Brainstorming a setting for a Tier 4 classes only game

[LurkytheDwarf]

Glad you liked the suggestion, it seemed to fit what you had in mind.

Some of the city-states will probably not hesitate to raid the farming settlements for captive labor, and this could lead to a number of scenarios in which the rangers are defending their people against slaving parties led by paladins of the non-good temple gods, who are acting in their city-states’ interests by procuring labor to support their divinely ordained economies.

...

Individual adventurers may occasionally rise to enough power to do the same—gather followers and take a city-state or a small region for themselves.

Wow. That is like almost exactly what happens in Conan the Barbarian (1982).

What classes or class roles/party roles do you believe you're missing, if any?

I'm not really considering roles right now, though I guess healing might be in slightly shorter supply. Really just piecing together a campaign setting using the Tier 4 classes as inspiration.

If you're willing to use setting books, the Religious Adept from the Eberron Campaign Setting provides a more deity focused adept via a single domain at the cost of familiars. So, you can still have a priestly caste capable of demonstrating not only power, but that they're blessed by their specific deity.

I've toyed with the tier-limited world idea in the past myself. It brings some interesting ideas to play with. I'm not sure Spellthieves actually can take the Shadowcaster's mysteries, which if they can't could lend them that extra air of menace (it's not even standard supernatural power!!!) though you may want to allow it any way. Still, notice the lack of Arcane spell casters. Given they steal power and cast non-divine magic, I would think a Spellthief would be very mistrusted beyond their basic criminal element. Like Shadowcasters, they defy the divine will of the gods/world.

Religious Adept is a really good catch. Palanan's city-state temples could have domain adepts (giving them strange spells granted by their unnatural/manmade gods, the nature gods being a bit more passive I would assume) while the barbarian/tribal witches/adepts still have familiars (which flavorwise feels on point). I like the idea of more cloistered clerics in robes who are political schemers than full-plated holy warriors. I also like when they get 8+ level they get lightning bolt instead of fireball, which gives them a sort of Emporer Palpatine–style menace.

I too am not sure if Spellthieves can take Shadowcaster's powers. If I remember correctly they act like spells for a certain time then become spell-like abilities, and the Spellthief does say something about stealing Warlock spell-like abilities. So maybe. With the adepts really taking on the religious caster roles (and becoming more prevalent in society), I guess I could do away with the sorcerer/wizard npcs altogether. Instead you have spellthieves sort of filling in for them: they would probably be the ones really throwing around enchantments and divination and transmutation, meanwhile stealing the powers of the other casters which leaves them as sort of predatory outsiders to the rest of the magic-users in the setting. They hint at the possibility of wizards/sorcerers in the past, a long dead civilization whose ruins litter the world and hide the magic items they crafted so long ago. A spellthief would just be the last and weakest in the long decaying line of those older, more powerful traditions.

Hmmmm, I would probably rethink the Warlock in this Setting.

Both as it fits the "Mortal pactitioning with beings they should not even know" theme often used in Sword and Sorcery AND, if you assume a lower magic World, removing the Warlocks "Craft anything" Feature in msot cases makes it Tierr 4 (if highest) anyway.

As for the Paladin: Paladins dont need Gods anyway (ven if they are normally associated with them). They are empowered by the pure Law and Good within the Planes and themselves.

I would even put Paladins as a counterpoint to the "small Cults with flaws" Gods used in S&S Settings if I would use them.

Just make sure that they are clearedr regarding their COde and "Falling Situatiuons", as the World is usually even more Grey in such Settings, and the Paladins as Beacojns of Light more important, if rarer.

Warlocks indeed could fit into the setting as well as probably several other classes but for now I'm going to stick with the core twelve I started with and see if during brainstorming anything would come up which would preclude other classes. Like right now, I know any of the classes in Tier 1 and 2 are out because this is already a sort of lower magic or at least a stranger-magic setting. Though eventually things from 3 and 5 could possibly appear.

I am waffling back and forth on paladins because while I do like the idea of them being enforcers for the city-state temples, there's just something about the pure Lawful Good shining knight which has always appealed to me. Perhaps, they are born to fulfill a certain purpose which they discover over the course of their adventuring careers.

Anyway, I've been thinking about the origins of the setting. I'm drawn to two descriptions from Incarnum and Shadow Magic:

• "Before creation, darkness was all, and it waits even now beyond the edges of all worlds."
• "Incarnum is an amorphous magical substance made up of the soul energies of all sentient creatures—living, dead, and, it is theorized, those even not yet born."

So it goes, the potential soul energies of life was swimming around in darkness and eventually congealed into the world. Something like that...