A Whole New World

[Serenity]

I'm very slowly beginning to work out a campaign setting predicated on the existence of Psionics, but no other form of magic. CoDzilla, Wizard, Sorcerer--all gone. Nor is there a Bard or Paladin, the latter being replaced by the Crusader. Monk and Fighter are both subsumed by their ToB counterparts as well. Rogue and Barbarian stay as they are. My scattered thoughts so far:

* I'd like to keep the Ranger, but his spell list will obviously have to be eliminated. Would giving him a Druid's animal companion progression be a good trade-off? Or perhaps we should give him a progression of Tiger Claw maneuvers?
* Since there's no more fighter, dwarves need a new base class. I'm thinking of going with Crusader over Warblade.
* The elven favored class becomes Psychic Warrior. Both swordplay and mental mastery are an art, and for elves, who seek perfection in their arts, unity of mind and body to such a degree is a truly admirable goal. Metagame reason for not simply replacing Wizard with Psion: I also plan to have Elans present, so I'd like to avoid having two effectively immortal races with Psion as a favored class.
*I won't be including Maenads or Xephs, as they strike me as quite bland. I'm also probably going to drop gnomes, since Bard is gone, and replacing it with Rogue for the Gnome favored class would step on Halfling toes.
*Among my few fluff ideas: A desert nation, ruled by a 'Celestial Rahjah', worshipping the Sun and the Moon, with an elite army of Crusaders called the Jannissary Corps. They have to deal with raids from Thri-Kreen tribes. Halflings as a gypsy race that worship the stars. Probably less pantheism in general. Obviously, various scattered monastic traditions teaching supplicants to hone their mind and body.

Any input, suggestions, etc. the forum has to offer would be most welcome!

[Lairship]

Some vague ideas. :smallcool:

~ Perhaps gnomes could be halflings that all live within the halfling ancestral home, they are secretive but welcoming to halflings. To give them a bit of a edge, a bit of "cool" they often lack, gnomes have stayed within this city so long they are a part of it, they can control things like doors, trains, elevators with their combinded psions. Mostly a NPC race.
~ The halflings are open to anyones religion, often naming a star after someones god and constantly adding to their faith.
~ The desert nation is open to many races, even some that are known to be evil. Ogres act as shock-troppers. Dwarves that live in anthill-like fortresses have a cold war with goblins, both of them want to be the Celestial Rahjah's main army.
~ Most elves are used as meat-shields for their immortal elders. Half elves are bred because they mature quicker, so they can be used earlier. Wood or wild elves are those that escape their masters. Drow fear mind control so much they hide from the other elves and practice a strange self torture to provent their minds from being controlled.
~ Elves feel the world has fallen into chaos, they may be right, but they are going about helping the world all the wrong way. Imagine a paladin, imagine what his mood would be like after a thousand years of fighting evil. What would he do in order to keep the world safe?

[Serenity]

Mmm, interesting ideas, but some of them might make races a tad unplayable. The halfling openness to other religions is already built into their star worship--since there are innumerable stars, each halfling essentially has his own personal god. They're particularly welcome in the desert nation, since they conceive of the Sun and Moon as overdeities.

Certainly, I think I might add in the elven mind control as the Drow belief, if not actual fact. and your first suggestion raises a good point of discussion: should the world be 'crystalpunk' or Psitech, so to speak, or a more traditional level of technology? If the former, I could probably look to Eberron for some inspiration. The latter, on the other hand suggests that psionics, while prevalent, is still something that many don't understand...

[Vadin]

Regardless of however the setting turns out, you absolutely must make it psionically knoweledgable on a mass and general scale. Most people should know what 'magic' is, more or less, and the middle class should have some access to it.

Why?

Because Crystalpunk is the gosh darned coolest thing I've heard all week.

Crystal guns shooting energy beams (for 1d6 energy damage, augmentable by the person shooting (up to a limit, of course)). Mind control devices backfiring as the subject uses the mind link to dominate the would-be master. All in all, it would end up looking not unlike a sort of backwards futuretech setting, where all of the technology is there, just used very differently and in place of things we ourselves would use (and the cultural aspects keep things like CrystalCallers (the hot new item this season) from getting into the hands of commoners, who would devalue the Callers merely by owning them).

In short, go with Crystalpunk, because it works well with the setting established so far.

[Serenity]

Crystalpunk it is...indeed, that would make a good name for the setting. And all the crystal tech running around suggests some ideas for dwarves. The branching corridors of their hive-like warrens may seem confusing and chaotic to some, but they are hewn, in fact, to a very specific pattern: along the ley lines of the earth, where grow crystals with natural psionic resonance, a necessary component in almost any psionic item...and perhaps allowing you to add +X bonuses to weapons without necessarily being psionically awakened yourself.

I'm also starting to think of dwarves with a somewhat insectoid mentality, not quite a hive mind, but close. Enough to make me wonder if it might not be a good idea to pare Dromites down to +0 LA and use them instead...

Elves don't live in the forest, but rather in crystal spires shaped by their very minds. (Elves and half-elves both get Naturally Psionic). Drow, on the other hand, dwell in the darkness of primeval forests, practicing ritual scarification and similar self torture to steel their minds against mental control. Any elves they capture are subjected to the self-same torture, to 'free' them from the supposed control of the elders and bring them into the fold.

[Serenity]

Bumping with a compilation of a few of the questions I have about making mechanical changes:

* If I'm to keep Rangers, I need to switch out their partial spellcasting for something else. Would giving them the Druid's animal companion progression be a good swap? Failing that, if someone could suggest a good Tiger Claw progression to give them?

* To make up for the healing loss of eliminating divine casters, I'm considering making the Cure X Wounds spells Psychometabolism powers. Good idea?

* How would you pare down the Dromite's LA? I might want to use them in place of dwarves, but it's no good to have a +1 LA as a base race.

[jagadaishio]

Bumping with a compilation of a few of the questions I have about making mechanical changes:

* If I'm to keep Rangers, I need to switch out their partial spellcasting for something else. Would giving them the Druid's animal companion progression be a good swap? Failing that, if someone could suggest a good Tiger Claw progression to give them?

* To make up for the healing loss of eliminating divine casters, I'm considering making the Cure X Wounds spells Psychometabolism powers. Good idea?

* How would you pare down the Dromite's LA? I might want to use them in place of dwarves, but it's no good to have a +1 LA as a base race.

1: Remove their normal spellcasting and replace their standard animal companion with an animal companion of equal power to that of a druid of their level. This would make them what the normal ranger should have been anyway.

2: Yes.

3: Remove either their energy ray or their natural armour.

[SurlySeraph]

http://www.crystalkeep.com/d20/rules/DnD3.5Index-Classes-Base.pdf

Try pages 91 and 98 for non-casting Ranger variants.

I second everything that jagadaishio said.