conducting a paternity test in D&D

[Drowbane]

Why doesnt the Rogue just pay her off? a fortune for her is chump change to an adventurer. Here is 1000gp, make sure the kid grows up healthy and well educated. Sign this document saying I am not the father and that you or the kid will ever contact me again.

seconded

 

[brehobit]

Why doesnt the Rogue just pay her off? a fortune for her is chump change to an adventurer. Here is 1000gp, make sure the kid grows up healthy and well educated. Sign this document saying I am not the father and that you or the kid will ever contact me again.

And then when the next 20 come to your door....

Mark

 

[Henry]

Best solution: wish! "I wish this were not my child!"

Expensive, yes. But he'll save money in the long run!

If I were the DM, nothing would appear to happen.

However, the mother, upon hearing about this through the grapevine, runs away with the child in disgust, incensed that the PC would go to such lengths.

The mother and child are taken in by a friendly necromancer a short time later, who is in reality a half-fiend who is a major opponent of the PCs. He trains the young baby/child, maybe even takes him and mom to another plane where time passes differently.

Baby comes back 20 years older, and a high-level Blackguard, bent on the destruction of the man who poisoned his mother with his lecherous ways. In short, he ain't your child, for sure... and he's trying to skewer you on his unholy frost greatsword!

Gotta love the Angel TV series...

 

[Demmero]

So how would one go about attempting to prove in a D&D setting (roughly Victorian-age technology level and standard magic) that he is or isn't the father of the child? Without the use of DNA testing, how would a D&D paternity test be conducted?

Well, I think you've gotten enough good advice that I can now get away with suggesting the following:

Have the rogue and the pregnant woman appear in one of those freakshows they seem to have every other day in Castle Maury