Split from this thread: https://www.burningwheel.com/forum/showthread.php?12000-Gladiator - stormy
Military Order gives you 1 M,P in THREE years, so allowing that in 4 seems reasonable for a gladiator. In fact, it might make sense to reduce it to 3, since gladiator training should be at least as intense, and reflecting the idea that professional gladiators were trained to fight smart, as well as dramatically.
Military Order makes you a part of one of the most fearsome military organizations of the day.
Being a gladiator makes you either a starved slave living in squalor or an oil-up show fighter at best.
Military Order is also somewhat difficult to get into. I don’t think you can do it earlier than your fourth LP, and doing so means two leads at minimum.
And you can barely do military order in 4 LPs: you need a hodgepodge of lifepaths that don’t give you that well-rounded of a character in terms of skills and rps.
I think the path my player chose was Born Peasant -> (Military) Apprentice -> Temple Acolyte -> Military Order. He barely had enough skill and resource points to cover all of his bases, and he still had to forgo buying armor.
Military Order is much better on a 5 or 6 LP character than on a 4 LP character.
Fundamentally, I think Luke’s point stands though. Fictional gladiators are glamorized and romanticized when compared to the “real deal.” Of course, if you want to play a game that takes inspiration from the popular, fictional portrayal of gladiators, then make your change and go right ahead. We can’t stop you. But if you want your game to be grounded in historical reality, then you have to accept that being a gladiator sucked for all but the most famous gladiators.