Aristocratic NPC - Fighter?

[aco175]

An old DM of mine has a whiny son of a noble named Pompus Asintent. We had to drag him around for a while before his father would give us something we needed. I think it was the nasally voice the DM used along with the constant "I'm tired" that I remember most.

 

[Satyrn]

I'd just just use the noble statblock, bumping up the hitdice if I thought he needed more.


And then as the game progresses, when the players wind up teaching him something, I'd add that to his statblock ( and maybe adding more hit points, but probably not).

For example: If the PC rogue is regularly getting his sneak attack because of the noble's positioning or help, then I'd add Sneak Attack to the noble's statblock. Or if he's always fighting beside the PC battlemaster, I'd give the noble a Superiority Die and one of the maneuvers the PC uses a lot.

Just imagine how fun this would be if your players are barbarians and warlocks!

 

[Satyrn]

Further to my previous post

What kind of choices, options, feats, proficiencies, and gear would you give him?

For gear, I'd give him a Dungeoneer's Pack, a rapier and breastplate. He figures a Dungeoneer's Pack contains everything an adventurer needs, the rapier is what he knows from his fencing lessons, and the breastplate is a fancy family heirloom. This outfit screams "Prince playing at adventuring to me.

I wouldn't even consider giving him feats. As with my previous post, Feats are something he might get to learn from the PCs. I probably wouldn't give him proficiencies ( Beyond the weapons and armor) for the same reason, unless there was a skill or tool that I thought he absolutely needed . . . And that would probably just be several languages.

If the players think he needs to be athletic to survive, for example, it'll be up to them to teach him.

 

[Draegn]

I envision the cartoon cavalier talking down to the party.

 

[BookBarbarian]

Like some of the others posters I prefer NPC stats for my NPCs, but if Noble is too low a CR for a long term NPC there are higher CR martial humanoids to choose from such as the CR3 Knight all the way up to the Cr 12 Warlord.

the 5e Archer NPC (CR 3) has stats in mostly the right places. Swapping weapons and armor to suit an aristocrat would be easy.