This is the fourth section of Part Twenty of a series of articles looking at creating a set of Starfinder feats under specific constraints.  You can read along as we convert every feat in the PF core rulebook to Starfinder (and  share my thoughts on that process, as a developer and writer)— or you can just look at the finished feats (as they are written) here.

We’re well into the S feats, with Selective Channel, which requires us to examine one of the consistent differences between PF and Starfinder.

So in PF, when a cleric channels energy, they affect all creatures within range. This can set you up to heal your enemies, which is both both bad tactics and awkward to explain later at Thanksgiving dinner. The Selective Channel feat allows you to choose who you affect, so you can channel to heal allies and skip affecting foes, which is extremely useful.

However our closest analogue to channel energy in Starfinder is the healing channel ability of the mystic’s healer connection… and it already just affects your allies. Man, sometimes it’s like the designers of Starfinder decided to specifically simplify the game and make some of the most popular and common options baked-in to class design. ([MorganFreeman]”They did.”[/MorganFreeman]).

So that use of Selective Channel is out.

Luckily “selective” is a pretty broad term, so all we need is to create a new option for healing channel that involves someone making a choice of some kind.

SELECTIVE CHANNEL
Your allies can help fuel your healing powers.
Prerequisites: Healing channel class feature.
Benefit: When you use your healing channel ability, every ally you heal can choose to donate a Resolve Point to the effort. This decision is made in secret by each ally, then all revealed at once. For every ally that expends a Resolve Point, each healed all may choose to gain an additional 3 Hit Points per mystic level you possess, or 2 Stamina Points per healer level you possess.

That brings us to Self-Sufficient and, yeah, it’s another +2 to two skills feat we need to totally redesign. We can still apply the benefits to Medicine and Survival, but we need to take some liberties to make it a feat a player would consider taking.

SELF-SUFFICIENT
You are an expert at looking out for yourself.
Benefit: When you make a Medicine check with yourself as the only target, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus to your result. Additionally, anytime you spent Resolve Points to stay in the fight, you may make a Medicine check on yourself for first aid, treat deadly wounds, treat disease, or treat poison without taking an additional action to do so. Additionally, if you make a Survival check with yourself as the only target to endure severe weather or live off the land, you gain a +2 circumstance bonus to your result.

PATREON
This series of posts about my specific game writing and development process (along with concrete examples and Starfinder feats) is — like all my blog posts — is only possible if people join my Patreon, help me have the free time to write these things, and let me know what you want to see!