In the recent episode of Arcane Mark someone asked a question about whether there would be race/heritage based class archetypes (presumably like Stonelord Paladin)
Mark dismissed the idea as far too narrow for Paizo to use their word count on (restricting on two fronts)
However he did suggest that heritage archetypes could be a thing - so applied across all classes. This is an interesting
So what sort of things do people think these can be? I guess they would be lore connected.
For example:
- Elf - Lantern Bearer
- Halfling - Bellflower Agent
No others immediately spring to mind. But fun that these things like "prestige classes" (and indeed many would be based off of old prestige classes) could be opened up to all classes
(And potentially expanded to other heritages a campaign reward or hook).
I mean the thing about lantern bearers/bellflower agents is that they take people who aren't elves/halflings, so you can print those as archetypes without an ancestry requirement.
Only PF1 archetypes/PrCs which really made sense as specific to a race were ones which required some particular biology specific to one kind of people (e.g. you can't be a Venomblade if you lack poison glands.) If it's just a cultural thing, no reason to say "no outsider will ever learn this" at a systems level.
We have design spaces for specific to this- genetic configuration (heritage), culture (ancestry feats), or place (rarity). So I'm not sure we really need more.
I was just spinning of something mentioned in a Q&A by Mark
I did not realise those organisations had members from other races
Your point on biological limitation does not seem like it is relevant for many of the core heritages
I mean there were a ton of race specific archetypes in the Advanced Race Guide and in the _ of Golorian and Blood of _ books. Spell Dancer and Treesinger for Elves are ones that at the very least need to be Class archetypes if not race ones for instance because they change/add class mechanics ass opposed to just +'s to numbers. Sky Durid for Sylph adds some features to druids they can't normally get in 1e without wild shape like flight.
So even if it isn't something Paizo wants to do it is good design space for 3pp's and homebrews. Especially homebrews not in/on Golorian.
I think it would be cool to see some racial archetypes/dedications that let you double down on your ancestry. I feel like they made the base ancestries really bare bones, so that the ancestry feats tend to feel like "catching up" to what you got by default in PF1; at least at lower levels. It would be nice to have a way to be even *more* dwarfy or elfy than you could be in PF1.