I'm thinking of running a campaign set in an oppressive mageocracy that ruthlessly cracks down on any non sanctioned magic use. The PCs would all be rebels fighting against the regime from within. This game would be primarily in an urban setting and would focus on roleplay and combat about equally. Because access to magic has been so restricted, the PCs will all be non-magical classes with extremely limited magic items.
As this will be a deviation from the assumed high magic nature of Pathfinder, I'm wondering if anyone has any advice about how to better set up and scale encounters against magic using enemies.
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This is always tricky. Characters without much gear are always at least one CR (or APL) lower than otherwise, at least they are starting at level 3 or 4. But it varies a lot by class (with non-spellcasters actually needing items significantly more).
And then there's healing, which Pathfinder really assumes you have access to. I'd strongly advise allowing an Alchemist, Cleric, Oracle, or other character with healing abilities of some sort to be included for out-of-combat healing. Have their very existence be illegal if you like, and limit there to being only one...but without some healing you're just better off using another system entirely.
Personally, I'd use something like this, but replacing the at-will spells with some sort of stat boosts, and allow a single character with healing (perhaps only a 6 level caster like Alchemist...who actually isn't technically a caster, come to think of it).
As far as healing goes, I was thinking of using this Strain and Injury HP variant coupled with relatively easy access to troll syptics. I want to, as much as possible, avoid any of the PCs being able to do anything that works like spellcasting at the beginning of the campaign so I don't think I'll be allowing alchemists. I will, however, let the players have cheaper and/or higher DC versions of nonmagical alchemical items.
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As long as the casters are out, balance in the party should stay about the same. You'll start to get into some problems if you limit items but not casters.
Deadmanwalking has it right that effective party level will probably drop one. You'll have to be careful about Damage Reduction, though, and any swarms.
Healing will be tricky, particularly status effects like blindness and petrification. Either avoid them, make them temporary, or include some explanation for how they're cleared early. I'm a fan of folk rituals, presumably banned by the mageocracy, but just make sure you think about it.
Edit: Looks like you have :)
I'd probably just run the game as-written other than that, though. You shouldn't need any sort of intrinsic bonuses unless you start including friendly casters.
Cheers!
Landon
The limited magic item schtick can work, but only up to a point. Especially if the enemies will have good access to magic items.
If the characters are lacking in the big six, especially the defensive items, then they're going to be fighting an incredibly uphill battle and you will have to continually lower the CR of enemies to make the party able to win.
For instance, if you don't have a Cloak of Resistance you're player's characters are going to be failing so many Will and Fort saves that they're going to be utterly destroyed. Especially Will saves, since most martial characters (which your players will very likely be) have poor Will Saves progression.
I'm thinking that status curing alchemical substances will be available. Not too sure how to handle the save defecit, though. Maybe by giving them the save feats for free or having them get save boosting traits as story rewards.
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You will certainly have to tailor encounters more than in a regular game, but this sort of thing can work very well in my experience. It just requires you to keep in mind what the partys capabilities and vulnerabilities are a little more than usual.
I am certain that you will get some naysayers chiming in here to tell you that this is a bad idea and that you should use some other system, but I would reccomend talking to your players, get them to buy into the idea and run with it. Sounds like fun to me, but I love playing low magic Pathfinder.
You could always work AC and Save boosts equivalent to Amulets of Natural Armor, Rings of Protection and Cloaks of Resistance into standard levelling to avoid the need for defensive items, WBL adjusted appropriately. This could help to keep CR close to normal. It'd likely be very similar to Deadmanwalking's solution.
Deadmanwalking's solution is very similar to the old 3.5 Vow of Poverty and that's not really the direction I want to go. The way I envision it is the players are kind of like commando operatives and they use things like inherent skill, unconventional tactics, and limited resource based tricks to win fights that they couldn't beat head to head.
Kind of like a team of medieval, fantasy James Bonds/Jason Bournes. Allthough, I want them to be acutely aware of just how close to death they are at any given time. I kind of want it to be an uphill battle. Most of the games we've played recently have been too easy.
If you do plan on really limiting magic items and casting you may well need to take very careful note of Challenge ratings and the enemies you're throwing at them. Without save bonuses low Will save classes (most mundanes) are very vulnerable to charm/domination spells that can wreck the party, so having them face a enemies that routinely use this would be very challenging.
To get the results you want (commando-style play) you may need to suggest ways to completely neuter enemy casters before they go into battle. Have hooks that allow casters to be drawn away from their bodyguards and dispatched seperately, or some kind of non-party support for specific missions. It is probably worth telling the players specifically that you expect them to use unconventional tactics and that diving headlong into fights is a bad idea. Liberal use of "are you sure you want to do that?" may be required.
Those are all good points, Corvino. There'll definitely need to be "a helpful voice in the sky" in the beginning, at least. I'm also considering giving them the Stealth Synergy feat for free so that they have an easier time sneaking around.
What is the PC's motivation for fighting the system ffrom within? Are the magocratic rulers evil?
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Many classes have spell-like, and supernatural abilities.
It is important to know the full extent of restrictions, before any solid advice can be given.
So, what classes are available?
Are classes that have archetypes that remove spellcasting available?
What races are available?
What is the point buy?
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It sounds like avoiding combat may be the "right" way to play in many circumstances. You should think about how you want to award XP; if you only award XP for creatures fought, you're giving contradictory instructions to your players on how they should play.
Consider focusing XP rewards on objectives achieved instead of enemies defeated.
What is the PC's motivation for fighting the system ffrom within? Are the magocratic rulers evil?
The PC's motivation will be primarily to achieve freedom from oppression. Specific motivation beyond that will be up to the players. The rulers are not outwardly or expressly malevolent just very greedy and power hungry.
Is the restriction on Arcane only, or is Divine magic restricted too?
Do gods exist in this campaign?
Divine magic is going to be completely prohibited and so is any kind of divine worship. I was planning on the players retrieving some long lost divine relics and reestablishing contact with a forgotten god as a plot point.
No supernatural or spell like abilities will be allowed in the beginning. Spell-less archetypes of classes will be allowed, however and some (su) options may be changed to (ex) if it makes sense to do so. All core races except gnomes will be allowed as well as orcs, hobgoblins, goblins, kobolds and ratfolk as they all make good "under-races." The magisters will primarily be humans and elves and they will have a strong bias against the other races. I'll probably give them either 25 or 30 point buy so they're a bit tougher.
It sounds like avoiding combat may be the "right" way to play in many circumstances. You should think about how you want to award XP; if you only award XP for creatures fought, you're giving contradictory instructions to your players on how they should play.
Consider focusing XP rewards on objectives achieved instead of enemies defeated.
I'm going to give XP no matter how they overcome the problem. Or I may just have fixed leveling points.
Um, without Spell-like and Supernatural abilities, your class choices basically come down to:
Fighter.
That's it.
I mean that the specific options that grant spell-like and supernatural abilities won't be available at first. For instance barbarians won't be able to take totem rage powers but will have access to any of the (ex) powers.
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Um, without Spell-like and Supernatural abilities, your class choices basically come down to:
Fighter.
That's it.
Nah, Barbarian, Rogue, Skirmisher Ranger, Martial Artist Monk, Gunslinger, and Cavalier are all doable without any of those. You'll lose out on a few Rogue Talents and many Rage Powers...but it's far from impossible.
Nah, Barbarian, Rogue, Skirmisher Ranger, Martial Artist Monk, Gunslinger, and Cavalier are all doable without any of those. You'll lose out on a few Rogue Talents and many Rage Powers...but it's far from impossible.Um, without Spell-like and Supernatural abilities, your class choices basically come down to:
Fighter.
That's it.
Also Brawler, Swashbuckler and Slayer from the playtest will probably work.
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Also Brawler, Swashbuckler and Slayer from the playtest will probably work.Nah, Barbarian, Rogue, Skirmisher Ranger, Martial Artist Monk, Gunslinger, and Cavalier are all doable without any of those. You'll lose out on a few Rogue Talents and many Rage Powers...but it's far from impossible.Um, without Spell-like and Supernatural abilities, your class choices basically come down to:
Fighter.
That's it.
Didn't want to presume, but yeah. Those, too.
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So, there is a number of class features, you cannot use, or cannot take?
You will really need to create a list for your players if so, along with the allowed classes/archetypes.
Also, a list of banned feats, as some provide Spell-like or Supernatural effects.
Uh...or just say "You can't take anything that provides spell-like or supernatural abilities."
Those things are labeled, after all.
I agree that this is potentially a pretty brutal game, but it's not logistically difficult in terms of character generation.
One thing that may make things a little easier is to limit the amount of magical creatures in the world. In the typical pathfinder settings there are a lot of magical creatures and races out there. These are what usually require magic to deal with. If most of the things they are fighting are mundane then they will not need the same resources as a normal party. For this to work it would also require that there be no summoning spells.
Maybe there is a religious reason behind the restrictions on magic. It could be something similar to the Kingdom of Man from Golarion. If Divine magic is consider heresy then that could allow some divine spell casters for the party. This would probably work best with partial spell casters as they can pretend they don’t have access to magic without being too obvious.
Another option is to allow the payers to be renegade spell casters. Maybe a wizard realized how unjust the system is and decided to work against the government.
e6 might be a good idea too, simply to keep all the wahoo the opposition could pull out.
How about giving everyone the Dangerously Curious Trait for free, and a free skillpoint per level to Max it out? This way you can occasionally throw them useful items like limited-charge level 1 wands without them needing to choose to invest skillpoints and traits on the off-chance.
I suggest less restriction on classes, and if a character has magical ability, that you work with them to decide how they deal with that. Perhaps they have learned to hide their abilities? Perhaps one of them is a sanctioned user of magic "fighting the regime from within". These would introduce additional elements to the role-playing you want to include. Most SP and SU abilities have to be activated, so concealing them wouldn't be a big deal for a player with some tact and the right skills. Magical auras on the other hand would become a bigger problem as they get to higher levels.
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First, when I hear "from within" I start thinking double agent. Maybe the party is working for the established oppressive regime but is also working for a rebel faction. That makes me think of cold war era KGB and CIA stuff or even WWII Nazi secret police. As agents of the government these people were often given special equipment and special privileges to get the job done as well as various levels of clearance.
basically if the party were double agents they would probably have more access to magical items and would be less restricted in choosing classes with access to limited spell casting or spell-like abilities. They may also not be restricted on the supernatural ability front at all.
the trick to this is that they may have to be hyper secretive as well as do things that would hinder their ultimate goal of overthrowing the government (which could also offer interesting opportunities to do some espionage on missions they are supposed to be accomplishing for the oppressive government).
also I don't see a low magic setting that has high level casters as the government having less of the typical monsters as much as it would have more government agencies that are tasked with hunting and eliminating these creatures. Which of course would be equipped to handle the challenge.
idk my 2 cents
In a world with limited magic any magic will be powerful. The opposition does not have to be what would be considered powerful wizards in any other campaign. They could actually be pretty weak and still be a challenge to the party. What you are essentially doing is scaling back the power of everything. It could lead to a situation where the wizards have become lazy and don’t exert themselves any more than they have to. So instead of powerful high level casters you have a bunch of low to medium level casters with lots of mundane backup.
Wizards would be considered something akin to the gods, if not considered actual gods themselves. Why would they want to deal with mundane problems when they are obviously meant for better things? Dealing with a bunch of unenlightened barbarians is beneath them, after all that is why they have servants. Most of the opposition would also be mundane with the occasional spell caster acting as the BBEG.
Will the rulers have standard access to magic items? If so, they will be a lot tougher than expected. But also, the players will suddenly become much more powerful when they manage to loot even just one of them.
I would strongly suggest using the hero point system. (And the feats that go with them.) It does a good job of simulating the lucky protagonist. It also gives the players another way to try and avoid some of the most dire effects. But they can't do it every time.
Suggest to the players that things like iron will and improved iron will are a strong contenders.
You might consider allowing some of the 'crappy' casters like the NPC adept class to be used. The PC would be giving up a huge amount of stuff just to get some small spell caster capability.
Might consider something like superior quality items (beyond masterwork). Superior weapons could have a 20% chance to bypass DR. Superior armor might give a DR of 1/-. Dunno, just something more than the standard masterwork.
{sigh} I wish I could join your campaign. I would really like to play in a low magic setting, but my current group has no interest in the concept.
The enemies they will face will be primarily humans and elves. The mages themselves will be powerful in a relative sense but not overly so in a absolute sense. Maybe they'll have a few minor pet magical beasts or elementals but nothing really major. Also the mages will be much more focused in their particular school specialization and will have few prepared outside of their focus.
I'm planning on giving all the PCs UMD as a class skill keyed off of any mental stat they choose to reflect some limited training or aptitude for magic item use.
First, when I hear "from within" I start thinking double agent. Maybe the party is working for the established oppressive regime but is also working for a rebel faction. That makes me think of cold war era KGB and CIA stuff or even WWII Nazi secret police. As agents of the government these people were often given special equipment and special privileges to get the job done as well as various levels of clearance.
basically if the party were double agents they would probably have more access to magical items and would be less restricted in choosing classes with access to limited spell casting or spell-like abilities. They may also not be restricted on the supernatural ability front at all.
the trick to this is that they may have to be hyper secretive as well as do things that would hinder their ultimate goal of overthrowing the government (which could also offer interesting opportunities to do some espionage on missions they are supposed to be accomplishing for the oppressive government).
also I don't see a low magic setting that has high level casters as the government having less of the typical monsters as much as it would have more government agencies that are tasked with hunting and eliminating these creatures. Which of course would be equipped to handle the challenge.
idk my 2 cents
I was thinking that they would be given various missions by the resistance commanders and that they would occasionally be given some sort of magic items to help them achieve these missions. There will definitely be infiltration missions and for those they'll have access to things like hats of disguise and rings of non-detection.
One way to change the playing field is the feat Master Craftsman. This can let you qualify for Craft Magic Arms and Armor and Craft Wondrous Item. Those will let them upgrade their stuff a lot, and if they have not spent much (since they can't buy magic), they can suddenly become much meaner characters. :-)
/cevah
I'm playing in a low magic.campaign now, although not nearly as low as yours. It's a lot of fun but one thing that our dm does that's really cool is he treats all.potions as non magical. Characters have to obtain recipes for potions then use survival chexks to collect reagents. Modified rules for potion creation. And craft alchemy can be used to identify potions instead of spellcraft. Spellcraft still works though to determine what spell it functions like if the guy with alchemy (not confused with an alchemist class) is unavailable.