I really can't seem to figure it out.
The "sorcerer who's trying to be a wizard" niche is already covered by the arcane and sage bloodlines, especially given the relative cheapness of the mnemonic vestment.
Meanwhile, the idea of a class that tinkers with the very fundamentals of magic and reads their spells from a book is basically a Wizard+. Even the idea of wizards who "cheat" is covered by the exploiter wizard.
It feels like the arcanist is that kid at wizard school who says "I can do your own job better than you because I have Plot Armor and Genius Protagonist written all over me by the narrative demands of the campaign storyline."
Don't get me wrong, I love the casting mechanic. Nearly the same flexibility as a wizard, but with the fewer spells per day really driving home the difference between them and the sorcerer. So much so that in the campaign world I'm developing for the next go-around, the wizards are replaced by arcanists with the school savant archetype.
But the thing is, it seems hard to really justify the existence of both wizards and arcanists in the same game world.
Also, the fact that arcanist used to be a generic term that could be applied to any arcane caster but is now the name of a specific class makes writing about magic really confusing. The only universal word that isn't taken yet is mage, and that sounds too much like the plural of magus.
So how do you fit the arcanist into the world without deleting either the wizard or sorcerer, and not have too much narrative overlap?
The best way is by disallowing the Exploiter Wizard archetype, since it effectively replaces the Arcanist class. This restores the balance, so to speak, and makes the Wizard distinct from the Arcanist.
In terms of design, the Wizard is an odd duck. Vancian magic is strange and the Wizard's only advantage is that it learns early. That, however, is a substantial advantage. If you look at D&D 5, you'll see that version of the Wizard actually functions more like the Arcanist in terms of casting. My impression is that this is a reasonable place to go mechanically and that Pathfinder was designed on the legacy for OGL and compatibility reasons.
Basically, what we see with the Arcanist is the effect of evolving RPG "technology" on an aging legacy system, which is sort of the premise of the Pathfinder Unchained book that's on the docket.
I really can't seem to figure it out.
This isn't an MMO; there doesn't have to be balance or unique roles. It is just another fun option for GMs and players alike.
This isn't an MMO; there doesn't have to be balance or unique roles. It is just another fun option for GMs and players alike.I really can't seem to figure it out.
I'm not talking about its mechanical niche. I'm talking about its place in the world. And saying "your question is invalid, it doesn't require a response" isn't really appropriate in this particular context.
I go to the trouble of starting a game of Civilization V with mods on that reveal the whole map at once, take a screenshot of the map, and use that with the hex map system from Ultimate Campaign for creating a believable world geography.
I go to way more effort than your average person to make sure a campaign world makes logical and consistent internal sense with as few deletions from the official rules as possible.
I know the average player will never pick up on these details in a typical campaign, but in my ideal game, I would like the option to—at any time—switch the campaign to sandbox mode and have it self-consistent enough that even people as observant as, say, the guy who runs yourmoviesucks.org would be unable to find even a hint of Fridge Logic.
I realize that trying to eliminate all Fridge Logic from a game based on the Pathfinder chassis is like trying to simultaneously determine the exact position and velocity of a subatomic particle: impossible.
However, just as there is a theoretical maximum amount of simultaneous certainty of both of those things (relating back to the Planck constant), I would like my game to asymptotically approach the theoretical minimum of Fridge Logic.
They dont have there own place in the World. They are what what wizards used to be. They are om essence a special kind of wizard just like the wizard and sorcerer is.
You may also want to look at Advanced Class Origins, which is specifically designed to nativize the classes to the world.
In a homebrew world, an arcanist with all of their archetypes could easily be taken as a "blank slate mage". Want a wizard? School Savant. Want a sorcerer? Blood Arcanist? Want a variant witch? Unlettered Arcanist. Want a full arcane caster that can heal? White Mage. Want a pseudo-summoner? Occultist.
I go to the trouble of starting a game of Civilization V with mods on that reveal the whole map at once, take a screenshot of the map, and use that with the hex map system from Ultimate Campaign for creating a believable world geography.
That is best idea I've heard for generating a good Kingdom Building map (something I really struggle with). What mods do you use, and are there any other handy tricks?
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I feel like the classes in the different books represent the growth of the world. For the longest time, people stuck to the basic classes, but over time new philosophies and techniques emerge. Eventually firearms were discovered and made more readily available, and we saw the emergence of the Gunslinger class. Meanwhile, we had adventurers from Tian Xia arrive, and we learned the techniques of the Ninja and Samurai. Now that time is continuing, we're seeing new schools of thought regarding magic, both arcane and divine, and new martial schools emerge, so it may very well be that the roles of the old have simply evolved into the ways of the new. Some may get overshadowed completely, others not.
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That is best idea I've heard for generating a good Kingdom Building map (something I really struggle with). What mods do you use, and are there any other handy tricks?
I go to the trouble of starting a game of Civilization V with mods on that reveal the whole map at once, take a screenshot of the map, and use that with the hex map system from Ultimate Campaign for creating a believable world geography.
I did something like this, but I adapted mine from a Civ IV map (as the macro scale map) and each square was 45 miles to a side. If you want to generate a campaign world from scratch, assign the starting civs to any culture/race/nation concept you want and let them organically start. Same goes with religions. It's interesting to see unexpected patterns emerge for civilizations (such as Orcs specializing in sailing or Gnomish theocracies). You can also roll dice on the city states to generate interesting sub-cultures. The worlds always feel organic and new.
I would add that one should consider underwater, underground and cloud civilizations (if present) when creating your world. It's easy to overlook but knowing what's there is pretty important in a sandbox.
Back on topic though, Arcanist arrived after I built my world. I feel the same as Thelemic - I try to make a world that is internally consistent and as reasonable in a real world sense as possible for a fantasy game. I haven't yet decided on this question yet, but my current thought was to have it's "sudden appearance" explained as an emergence from recent obscurity. It was once a more common class, but the arcanist tradition had been in great decline until the past century. Now it is making a comeback.