I'm currently working on a lower magic, e7, rules-light (or rather, refocus of the rules) d20 homebrew game, and I was thinking of dropping classes, or rather, to just have one class.
The thing is, one of the goals is to make classes more modular in any case - turning class features into feats and skill uses and handing out more feats and such. Turned sorcerous ("inner power") casting into feats accessible by anyone, for example. Now that I want wizardly casting to be more skill-based (basically, summoning demons to use magic for them through int- and cha based skills), I realized I have no need for a mage class anymore and so I'm down to just having an expert and a warrior class.
So I'm thinking, what about only a single class?
2/3 bab. 4+int skills per level. all saves at 1/2 level. Gain one feat every level.
Then you have "proffessions" chosen at 1st level, based on your background, that sets class skills and gives a +2 bonus to a save or two.
In a low-magic world, skills gain a lot of power and even more mundane professions (not the skill) might be relevant. Thus it would be easy to have a good bunch of professions, without having to fill out seven levels of abilities and having multiclassers and the like, and without it taking up so gorram much space.
What do you think? Is it possible without characters becoming bland? Any loopholes to watch out for? I realize balance might be harder to determine, but none of the players in my circles are very power gamery so it might not be a huge issue.
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I recommend you check out Game Room Creation's d20 Modern re-envisioning for Pathfinder. They have one base class, "Modern" with archetypes that serve for specialization. See Game Room Creations.
I had been thinking of something similar when I was making rules for an E6 game (basically, tweaking the ruleset towards the 6 level game).
While I approached classes a bit differently, I did do a "background" style of thing for 1st level.
A character choose three statistics: Racial, Cultural and Professional background.
Racial Background: This is all the physical characteristics of the race. Things that can be explained by physiology. Racial hatred, or skill and learned bonuses are not really applicable.
Cultural Background: This is where you were raised. Typically, your starting home and region, so like a desert tribal background with a racial hatred of gnolls... vs an underground mageocracy, etc. This is where you choose from your starting languages too.
Professional Background: Your primary training prior to becoming an adventurer. This can include things like soldier or merchant, but also a lack of profession like street urchin or wanderer. This gives your starting bonuses like the +1 BAB and +2 saves and some extra skillpoints and/or hitpoints.
While this ends up with a lot more work at first level building a character, it is the same bookkeeping as before really (once it's marked down it won't change).
It also makes it easier to have an elf who isn't raised in a magical training environment (easier for the DM or player to get a wild elf over a high elf), or have a gnome raised by dwarves, and getting a bunch of different cultural stuff.
This would give your characters a chance to start off a bit more unique amongst each other, without needing to have different classes.
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Don't know if this helps, but maybe it'll give you some ideas for how to do your thing...
Way back in the twilight days of AD&D, I tried out a classless version of 2nd Ed. The GM had taken all the hit dice, proficiencies, class abilities, ability scores, spells, etc. and assigned a point value to each. At the beginning of the game, you got X points to build your character. You could gain more build points by imposing restrictions on your character like limited armor use, lowered ability scores and vulnerabilities. The character races had all their typical traits but you could drop racial abilities in exchange for build points. There were no prescribed archteypes or classes. You just played what you wanted to play how you wanted to play it. My character, for example, ended being an illiterate, unarmored, grappling orc shapeshifter who was strong against poison, petrification, paralysis and death magic, but weak against spells, rods, staves and wands (AD&D's saving throw tables were quite a bit different from what we use now.)
The GM still used XP to measure advancement but, instead of simply improving your set abilities, you got a random number of points to spend on anything you wanted including buying out your restrictions.
We had a group of about four players and a GM and it was surprisingly fun.
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What do you think? Is it possible without characters becoming bland? Any loopholes to watch out for? I realize balance might be harder to determine, but none of the players in my circles are very power gamery so it might not be a huge issue.
I think this game is called Mutants and Masterminds with the Warriors & Warlocks sourcebook.
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So I'm thinking, what about only a single class?
2/3 bab. 4+int skills per level. all saves at 1/2 level. Gain one feat every level.
I would opt for a system with three classes. This system requires some decisions to be made at first level, but still has a lot of possibilities to customize.
Low Magic:
full BaB, CL is 1/3 HD.
Medium Magic:
2/3 BaB, CL is 2/3 HD.
Full Magic
1/2 BaB, CL is HD.
Then all classes have one good save and two bad saves or two medium saves and one bad save(player picks). This keeps characters a little more diverse. The rogue having the same reflex save as the mage seems odd to me. This system support a rogue with amazing reflex, a mage with amazing will, a fighter with amazing fort, a monk with better than average fort and reflex, a paladin with better than average will and fort, or a magus with better than average reflex and will.
All classes have 2+Int skills per level, but there are feats which give bonus skills per level. Possibly also allow the player to choose wisdom or int to determine skills per level.
Feats which grant magic abilities require a minimum CL along with requiring some other magic feat as prereq for certain spells to be gained.
For example, convert the Summon Monster chain of spells into a series of feats which give more and more monster options of increasing power. Or perhaps a single feat which grants additional summon options as CL increases.
For lower CL characters there could be an alternate chain which provides a much more restrictive list, but requires lower CL for each progression. Perhaps they can only summon devils, but full casters could summon many types of creature.
Feats which grant melee abilities such as the Weapon Focus chain then also need to rely on BaB in a similar fashion.
The system supports three basic types of character:
1 - melee focus
2 - hybrid
3 - magic focus
However, with feats, saves, and skills the player can still create very unique characters.
I was about to post a note about Threshold also, but it looks like Tim4488 beat me to it. Thanks Tim!