Wednesday, April 7, 2010

Steampunk Classes, Part I

After two playtest sessions (ridiculously adventurously fun sessions, by the way), I'm looking into some of the rules and assumptions I started out with in this Steampunk Campaign Setting I'm working on.

I've been using the Fantasy Flight Games book Sorcery and Steam as a jumping off point (it's 3e generic, but it's pretty in line with the way I want to run things).

The basic pathfinder classes I want to use are:

Barbarian
Bard
Fighter
Ranger
Rogue
Sorcerer

I'm also considering the Cavalier, which is a marshall/knight type of class if you're familiar with 3.5.

Today I'm mulling also over the Musketeer class, which is presented in S&S as a unique character class. It's fraught with dead levels, which is something Pathfinder doesn't take kindly to, so I've been thinking of how to modernize it for the system. But I was thinking, does the musketeer need his/her own class? Couldn't a fighter accomplish the same?

What about the artificer class? This is also in S&S and it's essentially a skilled (8 skill points per level like the rogue) character who gets craft-related special abilities. I think something like this class is essential in a technologically advanced setting. It's especially relevant (and appealing) in a gestalt game (which mine will be, if you recall) due to the fact that you can be a creator character without sacrificing pulpy action (by taking a fighter class or something similar in conjunction with the artificer class).

Any other thoughts? What classes would (or wouldn't) work well in a world where religion isn't (necessarily) relevant and magic is outlawed but existent?

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