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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 7825555" data-attributes="member: 4937">Yes, and no.No, in the sense that it is impossible to devise a spell like "Detect Class" that would successfully detect the class or classes a character in universe has. Class exists only in the metagame and is a simplified abstraction representing typical combinations of skills and backgrounds that exist in the fictional universe. Class exists for reasons that are strictly metagame, such as insuring that all characters will have broad skills rather than simply narrow and deep ones. Yes, in the sense that spell-casting classes do really have different traditions that lead to very different sources of their power. While ultimately they are all practicing the same sort of magic, how that magic is empowered varies greatly between classes. An in universe character can recognize when a character is practicing shamanic magic and differentiate it from say wizardly magic, sorcerous magic, or clerical magic. In character, people would not say that the person's "class" was shaman or wizard, but they would be able to say (correctly) that another person was a shaman or a wizard, or that they had the profession, skills, or training of a shaman or wizard. And each person wanting to successfully practice that magic, would have certain features in common that would be shared across all other persons that practiced magic of the same sort.So in this sense, people in universe are able to distinguish between a wizard and a sorcerer or a shaman and a cleric, in a way that they would be unable to precisely distinguish between a fighter, explorer, rogue, brute, warrior, paragon, expert or fanatic, or someone that was some combination of those things. Nor would they be able to easily distinguish between a low level wizard, a sage, and member of another class that dabbled in arcane magic without being an actual wizard. All three persons, if asked, "Are you a wizard?", might well answer, "Not really. I am only a dabbler." or else "At one time I studied such matters, but not any more." They would not understand the question to mean, "Do you have a level in the class wizard?", a question that would for the most part make sense only in the metagame. On the other hand, someone from the wizardly tradition could answer a question like, "What is the highest level of spell you can cast?", and would understand what was meant by this question, though in the game world this would likely be asked as, "What circle of arcane mystery have you penetrated?" However, if they answered, "The 4th circle/level.", it would be possibly erroneous to guess that they were a 7th level wizard because a sufficiently high level sage can also cast 4th level spells. Attempts to exactly reconstruct what level they were by enumerating available spell slots would run into problems of exactly reconstructing intelligence and aptitude and feats that modified spell slots. So, in short, they have a vague idea that spell-casting progresses in a way that could be described as levels, and wizards in particular have a regimented program of advances that they tend to adhere to avoid magical injury, they don't exactly know and do not try to figure out what 'level' people are. And it really would never occur to them that everyone has 'levels'. In game universe, they don't really. The levels and classes are just abstractions for a more complex fictional reality.</blockquote>

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