I don't know what you have to work with so I don't know if you have to purchase anything. You need to provide food and water where the chicks can get to it. I don't put any food or water in the nest but wait for the hen to bring them off the nest before they get food or water like chicks hatched by broody hens have been doing for thousands of years. But you can if you want to. I'd be cautious about getting the nest wet. I don't think spolled food would matter.
I've used different waterers both in the brooder when I don't have a broody or out when I'm raising them with the flock. I've settled on this as my preferred waterer when chicks are involved. I use plywood and 2x4's to build a slightly elevated platform and cut a hole in it for the waterer. The chicks can hop up on the plywood and drink. Elevating it a bit and having that platform on the bedding reduces how much bedding gets scratched in the water. With small chicks I fill this with rocks so they can walk on water without drowning or getting wet. They will walk on the rocks and poop in the water so you need to dump this regularly (I do every day). They need clean water plus dumping it keeps the mosquitoes from breeding in it.
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I've never tried the nipples, some people really love them. I've tried these chick waterers
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built my own gravity waterer
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and just set a bowl on some bricks. Yes, that is ice, it was +4 F when I took that photo.
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The gravity waterer and chick waterer need to be very level or they will leak. There are lots of different ways you can provide water. Chicks can drown in pretty shallow water. They can handle getting their feet wet and maybe a little wet on their bottoms, but you don't want them to wet enough that they can chill. Broody hens raise chicks where they get their water from farm ponds or streams so they are not that delicate.
As far as feeders it just needs to be something they can get to. Again, there are all kinds of things you can use. I use these buckets with holes cut in them for the entire flock. When I have baby chicks I set one of these on the ground. By the time the chicks are two weeks old they are flying up to my suspended feeders. So if you don't want your chicks eating a calcium rich diet all the chickens need to be eating the same thing.
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Some people isolate the broody hen and chicks from the flock no matter what breed. I never do, no matter what breed. That's a personal decision. I have lots of room inside and outside so my broody hens have room to work. Many people don't have that kind of space. It sounds like you do.
You do not need to supplement heat. All that will do is confuse your hen and chicks. Trust your broody, they almost always know more by instinct than we will ever know.
You can try. The closer in age they are the better your chances. Some hens will raise any chick, some don't, so I can't give you any guarantees. But if they are less than 3 days apart in age I'd try it. Often when I have a hen go broody I stick some eggs in the incubator, all started at the same time. Sometimes things go wrong under a hen or in the incubator. This way the hen has chicks to raise.
I don't know what you already have or what your facilities look like. Since you say they free range and you have a large coop I think they will be fine as long as they can get to food and water. Depending on the condition of your turf in the yard, you may be surprised at how little feed they actually eat and how much time the hen has them foraging in the yard.
All this is going to be a personal decision. Go by what you see, not some predetermined schedule.
I have no idea. Some cats are perfectly safe around chicks, some are not. Most broody hens protect their chicks and cats can be real cowards when a hen stands up to them. But a cat might ambush a chick before the hen has time to respond. Many farms with broody hens ranging with their chicks have cats for rodent control. Often it is not a problem but the risk is there.
I like having a cat on rodent patrol. From what you said about the cat, especially about your concerns for your Dad, that cat would still be gone if it were my choice.
I've seen a broody hen get chicks out of a hayloft 10' high. She said jump and they did, then bounced up and ran to her. I've had a broody hen hatch in a nest about 4' off the coop floor. The hen has never had a problem getting her chicks safely to the coop floor. If your nest were small I'd have some concerns but it's not small.
I leave my broody hens alone until they decide to bring the chicks to the coop floor. I leave that decision to them, I trust my broody hens. When the chicks get hungry they tell the hen. All I do is have food and water on the coop floor where the chicks can get to it. They never go back to the nest. At night the broody settles down on the coop floor and takes care of her chicks from there.
This is definitely worth repeating. The other hens can be laying eggs in the broody hen's nest. That's not good for different reasons. I strongly suggest you mark the eggs (I use a black sharpie) so you can tell which eggs belong. Then every day after the others have finished laying check under her and remove any that don't belong. As long as you check every day you can still use the new eggs.
You can pick her out of the nest and set her on the coop floor. She will probably lay there for a minute or two and them either go back to her nest or run outside to get some food and water, probably take a dump. If she is truly broody this will not break her from being broody. I usually just reach in and lift the broody up so I can look under her..
A broody hen can peck and it can hurt. When I was a kid my job was to collect the eggs every day. That included under broody hens that had the eggs marked. Most broody hens weren't that bad but occasionally one would peck hard. That can hurt. But I still checked. No way was I going to tell my Dad that I was afraid of a broody hen. I did not use gloves or long sleeves. You have that option if she hurts.
You may have noticed that Dobie and I do things differently. That's really common on this forum, we do these things all sorts of different ways. It's not that there is only one way to do anything, usually there are several different ways that can work. Our individual circumstances may point to one way being better than another for some of us but don't get hung up on the idea that there is only one right way.
Good luck. I'm feeling fairly good about your chances, especially with all that room.
