Random thoughts:
1) Regarding power lists by theme vs. power lists by class, one thing you might want to look at is doing at-wills and utilities by power source, encounters by role, and dailies and class features by class. That way, the bread-and-butter powers for in and out of combat are determined by your schtick (martials swing swords, arcanists shoot fire, etc.), you can do things every encounter that definitively say "I'm a defender!" or "I'm a controller!", and your big guns are class-defining to really set them apart, kind of like how barbarians have their rages as dailies, wizards can swap out daily spells, etc.
This means that (A) people have less need for system mastery/memorization, as knowledge of at-wills, utilities, and encounters will transfer between roles as well as between power sources and (B) this increased overlap means you don't need to worry about repeating role-specific powers too much between power sources and will have lots more room to get creative with dailies.
2)
How about the Sorcerer? They have the basic fluff of "innate, uncontrolled magic," which lends them well to a very direct in-your-face style of magic while bards might be more tricky and wizards might be more...caster-y with theirs, and sorcerers got several melee-friendly variants towards the end of 3.5 and gishes are well-served by reusing a signature set of buffs and debuffs rather than being Swiss army knives, so the playstyle would be familiar to many people. Also, sorcerers had plenty of special options like making good use of reserve feats, having those draconic-themed "sacrifice a spell to do X" feats, and similar that would allow a sorcerer to blur the lines of "casting spells" vs. "channeling magic" in order to differentiate it from other casters (for instance, while a fighter/wizard in 2e/3e might pre-buff before combat and toss a few blasting spells before charging in, sorcerers with Draconic Heritage and other dragon-y feats and features might have dragon scales for armor and could breathe fire in peoples' faces instead of blasting from afar).
3) Psions and wizards are fairly similar mechanically, but there are a few points where they have differed. In 4e, of course, psions have the augmentation mechanic for greater on-the-fly flexibility. In 3e, they had blasting powers where you could choose energy types on the fly and different energy types did different things. In 2e, they had a psionic combat system that let them directly attack opponents' minds and do so faster than most other caster-types. Putting these together, I would say the major difference between the wizard and the psion is that the psion is more tactical while the wizard is more strategic, if you know what I mean.
--The psion targets individuals well (messing with individual minds, quickly crushing single targets with overwhelming force, etc.) while the wizard targets groups well (creating free-standing illusions that can fool many people, filling the battlefield with spell effects, etc.).
--The psion improvises tactics on the fly (tailoring energy types, astral construct forms, and such to the situation) while wizards plan out strategies in advance (predicting the situations he'll face, preparing certain spells to be combined in certain orders, and such).
--Psions can be more subtle and sneaky in the thick of things (having no components or issues with armor mean they don't have to be obvious casters, many of their powers are invisible, etc.) while wizards benefit from having a bird's-eye view, sometimes literally (they are safer when separated from immediate combat, good range and vision help with targeting their wide-area powers, etc.).
--Psionic abilities are more ephemeral (many requiring concentration, not affecting the physical world, or similar) while magical abilities can be more grounded (lasting permanently, creating real or quasi-real things, and such).
So the difference, then, is not a matter of mental vs. physical, it's a matter of style, just like divine and arcane casters pre-4e shared many of the same spells but had differences in components, tools, synergies, and the like.
1) Regarding power lists by theme vs. power lists by class, one thing you might want to look at is doing at-wills and utilities by power source, encounters by role, and dailies and class features by class. That way, the bread-and-butter powers for in and out of combat are determined by your schtick (martials swing swords, arcanists shoot fire, etc.), you can do things every encounter that definitively say "I'm a defender!" or "I'm a controller!", and your big guns are class-defining to really set them apart, kind of like how barbarians have their rages as dailies, wizards can swap out daily spells, etc.
This means that (A) people have less need for system mastery/memorization, as knowledge of at-wills, utilities, and encounters will transfer between roles as well as between power sources and (B) this increased overlap means you don't need to worry about repeating role-specific powers too much between power sources and will have lots more room to get creative with dailies.
2)
Quote from: XeviatAnother way I had looked at making the classes ended up looking like this:
[table snipped]
I left the warrior arcanist off because I cannot think of an iconic warrior/wizard that isn't just a multiclass.
How about the Sorcerer? They have the basic fluff of "innate, uncontrolled magic," which lends them well to a very direct in-your-face style of magic while bards might be more tricky and wizards might be more...caster-y with theirs, and sorcerers got several melee-friendly variants towards the end of 3.5 and gishes are well-served by reusing a signature set of buffs and debuffs rather than being Swiss army knives, so the playstyle would be familiar to many people. Also, sorcerers had plenty of special options like making good use of reserve feats, having those draconic-themed "sacrifice a spell to do X" feats, and similar that would allow a sorcerer to blur the lines of "casting spells" vs. "channeling magic" in order to differentiate it from other casters (for instance, while a fighter/wizard in 2e/3e might pre-buff before combat and toss a few blasting spells before charging in, sorcerers with Draconic Heritage and other dragon-y feats and features might have dragon scales for armor and could breathe fire in peoples' faces instead of blasting from afar).
3) Psions and wizards are fairly similar mechanically, but there are a few points where they have differed. In 4e, of course, psions have the augmentation mechanic for greater on-the-fly flexibility. In 3e, they had blasting powers where you could choose energy types on the fly and different energy types did different things. In 2e, they had a psionic combat system that let them directly attack opponents' minds and do so faster than most other caster-types. Putting these together, I would say the major difference between the wizard and the psion is that the psion is more tactical while the wizard is more strategic, if you know what I mean.
--The psion targets individuals well (messing with individual minds, quickly crushing single targets with overwhelming force, etc.) while the wizard targets groups well (creating free-standing illusions that can fool many people, filling the battlefield with spell effects, etc.).
--The psion improvises tactics on the fly (tailoring energy types, astral construct forms, and such to the situation) while wizards plan out strategies in advance (predicting the situations he'll face, preparing certain spells to be combined in certain orders, and such).
--Psions can be more subtle and sneaky in the thick of things (having no components or issues with armor mean they don't have to be obvious casters, many of their powers are invisible, etc.) while wizards benefit from having a bird's-eye view, sometimes literally (they are safer when separated from immediate combat, good range and vision help with targeting their wide-area powers, etc.).
--Psionic abilities are more ephemeral (many requiring concentration, not affecting the physical world, or similar) while magical abilities can be more grounded (lasting permanently, creating real or quasi-real things, and such).
So the difference, then, is not a matter of mental vs. physical, it's a matter of style, just like divine and arcane casters pre-4e shared many of the same spells but had differences in components, tools, synergies, and the like.