Rome [No Magic]


Homebrew and House Rules


On another board, someone mentioned they are planning a historical campaign based in Rome. I do not know if he plans on magic existing within the campaign world or not. However, I was curious how this might look if you used Pathfinder, but did not allow magic.

There certainly was mysticism in ancient Rome, so that would have to be accounted for. So what changes need to be made? If this is already covered in depth, just point me in the right direction.

Note: please do not tell me to just use another system. I am well aware of all the other wonderful RPGs out there. This is strictly an academic curiosity.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

At most I'd have oracles, but they would be few and far between.
Haruspex would be a kind of arcane...they told the future via entrails.
They also were alchemists to a point.
There's rules in Ultimate Combat for Roman age armor and bronze weapons.
It's totaly do-able.
I guess for the magic stuff you'd need to decide if the gods are real or not.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

On the Paizo store there's an Argonauts D20 system that might suit your purposes. It's a very cheap purchase.


Theres The New Argonauts thats a free download which is an ancient greece campaign setting. its free for download and you can search for it on either paizo or google. check it out for some details.

Sczarni

I think this could definitely work.

The following classes would likely be the ones available:

Fighter (obviously)
Rogue (no Magical Knack or Ninja though)
Monk (Martial Artist/Tetori, or just assume their "magic" tricks are just the result of ultra-awesome physical abilities)
Barbarian (no Superstitious or Elemental powers, mostly everything else should work fine)
Ranger (Guide or anything else that drops spellcasting)
Cavalier

With no magic available, the following classes will probably be flat out:

Wizard/Sorcerer/Cleric/Druid/Witch/Oracle - full caster's big trick is spells, so don't even bother.

Alchemist/Summoner/Bard/Magus/Inquisitor - Still mostly spellcasters, although Alchemist & Bard seem like they could probably be made to work with a little effort.

Paladin is an odd duck...if you lose Spellcasting and Channeling, perhaps giving them a bit more combat or social buffs to compensate (4+int skills, expanded list, some bonus combat feats), you have an excellent "Son/Daughter of the Gods" class. Heals itself (make LoH a "self-only" ability), wields the weapons of the gods (Weapon Bond) and is blessed by the gods to resist pretty much everything.

If the party is made up of Legionnaires or the like, 20 or even 25 PT buy seems appropriate. If they're "Heroes of Legend" consider 15 PT buy with the Advanced Template added on top (or 20 PT if you wanna get real crazy)

Other than that, don't use things with DR/Magic (instead use lots of DR/Weapon Type or DR/Material) and SR becomes pretty useless. Healing will need to be addressed, but simply increasing the rate at which natural healing takes place, or allowing a Heal check to heal the # of HP on the check as a 1-minute or even 10-minute check should work.

In-combat healing becomes trickier, but then again, ancient Rome was pretty freaking deadly.

Finally, I'd probably set the adventure for the Level 1-Level 7 window. This way, there's plenty of bad-ass monsters/NPCs/animals to use (CR 5 Hydra becomes QUITE the threat in such a campaign, and worthy of a Hercules to take it out), and the game caps out before it gets WAY too hard to deal with without magical assistance.


I'd use Conan D20 for this, not Pathfinder.

Ken

Contributor

Moved thread.


If I took out magic, I would take out mythical monsters too.


CourtFool wrote:
If I took out magic, I would take out mythical monsters too.

without taking them out completely, you could make the pegasus the Pegasus (capital P) etc.

I believe Pathfinder RPG could work as well as any other system. Some people feel that the d20/Pathfinder system is inappropriate because letting go of anything magical means leaving a significant chunk of the game aside, but even the mundane "module" of the game is solid on its own IMO.

'findel

Sczarni

Well, then you'd pretty much be set.

Expect high-lethality, high-turnover games.

If you want to "patch" healing, use the Heal skill and allow that to treat HP damage with some mechanic (i like the "you can basically heal up, but with scars and possible missing bits" idea).


Would healing need to be patched? Is there an unspoken assumption that PCs should expect X fights per day? Could 'patching' it just be less combat? I can not imagine a historical Rome campaign filled with dungeon crawls. The final battle would be the climax of the mission. Or does that nerf the Fighters?


IMO, healing doesn't need to be patched since it isn't "broken", but it won't yield the same game experience (as it may take a day or two to recover from a fight).

Since we're talking about cutting magic out of the game, I guess providing a different gaming experience isn't out of the question...

'findel

Sczarni

CourtFool wrote:
Would healing need to be patched? Is there an unspoken assumption that PCs should expect X fights per day? Could 'patching' it just be less combat? I can not imagine a historical Rome campaign filled with dungeon crawls. The final battle would be the climax of the mission. Or does that nerf the Fighters?

Not at all.

In fact, I was picturing a more gladiatorial / epic-war-time type Campaign or a "Sons and Daughters of the Gods, Walking Among Mortals" game.

Since you said you'd taking out the mythical monsters, that leaves a more gritty, realistic vibe.

If your heroes are smart (say, by being NOT the first line, or using lots of cover & creative group tactics like the Roman Legions did) or fighting only a bit at a time (a la Gladiator Fights or senatorial cloak-and-dagger missions), then no, healing needn't be changed at all.

Like I said, it will produce a more lethal environment, but hey, them's the breaks, right?

Sczarni

Probably combat would look like This

Silver Crusade

what about doing roman themed mythic age stuff, as in allowing magic? I've been thinking of doing a setting like that sometime myself

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder PF Special Edition, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

Didn't Monte Cooke publish a d20 derivative specifically designed for no magic worlds?


My personal opinion is that taking magic completely out of a game hurts some of the fun and mystery of it.

The Romans believed in magic of a sort. They had oracles. They had secret religious 'cults'. Many soldiers believed that the Germanic barbarians they fought had witchcraft/magic.

The trick is not so much removing magic from the game, but making it rare, special, and awe inspiring. As such, it's not exactly a good idea to allow characters to be of a casting class, though perhaps I would allow something akin to "You may increase one level in a caster class for every 5 total character levels".

Additionally, I feel that one of the best ways to make magic awe-inspiring is to make it slow-casting ... as in, spells are mostly about scrying and curses and blessings ... not combat-round attacks. Cure Light Wounds may heal a person unnaturally fast, but unnaturally fast may be "one day" rather than "one round" and the spell may involve many prayers, the use of herbs, etc.

Don't remove magic ... just make it rare and special.

Grand Lodge

LazarX wrote:
Didn't Monte Cooke publish a d20 derivative specifically designed for no magic worlds?

He published "Iron Heroes" written by Mike Mearls. Though it wasn't completely devoid of magic, it was just super rare and was only meant to be used by NPCs (it also worked differently than "standard magic" as written in the PHB)...


I wouldn't use d20 for a game like that. You can do it, but I think you're painting a picture and drastically reducing your color palette. Something like Iron Heroes added a bunch of extra options and choices which brings you back to something similar to what you started with.

Without magical healing (or improved healing), combat becomes something that needs to be spaced out more. It might even be something fairly deadly that players might feel encouraged to avoid it when possible. That means you need a more robust system for out of combat encounters. I know there are a lot of people who would disagree with me on these boards, but I like rules for social interaction, IMO, they don't diminish roleplaying, but rather structure it, much the same way that combat rules structure combat.

I think a Rome game would benefit greatly from some rules for handling diplomacy and intrigue. The Romans definitely proved that words can be just as deadly as swords.

Games I would look at:
Burning Wheel (just use Lifepaths of Man, no sorcery, could keep Faith)
Houses of the Blooded
Reign
Cold City
A Song of Ice and Fire

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