4th Edition for low-magic historical gaming

[JPL]

I'd like to run a one-shot for my young nephews that could pass as educational. Leaning towards a Crusades-era game, where they play young squires (who get knighted at the end). Any PC magic has to be subtle and ambiguous.

Now the squires are easy enough . . fighters, or fighter hybrids with the other martial classes. Chain mail, sword + board, and the Mounted Combat feat is a must.

Coming up with a good character for their dad to play is a bit trickier. Dad has a master's in English and a good knowledge of the medieval era, so I want to cast him as an older adviser-type character --- maybe someone socially inferior to the young nobles. Not someone who gives orders, but rather someone who gives advice and information, and doesn't steal the spotlight in the fights. Maybe a priest or lay brother, maybe a sage.

So how to model this in 4th Edition? What I'm leaning toward is a deliberately nerfed tactical warlord or warlord / cleric. Pump up the Int and Wis, keep the physical stats modest, and forgo the heavy metal in favor of a scholar's robes and a staff. For feats, stuff like Linguist and Skill Focus. A warlord/cleric feels a bit more priestly, but again, the trick is to avoid anything that involves summoning the angelic hordes or shooting empyrian flames out of his eyes.

Any thoughts or experiences?

[Bumbles]

Sounds like a bit of A Knight's Tale.

But one thing you may want to do is to have multiple characters for them to choose from, or even play. You could have some squires, and you could have a gamewarden in training, a sneakthief from the city, and let the players pick different ones to play at times so they get a feel for the options.

This would let you have adventures involving different things, though it may add some complexity.

[Plane Sailing]

All the non-martial characters are intensely magical, so I think you'll need to stick to just martial classes, which shouldn't be a problem.

I think your idea of using an ageing warlord who wears robes rather than armour is fine - the only limitation being that most of the warlords attacks require a Str based attack to hit in order to do something worthwhile, which is a shame, as a weak non-fighting warlord will find it hard to make use of his main encounter and daily attack powers (although his utilities will be great).

[arscott]

There seem to be a pretty decent number of warlord powers that don't require the warlord to hit for their various buff effects to happen. I think you could build a reasonably effective warlord that has crap strength, but great Int and Cha, to take advantage of those powers.

[Nifft]

It's possible to build a Bard that looks Martial. Give him a belt of daggers so he won't outshine the kids in combat, but can easily make melee and ranged attacks.

Cheers, -- N

[Stalker0]

I was thinking the Bard as well for the sage guy.

[kitsune9]

Originally Posted by JPL

I'd like to run a one-shot for my young nephews that could pass as educational. Leaning towards a Crusades-era game, where they play young squires (who get knighted at the end). Any PC magic has to be subtle and ambiguous.

Now the squires are easy enough . . fighters, or fighter hybrids with the other martial classes. Chain mail, sword + board, and the Mounted Combat feat is a must.

Coming up with a good character for their dad to play is a bit trickier. Dad has a master's in English and a good knowledge of the medieval era, so I want to cast him as an older adviser-type character --- maybe someone socially inferior to the young nobles. Not someone who gives orders, but rather someone who gives advice and information, and doesn't steal the spotlight in the fights. Maybe a priest or lay brother, maybe a sage.

So how to model this in 4th Edition? What I'm leaning toward is a deliberately nerfed tactical warlord or warlord / cleric. Pump up the Int and Wis, keep the physical stats modest, and forgo the heavy metal in favor of a scholar's robes and a staff. For feats, stuff like Linguist and Skill Focus. A warlord/cleric feels a bit more priestly, but again, the trick is to avoid anything that involves summoning the angelic hordes or shooting empyrian flames out of his eyes.

Any thoughts or experiences?

Why nerf anything in 4e? I would rather just use the martial classes and have the appropriate culture and historical stuff in check. When actual combat is breaking out and characters are doing marking, healing surges, pushing, pulling, etc. all that is mechanical fluff that can be renamed to something more "historishy-like".

If you're really trying to emulate a historical setting with a simulationist feel, I wouldn't recommend any version of D&D other than BECMI without the CMI and make it completely non-magical.

Nevertheless, have fun and maybe blog your experience! I would like to read how your historical campaign goes.

[Nai_Calus]

Yeah, I'd definitely go for another system entirely, 4e really isn't designed at all for what you want to do.

To steal someone else's analogy, low-magic historical 4e is kind of like doing low-tech Shadowrun with no corps or cyberware.

[Plane Sailing]

If you are open to non-4e game systems, I would recommend Chaosium's Basic Role Playing in a shot for this kind of thing.

Cheers

[Skallgrim]

This cries out, to me, for GURPS. There's a GURPS Lite which is even a free PDF. The system is very easy to use, at it's base (though there are THOUSANDS of options), and is well suited to 'novice' characters (much more so than the overtly Heroic Fantasy of D&D).