We will be playing in the world of the Witcher, as created and described by Andrzej Sapkowski, with minor inspirations from the video game series (I haven’t yet watched the Netflix TV show and the Polish one was an abomination, so they won’t influence the plot and the world).
We will start in the year 1270—two years after the second war with Nilfgaard and the end of a book saga, three years before the games (they have shifted a chronology for that three years in those), starting as a first-level characters, trying to find their place in the North after all that turmoil. Because of that low-level nature of the game at first (you will eventually level up), no witchers are allowed. You can create one later, as a replacement character after a few level-ups, but I feel that the power level they introduce won’t budge well with the story I’m trying to create.
As for the mechanical system, we will be using the first edition Pathfinder, which should give us the necessary flexibility.
When I say that something is encouraged, I mean that as a light suggestion—as a typical solution/character idea, that require little to no explanation in character’s history and would be a good choice if you have no better idea what to do. Conversely, discouraged elements are things that should have some justification in the backstory, but by no means should be avoided, if that’s what you want to play.
Only when described as banned, forbidden (or enforced, necessary etc.) it is a hard limit.
- The world of the Witcher is a low magic system compared to most. While
mages and magical creatures are not that uncommon, magical items and
artifacts are.
- As such, don’t expect magical potions to be readily available or for a shop with magical items to even exist, beyond simple trinkets with no real power, made mostly for gullible people.
- ‘Conventional’ items of higher quality can exceed masterwork and be considered +1 or even +2 items. Truly magical artifacts start, as always, at +1 and go up to +5, but are exceedingly rare.
- Because of that change, hardly any creature has a damage reduction for non-magical weapons. Instead, silver and specific oils are used to break their resistance.
- There are no resurrection spells and magical healing is limited. To compensate for that, HP loss will be mostly reflavoured as light bruises, slight burns and armour damage, healing being required mainly for downed characters.
- Because of the scarcity of the undead, most undead-related powers apply to corpse eaters too.
- It has been three years after the Brotherhood of Sorcerers was disbanded, but two years before large-scale repressions start.
- There are no guns here, so classes, feats etc. relying on them are banned.
- Characters’ alignments have almost no mechanical significance—you can play the chaotic good druid if you like.
- Only the following races from the core rulebook are allowed: dwarves, elves, gnomes, half-elves, halflings and humans. There are no orcs in the world of the Witcher (so no half-orcs either) and other possible intelligent races, such as dopplers, high vampires or witchers, represent too high of a power level to start with and driads don’t match the story well.
- As for the classes and their archetypes (if I have missed something you
want to try, feel free to ask):
- Alchemists are OK as they are, with Chirurgeon encouraged.
- Arcanists are a good option for people new to spellcasting classes in Pathfinder and fit the campaign quite well, but will require some backstory as to why they don’t just sit in Oxenfurt and study magic from the library.
- Barbarians are reflavoured as Skellige’s Berserkers. Choose your archetype accordingly—for example, Mounted Furry is very heavily discouraged.
- Bards are encouraged, but their more magical archetypes, such as Arcane Duelist, Magician and (especially) Dirge Bard, are anything but.
- Bloodragers are discouraged, as barbarians are preferred.
- Brawlers are the go-to martial class. Choose this over the monk.
- Cavaliers are slightly discouraged for their reliance on mounts. Daring Champions don’t rely on them, so are perfectly fine, Beast Rider using exotic mounts is much worse, so outright forbidden.
- Clerics are fine, but to fit them into the world requires nerfing their magical abilities, including magical healing. Speak to me and we’ll find something to compensate for it. As for the archetypes, knowledge-based (like Cloistered Clerics) are encouraged, fighting (like Crusaders) are OK power-wise, but will need some backstory, magic-based (like Ecclesitheurge) are discouraged, and necromancy-based Undead Lord is strictly banned.
- Druids are the preferred alternative to clerics in many regards. They are mostly common on Skellige, but not unheard of outside either. Choose the archetype accordingly.
- Fighters are common and encouraged. Remember the non-existance of firepowder.
- Gunslingers are banned, for obvious reasons.
- Hunters are slightly discouraged for their mechanical complexity, though they fit the setting nicely.
- Investigators are fine, but will require some flavouring.
- Inquisitors are heavily discouraged, the world hasn’t fallen into the religious fever yet.
- Kineticists, in my opinion, don’t fit the world too well, so are discouraged, but you can possibly came up with some reflavouring that I didn’t think of, so I’m not going to outright ban them.
- Magi (Maguses?) are discouraged. They are many more flavourful magical options out there.
- Mediums are fine flavour-wise, but are underpowered. We can talk about making them stronger, if you’d like to play as one, but you might want to consider playing a witch instead.
- Mesmerists are somewhat OK.
- Monks, other than Martial Artists, are banned. The MA is OK I guess, but please consider brawler instead.
- Occultists are hard to understand and mechanically complex, so I’d rather avoid them unless you are quite skilled Pathfinder player that can keep track of their abilities mostly on your own.
- Oracles can be considered a different flavour of cleric, so the same restrictions apply.
- Paladins are heavily discouraged, with their more divine-focused archetypes, like Empyreal Knight, completely banned. Temple Champion relies on magic the least, so will be the preferable option out of their archetypes.
- Psychics are fine, but complex.
- Rangers are fine, but their spells require some reflavouring. As such, Skirmisher and Trapper archetypes are encouraged, you should avoid those that enforce mounted combat and you might want to consider a slayer instead.
- Rogues are encouraged.
- Shamans would require quite a backstory to justify their presence in the game, but other than that are fine.
- Skalds are mostly Skellige’s bards and are just as welcomed as they were.
- Slayers are slightly encouraged and a preferable alternative to rangers.
- Sorcerers are the go-to magic class for this world—while wizards might be more common in general, among low-level characters the untrained sorcerers are encouraged. That said, Celestial and Abyssal bloodlines are banned.
- Swashbucklers can be fun to play and are cautiously encouraged.
- Summoners, as summoning magic is rare in the Witcher’s world, are somewhat discouraged and a more standard caster class would be preferable.
- Warpriests might be what you want if you want to play a cleric, but there are similar concerns and limitations in place, which we’d have to discuss and adapt to.
- Witches are a great and flavourful spin on casters and thus very much encouraged. Avoid, however, the Gravewalker, the necromancy-based archetype.
- Wizards are the most common casting class world-wide, but the low-level ones are mostly still learning at the academy, which would have to be explained by the backstory.