Tips for running module 4's "The Battle for Gallo's Fend" (3.5E version)

valn99 · Feb 3, 2010

Hi!

Months after the Ragesians' attack on their beloved Gate Pass, my players have been sent to gain the help of the Dassen. They have thrown their lot in with Duke Gallo.

I'm on the verge of the battle for Gallo's Fend.
Now I've never had to run anything on that scale!
Even if the battle is broken down, as suggested, into just the heroes' unit and their opponents, that's close to about 60-100 persons/monsters!

There's no way I'm going to roll for all of them!

I was considering making rolls for groups (like 4-8 soldiers per group, etc), but I'm not quite satisfied and it's still a lot to handle. And magic can still have an impact on the result of the battle, as well as the heroes' presence and actions.

So I'd appreciate any advice and suggestions, homebrew system, etc that anyone might have.

Thanks!

valn

Nebten · Feb 3, 2010

This was an interesting battle to prepare for. I tell you what I did and maybe that will help you out in certain parts.

If you don't have big battle maps, get 1" graph paper from Staples that is typically used for presentations (24" x 30").

I then taped it down to 2 fold out tables, end on end. Remember, this fight for the heroes is to defend a stretch of land. This way you dont' have to worry about having the edges and going off map. I did state that if a hero wanted to retreat and fall back, he could do so as long as he reach the edge of his map. Once he was off, he was safe but couldn't come back into play I couldn't gain XP from there out.

So you should have a good idea what forces the heroes should have access to by the achievements accomplished before hand. What I did was give all the heroes the stats of their army & soliders before hand. I let them decide who is going to control what during the battle. This way when it was their turn, they not only have their PC but they have a "platoon" to control as well. They can do all the rolling for each member of their platoon.

I used tile pieces to place my mini's on and grouped them by color. For the DM side, it was typically a 1/4 of the soliders with a solo NPC.

In initative, it was alternating between PC/DM/PC/DM, but I let the PCs choose which order they wanted to go and just flipped a coin in the beginning to see who goes first.

Rolls: I made all damage rolls static for all NPCs, mostly averages of the roll. If a solider does 1d8+4 damage on a hit, its automatically 8 dmg. 5d6 fireball = 18 pod. This cuts down on rolling. The heroes could still roll all their rolls.

For the terrian, I kept it an open field to simplfy things except for one part. When somebody dies, that space makes it difficult terrian. It makes things interesting.

Make sure you do things in waves because that makes it easier on you since it cuts down how many bad guys you need to worry about on the field.

And for the biggest help, get an assistant DM if you can. Cut Steppengard's army in half and let the other guy run them. This way he can think of what moves to do while either you or the PCs are doing theirs.

This battle does take awhile so make sure you have enough time during the day to run it. Its a very fun fight and one that your players will remember for years to come.

valn99 · Feb 4, 2010

Hi Nebten!

Thanks for those suggestions.
I'll see if I can find an assistant.

Tell me though, how long did it take to run through the waves (and the entire battle), in rounds or in real time?
The second wave with those 4 troll mercenaries (resistant to fire and acid, no less) seems pretty tough. How did your players handle it?

I'm also thinking about having a bag containing tokens that represent random encounters and having the players draw one token every two rounds (perhaps less often).

Ideas for such encounters:

Friendly fire: A flying Timoran mage throws a fireball in the heroes’ battle field. Pick a spot advantageous for the heroes. FB – 18 dmg, Reflex DC 16
Deadly interference: The Steppengard mage Kelkin throws a fireball against the heroes’ forces. FB 32 dmg, DC 20.
Just Walking through: The Timoran Xorn walks through the middle of the battlefield and makes a bit attack against one of the major enemy NPCs (+21attack, 23 dmg), then continues on his way to another part of the battle.
Hear me roar!: An androsphinx flies by and makes a roar attack on the heroes’ battlefield.
Reinforcements have arrived: 4 Gallo soldiers enter the heroes’ side of the battle field.
Low morale: Pick a friendly unit and make morale checks for every NPCs, modified by their commander’s charisma.
Treason: Pick an enemy unit and make morale checks for every NPCS, modified by their commander’s charisma. Those that fail drop their weapons (“We won’t fight our dasseni brothers”, 70%) or turn against Steppengard’s army and join Gallo’s side (30%).
Friendly advice: The heroes receive intelligence information from an unknown source. That source could be one of Gallo’s Chaplain, or a renegade from Steppengard’s army. The piece of information could be about the Kelkin’s position, the content of the second wave (trolls with “abjuration magic”), etc.
Wounded flyer: A criosphinx enters the battlefield on the ennemy’s side. It’s already wounded (50% hp), having already fought in another part of the battlefield.
Lost ground: A group of wounded gallo soldiers have been forced to retreat. Put 1d4+4 soldiers on the left side of the battlemap, roughly in the center. They are all wounded (50% hp).
[*]Catapult!: One of the catapult throws a rock somewhere on the battle field. Determine the spot randomly. For example, taking roughtly the center square, roll 1d8 to determine scatter direction, then 1d20 for the number of squares the rock will land from the center. Damage as described in the modle.Any thoughts?

Thanks!

valn99

Nebten · Feb 4, 2010

I'm going to say about 6 hours.

And while the encounters seem tough, adventurers get witty pretty quick. They just had a solider or two stay on top of the troll beating him down so that he never got up, then the druid summoned a fire elemental and did coup de gras on it.

The biggest problem the heroes had was when the androsphinx came through and a good portion of the army and even a PC or two was under the fear affects and ran to the edge of the battle field.

Also when the sphinxes got behind enemy lines, they tore through the spellcasters but didn't last very long since they become a insta-target.

Those random encounters are a great idea. I wish I would have thought of those. Instead I just had it pre-planed on which round what was going to occur. I did keep the pressure on starting each side on opposiste sides of the table with catapult fire. This forced the party to close quicker instead of staying at a distance and just lob fireballs into the other army.

Primitive Screwhead · Feb 5, 2010

Echo that those random encounters are a great idea. I think they would seriously add to the chaotic feel of the battle.

I ran the encounter in about 3 hours, altho I trimmed it a bit due to time limitations. The group didn't disable the catapults, so I had them raining down fire for the majority of the battle, in semi-random locations. I used a D8 and a D6 for the scatter diagram. This was almost a year ago now, so I don't recall that much.

I also used three waves of bad guys, and came very close to overcoming the PCs. Thier saving grace was the two clergy I had on the field administering a healing touch potion (4 hp). They would move to heal the closest wounded ally... regardless of PC or NPC!

The Wizard truely showed his salt that day, cleaning up the battlefield pretty well.

RangerWickett · Feb 6, 2010

When we designed it, we figured it would be as good a chance as any to let artillery PCs have some great fun. The closest thing I ever played to it myself was the attack on the city in Red Hand of Doom, but that was mostly confined to streets, not huge sprawling fields.