Coal is the superfuel of this era of a fantasy setting much like how Atomic power is of a Dieselpunk era, and it fought over much like in our era how Oil is.
In this setting standard D&D 4th magic and sword fighting has too deal with 17th century Pike and Shot tactics, So what templates are changed in this setting?.
LW
Another item is dealing with Firearms and Bayonets. While guns are easy to work into the game by simply renaming existing ranged weapons to 17th century equivalents (crossbow to musket, for example), turning a ranged weapon into a melee weapon is harder. Ranged weapons and melee weapons function at base off of very different stats, and classes don't mix ranged weaponry and melee weaponry together as an option for build construction. You either use ranged weapons to fight, or melee weapons. Rarely do you mix both, and when you do it's generally with thrown weapons than actually reloading weapons. Making actual rules for Bayonets is hard because of this. Instead, use a quick patch by making a feat or the like that lets characters make ranged attacks up close without provoking opportunity attacks from the target. Though realistically, i doubt it's needed. Most characters that attack with ranged attacks do not wade in melee at all unless they are implement users.
An interesting thing to ask yourself is how does the Primal aspects of the world change with such a setting. Are primal characters treated as Arcane characters are in the Dark Sun setting, with fear and suspicion, or have they learned to mend the spirits and the industrial growth of society together in a delicate balance?
That's all I got for this. Happy Gaming
Druids and nature based hero classes would start having problems with Coal miners and Coal Barons Human families that control the Coal trade in this setting a cartel of powerful traders who are called the Coal Barons, they only care how much money can they make and how much Coal they can dig out of the ground much like OPEC of today.
The Elven people have no homeland anymore there was a War 200 to 500 years ago like in the video game Dragon Age, only pockets of tribal Elves clinging to there old ways live faraway from Human cities the lower class Elves live in Elven gettos in the cities and work for the Humans as servants.
LW
Well, the question is less how the Pike and Shot tactic affects the D&D staples of magic and swordplay, but how magic and swordplay affect the 17th Century staple of Pike and Shot. Magic is likely to become an integal part of such a society. Magical burning methods, coal growing, and other such concepts are likely to be important aspects of the era. The Eberron setting is a good place to look for ideas, as it was a similarly industrialized world using magic as a part of everyday society to support things from travel to warfare.
Another item is dealing with Firearms and Bayonets. While guns are easy to work into the game by simply renaming existing ranged weapons to 17th century equivalents (crossbow to musket, for example), turning a ranged weapon into a melee weapon is harder. Ranged weapons and melee weapons function at base off of very different stats, and classes don't mix ranged weaponry and melee weaponry together as an option for build construction. You either use ranged weapons to fight, or melee weapons. Rarely do you mix both, and when you do it's generally with thrown weapons than actually reloading weapons. Making actual rules for Bayonets is hard because of this. Instead, use a quick patch by making a feat or the like that lets characters make ranged attacks up close without provoking opportunity attacks from the target. Though realistically, i doubt it's needed. Most characters that attack with ranged attacks do not wade in melee at all unless they are implement users.
An interesting thing to ask yourself is how does the Primal aspects of the world change with such a setting. Are primal characters treated as Arcane characters are in the Dark Sun setting, with fear and suspicion, or have they learned to mend the spirits and the industrial growth of society together in a delicate balance?
That's all I got for this. Happy Gaming
Sounds like a good idea.
If it helps:
- a large fired black-powder pistol effectively becomes an improvised club in melee
- a fired musket effectively becomes an improvised great-club in melee
- an unmounted black-powder era bayonet is effectively an improvised dagger (they would typically be foot-long spikes, or short sword blades with no grips, attached to an awkward bracket that locked onto the musket barrel, making them awkward dagger-length weapons when not mounted on a musket)
- a mounted bayonet on a fired musket can be treated as an improvised short spear (training for fighting with bayonet-and-musket was more or less identical to training for fighting with a spear or pole-arm)
- a pistol with a dagger blade mounted on it (e.g., the Elgin Cutlass-Pistol) is basically an improvised short sword
[spoiler 3.5E Improvised Weapons]
In 3.5E (PHB 113), improvised weapons could be used by anyone capable of holding the weapon, at a -4 penalty on attack rolls, with the threat of a critical hit at 20. (With these "improvised weapons", at your discretion, you might rule that an Exotic Weapon proficiency for firearms:melee could negate the -4 penalty.)
[/spoiler]
See the Rules Compendium, page 272 for details on 4E Improvised Weapons rules.
LW
- the effects of guns compare roughly to D&D crossbows
- cannon compare roughly to fireballs and other magic spells
- pikes already effectively exist in D&D as generic "pole arms"
- cavalry already exists in D&D
- equivalents of much of the characteristic armor already exists in D&D
I think the only differences I see between this era and ordinary D&D assumptions would be that the 17th century seems to be an era where more formal military organization and formation are present, cavalry and defense against cavalry have become more formal in use, castles and and city walls have begun to give way to trenches and artillery, and firearms have begun to even out the differences between peasent conscripts and heavily and expensively armored knights while the role of armor begins to fade and tight formations of uniformed and carefully drilled firing lines begin to have a serious impact on the battlefield.
Magic in D&D, I think, parallels many of the more dramatic technological changes. The rest of the changes are political, religious, and social in nature, and I think would have a bit of a more subtle impact on the game than can be covered by tactics and mechanics.
So, typical equipment available to a party of PCs might be a bit different (specifically, firearms), but unless the party are on an open battlefield, exposed to formations of men armed with gun and pikes, cavalry charges, and artillery, I don't expect that the game is going to change much.
As for the cultural changes... wow! Compared to D&D's dark age, the 17th Century turns the world upside-down from a role-playing standpoint. The 17th Century was a time of almost constant organized warfare, but it also saw the first time that the speed of light was measured, calculus and mechanical calculators are introduced while the foundations of computer programming are introduced, the microscope was invented and microorganisms were observed for the first time, telescopes are improved and the "Martian Canals" are observed and reported while alien worlds come under careful scrutiny, serfs cowering under feudal strongholds give way to a rising middle class, the King James translation of the Bible has challenged the monopoly of the Catholic Church leadership over religion and opened the doors for common people to question organized religion, the printing press has long ago put literacy and books into the hands of common people, the English Civil War and the Magna Carta successfuly challenged the assumption that kings are masters of men, the earliest submarines are built. It was the age the brought us Descartes, Hobbes, Kepler, Huygens, Leeuvenhoek, Newton, Locke, Galileo, Bacon, Milton, Shakespeare!
Again thnaks for the help,
LW
Wind and sail, horse and carriage, foot and donkey.
In the 17th century, galley slaves were still used in the Mediterranean, serf labour was common, and oxen and draught horses did the heavy work.
I would use the superstitions of the 17th century to excuse magical phenomena and monsters; and I would use its extreme religiosity to severely limit widespread magic. Players would have to be secretive and clever about using their magic: rituals in the dead of night; disguise their spells as the effects of grenades and other missiles.
Have you ever seen BBC's recent television series about Merlin? In it, a yo9ung Merlin must constantly disguise and hide his use of magic to avoid detection. And yet the show is full of magic, adventure and wonder. Players and worlds do not have to be like Xanth where magic is every day and ludicrously easy.
Also, see the "Raven Roost Highwayman" in Monster Vault 2. His "bolt to the gut" power may have a hand-crossbow theme, but is exactly what I'm doing.
I also made a few other minor, cosmetic changes. I'm not using Orbs for wizards, for example, but rather using Orrerys. Plate Mail in mine looks like a spanish conquistador in full armor, scale is demi-armor (the conquistador stuff w/out the skirt and leggings), chain is just a breastplate and open faced or lobster helm. That sort of thing.
The Pathfinder RPG embraces black powder in the Combat handbook.
This is a time period that I also enjoy!