*or at least try to.
In pushing our current campaign into its new phase, I want to bring a little of that Old Tyme Religion to bear. That is no easy feat in Pathfinder, as the system relies heavily on magic across nearly every class. Even the allegedly magic-hating Barbarian has a host of supernatural abilities they can call upon. So how do we grim-dark this up and establish the theme of anti-magical zealotry in this set of rules?
Let's start with the Inquisitor class. Nigh unplayable as a player class (in my opinion), it's completely unmanageable from the DM standpoint. Tons of fiddly abilities, scores of ridiculously intricate Teamwork Feats that require a constant micromanagement of battlefield position, range and attack modes and types, and a weak spell list all add up to a headache for me and a lackluster villain for my players. So lets tackle these one at a time.
Spells, Orisons and Domains
The Inquisitorial spell list is ho-hum at best, mimicking that of a Cleric, but with reduced casting capacity and a limited tableau of spells to pull from, much like the Sorcerer. Also, there's a lot of humbug chicanery in the Domains list which doesn't jive with an anti-magical standpoint, so let's chuck it. ALL of it. No spells, no domains.
Teamwork Feats
As much as I love the idea of feats that work for the whole group, I consider their implementation in Pathfinder to be a failure overall. There's just so much overhead to managing them that I don't think they are worth the +1 or +2 conditional bonuses you get from them. Solo Tactics gives the Inquisitor a nice party-wide buff smorgasbord they can share with others, but I still find them unmanageable.
How about we make it simple? Instead of messing with bonus feats, let's just give the Inquisitor and his henchmen a nice, flat +2 buff that emulates a lot of what these teamwork feats do? Inquisitors are going to have a cohort or retinue following them about, so why not make it useful for their lower level followers to stay within his protective/augmentative bubble? Give them +2 to initiative, CMB and CMD while in his radius, as well as all three types of AC? I'm tempted to give them a +4 bonus on attacks of opportunity and flanking attacks as well, given the tight-knit fighting tactics they would employ.
Class Abilities
Like most Pathfinder classes, the Inquisitor has a gob full of abilities based on level (oh remember when dead levels were a bad thing?). Many of these are Supernatural Abilities, and I want to get rid of those, so I will. Ditch them all. These guys hate magic, remember? We'll find something to replace them with later on.
First let's get rid of all their Supernatural (Su) and Spell-like (Sp) abilities. That leaves behind a whole bunch of dead levels for us to fill in.
Let's change Judgement, shall we? The Inquisitor is supposed to be a scary, tough-as-nails opponent, even though their most impressive feature is their scary and indomitable personality. I'm thinking replace the fiddly Judgements list with the Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic from 5th Edition D&D. Instead of wondering where to apply this or that +1 or -1 from round to round, the Inquisitor gets 1 re-roll per round of a d20 roll (attack, save, ability or skill) or damage roll during combat, representing their ability to wade through battle in only the armor of their faith, knocking aside opponents and deflecting arrows. Then Second Judgement lets them reroll 2 rolls per round! ...I may have to soften this, but we'll see how it goes.
Keeping things in the antimagic vein, what about adding a wide area effect of magic suppression? Something like an area Spell Resistance, based on the size of his horde? Or ego? Let's call it the Chorus. The Chorus I think would operate something like this: Any magic acting at up to Medium Range would have to overcome a caster level check equal to 10 plus the Inquisitor's Charisma bonus (or Wisdom?), with numbers of followers adding to the difficulty.
What do we have so far? A fighting cleric with no spells but a resilience that belies his otherwise humble combat abilities due to the modified Judgement ability, a hefty buff and protective aura for all his followers, a wide variety of skills with which to supplement his forces, and lots of attitude.
Add in things like special materials for weapons, tanglefoot bags, thunderstones, fireworks and intelligent massed attacks.
