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So do the people of Golarion understand the concept of character classes? I have two scenarios to present.
A Legacy of Fire character is a Sorcerer with the Fire Elemental bloodline. He was raised as a merchant's son and if anything leans more towards fighter/rogue. Then some pugwampis get near him and he starts setting things on fire unintentionally. This fire gets more and more powerful and he starts to figure out how to direct it and make things explode. Would NPCs and other PCs automatically know he's a Sorcerer? Would he know that's what he is?
A Kingmaker character is an Inquisitor of Norgorber. She focuses on the secrets aspect of her god and doesn't go about announcing her faith. She walks around in medium armor with a halberd and can cast divine spells. She disguises her own faith, but doesn't want to act as a priest of another faith. Would she be able to get away with just saying she's a fighter who has picked up some spells? Or would NPCs/PCs expect or know her to be a Paladin or Cleric and be shocked when she can't channel energy for example.
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Good questions Coridan. I can only say how I would address this in my games as a dm. I would say that it is very situational, and when magic is involved it seems it would be a bit easier to recognize certain aspects of a "class". After all everyone knows there are wizards that spend a lot of time studying and learning magic. They also know that there are people who just have magic in their blood, and know it innately. Do they all call these people sorcerers? I doubt it. They may be known by different names, or may not be sure what is going on at first. I do think that most people would over time come to the conclusion that they are some sort of innate caster though.
Your second example I think would be a bit more interesting. In my Golarion this would depend on who is observing the character. A commoner who has little or no knowledge of magic might assume the character just knows some magic. Someone with ranks in spell craft, know arcana, or know religion may have some interesting questions for the inquisitor.
I have a proposed character for a pbp right now that is a summoner, in game he is a Shoanti shaman. I proposed his eidolon is seen as a totem spirit called forth to help protect the people. Since clerics and druids both are seen as shamans by Shoanti it seems that obviously they are used to having shamans who have different abilities. I gave the eidolon earthy aspects, and intent for his summoned creatures to be earth subtype instead of celestial, etc. to keep with the theme.
I don't know if that helps at all, but I don't see people walking around going of that guy knows how to disarm traps so he is a rogue, but like in your example i think most people would be able to come to the conclusion that your sorcerer has innate spell abilities. Now whether they call him a sorcerer, hedge mage, cursed, or witch that could be an adventure all in its own right. ;D
I would think that they understand that only in somewhat broad terms. A commoner would not get the difference between a fighter and a warrior, only that he is a guy with armor and weapons. IN fact, anybody wearing more than light armor and carrying weapons would probably be seen as a warrior at first. I guess most villagers seldom see their village priest running around in armor.
Skills set people apart in terms of their vocation rather than class - a merchant could be any class, as could be a carpenter.
Spellcasters are somewhat different, but for most folks, they would probably judge him by the spell effects rather than the source - a big,fiery spell is making the caster very dangerous, and a peasant could care less if this was a fireball or a flame strike. A healing spell makes him seem more benign, and the caster will probably called a healer, but not a bard, cleric or whatever.
NPCs with PC classes probably have a better idea of what is going on, especially in the case of spellcasting classes and spellcraft.
Overall, you need a sound knowledge of what people are able to do to judge their class correctly, and even then, it is not written on peoples faces. And you still won´t know if that guy in full plate armor is a figher, a paladin, a knight, a cleric or something else until he shows more of his abilities.
Stefan
With the exception of casters, skills and combat ability will largely determine how others will identify a PC. Even a Rogue could be seen as a man-at-arms, thug or warrior. I would imagine Sorcerers and Wizards get lumped together by most common folk. They wield magic and it really matters little what the source is. Clerics will probably be seen as priest or holy warriors.
To a certain degree, certainly.
The exploits of the exalted powerful people of Golarion are definitely going to be talked and sung about. The differences between a cleric and a wizard are night and day. While the people may not use those particular words, they'd certainly be able to make the differentiation. Even barbarians and paladins are distinct enough in behaviour that they'd like have iconic descriptions. Sorcerers not having to endure decades of book learning to access wizard-like magic? Again, certainly spoken of.
The only three base classes I see having some fuzziness to their definitions are fighters, rangers, and rogues. There's not much inherent in any of them that they'd be guaranteed identified as one in particular.
Think of the classes as more archetypes. The people of Golarion would absolutely know about those famous archetypes.
I remember playing in a one shot 4e game. One of the younger players asked me what I was playing and I told him a squire. He stared at me blankly for a few minutes before saying he did not know there was a squire class.
So do the people of Golarion understand the concept of character classes?
I think they understand the concept of roles, of abilities/capabilities.
They will usually be able to distinguish between different "powers", and sometimes they can zero in on what is basically a class (but it's more a "knowing the role" thing). And not everybody is equally good at this, of course.
Example: You have some guy who is mostly good at fighting, but doesn't actively train any other abilities or show exceptional power in many other fields. He's certainly a "warrior" type. But I don't think they could tell the difference between a warrior or a fighter, except maybe in very few cases.
Some things are easy to spot: You can spot a genuine "bard" as someone who can achieve supernatural things with his performances. A Paladin's probably something that's easy to spot, too (but mostly because they belong to a paladin order).
Something that is easy to spot but not that easy to distinguish (for your average peasant) is magic. "Sure, the guy over there just did something with his fingers and now my house is on fire. He does magic. But that stuff about 'wizzards' and 'sourcerers' is beyond me." A more experienced, learned individual could, on the other hand, probably tell a wizard from a sorcerer, and might even be able to tell you what "bloodline" that sorcerer is.
But it very, very rarely is "look, the guy there is a fighter, not a warrior, because he has too many feats for a warrior." (Though I think some really exceptional individuals can get close at what we consider the concept of classes, it is very far from the norm.)
A Legacy of Fire character is a Sorcerer with the Fire Elemental bloodline. He was raised as a merchant's son and if anything leans more towards fighter/rogue. Then some pugwampis get near him and he starts setting things on fire unintentionally. This fire gets more and more powerful and he starts to figure out how to direct it and make things explode. Would NPCs and other PCs automatically know he's a Sorcerer? Would he know that's what he is?
Automatically? No.
Some might infer that he has inborn magical talents and basically identify him as a "fire sorcerer".
A Kingmaker character is an Inquisitor of Norgorber. She focuses on the secrets aspect of her god and doesn't go about announcing her faith. She walks around in medium armor with a halberd and can cast divine spells. She disguises her own faith, but doesn't want to act as a priest of another faith. Would she be able to get away with just saying she's a fighter who has picked up some spells? Or would NPCs/PCs expect or know her to be a Paladin or Cleric and be shocked when she can't channel energy for example.
No automatic knowledge or anything here, either. If they witness her using magic (and she doesn't disguise it to fool them into thinking the magic comes from somewhere else), they will probably assume she can fight and do magic. Beyond that, it's a matter of spellcraft and general assessment abilities.
She could be a warrior/adept (or, in in-game-people speech, "a warrior/magic-doer").
who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.
who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.Thats easy thats Jigoku Shoju (Enmma Ai)
it is also a character i played a few variations of. under different names. i'd personally assume rogue or some stealth focused class, like a shadow hand swordsage.
i just looked up Enma Ai, she looks similar to the described character i played variants of, with a few differences, mainly eye color, which i accidentally left out. the RP character had eyes that were golden like those of a lion, each with 2 slit like pupils. and had a solid black kimono. different preference in hairstyle too.
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I think the people of Golarion only recognize character classes as expressed through social constructs. It's all about office and reputation. If you're a fighter with a reputation for theft and thuggery, you're a rogue. If you're a ranger who comes from an exotic location with a wardrobe of sassy animal skins, you're a barbarian. If you're a sorcerer who can strum a tune and has a way with the ladies, you're a bard (or a scoundrel). If you're rogue who belongs to the Red Anvil mercenary company, you're a mercenary. Etcetera.
Like the other posters said, magic complicates things, but the people of Golarion are probably concerned with one basic distinction:
Is it civilized magic?
Wizards, clerics, paladins and bards are commonly perceived as civilized magic users. Its presumed that they endured some sort of apprenticeship and they are beholden to a temple, college or fraternity that provides wisdom and censure. They're vetted. It gives citizens comfort knowing that these types must practice their magic like a trade or a craft.
Sorcerers, druids and rangers possess a type of magic that can be interpreted as unearned, and untamed. There's something wholly inhuman (in the broadest sense) about this sort magical savantism that can frighten many Golarions.
I think it would probably come across into three "spheres".
Sphere one:
You are what you are.
Sorcerors would strongly fit into this category. Clerics and Paladin would as well. Druids might. (they just "have the calling" so to speak).
WE think of being a cleric as a choice but I think to the game world its more of a calling. (just my .02)
Sphere two:
You are what you do.
Fighters, rogues, rangers, wizards, and such fall into this category.
These classes are, from an RP perspective, more "trained" and "learned" than "well you just are". of course, some people have a natural aptitude for something but thats largely reflected by ability scores and feats.
The names as we know them however are largely our own titles and the people of the game may not know them. "fighter" "rogue" "ranger" can all be largely interchangeable depending on what the individual is doing.
(rogues or fighters taking a nature bent, a ranger in the city being seen more of a "fighter" and so on.). The blur between the martial classes especially would be huge.
Sphere Three:
You are.. err.. something.
Summoners fall into this category as probably do most of the non-martial "oddity" classes. (witch, oracle, etc.)
These are the folks that the majority of the world either have never heard of or would mistake for someone else if they did.
Summoners would be seen as sorcerors or wizards who just had a longer pet out while witches and oracles would likely be seen as their respective "normal class" rather than the good variations that they are.
Overall I think most folks would fall into "ooh casters" or "hey, he uses weapons" kind of thing with more folks separating out the weapon types than the casters. (simply because they see and interact with more people with weapons as town guard, merchant guards and such than they do casters).
Do i think the average Joe could point out a fighter, a rogue, a barbarian, a druid, a wizard, etc and tell them apart? No, I would say most certainly not. An expert in one of the fields *might* but probably not.
And for that matter, the PC's probably wouldn't necessarily be able to either, at least not until a good many abilities were used to differentiate them from one another.
Just my thoughts.
-S
So do the people of Golarion understand the concept of character classes? I have two scenarios to present.
I'd have to say this depends on if you allow your npc's to have an understanding of the game in a meta-game fashion. A "character class" is nothing more than a meta-game creation from our perspective as a player, it is something that allows a player in the real world to fashion an imaginary character in a make believe world within the rule set put forth in the game book. It is for all intents and purposes a bag of abilities gathered together to create a skeleton or template of some general concept which is then fine tuned (skills, feats, ability and spell choice, etc.) by the player to "play" in the world. It was named that way to give the player (out of game) an idea of what the game designer designated this "skeleton" to be used for.
I guess the problem is that there is some cross over for the term, a Paladin (character class – meta-game) in our view has abilities X, Y, Z. A "paladin" (concept or title - in game) actually has nothing to do with those abilities. A martial character (fighter) with some levels of a caster class (cleric) could easily represent the concept of "paladin". To muddle things further there is a crossover of magic and item abilities. A Fighter/Wizard(or sorcerer) with appropriate spell selection could also represent a "paladin" in game. A straight Fighter with items could even give the illusion of being a "paladin" in game but could be more easily "outed" by anyone with the appropriately high skills (spellcraft and/or knowledge checks of like 15+ I think)- Far from your typical npc skill selections for a commoner or non adventuring type.
Take a look a "samurai" versus Samurai (class). The "samurai" was actually a social class, that is what the npc's would understand. The Samurai was a meta-game construct to fit a role in the game and give it the appropriate (designer chosen) abilities. A Wizard or Sorcerer is equally capable of being a "samurai" as a Samurai in the game. PFRPG has even backed this further by removing the Archmage PrC, they want the title "Archmage" available to anyone who fits the concept in game - any character of sufficient ability or reputation could then claim the title. This is something they stated when questioned about why the PrC was removed from the final product.
A Legacy of Fire character is a Sorcerer with the Fire Elemental bloodline. He was raised as a merchant's son and if anything leans more towards fighter/rogue. Then some pugwampis get near him and he starts setting things on fire unintentionally. This fire gets more and more powerful and he starts to figure out how to direct it and make things explode. Would NPCs and other PCs automatically know he's a Sorcerer? Would he know that's what he is?
Again we go back to what makes a sorcerer in game. Is it the type of magic they use? Well wizards, sorcerers and bards use arcane magic and the lists overlap in many places– that is a problem. Can’t use that, of course the vast majority of the npcs you encounter wouldn’t even be able to tell the difference between arcane and divine magic. How about the number of spells they can cast, again this is mutable – it depends on the level and attributes of the caster. A “well endowed” wizard (high stats – meta-game information) could cast as many spells as a less powerful sorcerer (low stats). Again, not good enough. Bloodlines would be a possibility but some of the abilities are able to be reproduced by feats or other abilities/spell selection so again that doesn’t cut it from an in game stand point. For me the most telling distinction would be a spell book, a Sorcerer doesn’t need one. However there are ways for a Wizard to get around that through item and feat selections so, in the game world, the two could be indistinguishable depending on the meta-game choices. Yes there might be a general and reasonable expectation for the in game designation of “sorcerer” BUT a character designed through another class (Wizard or Bard) could pass as one quite simply in the game world. There is another thread on the boards that this was brought up if you wanted to see it explored more in depth. It is a matter of in game fluff and the meta-game rules, game rules actually have no real connection to the fluff of the world. The game is designed so the rules could easily be transported from one game world to another and the fluff is interchangeable for that reason.
A Kingmaker character is an Inquisitor of Norgorber. She focuses on the secrets aspect of her god and doesn't go about announcing her faith. She walks around in medium armor with a halberd and can cast divine spells. She disguises her own faith, but doesn't want to act as a priest of another faith. Would she be able to get away with just saying she's a fighter who has picked up some spells? Or would NPCs/PCs expect or know her to be a Paladin or Cleric and be shocked when she can't channel energy for example.
PrC’s can be more tricky as some of them typically entail some sort of organization or specialized training, but again the prestige class is technically a set of meta-game abilities that you qualify by other meta-game statistics and abilities. The fluff of the PrC can be easily rewritten to be useful for multiple different purposes in the game. This PrC devoted to a specific god works for these 2 other gods? Copy and paste the mechanics, write up the story line for each instance, rename and there you go.
As for the character in question, I would have no problem with it, nor would or regular DM. In fact our DM has an unspoken rule that we don’t talk about our out of character/meta-game information in game, that means no saying I’m a 2 Fighter/3 Wizard. He wants us to role play the interaction. The majority of npcs might be a bit puzzled about the lack of channel energy if you were trying to say you were a paladin or cleric, but that isn’t what you are saying. You are saying “I’m a Fighter with some magical aptitude”. With the appropriate spell choices there is no reason for them to think otherwise. Given as it is divine magic and that typically requires you to use a holy symbol, the npc peoples “in the know” in game might raise some eyebrows when they see you cast (again requiring spellcraft and knowledge arcane of a decent amount as we’re talking about DC 16+) if you are saying you are using arcane magic. But there is always the “I’m a follower of this god and pray to him/her every time I cast for help and success” line. And we’re talking about magic here, by its presence anything is basically possible. Is there a spell a Wizard saw cast by a Cleric and they want to know? Well, they go and research and study and design a spell with similar effects (aka spell research in core rules) there you go. There is already cross over between arcane and divine so it is plausible and realistic in the world for the npc. They might not understand or like it, but there is no real way for them to counter “My god allows me to do this” or “My mentor taught me these spells”, it is out of the norm but it is still possible – and it has some possible campaign hooks if the DM decides to play it that way. The less you stray from the norm the less likely you are to raise suspicions of the npcs around you if that is what you are concerned with. Also don’t forget spells don’t have to be the same, some casters tailor the spells they cast (thematics) – green fireball could be a completely different spell to the typical npc than the normal red fireball. It requires a trained skill and typically significant investment in the skill to even be able to possibly make that distinction in game, and all that gets them is that it is a spell – not if it is divine or arcane (read the skill, there is no mention of that knowledge being gained. All you get is the spell.)
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Barbarians, Fighters, Monks, Paladins, Rangers, Cavaliers, and Warriors will be seen as warriors. Clerics, Druids, Inquisitors, and Oracles will be seen as priests. Sorcerers, Wizards, Alchemists, Summoners, and Witches will be seen as mages. Aristocrats, Commoners. and Experts are are seen as just regular people, despite the Aristocrat's higher position in society. An Adept might be seen as a mage or a priest, depending on his actions. Bards and Rogues might be seen as any of the above, depending on her actions. And for many folk, the line between mages and priests will be a very blurry one.
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I do not believe they can.
There is nothing that a character, PC or NPC, can do that would allow another character to say 'Oh, he's a Fighter.'
A character may see someone summon fire with a flick of his fingers and say 'Look at that sorcerer!' But he is talking about a sorcerer, a person endowed with magic, not a Sorcerer, the spontaneous spellcaster class.
He may see someone with a shaven head wearing robes leap to the top of a wall and say 'Oh my, that monk of the temple is extraordinary!' but has no idea that the character actually has Cleric class levels.
Class defines how you interact with the mechanics of the game, not how your character appears in the fluff of the campaign.
Class defines how you interact with the mechanics of the game, not how your character appears in the fluff of the campaign.
However, Class largely determines your abilities and therefore, at least in my opinion, does appear in the fluff of the campaign.
But an NPC declaring 'You Fighter there!' is retarded.
I agree. That is one reason I do not frequently play class based systems.
How is that even possible? I thought I finished every post with "D&D sux0r5!!!!1!!!shift+one Play Hero"
Blast it to Hell! Paizo does not have signatures.
who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.
I guess schoolgirl/hentacle victim/used panties seller.
who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.I guess schoolgirl/hentacle victim/used panties seller.
Nah, she's obviously a high-school student/ bokken master :D
I avoid having NPC's use PC terms wherever possible, and almost never refer to a 'class' by name except where really appropriate.
In my campaign, the badlands are riddled with outlaws, brigands and barbarians. The first time they came across a cadre of barbarian rangers there were no actual 'Barbarian's' in the group. There was a druid, a bard and many 1st level warriors.
Likewise, I have been encouraging my players to describe themselves as their profession rather than their class. While it's mechanically important to know I have a barbarian, a ranger, a sorcerer and a rogue, it's more flavoursome to know that I have a Dwarven Savage, a Gnome Wildsman, a Street performer, and a privateer.
Batts
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I agree a lot with what Iczer said and the other posts in the thread. In a game, PCs are going to be identified in character by what they do or say, not what is on the character sheet. Honestly, I think a lot of it comes down to what your character thinks he/she is and how he/she would answer the question "what are you?". For example, In a Curse of the Crimson Throne campaign, I have a geshalt sorcerer/paladin who runs around with Mage armor. However, she will proclaim to all the NPCs that she is a paladin and wave around her holy symbol. She is a "paladin" or maybe sometimes a "knight" in the game, never a sorceror. In another example, consider a inquisitor of sarenrae with a scimitar who hails from qadira. He would never describe himself as an inquisitor or even a priest, but would call himself a "dervish", and npcs would treat him as such.
To bring it to "real life", a person can be a soldier in the army and be a ranger (Sniper), a barbarian (shocktrooper), a rogue (engineer), a fighter (uh... Running out if ideas) or whatever. However, as a civilian, and especially if I see said soldier walking down the street, all I can say is, hey it's a soldier (and only then with a uniform). Even if I see them in action I can make a vague guess (uhhh they shoot things). However to someone actually in the army, they would be able to tell easily.
I have a relatively easy of determining if people know or not.
If they have legit PC levels, they know.
If they have only NPC levels (like commoner), then no.
To me it's just matter of skill check.
If my player asks, while staring someone casting whatever, to have an hint on him, I'd ask for a spellcraft check + knoledge arcana/religion (let's say to focus on 'style/source of power'). If he gets 'good' results, he'll probably know that that girl casting the divine spell X is doing it in a way that makes you doubt on the fact that she can be simply a 'standard' cleric. If he gets outstanding results I could even suggest: "you remember the time when you heard the story of a strange guy who did that and was called in a strange way, something like inquirer..., bla bla"
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"you remember the time when you heard the story of a strange guy who did that and was called in a strange way, something like inquirer..., bla bla"
Urg. This is exactly the type of thing I was advocating against.
An inquisitor is someone who roots out people who go against an organization, usually a religious one.
An Inquisitor is a group of abilities that can be used to produce many different types of characters. There is nothing in those abilities that would necessarily tie one Inquisitor to another.
A character would be more likely to think of the NPC as a bounty hunter, unless the Inquisitor was part of a group that actually called themselves the Inquisitors of Asmodeus or whatever.
I say this because I do not believe class should pigeonhole a character into one role. I have had a Ranger as the local thieves guildmaster. I do not agree with the 'base class for every character type'.
tl;dr There is no such thing as a 'standard cleric'.
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who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.
I would assume that a person who looks 12, is...12. I'd probably ask where her parents are.
Of course, once she uses some of her abilities the assumptions of her audience will change and become informed.
And then you're actually back to the topic of this thread.
who knows what the little asian girl in the black kimono could be? she could be anything. she looks about 12, stands 5'1", weighs 80 lbs, is as flat chested as the surface an ironing board, and wears a loose, heavy black winter weight kimono with a matching scarf, boots and gloves. what class or multiclass combination would you assume she is? if you have multiple assumptions, list your key one or few that you would default to.I would assume that a person who looks 12, is...12. I'd probably ask where her parents are.
Of course, once she uses some of her abilities the assumptions of her audience will change and become informed.
And then you're actually back to the topic of this thread.
the whole point was that looks can be decieving, or you can't tell a character's profession just by their appearance. you have to see them in action first. that actually was the base concept of a character i played, she was emancipated by the time she was 4th level. a 12 year old asian orphan who used the fact that she was a little girl to suprise her foes when she sneak attacked them. nobody expected the little girl to be good with a pair of wakizashis. they thought she was just a normal child and were dead before they saw her true colors.
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The question isn't so much as looks, but at seeing someone do a few abilities and knowing that they must be a specific class.
IE I see someone Lay Hands and immediately know they are a Paladin and have either a super sword or a magic horsey.
So how do you know the difference between Lay On Hands and Cure Moderate Wounds? And why must it be a super sword or magic horse?
bokken master :D
Chuck Norris can cut bullets in half. With a wooden sword.
So how do you know the difference between Lay On Hands and Cure Moderate Wounds?
It's probably matter of how each of us plays...
Again, to me, a character with basic spellcraft can probably tell the difference.While I agree that this is not due in a low-magic world, unfortunately I've never played in such setting.
Watch an arbitrary fantasy movie. Tell me what class the characters are.
There are characters with a "label" on them, for example gandalf and aragorn:
Gandalf is a wizard since in middle earth a wizard is a "species", all middle earth wizards are maiar.
Aragorn is a ranger since "ranger" means descedant of the people of numenor, dunedain, who patrols the forests
and there are characters with no label on them.
For example conan. Everyone who knows conan knows that he is some sort of barbarian or warrior. But this is no label, not even a profession - his profession is more something like a thief.
Just use the words like you would use them in real world. Someone throws fireballs? Thats a wizard. (Or sorcerer. As words they mean pretty much the same. "Wizard" comes from "Wicce", exactly like "Witch" and a witch is what I would call spontane caster.)
Another example, the character I want to play in the next campain:
His class is bard. He is focused on archery, using stuff like arcane strike and on lvl 8 I plan to enter the arcane archer prestige class.
Of course he can sing and cast bard spells but the focus lies on archery.
So what does he think of himself in terms of character classes? He thinks of himself as an archer. Or maybe as some kind of "arcane ranger". He does NOT think of himself as a bard, sure, he can play music, but being a bard is just not his role.
Now imagine a fighter with ranks in perform(sing) and perform(string). He might earn his money by performing music, travelling through the land, being schooled at combat since the land is dangerous, and since he wants to write songs about adventures he travels with other heros.
This guy might think of himself as a bard. Thats his role. A bard is someone who sings - the other stuff of the bard class like casting spells has nothing to do with the role bard.
Another example is the rogue class. This class is not only the usual class of a thief, but also the class a scholar (who is not able to cast spells) and a archeologist. Three entire different roles in one class.
the whole point was that looks can be decieving, or you can't tell a character's profession just by their appearance. you have to see them in action first. that actually was the base concept of a character i played, she was emancipated by the time she was 4th level. a 12 year old asian orphan who used the fact that she was a little girl to suprise her foes when she sneak attacked them. nobody expected the little girl to be good with a pair of wakizashis. they thought she was just a normal child and were dead before they saw her true colors.
I don't think this is a very good illustration of what you're trying to describe. You've contrived a less-than-realistic fantasy character specifically to be an example of the 'looks-can-be-deceiving' paradigm and are now employing it as a tool to argue for the generalizability of your argument.
Essentially, what you're saying (as a series of statements) is:
1. I fabricated a make-believe character whose looks were outwardly deceiving.
2. People couldn't tell outwardly what my character's profession was as a result.
3. Therefore, because of this one contrived example, people in this fantasy world are unable to come to accurate conclusions about any character's profession simply by looking at them.
On its face, this is obviously not valid. The robed cleric prominently sporting a book of scripture and holy symbol is archetypal. The white-haired wizard with a pointy hat and wand does not leave his profession to the imagination. While your argument might apply to a handful of characters created with the 'looks-can-be-deceiving' concept in mind, I would argue that most PCs are not created like that, and that your average NPC in the game world is perfectly okay with making reasonable guesses as to the occupational foci of the people around them.
the whole point was that looks can be decieving, or you can't tell a character's profession just by their appearance. you have to see them in action first. that actually was the base concept of a character i played, she was emancipated by the time she was 4th level. a 12 year old asian orphan who used the fact that she was a little girl to suprise her foes when she sneak attacked them. nobody expected the little girl to be good with a pair of wakizashis. they thought she was just a normal child and were dead before they saw her true colors.
actually Looks while looks can be decieving, they are often not (otherwise looks could never be decieving).
we have an inbuilt ability to make snap judgements based on appearance. It's a survival trait. when a player gives me the 'looks can be decieving' line It's usually (usually) a prelude to 'I want a hidden advantage' and/or 'I'm a bit of a jerk as far as players go'.
If you spent all your life expecting 12 year old girls to turn out to be double digit rogue/fighters then you will die of a coronary before you are 30.
Batts
the whole point was that looks can be decieving, or you can't tell a character's profession just by their appearance. you have to see them in action first. that actually was the base concept of a character i played, she was emancipated by the time she was 4th level. a 12 year old asian orphan who used the fact that she was a little girl to suprise her foes when she sneak attacked them. nobody expected the little girl to be good with a pair of wakizashis. they thought she was just a normal child and were dead before they saw her true colors.
actually Looks while looks can be decieving, they are often not (otherwise looks could never be decieving).
we have an inbuilt ability to make snap judgements based on appearance. It's a survival trait. when a player gives me the 'looks can be decieving' line It's usually (usually) a prelude to 'I want a hidden advantage' and/or 'I'm a bit of a jerk as far as players go'.
If you spent all your life expecting 12 year old girls to turn out to be double digit rogue/fighters then you will die of a coronary before you are 30.
Batts
looks can be decieving if it's not the norm. but my dm has associated me with the 12 year old girls that frighten him, Aasimaar clerics of Sarenrae with a bit of a taste for Zorroesque swashbuckling, grey elven sorcereresses that make loud sonic booms by simply walking, human rogues with intense japanese flavor. none of these are really cheesy, but these are my more memorable characters.