I Was This Close to Buying Starfinder 2E

I like Starfinder 1e, and I played some of that and its throwback 3.5E science fiction. The combats were fun, and the adventures were memorable and enjoyable. I also liked the concept of "space fantasy," with classic fantasy races in a futuristic world. I liked the space drow, the star elves, the space orcs, the goblins, and all the other classic Pathfinder races "in space," and it felt cool.

Seeing Traveller 5E announced got me thinking about getting the new version of Starfinder, but I hesitated. For one, I bounced off of Pathfinder 2E pretty hard, and that game is in storage. Going back to one would mean I pull out the other. Also, the classic ancestries are no longer central to Starfinder, and I know the games are cross-compatible, but the universe feels different.

The core Starfinder races are what the settings and adventures will be about. I am free to put everything from Pathfinder 2E in there, and even the OGL version, but again, that is a lot of work for a game I am not really into. Pathfinder 2E is a good game, just not for me. Things are not the same.

It looked cool, but I didn't think I would play it much. I had the store pages open, but did not add the books to my cart. I read a few mixed reviews about it, saying the writing wasn't up to the standard of the original. So I backed off, and I will likely read up more on this. If the writing isn't there, I will skip this edition. Excellent writing is something I look for in a game, especially its adventures.

Some have expressed disappointment that the game wasn't taken further from Pathfinder 2E, like it was in the playtest versions. Compatibility with Pathfinder 2E ultimately won out, which is a smart business move, but the game lost some of its identity and feels more like an expansion. Others say the "ranged meta" won, and DEX is your most important stat, and melee feels secondary. I liked melee being important in Starfinder 1E, which made the game hit differently for me. The best way to do considerable damage was up close and personal.

What I want is gonzo, anything goes, science fiction plus fantasy. I want melee strikers to be on par with ranged attackers. I want the rules to have depth and substance. I want an anything-goes science fiction world.

That game is Rifts.

Rifts backs me up, too, letting magic inflict MDC damage, so my elven arcane caster can throw up an MDC shield and blast away at power armor with MDC fire bolts. This is good stuff, and puts them on par with the armored powerhouses of the setting, and elevates magic as an equivalent force in this world. Get a rune weapon, some magic armor, and you are close to becoming a minor god at this point.

You can stand toe-to-toe with MDC armored foes in Rifts with magic.

You can also adopt a melee style and absolutely slay up close with MDC melee weapons, and beat the heck out of power armor with a rune weapon or your fists. That's cool.

The next best option is to keep everything on the hit point scale and use White Star, with fantasy races pulled from BX. This is also a viable option that works well, and I have White Star on my most-played shelves. However, this is not as flat-out cool as Rifts. My proposed game will be a mod, magic is relatively low-powered, and it feels derivative.

Another option is a science fiction campaign using Stars Without Number, incorporating the magical classes from Worlds Without Number and importing fantasy races from BX. The magic in this system is better than BX, and allows for magical casting that recharges after a scene, so magic-using classes are not "one spell and the day is done." Still, this is another mod, and it does not feel right.

But if I am going to DIY fantasy science fiction in those games, I can DIY it just as easily in Rifts, and have tons of cool monsters and enemies to battle. Plus, since Palladium games are by their nature "make your own game with this," I can drop in a group of elves, an elven faction, a kingdom of elves, or a whole planet of them anywhere I want, for any reason I want.

Dark elves? They can be in the setting. I will just mod the Palladium Fantasy Elf and port them in from somewhere in the multiverse. Anything I want is here, and it fits in. If I want a planet of them and a few gods for them, fine, go ahead.

In Rifts, anything goes.

In Starfinder, I will usually need to wait for the book. Why am I buying into this again?

DIY games are superior to those that ship with default assumptions. Rifts are so open that anything I can imagine can be here. It may sound silly, but all Palladium games are supposed to be wide open, and it supports many power levels and campaign types. There is no "this game is made for dungeons, and everything is balanced against each other" feeling. Every class is overpowered in what it does.

I don't mind MDC armor either. Nobody in D&D complains about having to wear armor. Mostly, they just ignore it and take the AC value. The MDC system simplifies Palladium combat greatly, eliminating AR, and you are either hit or not. Don't subject the players to cheap shots, and you will be fine.

Not wearing armor is not advised, and primitive weapons are useless. But this is science fiction, like Heavy Metal, where the energies and forces you are dealing with are so powerful you need special forms of protection, either tech or magic. Some miss the lower-powered science fantasy. I don't mind it since you are slugging it out with mech suits as a caster, and that is awesome.

With most other games, I feel guilty for breaking the game or playing it not as it is supposed to be played. I get this with Starfinder 2E and Pathfinder 2E, now that the OGL content has been removed. I don't see the classic Pathfinder Dark Elves anymore, and I know they will never appear in adventures, so a piece of the world feels missing.

But a part of me misses the old Starfinder, as flawed and broken as it was, with the massive weapon lists that turned into run-on sentences and felt like something out of a video game. There was a ton of 3.5E cheese in this game, too, and some classes felt utterly powerless. But the mixed science fantasy world was fun, which was the best part of the game. This is a game where most of what you put up with is for the sake of the setting. Even 3.5E was okay, I didn't mind it, but I knew how to break the system.

Removing alignment in 2E, I did mind, and the entire aspect of playing chaotic or evil characters is now an afterthought and gone from the game. Rifts and Palladium? It has the best alignment system in the industry, and playing anything is on the table.

A lot of people love Starfinder 2E, so there is something here.

But I almost bought Starfinder 2E today. It is a game I miss. But I need to learn more before I make a purchase, especially these days. It is on my radar, but I have other games taking up my time currently.

I don't find much enjoyment in sifting through rules. Let a computer game do that for me. I want story and easier character builds and powers. I don't play a tabletop game to slowly work my way through a few hundred pages of rules to simulate a combat. If I do want that, GURPS gives me a better end result, and there are far fewer rules to follow if you follow them all.

Most of GURPS' rules are optional. Few of Starfinder 2E's are.

People like the "-Finder" systems, and I bounced off hard after trying them. Pathfinder 2E was not for me, despite how hard I tried. I may give it another chance. I may grab the PDFs and skip the books.

We shall see.

Traveller 5E

Y&T was a great 80s metal band. Then, their label forced them to make cheesy pop-rock music. Then, the band died. Longtime fans felt they sold out. The new fans never showed up after the original MTV video went into high rotation, and then everyone dumped them. They could never return to their deeper cuts, and they were stuck in limbo until grunge killed the genre.

So what do they have to do with Traveller 5E?

https://forum.mongoosepublishing.com/threads/traveller-5e.126195/

I see people saying, "If Traveller wants to survive, it needs to attract a younger audience." Yes, the Traveller players are getting older, but this new audience is not interested in the current Traveller. The universe is not engaging with them, and a new set of rules won't make it any more appealing. If it were, they would be playing it.

So next year we are getting Traveller 5E, which is a terrible name since we already have Traveller 5.

But repackaging the current Traveller universe is not as compelling to the players they are trying to attract. They will want dragonborn, tieflings, animorph races, fae creatures, talking plants, robot people, dark elves, puppets, space elves, and all sorts of cute and cool things running around in space. 

Frankly, Starfinder 2E is the better game for them, and it is not even close. What the younger players want from science fiction is not what Traveller will give them. Starfinder is the better game, with better player options, and it plays perfectly to its audience and knows what it is.

Starfinder also feels more relevant to today's mood and feeling, and it feels more like a game for young players than Traveller in a 5E wrapper will ever be. Starfinder is an exciting, engaging universe that feels fresh and is begging to be explored and used for adventures. Traveller has the best-established universe in science fiction, but if it hasn't already attracted these players, a change in rules won't do much good.

The above is an excellent video on the Y&T band and a recounting of the events around this label-forced mistake that ended a great run and wonderful music. Please like and subscribe, and watch it all the way through. Great music commentary is very cool to see, and I support thoughtful, engaging commentary.

But it is an example of trying to be what you are not.

And trying to appeal to new fans who won't be there for you in the long run.

5E is not a universal solution to every problem with marketing and aging audiences. Companies that feel 5E is the answer to every issue will alienate their core fans, and the new fans they thought would be there will go right back to their Baldur's Gate 3 adventures and cartoony player options they are comfortable with. But if younger players like these things and it lets them express themselves fully, that is cool, too. Having fun is what gaming is about.

We are clearly in late-stage 5E, where every company is rushing to get its game on the platform. I fear the announcements of Runequest 5E, Rolemaster 5E, Tunnels & Trolls 5E, Call of Cthulhu 5E, Twilight: 2000 5E, Savage Worlds 5E, Paranoia 5E, Lamentations of the Flame Princess 5E, OSE 5E, and who knows what else. The modern audience will save us all, right?

Tell that to the band.

I get it, Traveller's audience is getting older. Tell that to every '80s band when grunge came out, and the kids walked away. There are times when there is not much you can do but try to please your core audience. The answer is not in rebranding; the answer is always in creating something new that speaks to the next generation.

You don't need to wrap Traveller with 5E.

You need to do what Starfinder did, and build a new universe that appeals to younger players. The best they can do is fork the Traveller universe and fill it full of neon-colored fantasy races. I know, it sounds like heresy, but you need to play to what your audience wants.

Starfinder 2E wins this fight before it even begins.

Starfinder vs. Pathfinder 1e

As much as I love Pathfinder 1e, having Starfinder out on my most-played shelves dragged the game down. I may end up selling my Starfinder books.

I had a fun game going through the Beginner Box, but I saw the writing on the wall by the end. The "credits are gear XP" system - where my party could own a starship and be completely broke - shattered my illusion of reality with the game. You can up your damage output directly with money, and that has to be tightly controlled so the game stays balanced.

Having players ask to do "normal sci-fi things," such as run cargo or passengers for money, and the books not answering them, stopped the game dead in its tracks for me.

What happened? The players became pack rats, stripping every room, encounter, dead monster, enemy weapon, loose bits of furniture, and anything not bolted down in adventures and starship wrecks I wanted to quit. I knew where they were coming from, "We need money!"

In Traveller or Cepheus, we can run cargo! Can we run cargo here? Can we take passengers? Mail? Do survey missions pay good money? How much would it cost to upgrade the ship? One looked at the weapon tables and told me not to let them run cargo, or they would buy the highest-level weapons they could get their hands on. If I give them a 200,000cr profit, that will be the end of my game and blow out the next five levels of challenge for them.

The game turns the referee into someone who hates how rich the players get. I don't want to let them get ahead. I need the game's challenge to be preserved! At least in Pathfinder 1e, a longsword is the same 1d8 weapon until maximum level. It still costs the same amount of money. magic items? If they are allowed for sale, then we are talking - but I like them better rare and special.

The modules give so little that my Starfinder players turned into Aftermath characters, searching houses, taking the silverware and plates, unscrewing every working light bulb, stripping the copper from the walls, and salvaging everything they could for barter. The game felt like some failed state where the people turned into ants that stripped the land dry of anything of value just to survive.

The game slowed down with every room and combat they had, asking if there was junk lying around they could sell. If they skipped rooms and just focused on the mission, they lost out on salvage and treasure. It was sort of the worst stereotype of old-school D&D games where the party has so little money they sold every rusty weapon and piece of armor they could drag out of a hole in the ground.

When they got done a dungeon in Starfinder, I would tally up what they missed, and know the next section was going to be that much harder because they missed valuable resources. I could have just given them the difference, but I do not play that way. The enemies' weapons leveled up faster than they did, and they realized this and started taking them and using them.

"Just make sure we can upgrade armor. We will take the next group of leveled-up space goblin weapons they use on us. We will never be able to afford the good stuff anyways."

Then someone would ask me, "Can we just run cargo missions?"

Then I gave up. This is not the sci-fi game my group wants to play. They want something more traditional, less dependent on leveled gear, and with a solid economic and trading model. Something with planetary generation, random space encounters, a strong exploration game, and a flatter progression curve. That game is Cepheus Engine.

And having Starfinder out pulled attention and love away from Pathfinder 1e, which does not have these problems. I swear, the Starfinder design team lost their way and did not want to design a sci-fi game. They never played the classics with solid random system generation, space encounters, world creation, and trading games. All they knew was how to write and sell adventure paths. And this is all Starfinder did.

Pathfinder 1e still has the classic 3.5E DNA, and it can do social, exploration, and combat equally well. It does not have "leveled gear" or require the referee to both balance encounters and limit monetary rewards. I could give a level 1 party in Pathfinder 1e a 10,000gp gem, and if there is nowhere to buy magic items, the balance is still intact.

It is sad because I like the visual design and appeal of Starfinder.

But the way this is looking, these are going in a sell box soon and going out the door.

I have better games to play, and ones my group likes better.

Shadowrun: Street Level Play

Shadowrun forces you to make hard choices before you even begin play. Are you a citizen? Do you have a fake ID card? A real ID card? Can you be tracked? Who do you know? What is your lifestyle? Who are your contacts? Do you have insurance or licenses? How much debt do you want to be in for that flashy lifestyle?

Money is important.

The hustle is what you do to survive.

Do you stay off the radar? How do you deal with sudden notoriety?

How does your life change?

It perfectly encapsulates surviving in today's gig and influencer economy in a world that hates who you are, wants you homeless, and crushes you under the boot of authoritarianism and mee-too-ism any time you begin to find a winning schtick and angle for keeping your head above water. The suits will crush you with the state's authority from above, and your peers will eat you from below by copying your thing and trying to muscle in on you.

And those you wronged, or their friends, will still be after you.

Again, I know SR 6 has SEVERE problems with the rules, but I like the character creation and the trade-offs. Whatever system I play this with, the setting will be classic. The more I think about it, the more Year Zero engine could fix most of the problems here.

In contrast, Starfinder inherits that "D&D social immunity clause" that  PCs seem to have. The game fears to "come at" the PCs this way since that may trigger somebody. Even the starships in Starfinder are "free," and their upgrades are subsidized by the state or the faction you work for in an adventure path. Money only exists in Starfinder to buy personal armor and weapon upgrades. If there are starship running costs, upgrade costs, and cargo tables - I can't find them. The game's starship, trading, economy, and money system have always been my biggest disappointments.

The game gives you boxes of "stuff," but after a while it begins to feel like an overpacked closet. There is tons of junk I never use, and little of it inspires me. Most of it—hundreds of weapons on leveled lists, dozens of aliens, lists of powers—feels like "option filler."

Money feels both scarce and worthless in Starfinder. You only find it to level up personal weapons and gear. I had a group of PCs who owned a starship with only 1,000cr in their pockets. They looked at me and asked, " Can't we run some cargo, passengers, or something?"

I'm like, "Nothing in the rules. Sorry. The Socialist government of Pact Worlds disallows private enterprise. Ship upgrades are given by the state. You need to kill space goblins to find money."

The middle fingers around the table went up, and we all laughed.

Starfinder excludes a lot of the sci-fi genre tropes. I get why they did it, to push "space dungeon crawling" more than any other genre aspect. There is no need to go dungeon crawling if you can haul cargo, score a lucky load, and upgrade all your weapons to level 20 in one great run. Even if you level-limit guns and armor, you will be sitting on 30 million credits in the bank, waiting to buy gear, buying it all, and storing it in your weapons locker.

Starfinder is a fun game but far closer to a video game than many know.

If you want to do "space truckers" games, get yourself Cepheus Deluxe Enhanced Edition (get the B&W version of Deluxe EE), and ignore every other sci-fi game. This game has a chapter - plus examples - of cargo trading, encounters, ship design, and everything to make your space trucker lifestyle go perfectly without fudging anything.

Can I do crazy aliens in Cepheus? Yes, nothing stops me. Can I do lots of weapons? I can, but who needs them? More options to the point of page after page of lists are meaningless chaff and cause choice paralysis.

Magic? A book covers that in a 2d6 framework with Swords of Cepheus. I have options here, in a game that is simpler and has campaign support in the areas I need it. There are dungeons and adventures here too.

With Starfinder, cargo runs are like, "You are on a cargo run when suddenly a dungeon happens!"

"Okay, we got done the dungeon. Do we get paid?"

"No, the faction you are working for says thank you, and they upgrade your ship for free."

"Wait...money! Cash in hand! I need a laser rifle upgrade!"

"Oh? Money? You are in the starport when space goblins attack!"

With Cepheus Deluxe, you break out the calculator and do percentage math, then worry if your 700 tons of computer parts will make it through pirate-infested space or if you will blow more money on repairs than your load was worth. Yes, it is a math game, but your characters stand to lose big if those go into your cargo bay and fry computers like Bitcoin miners powered by lasers.

Then again, business is a math game. Figure this as "life training."

I like sci-fi games with a solid cash-money game, and Shadowrun's setting has one. In fact, the GM knows each character's monthly burn, so judging rewards is easy. While weapons don't "level up"—the good stuff is often expensive—buying influence and keeping the heat off can drain a wallet fast.

Shadowrun and Cepheus - money matters. You spend it to buy, sell, hustle, pay people off, make improvements, reward contacts, grease palms, buy specialty gear for special missions, and blow on lifestyle costs. If you are not spending money constantly in sci-fi, you are not playing sci-fi.

In Starfinder, I feel money is "gear upgrade XP." I spend it immediately to increase weapon damage dice or armor, and then I care not to even pay attention to it. It is both strangely too important and completely forgettable at the same time. I don't need it for a ship or place to stay; no ship upgrades or fuel costs - just gear. We played through the Starfinder Beginner Box, had a starship at the end, and needed more money. The characters felt they should "go back and loot everything to sell" or "they missed their chance to take everything not bolted down."

It felt like they needed to be pack-rat Skyrim characters, taking every bit of armor and weapons from enemies and selling it wholesale by the cart load back in town. And then making multiple trips.

I can have a million credits in Cepheus, but I still need more for my ship. I will need even more to make great cargo runs, and that money goes back into more giant starships and escorts, along with paying crew.

I can have a million newyen in Shadowrun and cause a lot of trouble, or live the high life for a few weekends, or spend it on one car.

In Starfinder, a million credits can be spent maxing out weapons and armor and then feel strangely useless. Could I spend it on the above things? I could rule it, but the game's focus is different. Starfinder doesn't even encourage you to gain wealth and status. It is like 5E, where the designers made a conscious decision to deemphasize wealth and focus the game purely on personal power as the metric of success.

Socialist game design theory has replaced a few roleplaying games, including New School and OSR. Games where money does not matter, and the focus is almost entirely on "my personal power" - that can strangely never be taken away once accumulated, give people this false sense of empowerment. Worse, it acts as an opiate for not improving their real-world situation. Some games stick to the capitalist ideal, and in Shadowrun's case, it is more used as an enemy and simulates a capitalist nightmare - but the capital system is still needed to create the dystopia.

And this gets repeated in the media: my power, having power, getting power, getting power, power, power. Power. That childish notion of "muh powahs" is almost a joke at this point, and I get the feeling any game or movie telling you "this is about power" is lying to you and telling you that you have none, and why try?

When they tell you one thing, believe the opposite.

And all of today's superhero movies and role-playing games are about gaining power that cannot be removed or lost. It gets silly, childish, and stupid at a point. In life, there is an end - no more power. There are no immortals here. And beware of "opiate fantasy" removing you from the real world.

Fantasy is good, but too much is a bad thing.

You cannot remove capitalism from Shadowrun and make it a "5E game" where "my powers are all that's important to me" since that would lose the entire point of the setting. Taking capitalism out of Shadowrun would be like taking Cthulhu out of Call of Cthulhu.

Ask yourself this? Can I lose it all in a game? Not just death, but most all of my power? I expect skills, ability scores, and knowledge of magic to stick around. If you have money, do you always need more? If I lose all my wealth and influence, the crash and burn, will my personal power eliminate the pain?

In 5E, if my 10th-level thief is locked away for 10 years, on his second day of freedom, he will instantly return to where he was regarding money, gear, and power. This is true in some OSR games, too, like DCC.

In Shadowrun or Cepheus - I can't say that.

You can lose it all.

Starfinder: Is it Too Much?

Most Starfinder books don't bat an eye at throwing a half-page weapon chart at you. Want some more weapons? Sure, here is a massive list of them! Here are a few dozen races. Here are a half-dozen more character options. I have a shelf of Starfinder books, and none feel compelling.

It is funny. I don't feel the same way because I have two shelves of Pathfinder 1e books. Fantasy is a genre you can instantly narrow down to a simple, core story and theme. The village is under attack. The heroes pick up a sword and cast a spell. The adventure that lasts a lifetime begins there.

99% of the time, I could play with the core rulebook and pull in a few things from one other.

With Starfinder, they give me a ton of stuff, but finding something to do with it takes time and effort. The game expects you to know and use the conflicts of Pathfinder 1e in this new world, so you need knowledge the game doesn't provide. The book describes gods and races and expects you to make that 1:1 jump yourself. Orcs hate elves in fantasy, so orcs...? Dark elves worship demons, so...?

Thousands of years have gone by.

I wanted a new world with new conflicts.

One of Starfinder's huge problems is it requires you to be a Pathfinder fan. Only some things translate, and the stuff you think would - doesn't.

Shadowrun does Starfinder a lot better. What? That makes no sense. Different games! Let me explain.

Both games are about a team of characters in a futuristic setting who are motivated to solve problems and follow their motivations. The structure of the parties' relationships and goals are the same. The environments they operate in (dungeons, cities, wilderness, and vehicles) are the same. While one setting has starships, the other setting has hover vans. You get in a thing and go to a place.

Where Shadowrun beats Starfinder is in story motivation. The world is a fantastic sandbox filled with conflicts, factions, societal forces, and stories waiting to be told. Everything you learn unlocks a new secret and a new chapter. Deep conflicts are built into the setting. The tradeoffs, like magic, are built into the rules. Even cultures and races are in conflict.

Starfinder books are content to give you more and more until the game becomes an unintelligible, muddled pile of confused lists. They will list the original Pathfinder gods, but I need to see conflicts built into the setting or rules. There are hundreds of races in Starfinder, and in Shadowrun - there are five. If I play one of those, I feel special. If I add a few - each one of those is special.

Add too many, and nothing means anything.

What is the point of a dozen cute races? Marketing?

Quality over quantity is one thing that escapes Starfinder. It is different in Pathfinder 1e, despite having twice the books. In fantasy, I have a world model in my head. That takes precedent. With Starfinder, I have no frame of reference, and every time I try to settle on one, a book contradicts me. I override 90% of my reading, and my mind goes, "Why bother?"

I could play Starfinder with one book and focus on a core conflict, but I am doing a lot of the heavy lifting myself to create deeper conflicts and stories. Evil and good get along together. Space goblins exist to season dungeons and abandoned starships with cheap combat encounters. The gods are meaningless since magic comes from anywhere. Why even have them? Fantasy races are tossed in the back of the book like an embarrassment.

They wanted a sci-fi game but needed to learn how to build a universe. They had to do a 'great reset' and wipe memories. What Hollywood wishes they could do with the last few years of superhero entertainment. It is a universe built upon a deus ex machina.

For all its "D&D with guns" feel, Shadowrun feels plausible. It has a history. You can have a dragon as the head of a megacorporation, an orc street gang, or an elven Yakuza. It oozes style and panache, and those tiny examples create a thousand stories in my mind.

They are the same game, but instead of throwing more and more at you to justify hoarding and collecting, Shadowrun focuses on story and conflict first. Nothing works in Shadowrun unless the core story conflicts are solid. In Starfinder, there is always another book of stuff I always need help with.

And three or four more tables of weapons.

B&W Starfinder: All Divine Magic, No Arcane

In my black-and-white Starfinder setting, all magic comes from divine sources.

Why?

This is a massive clean-up of the mess of "it may be divine, it may be arcane, it may be spiritualism, it may be some other something" soft, undefined, messy mess of magic origins in the game. I can't make any sense of what magic is in this setting or what technology is, and it all blends together like some neon food-coloring, chemical-laced millennial drink.

In B&W Starfinder, all magic comes from divine sources.

Technology replaces arcane magic.

This makes technical-minded characters "the mages" of the setting and clears up the split between technology and magic very cleanly, as well as a lot of ambiguity.

This simplifies the setting considerably and focuses the magic system along the Dungeon Crawl Classics sort "patron" system, where your magic comes from an alien intelligence, divine source, or something out there that can both ask for favors and take away magic due to disfavor. This also heightens the importance of the gods in the setting; before, they were dongles, which did not matter at all.

Now?

You need a god for magic. You will be asked for favors, and your magic powers may be removed if you displease your patron. This is not a "neutral, zero cost, no responsibility" magic source in the setting like arcane is in fantasy.

No patron? No magic.

No favors? No magic.

Anger your patron? No magic.

And the gods won't be these "modern" versions presented in the book, where they wear business suits, spacesuits, or dressed up as aliens. They are amorphous, strange, powerful, and mystical entities that aren't made cute, given iPhone app icon designs, or made socially acceptable if evil. They are more like DCC patrons: strange, never understandable, with vague motives, but desiring clear outcomes. I will also use the original Golarian deities book for these choices since it strips off all the marketing and plastic coating from the identities of the gods.

They aren't cute or TikTok celebrities—they are ancient, powerful, almost alien intelligence entities. They are concerned that technology will replace them and cause them to cease to exist.

If you serve a good patron of a life domain, and the undead are present - that will not be good. For the undead, or you should ignore the call to destroy them.

I can hear people now, "But I want to play undead! I want to play demon-touched! They are valid character options I can choose!" Okay, but like in a fantasy game, you will live with the consequences of your choices.

Starfinder's most significant problem is this soft moral relativism that makes every choice acceptable. I should probably say the Pact Worlds since my setting will have more vital good-aligned and evil factions battling for control. The Pact Worlds will be the neutral party crushed between them, trying to say, "All sides have a point," and "Can we just get along?"

Again, I only need to point to the present day to see where that gets you. Starfinder was written before what we know today, and the events in Europe really changed everything and made this game show its age. The Pact Worlds appease evil, deny there is a war, and will suffer the consequences, just like every other group that thought appeasing the bad guys ended up in this world.

B&W Starfinder has no such problems and aligns the game with what we know today. The battles between good and evil mirror the battle between faiths and technology. This way of looking at the game setting creates explicit conflicts and makes telling stories here simple.

The war has already begun.

Pick a side.

Starfinder

If I play 3.75 Pathfinder, I could play OG Starfinder. Am I getting the 2E version? Likely not, I have a shelf full of books I barely explored, and the original Starfinder is still a good game. I have struggled with it, but this game lasted longer than many other sci-fi games in my library.

The jump between Starfinder 1e and Pathfinder 1e is close; if you play one, your mind is set up to play the other. So, alongside my 1e campaign, I will kick-start my Starfinder game.

Starfinder needs a GM Guide. Why it never got one, I will never know. The closest book we have is the Galaxy Exploration Manual, which covers the essential genres and gives lots of charts - but I wanted a book that went a little more in-depth into some of the topics the Pathfinder Gamemaster Guide went over (I know, I can use that book too).

There are many planet types and plot hooks, and the book ends with various toolboxes for NPCs, starships, treasure, and more. Stars Without Number does an excellent job of tables and random generators, but this will do in a pinch. SWN does a better job listing conflicts and factions on world types and plot hooks with locations.

What makes me raise an eyebrow is the section of the book listing science fiction subgenres that imply they can be played with Starfinder. Could I play The Matrix or Robocop with Starfinder? I guess. What about hard sci-fi, like 2001? It would be a stretch, but I am tossing out all the magic and crazy races. For a one-shot? What about The Martian? The Walking Dead is mentioned under post-apocalyptic. How about Back to the Future?

Starfinder is its own thing.

It isn't a roleplaying game that could do Back to the Future, but it could do an adventure inspired by that. Same with the other genres. Starfinder does its own thing and sucks in inspiration like a lint roller. To play Starfinder, you need to play all or most of it.

It is like the pop-modern version of Space Opera to me. Where Space Opera was Wheaties, Rice Krispies, and Corn Flakes poured in a bowl; Starfinder is Fruit Loops, Frosted Flakes, and Fruity Pebbles. It isn't bad, just brightly colored and random.

And sweet.

There are times when being just as random as the game when running works in your favor. In other sci-fi games, I tend to overthink things and grind to a halt. Here? If you start dragging or hitting a dead end, make a combat, chase, or other action happen. Who sent you?! A clue or confession sends the players to the next arc.

Don't think.

Do.

That is Starfinder.

Keep it moving.

T-bone the plot with a sudden WTF moment. Have a starship combat. Force yourself out of your box. Use a part of the rules you never did before.

Don't think.

Lean in, dive in, and go.

It isn't a generic system either; a definite leveled progression system powers you up like a JRPG. Many sci-fi games have a flat progression curve and simulate a 50% skill moving towards a 100% one. Starfinder is a progression on an upward-moving curve.

If you were to redo the Star Frontiers adventures, such as Volturnus, in Starfinder, there would be parts of the planet "too high level" for you. The bad guys who show up by the end of the series would all be level 12-15 enemies. It's d20 gaming, a video game in pen-and-paper format.

You could do Volturnus as a "not Volturnus." Do a hex-crawl on a desert world - and let the terrain go from there. To be a heretic, some of the modules in this series had problems; they were railroads, and a few points felt forced. I have done Starfinder as a sandbox and hex-crawl before, and it was fun. I could drop some of the signature module locations wherever I feel they should go, and that works.

Also, I could rip a copy of Volturnus out of the original SF universe and drop it straight into Starfinder as a system - with no other Frontier existing. It makes sense since this planet was 90% of our campaign and the only world we cared for. I would make the ship that crashed there a giant colony ship, and then the task isn't to escape but to gather all the shipwrecked survivors and build a home.

I will miss those space drow so much if I ever get into 2E. They are classic, Buck Rogers-style villains in my universe. If I play 1e, they are still here.

There is much to like in Starfinder, but also lots to pull apart and make sense of from a story perspective. Its scope, sheer amount of stuff, and too-much-mojo nature make it difficult for coherent storytelling - too much is happening. There are too many power systems. There are hundreds of alien types. The weapons and spell lists go on pages. There are far too many caster classes and different styles of magic.

In a game like Star Frontiers, you have your iconic laser pistol, 13 skills, a page of weapons, gear, and four races. There are no magic or psionic powers. Stories in this game are easy to tell.

Today, the far-superior Frontier Space is my replacement game, with a far better action economy, a similar d100 mechanic, and a more streamlined system. The stories here are easier, too, since the selections are tighter, the game has a narrow focus, and all the classic story motivations and frameworks work well.

Another game with easy stories is the Cepheus Engine, which now has so many versions and games that it can fill up a small solar system, but I still love non-Traveller 2d6 generic sci-fi.

Sometimes, I play Starfinder and need a college course to understand how to tell stories in the setting. I need to narrow down what the game gives me to get started. There is a solid d20 sci-fi game in Starfinder; it just takes sorting through a million options to find it. This is one of the reasons my Starfinder games have consistently failed; I would start off well, complete an adventure, and then when it came time for me to create something on my own - my game would die.

I got overwhelmed instantly.

There is too much going on here.

There are a billion conflicts, or no conflicts defined at all.

Is the galaxy at war with evil or not? Is being at peace with the undead "a thing?"

What is evil? What is good? There are gods and demons, but what do they do? Sit on the sidelines?

You can start seeing Paizo's slide into moral neutrality in this game, where nothing is truly evil, and nothing is truly good. Would an undead star empire killing billions of people on a planet and turning them into undead be considered evil in this game? This is the time to call the star paladins in and start smiting the bad guys. If the forces of Hell opened demon gates on a world, killed an entire planet's population, and turned the place into the Doom video game, would it be considered evil?

I spent a few hours reading the books last night, and I could not find an answer to those questions. There are listings for Asmodeus the archdevil, but he sounds more like a Wall Street CEO than the end boss of Doom. An entire planet of undead is in the Pact Worlds, and there is open cannibalism in the world (Pact Worlds, p90). There is this feeling in Starfinder that if something is presented as a valid character option, then anything that goes on to support the background is okay with everyone. After all, we have cool pictures of bone-guy characters!

The books say, "Not everyone is okay with it, but politics keeps it the way it is."

But taken to its logical extent, space truckers would be shipping living people to the world to be consumed. Is that evil or not?

Politics keeps it the way it is.

Okay, then the Pact Worlds are evil.

My version of Starfinder is much more black-and-white than this morally ambiguous mess of a default setting. I would leave the Pact Worlds as messy, confused, morally relativistic place and make a new good-aligned Confederation of Light that good-aligned worlds are joining in reaction to the rampant neutrality of the Pact that invites evil to consume planets. Starfinder was written before the Ukraine war, and you see the same "well, both sides have points" relativism in the setting as you hear today when people try to support evil.

Evil would also be drawing ranks in my version of the setting. Demons would turn planets into Doom levels, and undead would destroy worlds to get more legions of the dead. The space drow will naturally align with the demons of Hell, and they will create an Infernal Empire. The undead will align with an Axis of Death and be undead space Nazis.

Sorry Pact Worlds, I don't see you lasting another 5 years when these space empires start clashing. People will be forced to pick sides, and the default structure of the original setting will be in decline and discussed in the past tense. They will be seen in the same light as the pre-WW1 German liberal free-thinker parties, sort of that failed 'grand society' that broke apart because it ignored the rot from within that gave rise to greater evils.

B&W Starfinder is a game I can easily tell stories in.

Pathfinder 2e: Utterly Alien

I have mixed feelings about the Pathfinder update to a "2.5" version. I am happy with the 2.0 books and do not plan on buying the remasters. I miss the classic dragons, drow, and other fantasy staples - and the replacements feel like something entirely alien.

I get it; they need to be their own masters, be able to create video games and VTTs without worrying about Wizards, and do their own thing.

And I know, your table is your table - I get it.

It is hard to discuss feelings about the whole situation since the toxicity is very high everywhere, with the remaster dividing the community. People feel the classic dragons and fantasy standards would be a part of the game - and they still are - but they are not in the new books. And the community wants to stop player loss, so they lean into calling people who feel "I am losing something" as stupid and unreasonable (to silence them and prevent the feeling from taking hold), which drives people feeling this way away for good.

Here's a hint, if people in the community have fears and concerns - don't attack them or call them dumb.

Some places that were the best and most inviting in the Pathfinder community are mocking people with these feelings instead of discussing them and working things out. If that happened to me, I would walk from the game and community and never return. The books would get sold the same day. And I see it happening, and it is the moderator's fault for letting this go out of control. The community is losing people for good with every thread that turns into a flame fest.

Nothing much is changing, and you can still have everything as it was. Everything is fine. This is one of those rare cases of the game being okay but the narrative and community spinning wildly out of control.

If I were a third party producer?

Here comes the Kickstarter for Classic Monsters and Character Options for Pathfinder 2 Remastered!

Seriously people. That is an easy win. Easy. Somebody do that and END THIS.

Seriously.

They are chasing people out of the Pathfinder 2 community for good - for no good reason other than them wanting to win an argument and get likes. They should be leaving, not the good people we are losing.

And the fears are justified.

More fallout from Wizards and more reasons to never go back to them. They are still hurting communities months later. I also feel Paizo is being unreasonable by memory-holing so many familiar terms and fantasy standards. The game will be more challenging to transition into, and you will find more people sticking with one or the other instead of trying both.

It is a mess.

But on a more "look and feel" level, Pathfinder no longer feels familiar. I entered that world with 1e, and I like that edition's style and mature fantasy feeling. Pathfinder 2's art feels a bit too "pop" to me, with photobombs, selfies, Pokemon pets, and other Internet meme elements entering the art and style, with way too much steampunk standing in for modern technology.

I am too used to the pseudo-3.5E the original game started as, and I feel, "That was the promise to me." So, no, Pathfinder 2e's world, and even more so, the 2.5e world, does not feel the same. It is not a fantasy one anymore; this is steampunk. The lore is changing, too, from "generic fantasy" to "Paizo fantasy." I like the lore, but this limits the game's usefulness to me, in the same way using a Star Wars RPG would play in my own sci-fi settings. I will play generic fantasy with OSR games, C&C, or non-Wizards 5E.

The language of Pathfinder is changing too. What was familiar because of 3.5 is now a step removed in terminology. This is another barrier to entry for the rest of us used to things meaning commonly accepted meanings and having a product line with redefined words all over the place. The average consumer isn't going to be able to grasp that, and I know how easy it sounds - but things have failed to resonate with consumers for less than this.

They should have just gone with Creative Commons and the 5.1 SRD. The ORC license feels like it backed them into a corner, and they have to change the game too much.

At this point, I would be more excited about the setting if they mixed Starfinder and Pathfinder into one setting (and set of rules) and did an epic science-fantasy blend of the two. Make Starfinder optional, but combine the settings and rules. This way, you could do "magi-tech" instead of steampunk, and the game's technology would work the same way.

That would feel highly compelling and give the world purpose and reason.

Starfinder should be an optional setting expansion for Pathfinder 2.5 with no main rulebook but expansion books focusing on classes, tech, and powers. Unify the magic systems and rules. Import the ancestries' and backgrounds.

And the alien aspects of the new 2.5 world would feel right for a science-fantasy universe. Dungeon Crawl Classics pulls this off nicely, and they show you can have a science-fantasy world and still have it feel like fantasy.

Give me one game with one setting in one world - and the science-fantasy part as the optional expansion content. That would feel right to me and help me get over these feelings of things changing. You could have a modernized and clean Pathfinder 2.5 and a brand-new Starfinder under one roof and system. Everything could work and play together nicely, and we would have a bigger game and sandbox.

But otherwise, this is a dark time, and it is worsening.

I hope things get better in the Pathfinder community and they can work this out. The feelings and fears are valid. How the community addresses them is a considerable challenge; from what I see, they need to rise to the occasion.

Cypher: Starfinder

I love the Starfinder setting; the rules are one of the best 3.5-style science fiction games. I don't have the time to play it and manage all the characters I want to run. I tried, but when you struggle to run five characters with printouts of 4-5 pages each, you wonder if this much work is worth the trouble.

I have the same problem with Pathfinder 1 and 2. The games are far too in-depth for my time during the day, and the effort is not worth the fun I get from the system. I don't doubt the depth and detail are incredible for some players and groups; I played these and appreciate the incredible designs and options.

And I flip through the Starfinder adventures, and it is page after page of stat blocks for monsters. Yes, the challenge! But can we do better? Is roleplaying storytelling or World War II wargaming? If I want the ultimate tabletop experience, I will play Pathfinder 2.

My time with the Cypher System has really been an eye-opener. I plated rules-light narrative games such as FATE and Index Card RPG, and these are incredible games that keep character sheets simple while focusing on narrative flow. FATE is still a fantastic game, one of those classic pick-up-and-play gems.

Cypher is entirely different; it keeps play simple while providing a 5E level of depth in the character options. And it dispenses with monster stat blocks entirely. The characters aren't 4-5 page PDF printouts I feel endlessly waste paper. I can maintain sheets by hand.

With Cypher, I sit down, turn on some music, and play. Since the level of "GM prep" is near zero, I don't need to spend any time getting a dungeon laid out, encounters built, treasures stocked, monsters selected, and all sorts of flipping through GM books or adventures to begin. I use my solo-play oracle, generate some starting situations, and get playing as the Cypher System flow takes over, and "me as GM" is not rolling dice and just presenting the challenges. "Me as the player" is rolling the dice.

And if I want to rate challenges of anything from skill checks to monsters, it is all on the 1-10 scale.

What is that, those Starfinder space goblins? That would be a level 2 monster, and maybe the special ones with heavier weapons would do 4 damage on a hit. I do not need to look at stats, books, or special attacks and defenses. The low level of detail in the Starfinder game does not matter; only the general challenge level and the few special rules that may apply to a monster, such as special attacks and defenses or multiple attacks.

If I pick a monster token I know nothing about, I would guess the abilities or look it up in a book, but I keep the design fast and loose, using generalities to determine monster abilities. Weakness in an element would ease the elemental attack, whereas resistance would hinder the same. You could do elemental immunities. Armor. Special attacks. All of it is easily translated, and it is a more straightforward translation than games like GURPS or Savage Worlds.

I could use the Cypher System for the rules to play in the universe and tell stories. If I want the whole experience of the rules, I will use the rules. Right now, my playtime is minimal, and while I enjoy the whole experience of the Starfinder system, I just don't have the time to play it and maintain a collection of characters.

Is Starfinder compelling enough to play with another system? The big draw of Starfinder is the crunch and rules. The setting? It is good, but a part of me says if you want to play in that universe, use the Starfinder rules. You pay for the stat blocks and playtesting with the adventures, so you should use and appreciate them. So no, I won't convert.

I made this decision by reading the Dead Suns adventure path and realizing the structure of that module:

• 50% is combat with finely-tuned encounters
• 25% is exploration glue between combats (maps, etc.)
• 25% is guidance on the DC checks needed to progress the story for the first two

Throw out the rules, and you are mostly throwing out the adventure. So to be fair, this was made to play and show off how great Starfinder is, so it is unfair to replace rules and kinda-sorta play through a story that is the glue for the encounters. I also have a problem with many Paizo adventures; they tend to focus on combat more than discovery or problem-solving - but they play to their audience, of which I am a part, so I can't complain.

I could have 80-90% of the same science-fantasy experience with Numenera. What is missing? Starships? Add them in and do inter-system travel. Star elves or any of the fun races? Add them in. Again, I hit the quandary of conversions. How much of what you like or want about the system is there, really? I feel the same with settings like the Forgotten Realms and Greyhawk; very little I like about those settings is tied to the setting itself. Dark Sun? A generic "fantasy desert survival" world with "dragon emperors" and their "sorcerer kings" painted with a roughly savage Conan-style brush would work for me. I could play that with anything from GURPS to Cypher System.

This is also the problem of current-day Wizards of the Coast. All they see is what is problematic about a setting, and they are blind to what makes a setting excellent and engaging. You could rebuild a 5E Dark Sun along the thinking I laid out, and there would not be anything problematic about it, and the setting would be re-engineered towards the flavor and fun of the original game world. Put "what is fun" on one side of the whiteboard and "what we would like to update" on the other. Make everyone oppressed by the evil rulers, and make the game about overthrowing them.

It is elementary to update these worlds, yet they don't do it.

But I feel the same way about Starfinder. My starship captain and about 4 NPCs form the group's core. None of them are strongly tied to Starfinder. As long as I have "space science fantasy" with a few "classic fantasy in space" tropes, that is 80-90% of what I want anyways. Numenera fits them well.

I am falling out of the conversion game and more just doing what I want these days or playing settings how they were intended to be played.

Starfinder: Much Better as a Hexcrawl

No shade is thrown at those who play the adventure paths and love them, but I have been playing Starfinder as a hex-crawl and love this. This is my sort of Heavy Metal-inspired randomly generated world, where all the ancient civilizations on these worlds were Pathfinder 1e, the worlds destroyed and forgotten over millennia of war, and then sci-fi civilizations try to tame these worlds and setup cities and colonies on them.

And those sci-fi civilizations are all at war with each other to control the only supergiant solar system in the galaxy. A "throne world" system so large, with so many worlds, with so many ancient treasures and raw resources the faction that controls this system can set up an empire that lasts thousands of years and will reach thousands of light-years away.

So these worlds have ancient temples in them (hello reused Pathfinder 1e dungeons), and sci-fi factions constantly invading, landing mercenaries, conducting starfighter raids, hiring defenders, exploring, settling, repairing destroyed infrastructure, and building armies to try to hold these precious worlds for a while. You have free traders and mercs operating their own fleets and selling services, planetary directors in charge of rebuilding and exploration, and all sorts of stuff happening.

Lost Pathfinder 1e magic items like +2 swords and staffs of wizardry and priceless artifacts. There are black markets for things like that, and groups interested in ancient magic that would pay - or kill - to have them.

And between planets, starships roam, setup no-go zones, control space, piracy & trade are rampant, and there is a lot going on up there.

Beginner Box

Part of why I felt so turned off Starfinder was my beginner box experience. The money was too tight. Rewards were strictly controlled. You were given a free starship. The story felt a bit like a railroad and had you working for undead factions that your lawful good space paladin may honestly never wish to even associate with. There was a bar encounter that felt like it assumed combat (in a packed nightclub) and did not really present alternate ways to resolve the problem, like hacking, sneaking in when the place was closed or other "great idea" sort of approaches.

And it did not feel like it had that sense of freedom that I wanted from a sci-fi game. Yes, the beginner box is excellent for teaching rules and concepts, but what I love about sci-fi is not structured story scenarios - it is the freedom to go anywhere and do anything. Playing this adventure I felt there was not much else out there beyond the story. There was another dungeon level that you could fill in yourself as an expanded part of the experience; but I would have loved a mini-area of a moon, a bunch of hexes, that the team was hired to explore, and you were free to fill that in with suggested locations, mini-maps of destroyed stations you could put down and fill in, resources and treasures to find, and even some of the hexes start a small starship battle.

More Hex-Crawl Please!

I now have the freedom to help a faction settle an area of the map, sort of like Kingmaker, or become a leader in the faction myself. I can even hex-crawl in a starship in space if I create a map of an asteroid field or an uncharted area of a moon. There are probably space stations (for different factions) with tons of missions to take, like cargo hauling, starfighter raids, rescue missions, recovery ops, VIP transport, passengers, and any other thing you can imagine.

Money is still tight, but with infinite random encounters, dungeons, and resources out there that is my problem to solve - not what the module will give us next (and we will be disappointed again they are being too stingy with rewards).

That alone is a huge change.

You want money for gear?

Get off your butt, there are plenty of unexplored hexes out there and random tables to roll on. Better yet, make a deal with a faction interested in the area to clear those hexes out, for a price, so they can resettle them and rebuild those ruined agricultural farms, hydro stations, and monorail lines.

And take all the loot sitting there as bonus cash.

Maybe you will even find lost ancient ruins.

How much do you think 700 ancient gold pieces will get us again? Are they worth more melted down or to a collector? Can we find a collector? What about this strange knife that radiates magic? And this scroll with this ancient writing on it? How much do you think it is worth? What about this wand? Do you think even asking around is going to make us a huge target by black-market thieves? Can we use any of this stuff?

And we need a mech if we ever want to take care of that purple worm living at the Ag-Farm. Gonna be expensive, but the reward will be worth it. And I am sure once we go down in the worm tunnels we will find even more loot. Bring a flamer.

And the setting I created too, a near-infinite system of strange worlds, ancient ruins, hundreds of factions, and open wars with each other keeps things interesting and gives me that Heavy Metal vibe I wanted. I don't want "quiet planets mostly at peace with each other" - I want conflict. I want multiple factions in every world - and between them - and a situation that keeps changing. It is rare for one faction to control a single world. Installations are won and lost. The battle lines change. Factions take losses and look for help. Evil factions grow in power and need to be pushed back. Ancient factions, such as dragons, still live on these worlds and deal with outsiders.

Good stuff.

Pathfinder Magic Weapons in Starfinder

So in a mixed Pathfinder - Starfinder game the question comes up, how do you handle magic weapons?

Just treating them as normal Pathfinder weapons will not make them awesome. Seriously, I would toss a +3 longsword away around level 8 when the better weapons come online. Starfinder exists in this strange reality where melee weapons can do a LOT of damage, so here is what I did, and this works within Hero Lab Online.

For every "plus" in damage, add one base damage die. Make these custom melee weapons so you can change the name, and add the hit modifier after the fact, so this +1 longsword would actually attack at melee +2 and do 2d8. Ignore the +2 damage of Pathfinder and only up the base dice.

This makes weapons up to a +5 do 6d8 S damage with a hefty to-hit modifier, making them viable all the way up to level 18. The white-star plasma sword at level 18 does 8d8 E & F damage but does not get the very nice and possibly unbalancing +5 to-hit modifier. Less damage, way better hit, feels like a trade-off, especially when you consider the level 20 plasma sword doing 10d8 E & F damage.

That +5 sword is still gonna be viable against tougher targets even at level 20 since it will hit 25% more for a little more than half damage of the big one. Still, against a nearly invulnerable foe, that may make all the difference. Also, if the sword is flaming it will do S& F damage, so more modifications are possible given the weapon's enchantments.

This will make all those magic swords, daggers, axes, and other ancient weapons lying around those ruins and tombs in my current campaign all the more valuable and attractive to players, collectors, and anyone else wanting to get their hands on some old-school pointy steel.

Hero Lab Online: Starfinder

I am back in Starfinder for a while and decided to check out the Hero Lab Online (subscription, expensive) product for creating characters. In my first campaign, I used the Starbuilder app (an excellent app, one price for everything), and as I suspected there were differences between the characters I built.

My one issue with Starbuilder was having to use Android to manage characters. I have an Android tablet, but I love typing and working on a PC screen so it was an annoyance to have to cloud transfer the PDFs around so I could have them elsewhere. I just work faster and more free on a PC, where I can look for character images, type a lot of text quickly for backgrounds, and generally work more comfortably than on a tablet.

Also, Pathbuilder 2e (the Pathfinder 2e app) is coming out with a free web version, which I find highly interesting.

Hero Lab Online is very nice. They made some strange UI choices where I am chasing down errors in different tabs, the equipment lists feel arbitrarily divided up between tabs, and I do miss editing the data files or crafting my own - maybe they will implement this in the future and let us create custom entries. Some of this is due to odd choices in Starfinder where mechanics have to have a "custom rig" attached to a particular type of tool kit, you click on the error, and it does not tell you where to go, what to buy, or what to do. They have special pieces of equipment called things like "hacking kit w/custom rig" that you buy and the error goes away.

Also, my complete Pathfinder 1e Hero Lab collection is now online. Very nice. Considering I can use anything in Pathfinder 1e in a Starfinder game, this doubles my content for monsters, races, characters, and all sorts of craziness. The subscription fee? Not too bad, but I have a lot of Starfinder books I want to have fun with, so I either pay up and have a tool that makes my life easy, or these are going back in a box and I am not having any fun with them.

So, why back to Starfinder...?

Pathfinder 1e

Sorry, Pathfinder 1e is still a great game played by many people, and I have 13 years of books I can use with Starfinder. Now,  I can't go an give a Starfinder character the Pathfinder alchemist class, but I am free to have an alchemist NPC as a part of a campaign. I can toss a purple worm at the party and watch them blast it with rocket launchers. I can use a classic Pathfinder 1e vampire and put her in a starfighter. Any one of the classic dragons can show up, wearing powered armor with miniguns on the sides of their helmet and air-to-air missiles mounted on their back.

Lucifer himself from Tome of Horrors Complete could show up and start demanding planets surrender to him, and then sending his generals around to conquer worlds and the players racing around trying to stop his dastardly plans in epic adventures and massive star battles.

Lucifer, from Frog God Games' Tome of Horrors Complete

Cool stuff.

Heavy Metal stuff.

Kick ass, wild ass crazy stuff Appendix N sort of stuff we only get from Dungeon Crawl Classics. But this time with heavy weapons, mechs, starships, tanks, fighter jets, and freaking lasers.

Guns, lots of guns. Rock music too.

The true "Pathfinder in space" stuff we were promised.

Stuff I have game stats for and is 90% compatible with Starfinder (conversion guide in the back of the main Starfinder rulebook).

The Campaign?

I am staying away from the Starfinder adventure paths, maybe I will steal parts as filler, but the campaign I want exists hundreds of years in the future, way out on the edges of explored space, so far away from Absolom Station that people derisively call that place "The Core" and they live in an area of space called The Shattered Expanse, a frontier area of former fantasy worlds and civilizations that gone sci-fi. That Heavy Metal campaign of countless worlds and endless wars.

Those sci-fi matte paintings of a planet, with a few giant planets in the sky, with moons around them, and more moons painted in for good measure. And every one of those giant planetary moons that should cause massive tidal waves on this world - every one of those planets is a hexcrawl.

And there are hundreds of moons and planets in the central supergiant star of this area of space called Titan, and they are all being fought over by different space factions. You conquer Titan, and every star within hundreds of light-years shall be yours just because of the wealth, resources, raw energy, and space for the population you will have.

Systems like this are the throne of empires.

And there shall be good factions, space paladins, space orcs, star elves, scheming drow in space, neutral factions, dwarf miners, goblin traders, kobolds and space dragons, space demons, undead moons, gnoll space pirates, hobgoblin mercenaries, space vampires in giant goth temples, good guys, bad guys, races of robots, android societies, and whatever.

I start off simple, on a resort world (generated with the tools at donjon) ravaged by war, between the space paladin factions and the star demons, with opportunist space orc raiders coming in to try to stake a claim here, and expand from there. Put a neutral corporate faction, allied with goblin traders (the more World of Warcraft corporate goblins and not Paizo's) trying to hire mercenaries and reopen the resorts to make money.

Since all of these worlds were once "Pathfinder 1e fantasy worlds" and have been for thousands of years, lots of lost civilizations, temples, old-school monsters, magic items, scrolls, artifacts, magic +2 swords, and other powerful stuff lying around - and adventures and exploration to have. Maybe there are even forgotten civilizations of people that don't know anything is going on out there and are still living in medieval villages and grand castles. Lost tribes of lizardmen. Dragons that plot to manipulate the outsiders. Elemental temples of evil.

Subdivide these 20-mile hexes into 2-mile mini hexes, stock them randomly with ruins, lairs, encounters, crashes starships, small settlements, and all sorts of hex-crawl crack and we are good to go.

Heavy Metal: The Hex Crawl featuring Starfinder with special guest star Pathfinder 1e.

I am keeping it simple.

Everything Pathfinder 1e compatible I got.

In one epic hex-crawl game covering multiple worlds and all the space between.