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I got bored and did a thing.
I was curious what the breakdown of magic tradition representation is among the spellcasting classes. Which gets complicated when some of the classes have subtypes with varying traditions and some classes are more powerful casters than others.
So this is my breakdown.
3 slots is baseline caster. So psychic is 2/3 caster and wizard/sorcerer/oracle is 4/3 caster and magus/summoner is 1/2 caster.
Variable tradition splits their score among the traditions proportional to the quantity (not the quality) of the subtypes for each tradition.
Animist is just weird. 1/2 divine and split the other half proportional to the Apparition choices that give spells of the various traditions. Some of them I just have to make a judgement call on.
animist: (1/2) * 4/11 arcane, 1/2 divine, (1/2) * 3/11 occult, (1/2) * 4/11 primal
crafter in the vault: arcane
custodian of groves: primal
echo of lost moments: arcane
imposter in hidden: occult
lurker in devouring dark: arcane
monarch of fey: occult
reveler in lost glee: occult
stalker in boughs: primal
steward in stone: primal
vanguard of waters: primal
witness to battles: arcane
druid: 1 primal
oracle: 4/3 divine
psychic: 2/3 occult
bard: 1 occult
witch: 1/13 arcane, 1/13 divine, 5/13 occult, 6/13 primal
baba yaga: occult
devourer of decay: primal
faith's flamekeeper: divine
mosquito witch: primal
pacts: occult
ripple in the deep: primal
silence in snow: primal
spinner of threads: occult
starless shadow: occult
inscribed one: arcane
resentment: occult
whisper of wings: primal
wilding steward: primal
wizard: 4/3 arcane
cleric: 1 divine
magus: 1/2 arcane
sorcerer: (4/3) * 3/19 arcane, (4/3) * 6/19 divine, (4/3) * 5/19 occult, (4/3) * 5/19 primal
abberant: occult
angelic: divine
demonic: divine
diabolic: divine
draconic: arcane
draconic: divine
draconic: occult
draconic: primal
elemental: primal
fey: primal
genie: arcane
hag: occult
harrow: occult
imperial: arcane
nymph: primal
phoenix: primal
psychopomp: divine
shadow: occult
undead: divine
summoner: (1/2) * 2/12 arcane, (1/2) * 4/12 divine, (1/2) * 2/12 occult, (1/2) * 4/12 primal
angel: divine
anger phantom: occult
beast: primal
construct: arcane
demon: divine
devotion phantom: occult
dragon: arcane
elemental: primal
fey: primal
plant: primal
psychopomp: divine
undead: divine
Sorting this by tradition and doing some calculations:
animist: (1/2) * 4/11 = 4/22 arcane .182
witch: 1/13 arcane .077
wizard: 4/3 arcane 1.333
magus: 1/2 arcane 0.5
sorcerer: (4/3) * 3/19 = 12/57 arcane .211
summoner: (1/2) * 2/12 = 2/24 arcane .083
animist: 1/2 divine .5
oracle: 3/4 divine 1.333
witch: 1/13 divine 0.077
cleric: 1 divine
sorcerer: (4/3) * 6/19 = 24/57 divine .421
summoner: (1/2) * 4/12 = 4/24 divine .167
animist: (1/2) * 3/11 = 3/22 occult .136
psychic: 2/3 occult .667
bard: 1 occult
witch: 5/13 occult .385
sorcerer: (4/3) * 5/19 = 15/57 occult .263
summoner: (1/2) * 2/12 = 2/24 occult .083
animist: (1/2) * 4/11 = 4/22 primal .182
druid: 1 primal
witch: 6/13 primal .462
sorcerer: (4/3) * 5/19 = 20/57 primal .351
summoner: (1/2) * 4/12 = 4/24 primal .334
Adding the subtypes together:
arcane: 2.386
divine: 3.498
occult: 2.534
primal: 2.329
full casters: 5
4/3 casters: 3
2/3 casters: 1
1/2 casters: 2
5 + 3(4/3) + 1(2/3) + 2(1/2) = 10.667 spellcasting classes
2.386 + 3.498 + 2.534 + 2.329 = 10.747 spellcasting subclasses
Which is within tolerances for rounding errors.
So divine is the clear 1st place caster quantity at almost three and a half classes worth. Occult comes in at a solid 2nd place with two and a half classes, and arcane and primal are close behind and nearly tied for 3rd place with two and a third classes.
I too have counted the traditions. In my Strength of Thousands campaign I have been creating stat blocks for several of the faculty and fellow students at the Magaambya Academy who accompany the PCs on homebrew field trips. An NPC who works alongside the party is best built as a PC rather than by the Building Creatures rules, so I search for an appropriate PC class. The Magaambya Academy specializes in arcane and primal spells, so I look at those traditions mostly. An uncommon arcane witch of The Inscribed One would tempting, but I am considering primal traditions for the two NPC students who are witches.
My primary source on the teachers is the article Teachers of the Magaambya in Secrets of the Temple-City that describes teacher Ahassunu as a N | female | lizardfolk | historian in the Uzunjati storytelling branch, teacher Izem Mezitani as NG | male | aasimar human | archaeologist in the Rain-Scribes exploration branch, teacher Koride Ulawa as CN | female | human | naturalist also in the Rain-Scribes exploration branch, teacher Lesedi as CG | female | elf | extraplanar scholar in the Cascade Bearers research branch, teacher Mafika Ayuwari as NG | male | human | martial artist in the Tempest-Sun Mages protective branch, and so on for a total of twelve. The adventure paths have stat blocks for teacher Mafika Ayuwari as an arcane prepared spellcaster with Halcyon Speaker archetype and for teacher Takulu Ot as another prepared arcane spellcaster. A variant of Koride Ulawa, Unshadowed Koride, appears with enough clues to demonstrate that the original Koride is a prepared primal caster. The text avoids player-character labels such as "wizard" and "druid."
I built Izem Mezitani as an angelic sorcerer with divine tradition because of his aasimir heritage, Lesedi as a wizard of pre-Remaster conjuration school because of her extraplanar knowledge, and Thema as a leaf druid because she is the groundskeeper of the Leshy Gardens. I have not yet fully statted out Janatimo, head of the Uzunjati branch, but I have roleplayed him as a fey summoner with primal tradition. Izem Metitani has taught Stealth, Trap-Finding, and Library classes for archaeology rather than spellcasting, so I could give him a tradition that does not fit the magic taught at the Magaambya.
Their fellow students Chizire (CN | male | catfolk | slacker, Cascade Bearers) became a druid with alchemist archetype, Ignaci Canterells (N | male | human | thaumaturge, Emerald Boughs) became an thaumaturge with wizard archetype, Okoro Obiyo (NG | male | human | researcher, Uzunjati) became a psychic with druid archetype, and Strands-of-Glowing-Dawn Tzeniwe (NG | female | anadi | dreamweaver, Emerald Boughs) became an investigator with wizard dedication.
Arcane and primal traditions being the least common among the four traditions has cramped my variety in creating NPCs. I default to druid for primal and wizard for arcane due to other factors, such as the lack of a familiar.
On a second point, as a mathematician I am aghast that you use fraction notation, such as "psychic: 2/3 occult" meaning 2 slots per level rather than 3 slots," in a posting that uses the same notation in a similar location for actual fractions, "witch: 1/13 arcane, 1/13 divine, 5/13 occult, 6/13 primal." Why not simply label a psychic as a 2-slot caster and a sorcerer as a 4-slot caster?
as a mathematician I am aghast that you use fraction notation, such as "psychic: 2/3 occult" meaning 2 slots per level rather than 3 slots," in a posting that uses the same notation in a similar location for actual fractions,
The meaning turns it into an actual fraction. The spell slot count is a designation that I am using to try and gauge the power level. The Psychic's 2/3 is the power level that I am assigning it. Magus doesn't have half the spell slots of a witch. The 1/2 that I am assigning them is an actual fraction.
Arcane and primal traditions being the least common among the four traditions has cramped my variety in creating NPCs.
Yes, that is another thing I noticed in the breakdown. Arcane is dominated by Wizard, which has 1.3 of the 2.3 total. With Magus being the second most dominant Arcane caster at 0.5. The only other way to get Arcane tradition is from variable tradition casters (or Animist, but I'm not convinced that that counts).
Primal is at least as bad, if not worse. Druid still dominates and is the only fixed tradition caster on the list. The rest are variable tradition casters. At least there are more options of subtypes for Witch and Summoner that use Primal.
as a mathematician I am aghast that you use fraction notation, such as "psychic: 2/3 occult" meaning 2 slots per level rather than 3 slots," in a posting that uses the same notation in a similar location for actual fractions,The meaning turns it into an actual fraction. The spell slot count is a designation that I am using to try and gauge the power level. The Psychic's 2/3 is the power level that I am assigning it. Magus doesn't have half the spell slots of a witch. The 1/2 that I am assigning them is an actual fraction.
Ah, so you are counting casters as only partially in a tradition if they cannot cast a full 3 spell slots per level in that tradition and counting oracle and sorcerer as overclocked in their traditions. That is not how I would have counted the traditions, but it does partially fit my problem with rejecting some classes due to conflicting factors. If a class has only 2 spell slots per level or is a wave caster, then they have some other ability to compensate, such as amped cantrips or an eidolon, which can be a conflicting factor that causes me to reject the class.
Shouldn't the cleric's heal or harm spells from their divine font count toward their total divine tradition spells, increasing their value from 1 to 1.25 and adding to the divine tradition's lead?
If a class has only 2 spell slots per level or is a wave caster, then they have some other ability to compensate, such as amped cantrips or an eidolon, which can be a conflicting factor that causes me to reject the class.
Yeah, I am measuring solely on their ability to cast tradition spells from spell slots.
The partial caster classes definitely aren't bad as characters. But they have their character power in things other than spell slot casting.
Shouldn't the cleric's heal or harm spells from their divine font count toward their total divine tradition spells, increasing their value from 1 to 1.25 and adding to the divine tradition's lead?
Yes, I considered it. I wasn't sure how much to give Clerics for those. I ultimately opted to keep it simple and just leave them at 1. If you get bored, you could re-run the analysis with Cleric at 1.25 and see what that does to the spread.
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as a mathematician I am aghast that you use fraction notation, such as "psychic: 2/3 occult" meaning 2 slots per level rather than 3 slots," in a posting that uses the same notation in a similar location for actual fractions,The meaning turns it into an actual fraction. The spell slot count is a designation that I am using to try and gauge the power level. The Psychic's 2/3 is the power level that I am assigning it. Magus doesn't have half the spell slots of a witch. The 1/2 that I am assigning them is an actual fraction.
I understand how you arrived at this, but I think that methodology does the Psychic a disservice -- a Pyschic is not a 2/3 caster. It is a full caster, that diverts some of its power into empowering its cantrips. Since those cantrips are *also* part of the spellcasting tradition, I don't think that should lower its caster tradition rating.
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I understand how you arrived at this, but I think that methodology does the Psychic a disservice -- a Pyschic is not a 2/3 caster. It is a full caster, that diverts some of its power into empowering its cantrips. Since those cantrips are *also* part of the spellcasting tradition, I don't think that should lower its caster tradition rating.as a mathematician I am aghast that you use fraction notation, such as "psychic: 2/3 occult" meaning 2 slots per level rather than 3 slots," in a posting that uses the same notation in a similar location for actual fractions,The meaning turns it into an actual fraction. The spell slot count is a designation that I am using to try and gauge the power level. The Psychic's 2/3 is the power level that I am assigning it. Magus doesn't have half the spell slots of a witch. The 1/2 that I am assigning them is an actual fraction.
Yeah, Primal deserves some more representation.
Also, this is why I seriously hope Remastered Psychic will have 3 slots a level.
Amped Cantrips and Unleashed Psyche don't possess enough power to justify being a 2 slot caster.
I understand how you arrived at this, but I think that methodology does the Psychic a disservice -- a Pyschic is not a 2/3 caster. It is a full caster, that diverts some of its power into empowering its cantrips. Since those cantrips are *also* part of the spellcasting tradition, I don't think that should lower its caster tradition rating.
So what do the numbers look like after you make that change?
Also, if you are going to count the Psychic's focus spells, you should also count the focus spells of Bard, Animist, Witch, Oracle, Druid, and probably Sorcerer. Maybe for all of the other classes too, though those are the ones I find have the focus spells with the most impact.