Another difference is that travel through other planes is very risky, if not impossible, because most of the planes are blocked, dimension door and teleport run the risk of grabbing the attention of infernal powers, and summoning spells have changed tables that give you local animals and monsters instead of outsiders.
Necromantic magic has the risk of causing 2 points/spell level of subdual damage on a failed Fort save DC 15+spell level. Not all necromantic spells do so, though, they have a nice list of necromantic spells that carry that risk.
Infernalism is simply selling your soul to an Infernal for favours, and can be attempted by anybody. Calling rituals to grab an Infernal's attention are easy and don't require any spellcasting prowess. You could probably just dangle a dying person into an impromptu ritual circle and yell "Come and get it!"
The gods and religions of the IK are
very detailed and well-defined, and a big motivator for a lot of the action in that setting. They interact with each other through their followers. The already cited "Pain of Healing" is a punishment a deity metes out on priest as well as supplicant when healing a non-believer, or when the priest is over his alloted healing per day (10+Wis mod x caster level points of healing). Healing is limited, and raising dead is very much frowned upon because it removes souls from the side of their god, who needs them in a greater war in the afterworld. Raise Dead is a 9th level spell, and only rarely used. Those raised run into the risk to come back changed...and not for the better. On the other hand, most gods grant their followers additional boni or special abilities unlocked via special feats.
Mechanika (mechanically enhanced magical items) serve to lower the cost and risk of creating magical items. Standard magical items are more expensive, and there is a flat 20% chance that you lose 1 HP permanently for every 200 XP you blow on a permanent item. Steamjacks and other "half-robotic/half-magic" creatures are setting a very interesting background for a budding industry in the IK.
Dragons are CR 35 and up, and are real corruptors of land and people. Don't tangle with one...they can't be truly killed anyway as long the heartstone is not destroyed. Luckily, there are only 3 or 4. Unluckily, one of them is godlike and rules a nation of pirates, necromancers and undead servants.
Oh yeah, and for some reason every human nation is constantly prepared for war. The main elven nation is a bunch of xenophobic paranoids that bustle around a dying goddess, with secret hit squads going after human wizards who are blamed for the dying of their goddess. No halflings! Goblins have taken up a kind of half-nomadic lifestyle and have a natural talent with mechanical stuff of all kinds (think Java
). Ogrun and Trollkin are setting-specific new races, both interesting and well-done. And contrary to what others might say, Ogrun are overpowering only when they stay in their clichéd role as group tank. And even then, there's enough to show them their limits. And both races carry a LA +1 around with them, which is more than what a few other new races I've seen can claim.
) feel to it, then I highly recommend IK.
