I still see the issue of not all vigilantes even having an origin, mine still doesn't have a specific origin, he just doesn't want to be caught, so has two identities. There is no vengeance, or accidents, or pacts with this character.
What is his backstory and why isn't he another class? Because I see that statement as the equivalent of taking a plane to New Jersey because there were free peanuts. You literally decided to take up unrepresented law/justice/fate enforcement without legal authority because you are trying to hide?
What is his backstory and why isn't he another class? Because I see that statement as the equivalent of taking a plane to New Jersey because there were free peanuts.
His backstory is simply that he is a rich noble that's greedy, so by day he is a respectable noble, and at night he is The Storm, a thief that can get in places that are considered impossible to infiltrate. He isn't another class because other classes aren't good at being a magic rogue that manages two seperate persona.
You literally decided to take up unrepresented law/justice/fate enforcement without legal authority because you are trying to hide?
No. Not all vigilantes have to do that. Unless your stating all people with a level of barbarian have to be from the wilderness simply because of the name?
What is his backstory and why isn't he another class? Because I see that statement as the equivalent of taking a plane to New Jersey because there were free peanuts.His backstory is simply that he is a rich noble that's greedy, so by day he is a respectable noble, and at night he is The Storm, a thief that can get in places that are considered impossible to infiltrate. He isn't another class because other classes aren't good at being a magic rogue that manages two seperate persona.
You literally decided to take up unrepresented law/justice/fate enforcement without legal authority because you are trying to hide?No. Not all vigilantes have to do that. Unless your stating all people with a level of barbarian have to be from the wilderness simply because of the name?
That still reinforces my argument that a feat or two would serve you better than the class unless you have a reason to be greedy enough make an entire new persona just to steal things like every other masked burglar backstory. Even then I'd still argue that you could be a rogue with a hat of disguise or a high disguise check and be better off.
Also 'Greed' is a viable origin, even for heroic non stealing characters (Booster Gold).
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That still reinforces my argument that a feat or two would serve you better than the class unless you have a reason to be greedy enough make an entire new persona just to steal things like every other masked burglar backstory. Even then I'd still argue that you could be a rogue with a hat of disguise or a high disguise check and be better off.
A feat... what????
No. I want him to function great in social situations and function as an actual magic thief... you know a thief who uses spellcasting, not just some fake mage with a couple of crummy wands. Plus, the mystic bolt helped with the persona's name a fair bit. Rogue does not cover my concept at all.
Also 'Greed' is a viable origin, even for heroic non stealing characters (Booster Gold).
And your going to assign mechanical abilities to the Greed Origin.... right. That sounds like a rather dumb idea. There are page count restrictions, they cannot cover every origin, and greed definitely isn't one of the major ones. But, if it isn't one in the main book, I lose the ability to play my character. This origins idea forces flavour, because you're going to have to pick from a small selection of origins, and these will not be able to cover every concept.
That still reinforces my argument that a feat or two would serve you better than the class unless you have a reason to be greedy enough make an entire new persona just to steal things like every other masked burglar backstory. Even then I'd still argue that you could be a rogue with a hat of disguise or a high disguise check and be better off.A feat... what????
No. I want him to function great in social situations and function as an actual magic thief... you know a thief who uses spellcasting, not just some fake mage with a couple of crummy wands. Plus, the mystic bolt helped with the persona's name a fair bit. Rogue does not cover my concept at all.
Also 'Greed' is a viable origin, even for heroic non stealing characters (Booster Gold).And your going to assign mechanical abilities to the Greed Origin.... right. That sounds like a rather dumb idea. There are page count restrictions, they cannot cover every origin, and greed definitely isn't one of the major ones. But, if it isn't one in the main book, I lose the ability to play my character. This origins idea forces flavour, because you're going to have to pick from a small selection of origins, and these will not be able to cover every concept.
A Anyone with a good enough diplomacy check can function well in social situations it's just a matter of having a class that serves as a magical thief, and even then the magic has to come from somewhere. If you learned it, then, there's anything leading up to Arcane Trickster. Every class 'forces' flavor even just by deciding what stat is used for casting. There is nothing blocking you from playing out your concept with the options you have now.
No there isn't room in one book for every kind of origin no matter how broad you go. This gives space for designers to create more. If it were simply in build-a-class mode each new design is a drop in the bucket while people will just gravitate towards the mechanically good ones and complain that the rest are traps or bloat. I want to be nice to designers too and keep them fed. But Greed is definitley a major one if you cover just the basics of heroes and villains although Avarice would be broader.
I have a long day today so can't rely reply to anything until tonight so I wanted to leave a nutshell version of my argument in favor of an origin story mechanic.
I want this class to be more than a mask. With dual identity being a central mechanic I want the class to be about why someone would be driven to have dual identities or what dual identities does to them. If dual identity was a feat tree I think that the best class for this book would be a more rogue-y version of the Magus. I think that an origin story mechanic can drive the flavor of the class and differentiate it from other classes to the point where it can stand as it's own thing that deserves it's own archetypes and options that don't fit anywhere else. I chose the concept of origin stories because of all the things that go hand in hand with masked vigilantism, and dual lives in fiction the concept of things that drive a character to that point is, I feel, to be the most prevalent and a true distinction between a man that disguises himself as a different identity and a man that has a different identity. I say this as a person who has played with identity and superheroism within the context of the rules that already exists and as someone that loves the concept. I believe that the history behind the tropes, it's prevalence in fiction, and scholarly analysis of masked vigilantism backs up my argument. I also believe that it is consistent with the flavor design of previous classes and does not have to be as restrictive as it can sound. I also believe that with that flavor in mind the class can do thing beyond mimicking other classes as an origin story can encompass gifted, inherited or induced power that is not consistent with previous forms of magic in the game have room to exist and will have room to grow without the baggage of the class features that would normally accompany them.
At that point I would be reiterating myself by arguing. Epic Meepo, those aren't bad design philosophies but I don't think they're entirely consistent with Pathfinder core rules as it exists and I don't think the way that they exist are a bad thing. As the game exists now I don't think Pathfinder needs an amorphous class with a central theme that can be easily replicated once the archetypes that farm out the dual identity class feature that are almost guaranteed to happen. I don't think that's a base class, I think that's a prestige class at best and have not heard of any argument for how to differentiate it from other classes beyond being able to have dual identities better, which I don't think warrants an entire base class. In fact I one of the most common complaints I've seen was that its a highly hampered fighter/slayer/rogue/inquisitor. I myself have to admit that the only really appealing bit about the specialization based class features were the Warlock talents that weren't spells but I'd argue that if the vigilante is nothing more than a hyper mask, the better class to make is a 20 level arcane trickster and leave Dual Identity to archetypes, feats or a prestige class. In fact I think your argument backs me up on that where rather than enabling flexibility among the classes we have we have to shoehorn the concept of keeping a secret identity into one class.
In the context of Batman, I've been avoiding the Batman connection actually. Most of my assumptions about this class comes from pulpy-ole entities like Zorro, The Shadow, and The Phantom. (I'm getting married this August. My wedding band is literally The Phantom's ring. I'm not kidding. I like The Phantom.) Which to be far are kind of proto-batmen when put together but I do attribute 'purpose' to the concept of a vigilante the same way I attribute purpose to the Inquisitor, Paladin and Cavalier classes, and I think that's important for the design of those classes. If I were to remake the game for my own tastes, Cavalier and Paladin would be Fighter options and Inquisitor a Cleric option but despite my tastes its nice that they exist so that Fighter and Cleric can have their own assumptions reducing each class's option paralysis which can already be high. The same could be said for class-less or more abstract systems, but that's not the context we're dealing with.
I see what Malwing is suggesting: in fiction, most heroes & antiheroes superhero or otherwise have a driving concept behind them. Even the newer iconic superspies like Michael Weston have an Origin, either Vengeance or Reconciliation could cover him. It may come with some built in flavor, but lets face it, in a home game the flavor can be removed & just use the base power, then add your own flavor. A "Dark Pact" origin that gives you Spellcasting can remove the Dark Pact name & its still spellcasting.
I personally like the idea of picking an Origin & then building a character around that Origin (assuming a large enough grouping of them). If done well, it could be a very nice, pick-your-power system with a very Personal touch.
Part of one of my points before by comparing the idea to other class features like Cavalier Orders. It implies something that gives you roleplay prompts and gives the class flavor but I have yet to see a Cavalier that was actually a part of any kind of organization. They're pretty much just powers packaged by theme. Same goes for Sorcerer Bloodlines. The only time I've actually seen the power source played out was when someone played a japanese merfolk water elemental sorcerer with water kami ancestor spirits and played it off like a temple priestess.