Pathfinder 1E Published settings-- is the absence of iconic classes/races/setting elements a dealbreaker?

[cgraph]

IE, a setting without say, elves, or one where there are no sorcerers? Or if for whatever reason there are no other accessible planes of existence? Does this become a deal breaker if you're looking at it? (Obviously, this is a question that's hard to answer-- it's a lot easier to say its a dealbreaker if the rest of the product looks like it was done by a 10 year old).

 

[jonesy]

Nope. That's not even a consideration when looking at what settings to check out.

 

[steeldragons]

*shrug* That's not really something that can be answered. What's the rest of the setting include? Maybe there's something really great in there that still sparks an interest. Or, as you said, maybe the rest looks like it was done by a 10 y.o. or does it have really great product quality and art? Are there going to be some ideas/things to "mine", even if I wouldn't play in the setting as is?

There's really no way to say. It could turn me off immediately. It could be "this is too good to pass up." There's really no way to say.

 

[gamerprinter]

I'd say definitely no (and personally I'd avoid any 3PP setting that includes the standard races, as I hate the standard races.) If it were true, then I'd be in trouble, since I develop the Kaidan setting of Japanese horror (PFRPG) as a published setting under Rite Publishing, as not only are the non-human races more fitting to a Japanese setting (kappa, kitsune, korobokuru, henge and tengu), but if any of the standard non-human races show up in Kaidan, the locals treat non-locals badly, and non-human non-locals even worse than beasts.

I say keep the elves, dwarves and halflings in Middle Earth and out of my game settings. If I never saw another elf in a game, there'd still be too many elves out there, for my taste...

 

[Starfox]

If you shoehorn all these things into a setting where they don't belong, that is a lot worse than not having them. So if you make a setting where it makes thematic sense not to have sorcerers and the only outer planes are heaven and hell, that is how it should be.

Rules serve top bring the setting to life, not the other way around.

Now, if your setting really does not care one way or another if a specific rules-supported class or other feature is there, you should probably include it.