I'm thinking about running, online at D20/Google Hangouts or in person, what I'm calling a "divine" game with Pathfinder/Golarion as a setting and cosmos. Basically my idea is this: four players, 15 point buy, limited to good alignments and the rules that follow.
(1) All characters must worship the same good deity.
(2) All characters must have a good alignment and an alignment within one step of the shared deity.
(3) All characters must be of one of the Core Rulebook races.
(4) All characters must be of a "divinely-inspired" class/archetype combination, which is to say: cavalier (Order of the Star), cleric, inquisitor, oracle, paladin, rogue (sanctified archetype), warpriest, etc.
My thoughts are to eventually run an AP within these strictures, but to first test the waters (and the system) by running a level 1 to 5 or 6 series of adventures. I'm thinking of having the party be either officially attached to a church (if the deity they choose has an organized church) or else be the agents of a powerful follower of the chosen deity. I guess I'm more or less substituting a deity for the Pathfinder Society as an organizing principle for an adventuring party, if you want to look at it that way.
What I'm hoping you good people will help me puzzle out is answers to theses questions.
(1) What other class/archetype combinations fit this campaign theme?
(2) What specific good deities would you encourage parties to look at closely when they choose their patron?
(3) What Pathfinder modules would you choose for a six-level test run? (Right now I'm looking at The Dragon's Demand.)
(4) If and when it comes to it, what AP do you think such a party would best thrive in?
(5) What general game circumstances do you think will be most challenging for such a party (combat, social situations, traps, etc.) and what allowances do you think I should make to overcome such shortcomings?
Thanks in advance!
Cheers,
Christopher
I don't think I would limit it to characters with class features that are related to a deity. A devout fighter can be at least as interesting of a character as a paladin, and in some ways since they don't 'get something' from their devotion their faith is even more pure.
Even with that limitation though, I don't think your party would face any special challenges. There are enough 'godly' archetypes for non-deity focused glasses and enough archetypes for the diety focused classes that every role in the game can be covered. I think you could manage that just fine with just an all cleric party, let alone everything else.
For APs I think Kingmaker could be interesting, religious people trying to build a new land to worship as they desire is certainly full of historical parallels. Giant Slayer with an all Torag worshipping group would be interesting. Wrath of the Righteous would be an obvious fit. Skull and Shackles could be interesting if reflavored a bit to be anti-slaver privateers or something similar.
When we started Kingmaker, CRB, all followers of Erastil, we were going to carve a goodly kingdom out of the wilderness.
Started with a human Rogue, human Druid, dwarf Ranger, dwarf Barbarian, and elf Wizard. No archetypes - APG had not been printed or we were not aware of it yet.
For levels 1-6, it would focus on defeating the bandits, dealing with fey, possibly checking the incursions of monsters into the farmland. There are several lost church sites from the past to be re-discovered.
I don't see any special challenge for followers of Erastil, but if they were all followers of some other faith, say Desna, and your "typical" Varisians, trying to carve a kingdom out of the wilderness, that would be much more challenging.
We all chose Erastil because the information given us lead us to believe he was the most suited, as his portfolio is mostly "carve rural civilization out of the untamed wilderness and limit the size of any cities you build".
I think your game would be defined most by which diety your players choose.
There are weapon mastery feats specifically for classes that aren't members of those you have that are tied specifically to deities. You could allow more classes, but require those feats.
Make sure to check out Inner Sea Gods for more options for other classes.
2. Well, given the requirements, I would say that a NG diety such as Sarenrae would be a good choice. This is because a more neutral diety would give more options in the 'within one step' guidelines here. That means you can have CG, NG, and LG characters.
If it was CG of LG diety, then there would be an entire part of the good spectrum unrepresented in your game. And if you went with CG, then you just couldn't have paladins without fiat.
Storywise, having a spectrum across the good alignments means you can possibly have some dramatic conflict- the CG person wants to storm in and steal the artifact from the government's vault, but the LG character wants to continue trying to investigate and negotiate for the artifact.
1. Could you relax the restrictions, and allow people with diefic obedience to play as well? Maybe require them to be evangelistist (aka- you are still playing your other class, but your class's stats are tweaked, and you get some extra religious stuff too).
It would be good for party cohesion, if nothing else.
1. Arcanist (White Mage) is a bit of a stretch. Bard (Dervish of the Dawn). Hunter (Divine Hunter). Ranger (Divine Tracker).
2. NG is the most flexible alignment, to the point where I'm getting wary of Sarenrae -just say Pelorae already Paizo! Caiden Caylen was a fun deity to adventure for, like an Olidammara you wouldn't feel guilty about:
"What were we fighting for again? That Herald of yours was trying to tell us something."
"Who cares, she's a killjoy sometimes. What matters is you killed evil people and spread fun across the land. Good was served today, and blah blah -now shots!"
"Thou art Awesome!"
3. Go crazy. We be Goblins, Too, & Free. Just imagine the travails of Sarenrae -some errant Birdcrunchers started looking at the sun for too long and started hearing whispers not meant for them. Imagine the consequences for the regular adventuring party that didn't.
"Spread my Guiding light into Varisia, heralds of the Dawn."
"Boss Fire Chief sez burn-burn for her ever day!"
4. Most APs where the overwhelming majority of the opponents are Evil-aligned. Carrion Crown would be a cakewalk for them, provided the rest of Ustalav doesn't mobilize and merc these do-gooders.
5. Drop them into a morally ambiguous campaign where the primary antagonists are a LN organization or even the followers of another Good Deity (Law vs. Chaos). Cheliax would be a nightmare for them should the majority of the opponents they encounter are organizations like the Hellknights or where the populace was LN to begin with from Aroden's time.
As a thought, there are four Divine-type Tier-9 casters. What problem posed would a focused Oracle, generalist Cleric, animal accompanied Druid, and a Shaman not be able to solve between three spell trees? Just anti-magic?
I'd have to agree that you'll need to have the NG to keep things going. Otherwise you're effectively banning either paladins and monks or barbarians. And every party needs to be full of paladins, monks, and barbarians. ALL OF THEM.
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1) Pact Binder Wizard is probably your best bet for an arcane option.
2) Sarenrae does offer a lot of flexibility in character building thanks to having a ton of specific archetypes (like the dawnflower dervishes). However it depends quite a bit on how they like to play - Erastil for example is good for Kingmaker and would also support the nature-based divine casters like druids or shamans.
5) You're practically guaranteed to have good support and healing, and I'd be surprised if you didn't have decent social skills and combat abilities, since those are fairly common in divine-themed classes. Other weak points depend a bit more on whether players choose very specific options.
Battlefield control is most likely to be an issue since divine magic favours support with a few debuffs. Druid, Heavens Oracle, Pact Binder Wizard, and maybe a few other builds could fill the role. Parties with poor battlefield control tend to engage in faster and more brutal combat.
Skills, and especially knowledge or subterfuge skills, might also be an issue. Again there are options that do have those abilities, like an inquisitor, sanctified rogue, Dawnflower Dervish bard, or the Pact Binder (for knowledge at least).
I would encourage players to plan for these weak ponts when making characters.
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Thank you all so much for all this helpful advice!