|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Has there been any discussion on a playtest of the new starship rules? Just got the GM core and was a little disappointed to see how little content there was about starship combat. It was weird that vehicles were next in the book and that write up felt more like I was hoping to see for starships. Do not get me wrong, I will use the cinematic starship rules, they are good in certain situations but I was hoping for a little more.
I think there is a book coming out early next year with more...but it would be great to playtest starship combat and provide feedback.
Just wondering
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
They (Jenny)said in a GENCON panel there will be a playtest for us (THANK GOD!!).
No timeline yet but I am assuming it will be in the still unannouced Tech book, along with the Teckno and Mechanic for what comes of that. 2026 is my best to shoot for for an official version so playtest by the end of this year maybe I suspect...??
More concerning for me is just a screenshot of the unannounced first real SF II Adventure path, no name or date or much of anything else. And I wonder if it will follow the new Hardcover only AP line that PF II is taking, I'm sure thats coming as well, just not sure when.
For me this might be a good thing, BUT AP Hardcover reviews will be HUGE, as one could just buy module 1, see it it works for you and your group, and if not don't get the rest. Now we are forced to buy the whole 3 parter, so we will see how well this works and if the all in one hardcover gets a lot of the kinks out from what we have had before, for PF II and Starfinder 2nd Ed.
Sorry for the thread hijack but wanted to post what else I'm "worried" about.
Back to the subject, I hope we might get a couple different starship combat systems to try out, doubtfull but that would be the best for the playtest as they can go in so many different directions and only playtesting 1 would be a shame in my humble opinion :)
Tom
|
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
IT has been stated that Paizo will be conducting a playtest regarding tactical starship combat. The rules in the GM Core are meant solely for "cinematic" starship combat.
Stuff not relevant to this thread:More concerning for me is just a screenshot of the unannounced first real SF II Adventure path, no name or date or much of anything else. And I wonder if it will follow the new Hardcover only AP line that PF II is taking, I'm sure thats coming as well, just not sure when.For me this might be a good thing, BUT AP Hardcover reviews will be HUGE, as one could just buy module 1, see it it works for you and your group, and if not don't get the rest. Now we are forced to buy the whole 3 parter, so we will see how well this works and if the all in one hardcover gets a lot of the kinks out from what we have had before, for PF II and Starfinder 2nd Ed.
Sorry for the thread hijack but wanted to post what else I'm "worried" about.
Tom
Tom... as people were pointing out in the actual comments for the AP changes thread:
Sorry if that sounded hostile. I just saw that come up several times in the thread.
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
More concerning for me is just a screenshot of the unannounced first real SF II Adventure path, no name or date or much of anything else. And I wonder if it will follow the new Hardcover only AP line that PF II is taking, I'm sure thats coming as well, just not sure when.
Pathfinder is following Starfinder. Starfinder already went hardcover-only near the end of SF1e.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
The GM Core says tactical rules will be in the forthcoming Tech Core. Either:
1. There will soon be a quick, perhaps abbreviated and/or poorly run playtest.
2. They lied/changed their mind about the playtest and there won't be one and GM Core is telling the truth.
3. GM Core is mistaken and they decided to yank out a huge chunk of Tech Core pages previously plannged for tactical starships and replace them with something else after GM Core was sent to the printer.
I'm betting on no playtest. Having one always seemed like a bad idea: it's inevitably going to make a lot of people mad at the design they chose and they'll have limited time and flexibility to respond to any feedback, so better just to not scare off the preorders.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
The GM Core references subclasses, feats, and weapons that were cut from the final release of Player Core. It definitely went to print much earlier, so it wouldn't surprise me if plans have changed since then.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The GM Core says tactical rules will be in the forthcoming Tech Core. Either:
1. There will soon be a quick, perhaps abbreviated and/or poorly run playtest.
2. They lied/changed their mind about the playtest and there won't be one and GM Core is telling the truth.
3. GM Core is mistaken and they decided to yank out a huge chunk of Tech Core pages previously plannged for tactical starships and replace them with something else after GM Core was sent to the printer.I'm betting on no playtest. Having one always seemed like a bad idea: it's inevitably going to make a lot of people mad at the design they chose and they'll have limited time and flexibility to respond to any feedback, so better just to not scare off the preorders.
Huh. Well ain't that something? I hadn't realized GMC made a promise like that.
Well, I'm gonna continue not buying SF2 books until the tactical rules are released, and I like them.| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Wait, wait, it does? I noticed that happening in the Galaxy Guide, but in the GM Core too?
Yep: Hotshot envoy subclass, Fabricator feat, injection weapons. It's likely just a byproduct of having a very tight, very messy production schedule. I wouldn't be surprised if the authors were wrestling with Player Core's page count up until the very last second, well after its sister books had already gone to the printer.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Wait, wait, it does? I noticed that happening in the Galaxy Guide, but in the GM Core too?Yep: Hotshot envoy subclass, Fabricator feat, injection weapons. It's likely just a byproduct of having a very tight, very messy production schedule. I wouldn't be surprised if the authors were wrestling with Player Core's page count up until the very last second, well after its sister books had already gone to the printer.
Things like a subclass or an entire grouping of weapons seem to me to be a space issue. The SF2e Player Core page count is the same as the PF2e Player Core, so I'm guessing the page count was set from the start of development.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Things like a subclass or an entire grouping of weapons seem to me to be a space issue. The SF2e Player Core page count is the same as the PF2e Player Core, so I'm guessing the page count was set from the start of development.
Yes. That's what I meant by "wrestling with the page count." Getting everything to fit and deciding what had to go was likely very difficult.
|
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Just got the GM core and was a little disappointed to see how little content there was about starship combat. It was weird that vehicles were next in the book and that write-up felt more like I was hoping to see for starships.
I'm still waiting for the GM Core PDF to come out, but I got a chance to page through it at a game store today. The Vehicle section of the SF2e GM Core isn't even remotely close to the size SF1e starship rules, which took 3 books to get to a good place, and combined took up 195 pages. That's not including the 4th book with the narrative rules. So there's a good reason it wasn't in the Player or GM Core; it's going to take up more room than either book could spare.
Meanwhile, the cinematic starship rules may not seem like much, just looking at their page count, but like complex hazards that one stat block can do so many things, it's a really flexible system. I'm looking forward to seeing how far it can be pushed.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
From what little I've seen so far of the cinematic starship rules, I think it's important to try them out before the tactical starship playtest, because I think there is a good chance they could be used together. The cinematic starship rules could be used to set up a mission and its objectives, and any non-combat complications, and then use the tactical rules for just the combat part. In theory, you could have an encounter using cinematic starship rules, tactical starship combat, and be fighting a boarding party with normal combat rules all at the same time.
1: Cinematic starship rules set up the encounter and mission. Do a scan of the system, looking for "something" you must complete this and get out before the star goes supernova or some other time limit. 2 PCs work on the scan. One of the PCs doing the scan may have to decide between helping with the scan and repairing battle damage to keep the ship going.
2: Tactical starship combat deals with the ship getting attacked during the mission. 2 PCs handle this as the pilot and a gunner.
3: Normal combat to deal with a small boarding party or stowaway. 2 PCs deal with this. One of the PCs doing the scan is a healer and may have to choose between helping with scans and healing other PCs.
That's a lot going on, but it's not much more than just a combat with an active hazard going on at the same time. This could work out if the tactical starship rules also use the normal 3 action economy. The only new rules that might be needed here are how the pilot moves the ship and the pilot's initiative order, which might need to be rolled every turn, just for the pilots.
The other part of the full starship rules we are still missing is the ship-building part. One big advantage of doing the Cinematic Starship rules first is that when we do get ship-building rules, they can be developed with both Cinematic and tactical considerations.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm betting on no playtest. Having one always seemed like a bad idea: it's inevitably going to make a lot of people mad at the design they chose and they'll have limited time and flexibility to respond to any feedback, so better just to not scare off the preorders.
Honestly yeah. I'm kind of feeling this from SF in general. I keep looking at problems that went ignored from the core playtest or things that Paizo actively made worse and it's a big of a buzzkill. Might enjoy things more if I hadn't started with the playtest at all... and so many things were missed or trashed I'm not sure there's evidence playtesting has really helped here.
The SF2e Player Core page count is the same as the PF2e Player Core, so I'm guessing the page count was set from the start of development.
Meanwhile GM core is a full 70 pages shorter than its PF counterpart (and 200 pages shorter than SF player core) ... might have been a nice place to re-include some of that cut content. Alas.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I'm betting on no playtest. Having one always seemed like a bad idea: it's inevitably going to make a lot of people mad at the design they chose and they'll have limited time and flexibility to respond to any feedback, so better just to not scare off the preorders.Honestly yeah. I'm kind of feeling this from SF in general. I keep looking at problems that went ignored from the core playtest or things that Paizo actively made worse and it's a big of a buzzkill. Might enjoy things more if I hadn't started with the playtest at all... and so many things were missed or trashed I'm not sure there's evidence playtesting has really helped here.
The SF2e Player Core page count is the same as the PF2e Player Core, so I'm guessing the page count was set from the start of development.Meanwhile GM core is a full 70 pages shorter than its PF counterpart (and 200 pages shorter than SF player core) ... might have been a nice place to re-include some of that cut content. Alas.
I had fun with the playtest, and I'm having fun with SF2e. I didn't take the time to compare the changes and see no reason to. I'm still playing SF1e and playing SF2e at the same time; I have fun with both; I don't even try to compare them, which is why I'm happy playing almost any edition of any game.
As far as character options that didn't make the Player Core, I don't think the GM Core is the right place to add them back in. For anything ancestry-related realted the recently announced ancestry books would be the right place.
I don't think it makes any sense to compare the size of the SF GM Core and Player Core. Comparing the PF2e GM Core and SF2e GM Core makes more sense. I've only briefly paged through the GM Core at a game store, and I'm hoping to download it at 12:01 am tonight. But I'm willing to make a wild guess that the 70 missing pages are the Treasure Trove section of the PF2e GM Core, which takes up 108 pages. Starfinder is not a treasure-finding game, but it does have a ton more high-tech equipment that the players can buy, which way SF1e had an entire book of equipment. I suspect the Tech Core will be that + the 2 tech-related classes.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I'm betting on no playtest. Having one always seemed like a bad idea: it's inevitably going to make a lot of people mad at the design they chose and they'll have limited time and flexibility to respond to any feedback, so better just to not scare off the preorders.Honestly yeah. I'm kind of feeling this from SF in general. I keep looking at problems that went ignored from the core playtest or things that Paizo actively made worse and it's a big of a buzzkill. Might enjoy things more if I hadn't started with the playtest at all... and so many things were missed or trashed I'm not sure there's evidence playtesting has really helped here.
The SF2e Player Core page count is the same as the PF2e Player Core, so I'm guessing the page count was set from the start of development.Meanwhile GM core is a full 70 pages shorter than its PF counterpart (and 200 pages shorter than SF player core) ... might have been a nice place to re-include some of that cut content. Alas.I had fun with the playtest, and I'm having fun with SF2e. I didn't take the time to compare the changes and see no reason to. I'm still playing SF1e and playing SF2e at the same time; I have fun with both; I don't even try to compare them, which is why I'm happy playing almost any edition of any game.
As far as character options that didn't make the Player Core, I don't think the GM Core is the right place to add them back in. For anything ancestry-related the recently announced ancestry books would be the right place.
Also, Paizo is not going to skip the playtest. They have to playtest the Spaceship Combat rules. Otherwise, they run the risk of REPEATING the issues SF1e had regarding the spaceship combat rules.
I think they clearly understand that they'll need player feedback this time if they want to release decent rules.|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Comparing the PF2e GM Core and SF2e GM Core makes more sense. I've only briefly paged through the GM Core at a game store, and I'm hoping to download it at 12:01 am tonight. But I'm willing to make a wild guess that the 70 missing pages are the Treasure Trove section of the PF2e GM Core, which takes up 108 pages. Starfinder is not a treasure-finding game, but it does have a ton more high-tech equipment that the players can buy, which way SF1e had an entire book of equipment. I suspect the Tech Core will be that + the 2 tech-related classes.
I would love to hear where you suspect the 70 pages were trimmed from when your pdf arrives.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I agree, from the start, the Starfinder developers have stated several times that they want to take time to get starship combat right. And from my own experience with starship combat think it's not an easy thing to do
I also agree, I can't see Paizo skipping the play test. I do hope we get some news as to when I might be.
When SF2e was first announced, I started looking at other games with starship combat. Despite half the Starfinder community seeming not to like the Starship combat in the game, I was surprised to see other games talking about how they wish the other game played more like Starfinder's starship combat. I also started playing Star Wars Armada and X-wing, and I still play X-wing.
My big takeaway from all of that is it's not easy to make a good TTRPG space combat that plays like a TTRPG. It's all so hard to make a TTRPG that can tactically compete with X-wing. There's a huge difference between single play vs single player and a team of PCs vs NPCs.
From playing both Armada and X-wing, my big takeaway was, Starfinder might be better off picking a scale of ships to use that makes sense for a party of 4 to 6 PCS to be using for tactical combat. The larger ships in the Armada that don't overlap with the ships in X-wing are like flying cities. Fighting a city-sized ship in a ship built for a crew of 6 isn't a tactical dog fight; it's either like a bomber run or siege warfare. Where that city-sized ship you are attacking is the map, and the PC's ship is a medium-sized pawn base size.
No idea what Pizzo will decide to do in the end wiht tactical starship combat, but RPG-wise for everyone other than the pilot and maybe gunners, I really like what I experienced in Battle for Nova Rush and seen in the cinematic rules for feeling like you are the crew on a starship during a battle in a very TTRPG way.
Regardless of what the tactical starship rules end up as, I'm looking forward to the ship-building rules. Paizo is great at making games with lots of options. I'm hoping to get lots of starship building options that are not just for tactical combat.
|
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Comparing the PF2e GM Core and SF2e GM Core makes more sense. I've only briefly paged through the GM Core at a game store, and I'm hoping to download it at 12:01 am tonight. But I'm willing to make a wild guess that the 70 missing pages are the Treasure Trove section of the PF2e GM Core, which takes up 108 pages. Starfinder is not a treasure-finding game, but it does have a ton more high-tech equipment that the players can buy, which way SF1e had an entire book of equipment. I suspect the Tech Core will be that + the 2 tech-related classes.I would love to hear where you suspect the 70 pages were trimmed from when your pdf arrives.
I can arrange that, but once I read it, I won't be able to make wild guesses anymore. But if I were a betting skittermaner, I'd be willing to bet all 6 arms that the Anachronistic Adventures chapter is shorter than the PF2e Treasure Trove chapter.
|
|
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Got the Starfinder GM Core PDF
Chapter 1 Running the Game
PF 50 pages
SF 50 Pages
Chapter 2 Building the Game
PF 79 pages
SF 85 Pages
Chapter 3
PF 39 pages (Age of Lost Omens)
SF 55 Pages (The Pact Worlds)
Chapter 4 (Subsystems)
PF 35 pages
SF 35 Pages
Chapter 5
PF 107 pages (Treasure Trove + treasure tables) *the missing pages
SF 13 Pages (Anachronistic Adventures)
Index
PF 10 pages
SF 12 Pages
Other than Chapter 5 the Starfinder GM Core has 24 more pages covering the same chapters as the Pathfinder GM Core.
All the treasure in the PF GM Core is usable in Starfdiner; it would just be really old treasure.
The other thing that the SF GM Core has that the PF GM Core doesn't is tariffs.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think it makes any sense to compare the size of the SF GM Core and Player Core.
In terms of content, no, but economically I think you can. It's a bit of a sore spot that the books are identically priced and released only a couple weeks apart when GMC is only a bit over half the size.
Especially given the shrink comes from just cutting the item section, when itemization issues have been a bit of a pain point with the system's release. Understandable, with SF being brand new, but the two paired together don't look or feel great.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Saw this on Reddit about the price difference.
As to the price relative to the Player Core, I'm afraid it's because the Player Core's retail price is heavily subsidized at this point. Our normal pricing matrix would have that 460-page book's appropriate price at over $90, but since it's the main book for the game we wanted to keep the book closer in price to the rest of the rulebooks in the line. So it's not so much a situation of the GM Core being highly priced, but the Player Core being priced much much lower than it "should" be, which admittedly makes for a challenging comparison here.
Orginal comment. Scroll down to find the comment.
For me, the price of books has gotten so high that I'm mostly buying PDFs now. Also, I'm out of bookshelf room. But I do see how, looking at the book side by side, the pricing seems off if you don't know about the Player Core being heavily subsidized.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't think it makes any sense to compare the size of the SF GM Core and Player Core.In terms of content, no, but economically I think you can. It's a bit of a sore spot that the books are identically priced and released only a couple weeks apart when GMC is only a bit over half the size.
Especially given the shrink comes from just cutting the item section, when itemization issues have been a bit of a pain point with the system's release. Understandable, with SF being brand new, but the two paired together don't look or feel great.
This video might also provide some insight, Squiggit.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
With the tariffs and the Dimand bankruptcy, I'm just happy we even have Sf2e.
The video I posted mentioned both of those.
Also, I AGREE.
That video also shows it's not just Paizo having problems. For some of the other games I play, I have to buy things from out of the country, and some places are simply refusing to even ship the the US anymore.
Another video I don't have saved, unfortunately, was about several small manufacturers trying to source all of their parts from the US, and they couldn't do it.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
That video also shows it's not just Paizo having problems. For some of the other games I play, I have to buy things from out of the country, and some places are simply refusing to even ship the the US anymore.
Another video I don't have saved, unfortunately, was about several small manufacturers trying to source all of their parts from the US, and they couldn't do it.
A lot of places are refusing to ship to the USA because, uh, the current tariff thing is so poorly implemented that there isn't actually anywhere or way to, like, pay the new tariff? Or even a way to send the customs information about the package so everyone knows how much it's going to cost? So a bunch of countries' postal services can't actually send stuff without possibly violating USA customs law, which is why they aren't shipping to you guys. It's not a refusal so much as the current administration making it logistically impossible. Here's a citation.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Trying to keep this game related...
This is what happens when a government is run by someone with.
+10 deception
+10 intimidation
-10 diplomacy
-10 economic lore
-10 will save vs big building, faltery, money, or women
Has the confused and controlled condition,
and is easily dazzled and fascinated by posted to the infoshpere.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Trying to keep this game related...
This is what happens when a government is run by someone with.
+10 deception
+10 intimidation
-10 diplomacy
-10 economic lore
-10 will save vs big building, faltery, money, or women
Has the confused and controlled condition,
and is easily dazzled and fascinated by posted to the infoshpere.
Game related, yes, but far afield of the thread.
I'm somewhat concerned that we just won't get tactical starship combat for maybe a really long time.
If people play the system without it long enough, there's no incentive to remake the system that caused so much derision in the previous edition.
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
If you need to vote on what would annoy you more, you likely will be annoyed no matter what.
I'm glad to wait for tactical starship combat. Meanwhile, we have the cinematic starship scenes, which I think a lot of people are writing off without really seeing their potential. People on Reddit were saying there are no starships in the GM Core, but here's a list of ships that have stat blocks, despite that.
RC-HPR is known as a rock hopper
Pale Butcher Scout vessel
Idaran Peregrinasi-style explorer-class starship
Norikama prototype
If you look at just the starship part of the Cinematic Starship Scenes examples, the ship part of the stat block is longer than the stat block of most vehicle stat blocks.
Adventurally, we might get ships with separate stat blocks that can be plugged into a cinematic starship scene stat block.
The ship-building rules keep referencing the Building Creatures rules; the ships have saving throws, resistances, and weaknesses. Ships can take persistent damage, can have more than one pilot. This is all huge news coming from SF1e
Cinematic starship scenes, and ship building are combining complex hazards, victory point system, and the creatures building rules for scaling and balance. There's nothing to playtest here; it's all well-tested subsystems being used. If tactical starship combat uses the same scaling and balance as Cinematic starship scenes and creature building, then most of the math is done. I suspect the tactical and Cinematic rules might even work together. That just leaves ship-building, character options, and moving and maneuvering rules for starships to play test for tactical rules.
You could easily use the Cinematic starship scenes to play the Death Star trench run from Star Wars. I think that Cinematic starship scenes could have covered 70% to 90% of the starship battles I was in in SF1e. My guess is that Cinematic starship scenes start to not work well if the PCs have more than one ship. So I think the playtest for tactical rules started now, by trying to find what you can't do with Cinematic starship scenes.
|
As I've finished writing a cinematic starship scene just now, I'm also looking forward to tactical rules, mainly because I can push some work towards the players then... :P
I think we could get 2026 even if we get the playtest at the end of the year. I think the math they used in CSS is fine, as it uses standard creature rules.
The real challenge would be to make general applicable actions for each starship role that don't use their entirely own rules, which was one problem of SF1 starship combat.
The only role that "progresses" the fight was gunner, after all, for most fights. The rest more or less only had the task to support their gunner and/or disrupt the enemy's, after all.
What I like about CSS is how you can also add victory points into the whole encounter to change the tide of battle, demoralize the enemy, or work towards objectives.
So having rules to build starships for CSS would already be very welcome, especially with different technologies. Especially on the GM side as well, as Azlanti Ships should have some specific traits/rules to show how much more they include magic into their ships, etc.
|
|
The real challenge would be to make general applicable actions for each starship role that don't use their entirely own rules, which was one problem of SF1 starship combat.
The only role that "progresses" the fight was gunner, after all, for most fights. The rest more or less only had the task to support their gunner and/or disrupt the enemy's, after all.
Plenty of characters meaningfully contribute to traditional combat scenarios without causing enemy hp to go do down.
Buffing, debuffing, healing, and battlefield control all contribute to making a fight more likely to be a victory without "progressing" the fight, in the strict sense.Also, the point of "only gunners progressing the fight" is still the case in 3/7 of the CSS examples on the archives. You must defeat an enemy ship to achieve victory, which can only by progressed by gunners.
Scenes where a primary victory condition is not defeat enemy ship(s) are, imo, the ideal usage of the CSS system.
Scenes where destroying one, or especially more than one, enemy ship is required, I think I would prefer something more tactical.