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I saw some Star Finder 2nd edition (playtest edition) at my local HobbyTown store today.

What is the game like?

It clearly seems to be D&D set in space, but still has cat people and magicians.  That sort of thing is a turn off to me.  I would rather have a much more sci-fi game.

I did like that there were six classes, one that uses each of the six stats as the primary attribute.

The Strength based class, the Solarian, aka the Solar Knight seems to be a Jedi Knight analog, but I didn't get a lot of time to look at the abilities to see how close or far.

I want to know more about it.

I started a campaign of 1st edition Starfinder a few years ago, but it died quickly.

It's Pathfinder in space, so either you're going to like that or not. It's been a long time, but I remember thinking the classes were good but the races and general setting lore were lame. We homebrewed a whole new setting for it. The Solarian (which I assume was the previous version of the Solar Knight) was clearly intended to be a Sam's Choice brand Jedi.

There are two things I remember distinctly liking about it. 1) it had separate Stamina and Health, so your stamina would increase with levels, but your Health really didn't. I like that. 2) it divided up equipment by recommended level. Higher level items are more powerful versions of lower level ones. Technically any level character can use any item, but they price low level characters out of the better gear. I thought was a good system for a sci fi version of D&D, where you need gear progression, but you want to be handing out enchanted machine guns all the time.

I played a little bit. Mechanically I thought it was okay. The best explanation I have for it is that Starfinder is the link between PF1 and PF2, the same way that Star Wars: Saga Edition was the link between D&D3 and D&D4.

I don't like that it has the same level 3 power spike that most of the PF1 classes have, only it codifies it into the system more rigidly, and continues the general trend of "you suck until 3rd level" that plagues so many D&D and D&D-related products.

I never got to play with actual starship combat, but it looked like the rules could be serviceable. Can't give you a final verdict on that. I could be wrong, and they could suck for reasons I won't understand until I play it, but based on reading the book I'm willing to give it a shot.

The actual setting is dumb, and if you're remotely interested in the Pathfinder world and understand the lore, it's even dumber. This planet that is supposed to be the prison for the god of destruction just disappears, and nobody can remember what happened. That whole stretch of time is just erased from everyone's memory, even though there are people alive today who lived through it (elves). The Aphrodite stand-in has inexplicably disappeared so that her position within the pantheon can be filled with the trans archangel who achieved apotheosis so we can have a trans deity. The aboleth who were the secret puppet masters of all mortal nations are somehow not a thing anymore, but every sci-fi secret puppet master creature is kidnapping mortals, experimenting with them, cloning them, and impersonating them. It's like there's one genuine, authentic character in the entire setting, and everyone else is some secret shapeshifting puppet master alien and they're all experimenting on him, cloning him, controlling him, and impersonating him. In secret, of course, because the shapeshifting puppet master aliens are all so smart, so sneaky, and so manipulative that none of them know about each other or their plans. Because alien conspiracies are peak science fiction.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on August 29, 2024, 09:04:28 PMI saw some Star Finder 2nd edition (playtest edition) at my local HobbyTown store today.

What is the game like?

It clearly seems to be D&D set in space, but still has cat people and magicians.  That sort of thing is a turn off to me.  I would rather have a much more sci-fi game.

I did like that there were six classes, one that uses each of the six stats as the primary attribute.

The Strength based class, the Solarian, aka the Solar Knight seems to be a Jedi Knight analog, but I didn't get a lot of time to look at the abilities to see how close or far.

I want to know more about it.

I have played quite a bit, and have a lot of the books, so fell free to ask away.

It's literally the future of Pathfinder, so it's D&D in Spaaaaace. Space Orcs and Space Elves and a bunch of other stuff. Skittermanders (little furry comic relief guys) and Vesk (The honorable warrior race, but that honor varies across individuals) the big space human Azlanti Star Empire.
The hook is Golarion station, the DS9/Babylon 5 of Stafinder where big things happen. The Starfinder Society is the Starfinder version of the Pathfinder Society. An organization of scholars, adventurers and whatnot looking to do good and find out cosmic lore.

There's a ton more factions and planets and lore, but that's the overview. So yea.

The 1st edition system is a refined version of Pathfinder. At first I thought I would not like the leveled equipment system (Major equipment like weapons and armor have levels) but you get used to it. It's not that much different than having a 1 HD orc and a 12 HD orc differential.

I really like it, and played in the official Starfinder organzied play for about a year or so before Covid. Tastes vary, and a lot of people have a dislike of the setting or system or both.

Quote from: Corolinth on August 30, 2024, 12:05:35 AMI never got to play with actual starship combat, but it looked like the rules could be serviceable. Can't give you a final verdict on that. I could be wrong, and they could suck for reasons I won't understand until I play it, but based on reading the book I'm willing to give it a shot.

Spaceship combat in Starfinder suffers from the same issue that any space ship system with a bridge crew has. Everyone can do things, like the captian yells orders, the gunner fires the guns, the navigator makes a defense roll and moves the ship, the engineer bypasses the flow regulators to give more power to the engines, but really it's like having 5 people drive a single character in combat. Some are just along for the ride, and that's kinda boring.

The space combat part of an adventure got looked at as the "chore" you had to do to get to the good stuff. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't great. Just kinda meh.

I looked at a review on YouTube, and found out that the playtest PDF is available for free.

StarFinder 2E playtest PDF for free from Paizo (https://paizo.com/starfinderplaytest)

At least now I can read it and see what I think.

I'll say this right now. I will likely never play it.  It is just one of those things I'll get as a collector, not a player.  If I actually had to play Star Wars right now, it would be a toss up between Mini-Six Bare Bones or Tiny-D6 Frontiers (with my own, custom "Precognitive" psychic power as another option, complete with using a sword to deflect ranged attacks).

But, as I said, I love to collect free rulebooks and read thru them just for fun.

It's Pathfinder in space, that pretty much sums it up.  Paizo is still an (IMHO) worse company than wotc as far as as shoving their left-leaning politics down your throat, so I wouldn't touch it based on that alone.

I played around 8 levels of the first Starfinder and it wasn't for me.  Paizo, to their credit, advertised it as space fantasy when it came out and I think part of the issue I had with it was that it wasn't science fiction that I had hoped when seeing the initial art; that was my own fault as they were honest and accurate in their self assessment.   It really was (in SF 1e) pathfinder 1e/d&d 3.75... in SPAAAACE!   The starship and cyberspace rules felt bolted on and not well thought out and firing your futuristic space laser rifle was mechanically the same as shooting an arrow from your bow unless you were going full auto or had a blast weapon.   I haven't played pf2e so can't comment on the mechanics of that other than just first impressions from skimming over the rules but from their own design goals this will be pf2e... in SPAAAACE!   They were spot on accurate in their description before so I see no reason to doubt them now in that regard.

As for the setting and asthetics, if you're ok with mildly woke (the people working there are alot more obnoxiously loud and proud than the actual work product itself unlike modern D&D) and ubiquitous cutesy furries in space fantasy then you'll be ok.  The art is very consistent though (or at least it was in 1e) for better or for worse (better in my opinion as I liked it personally).

Quote from: Nobleshield on August 30, 2024, 06:35:16 AMIt's Pathfinder in space, that pretty much sums it up.  Paizo is still an (IMHO) worse company than wotc as far as as shoving their left-leaning politics down your throat, so I wouldn't touch it based on that alone.

Can we all please stop pretending that gay race communism is left "leaning"?

Admittedly I've paid less attention to Paizo since PF2 launched, due to the aforementioned far left politics, but my recollection is that it was mostly centered around the rainbow apocalypse. I can't put my finger on why WotC has seemed more egregious since about 2018. Paizo seems more basic bitch "we are straight white people who super care about alphabet people" to me.

As it pertains to Starfinder, I find this less offensive. Pathfinder started off as a relatively cool generic fantasy setting with an unrealistically high percentage of girlboss heads-of-state. Then Paizo steadily turned up the knob on the gay setting. I can accept the core premise that after thousands of years of far left social progress, Golarion disappeared up its own ass during the gaypocalypse and now they have luxury space communism threatened by far alt-right wing christian space nazis from another galaxy.

I think I've just convinced myself Starfinder is woke 40k.

Quote from: RNGm on August 30, 2024, 08:00:48 AMAs for the setting and asthetics, if you're ok with mildly woke (the people working there are alot more obnoxiously loud and proud than the actual work product itself unlike modern D&D) and ubiquitous cutesy furries in space fantasy then you'll be ok.

Thank you for this. I still can't articulate why it comes across as less woke than modern D&D, but at least I'm not the only one.

Quote from: Corolinth on August 30, 2024, 08:15:01 AMThank you for this. I still can't articulate why it comes across as less woke than modern D&D, but at least I'm not the only one.

No worries and I too am glad that I didn't miss anything major.  The caveat is that the entirety of my 8 levels of play were in the Dead Suns campaign series which was literally the first one for Starfinder so I'm not really current on much in the way of future developments.   I only looked at newer books when we were leveling up for additional mechanical options and never got into the setting metaplot other than the whole Swarm is coming to devour us all! thing.  That was in stark contrast to the D&D Rime of the Frostmaiden experience we had literally right after (the SF group was in person and fell apart due to the pandemic and we started D&D5e virtually right after with Rime).   Rime (at least in the first 40% I played in) was chock full of ideology, checkboxes, and even a dose of hateful representation for those who don't check any and/or disagree.

Terrible game, terrible. Lots of games out there are objectively better for sci-fi.

Quote from: Nobleshield on August 30, 2024, 06:35:16 AMIt's Pathfinder in space, that pretty much sums it up.  Paizo is still an (IMHO) worse company than wotc as far as as shoving their left-leaning politics down your throat, so I wouldn't touch it based on that alone.

This is so so not true anymore and hasn't been true since 2018 at least.

Yes Pathfinder has a progressive slant. It is easily ignoranble and Pathfinder is still a game that emphasizes adventure and combat and differences between races unlike Modern D&D.

I ran most of the Dead Suns adventure path.  As I remember, it was perfectly serviceable for what it was trying to be which was Pathfinder but in space.  There was some shuffling around.  Many of the lower level single target damaging spells were taken out and replaced with space guns.  Not much point in learning magic to cast ray of frost when you can just buy a cold gun that does the same thing.  The one problem I remember is that no one liked the new death rules and I ended up basically using the Pathfinder 1e death rules.  I don't remember what the problem was exactly but none of my players liked them.

Oh, yeah.  I remember some players being very salty that dual wielding did not give you more attacks.  There is a segment of players that is all in one dual wielding to get extra attacks.     

Quote from: yosemitemike on August 31, 2024, 03:35:29 AMOh, yeah.  I remember some players being very salty that dual wielding did not give you more attacks.  There is a segment of players that is all in one dual wielding to get extra attacks.     

Yeah. Extra attacks is a big can of worms. I can understand a system that just goes "Nope!".

Quote from: Ratman_tf on August 31, 2024, 04:16:22 AMYeah. Extra attacks is a big can of worms. I can understand a system that just goes "Nope!".

Dual wielding with iterative attacks was a giant pain in the ass in Pathfinder 1e.  I attack 8 times with a different bonus for each attack.  Great.  Let's spend 15 minutes doing that.  I think they got rid of iterative attacks too.  It has been 7 years or so.

Quote from: yosemitemike on August 31, 2024, 05:56:26 AM

Quote from: Ratman_tf on August 31, 2024, 04:16:22 AMYeah. Extra attacks is a big can of worms. I can understand a system that just goes "Nope!".

Dual wielding with iterative attacks was a giant pain in the ass in Pathfinder 1e.  I attack 8 times with a different bonus for each attack.  Great.  Let's spend 15 minutes doing that.  I think they got rid of iterative attacks too.  It has been 7 years or so.

Dual wielding also offered no real advantage for all the feats you had to take in order to do it. I'm fine with a game reflecting that fighting with two weapons is not actually as good as players think, but if a character is spending eight feats on something, it should be better than taking power attack and swinging around a claymore. While I appreciate that PF1 did try to make dual wielding a mid-point between sword & board and a two-handed weapon with two-weapon defense feats, that's just more feats a character has to take.

I thought Starfinder's approach to extra attacks was a pretty good compromise. You either take a single attack, or you sacrifice some accuracy to make two. It kept things moving better than iterative attacks with different bonuses. Also it made combat more interesting, because moving (and thus giving up your iterative attacks) was just too big a penalty for a character to ever do it.

Like PathFinder, StarFinder's biggest sin is that it is afraid to have an identity -- Everything and the kitchen sink is in the game setting, but nothing is really differentiated so it merges into grey goo.

Even worse, while the setting itself tries to throw Star Wars, Star Trek, Starship Troopers, Alien, Predator, Terminator, Blade Runner, X-Men, and every other sci-fi/fantasy setting into a blender, the rules system itself doesn't really try to emulate any of these settings authentically.

Why are there characters regularly fighting with melee weapons in the XXst century with all kinds of ballistic & energy weapons in common usage? Because this is a staple of D&D/Pathfinder.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on August 30, 2024, 01:22:03 AMI looked at a review on YouTube, and found out that the playtest PDF is available for free.

StarFinder 2E playtest PDF for free from Paizo (https://paizo.com/starfinderplaytest)

At least now I can read it and see what I think.

I'll say this right now. I will likely never play it.  It is just one of those things I'll get as a collector, not a player.  If I actually had to play Star Wars right now, it would be a toss up between Mini-Six Bare Bones or Tiny-D6 Frontiers (with my own, custom "Precognitive" psychic power as another option, complete with using a sword to deflect ranged attacks).

But, as I said, I love to collect free rulebooks and read thru them just for fun.

One of my players picked it up. I had a glance at it and was thoroughly unimpressed. Reminded me of the 3e D&D 3rd party setting Dragon Star.

I'm happy it's successful for Paizo.

I have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

But they apparently exist because it's a successful game!

There is an audience for being a Paladin on a Spaceship fighting Aliens that's NOT Star Wars.

Quote from: Orphan81 on September 03, 2024, 05:55:37 PMI have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

It's the same audience as the one for plenty of OSR sci fi games. Lots of people genuinely believe their preferred version of the D&D rules can do any kind of game. Even more people just think any system works about as well for any genre and just want to play the rules they already know.

Also, the native Starfinder setting isn't that much like Star Wars. Yeah, the Solarian class is clearly supposed to be aesthetically close enough to Jedi, but the lore is all different for them, there's no evil empire, a much smaller number of common races, and so on. If anything I'd say it's more like the product of stretching a D&D skin over Mass Effect.

Edit for repeat posting instead of editing.

Edit for repeat posting instead of editing.

Edit for repeat posting instead of editing.

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 03, 2024, 07:14:21 PM

Quote from: Orphan81 on September 03, 2024, 05:55:37 PMI have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

It's the same audience as the one for plenty of OSR sci fi games. Lots of people genuinely believe their preferred version of the D&D rules can do any kind of game. Even more people just think any system works about as well for any genre and just want to play the rules they already know.

Also, the native Starfinder setting isn't that much like Star Wars. Yeah, the Solarian class is clearly supposed to be aesthetically close enough to Jedi, but the lore is all different for them, there's no evil empire,

Ahem. (https://starfinderwiki.com/wiki/Azlanti_Star_Empire)

Quotea much smaller number of common races, and so on. If anything I'd say it's more like the product of stretching a D&D skin over Mass Effect.

I'd agree. But then Mass Effect was in part inspired by space opera like Star Wars so...

Quote from: Ratman_tf on September 03, 2024, 08:34:25 PM

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 03, 2024, 07:14:21 PM

Quote from: Orphan81 on September 03, 2024, 05:55:37 PMI have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

It's the same audience as the one for plenty of OSR sci fi games. Lots of people genuinely believe their preferred version of the D&D rules can do any kind of game. Even more people just think any system works about as well for any genre and just want to play the rules they already know.

Also, the native Starfinder setting isn't that much like Star Wars. Yeah, the Solarian class is clearly supposed to be aesthetically close enough to Jedi, but the lore is all different for them, there's no evil empire,

Ahem. (https://starfinderwiki.com/wiki/Azlanti_Star_Empire)

Ok, it's been a long time since I read the book. What I was trying to say is that the Starfinder system isn't about a galactic empire that rules everything and the heroes are expected to rebel against. If memory serves, the book suggests Absalom Station as a campaign hub, which made me think of the Mass Effect citadel. The whole mysterious memory gap thing is reminiscent to me of the Mass Effect backstory with the Reapers.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on September 03, 2024, 08:34:25 PM

Quotea much smaller number of common races, and so on. If anything I'd say it's more like the product of stretching a D&D skin over Mass Effect.

I'd agree. But then Mass Effect was in part inspired by space opera like Star Wars so...

Again, sure, but Star Wars doesn't hold a monopoly on space opera. Mass Effect doesn't feel much like Star Wars to me. You could fairly call it "Dragon Age in Space", but to the extent that it draws from outside source material, it's  more like Babylon 5 than anything else.

Quote from: Orphan81 on September 03, 2024, 05:55:37 PMI have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

People who want to play Pathfinder in space.

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 03, 2024, 09:37:06 PM

Quote from: Ratman_tf on September 03, 2024, 08:34:25 PM

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 03, 2024, 07:14:21 PM

Quote from: Orphan81 on September 03, 2024, 05:55:37 PMI have no fucking clue who this game is for. What bizarre Playerbase there is that says "I want to play Dungeons and Dragons in Space, but not like... yaknow Spelljammer, more like Star Wars, but NOT Star Wars."

It's the same audience as the one for plenty of OSR sci fi games. Lots of people genuinely believe their preferred version of the D&D rules can do any kind of game. Even more people just think any system works about as well for any genre and just want to play the rules they already know.

Also, the native Starfinder setting isn't that much like Star Wars. Yeah, the Solarian class is clearly supposed to be aesthetically close enough to Jedi, but the lore is all different for them, there's no evil empire,

Ahem. (https://starfinderwiki.com/wiki/Azlanti_Star_Empire)

Ok, it's been a long time since I read the book. What I was trying to say is that the Starfinder system isn't about a galactic empire that rules everything and the heroes are expected to rebel against. If memory serves, the book suggests Absalom Station

Ok, every time previously that I've said "Golarion Station", I meant Absolom Station. *Embarrassed*

Quote from: yosemitemike on September 03, 2024, 11:21:02 PMPeople who want to play Pathfinder in space.

That's about as tight a description as you can get.

I played in a Starfinder 1.x game through the first module + 1/2 of one of their adventure paths.

The system of 1.x was essentially Pathfinder + a number of enhancements _and_ in a future version of the "Golorian" universe. It is space fantasy, but far more fantasy than something like Star Wars.

Overall, it was fun and, really not much of a step beyond Pathfinder 1.x. But the classes were really, really tied to the total campaign setting. I think some could come up with an alternative campaign setting but, it would be far more work than making an alternative campaign setting to Golorian.

One thing I thought interesting is that their bestiaries were set up to add playing many of the 'beasts' as PCs. As with Pathfinder though, some are obnoxiously cute.

If you really want to play the Paizo setting in a space future, its for you.

I played the first edition for a few months, and eeeeehhhh.  The mechanics are mediocre at best and highly treadmilly: in some cases the DCs scale precisely with your levels such that you have a 50-50 chance of your skill working at level 1, and still have a 50-50 chance of your skill working at level 10.  In the first printings the game was so intensely stupid that you actually had a worse chance of your skill checks succeeding at higher levels.  That's been errataed in more recent printings, but speaks to the overall quality.

Gear is also tied to level with people only willing to pay like 5% of an item's value when a player sells it because reasons, while the book states that higher level equipment won't be sold to lower level PCs despite sitting right there on a store's shelf, also because reasons.  Because Starfinder is basically using D&D HP that build up with level, your level 1 1d6 sword will quickly become useless and you might be eyeing that level 5 5d6 sword, but it costs exponentially more and won't be sold at all unless the character is at least level 4, an utterly ham-fisted way to keep equipment in the GM's court.

There are some okay races around that at least look pretty cool, but the setting as a whole is very bland.  There's a general 'stuff is kinda going on here and there', but no truly major events are occurring in the galaxy, while the Starfinder Society exists to make the PCs into errand boys doing whatever quests that cross the GM's mind.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on September 04, 2024, 01:07:51 AMOk, every time previously that I've said "Golarion Station", I meant Absolom Station. *Embarrassed*

I had to look the name up, too. Safe to say it's not a very memorable setting.

Yeah, I'm getting the vibe that if you wanted to do space opera with actual magic, then choose a different game. 

Or just play Star Wars.  Or a Star Wars knockoff game <cough> Star Adventurer written by some guy named RPG Pundit <cough>.

Hell, I think I would rather play Rifts - Phase World.  That too is a sci-if setting with tons of mystical character types that includes the actual wizards from the core rulebook.  Phase World even has a "Jedi Knight" analog called Cosmo-Knights, although their powers are way different.  They are tough as army tanks, shoot powerful lasers, create melee weapons and armor from thin air, they fly, and can go to FTL speeds to reach other star systems without needing a ship (ships tend to be faster, though).

What is your opinion on Star Finder?

Loved the idea! Very fun and imaginative!

The execution of that idea was horrible and bad. WAY TO MANY RULES FOR EVERYTHING. Like a great many ttrpg's these days. It was not just that however, a lot of those rules were also just very bad and did not work at the table at all. Walking into a store in that game to see what was available had a lot to do with your level. Too low? This arms dealer has no powerful arms to sell you or if he does....you are not high enough level to use them! Geez..

So what I would do is use every ounce of fluff from that game and just BX mechanics.

Quote from: Bogmagog on September 04, 2024, 01:20:15 PMWhat is your opinion on Star Finder?

Loved the idea! Very fun and imaginative!

The execution of that idea was horrible and bad. WAY TO MANY RULES FOR EVERYTHING. Like a great many ttrpg's these days. It was not just that however, a lot of those rules were also just very bad and did not work at the table at all. Walking into a store in that game to see what was available had a lot to do with your level. Too low? This arms dealer has no powerful arms to sell you or if he does....you are not high enough level to use them! Geez..

So what I would do is use every ounce of fluff from that game and just BX mechanics.

My opinion is that they took fantasy Pathfinder, put the thinnest veneer of sci-fi over it, and called it a day.   It's NOT a true sci-fi game.

I played Star Finder for several sessions and ultimately didn't enjoy it for reasons the nay-sayers here have already elaborated on.

I also remember the game being controversial when it came out due to the woke rewrite of the Lashunta species which had originally been a rather pulpy race based on a fusion of several Venusian species from old pulps. They were a sort of Amazons with neanderthal like men and beautiful Dejah Thoris type women in earlier Pathfinder products.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on September 04, 2024, 05:22:40 PMMy opinion is that they took fantasy Pathfinder, put the thinnest veneer of sci-fi over it, and called it a day.   It's NOT a true sci-fi game.

You are correct but they don't actually claim that it is (though I too had hoped that they were wrong and that it was actually sci-fi).   They've consistently described it science fantasy.

Quote from: ForgottenF on September 03, 2024, 07:14:21 PMIt's the same audience as the one for plenty of OSR sci fi games. Lots of people genuinely believe their preferred version of the D&D rules can do any kind of game. Even more people just think any system works about as well for any genre and just want to play the rules they already know.

News flash. D&D started out with sci-fi elements. Blackmore had alien invaders. OD&D was very kitchen sink and you had some monsters from John Carter in there among other things.

I bought the 1e Starfinder core book several years ago (when it first released). I read it over for a week or so then shelved it. It's sat there ever since as a warning to me to not buy anymore Starfinder. It also stepped up to warn me off of PF2, so I guess that was a bonus too.

I like the idea of the mix of magic and tech, like how Shadowrun has, but higher leveled.  not 100% sold on the d20 / pathfinder system on it.