Esotericist (Starfinder Archetype)
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The secrets of magic are numerous and wondrous, but in an era of constant technological advancement such as the far future of Starfinder, it can seem very much like pure magic is falling somewhat by the wayside in the areas where it cannot be made useful to technology. Heck, the canon reason why no 9th level spellcasting exists in Starfinder 1st edition by default is that nobody is willing to put in the time to focus on the secrets of a magical discipline to get to those rare high level spells when it’s so much more practical to develop other magical abilities and integrate technology at least somewhat into their lives. A message spell is only 25 words, after all, but your average modern SMS program can tap out over 8 times that and send it much further in most cases.
But there are those that seek to preserve and rediscover those waning arcane traditions, and in doing so become known as esotericists, taping into magical secrets that most consider lost or too impractical for regular use.
Some may use the term derisively, suggesting that these mages are putting too much focus on what amounts to archaeological trivia over the practical, and conversely, many esotericists view technology as a diluting factor in the potential of magic, but there is no denying that these mages have incredible power over their own magic and the magic of others.
While most of these mages are mystics, precogs, or witchwarpers, there are also technomancer esotericists. Less eager to dismiss technology, these enthusiasts look upon the magical works of old and see only opportunities for to blend the old and new.
As you might expect, this archetype is only available to casters, and all it’s class features are optional, some able to be gained more than once.
Some gain great skill at identifying spells, items, and creatures, as well as disabling or manipulating magical items.
Others gain an additional reserve of power, albeit one that can only be used to cast a spell that does not interact with technology in any way.
Others still can spend resolve to resist having their spells disrupted.
A few esotericists focus on one or more schools of magic, becoming not just skilled at identifying them, but also at reflexively casting to disrupt such magic as it forms.
Others achieve a flow state letting them reflexively cast a spell of a chosen school in the seconds after disrupting the spell of a foe with a little resolve.
Tapping into the metamagical practices of old, some learn to enhance the area, range, duration, or number of targets of their spells a few times a day with a chosen school.
Others expand this to shaping two schools this way.
Powerful masters learn the art of enhancing the raw damage of a spell to devastating effect.
Additionally, while technomancer esotericists are rare, the archetype includes two magical hacks for them. The first allows them to use magic to temporarily improve a simple or archaic weapon to be on part with modern armaments. The second allows them to mimic the magi of old and grant temporary weapon fusions to a weapon.
The flexibility of the possible class options here is robust, so there are a lot of potential builds to play with here, whether you wanna focus on bolstering or inhibiting a specific school of magic (honestly such a rarity seeing magic schools matter in Starfinder 1e) or you might focus on shaping your favorite school or what have you. You should definitely have one or two schools you like in mind when choosing this archetype though, so keep that in mind for your build.
It's funny to me that one of the powers this archetype can give you lets you spend resolve to resist losing a spell when you’re disrupted by something like an attack of opportunity. Because you would think that would be something in the base game. Things like that make the confession that Starfinder started out as a smokescreen to hide the existence of Pathfinder 2e in development make so much sense. Also, I can’t imagine that this archetype will survive to see a version in SF2E, since every spellcasting class is 0-10 now.
Beyond that, There are several abilities in this archetype that allude to how most esotericists dislike using magic alongside technology, and that’s perfectly fine, but honestly I’d just as happily ignore that as far as lore-mechanics integration goes.
Having just finished defeating a petty tyrant trying to transform and enslave an entire population, the party feels like they’re ready to rest. However, they are approached soon after by a scholar of magic who points out some of the mystical power the villain was tapping into is lost knowledge from an earlier era. Finding out where he got such secrets is shaping up to be an adventure in it’s own right.
Driven to keep going without fully understanding why, the undead varculak known as Drifter only remembers their former skill with the arcane, but not why they know it or what their goals were. The only clue they have is a strange amulet that boasts impressive mystical power sleeping within that they only seem to activate in bursts.
Fascinated by transmutation magic in all it’s forms, Etxia eagerly studies all instances of magical transformation wherever they can. Their current project is their most ambitious yet: discover the true history of the strange beings known as Undershrikes, including what they were before their transformation.
