D&D 4E Houseruling a Conan Style Game for 4E

[Retreater]

Thulsa Doom turns into a snake. Is he a warlord who multiclassed into druid?

Mako's character was able to cast Raise Dead, and use telekinesis to fight over a door. The door thing, admittedly, doesn't fit any existing powers I know of.

These would be examples of NPCs, not PCs, though. Magic (when it is present) is basically handled as a ritual. There are a few instances, such as the assassins from the temple of Set who use the Black Hand in the novel "The Hour of the Dragon" that can be seen as wielding magic, but it is such a rare and unwholesome power that characters shouldn't have access to it (or even encounter it often).

It would be a mistake I think to rule out what should be an iconic class for the setting, the Barbarian!

Right. But I'm not sure how well the 4E barbarian fits the Conan mold. I was thinking the feel is more D&D Essentials Slayer.

I definitely like the weapon breakage rules from Dark Sun. Will need to try to incoporate those into the game.

Thanks for the tips.

Retreater

 

[Prestidigitalis]

I love the idea of a Conan game -- good luck with it!

One of my favorite parts of the Conan books is the way that magic is treated -- it's exotic, mysterious and dangerous. One of my complaints about D&D generally is that it makes magic too commonplace. Unfortunately, it's hard to do otherwise when so many players want to play arcane-based characters.

 

[TerraDave]

Rituals and the arcana skill are the way to bring in magic for PCs. (as noted above, there are some special cases you may need to deal with, though you really don't need either the barbarian or shaman class to have barbarians or shamans). Maybe, maybe multiclassing through feats, but not hybrids.

NPCs can of course be mages of one kind or another. At least until slain by the PCs.