Forums: Playtest General Discussion: Shirren flight feats are fine, fellows (2024)

At 9th level a permanent flight Shirren has spent its heritage and two feats to have:

Speed 25
Flight 35

A 9th level Barathu has spent one feat to have:

Speed 20 (and sometimes a brief swim/climb)
Flight 25

So a net of one feat and one heritage to have +5 basic speed, +10 flight speed over the Barathu. If this was an elf or similar ancestry spending a heritage and a feat to get +10 speed over someone else, you'd say "gimme."

I remain silent on the rest of the Barathu vs. Shirren comparison, or indeed the Barathu vs. everyone comparison.

As far as flight equipment comparisons, the level 9 Shirren is +15 over a level 5 jetpack, only the very expensive level 19 version outspeeds it by +5, and they tie up a scarce armor upgrade slot that could be giving you an extra energy resistance or temp HP. The Ultralight Wings augmentation is better, with the level 9 version equaling your inherent speed and the level 12 doing 60 feet, but they occupy a very scarce augmentation slot. They also limit you to light armor, for any of the few melee builds that didn't plan to invest in enough dex at this point.

My main takeaway from this is that Barathu are slow and get left behind after a while. Maybe they need Ultralight Wings to keep up.

I'm just still kinda confused by the initial talk of "early flight ancestries" only for Shirren to have to wait until level 9 for it, like they're PF Tengu.

That's the confusion, and the concern point for me.

Nezuyo wrote:

I'm just still kinda confused by the initial talk of "early flight ancestries" only for Shirren to have to wait until level 9 for it, like they're PF Tengu.

That's the confusion, and the concern point for me.

They gave you an early flight ancestry in the Barathu as a species that makes no sense for it not to have flight. The Shirren are a species that traditionally never had flight and don't need it to survive, so they're trying out a middle ground that has an in universe justification (some bugs have vestigial wings that don't work great, Shirren are bugs) for a subspecies of Shirren, and then as a balance for the investment you have to do the eventual full flight is better than what the Barathu get.

Maybe everyone will hate it. I'm just pointing out the tradeoff and that it's not strictly worse than Barathu flight or no flight. A "Shirren start with flight" option would probably be somthing lame like 15' vestigial wings and never go faster, and you'd pay for it with a land speed reduction. You'd end up buying gear flight later anyway.

Perpdepog wrote:

Also, doesn't shirren flight key off their land speed? It's not a singular, fixed number like most flying PF2E options. That also means you can do things like wear Boots of Bounding or augment yourself with Speed Suspension and fly faster.

Oh, excellent point. A shirren could get +5-15 from speed suspension, and more from spells or precog quantum field or whatever.

Yeah and I don't like that balancing then, if I want to fly as a Bug dude then I want to basically whenever I want at Level 5 at the latest--make it slow at first at level 1 if it's needed then have a level 5 feet to upgrade it.

Once per day flight sucks ass when I want to play bug guy.

Gobhaggo wrote:

Yeah and I don't like that balancing then, if I want to fly as a Bug dude then I want to basically whenever I want at Level 5 at the latest--make it slow at first at level 1 if it's needed then have a level 5 feet to upgrade it.

Once per day flight sucks ass when I want to play bug guy.

Agreed, it really feels like Sf2e is being kneecapped or restrained by its Pathfinder compatibility. Really seems like the only reason they get flight at 9 is because that's how pathfinder does it.

Nezuyo wrote:

I'm just still kinda confused by the initial talk of "early flight ancestries" only for Shirren to have to wait until level 9 for it, like they're PF Tengu.

That's the confusion, and the concern point for me.

Many real insects are not born with wings and gain them later in life, so I think that's fine for shirren to get flight later. Barathu gets flight at 1st level so we do have an early flight ancestries, and will likely get more in later books.

DMurnett wrote:

Chiming in to say that for someone wanting to play a flying bug guy, yes, it's gonna be a bummer that Shirren don't have innate (or even especially low level) flight... But it's not like they're the once and forever bug ancestry of Starfinder. It's a very likely chance that we'll get a playable bug species that does have innate flight sooner or later. Just from a quick skim of AoN, 1e had plenty of arthropod species and some of them have innate flight. Yeah it's not gonna be on launch, but we're not even getting starship combat and archetypes on launch, it's not unreasonable to have to wait for a future splatbook to do a thing every now and then. Still waiting for more playable fey (satyr satyr please satyr) for PF2e myself.

But why? If flying PCs are something they want to show off (enough to specifically call them out), then why would they wait for a Splatbook to have them? I think it's naive to assume future races will have LVL 1 flying. They have made it clear that compatibility is important. In Pathfinder flying is at lvl 9 and Shirren shows us that Starfinder flying is going to be lvl 9. With the supposed "ranged meta" they claim, flying isn't op in combat since every enemy is going to have a gun/ranged attack. There likely isn't any cover for fliers either.

ElementalofCuteness wrote:

Besides there is a Bioaugmentation for wings! Enjoy.

More reason to give Shirren low level flight then!

Heart_of_the_Wildfire wrote:

DMurnett wrote:

Chiming in to say that for someone wanting to play a flying bug guy, yes, it's gonna be a bummer that Shirren don't have innate (or even especially low level) flight... But it's not like they're the once and forever bug ancestry of Starfinder. It's a very likely chance that we'll get a playable bug species that does have innate flight sooner or later. Just from a quick skim of AoN, 1e had plenty of arthropod species and some of them have innate flight. Yeah it's not gonna be on launch, but we're not even getting starship combat and archetypes on launch, it's not unreasonable to have to wait for a future splatbook to do a thing every now and then. Still waiting for more playable fey (satyr satyr please satyr) for PF2e myself.

But why? If flying PCs are something they want to show off (enough to specifically call them out), then why would they wait for a Splatbook to have them? I think it's naive to assume future races will have LVL 1 flying. They have made it clear that compatibility is important. In Pathfinder flying is at lvl 9 and Shirren shows us that Starfinder flying is going to be lvl 9. With the supposed "ranged meta" they claim, flying isn't op in combat since every enemy is going to have a gun/ranged attack. There likely isn't any cover for fliers either.

They aren't wiating for a splatbook to show off flying PCs. Barathu, my personal favorite ancestry in the system so far, has innate flight at level 1 and effectively no ground speed. The thing they're not giving it to at level 1 is the Shirren, and their gimmick is telepathy (admittedly underwhelming), not flight. To my knowledge this isn't even inconsistent with 1e so take it up with whoever first dreamt up the Shirren years ago not to have flight.

I'd also take the PF compatibility angle with a grain of salt. The thing they want is compatible rules, not to make Starfinder a supersized PF expansion. You're clearly not meant to just throw tech gear or a Barathu in your PF game, nor are you supposed to allow a poor Wizard in Starfinder where they have to choose between foregoing armor improvements entirely with a Flight Suit or instantly dying in the icy vacuum of space in their explorer's clothes. Any crossover between the two in your own home games is allowed and encouraged (I plan to allow blanket use of Lashuntas in one game of mine), but should be handled with great discretion.