Archetypes

 Alright, so a little system I'm working on implementing. Essentially, there are five primary Archetypes. An Archtype is essentially what classes they have avaliable to them. There's the Warrior Archetype, which contains classes like Knight, Lancer, and Brute, the Rogue Archetype, which contains classes like Covet, Assassin, and Alchemist, the Ranger Archetype, which contains classes like the Hunter, Archer, and Vampire Hunter, and the Mage Archetype, which contains classes like Necromancer, Red Mage, and Druid. Characters can fall into a total of two Archetypes. The idea here is that it'll give the player enough freedom and customization, without my Thief character running around wielding greatswords and maces. What do you guys think of the idea?

Sounds neat, but not sure why the Alchemist is in the Rogue Archetype :) What about religious sorts like Paladins and Clerics?

Meh, they were mainly examples. And those would probably fit into the Mage and Warrior (Paladin) archetypes

Yanfly has some superb Class management scripts that will make your idea much easier to implement.

See: https://yanflychannel.wordpress.com/

Since they can choose to pick from two archetypes, I think it would be cool to be able to combine class types instead of having two different sets of skills/traits. For example, if the player chooses to have archetype 1 = Warrior and archetype 2 = Ranger, then the player create a mash up of the three sub-archetypes. I'm not thinking anything too fancy, maybe just a few extra skills that combine some pre-existing skills from the two archetypes. Maybe have the warriors super sword slash combine with the ranger's assassin throw weapon ability to create skill that does awesome boomerang sword throw. The idea I think is good but, maybe not my example :D

They don't really get to choose the actual archetype, seeing as all my characters are already set in place, and the system is in place mainly to allow customization while not letting the player drift too far out from sensibility. But thanks for the input ^.^

What is your the game-design idea behind these Archetypes - that is, how will it make for a better, more fun, or more interesting set of choices for the player?  I feel like there's a reason, but it's not clear from what you've described.

Or is it just a cosmetic thing?

So, as per usual. all the characters have their own personalities, physical traits, etc. The idea is to keep the players from straying too far from what could actually happen. For example, it actually makes sense for my Rogue character to learn to use a bow, but him running into battle with 450 pounds of armor and a 60 pound sword just isn't realistic. Also, it's there for balance - Seeing as a lot of the enemies are armored, it would be a bit unbalanced to have every character armed with lightning spells.