How to add an automatic saving throw to an NPC ability

I have a custom NPC I am making in Starfinder. I want to add an ability that will automatically roll a saving throw for the target the way that most spells and some abilities do, and if they fail apply an effect. If possible I'd like it to roll for a duration too. I have no problem setting up attacks, even ones with critical effects, but I can't figure out the syntax necessary to get an attack or offensive ability to initiate a saving throw, much less automatically apply an effect. I've been looking at various NPCs and I can't actually find an example of an NPC ability that automatically rolls the saving throw or applies the effect, so I'm not even sure its possible. I can't find a tutorial on this, but its possible I'm searching the wrong terms. So if there is a well-known tutorial on how to set up NPCs with abilities that automatically apply the right effects I'd love to read/watch it. Possible or not, I appreciate your time and tips on this!

Moderator: Moved thread to the Starfinder forum. This is the best place to post questions about the Starfinder ruleset.

Thanks, I wasn't sure where to put it because it felt more like a general Fantasy Grounds design question, but I have no idea if the different systems function differently so I thought I'd start here. Sorry for the confusion on my part.

I think in Starfinder you'd need to create the ability as a spell and then drag that into the spells tab. This should set up a saving throw if you have set up the spell correctly.

There's not a way to automatically apply a condition on a failed save.

Okay, I'll fiddle with that. Thanks for the help! Its weird that there isn't a way to automatically apply effects, since there are a lot of similar (but not exactly the same) functions; like crits can add bleed, burn, or blind. And spells can roll for save and then properly halve the damage on the follow up roll. I'm not familiar with modding this software, though I've done it some custom work on the original Hero Lab. Are there any tools for modding FG? This isn't a big deal really, but now I'm curious about what it would take to add that specific function to the software. If it takes a lot of software dev experience then I'm out, I have a strong confidence with scripting jobs and modding games with tools, but I rarely write or modify any real amount of code.

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Originally Posted by EpicWin

Okay, I'll fiddle with that. Thanks for the help! Its weird that there isn't a way to automatically apply effects, since there are a lot of similar (but not exactly the same) functions; like crits can add bleed, burn, or blind. And spells can roll for save and then properly halve the damage on the follow up roll. I'm not familiar with modding this software, though I've done it some custom work on the original Hero Lab. Are there any tools for modding FG? This isn't a big deal really, but now I'm curious about what it would take to add that specific function to the software. If it takes a lot of software dev experience then I'm out, I have a strong confidence with scripting jobs and modding games with tools, but I rarely write or modify any real amount of code.

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You'll need some experience with Lua and xml coding if you want to write extensions. Effects and conditions are never automatically applied because there are so many cases where it shouldn't be applied. The target might have some ability that allows them to avoid it or they are immune to certain conditions or they may be able to avoid it in some other way.