#cache hack

(art by SiqNO on DeviantArt)

One of the greatest advancements in technomagic in Starfinder is the ability to set up a magical capacitor inside one’s spell cache to keep a single spell running all day, providing one, and then later several, constant buffs running at once.

Which is absolutely great! Buuuut the available spells that are listed for this ability is very limited and frankly kinda boring. Enhanced magical senses, flight, unseen servant, the ability to create a small habitable zone around yourself? Heck, there’s only one actual defensive option in all of that is lesser resistant armor, which is fine, it’s a very versatile spell. But it’s kinda bland.

I really can’t imagine any self-respecting technomancer, a class that is known to using tech to bend the rules of magic and magic to bend the rules of tech, would ever let themselves be so limited as to have one standardized set of semi-permanent spells, which brings us to today’s subject: Cache Hacks!

Despite the name, I severely doubt that most technomancers actually hacked their spell caches to make these spells available, more likely they custom-built said caches to have the spells they needed, programming them to suit their needs with custom code that no doubt is incomprehensible to most.

The end result is spellcasters that cast the spells they want to cast and enjoy the buffs they want to, which I think is for the best for everyone.

So the way this alternate feature works is, you choose a theme, which determines the suite of spells you gain. Additionally, this introduces spells with instantaneous durations and otherwise hostile spells with durations that you’d probably not want to have active all the time. In these cases, if such spells are chosen for the cache that day, they can instead be cast at will any time you want. Which sounds broken but let’s face it, despite the memes not every situation calls for fireball.

The list of themes for your cache hack are as follows.

Devastator, which focuses almost exclusively on damaging effects, as well as a few debuffs like sending a virus-like magical program to overburden a foe with false sensation. This is the cache of someone that expects to fight a lot and tries to destroy their foes as quickly as possible.

Genehacker, which focuses on hostile and beneficial polymorphing, with a dash of sense buffs, mobility, and utility. You could expect to see this on anyone with a fascination with polymorphing magic.

Holographic Arist, which carries illusion magic for defense, stealth, and deception, as well as a few summon spells that are implied to be hardlight replicas of the real creatures. Like the name suggests, they might be hologram artists or simply enjoy using them in their efforts to twist their enemy’s perception.

Junker, which naturally has a lot of spells that turn junk into weapons, armor, and supporting robots, as well as conjuring minibot support, and recharging unpowered tech. Perfect for the self-taught junkomancer on the edge of society.

Officer, which focuses on combat with a tactical edge, turning everything in the area to their advantage, giving them summons, junk weapons, invisibility, understanding languages, and other tactical spells. Good for a military or police officer looking to end conflict as efficiently and without loss of life and resources as possible.

Scholar, which has a lot of spells for knowledge utility, as well as ways to conjure assistants, have handy dandy ways of carrying equipment and finds, and buffing equipment when needed. Good for a researcher in the field.

Spymaster, specializing in steals that gather information and conceal themselves. This makes it perfect for magical espionage.

And finally, the technowitch, which is perhaps the weirdest, having debuffs and tricks in expected ways like cursing a foe with incompetence or remotely controlling a vehicle, or beneficial spells for themselves, such as invisibility, various self-polymorphs, flight, or even just conjuring a holographic lifting frame for when strength is required. A good choice for an especially tricky mage.

As we can see, there’s a lot of good options here that can help guide or complement your specific technomancer build, whether you focus on buffs, debuffs, blasting, or whatever. Feel free to complement these all-day spells with others that fill the same theme, but also don’t forget to diversify as well.

This class option started out in Character Operations Manual, but the fact that the full list of cache themes includes entries from Galactic Magic and even an Adventure Path makes one thing clear: This was meant to be homebrewed, so if you have a theme in mind that is coherent and makes sense, you can absolutely work with your GM to establish a list of spells for you to work with.

Secret Agent Bilpinub has been working for Galactic Peacekeeping for many years now, but the jububnan mage would never have gotten this far if he hadn’t tailored his personal spell cache with spells to make his presence unremarkable and his ability to collect data that much greater.

The party gets involved in a battle against a rogue military, and end up bringing down a horrific undead amalgamation of flesh and power armor called a gatecrasher with the help of guerilla technomancers and their specialized spells. The mages want to finish the thing off and be done with it, but in a moment of lucidity, the thing begs the party to take his pistol, weapon he’d grown to massive and twisted to hold, and bring it to his son on his homeworld, along with his final words.