[Realm] No-No's of design?

[warrenfry]

I agree that you should allow yourself the freedom to name your classes-types-careers what you wish.  If 'bard' evokes all the other bard-baggage from games before (D&D, etc.) and you are not comfortable with that kind of content being read into that character type then I would avoid it.  I think the same goes for the term gamemaster or storyteller or what have you.  If the convential, canonized term doesn't work then don't use it.  Of course, terms like gamemaster do work a lot of the time, perhaps why they are canonized!

Cheers!

[Sydney Freedberg]

I am not aiming for "classes" though. More for a "skill set" for players. I'm aiming for about 3 per kingdom and a few for each race.

Tying specific character-types to particular cultures is a good idea -- a lot of D&D-influenced fantasy sort of assumes that all humans are basically the same and have the same cultural roles. (Or rather that there are the Vaguely Medieval Western Guys with Paladins and Rogues and then the Vaguely Asian Guys with Kung-Fu Monks, Samurai, and Ninja). I'd suggest that each of your "races" have subcultures of its own: Remember even in Tolkein the Rivendale Elves and the Lothlorien Elves are culturally distinct, and neither is identical to the old high Elves of the Silmarrilion, while the Moria Orcs are physically and psychologically very different from Saruman's Orcs who are in turn different from the Mordor Orcs.

You should check out the past discussions on race and class listed in the links in this post of Ron Edwards's (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/forum/index.php?topic=17827.msg188487#msg188487 if the link's busted). (Don't post in any of those threads, of course; Theory Forum's closed now, and most of the threads were so old they were closed long before the forum was).