Character classes for an RPG

glennmagusharvey

First rule: Character classes should be summaries of a character's abilities rather than about their occupation or their background.  These could match or correlate with their abilities, but the point of a character class is not to describe these.

Second rule: Character classes should not be based on moral stances.  Unlike D&D, which has alignment restrictions on some classes, I want my system to be based solely on characters' abilities.  A witch and a paladin could each be good or evil, and their class by itself should ideally say nothing about their ethics.

Third rule: No character classes should be restricted or promoted based on race.

Yarrun XIX

Guy What Punches Hard

Guy What Hits Hard With Implement

Guy What Causes Pain From Distance With Object

Hexartes

The "no occupations/background" naming convention makes things a bit tough

Yarrun XIX

Guy What Unpunches Hard

Guy What Causes Pain From Distance Without Object

Guy What Looks Like Steve Buschemi

Imipolex G

Girl With Fuzzy Guitar Tone

Fossilmaiden

Girl That Likes Girls

...wait

glennmagusharvey

I was actually in the middle of typing up a big post summarizing existing character classes when I had to AFK. So pretend there was a placeholder i guess lol

glennmagusharvey

Kexruct said:

The "no occupations/background" naming convention makes things a bit tough

I meant that the character classes shouldn't just be "engineer", "teacher", "doctor", "truck driver", etc., but should take into account that someone who's a truck driver could be a scholar of magic, a martial artist, or a skilled explorer of nature.

glennmagusharvey

D&D 3.5 lineage standard base classes:

• Bard: Knows lots of random stuff.  Buffs party.  A smattering of spells.  Kinda a jack of all trades.  Usually drawn with a lute.
• Barbarian: Lots of HP.  Hits things hard; charges into battle to hit things harder, and lasts longer just to hit things.  Possibly illiterate.  Usually using an axe, possibly adorned with the skulls of their enemies.
• Cleric: Serves a church/deity.  A western religious monk, but made cooler by being granted the ability to hit things.  Can also smite things.  And heal people, unless they're evil.  Probably has a mace.
• Druid: <s>A tree-hugging hippie</s> Someone really in touch with nature, so they have abilities with animals and naturomancy/geomancy.
• Fighter: A catch-all physical combat class.  Can't really say much more than "hits things".
• Monk: An oriental-style martial artist monk.  Often fights bare-handed, possibly also bare-chested.
• Paladin: Champion of justice, but with no off button (unless roleplayed properly).  Always Lawful Good.  Smites things.  Minor healing powers.  Heavy armor and a big sword.
• Ranger: The outdoorsman.  Tracking, hunting, nature-related stuff.  Generally portrayed with a bow and arrows, but two-weapon fighting versions are popular, possibly because munchkins.
• Rogue: Sneaky git, possibly with the ability to sneak around in the darkness, steal things, collect intel, assassinate targets, and be really suave.  Usually portrayed with a dagger.
• Sorceror: Mages that get their magic from...talent.  Functionally, this means they get few spells but cast them a lot.
• Wizard: Mages who learned their magic.  They tend to know lots of spells.

Other D&D lineage classes that I can remember off the top of my head:

• Warlock: Throw weak magic at stuff, but do it constantly and consistently.  For some reason this strikes me as a shmup protagonist's class, basically, aside from the fact that they fire well more than once every six seconds.
  
• Witch: I'm not hugely famiilar with this but this seems less focused on offense magic and more on charms and utility spells, at least in Pathfinder.  Also, stereotypically even outside of D&D, incantations are a thing.
• Warrior: Sucky version of Fighter, for NPCs.
• Healer: Cleric minus hitting things, so basically a sucky Cleric, or so I've heard.
• Psionic classes: Play Earthbound in D&D.  Actually has <s>MP</s> PP, even.
• Inquisitor: Paladin, but less noble, more fervent, and more of a jackass.
• Scout: Rogue but instead you move around a lot.
• Beguiler: I forgot, but probably even more insidious than a regular Rogue.
• Arcane Whatever: Add magical effects to enhance whatever Whatever does!  Prestige class.

Prestige Class feature is mechanically interesting in that they're classes with prerequisites, which means that multiclassing has to be mechanically enabled in the system.

Compare Final Fantasy, which had prestige classes (or whatever they called them) but essentially no multiclassing in FFI, no prestige classes in FFIII or FFV, and brought them back in FFTA.

Also compare Fire Emblem, whose prestige classes (or whatever they called them) were basically implemented like FFI (no multiclassing to a prestige class), but with options (one base class might have multiple possible prestige classes).

Hexartes

glennmagusharvey said:

Kexruct said:

The "no occupations/background" naming convention makes things a bit tough

I meant that the character classes shouldn't just be "engineer", "teacher", "doctor", "truck driver", etc., but should take into account that someone who's a truck driver could be a scholar of magic, a martial artist, or a skilled explorer of nature.

I'm aware, and I understand the sentiment

Though if over-presciptivism is your concern I question why you're going with a class system, to be honest

ihonestThi (Android helpfully proviprovided that jumbled mess that I elected to preserve so you can see how ridiculous my phone's autocorrect is)

I suppose it depends on how broadly you implement that rule, like would "lord" or "mage" count as occupations

glennmagusharvey

Final Fantasy tradition:

• Fighter/Warrior: Swords, shields, heavy armor (expensive to equip).  Hits things hard and soaks up hits.  On advancement, hits things harder and harder and possibly more times.
• Knight/Paladin: Warrior but possibly with the ability to take damage in place of others, and maybe minor healing magic.
• Dark Knight: This appeared in FF4 as a class with the special skill of spending one's own HP to deal damage to all enemies.
• Samurai: A variant that uses more specialized armor and katanas.  May get the ability to throw money for damage (such as in FF5) or charging an attack (such as in FF6) (not to be confused with a charging attack).
  
• Thief: Started off as a class whose only specialties were being fast and running away.  Light armor and daggers, typically.  Later added the ability to steal things, as well as to attack and steal simultaneously.
• Ninja/Assassin: Some combination of sneaky attacks, an odd selection of spells (if Ninja), throwing weapons (famously ignoring enemy defense), and probably two-weapon fighting (deals more hits, usually at the cost of damage, so you want to have Strange Damage Calculation weapons for this).  Probably can use katanas.
  
• Black Belt/Monk/Master: Punches things.  Light or no armor, but learns to work well with being unarmed, or using claws.  Some versions get to charge their strikes, or use other martial-arts-inspired techniques.  May have some odd healing skills, especially if they only self-target.  FF6's version gave it fighting-game-input techniques that were basically free magic spells.
  
• Red Mage/Red Wizard/Sage: So Final Fantasy has had a historical distinction between healing and offense magic.  See the division between Black and White Mages.  But Red Mages famously get some of each, though not the best.  They can also equip better weapons and armor than those dedicated mages can, but not as good as a Fighter.  They're the class "jack of all trades master of none" class in FF games.  Sage is basically this but maybe minus the ability to do weapon combat.  That said, mastering this in FF5 gave access to multi-casting magic, which could be combined with other classes' abilities.
  
• Black Mage/Black Wizard: Mostly attack spells, including elemental magic of various sorts.  Robe and wizard hat, often literally.
  
• White Mage/White Wizard: Mostly healing spells, which damage undead.  Also, one powerful attack spell, called White/Pearl/Holy.  Robe and staff, though FF4 gives access to bows.
  
• Dimensional Mage/Time Mage/Grey Mage: Shows up in FF5.  Ends up scooping up a bunch of buffing/debuffing spells that were scattered between the Black and White libraries previously.  So called because the icon for these spells is grey in FF6.  Also throw in a few attack spells.
  
• Summoner: Instead of casting spells normally, they get spells whose animation involves summoning a creature to do something.  I think newer FFs actually let the summoned creature stick around and fight for a little while.  Whips are a popular weapon for this class.
  
• Blue Mage/Lore Master: Instead of learning standard spells, learn a particular and infamously weird set of enemy attacks, which may cover otherwise not-covered elements and effects, generally by being hit by them.  Also has about as good weapon skill as Red Mage.  (Fun fact: one of FFTA's laws forbids "color magic".)
  
• Berserker: Axes, animal skins, and uncontrollable attacks that hit hard.
  
• Engineer: A bit of a weird class.  FF4 gave it the ability to see weaknesses.  FF6 instead gave it the ability to use special items with various effects.  Uses wrenches as weapons?
  
• Scholar: FF3 gave it the ability to hit things with books and see weaknesses.
• Mage Knight/Rune Knight/Magic Knight: Okay, here's a class that has also had disjoint abilities depending on incarnation.  FF6 had absorbing magic, while FF5 had basically giving elemental abilities to weapons, with storing high-level spells making it possible to deal instant death.  Not to be confused with the Red Mage.  Knight-level strength as far as weapons go.
  
• Bard: Buff/debuff songs.  Light armor and simple weapons, but most used for their effects.
  
• Dancer: Not the same as a Bard, but instead has unpredictable weapon attack effects and equips Ribbons which are a famously powerful defensive item in FF5, while replicating Geomancer in FF6.  Light armor and simple weapons.
  
• Geomancer: Uses abilities associated with the current surroundings.  May be able to magically change surroundings.  Mage-like armor and weapons.
  
• Ranger: Can capture and use some creatures.  Also ends up granting the quadruple-hit ability in FF5 when mastered.  Often uses bows.
  
• Juggler: A variety of strange but useful effects.
  
• Gadgeteer: Unpredictable status effects galore.  Shield your side before using.
• Calculator: Takes the Blue Mage's Level Whatever abilities and applies the Level Whatever conditions to, like, all sorts of spells.  Requires planning and knowing the enemy but can eat many things alive when used correctly.
• Mimic: A usually late-game job defined by the ability to duplicate immediate past moves of other characters at no cost, and duplicating entire skillsets at normal cost.  Stats and equipment selection tend to be somewhat sucky.
• Morpher: The Druid's Wild Shape ability.  (FF6's Gau combined this and Berserker's uncontrollableness, basically.)
• Gambler: Chance-based skills, such as a...virtual slot machine?  Also, chance-based weapons, such as...dice?  Whatever.  The concept is neat but may be awkward when taken outside of its medium.
  
• other miscellaneous classes I don't exactly remember off the top of my head
  

glennmagusharvey

Kexruct said:

glennmagusharvey said:

Kexruct said:

The "no occupations/background" naming convention makes things a bit tough

I meant that the character classes shouldn't just be "engineer", "teacher", "doctor", "truck driver", etc., but should take into account that someone who's a truck driver could be a scholar of magic, a martial artist, or a skilled explorer of nature.

I'm aware, and I understand the sentiment

Though if over-presciptivism is your concern I question why you're going with a class system, to be honest

ihonestThi (Android helpfully proviprovided that jumbled mess that I elected to preserve so you can see how ridiculous my phone's autocorrect is)

I suppose it depends on how broadly you implement that rule, like would "lord" or "mage" count as occupations

I was thinking of using this thread to lay out what are some existing character class traditions that I know about and then tossing around some ideas of how I feel I'd like to make them more appealing to me, such as if I were to make an RPG system myself.  So, basically, some idea-doodling on metaphorical scratch paper.

Lord would be an occupation; Mage might be a class or a supercategory for classes.

glennmagusharvey

And yeah I'm thinking about questions like:
* should all classes produce distinct skills, or can they overlap on some skills?
* should multiclassing be possible?  (answer's probably yes)
* should prestige classes be a thing?  (maybe, probably used to address specific branches of some classes -- e.g. the distinction between Archer, Hunter, and Sniper)

FWIW I'm imagining a system that's simpler and closer to the FF lineage than the D&D lineage, with the former's relative simplicity.

But another question I'm wondering about is also how much I want this to be a gamey/combat system vs. one that covers both combat situations and non-combat situations.

glennmagusharvey

@Kexruct you might be onto something actually; the idea of just combining skills as opposed to sticking with classes is sort of an attractive idea.

Hexartes

I had a design idea conceptualized without character class per se, but a list of commands that would have archetypal class-type names, e.g. the "Black Mage" action would be useful in combat and in situations calling for subterfuge, the "Bard" action would be good for diplomacy

glennmagusharvey

Kexruct said:

I had a design idea conceptualized without character class per se, but a list of commands that would have archetypal class-type names, e.g. the "Black Mage" action would be useful in combat and in situations calling for subterfuge, the "Bard" action would be good for diplomacy

wait, why subterfuge?

Hexartes

I mean, no reason in particular beyond the classes needing to have utility outside of combat