Neithan's page

I really do love the whole idea behind the license and how it's reaching out to bring lots of medium and small content creators together.

But the more often I see it, the more I am bothered by naming it the "ORC" license.

Whatever anyone's personal views are on orcs being harmless fun or offensive and toxic, it's been the most controversial and divisive topic in RPGs and fantasy in recent memory.

Yes, I get it. It's a bit of a pun. It's cute.

But surely I can't be the only one who is feeling really uncomfortable using ORC in the branding of material I create and want to release? I'm not even feeling super strongly about the issue and don't feel bothered by people wanting to use orcs in their own material.
But forcing me to decide branding my material as ORC license or not releasing it at all really is a situation I don't want to be in. And surely there are many more people who feel the same or even more strongly.

If the goal is to create something that brings people together in a common creative space, then I don't think a cute pun is worth the alienation it brings because of it's controversial and problematic name.

Under any other name, I would totally be on board with it. But like this, it might make me scrap my plans to release the material I created for my favorite game system.

It's only 3 in the night. You probably have to wait at least 6 to 8 more hours.

I like some of the aspects of those, but the modern image of "the middle ages" is already a completely inacurate fantasy version pretty much entirely divorced from the reality.

I simply stopped using any alignment and just have players pick some allegiances for their characters.
I have no idea why d20 Modern and Conan d20 are the only games that ever used that system. It's so much better than alignment in every way unless you specifically want PCs and NPCs to be carricatures of black and white morality.

Dapper Panda

If you have 10 HD, you can have 10 Ranks in a skill. That's the only restriction.

I think Golarion is lame kitchen sink setting that doesn't even reach the level of Forgotten Realms.

Spellcasters should never have gotten all their class features, spells are class features enough.

Vancian Spellcasting is bad. All character classes should use spell points like psionics (though I admit that would have wrecked any backward-compatibility).

The beefed up races are stupid. I always use 3.5e races.

As always with any thread dealing with this topic, I want to appeal to people to not start crying in anger because this idea will "ruin Pathfinder FOREVER!" and "makes fighters completely useless!". And as always, I don't expect that this appeal will be paid any attention by these people. They never are.

But anyway, talk about a "Pathfinder Light" show up every so often again and again, so there are actually people interested in playing a game that is like Pathfinder but much less complex and hard to learn and to run. If you play the game for complex tactical combat, this idea is not for you.
This proposal for Pathfinder Fast Play is aimed at people who never really think about adding modifiers for range increments and soft cover, rarely have encounters on difficult terrain, don't have fog and wind come up during fights, and whose fighters regularly use full-attack and whose wizards prepare fireball three times per day anyway. This is important. This proposal is completely and utter broken and unbalanced. It's not a goal, but an issue that is already assumed to be irrelevant for the entire content of this concept. This isn't anything that is significantly different from what D&D did for over 20 years and that all the OSR retro-clones are still doing to this day. What is relevant though, is that all players and GMs who would play in a game like this have to have a mutual unerstanding that there will be no optimization in that campaign. There needs to be a mututal understanding that combat is not a mathmatical problem for which an optimal solution has to be calculated.
The basic idea is "rulings, not rules". That is, the rules of the game just provide a general framework how most common things work. If the players want to do something, they describe their plan and all the rules and dice rolling are simply there to help the GM detrrmine if the action succeeds or fails. It's rules for a game that is all about exploring the world and interacting with it through a story that develops as it goes.

That being said, here the actual crunch of the concept:
Ability Scores: Work just as in the CRB.
Races: Work just as in the CRB.
Classes: Work just as in the CRB, except for class features that might become redundant because of later changes.
Favored Classes: To keep the rules short and simple, these are just dropped completely.
Skills: The Skill list and the system of gaining and distributing skill ranks works just as in the CRB. The rules for using specific skills can change though.
Feats: Work just as in the CRB, though some specific feats might become redundant because of other changes later on.
Monsters: Stay mostly identical to the Bestiaries. A notable exception for the Grab and Constrict abilities.

The major changes:
Combat Grid: Not used, or entirely optional. In larger fights, markers can still be used to indicate the rough relative position of all combatants to each other. Movement ranges and spell areas are eyeballed.
5-foot step: Taking a lesson from Star Wars Saga, these don't exist.
Attack of Opportunity: Provoked when moving out of an enemies threatened range, casting a spell, or attempting a Combat Maneuver, or a character does anything else that requires stopping to dodge any attacks.
Flanking: There is no flanking. Sneak Attack only works when the target is denies Dex Bonus to AC.
Reach Weapons: Do not exist, their range is just like any other weapon. (Though it should be considered when trying to stab at an enemy trapped in a pit or a cage.)
Casting Times: Casting a spell is a full-round action. Spells with a casting time of a swift action become standard actions. Spells with a casting time of a full-round action become 1-round actions.
Defensive Casting: Spellcasters can not cast defensively. The Combat Casting feat provides a +4 bonus to Concentration checks for taking damage of any kind.
Negative HP: A character at 0 hp is unconscious and stable. A character at negative hp takes 1 point of damage every round until a healing spell is cast on him or a DC 15 Heal check is made.
Stealth: If a character has cover or concealment, he can make a Stelath check to hide. If the GM says an NPC has his back turned to the PC, the PC can make a Stealth check to sneak up on the NPC and stay undetected even when outside of cover or concealment.
Shoting into Melee: A flat -4 penalty to hit. No adjustment for other creatures staying in the line of the shot, no chance for hitting another creature (since exact positions are not tracked). In specific situations like using a hostage as a shield, the GM is encouraged to come up with something on the fly, but it should be kept basic and simple in ordinary fighty.
Grapple: Grapple becomes a simple "Pin" combat maneuver, which is a standard action. When beating the targets CMD, the target is pinned until the next turn of the attacker starts. A pinned target can make a combat maneuver roll or Escape Artist roll as a standard action on its turn to escape.

This is the draft for now. Any suggestions what things should be simplefied or where these proposed changes could be improved? Remember, under the assumption that the game is played at low-optimization and casual tactical complexity.

Few necromancy spells are evil. I'd say let him play a necromancer and if he turns out to be evil anway let the other PCs kill him.

While I was looking for ideas how to run a game that consists to a major part of the PCs traveling through the wilds like in a hex-crawl sandbox game, I cam upon this interesting article.

A Quick Primer for Old School Gaming

This is intended as an introduction to BECMI, ACKS, and other retroclones, but I noticed that pretty much everything it speaks about isn't really specific to those rules, and in fact isn't really opposed to the rules of a game like Pathfinder, from which it wants to separate those Old-School games.
In the end, it's really just about the way you run the game, not about how open or detailed the rules are. It probably works better at lower levels or in an E6 game, but even in Pathfinder, PCs can still attempt anything the players can think of (excluding spells). All the feats and class features merely provide bonuses that increase the chances of success.

I think a Pathfinder game can be greatly enhanced by making use of these methods of planning adventures and running games, which have been given not much attention in the last one or two decades, when the style of successive highly tactical combat with optimized characters became more of a default assumption in community discussions.
At least since the very first days of D&D 3rd Ed., adventure modules have been designed and presented as a number of combat encounters pre-scheduled in a more or less linear fashion. Notable exception here being obviously Kingmaker. But I think those kinds of adventures have even been around in AD&D 2nd Ed. and people had to look waaay back before you find a stage where class-level based games and purely narrative games where not treated as entirely different things.

Here someone explains why random encounters are boring and there is alway only one per journey. But the real reason is that random encounters are only a single element in a bigger complex of interrelated mechanics, which simply can't work without the others.
I'm not even a fan of sandbox games and think they sound extremely boring. What I always wanted was to run and play games in which the GM prepares an antagonist and a general goal for the PCs, but the players decide how to deal with it and in what way progress through the campaign. It's still plot-driven, but for all the overland travel and exploration of dungeons, I think the game needs to use those mechanics of old-school hex-crawl games.

Do other people have experience with this, and can share insights on where certain things work really well and what other things need additional considerations and preparations to be fun in a game using Pathfinder rules?

Mostly correct. A touch spell aimed at a creature can not affect any items the creature is wearing or holding.
You can however target the spell at an item directly.

Use the old AD&D boxes. It's a completely different world.

One that is actually kinda medieval, you rarely get to see those anywhere around anymore.

Dosgamer wrote:

Having said that, I love Golarion and would likely keep my campaigns in it. It's a very diverse fantasy world.

Me too. The setting of Golarion is what really makes Pathfinder appealing to me. It's a beautifully thought-out, complex, and interesting world.

Not to debate the pros and cons here, but for me Golarion is actually the part of Paizos publications that doesn't do anything for me. At which I am not exactly alone.

Publishing another and rather different setting might be a theoretical option, but I think that's probably not going to be something that fits into Paizos business strategy.

So I think it's wise to keep the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game and the Golarion Campaign Setting clearly separate as they are now. A pure option that you can pick up together with the rules system, but that you can completely ignore if you don't want it.
When promoting the Roleplaying Game, they should keep it this way and offer it as another product line they sell. Not as part of the same.

Promotion of the Core Rulebook would probably do a lot more good than any new releases.

What I prefer is XPH style spell points.

But if the options are only prepared or spontaneous, I take spontaneous EVERY time. Since I am usually GM (and my players don't read rulebooks), I basically always allow only spontaneous classes. Or allow the other classes to use spells per day or spells know like as sorcerers or bards.

The reason is that prepared magic does not make any sense at all. And is basically exclusive to D&D. In no other kind of fiction does magic work that way. Even the one novel series that D&D originally tried to emulate was actually different, as far as I know. Prepared magic simply should not exist. It's the one really big complaint I have with every edition of D&D.

Witch uses spell slot preparation, but I hate that in all classes. Otherwise it looks like a really decent class and a much better way to fill the role of sorcerers.

Inquisiters have interesting fluff, but the crunch is lacking. Judgement just doesn't seem that interesting. But it uses spontaneous casting, which is a big improvement.

Cavalier just doesn't really offer anything interesting other than mounted combat. I rather take a fighter or a bard.

Alchemist is a fun idea, but it seems weird to have him make temprary potions that he can only use himself. Seems more like a refluffed sorcerer than a crafter of alchemical items.

Summoners are all about their pet, and I don't even like animal companions. One player, one character for me.

Oracles are cool though. It does not use silly preparation and moves away from the tank-priest that is the cleric.

And just for the protocol, I don't like clerics, druids, monks, paladins, and wizards either.

I said I don't like Golarion. That's blasphemous. ^^

Nobody knows.

Though Pathfinder is my RPG system of choice (with SWSE for Sci-Fi games), I still have great love for several more "simpler" games like AD&D, Dragon Age, and others.
I actually consider it one of the major flaws of the d20 system, that it tries to cover pretty much any imaginable situation with a specific rule. Other games tend to assume that lots of things are just successfully completed automatically without any rules to see if it works or not.

This is very much a matter of personal preference and playing style. If you play Pathfinder for the tactical combat and building character, simply handwaving things and ignoring specific rules won't enhance the game, but only chaos and arbitrary situations.

But you can also play the game by focusing on interaction and story progress, while letting the rules fade into the background. (Though you can of course also do both.) And I think in such situations, the d20 system tends to get a bit clunky and occasionally getting in the way. But in the old tradition of AD&D, you don't actually have to use every single rule there is, but keep it to the bare bones or anything in between.

What I am looking for are ideas which can help to free the players from being tied to the dice all the time and enable both players and GM to simply go with the flow and come up with resolutions to things as you go. I already got a couple, but would really like to get some additional ideas from other people as well.

1. Only roll dice when the outcome is uncertain. There are many rather mundane actions that can be resolved by using the regular rules, but quite often it just isn't neccessary. When you ask someone for the way to the temple, you don't need to make a Diplomacy check to Gather Information. When a rogue in light armor drops his backpack to climb a tree to look around, you don't really have to make a Climb check. The Swim skill and the Ride skill, say that you don't need to have Ranks in the skills to swim or ride, and don't have to make checks for most "ordinary" situations in which you swim or ride. The skills are for situations in which you perform extraordinary attempts at riding and swimming.
I think that's a good advice to actually a great range of situations. If a failed roll has no real effect on how the adventure progresses and it seems like a task that almost everyone would be able to complete without any problem, skip the rolling of dice. I would even extend that to "don't make checks against a DC of 10 or lower", unless there are circumstances that would complicate things. Like climbing a tree in plate armor with a heavy load. Intution tells you it's not guaranteed to work, so roll the dice and add the modifiers.

2. Use +2/+4 bonuses and -2/-4 penalties on the fly. I think there are lots of rules for fog, and smoke, and thick vegetation, wet floors, loud noises, and so on. But those come up very rarely and I wouldn't be suprised if most GMs would have to look them up. While you of course can look them up, for a game that puts less emphasis on tactical combat, I instead favor very strongly to simply apply a small modifer to any relevant rolls like attack rolls, Perception checks, Reflex saves, and so on.

3. For small encounters, don't use a grid. Not exactly about dice, but works similarly. If you have an encounter in which you have only 4 PCs and three or four enemies, you can keep track of everyones general position pretty well in your mind. Saying "I step into position to flank the ogre together with character B" and "I back up so the ogre can't reach me with a 5-foot step" can often be precise enough. The really critical things to know is "who is flanking" and "who is in what characters threatend space". All that the grid really does is giving precise information about that. If a group has a more laid back approach to combat, it's not really neccessary. For highly tactical combat, that obviously is not an option, as movement speed and line of sight become completely arbitrary.

4.Simplefy spell durations. Keeping track of how long a spell lasts is one of the more complicated parts of the game. However, this can be quite significantly simplefied:
If you play in the low- to mid-level range of 1st to 10th level, a spell that lasts 1 round/level will last 1 to 10 rounds. Since most fights last in the range of 3 to 5 rounds, a very significant portion of such spells being cast will last until the end of the encounter, and will be long over by the time the next encounter starts. So to simplefy, you could also say that "1 round/level" means the same as "for the rest of the encounter.
Similar, a spell with a duration of 1 hour/level will last between 1 and 10 hours. That almost always means "the whole adventuring day". 1st level characters will rarely crawl through a dungeon more than 1 hour at a time, and even 10th level characters are very unlikely to go full 13 hours in one go.
Spells with 1 minute/level are less clear, but a good estimate is "one series of rapid encounters", like storming a small bandit hideout which includes clearing 4 rooms of bandits in rapid succession. It will probably last long enough to clear the entire gatehouse of a castle, but will have ended by the time you continue to the next strongpoint where the defenders have holed up.

I do have a quite sizable Bestiary of custom critters. Quite a bunch of pseudo-prehistoric beasts and giant reptiles.

Others include:

Naga: More like serpentfolk than spellcasting snakes.
Serpent Warrior: A less powerful variant of Degenerate Serpentfolk.
Shie: Tall elf-like spirits that are almost immortal and with supernatural powers.
Oni: Kuwa Oni with the Giagantic template, to get the Ogre Mage down to CR 5.
Spriggan: Advanced 6 HD Kodama, refluffed to tall plant people made of vines and branches.
Mountain Giant: Intelligent and less fat hill giant.
Hill Giant: Smaller giant with focus on shamanism.
Thorn Beast: Large plant spirit that combines the shape of a giant wolf and bull.
Nightshade: Plant-spirit focused on Stealth, poison, and archery.
Grimlocks: The real, eye-less deal. ^^

Demons in the Material World
Dread Warrior/Dread Beast: Corpse possessed by a minor demon.
Iron Demon: Old suit of armor possessed by a minor demon.
Ice Demon: Floating shart of ice, possessed by a demon.
Shadow Demon: As in the Bestiary 1.
Fire Demon: Elemental-like hunk of lava, possessed by a demon.
Rock Demon: Elemental-like, humanoid pile of rock, possessed by a demom.

Demons in the Void
Rage Demon: Demon of destruction.
Hunger Demon: Demon of tracking and hunting.
Greed Demon: Demon of Stealth and assassination.
Desire Demon: Demon of trickery and illusions.
Sloth Demon: Demon of corruption and lies.
Tyranny Demon: Demon of mind-control and enslavement.
Pride Demon: Demon of transmutation.

Still have to finish writing many of these up, but with the spells and feats nailed down, it should progress quite well now.

So this is basically like the mobs from DMG2? Sweet.

It's still a story about trying to find and save an evil supernatural being, because her half-mortal offspring are going to do something a lot worse, and you are visiting a couple of different sub-arctic cultures by using a magic demi-plane that connects to many locations in the world.
Sounds pretty cool to me.

I am very much intrigued by Reign of Winter and might even run it this winter. But I don't like the Golarion setting and especially the idea of visiting other planets and Russia in world war one.
While this one might look a bit tougher to adept to another setting, looking up the descriptions and reviews, it might not actually be such a huge undertaking.

So what would I really need to have in a world, to make Reign of Winter work?

I think Baba Yaga might actually be quite easily replaced with just some demigoddess of winter and cold, who likes to visit the lands covered in snow during winter.
She also needs to have semi-immortal daughters, who rule over a decently sized, but not neccessarily big domain somewhere in the subarctic regions.
For the Planet of Ice, the PCs could simply be transported to the north pole, which is normally unreachable and unexplored by people of their homeland.
How to make Rasputins base and troops normal fantasy fare depends on how they will make an appearance in the not yet released adventure. But I think it could just be another continent on the opposite hemisphere of the planet, that is unknown to characters living in the setting.

That probably leaves the hut. Is the fact, that it has legs, actually relevant? I think of just making it a normal hut that appears and disappears during violent snow storms in any place that is below freezing. People will enter the hut, conjure a snowstorm, and after the storm calms down after an hour, the world outside is a completely different one. If the hut actually gets to fight anything, it could get some kind of guardian spirit instead, I would assume, making the rest of the plot work as well.

Since it's still a nature deity, the Winter Spirit would want winter to happen according to the natural cycles of the year, and some upstart witch trying to steal that control and have heir way with this power is as unacceptible to the spirit as it is to the PCs.

Are there any problems with that approach, or any other things that need to be present, to run the AP in an existing setting?

I've been doing a bit of work on a new campaign setting for a couple of years and have already been running two short mini-campaigns in a "proto version" of it. Now disappointed with the other RPG systems I've been trying I've finally nailed it down to Pathfinder, mostly because it's a much neater and more ordered version of the game I already know best, but also to some extend because of the possibility of making it available to a greater audience. For free. And having checked on the terms, I want to apply for the PFRPG Compatibility Logo as well.

If anyone is interested in the specifics of the world, you can take a look at a great deal of the semi-completed work here or at the website I created for it, the Barbaripedia (still in an early stage).

In this thread, I want to give a short summary of the general concept, followed by the specific differences between the standard Pathfinder rules and assumptions, and an Ancient Lands campaign. The aim of this thread is to get some input from other people, how much these peculiarities seem to be a good and working solution to represent the game world, but also for other things you think could be useful additions.

--

Basic Concept
The name Ancient Lands has two meanings. For one, it is a world, which from our perspective is ancient to what we consider a "common" fantasy world; but it is also a world that is regarded as ancient by the people who live in it, because of its age.
At the core of the entire concept stands the idea, that the Ancient Lands are a world that is dominated by tribal or pre-historic societies. The social, economical, and political situations are losely modeled on those we associate with post-Roman Europe, ancient India, or the prehistoric Mediterranean. Ancient Egypt, Mycenae, merowingian France, pre-christian Germanic people, American Indians, or the Huns are all good examples for the kind of world people in the Ancient Lands are living in. One aspect that is important to me, is that I don't want any of the races and cultures to be real world analogs. There are no Germanic tribes, no Aztec empire, no Pacific islanders, no Chinese, and so on.
I draw many inspirations from the continents Xen'drik (Eberron) and Kalimdor (WarCraft), but the main difference is that the current age of the Ancient Lands is not a time thousands of years after the local civilizations of elves, giants, and lizardfolk have been destroyed or faded into obscurity. Which is also a strong theme in the worlds of Middle-Earth or the Forgotten Realms. Instead, the world that is described in the Ancient Lands is one, in which these great civilizations are just starting to emerge from the prehistoric barbarian tribes. It is an age in which kingdoms are founded, but many of which also disappear quickly to be eventually forgotten in time, in which mages are starting to turn their attention to other worlds that might exist outside their own, and in which the mighty dragons and giant kings still have to be slain. But it is also an age, where most of the world is still uninhabted wilderness entirely dominated by nature spirits who have a much greater effect and more direct influence over mortal humanoids than any distant and abstract gods. And deep below the surface of the earth and at the bottom of the oceans, there are still beings from a far older time, when the planet was a hostile world of lava, boiling seas, and permanent storms that have never been seen anywhere since.
Player Characters in this world are usually not adventurers traveling the lands in search of quick and dangerous ways to gain great riches, but are instead members of small tribal clans, who are counted among the warriors and shamans who defend their people against the countless threats of a wild and dangerous world, where many small civilizations vanish without leaving anything behind for later generations. But the people of the Ancient Lands are not only trying to survive, they are also constantly struggling to improve their lives and society, by creating greater accomplishments than their ancestors and the people who inhabited their homeland before them. And to do that, the bravest and most capable people of a clan have to go outside the relatively safety of their villages, and explore the vast wilderness around them, where ancient ruins still hold many secrets and treasures left behind by the spirits that build them in long forgotten times.

The Rules of the World
Here I come to my ideas how I think this concept can be best realized within the rules of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game.

Maximum Level 10th
I was contemplating making the Ancient Lands an E6 setting, but decited against it for various reasons. Instead, the Ancient Lands are a setting in which you won't find almost any NPCs of 11th level or higher, with only very few exceptions for certain "unique" and semi-immortal beings.
In my personal experience, and matching what I heard from many other people, 10th level is already a point of character advancement that is reached by very few groups even in relatively long running campaigns. Generally, I envision the setting as a world in which combat is not always desirable and avoiding it when possibly is given a certain priority. If any individual group likes to run a game in which combat is more frequent, using the slow XP progression is one option. If the PCs should reach 10th level but the adventures are far from over yet, turning it into an E10 game is no problem at all.

Character Races
While the Ancient Lands are a setting for the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game system, I do not envision it as a Dungeons & Dragons world. That means that among other things, that the creatures inhabiting the world, do not exactly match those of the CRB and the Bestiaries. This affects the existing selection of humanoid races as well.
Wood Elves: Wood elves are the race with the strongest position when it comes to learning and advanced military, and also one of the most numerous. However, the Ancient Lands is not an elf-centric setting. The wood elves are not a unified people, nor are they inherently good or superior to anyone else. Their cultural advantage is based almost entirely on being the first who rose from savagery. When it comes to individuals, personal learning and experience make the much greater difference. There also is no real difference between nature and civilization in the society and culture of the Ancient Lands, wood elf is merely a term to emphazise that these elves are tribal people living in relatively simple conditions, just like everyone else.
Dark Elves: Less numerous than the wood elves, but still one of the major races, the dark elves are one of the two major races that inhabit the southern part of the Ancient Lands. Spending the mid-day in their underground homes, they emerge at sunset to work, trade, and hunt in the jungles late into the night. They are not more inherently evil than any other races, but tend much more to isolation than most wood elven clans and are not nearly as welcoming of visitors and strangers.
Lizardfolk: Lizardfolk are more numerous than either wood elves and dark elves, but rarely travel out of the jungles of the Southern Ancient Lands the the subtropical islands near the coast. While the majority of them still lives in ways that many of the other races regard as savage, lizardfolk civilization is just as old as that of the elves and there are some centers of culture, that rank among the most advanced places known in the entire world.
Gnomes: The gnomes of the Ancient Lands combine traits and elements of the dwarf, gnome, and halfling races. In an attempt to make the dwarves less drunken scottish viking miners, and the halflings less english cleptomanics, it seemed like the sensible thing to merge the elements that work for the Ancient Lands in a single race. Gnomes are kind of in the middle between them, so that's what they are called. Gnomes are not very numerous and not a major military power in the greater state of things, but their knowledge of mining and metalworking by far surpases that of the other races. Their control over the supply and trade of steel makes them a much more important player in the Ancient Lands than many would think.
Humans: Humans are not native to the Ancient Lands. Instead, they are descendants of barbaric people who lived on the wide plains far to the east of the Ancient Lands, but where hired as mercenaries by elves who needed additional guards to protect the few caravans that brought goods from unknown lands beyond the plains and are still fantastically valuable and expensive. Many of the plains clans eventually made their whole living by working for elves, and considerable numbers eventually moved their whole families to the Ancient Lands, where they either became vassals to some local chiefs, or established themselves as minor rulers. The humans of the Ancient Lands lack major cities and only a few of their chiefs rank as equals among the mover and shakers of the region. But it is still possible to run an Ancient Lands campaign with a party consisting only of humans and taking place in human dominated lands, if being vassals to an elven people is not to the players liking. It isn't to many of the humans either, so this isn't something that would keep anyone from enjoying the rest of the setting. It is still perfectly according to the design intent of the setting.
Kaas: The kaas are a new and custom race that losely corresponds to the archetype of the "noble orc". There kaas are humanoids who stand somewhat taller than humans with slightly bestial features. They are covered in light brown fur, have thick dark manes, and faces that have some faint resamblance to wolves or lions. The kaas are at home in the northern parts of the Ancient Lands and are known both for their strength and their exceptional ability to climb on rocks. Culturally and technologically, the kaas are quite comparable to the humans, but they are a native people of the Ancient Lands and have been around longer than anyone can remember. They have a very complex tradition of shamanism, but generally do not tollerate mages among them.

As mentioned before, an important aspect is, that this world is not an elf-centric one. Elves do play a central role and as a race have considerable advances, but the intend is not to portray them as superior in any way. If individual elves are portrayed as racists pricks, then these individuals are meant to be racist pricks. People of questionable character who are controlled by their prejudices. Predjudice and elitism are themes that the setting does incorporate, but as aspects of a world that is harsh and unfair, and in which people don't neccessarily share our perceptions of right and wrong.
Settings in which elves are portrayed as just plain better are rather annoying and you don't have to be an elf-hater to be seriously turned off by that. In the Ancient Lands, any such notions are meant as delusions by the characters, and any hatred directed at them is entirely within the goals of their design. ;)

Character Classes
The Ancient Lands portray a society in which many of the institutions taken for granted in a medieval or early modern society have yet to come into existance. This manifests in the number of classes that are most commonly appearing in the Ancient Lands.
Barbarian: The barbarian is basically a no-brainer here. Barbarians exist among all the races and even include elven warriors who throw themselves into battle with an unnatural passion.
Fighter: The fighter is the class of the "common warrior", if such a thing exists in the Ancient Lands. Fighters make up the bulk of NPC warriors the PCs will encounter.
Ranger: While the fighter is a tribal warrior who protects the village and goes into battle at the side of his chief, the rangers is more of a frontiersman and scout. Many of them are still counted among the warriors of their clan, but are usually much more concerned with patrolling the borders than taking part in the politics and rivalries of the other warriors. For an Ancient Lands campaign, rangers should be of the Skirmisher archetype, or any other ranger archetype that replaces spellcasting.
Rogue: The rogue class basically applies to all the people who can handle knives and bows well, but are not usually considered warriors. In an Ancient Lands campaign, the Minor Magic and Major Magic rogue tallents are not appropriate and should not be available.
Adept: The adept is a new class (name might still change) that represents all kinds of spellcasters who are not shamans. These can be witches, warlocks, sorcerers, or whatever they may call themselves. The Adept class very closely matches the Wizard class, but uses the Class Skill list of the Witch and is converted to the primary magic system of the Ancient Lands Campaign Setting.
Shaman: A shaman is a spellcaster who serves as an intermediary between the mortal people and the beings of the spiritworld. The spirits tend to take forms that are invisible to normal people an interpreting their will and demands requires insight into a very alien way of thinking and percieving the world. Shamans train their whole life to learn to communicate with the spirits and maintain harmony between the villagers and the spiritworld. The shaman clase closely resembles the oracle class but has been adapted to the magic system of the Ancient Lands Campaign Setting. They do not gain additional known spells from their mysteries, but also do not have the oracle curse feature.
Oracles and Sorcerers: If any group prefers the regular spellcasting mechanics of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, the oracle and sorcerer class make the best substitutes for shamans and adepts respectively.

Allegiance
Allegiance is a kind of "alignment" system that has been introduced many years ago by the d20 modern game, but has gained suprisingly little attention anywhere. (The Conan d20 Game is the only other game I know about that uses it.) In a world like the Ancient Lands, objective notions of Good and Evil have no real use and things are almost always much more complicated. It is also a world, in which people have priorities and notions of morality that can be quite different from what we are used to. Allegiance is a method that repaces alignment and serves as a very useful tool to help players assuming the point of view of a person that lives in a very different world than themselves.
Basically, a character has up to three Allegiances, which are a strong devoted loyalty to a person or group, or commitment to a certain ideology. The main idea is for players to write down what things are of the greatest priority to their character. When faced with difficult descisions in which there are no obvious right or wrong options, the allegiances of the character can be a very powerful tool to remind a player that they might be playing a character with rather different views than themselves. Save a child or save the king might seem like an easy choice to us, but if the character has loyalty to his king as one of his allegiances, and believe that all members of the clan have to make sacrifices to protect the king, his choice might be different.
In addition, characters who know that they share an allegiance, treat each other as allies or at least like-minded individuals, and making Bluff, Diplomacy, and Intimidate rolls against such NPCs gains a +2 or +4 bonus to the roll. On the other hand, characters might now that they follow allegiances that oppose each other, and they get a -2 or -4 penalty to these rolls, because they never really trust each other.

Background
Background is a new aspect of a character and basically represents the station of his birth. In the Ancient Lands, not everyone is born equal and it makes quite a difference what class of people you belong to. A lowborn commoner might face harsh punishment if offending a highborn nobleman, while the nobleman can insult any commoner as much as he wants to with no real repercussions. However, a member of the lowborn class will find much more acceptance and openness from other lowborn, than any highborn would ever see. Every rank brings with it certain benefits and drawbacks, and it is up to the players to chose which of the six options they chose. In the Ancient Lands, this is not just a purely sociological concept, but people tend to be very much aware of the social rank of any person. (And it requires a Disguise check to pretend that you belong to another group than your own.)
Highborn: Even in societies with no real notion of nobility or aristocracy, there are still certain families who hold almost all of the power and wealth in their clan. These people are shown great respect by members of the other ranks, but it also means that they can not easily mingle and particularly people of the lower ranks will outright refuse to treat a highborn like any other people, as this calls for trouble from other highborn. In situations where characters from lower ranks gain great prestige and power, they almost automatically advance to the highborn rank, even if they are not born into it. Personal accomplishment is ranked much higher than birth, and those who have the ability to take power deserve to be treated that way.
Clansmen: The clansmen are often identical with the "old families" and long established bloodlines of the clan. These are people with full right within the clan, which includes serving as a warrior, owing property, or voting on important descisions. Clansmen is assumed as the default rank for most Player Characters, unless the player explicitly decides to pick something else.
Freemen: A freeman is a person who is not a member of the clan, but still a respected member of the community. Freemen families are considered guests of the chief in his domain and can be forced to leave at any time, if the chief choses so. They also have no right to vote on public descisions. Freemen are very common in independent towns and cities, but in smaller villages they often live as servants on farms owed by clansmen families.
Lowborn: The lowborn class consists of all kinds of people who are permited to live in the community of a clan, but have basically no wealth or power. Many of them are slaves or poor freemen, but some are actually impoverished clansmen as well, who are forced into servitude to others. Lowborn lack any previleges or special rights, but they are often treated as almost invisible and usually know a lot more of what's going on around them and in their masters home than anyone else expects.
Hermits: Hermits are individuals who have renounced their ties to their clans or lords to devote their lives entirely to the persuits of a higher calling. Many of them are shamans or adepts and treated with very high respect by both highborn and lowborn. They are perhaps the only people who can mingle with others regardless of their social rank and a well known hermit will be a welcome guest in the home of a chief even if he just cared for a sick beggar. However, hermits are expected to act according to their calling and those who abuse the reverance they recieve might eventually find a hard time recieving hospitality and shelter.
Outcasts: Only under the most severe conditions do the clans ever condemn any of their own people to exile. It is a sentence for the most despicable people who could barely escape execution, but quite often their chances to survive another year all by themselves are pretty slim. Anyone who has no clan or at least the personal protection of a chief who vows for him, is considered as entirely untrsustworthy and not welcome in any decent community. Even if they have not been punished with exile, they must have been raised by people who were, and no such person could ever raise a child to be honorable and trustworthy. Small communities of outcasts can be found in many places, and most are very bleak places to live. More often than not they are ruled by brutal thugs who intimidate those weaker than themselves and even those who try their best at a honest live are often forced to steal to survive. However, most outcasts share a certain bond or common understanding of their desparate situations. Even if they are hiding in secret among other people and disguise their true identity, they are still able to recognize one another and form vast unofficial networks of contacts. Outcasts hiding among freemen and lowborn are very common in larger towns, where clan allegiance is not as important, and they are usually in control of large parts of the underworld. Other outcasts tend to have very few problems finding these people and making contact with them, even if most of the townsfolk have no idea they even exist.

Honor
Honor is a system from the recently released Ultimate Campaign. For the Ancient Lands, additional Honor Codes need to be drawn up, but I think it's a system that should work quite well.

Magic
As mentioned before, the Ancient Lands Campaign Setting does not use the standard "vancian" spell slot system. Instead, magic in the Ancient Lands is based on a concept of manipulating natural energies in the environment and creatures to bend them to your will, much like you can control your own body or thoughts. The adept and the shaman spellcasting classes use a spell point mechanic similar to the power points from Psionics Unleashed. There are about 60 spells (of which a 10th level spellcaster can know 21 or more), that can be increased in power by spending more than the minimum amount of spell points, by the Augmentation mechanic. With augmentation, a spell basically becomes a more powerful version of itself, for example allowing the charm spell to not only affect creatures of the humanoid type, but also of the magical beast type or even outsider type. As the number of spell points that can be used to power a spell is limited to the same number as the Caster Level of the spellcaster, new options and variants are automatically added to your known spells as you increase in level.
Spells range from 1st to 4th level, but more powerful effects are possible by using Incantations, magical rituals that take a long time and expensive resources, which can be of 5th level and higher, though not requiring a specific caster level.

Taint
In the cosmology of the Ancient Lands setting, there is only the material world and the spirit world. However, outside this "natural world", there is an infinite Void of space and time that blends elements of both the Astral Plane and the Far Realm. It is the home of demons (who have more in common with quori than tanar'ri), who can not enter the natural world themselves, but take possession of mortal creatures, turning them into hell hounds and similar beasts.
The Void is a realm entirely alien to the natural world and any energies comming from the void cause the normal reality to slowly start to fall and corrupt. This corruption is known as Taint and can affect both the environment and creatures. With the exception of ghosts, pretty much all undead creatures are the result of corpses being corrupted by the taint, or living creaturs being killed by it. And creatures affected by taint also cause everything they come into contact with to be tainted as well, though the effect somewhat decreases with every transmission, or the whole world would already by corrupted. However, magical energies from the Void give a spellcaster great power and many are tempted to learn to use them, even with the terrifying consequences it can have for them and anyone around them.

Blood Magic
Blood magic is an ancient and almost forgotten form of magic, in which the energies that power are spell are not drawn from the environment in small quantities, but directly from the blood of the blood mage or another living creature. Blood magic is not inherently evil, and despite what many people believe, does not cause the spread of Taint (rather the opposite of it). But it is a very gruesome and violent form of magic, especially when used to harm a creature, so most traditions have abandoned it centuries ago. However, some blood mages still exist, especially among the priests of small isolated cults that worship ancient beings from the earliest days of the world.

Deities
The Ancient Lands does not have any deities as they commonly appear. Instead, religion is almost entirely based around keeping the local spirits happy by doing what the shaman says is the spirits will.
There are some beings that could be called gods, but they are actually more like extremely powerful spirits, being the spirit of the Sun, the Moon, the Earth, and the Oceans, as well as some others, like the universal spirit of the Hunt or the Spirit of Healing. These are not personal gods that one could talk with and who could hear the please of any worshippers, but rather ideas or concept worshipped by deeply philosophically inclinded monastic cults. Villages might offer gifts and prayers on the day of the solstice or a night of a full moon, but these are still offered to local spirits, with the Sun and the Moon being higher powers who watch over and bless these interactions.

"IQ is what an IQ test tests for."

And that's basically the same things that the Intelligence score is meant to represent.

Personally, I do believe that the themes of classes are hindering diversity. Because with every new class, each class becomes more narrowly defined and reduces to subconscious incentive to get creative.
At the current state of pathfinder it is not yet a real problem with the CRB and APG classes. But it is the main reason I never use prestige classes in my game. Because of the prerequisites of prestige classes, players are strongly encouraged to follow specific builds. And once they start to use the PrC, they are less likely to play "an Assassin" but "that Assassin".

6 character classes is what I consider the ideal for any given campaign. Depending on the specific themes, it can be as low as 4, or up to 8, but I really make heavy use of whitelists that limit the character options considerably, so that players are incentived to think of their characters not as examples of classes.
Of course, this only really works if the group approaches the game as a game of social interaction and exploring the world. In a game focused on tactical combat, that would hardly fly.

*manifests compelling voice*
You should try psionics.

Move along...

When the PCs get into a situation where it would be a real option to go on some far away journey, but the players use their metagame knowledge that this isn't planned as part of the adventure and the GM has nothing prepared for it, so they decide against it. That's the kind of good metagaming that's happening the whole time.

The spell detect magic is terribly unclear when it comes to supernatural abilites.

Supernatural abilities are defined as "magical but not spell-like. Supernatural abilities are not subject to spell resistance and do not function in areas where magic is suppressed or negated (such as an antimagic field). A supernatural ability's effect cannot be dispelled and is not subject to counterspells."

This establishes that they are magic.

Detect magic has the line "If the items or creatures bearing the auras are in line of sight, you can make Knowledge (arcana) skill checks to determine the school of magic involved in each. (Make one check per aura: DC 15 + spell level, or 15 + 1/2 caster level for a nonspell effect.) If the aura eminates from a magic item, you can attempt to identify its properties (see Spellcraft)."

This established that the spell can detect magical nonspell effects. And what is a magical effect that is not a spell? A supernatural ability.

However, the rest of the spell only tells the Aura Strength and the Duration of a Lingering Aura for spells and items. Which can lead to the impression that it only works on the auras of spells or items and nothing else, if one gives the spell just a single read.

The spell description should at some point include the words "supernatural abilities" to finally and completely remove all ambiguity.
I think basing the aura strength on the HD of the creature would be a good solution. Like making the effective level of a supernatural ability equal to half the creatures HD.

Here is what I always tell everyone:

A good setting is not about places, history, and special rules. At the heart of every good setting is a strong theme. At the very start, try to nail down the theme as specific as possible.
With everything you create later on, you should consider if it really supports the theme you envision, or if you want to alter the theme in some way. If something does not fit the theme, then let it go and don't force it in, even though it's unneccessary or doesn't really fit.

People won't care if you have a cool dungeon, cool legendary NPC, or complex history. All that really wins people over is when the setting is strong and interesting, even when their characters are sitting in some unnamed backwater where none of the great heroes ever came by and there are no demonic hordes invading.
Take for example Dark Sun, PlaneScape, or even Star Wars. Even without any of the iconic places and characters appearing, at a completely different time than the well known stories, these worlds have their own unique environments and dynamics.

If greek style goods, fae folk, and changelings are the main hook of your setting, then make it so that they actually have a major influence on almost everything and in all places. If it's just a generic world in which everything exist and fae folk and changelings as well, then it will still be just a generic world.

Which brings me to a sub-point: Identify what role the Player Characters are assumed to have. You can make settings in which players can play everything they like, but again that results in generic settings that are like any others.
Planescape is about adventurers stubling into weird places on the outer and inner planes. Dark Sun is about a bunch of bad-asses battling the dangers and monsters of the deserts, as well as all the other people trying to kill them for their stuff.

Having psionics but stripping it of it's best part?!

Heresy!

I'd rather have a book that converts all spellcasters to spell points and gives augmentation options to all spells.

I think Ultimate Campaign could have provided a lot more in that respect. That was actually one of the main things I wanted from it (other than getting Kingdom and Army rules into the SRD). I'm already working out honor codes for my campaign and people have been quite excited about retraining and magic item crafting (for better or worse).

I would love to see a real Unearthed Arcana for Pathfinder. For example with some system for corruption like Taint or the Dark Side. Or magic that harms spellcaster every time they use it.
And please! Give us finally some book that has Allegiance (and adds it to the SRD). Allegiance is the greatest alignment system ever yet I've seen it used only in a single d20 game ever since its creation.

Sorcerer does not prepare spells in slots. That pretty much seals the deal for me.

(Same reason oracle can completely replace clerics for what I care.)

I kind of like the Honor Codes from UCam and think they could really help to add some additional aspects to the game that assist the players in playing characters with morals and priorities different from their own. It's often fun, but all too easy to slip back into "what would I do" quickly.
So even an informal honor code for a character can help, especially when it provides you with a new resource that you can use. (The full rules are in UCam. Basically you remind people of your perfect reputation to get special favors, but get a slight blemish to your Honor, as a truly honorable person would not exploit his reputation for personal benefits.)

Now, I am thinking of developing new Honor Codes for my setting that represent the morals and priorities of its people. However, I feel they might be a bit human-centric and the world really is about the early realms of elves and lizardfolk, with humans being one of the smaller mercenary races fighting in the greater conflicts.
So I am now searching for ideas what things elves and lizardfolk could be considering as "honorable". Actions that show that a person will not easily abandon his ideals, give in to pressure and opposition, or go back on his word. Things that show they are reliable and will honor their agreements. It does not have to be things that you would like about a person or approve off, but rather things that show a person is dependable and someone you can negotiate with, even if he's your enemy.

The way around blindsight is a 30-ft.-semi-circle.

Yes, but I don't consider that the main issue. I think the bigger problem is with nudging new players into that direction without them even having the intention to do so.
Optimization over roleplaying rarely happens by accident, but rather is a result of what impression players get where the goal of the game lies. If you show them that even fore minor things there are special mechanical rules they "need" to include on their character sheets, they will rightfully expect that it all plays like a video game where you can't do anything that wasn't already programmed into the game.

If that is even a problem depends mostly on what you want to get out of the game, but the way I play and run games, I want to avoid that as much as possible. I want players to think of their characters actions as a story first, and then we see how we can best represent that within the rules. Even if it's just a plain and simple ability roll.
d20 does a lot of things well, but it's a very dense system overcrowded with rules, so I consider limiting the options to what is really neccessary a vital measure.

I think the game is safe to play until 8th level or so, but you should really slow down with the XP if you get close to 10th and still want to continue playing.
After that, the game becomes one of demigods devastating everything in their path. I have no personal interest in those kinds of fantasy world and rather keep it to the 4th to 8th range, were things are still more mundane.

There are a lot of Pathfinder adventures that look really great and that I would like to run. But for every single one, I have to switch out all the locations and organizations with something else from the world I am playing in.
It's not a huge amount of work, but more generic and self-contained adventures would make adapting them a bit easier.

Yes, pretty pretty please. The rules bloat was one thing that made D&D a bit of a drag towards the end and starting with a clean slate was one of the things that made Pathfinder so attractive. We really don't need a new Feats and Spells book every four months. As amazing as Advanced Players Guide is, UC and UM had already been loosing steam. No need to drag it out into indiffeence and insignificance.
If you have something new that really adds something to the game, I am all for it, but more feats and spells just for the sake of increasing the number should be avoided.

369. A single line from a great song: "Why does a stream of pilgrims keep visiting the prophet who never speaks?"

When I run PF games, I usually limit spellcasters to bards, sorcerers, and oracles, and if a player really wants to play a wizard, cleric, or druid, these classes simply replace their spells per day lists with those of sorcerers.

But I think converting everything to psionic power points would be a much better solution. It's just a huge amount of work with all the spell-like abilities of creatures and mystery spells, and so on. So spontaneous spell slots are a more practical solution.

If taking silly spell slots away from the game makes it no longer part of the D&D tradition, then I no longer want to play D&D.

In case there are still people who don't know about it, E6 is a simple variant system in which 6th level is the maximum level and you use any additional XP you gain to buy bonus feats for 5,000 XP each. (Seriously, this is the whole system. Everything else is just commentary.)

I'm quite familiar with how regular E6 works and behaves, but are there any special considerations to keep in mind when doing it in Pathfinder? Are the any things that work differently than under 3.5e in a meaningful way?

Out of curiosity, I build armies with the mass combat rules from Kingmaker (which will also be in Ultimate Combat) with these numbers.

On the one side you would have 5 units of peasants with an Army Challenge Rating of 8 (28 hp each) and 1 unit of knights also with an ACR of 8 (44 hp) and +3 to offense and defense, equal to an ACR 11 army.

The wizards would be a single unit with an ACR of 13 (45 hp) and gain a +5 bonus to both offense and defense, which gives it the offense and defense values of an ACR 18 army.

Now armies don't have an AC but defense works a lot more like Damage Reduction. To harm the wizards, an attacking army would have to make an offense roll of at least 28 with an attack bonus of +8, or +11 for the knights.
On the other hand, the wizards would only have to make an offense roll of 18 or 21 while having an attack bonus of +18.

In short: The peasants can't harm the wizards and the wizards will always hit the peasants. On average it should take the wizards three rounds of battle to whipe out a unit of peasants while not being at any real risk.
That leaves the knights vs. the wizards, and a 5th level fighter for every 10th level wizard does not stand a chance.
Strategy, Tactics, Terrain, and dice rolls could possibly lead to a defeat of the wizards, but it seems very unlikely.

[1], [2], [3], [4], [5]

I love sword and sorcery worlds and bronze age settings a lot, but I'm not a fan of early modern settings, like Golarion. So it's often some converting and adjusting of adventures and APs for me. The Kingdom Building system from Kingmaker is an interesting idea, but I think there could be some changes made to make it more fitting to represent the small domains of a chief.
Unfortunately, Ultimate Campaign, in which the rules will be reprinted, will be released only two weeks and it might even take a bit longer until they will be accessible in the PRD. So if you don't know the rules but want to understand the specifics of the system, I'm afraid you'll have to wait for a bit more.

To summarize, you control a certain area of territory in which you can found major settlements. In each of these Cities, you can invest Build Points from your treasury to create new buildings for merchants, craftsmen, and all kinds of public services. Once per month you roll dice to see how much income your settlements generated and how much you had to spend to maintain them. If you make surplus, you can invest the profit into new buildings, but those also consume additional resources every month, so you need to find a good balance of what special buildings you have in your kingdom.
You can also fill certain public offices with NPCs or even other PCs in the party, and then you add one of their ability modifiers (often Int or Wis) to the rolls you make every month to see how well the economy performed and if the locals are still happy. If they get too unhappy, the economy suffers and you might lose parts of the territory you control.

Now since some barbarian with his companions and their followers can hardly be called a Kingdom, I suggest calling these territories simply domains for the purpose of this thread. Similarly, not every major settlement would actually be a city, but mostly relatively minor towns, so I'd say let's call them just towns.

But the bread and butter of the system are the special buildings you can get for your town.
I suggest that the following buildings should not be available at all, or at least require that a town has a minimum of 50 already existing special buildings.
Academy: There simply is no formal education in a town of barbarians.
Cathedral: There might be one in the primary religious center of the entire culture, but an individual chief should not have one in his town.
Library: Like an Academy, it would be rather out of place.
Luxury Store: Could be feasable in a major trading center with contacts to distant lands, but usually there wouldn't be much of a customer base for their goods.
Magic Shop: In a setting leaning towards Sword & Sorcery, these would be out of place.
Monument: Might work, but I don't have much of an idea for what would seem apropriate in this context.
Park: Doesn't seem to make sense.
Theatre: Neither does this. Bards and minstrels would rather perform in Taverns or the chiefs keep.
Town Hall: Since the whole government would take place in the chiefs home, there is not much need for it.

That said, there are a number of special buildings that I think are still missing and should be added to the list:
Heros Grave (4 BP): The resting place of a famous hero, often the founder of the clan. A smaller version of the monument. Loyalty +2, Unrest -1.
Keep (27 BP): A smaller version of the castle. Usually the home of the chief or one of his most loyal followers entrusted with governing the area. Economy +1, Loyalty +1, Stability +1, Defense Modifier +4, Unrest -2, limtited to one Keep or Castle per town.
Palisade (3 BP): A much cheaper alternative to stone walls. Defense Modifier +2, Unrest -1.
Town Square: A central meeting place where the elders and leaders of the town gather to discuss matters of public concern and where the chief adresses his people. Loyalty +1, Stability +1.
Warrior Hall (20 BP): A central meeting hall were the accomplished full time warriors of the clan gather and train. Since this is basically the headquarter for military forces in the area, it makes the town a lot more secure. It also promotes pride in the clans might and displays the forces that the chief commands. Defense Modifier +2, Loyalty +1, Stability +1, Unrest -1.
Witch Hut (10 BP, may not be adjacent to more than one building): A lesser version of the casters tower. A witch can provide vital services, but is generally mistrusted. 2 minor items; Economy +1, Unrest +1.

Another thing that needs to be adressed is alignment. Alignment really doesn't work at all for Sword & Sorcery games. But like character alignment can be very well replaced with Allegiances, so can the alignment of a domain be replaced with a certain type of society.
Here some ideas:
Hunters: This clan uses a lot of hunting and also trading over agriculture. +2 Economy, +2 Loyalty.
Druidic: The people of this domain live under the protection of an influential group of druids or shamans. While not rich, such clans are less at a risk of famines or uprisings against unpopular rule. +2 Loyalty, +2 Stability.
Traders: These clans gains their wealth from trade. While they are often wealthy, their fortunes are fickle and hard to predict. +6 Economy, -2 Loyalty.
Raiders: This clan relies heavily on stealing goods and riches from their neighbors. While they often live well and can easily compensate for a bad economy by increased raiding, people of these clans are prone to turning against each other. +2 Economy, +4 Stability, -2 Loyalty.
Cult: This domain is populated by deeply devoted followers of a minor deity, ancient horror, or demon lord. The isolation of the people makes them poor, but they rarely turn against their leaders and perform their work as it is expected of them. -2 Economy, +4 Loyalty, +2 Stability.

This was all brewed up rather quickly but I still, and even because of it, I'd want to hear peoples oppinions of where I could add to this and how I might adjust the modifiers and BP costs a bit better.

The most relevant stories are those that explain why certain things are as they are now, and why they could not have turned out differently.
That's the same basic principle by which historians have been working for thousands of years.
First you had this, then something happened, certain people did that in response, and because of this, we have now something or another.

A story that just tells us that some guy did something really cool is just a story. To make it a myth of historic relevance, it needs to be an explaination for the world the people are currently living in.

Why is our town in such a poorly picked place? Why do we have to pay tribute to the emperor every year? Why do we have to allow the other village to graze their sheep in the valley that is much closer to our own village? Sometimes you can give a completely mundane explaination, at other times nobody really knows and makes something up. But for the myth, that's not relevant. The important thing is that it's a story that tells the people to accept that things simply are the way they are.

The myths of Prometheus and Persephone come to mind. (Which both are not versions of the Heroes Journey.) The myth of Prometheus explains why humans have culture and technology and all other animals do not. The myth of Persephone explains why there is winter and it can't be spring all year round.

Fighters are not bad, especially in Pathfinder. The only "issue" is that there are not nearly as many ways to break the game with them by using doubious interpretations of rules from multiple sources as there are with spellcasters.
In the range of 6th to 10th level, that isn't that obvious yet as people really have to put some effort into it to make spellcasters super-powerful. But once you get to the high levels of 13+, they just get so many spells and magic items for spellcasters, that it gets difficult to keep them in check even if the players aren't actively trying to outdo everyone else in the party.

Fighters are good. Wizards, clerics, and druids are bad classes.

I would suggest to not use rules for bronze weapons and armor. Those are laughably bad, with equipment shattering all the time. Bronze is not bad. Bronze is even better than many early steels. The idea that it breaks all the time is nonsense.

Instead, it makes more sense to limit the equipment options to items that can actually be made from bronze.
That mostly means no greatswords, bastard swords, falchions, half-plate armor, full-plate armor, and banded armor. I think in theory you could even make bronze full-plate, but since it has never been done it would be out of place in a Greek themed campaign. Long blades made of bronze won't work. Those would actually behave quite like the rules for bronze weapons if anyone would make them.

A big problem with MM4 and MM5 were the large numbers of variant ghouls, variant demon-dogs, variant drakes, and ape-brute demons. It feels like these concept account for two thirds of all the monsters. And many 3rd party monster books are just as bad.

Compared to that, the Divs and Kami offer much more new things to the game that are not just the eighth remakes of something that was bland the first time.

So the 2000 posts of the Bestiary 4 wishlist thread were not in vain.