Starfinder Adds Starship Combat in New Starship Operations Manual

Starfinder's next major expansion adds tons of rules for manning and battling a starship. Today, Paizo releases its brand new Starship Operations Manual, a new rulebook that contains an expansive guide to operating a starship in your Starfinder campaign. Starfinder is a TTRPG set in space and previously included basic rules for using a starship in your campaign, but the Starship Operations Manual greatly expands on those options, providing rules for increased combat options, letting players run everything from a starship squadron to a full-blown armada battle.

Squadron combat provides players with the option to design a squadron of lower tier starships whose total power roughly equates to that of a fully operation spaceship. These squadrons can be used to give players individual options in battle, so an entire party isn't committed to a single course of action. Because squadron ships are small, they tend to rely more on minor actions that emphasize teamwork and usually require swapping between roles based on a starship's immediate needs.

Armada combat is the opposite of squadron combat in many ways, as it provides players with an entire fleet to command. Different kinds of fleets have customizable special abilities, and damage is calculated for the fleet as a whole as opposed to focusing damage on a specific fleet. Certain types of fleets are also strong against certain other kinds of fleets and weak against others, which provide bonuses or penalties during the gunnery phase.

You can check out some preview pages provided by Paizo down below. The Starfinder Starship Operations Manual goes on sale today for $39.99.