Pathfinder Low Magic World

[Amurion]

So I am considering a world in which magic is very random and erratic in who has it. Of course all the PCs would start with spells from one list or another, but if they want to increase spell casting they will have to focus one level out of every few. This would effectively remove magic based classes, but it would encourage those that never play with magic to give it a shot. Also, this would make magic items few and far between unless the group makes them themselves.

Anyway, this is just a rough idea and I will work on it more when i get a chance, but if anyone has some input I would appreciate it.

Thanks

[SowZ]

So I am considering a world in which magic is very random and erratic in who has it. Of course all the PCs would start with spells from one list or another, but if they want to increase spell casting they will have to focus one level out of every few. This would effectively remove magic based classes, but it would encourage those that never play with magic to give it a shot. Also, this would make magic items few and far between unless the group makes them themselves.

Anyway, this is just a rough idea and I will work on it more when i get a chance, but if anyone has some input I would appreciate it.

Thanks

Well, if magic items are rare then creating them, (even for the PCs,) will be difficult as well. In a world where few people have magic, those with magic levels will be far more powerful then they would have been. This will also make them more feared. Some people will hunt magic users and some cities will not allow magic users in and some merchants will refuse to deal with them out of prejudice/fear.

The players will have to hide their magic and only use it when they have to. This also adds drama and character development/tough moral decisions on whether or not to let people who saw the players use their magic live to tell the tale.

[Amurion]

That is exactly what I am going for. I'm thinking of making magic items requiring a special magical orb or such, and these are very rare. However, the spells and effects can be exchanged and each one can accommodate different number of levels. This sort of thing obviously increases the power level of the players, but that can be managed as long as all of the players are of similar power levels. I'm just hoping that this will eliminate the whole idea of class tiers by leveling the players, no matter what class they took.