This idea has been rolling around in my head for a little while now. With the release of Occult Adventures, there are three different kinds of magic in Pathfinder: Arcane, Divine, and Psychic. What if we got rid of Arcane magic?
This would mean no Arcane Scrolls and no Arcane Classes. So goodbye Wizard, Sorcerer, Bard, Summoner, Witch, Magus, Skald, Arcanist, and Bloodrager. Although in this setting, some of those classes might be okay to play if you use one of their Archetypes that replaces their casting with Psychic Magic.
Here are some thoughts on how I think such a setting would look.
The main difference between Psychic Casters and Divine Casters would be how they access their magic. Psychic magic would be power gained from mastering the self, while Divine Magic is received from a higher power. The way they're both cast shows this divide; Psychic magic uses Thought and Emotion components, which are purely related to the casters mind. Meanwhile, Divine Magic uses Verbal and Somatic Components. The ritualized movements required by divine magic make it look much different than Psychic Casting.
This world also has no need to worry about spell failure in armor. A character who goes in robes is a psychic who never bothered to train with armor, and Ecclesitheurge who has forgone armor for a greater connection to their God, or a monk.
Any spellbooks found would not be used to learn spells. They would probably, in fact, mainly be used for recording how Occult Rituals are performed.
Knowledge (Arcana) would mainly be used for making skill checks related to Occult and Psychic phenomena.
One other idea for differentiating Psychic and Divine Magic would be to ban the Divine Spellcasting classes that cast Spontaneously. Having Spontaneous magic be a purely Psychic Endeavor while all Divine Casters must ask their Gods for their prepared spells would be interesting. Of course, this also bans some rather fun classes like Inquisitors and Oracles, so it would probably be too far for some people.
Anyway, those are my thoughts for now. Feel free to discuss how else a world without Arcane Magic, but Psychic Magic instead might look and feel.
If the intent is to differentiate between the Occult and the Divine, then perhaps in a world without magic, you would change Knowledge (Arcana) completely into something like Knowledge (Occult). As the divine tends to have its own knowledge (i.e. religion), then the occult would have its own dedicated knowledge as well.
Another interesting thing, is that if I recall correctly, one could make a cleric that has no god. Same with paladin. So it's sort of interesting to consider the idea that despite the power coming from faith in themselves or something to that effect, they still rely on verbal and somatic components to cast.
I don't think it'd actually effect society all that much. At least from the way we see it from the outside looking into the fictional world right now. Especially if arcane magic never existed in the first place. There's no reason to think they'd react any differently than they would in the world as it stands currently. After all, one doesn't need to adapt to, nor react to something that never happened.
One could envision Psychic's taking the place of wizards and such, not in the search for arcane intellect or "feel", but occult knowledge and self understanding. Libraries full of Occult lore, large areas set aside for meditation and so on. However, that could easily exist in a world where the arcane magic exists as well, so the idea is moot. Just re-flavoring really.
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It is an interesting idea, although I feel like it might be a bit complicated to pull off. You are basically tearing out a huge chunk of the rule book by eliminating Arcane magic. A lot of play styles can't be reproduced with Divine or Psychic magic, so you are limiting what your players can do. If you had a player who wanted to play that awesomely powerful wizard or sorcerer-like PC (or any arcane concept here), they won't be able to create that experience with a Cleric or a Psychic (or any class here). They can still be great characters and it would be a great experience to try out new things, but it would be limiting a lot.
This is obviously the kind of setting that would require player buy-in, I admit.
What happens to all the creatures with arcane spell-like abilities?
What happens to all the creatures with arcane spell-like abilities?
Either don't use them, or change them to count as either divine or psychic (I do that to a lot of creatures anyway, like outsiders having divine SLA's and aberrations have psychic SLA's).
A few other changes I have thought of:
- The major scholars of the forces that underpin the world would probably be Occultists, with the occasional Psychic. No wizards, after all.
- Some spells can only be accessed if you have the proper Domain/Psychic Tradition. For example, if someone casts a fireball, the automatic assumption of most people is probably going to be that the person is a Cleric of a Fire God, or an Oracle that was blessed by said God. Not a wizard.
- The terms "Mage" and "Wizard" would likely be generic terms that are applied to all spellcasters. When a peasant mentions "that wizard on the far side of the mountain," they could be talking about a Shaman or a Mesmerist.
- Monsters like Dragons would default to using Psychic or Divine SLAs, as Milo v3 mentioned. This could be played up as Dragons being instruments of divine wrath, or being steeped in the hidden forces that permeate the world. Or you could just remove the SLAs if you like. I mean, a highly mobile talon and firebreath machine is plenty scary already without adding a bunch of random spells to it.
- Expanding on the Shifting of SLAs, Divine Magic could be seen as power that originates in the Outer Planes. So things like the wishes granted by Genies and deadly power of Pit Fiends are all examples of Divine Magic.
- PC races that were known for certain flavors of Arcane magic have their focus shifted to certain forms of Psychic Magic. Elves are known for thier studious Occultists and powerful Psychics rather than Wizards. Gnome tricksters would be Mesmerists instead of Bards. And so on and so forth.