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I'm running a game now with a couple of different themes and factions. It's complicated, but this campaign is intended to go all the way to 20 (and maybe beyond). I'm still a pretty new GM, though, I've only been playing for a just over a year now. I seek advice on a few different things from you fine folks.

First and most important, how do I manage a game that takes place in two planes? I want the party to be spending their time on the material plane (my homebrew world) and the shadow plane (Jon Brazer Enterprises' Shadowsfall + homebrew stuff), with about a 65%/35% split for now. The thing is, they're level three. How do I get them to travel back and forth? They do have something of a mentor party of very experienced adventurers that can help them across, but I don't want them to be totally reliant. Also, how do I make the shadow plane really feel different?

I feel pretty comfortable with the aberrations and the prophecies. I've got cool ideas for those. The thing is, there are a number of major factions that I all want to matter and feel distinct. There's the drow, the dwarves, the elves (represented mostly by the lantern bearers, which one party member aspires to become), a kyton demagogue I have yet to detail, several human lords and a king, and the elans. That's a lot. How do you manage this many different groups with all sorts of different goals in a game? There might also be a resurgence of the ancient cyclops empire.

Just a note, the game is mostly open-world, with the players making a lot of decisions on story direction themselves, which only further complicates things.

I'm running a game now with a couple of different themes and factions. It's complicated, but this campaign is intended to go all the way to 20 (and maybe beyond). I'm still a pretty new GM, though, I've only been playing for a just over a year now. I seek advice on a few different things from you fine folks.

First and most important, how do I manage a game that takes place in two planes? I want the party to be spending their time on the material plane (my homebrew world) and the shadow plane (Jon Brazer Enterprises' Shadowsfall + homebrew stuff), with about a 65%/35% split for now. The thing is, they're level three. How do I get them to travel back and forth? They do have something of a mentor party of very experienced adventurers that can help them across, but I don't want them to be totally reliant. Also, how do I make the shadow plane really feel different?

I feel pretty comfortable with the aberrations and the prophecies. I've got cool ideas for those. The thing is, there are a number of major factions that I all want to matter and feel distinct. There's the drow, the dwarves, the elves (represented mostly by the lantern bearers, which one party member aspires to become), a kyton demagogue I have yet to detail, several human lords and a king, and the elans. That's a lot. How do you manage this many different groups with all sorts of different goals in a game? There might also be a resurgence of the ancient cyclops empire.

Just a note, the game is mostly open-world, with the players making a lot of decisions.

I'm playing a cryptic in an upcoming campaign. I'm very knowledge obsessed (as a good cryptic should be) and I want my powers to reflect that. I'm willing to spend a feat or two on expanded knowledge to take things from the psion or seer power list. What are the best clairsentience powers for me to take from my list and any other?

Basically, what's your philosophy in creation? Where do you get your concepts? Mechanics first and then role playing, or vice versa? Or what?

Personally, I have one rule I like to follow. Everything else is mutable, like whether its mechanics or roleplaying first, or what. That rule is as follows:

All of my characters have one unoptimal gimmick, and the rest of the build is optimized as much as possible within this and the character personality.

For example, a barbarian who takes all the hurling rage powers and uses them a lot. Sure, he's got a big hammer too, but his signature is the giant boulders he tosses to open battle. My current character: a cryptic (3rd party psionic class) who uses tons of traps, using the craft skill instead of ranger traps or something like that. Others (off the top of my head) could be a wizard who specializes in mad monkeys, or a druid who wildshapes only into birds, or a fighter who uses starknives for everything all the time.

I find characters like these a lot of fun for a few reasons. First, they're great for roleplaying, because a unique concept helps me get more into the character. Second, they're a ton of fun in combat, to be doing something totally weird and badass. Finally, I find it a fun optimizing challenge to make them viable and not a drain on the party. It's not even really something I do intentionally, but just how all my characters tend to work out.

At 2nd level, a Lantern Bearer selects a creature type from the following:

Aberration, animal, fey, humanoid (elf ), outsider (evil), and plant.

This ability functions exactly like the ranger class ability of the same name, and Lantern Bearer levels stack with other class levels that grant the favored enemy ability.

What exactly does this stacking bit mean? The favored enemy he takes here can stack with favored enmieis from ranger for total bonus, or he gets these and favored enemies as though he had progressed normall?

So, anyone got any good ideas for a mythic path for psionic casters? I would ask jeremy what he has in mind but he is extremely busy right now with all the ultimate psionics stuff. I would prefer not to just ape the archmage and hierophant, but have some really unique abilities. I wish I had some ideas, but right now I'm at a loss. Maybe I'll have some thoughts in the future, but what about you clever folks?

P.S. Maybe this should go in homebrew, not sure.

My playes got into some trouble last session and ended up killing a few city guards. Typical low-level character stuff. Now, they've got to get oth of the cty before they can get arrested. I don't know if they'll go for stealth or disguise, but they're definitely gonna run.

So how do I do this? If they get found out, I can easily run a chase. But before that happens, what's the best way to make an engaging "get out of town" type encounter/session?

Well, this was quicker than expected! I've finished up the introduction and the first two sections, Races and Paths. I'll be adding the rest over the next two or three weeks.

The Guide

Now, before you grumble at me about how this is in the wrong forum, I would at least request that this be added to the Gude to the Class Guides. If you mods think moving it is really necessary, whatevs, but just put it up in there. Third parties need some loving, too.

Back on topic! Give me any criticism you have on this here guide of mine. I'm all ears. Not guaranteeing implementation, but I will definitely consider it and keep your advice in mind.

Enjoy!

Howdy, I'm interested in trying my hand at all this guide crafting business. I'd like to do something that hasn't been done yet, and I'm a big fan of psionics. I'd be glad to do a guide for any of the psionic classes released by Dreamscarred Press, if anyone is interested.

Which specific classes would you like to see? Psion, Wilder, Soulknife, Psychic Warrior, one of the Psionics Expanded classes?

My party is probably going to encounter a dreamweaver witch soon, and she will try to convince them to take her along with them. She's level 6 (they're level 3) but she will pose as being just a novice spellcaster, level 1, basically. Her appeal to the party will be her potion-making abilities, since they lack any good healing source and could always use more buffing, and also the fact that she's a babe and they're all dudes. Here's the thing, though. She's mind controlled by some phrenic scourges (I'm big on psionics) and is actually trying to mess with the party. How do I run spells like charm person, suggestion, and sow thoughts?

I would like her to be around for maybe 2 or 3 sessions until she is either killed or rescued from her compulsion. Two of the party members are elves, so no magic sleep effects, and the other two are a sorcerer and a bard, so they have decent will saves. She will probably focus on the bard, and I want her to use her enchantments on him.

How do you run stuff like this? I definitely don't want the other players to know, but I'm wondering if there's anything better than slipping the bard a note that says "hey, you're charmed," or something like that.Any advice or, or is that the best I can do? We're playing tomorrow, but she might not show up until next session, depending on what the party does.

In Psionics Expanded, the blue favored class bonus for cryptics reads as follows:

Cryptic: Add +1 to Craft checks.

So, what, all craft checks all the time get +1? This just doesn't seem balanced to me. I feel like it's supposed to read "Cryptic: Add +1 to Craft checks made with a single craft skill of your choosing." or somesuch.

I'm building a mercenary NPC that I'm hoping will become a recurring enemy for my party, appearing without warning and relentlessly attacking them until he can't go on anymore.

There are three things I want to achieve with him, in order of importance:
1. He is extremely hard to kill or even stop. High saves, high HP, high AC.
2. He is effective at shutting down casters. It's a magic-heavy bunch and he's sepcifically after a halfling sorcerer in the party.
3. He needs to be able to deal damage in combat enough to actually be scary when he shows up.

A few things that won't change: He's a half-orc and he's an unbreakable fighter. Don't try and convince me otherwise. Not interested. Right now I've got him at level five for his first encounter with the party, and they're level 2.5ish (using SKR's step-leveling). They'e also not a party ideal for front-line combat; they're an archer ranger, an arcane duelist, a TWF rogue, and a shadow sorcerer. They're more comfortable infiltrating and stuff, which is part of what will make this guy so scary.

A little side note, is he properly leveled for the party? He'll have two or three level 1 fighter minions with him.

I really love the machinesmith from Louis Porter Design. It's great. However, I don't like my players to have crafting feats other than brew potion and scribe scroll. So, what's a good alternative for the crafting expertise feat? I know two archetypes replace it, but I'm just looking for something general to swap out for it. Any ideas? Feedback from the developers themselves would be extra appreciated.

I'm building an NPC kobold nature oracle, and as everybody knows, kobolds ride dire weasels. Yet, Paizo hasn't published stats for one. In light of what is perhaps one of the greatest mistakes a company in the RPG field has ever made, let's try and remedy the situation.

I'm thinking a few things. It should start small and thenincrease to medium at 4th level. It should have really high dexterity. Like, 17 or 19. Even after the size increase, it should have a higher dex than str. It should have a climb speed. It needs to have attach and scent.
Here's what I'm thinking:
Size Small
Dex 19, Str 10, Con 15, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 5
Scent, Low-Light Vision
Bite 1d4
Speed 30 ft, climb 20 ft
Natural Armor +2

Level four upgrade:
Dex -2, Str +4, Con +2
Bite 1d6 plus attach
2 claws 1d4

I balanced it with the badger. I figured the higher dex was ok because no burrow speed. Attach replaces rage. Also, it doesn't get claws until medium. Good?

Here's my idea for the goliath race from races of stone, 3.5. I took a few liberties and tweaked some things here and there.

I'm planning for my players to eventually encounter an umbral dragon in their adventure. It will be the first time any of them, player or character, has ever met a dragon. They'll have the opportunity to befriend the beast and gain a very powerful ally.

I'm about to start a campaign, and in my world drow worship kytons. It's about how their curse causes pain and susceptibility to sunlight, leading them to turn to the kytons as allies instead of demons.

So, I need a good kyton bloodline. While shadow or infernal could feasibly work, I don't think either of them really fits, so I need some assistance creating a source of sorcerous might derived especially from the masochistic outsiders that live in the plane of shadow.

I've got some general ideas, but nothing too specific. The arcana needs to be something related to causing pain. I'm thinking nonlethal damage added to just about every spell. For spells, things like interrogate, eyebite, symbol of pain, torturous transformation, and any other spells with the pain descriptor, and maybe delay pain, should work. For the first level power, I want something more unique than a variant touch or ranged touch attack, but still 3+Cha uses per day. Feats will include improved initiative and lightning reflexes, maybe blind-fight. And the class skill will be heal or knowledge (planes).

So, who can help? Any ideas? Anything in my requests that seems like it doesn't fit?

I've got a ranger who's going to take the companion bond instead of the animal companion. He's going into the lantern bearer prestige so he can kill drow dead, so he's not choosing the animal companion that would quickly be useless. Are there any feats to make the underwhelming companion bond better?

I posted on here a few days ago requesting creative skill uses. I need some help now on how to DM this party. It's an archery ranger going into lantern bearer later, a TWF rogue, a bomber alchemist, an umbral sorcerer, and a bard, unbuilt so far. He'll probably be a typical finesse melee character. They're all new to the game, but I'm not.

So, they're lacking much in the way of muscle. The campaign, so far, will be about drow making contact with mind flayers, and a war against drow and all sorts of aliens, aberration heavy. There will probably be more thrown into it, but most of them haven't done their backgrounds yet and that's how I determine what we do.

How do I challenge them without crushing them? They have a million collective skill ranks, and they're very stealthy. I don't want something urban. Any sort of ideas, specific or general, would be much appreciated.

I'm playing a stonelord paladin in an upcoming campaign, and we'll be spending a lot of time exploring old ruins and dungeons in search of treasure. We've got a catfolk archaelogist bard who will be handling any sorts of knowledge or information gathering checks. My job will basically be to be his big badass buddy who smashes enemies. We'll also have a hobgoblin fighter, which will provide good roleplaying opportunities. The fourth person in our party is very undecided, but I suspect they may go psion.

My backstory is basically I was an elite guard of my dwarven hold-in-training, a member of the stonelords. I got sent away after an attack led by some rune giants to gather allies for my clan, as well as to do very paladin-y things in general. My order focuses less on destroying evil (no smite evil, after all) and more on defending dwarves, anyone who's disadvantaged or oppressed, and redeeming bad guys when it's feasible.

I should be stubborn and honorable, like any good dwarf paladin. The hobgoblin and I will not get along due to racial tensions (at leastat first), and I'll probably find the arcane magic silly and the psionics a luttle bit subversive. I am a little nieve, too. This is my first time really leaving my clan. So, here's what I need help with:

A: Justifying pursuit of treasure, and what to do when I obtain it.
B: Working in my diplomatic outreach.

Maybe helping civilizations recover lost artifacts so I can earn their goodwill? What else?

TL;DR: I am a dwarf paladin. Why am I also a treasure hunter?

Hey all, I'm building a stonelord paladin (dwarf, obviously). I'm looking for some help with build ideas, particularly feats. I am not looking to minmax, just to be sure that I'm going to be viable the whole time. There are several things to consider for my build.

First, I want to be tough as nails. Stoneborn paladin already guarantees this with DR, fortification, and NA bonuses. I don't think I'll need much in the way of feats for that.

Second, offensive abilities. I'm not sure if I'll be going shield+axe or polearm (dwarven longaxe/longhammer). I won't know until I've played for a level or two to see what I prefer, but I suspect I will favor polearm because I get defensive stance, so reach would be very useful. I've considered three levels of phalanx fighter, but I want to keep all my paladin abilities leveled with me, so more than a one level dip is a no go.

Third, I may need to be the party's partial healer. It's a four person group. There's me, a hobgoblin two handed fighter, and then one bard (watersinger or archaelogist) and one psionic character (psion or cryptic). I am totally willing to do this via lay on hands; the issue is that I won't have many uses because stonelords don't benefit much from charisma so I won't put it above twelve, and I only get one mercy, at 6th level. What lay on hands feats are the best? Keep in mind my channel energy only works on earth subtype creatures.

Anything other than Vancian spellcasting. I'm talking 3.5 as well as pathfinder. Now's your chance to plug your favorite little-known splat book or third party magic system. This is definitely not a Vancian hate session; let's not even mention it, huh?

I enjoy power points because it feels different enough to stand out but it's similar enough to still fit very easily within the system and it's not difficult to learn. It also doesn't hurt that dreamscarred is doing awesome stuff with it. I also feels that it forms a good trinity with arcane and divine. One comes from the gods, one from the universe, and one from the mind.

I'm also a huuuuge fan of incarnum from 3.5, and fully intend to implement a pathfinderized version in an upcoming campaign. It's really unique and creative, and the whole essentia thing is just damn nifty.

How do I do it? I really have no idea where to start. This is more for a typical NPC enemy, not a specific characer, so only levels 1-4 are of major concern. If you have ideas for higher levels, please share, though.

The classic mongolian horse archer was lightly armored, fast as hell, and would run circles around heavily armored knights, peppering them and their horses with arrows.

What class is best? Mounted rager seems good thematically, but has obvious issues in the archery department. Ranger is probably the best choice (companion when it matters, bonus feats) but what else would be good?

Feats? Ride-by-attack would be ideal except you have to charge, so it needs to be a melee attack. Which leaves us with shot on the run, a prerequisite heavy feat which isn't even that useful. Anything I'm missing, and what else is essential? Oddly enough, precise shot is not a big necessity because there will probably be no allies in melee, only enemies. They would retreat and shoot rather than go into melee.

Hey all! So, it doesn't seem like paizo will be releasing any new classes for a while, and if they do my guess is it'll be the shapeshifter everyone wants or something totally out of left field. This is perfectly ok, but it leaves the step child arcane and divine spell lists flapping in the wind without a spontaneous representative.

What do the boards have to say about these two concepts? What would they be like? This should be a discussion about potential themes and specific class features. Ideally this will be a nice collaborative double project.

What are some good and/or cool anti-caster builds you've come up with in your time? They can be a caster or not. Viability at a wide range of levels is a big plus here. Everyone knows AM BARBARIAN, but what else have you guys come up with?

One of my favorites is a hexcrafter magus. They would cast a lot of curse spells to inflict spellblights and focus on getting next to an enemy caster. They would have step up to stay next to the caster when they tried to five foot step away. They'd take the disruptive and spellbreaker arcanas, in addition to the curse strike arcana, whatever that's called. They'd have blighted critical, greater blighted critical, and blighted critical mastery. Probably a finesse build. While I'm not sure how effective soellblights really are, this build would be all sorts of fun and flavorful. It sounds like the new elf magus archetype in the ARG might complement it well with movement abilities and such. Thoughts on this concept? Builds and concepts of your own?

A player of mine is playing a grenadier alchemist. They just got to level two, and I realized what kind of awesome things he could do with the character. With the free martial proficiency, alchemical weapon, and explosive missile, he can become quite the explosive archer.
The thought process goes like so: I figured since he was already taking ranged feats, using a bow as his martial weapon is a good choice. It's also a solid backup for when he runs out of bombs, which is a possibility with the long, punishing days I put my players through. He can use all his alchemist fires, acid flasks, etc. on his bow, as well as his bombs with the explosive missile discovery. He's less a bomber and more a rocketer. A dex mutagen will help with his to-hit, partially making up for his med BAB. He's going to be constantly making alchemical items (with the aid of this fantastic table, courtesy of Eric Clingenpeel), so he'll have plenty of things to augment his attacks.
My only real concern is a lack of feats. I don't think he wants to dip at all, so what feats are most essential for this character, in terms of archery and others? Also, can explosive bomb be combined with fast bombs?

I just created a half-orc vampire fighter/rogue to serve as a mob boss opponent for my party. I gave him the chain fighter alternate racial feature so he could use a dire flail, and now I've got a few questions.

Does a double weapon add 1.5x Str on both attacks?

For TWF feats that call out the use of two weapons (i.e. TW defense, break guard) does a double weapon count as two weapons? He's gonna be doing a lot of disarming and I'd like break guard to be a viable option.

So, I was laying about today and as m mind wandered I thought of an interesting idea for a civilization I'm considering adding to my homebrew.

I was thinking about implementing the standard egyptian culture. In the desert, pyramids, blah blah blah. Why even bother copy pasting real cultures into your game? Butts, I say. So my first step towards changing my egyptian flavored civilization was simple: take it out of the desert. I'm thinking a temperate climate. Imagine, giant pyramids and obelisks surronded by decidous forest. Visualize the seasons. Winter would be especially interesting. Ancient egyptian architecture with a foot or more of snow burying everything? Pretty visually cool, I thought. Egyptians loved cats, too, so why not have everyone be catfolk? Simple enough. They also obsessed over death a lot. So, maybe undead catfolk?

I want to add some cool cultural quirks to avoid the land of endless gimmicks, but I think an (possibly) undead empire of egyptian cats in the forests and mountains of western-europe climate analog. The undead thing might be too much.

Thoughts? Too gimmicky? Am I a brilliant revolutionary, an insane hack, or simply an unmemorable forum goer? What would you add or change to this basic framework?

I'm thinking about implementing a houserule that would allow spontaneous casters to use their own spell slots to cast from spell trigger items (wands, staves). This would give them more versatility. Specifically, I'm thinking that they should be able to power a spell that is on their spell list from a spell trigger item for the cost of an equivalent spell slot. I'm a little wary that a 1:1 trade is a bad idea, but I'm not sure. Should I raise the cost or keep it even? Or is this whole thing a bad idea?

It's something I really don't enjoy. I'm just not big on magic items dominating the game. But I also don't want martial characters to be screwed? Any suggestions?

So, I saw something in the ask James Jacobs thread that I thought was very interesting. He said that he wished he could change the summoner to bond with an outsider of a specific type, aka, demon, azata, devil, archon. This was an idea I found simply delightful, and decided to try my hand at creating or editing a class for the first time. I've never done this, so I'm requesting assistance to achieve this excellent idea.

First off, I'm thinking they should each have their own base form. A lot of these base forms might be the same, for example devil/angel/archon or demon/agathion. I'm also thinking that each base form should get one extra evolution point, to allow for more variation, and each type should get a special ability. To compensate for this, the will be no (!) evolution points at level one. So here are a few base form ideas, without the special abilites or statistics common to all forms:

Angel/devil/archon (also maybe oni, inevitable, and others):
Str 16, Dex 12, Con 13
Freevos: Legs, Arms, Weapon training

Azata:
Str 12, Dex 16, Con 13
Freevos: Legs, Arms, Weapon Training

Protean:
Str 12, Dex 16, Con 13
Freevos: Legs OR Arms, Bite, Tail, Tail Slap, Grab (Tail)
(I know they have 7 points instead of 6, but come on, tail is a joke)

Aeon:
Str 14, Dex 14, Con 13
Freevos: Legs OR Arms (x2), Slam, Skilled (any knowledge)

Demon/ Agathion:
Str 14, Dex 14, Con 13
Freevos: Legs, Arms, Claws, Pounce

I have some more along the same vein. For special abilities, some of it is easy. Agathions get lay on hands, archons get aura of menace, proteans get warpwaves, qlippoths get horrific appearance. Some others are tough, like devils or angels. Also, class features for the summoner itself will need to change.

Thoughts, ideas, contributions?

I was out doing hard work yesterday, and I was inspired by the profusion of earthworms. I decided my world needed more weirdness, so I statted and cultured up some worm people called annelidians. Here's the stats:

I'm not sure what role the alchemist is trying to play. Probably wanting to be as versatile as possible, but I'd be willing to specialize. I would also prefer to not take more than one other class or multiclass.

Why is everything evocation, conjuration, or transmutation? I feel like a number of schools really get screwed for no reason, especially abjuration. The vast majority of defensive spells are transmutation or conjuration. What if I want to play an abjurer? It's meaningless. Transmutation in particular has way too many purposes.
Thoughts?

At the end of my last encounter, my players captured a Tiefling inquisitor who was chasing them across the rooftops to capture them for his own nefarious purposes. They knocked him out, tied him up, and healed him back to consciousness. So ended the session.

They plan on interrogating him. I'm left wondering if his judgement is still active. The rules state that it ends when an encounter ends. He was knocked unconscious but revitalized right away, after he was tied up. Should his fast healing still be active or does he have to use another judgement? And if he it isn't active, can he use another judgement? Is this a combat encounter?

So, I love flumphs. How could you not? Friendly floating flattened space octopus? It's great! That 1 CR is a killer, though. I want my flumphs (or at least one or two of them) to head out with a party of adventurers slaying dragons. The solution: Class levels! The question: What levels would a flumph take? (I'm certainly not adverse to throwing the flumph some ability score increases ala PCs, if necessary)
Cleric is an easy one. Wisdom's good and they could
Sorcerer I like for flavor reasons. Mostly because a flumph accessing its aberrant nature to fight evil seems just swell to me.
Rogue? Imagine getting sneak attacked by one of those nasty poison stingers. Ouch!
So, what say you? How would a flumph level up, for the purposes of minmaxing, role playing, and/or goofy flumph heroing? Discuss!

Edit: And don't think that I don't understand flumphs are supposed to be goofy little advisors and guides. I'm all for that. But I would like the occasional flumph to be unsatisfied with sitting and watching while others go about saving the day. Then he pursues the art of magusry and eventually defeats the grave knight half-fiend antipaladin overlord on the world's highest peak as their armies watch in silent anticipation.

I've been thinking a lot lately about something I wish would have been added in UC. I love magic weapons as much as the next guy, but I would love to see non-magic alternatives for all stages of the game.
I like the idea of weapons that are simply so well made that they are as good as weapons filled with wizardly magic. While things like exotic weapons and different weapon materials hint at this, I would like more in this vein. And most importantly, I would like the ability to add new qualities to weapons. A longsword with trip or disarm or bonuses against heavy armor. A longbow with blades on it for melee or that fires multiples arrows at a time. Basically, physical weapon mods that are as good as enchantments (or maybe a bit weaker) but different and non-magical.
Thoughts? Discuss.

Don't get me wrong, I always put role playing ahead of optimizing. But I see literally no advantage gained by the first world summoner. I want it to be mechanically not a terrible choice, but the eidolon hit points and base attack are basically halved, it loses Darkvision for low-light vision, and you get SNA instead if summon monster. I see nothing gained other than flavor, and I think that's unfair for people who would want to play this for role playing reason (i.e. me).

Partially inspired by OotS, I've decided that I want to create a rival party for my players to go up against throughout the campaign. Here are the PCs and the enemy party that I am currently planning (subject to change, obviously):
The PCs

I want to get it, and I'm just wondering what thoughts people had on it.
Discuss!

While I think that there is already a good number of 20-level base classes, I think that Pathfinder could benefit a great deal from adding a few more. Yes, the archetype system allows for a great deal of diversity and customization in addition to the choices that can already be made with a class. And yes, I know that WotC overdid it, but I think the issue with 3.5 class bloat was more with prestige classes than base classes. I don't want ten or probably even five more. But I firmly believe that Paizo could easily create 2 or 3 more truly distinct classes. With the possible exception of the witch and wizard, I don't think any current classes have too much overlap.

So, should there be more classes, even just a few? I would like to see an 8+int skills class without a sneak attack derivative that took a different approach than the rogue. Also, a spontaneous caster that uses the druid spell list. Thoughts, suggestions, criticism?

Below is a lot of context. You can skip if you want, it's not essential by any means.

So, I'm a DM crafting a world. I'm going for a very global feel. I have the classic pseudo-medieval fantasy setting, and then a far east, dragon emipres style continent that are connected via isthmus (on which live some mesoamerican style nations). To the far south is a mountainous, cold continent which will be giant-heavy and have Viking-esque culture. Then there's a continent to the east that has Indian, middle eastern, and probably African cultures.

Each of these different areas have different races that populate them. For the middle eastern culture, I am going mostly the four elemental plane touched and suli, on the basis that they're descended from genies and humanoids. They pretty much dominate that area. It's mostly desert, which is fine for me and all the races. But I also want the undine to expand into the ocean and live underneath the waves. As far as I can tell, they can't breathe water.

My question is, can undine breathe water? And if not, would it be much of a stretch for me to give them the aquatic subtype and amphibious special quality, or is that versatility more powerful than I think?

Magic of Incarnum was, by far, my favorite 3.5 add on book. I know that at first it seems a little confusing, but it quickly becomes clear after reading through the rules two or three times that it's a very smooth and innovative system. I was wondering, could Paizo legally use and update Incarnum content? I'm pretty sure it's not OGL, but I figured I'd ask just to be sure and to get some views from some pathfinders on the system.

I think if Paizo decides to do any alternate magic systems anytime soon (words of power are neat, but you know) doing Incarnum or, more legally feasible, an Incarnum-esque system would be awesome. It's so radically different from the classic spell system but yet it works so well. I know there's the whole backwards-compatibility thing, and I've seen some good PF conversions of the system on various forums, but it'd be awesome to see Paizo tackle the system and give it continued support. Wizards was notorious for lack of support for everything but the core rule books (and Psionics, sorts of), but I think Paizo could really do the system justice and make it fit and keep it alive.

Thoughts?

P.S.
First time poster, don't mind my name, I've used it for everything since I was 12 or so and I dig it; I am not a being of pure hubris.