Just bought the Chronicles of Conan from the local bookshop which has all the original stories by REH. Read a few of the stories and have been inspired to start my 3rd chracter (I have a randomly generated character and a Paladin that needs restarting as his reputation has been tarnished. See my previous threads for details). Did a search but there was nothing on Conan which I found a little surprising.

Anyway, the stories I've read so far are those set in his youth when he was a thieflike charcater which suggests unarmoured or light armour but do know by remembering a long time ago when first reading about Conan that he wore heavy armour when he became King of Aquilonia. He was also skilled in all weapons but don't remermber him using ranged weapons. He also didn't use any magic. So, as I want to roleplay him, as I do all my characters, he has a few skills to choose from:

1. Light and Heavy Armour.

2. Blunt and Blade.

3. Acrobatics (Cimmerians could climb sheer rock faces) and Athletics ( Conan could run all day).

4. Block is a gimme I think.

5. When fighting the Picts on the Gunderian Marshes he was a kind of Ranger so perhaps Sneak.

6. As a thief perhaps Security.

I can't think of any more skills that would fit in. Obviously I know it isn't recommended to take two weapon styles and two armours but for role playing purposes may have to do this, I don't know.

The obvious solution is to play him as either a youth as a thieflike character or in his later years as a heavyily armoured King who got tired of keeping in one place and decided to sneak out and become a freebooter again.

I feel he needs to be a Nord as they are closest to the Cimmerians of all the available character races and depending on what period of his life it would have to be either stealth or combat specialisation.

As he wouldn't use any magic can't see him using any of the magicka birthsigns so probably the Thief or the Warrior best fits him.

STR/END seems the likeliest attributes to go for.

OK, what does everybody think? Any suggestions gratefully recieved.

Thanks.

I found the quote on the Wikipedia article.

Sounds like a sneaky unarmored or lightly armored swordsman.

Athletics, acrobatics, blade, block, security, sneak, light armor

Have fun!

Mara

I like it really its a solid role to play with, so I'm not going to tell you ( sorry give you some advice ) on which skills to take as majors.
I say take it easy, play it how you would like too.
I'm getting the feeling you want to play out the story aspect of going from humble thief to mighty warrior so give that a try and see how it goes.

I have found if you use all the skills that fit but take the most likely as majors; ( i.e take light armour but mix in some heavy, vice versas, and the same with blade blunt ).
You get the best of both worlds, and it changes gameplay a fair bit, making some things easier other a little tougher, but always making it fun imo.

So a great idea, a strong central tenant just take it easy and have some fun with seeing Oblivion in his eyes.
Note try and find the series of books entittled Beggar, thief, warrior in game as they are pretty much about the life of someone in Oblivions world that went your characters path.

The obvious solution, I would think, would be to start him as his youthful thieving self and have him gradually progress toward heavily armoured King type over the course of your play through.

Yeah, I am very familiar with the books, been reading them since 1978. Conan learned a lot of stuff over his travels, heavy armor and bow being two of those. For role play I'd say he started with

Acrobatics
Althletics
Block
Blade
Blunt
Sneak
Light Armor/Sneak - could go either way, he hunted and stalked pray and in the Wolves Beyond the Border it mentions his sneaking ability has started from his youth. Light Armor would work too, as they used it some but he could certainly start with no armor skill as he really only partook in one raid prior to starting his journeys at age 15 or 16.

Sign Warrior
I'd go with Fav atts End and Speed just to balance it out.

Okay, wanted to get back to this as I was in a hurry earlier cuz I already had Sneak in the build. So in the last slot, besides light armor you could also consider Marksman, if that is something you wanted to play. In the books when he goes to Turan a few years into his wandering career, it mentions that he got much better with the bow, but it says something like he was somewhat familiar with it already, but had no where near the level of skill of the Turanian Horsebowman, who trained him quite a lot. So one might consider that he had some skill - apprentice - just from hunting as a youth, and then it sort of was dormant until later. Often when taking fictional characters there is some leeway in how you can set them up in a game like this.

Then as for Armorer, in the movies since he was the son of a blacksmith you could theoretically put in in majors, but I wouldn't. One, I don't like much about how the movies were story wise, and two because it is much better to train it every level as a minor as far as slowing leveling and raising Endurance.

Thanks everyone for their replies. Here's what I've decided on:-

Attributes: END/SPD

Specialisation: Combat

Skills: Sneak, Marksman, Athletics, Acrobatics, Blade, Block, Heavy Armour

All pretty conventional although the idea of someone sneaking in heavy armour doesn't sit well but as I'm roleplaying.....

Avarae, good to meet a fellow fan, my favourite story (from what I've read so far, about a third through the book) is Red Nails, have you a favourite?

OTT, anybody read Karl Edward Wagner and his Kane books? A contemporary of Conan but a much darker character. I've got all the novels as well as a couple of short stories in the Barbarians anthologies. My favourite short story is Misericord if anyone has read it.

By Crom, what a great idea! TES Nexus has http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=14111, and a couple of save files http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2584, and http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=4280.




Yes indeed. I love the Kane books. I like how KEW portrays immortality as a curse rather than a gift. It has certainly brought Kane no measure of comfort. I also like that he is such an amoral character. He is an excellent anti-hero. I never read Misericord. I think my favorite of his is probably Bloodstone. I love how he plays off both sides for his own ends, only to discover that in the end, he was being played himself.

Cool. I've been looking for something inspiring to read.

That Conan idea sounds tempting. I'm curious to try it, problem is I already have 3 characters going at the moment, with a backlog of 3 others who haven't started a new game yet!

Thanks everyone.

Tried to subscribe to TES Nexus as the files were over 2mb but it wouldn't accept my user name and password.

Should this current username and password work for Nexus?

No, the forums and TES Nexus are not connected. If you can't register with your name though, it probably is already taken. Just choose a similiar one...

Ah, thanks Mastermind. What concerns me is that it liked the CaptainKronos but said my email address was already taken. I'm 99% sure I haven't previously registered in a previous life. I asked to change the password and they sent me the usual email which took me back to the registration process, put in a new password but it then didn't like my current user name.

Oh well, downloaded the Conan prison save and atarted agin from scratch, like the typical square jawed Conan I've now got.

Okay, a cupla things. I would not put Heavy Armor as a major, unless you have a mod and aren't worried about attribute modifiers.
As far as favorite Conan stories, I guess my favorite would be the one when he is king of Aquilonia and these guys bring back an ancient wizard of Acheron and capture Conan and replace him... It was released as Conan the Conqueror in the books that came out a few years ago, and it is based on the only full length Conan novel manuscript that Howard ever wrote. A great story with allusions comparing Conan to the Messianic Jesus of Revalations. Funny that most critics now consider Howard as one of the progenitors of sword and sorcery fantasy, which is distinguished from Tokienesque High Fantasy, as High Fantasy is supposed to deal with epic struggles of good vs evil and nations or peoples, whereas Sword and Sorcery is supposed to be about small scale personal advventure/fantasy stories. However, that Conan book deals with a titanic struggle of good vs evil with Conan fighting against the resurrection of the evil Empire of Acheron, and the destruction of the known world so it is really High Fantasy by definition.

Interestingly, Howard was a pen pale of Lovecraft, and they were actually almost constanty in correspondence. Lovecraft, who was very familiar with Howard's work, was also an influence on Tolkien, and hung out in the same book group. So really I think Howard could be considered the father of modern High Fantasy and Sword and Sorcery.

Oh, and that manuscript was titled "Hour of the Dragon" by Howard, which is an obvious reference to the Dragon/Satan anology in Revelations. Also, there are many references in the book to revelations that I could anotate if anyone had time or a desire to read them.

Avarae

Good stuff, have you any links to this or is this all from memory?

Yes I remember that one, something about seeking the Heart of Ahriman or something? Some squire wears Conan's armour (as Conan has been paralysed by that sorcereor) and is killed.

I think in the UK we think of this genre as Heroic Fantasy where the male characters are larger than life and all women are knock-outs. On the other hand as someone has already said Kane is an anti-hero and is more like Sword & Sorcery and I wouldn't say he was Heroic Fantasy.

This was all from memory, but I could annotate much of it. Here are some examples, sort of, as I still dont' have the exact sources handy. But as you said Conan was captured after the battle where his double was killed, so to everyone else he was dead. The guy that brought the cliffs down on the fake Conan, and destroyed most of the army, the "Flower of Aquilonian Chivalry', was Xaltotun the resurrected evil wizard of Acheron. He was a symbol of the Anti-Christ. So Conan was imprisoned in the bad guys dungeon for precisely three days, just like Jesus was before the resurrection. The first person to see Jesus reborn was Mary Magdellan. For Conan the first person he sees is Zenobia who helps him escape and he eventually marries, so she is like Mary. When he gets out and finally high tails it back to Aquilonia, the first person he sees there is one of his loyal 'publicans' which is essentially a 'King's Man' in this definition. The publican, when he sees Conan, asks are you a ghost? Conan replies "No man I am flesh and bone. Give me a paste (a pattie of breaded fish or meat) and some wine'. In the Bible when Jesus first appears to the other aposltes they ask him if he is a ghost to which he replies, 'No, I am flesh and blood. Give me some fish and wine and I will show you". There are more examples, I did a paper on it in college, which I don't have, and I had lots of footnotes to almost word for word quotes from the Bible to the Conan story. I grew up in a town about 30 miles from Howard's and I assure you he knew the Bilbe well.

So the point (and I do have one) of that is that this book has a battle between the 'good' armies of the west, like Aquilonia and its allies against the 'evil' armies of the east, and their leaders who resurrected Xaltotun, who was going to bring back Acheron and enslave all of the known world. (Don't get me started on the East vs West thing). So it was an epic struggle of good versus evil and nations for the fate of the world, which is, apparently the definition of 'High Fantasy'. Which is apparently almost synonomous with 'Heroic Fantasy'. Where as sword and sorcery is something more like D&D type small scale 'scenarios' of danger, drama, and, well, swords and sorcery. Michael Moorcock is credited with creating the anti hero character, Elric. Moorcock is also the person that coined the phrase 'Sword and Sorcery' and the anti hero is something more associated with S&S than High Fantasy, or Tolkienesque Fantasy. Moorcock, Fritz Lieber, and many others credit Howard as the father of Sword and Sorcery because most of Howard's printed work on him was just him wondering around and having bizarre adventures. To confuse matters more Steven R. Donaldson's character 'Berek Half'-Hand' was an anti-hero type figure, who actually is the protaginist in a 'High Fantasy' type story. Howard's 'Hour of the Dragon' was never published as one piece in his lifetime. But my point is that in 1935 Howard's "Hour of the Dragon" could be considered the first modern "High Fantasy" novel. Further, I think Lovecraft probably introduced Howard's type work to Tolkien. So Howard is really the progenitor of High Fantasy and Sword and Sorcery.

If you want some resource material of where I am getting this classification of 'Sword and Sorcery' vs 'High Fantasy" just google 'Sword and Sorcery' and there is a wiki article on it and some other stuff. There is also a recent book called 'Swords and Dark Magic' which has a forward on the subject.

Given some time and some motivation I could reference exact lines and versus, but no one has the time and, therefore, I don't have the motivation.

Thanks Avarae, excellent stuff as usual.

Ah yes, my other favourite characters, Ffarrd (spelling?) and Grey Mouser. Hmm, Grey Mouser as an Oblivion character......

The 'Hour of the Dragon' is in the last third of the 'Ciomplete Chronicles of Conan', 158 pages so more of a novella perhaps. I'll read that next.