Starting the 4e conversion

[kgauck]

I think there is a real chance that someone that was born noble and grew up in a pampered lifestyle might be less equipped to run a country than someone that had it rough.

Sure, its the classic sub-optimal build, or to put it another way, a character optimized to be good at gambling, wenching, hunting, and amusing one's self, rather than anything else. To make it worse, use the Aristocrat NPC class. I've built a few characters like this, as troublesome siblings.

Invest in things like Bluff, Ride, Handle Animal, Profession (Gambler), Sense Motive, then a smattering of Diplomacy, Appraise, Knowledge (Nobility), Perform (Etiquette), and Survival (for hunting), and call it a day.

You can also make earnest, but ineffective characters, who have way too many ranks in things like Art and Architecture. They make the capital city and the palace beautiful, but can't run the city or the country.

When I build a character I intentionally try and optimize them for something, but that something isn't always useful. Certainly a carouser should be optimized for successful carousing.

[AndrewTall]

Shadow-world power source
The power does not actually need to draw from 'the entire world' - I can easily see one warlock drawing power from the dark corrupted areas dominatlated by the Lost, another drawing from the vibrant areas of the Seelie, a third from the chaotic maelstrom of the most wild areas of the seeming, and a fourth from the dead empty lands of the 'classic' shadow world envisaged prior to the release of later products. Each of these could be modelled with a different pact, abilities, etc. You might have to rename the pact depending on whether it is with one of the Lost, a Seelie, etc but that shouldn't be a problem.

Skills
2 skill points a level was a problem for fighters and so on, but if the character put a high score into int instead of into stn (say) they would wind up with half a dozen reasonable skills not just 2 - the only question is whether the fighter wanted to be a 'I have swung a sword for the past 5 years and never done anything else - fear me in battle' or 'I've swung a sword, but I've also led troops, planned seiges, negotiated alliances, arranged supply convoys, etc - fear me in war' type of warrior. I like the 4e idea that the character will pick up at least some minimal skill in any given area as they progress - but 3e handled that well for all but the most crunch-focused munchkin by letting the PC spend minimal / some / many / lots of skill points depending on how much of the action they had done.

Personally I'd have liked to split the skills into 'combat' and 'non-combat', and puffed up skills in the second slot - that would let some characters focus on 'craftsman, peasant, etc' stuff rather than 'noble' stuff. This is more of a 'background build' sort of approach than the traditional D&D approach which has always been purely class based, but it works well for other systems.

[Rowan]

Ken mentioned something about 4e multiclassing. I agree that it is inflexible. I fixed that by allowing that first multiclassing feat to grant access to any powers from the new class, so that you can fill your allotment of powers from either class. It's a more powerful variant, considering that this opens 4e up to some serious strategizing of complementary powers. I'm willing to go with that, though, partly because I'm generally more fond of classless games that allow anyone to choose to learn whatever they want their characters to learn.


As for regent-focused classes, I don't like the idea because it doesn't mix well with the normal classes. I think you make a monster character if you want a non-standard-class NPC. You could create a generic class and let PCs choose from that, too, but it would need to be pretty bland, allowing you to customize more by selecting rulership powers.

I do think that special feats and weekly/monthly/seasonal/or annual powers ought to be created for rulers, that anyone has access to. I would allow a certain number of these feats and powers as extra, on top of adventure-powers. Restrict that benefit to scions or not, I don't think it matters much. You could also allow additional access to these rulership abilities in lieu of adventure feats and powers, but that will lead to characters that don't mix well with those optimized for different things; this may matter depending upon the type of game you are playing.

[AndrewTall]

Since the cross-over between a ruler class and a 'normal' class would be so minimal, I would suggest creating a series of social 'background' classes from noble to peasant, progression either directly linked to the 'standard' class, tracked separately, or whatever. This would avoid creating 'weak' cross-class PC's that function poorly in comparison to 'pure' classes.

Those PCs that do not want to be rulers could be equally skilled in other social areas of more interest to their back story or in-game interest. The problem with BR compared to other games is that the ruler will also have an active game-play role compared to the 'craftsman' PC or the 'wildman' PC etc which could leave PC's with a non-ruler background class feeling left out.

[kgauck]

My preference for a noble class relates to 3e multi-classing. For 4e, a noble talent tree seems more suitable.

[irdeggman]

Shadow-world power source
The power does not actually need to draw from 'the entire world' - I can easily see one warlock drawing power from the dark corrupted areas dominatlated by the Lost, another drawing from the vibrant areas of the Seelie, a third from the chaotic maelstrom of the most wild areas of the seeming, and a fourth from the dead empty lands of the 'classic' shadow world envisaged prior to the release of later products. Each of these could be modelled with a different pact, abilities, etc. You might have to rename the pact depending on whether it is with one of the Lost, a Seelie, etc but that shouldn't be a problem.

But now you've split what are esentially different planes (despite the name "world" into different "realms" and would then by extrapolation thus have on Cerilia have regents draw from realm power soutces.

Now realm power sources is an interesting idea for realm spells and such but that too would apply to the Shadow World and thus mix two different power sources (warlocks and regents drawing from the same thing - so a warlock - regent would be double dipping). Mechanically this just doesn't work for me.

[irdeggman]

My preference for a noble class relates to 3e multi-classing. For 4e, a noble talent tree seems more suitable.

IMO this is the way to go.

A regent would be a better regent by giving up being better at something else. This doesn't restrict him from being a regent but makes him choose to be better at somethiing he focused on instead. This fits into the current 4th ed system very, very well.

I told you I was finding myself agreeing with more and more on 4th ed.

[fbaker4]

To work out, concretely, how some of these all will work in practice?

[bbeau22]

IMO this is the way to go.

A regent would be a better regent by giving up being better at something else. This doesn't restrict him from being a regent but makes him choose to be better at somethiing he focused on instead. This fits into the current 4th ed system very, very well.

I told you I was finding myself agreeing with more and more on 4th ed.

Whoo Whoo. This is certainly the way I would like to go about it.

One of the ways to do it is to do the backgrounds like people have said and have one of them be "Noble" background. This would allow the noble character to have access to certain feats and powers that can replace class powers.

Also the best part about this is we can create non-combat feats for other backgrounds too as we have time. Artisan, Peasent, soldier. Some might give unique abilities to help ruling also that a noble might not have, although the noble one would probably have the most.

-BB

[irdeggman]

One of the ways to do it is to do the backgrounds like people have said and have one of them be "Noble" background. This would allow the noble character to have access to certain feats and powers that can replace class powers.

-BB

I have problems with this one.

In that there is no direct tie to being blooded.

Being from a noble background does not mean being a scion. There are many nobles who weren't blooded.

IM being noble has a lot to do with having "privedge" and access to things that others do not. This acces could come from tradition of the family or from being in a family that has a lot of money (i.e., the nuveau rich).

Not all scions come from such backgrounds and not all people from such backgrounds are scions.

To follow the regent talent tree one should ahve to be a scion, IMO.