I have a pretty massive update for everyone today, everything mostly focused on game balance. We’ve been getting a lot more playtest recently with high level characters, and there has been a lot of edits reported by the public discord crowd. All of you, thank you for what you do.
General Changes
-Reworked the Cone (X) weapon trait, to make it more clear the exact dimensions of a cone
-New special rule under the Acrobatics skill: flying creatures can use acrobatics instead of pilot for all pilot checks
-New special rule under the pilot skill: piloted vehicles and robots with vehicle locomotion can make pilot checks to replace athletics, acrobatics, strength, or agility checks.
-Removed Reference on page 22 (CRB) that Instinct is used for Tactics
-Changed the ‘Addiction’ section of chemicals to more accurately resemble the addiction rules in the respective chemical entry.
-Page 249, removed reference of Chemical Threshold under the Cybernetic Organ description
Terran Changes
-Master Gymnast used to give unlimited evasion attempts. Now it gives +1 per round
-Legendary Gymnast no longer causes all attacks against you to suffer disadvantage. Instead, you reduce all hailfire of attacks against you by 1 and missed attacks only gain half penetration.
-Shotgun Hitman specialization in Dominion Intel Briefing now gives +4 accuracy when used with shotgun spread.
-The Special Forces master specialization has changed:
-Now, you apply the modifier to reduce ammo expenditure after all multipliers to ammo spent
-The tactics benefit that allows you to activate all tactics is capped at the DC 15 benefit if you activate all tactics, or the DC 20 benefit if you have master tactician talent.
-The first ability of Icon of Mankind has changed. Instead of gaining a free morale point when rallying, Inspirational Rally allows your followers to use your morale bonus instead of their own when you are using a leadership combat augmentation on them.
-The Upgraded Turret talent in Supplement 2 has been changed. Now it, it always makes the base gun the automatic variant (Heavy Gauss Rifle or Gauss Cannon), but also has an underslung version of a heavy weapon (Flamethrower or Rocket Launcher) that has a limited number of shots per day.
-The Shotgun Spread talent no longer gives Hailfire when used. It’s previous Hailfire invalidated other cone weapons, namely flamethrowers. Instead, it is a Cone (6) at rank 1 and Cone (10) at rank 2.
Protoss and Zerg Changes
-The Subterranean Spike primal zerg evolution now requires a full-round action to use. It now specifies that it uses melee skill and talents, not that it is used as a substitute for a melee attack.
-The Robotic Domination ability of the Aiur Artificer (SUP 3, PG 39) now specifies it does not affect targets over gargantuan sized.
Equipment
-Combat Stimulants have been changed. They now only last 5 rounds, cause the loss of 1 healing threshold per 3 potency, and cause you to use thrice as much ammo when you gain Hailfire 2 from stims.
-Directorate Boarding Saw lost Hailfire (2) but gain +11 base damage and +4 rending.
-Specified under equipment tiers, PG 93, that tier 3 items cannot generally be purchased unless their base cost is 1,000 or less.
-Under the Regenerative Nanobots cybernetic upgrade (page 250), remove the section that the nanobots reduce the effectiveness of toxins and chemicals. Instead, it gives +2 to Endurance checks against poison.
-The Ripper Claws Cybernetic Upgrade (CRB, Page 251) gained +2 damage, +1 accuracy, and the Unarmed weapon trait.
-The servo claw cybernetic upgrade (CRB, page 251) gained the unarmed weapon trait and improved to average attack speed
-The Phase Gauntlet weapon (SUP 5, PG 116), gained +2 damage but has a slow attack speed
-Vindicator Powered Armor (SUP 5, PG 119), gained +1 damage resistance. The Tal’darim Blasphemer and Tal’darim Commander NPCs received +1 DR to their statistics entries for this change.
Talents
-Mobile Attacker Talent now gives 1 defense per rank while action moving
-The benefits for pistol finesse and knife master rank 2 have been improved. The second ranks give +1 damage per point of agility and +1 penetration per 2 points of agility.
-Pistolier no longer gives bonus defense, but gives you a free aim action when you bob and weave
-The Focused Attack talent (SUP 2) specifies it does not work with area of effect attacks
Swarms
*Major* Continuing our quest for the perfect swarm rules, we have changed swarms once again. This time, our changes are based on giving swarms a more realistic size while also making AOE attacks more effective against them.
-Swarms are now 4 size categories larger than the base creatures, instead of 2 sizes. Their space is now eight times that of the base creature, instead of 4.
-Area of effect attacks gain additional hailfire when targeting swarms. Bursts gain +1 hailfire per burst area, cones gain +1 hailfire per 2 cone value, and lines gain +1 hailfire per 4 hailfire. All these effects can gain a maximum of +4 hailfire from area attacks, stacking with other sources of hailfire.
-Swarms now gain +20 extra toughness instead of +10
-Swarm ranged attacks gain +2 burst instead of +1
-The base swarm rules has sections on how swarms interact with the Burning and Melting conditions
Vehicles
*Major* There has been another major change to combat speed for vehicles. Now, when you are at combat speed, you cannot free move, but instead perform 4 moves a turn at 0%, 25%, 50%, and 75% of your current speed. This is to prevent exploit exploits that involved characters moving at high speeds to get defensive bonuses, but just driving in tiny circles.
-The extremely maneuverable vehicle trait now allows free movement WITHIN combat speed, instead of outside of it.
-Flying vehicles can, at combat speed, sacrifice half forward movement for vertical movements, instead of full transfer.
-Several pilot maneuvers have been changed for how they work for the combat speed change: Extreme Turn, Powered Reverse, Power Turn, Evasive Break, Exotic Maneuver
-The Backlash Rocket Battery of the Banshee now holds 240 rockets instead of 48. The BLRB is the banshee’s only weapon, and it needs to be able to hold a large number of these munitions.
-The pheonix’s gravity beam now properly states it goes against defense and toughness. It’s accuracy bonus is increased to +15. The Phoenix can now not move while the gravity beam is active.
-The Cloaking Device vehicle equipment now specifics that it requires a minor action to activate, or a free action to sustain or deactivate.
-Specified for Starship Scale combat (PG 142), that the rules for facing only effects massive and targets larger than massive, not colossal-sized.
-Specified in Rapid Flight descriptor section (Page 242, CRB), that acceleration does replace normal fly speed, and rapid flight is activated as a move action when the flyer choses to fly beyond their acceleration rating.
-The Arbiter vehicle in Supplement 3 has been updated to have 2 crew actions like other extremely large vehicles. This replaces its command crew trait. The cloaking field and psionic powers now require crew actions.
Psionics
*Major* New section in the psionics chapter about Duration Keywords that determine how long your powers last. This may seem a small change, but it makes the nature of some ongoing powers much more clear.
-Instant Powers: Effects of power are resolved immediately
-Persistent Powers: Power is active until the duration ends
-Sustained Powers: Power is active as long as you pay the energy fatigue cost at the start of your turn
-Channeled Powers: Power is active until dismissed at the start of your turn or until you recover energy fatigue
-The Brimestone Form psionic power does not cause you to lose healing thresholds anymore; instead, it simply causes a hit of 30 piercing damage every round. PL 10, which previously caused you not to lose healing thresholds, no longer exists.
-The fire created by Conflagration does not deal damage per square moved through.
NPC Updates
-All swarms in SUP 1&4 have been updated for the swarm changes.
-The Advanced Repair Bot (robot NPCs, Core Rulebook) now costs 8,000 credits.
-The Reaper (SUP2 Page 218) gained and update to it’s attack profile based on the change to the Pistol Finesse II talent.
-Updated the following NPC’s abilities for the changes to Special Forces Master Specialization: Ghost Senior Operative (SUP 2), Elite Marauder (SUP 2), Spectre Anti-Hero (SUP 2), James Raynor (PotG), Tychus Findlay (PotG), and Nova Terran (PotG).
-Updated the following NPC’s abilities for changes to Icon of Mankind: Directorate Colonel (EGttS) and James Raynor (PotG)
-Updated the Directorate Scientist for the changes to the Upgraded Turret talent.
-Updated the Phoenix NPCs for the changes to the Phoenix’s gravity beam, both the Templar Phoenix (SUP 3) and Tal’darim Phoenix (SUP 5).
-Updated the Banshee NPCs for the changes to Banshee ammunition supply (SUP 2)
-The protoss Reaver has had its Scarab Detonation area doubled to Burst 12, and now clarifies that you must end your turn in the area to suffer damage.
-Fixed entries in the Oracle and Corsair piloted vehicle NPCs for up to date versions of the Spiral Motions ability of the Nerazim pilot