency to the base Solarian and nix Solar Rampart.

I'm with you there. I'm sure there are tankier, more defensive solarians, and having a--probably graviton-attuned--feat or something that lets you zero in on that aspect, maybe even granting something that looks like armor specialization if you squint, would be cool, but solarian fantasies tend to lean toward being mobile, moving through gunfire to mess up the enemy.

'Course, that could also be a fantasy that was boosted because, by and large, photon was more popular than graviton attunement in SF1E, likely because photon attunement gave you extra damage while graviton gave you a boost to reflex or something.

And needing to take a feat to become proficient with heavy armor for solarians was annoying in SF1E, and that hasn't changed, IMO.

[Serge Slade]

People tend to ignore the fact that heavy armor just isn't a viable option at lvl 1. The cost is well beyond any reasonable starting gear value, and last I checked, has been this way since PF2e originally dropped (and since SF2e is based directly on the PF2e core ruleset, this is just how things are for now). I've had some close calls HP wise wearing medium armor during A Cosmic Birthday, but nothing I wouldn't call unmanageable. Yes, I was dumping actions to use medpatches when the mystic was unable to immediately dump its HP sippy-cup all over me, but that's because I prioritized survival (and therefore the ability to continue to provide damage instead of just falling over dead). Classes aren't designed to operate in a vacuum, they're intended to synergize with each other. For this reason, party that lacks a Mystic is literally doing themselves a disservice. This results in reliance on medpatches, resulting in action economy hits for all involved.

[Teridax]

It's actually worse than PF2e. Pathfinder has splint mail that can be purchased at level 1 (for most of your budget) and can give +6 AC if you have a positive Dex mod, but all heavy armor in the playtest costs at least 200 credits, well over the starting amount you get. Rather than avoid giving the Solarian heavy armor proficiency though, which they'd get to put to use the very next level without needing a class feat (or at level 1 if they find the right loot), I'd advocate for reducing the price of commercial heavy armor, so that it at least matches equivalents in Pathfinder.

I'll also say that no class should be balanced around the existence of a specific other class, and that's just not how 2e works in general. The existence of a Mystic or heal font Cleric should definitely allow a team to play much more aggressively than they normally would and get healed more, but it should not be the bare minimum expected for a class to survive or function properly. As much as I love the Mystic, I also look forward to playing with parties that don't have a Mystic sometimes, and I don't want to tell players that one of them has to go on Mystic duty for this entire adventure, because it's that exact kind of mentality that puts people off of support classes and makes them enjoy games less. The Solarian should have the AC and HP they need to function in melee independently of any healer classes, and if a Mystic gets to save them medpatch actions through single-action heals, all the better.

[Justnobodyfqwl]

While slightly off-topic, I really think heavy armor at level 1 is such a huge pain point. I dislike the play pattern of "I would build the exact same character very differently depending on if we start at Level 1 or Level 3, because it just is not feasible to get heavy armor at Level 1 for the two classes that might want it".

Whenever I try to build a Solarian or especially Soldier, it feels so awkward to realize that the stats that make sense for the medium armor you have to use at level 1 don't fit what makes sense for the class at level 3! (And it's even worse for poor Soldiers, who have so many feats and options available for Demoralizing that just feel soft locked until level 3....)