Looking back at 2017: Pathfinder/Starfinder

Looking back at this post from January this should be a pretty short item, right? 

This is the year I stopped running Pathfinder. I'm still playing it in my friend's Kingmaker campaign, but even in that once-a-month game we only played about 6 times this year. Most of this is due to scheduling issues more than anything else but I'd still say as a group we are less excited about Pathfinder than we used to be.

We had a fight that took up roughly 5 hours. There were plenty of interruptions and distractions but still, that's a lot of time for one combat. If we're going to spend that kind of time on battles I'd rather play 4th Edition or Champions. Pathfinder rewards (some might say requires) system familiarity quite a bit and with us only playing it once a month (or once every two months) we get rusty and the game plays slow. I suspect a group that plays every week would wonder what in the hell we are talking about  but we cannot manage to do that anymore.

I still like the game in general. I still have adventures for it that I would like to run. I'm just not sure when that is going to happen.

Then there is Starfinder - the game I was so middling about that I haven't finished reading the PDF. When it comes to sci-fi fantasy mixes I have Shadowrun, Rifts, and Star Wars and I'd probably go with any of those before I start up a Starfinder game - at least that's how I feel right now.  I'm sure it's a decent game but it's in a niche I have well-covered already.

Will I run either of them in 2018? Who knows? Starfinder I might give a test run if I ever finish reading the rules - a one-off if nothing else. Pathfinder might sneak back in if we end up unsatisfied with 5E for some reason or maybe a limited run through a specific adventure. Neither one is really at the top of the list anymore though.