Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

[Doc]

Hi everybody,

 

I plan to make a little nordic fantasy campaign somewhen in wich I would like the players' characters to start as children in its first half (to have them being grown-up in the second one wich will take place something like five years later or so...).

 

 

My question is: how much would you give character points to start this and, most importantly, how would you divise them in CPs and DPs? My first impression is to give 50/50 points, or maybe 75/25, for a taotal of 100.

 

It would be a low powered fantasy with "normal" humans being the central part of the setting. I plan to have the children fight against a small bunch of goblins in the final act of the first half...

 

So, what do you think about it?

[ghost-angel]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

First, what power level do you want them to be when they start the grown-up campaign?

 

Then figure out about how much growing and experience you want them to get both in between campaigns and during the first campaign, start them low enough to accommodate this growth.

[Comic]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

Use the PS238 rules...?

[Alibear]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

I'd make the 8s across the board and give them 25+25 to play with and set a low NCM threshold on stats and skills. Let's face it a kid is rarely more than a nuisance to a hardened soldier.

 

Really how old are these children? Teenagers? Are they likely to have any combat experience or dedicated combat training?

 

After that I'd make sure they had an idea how they wanted their character to look like as a grown up. Choices make in childhood will 100% affect later life.

[Doc]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

Use the PS238 rules...?

 

 

What's that???

[Chris Goodwin]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

I'd make the 8s across the board and give them 25+25 to play with and set a low NCM threshold on stats and skills. Let's face it a kid is rarely more than a nuisance to a hardened soldier.

 

Really how old are these children? Teenagers? Are they likely to have any combat experience or dedicated combat training?

 

After that I'd make sure they had an idea how they wanted their character to look like as a grown up. Choices make in childhood will 100% affect later life.

 

It depends on what Doc means by "nordic fantasy". If it's something like the real world in the medieval age and prior, by the age of 14 a teenaged male would likely be considered a man, either partway or fully through his apprenticeship and engaged in his profession. He could easily have stats in the 13-14 range.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

One option is to build the 'final fighter' i.e the adult version of the character, and then reduce the stats and skills to reflect a younger version. Someone who is going to end up with a 20 strength is probably pretty brawny even when quite young - my 14 year old son is now 6'1" (taller than me) and nearly as strong, and quite probably has better CON and DEX. Obviously there might be some changes as the adult version might well have a career path that suggests different choices from those originally envisaged, but it is not a bad way to get a character with development room.

 

Also be aware that characters can gain a quite enormous amount of XP in 5 years of game time, so you might want to look at how you are going to award XP, depending on how you see your game developing.

[Doc]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

It depends on what Doc means by "nordic fantasy". If it's something like the real world in the medieval age and prior' date=' by the age of 14 a teenaged male would likely be considered a man, either partway or fully through his apprenticeship and engaged in his profession. He could easily have stats in the 13-14 range.[/quote']

 

 

Yes, when I say "nordic", I mean a viking setting of the first half of the Middle Age. And I so mean characters are about 8 years old when I say yhey are children.

 

 

One option is to build the 'final fighter' i.e the adult version of the character' date=' and then reduce the stats and skills to reflect a younger version. Someone who is going to end up with a 20 strength is probably pretty brawny even when quite young [/quote']

 

 

Mmmm, interesting...

[Alibear]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

Stats somewhere around 5 and no skills above 8- if they have any bar climbing at all.

[Checkmate]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

Personally I'd leave the stats alone. I would say that a "normal" child has a base of 8 and Heroic Children have a base of 10. Then I'd adjust the STR chart. When I made an adult I would just use inflated stats. If a normal child has an 8 as a base, a normal adult would have a 13-15 or some such.

 

My theory is that since all the PC's are children, keep things base 10, and adjust everyone else around the PC's.

[Sean Waters]

Re: Children as main characters in a fantasy setting

 

How realistic is the game to be?

 

I mean, be aware that low stats = very little combat ability, so unless the theme is 'children running for their lives', or there is no combat (viking game, what are the chances?) just build the characters as normal and maybe take a few disadvantages to reflect that the characters are children - physical limitation Child's stature - cannot apply full strength for lifting and throwing. That sort of thing.