Archetype Inventor and Innovation

[Waldham]

Hello, I have a question about archetype inventor.

Inventor Dedication gives an innovation but there isn't a one initial armor modification to apply to its innovation,the character must have the Basic Modification feat to obtain an initial armor modificatio, is it right ?

Thanks for your future answer.

[NorrKnekten]

Correct. You gain the innovation but none of its abilities like Explode or Modifications as is mentioned in the dedication.

Inventor Dedication wrote:

You become trained in Crafting and inventor class DC. You gain the Inventor skill feat, even if you don't meet the skill feat's requirements. Choose an innovation. You gain that innovation, though you don't gain any other abilities that modify or use that innovation, such as modifications or Explode.

You can obviously pick some of the related abilities up later trough the Basic Modification and Explosion feats.

[Finoan]

Yes, with just the Dedication feat you get the Innovation, but it is plain (unmodified) - for armor and weapon innovation I'm not sure it will mechanically be any different than any other armor or weapon, though you would probably describe it differently.

You can use Basic Breakthrough and Advanced Breakthrough to get Inventor feats that can apply to your innovation. I'm not seeing any that directly require Explode or Modifications, but there is Variable Core that doesn't actually do much of anything without Explode. There may be others too. Most of the ones that I am finding, such as Explosive Leap will (despite the name) work fine without Explode.

You can get Explode and the initial Modification from the level 6 and level 8 feats from the archetype.

You can't get Overdrive, Reconfigure, or the higher tiers of Modifications from the archetype.

[HammerJack]

Armor is definitely different from normal options without modifications. There isn't other medium armor with the AC of heavy armor.

[Finoan]

Fair. There may be some that are similar, but equally build expensive - not standard armor.

I think Automaton Reinforced Chassis gets there eventually at 10th level. Titan Nagaji armor looks like standard medium armor though. I'm sure I'm missing some others.

[HammerJack]

Automaton Reinforced Chassis is not armor. When it was, it was breastplate stats, just like Titan Nagaji.

I believe Innovation armors are actually the ONLY case of medium armor with a heavy armor AC total. There are equivalent lyrics strong defenses, but nothing that is quite a match mechanically, so it gets the nod for being mechanically different, just not any implication that it is unmatchable.

[Finoan]

HammerJack wrote:

Automaton Reinforced Chassis is not armor.

That's more of a technicality of semantics.

It provides an item bonus to AC and has a DEX penalty.
It is incompatible with wearing other armor.
You can etch armor runes on it.

It is close enough to armor to qualify for a comparison like this.

And at level 10 it provides a +5 AC bonus with a DEX cap of +1. Same as several of the Heavy Armor options.

[HammerJack]

It's a change that's pretty important to some characters, though (looking at the cloth casters and monks in the crowd).