[MENTION=6876021]kagayaku[/MENTION] Happy to pass along any hard-earned insights that make your game better. I really cut my teeth figuring all this out for myself. Good luck
Two follow up things:
That's really exactly true in a medieval warfare scenario. I realize this is D&D, but to give you an example...armored warriors often carried thin daggers in case they defeated a foe with a helmet. According to the sources we have, it seemed fairly common practice to do something like this: Hold the thin dagger to slit in the helmet or other vulnerable point in the armor and demand the person's lineage – if they weren't noble they got killed, if they were noble they got held for ransom.
Another example: In medieval combat you don't have, say, 50 longbow men line up and get directed to "shoot down the one with the red feather helmet." They're launching volleys of arrows on a much larger scale.
In your "Helm's Deep" scenario, you shouldn't be targeting the PCs with multiple goblin attacks each, for example, unless the sh-- orc-- really hits the fan (probably as a result of the PCs drawing undue attention to themselves).
This is why I recommend battle zones, translating stuff like this from "hundred monster attack" paradigm to a "hazard of war" paradigm. So you can better foresee what you're actually planning to run them through.
[SBLOCK=As an aside...]As an aside, recently I placed a chamber in a high-level dungeon with 99 flameskulls. I knew that running it as a combat would be A Bad Idea, so instead I focused on
"what's interesting that the PCs can do here? how might they might circumvent these monsters in a creative way? and how do I make sure they have enough time/ways to avoid getting killed till they manage to do so?" I ended up designing it as a trap using
Unearthed Arcana: Traps Revisited.[/SBLOCK]
In your scenario
not knowing exactly is probably OK, as long as they know it's "something bad."
I should have emphasized that it's the immediate and ongoing visual prop that matters.
It's the Jenga tower effect in Dread (a terrific little indie horror game where you draw pieces of a Jenga tower as you tell the story/play the game, with collapse of the tower leading to some grisly fate for that hero). Having a physical prop – even just a die you keep turning down – that the players can constantly reference helps sustain the tension when players might otherwise forget.
Well I really appreciate it, thank you!
And if I get any excuse to have a defeated PC held at knife-point and their lineage demanded l'll use it for sure now. It could even help keep a PC alive. :'D
The rain of arrows scenario is the bit I think I'm still not sure on. For the most part I will do as you suggested with the battle zones, but sometimes the numbers will be small enough that it makes sense to play it out on the grid and let players flank and cover each other and so on with a clear cause and effect. The mob rules cover many attacks against 1 target but not many against many (or 1 against many). It seems fair that if you just want to hit
anyone in the big first wave of charging, lightly armoured goblins it would be much easier than hitting a specific target. I'll probably just give the players Advantage for such rolls. Maybe for the many vs many thing I'll just treat it as many vs 1 with mob rules, but with -5 AC to emulate advantage on the attack. ... Or maybe I'm overthinking things now and should just see what pans out the day. x'D
I see what you were saying with the dice now. I think I can get away with just implying they're bad and the players will probably take it from there in their own little spiral of doomsaying, but hastur_nz has convinced me I should at least drop solid hints about the incoming allies, so maybe I'll be a little more obvious on both. I'll be sure to make a show each time I turn the dice down though. Dread incidentally was my first GM experience, just before I got to play D&D. It was for just one person and it was super fun and intense. At some point I'll run a bigger one with more people too. xD
I ran a little battle recently for 3xPC's at 7th but no fireball etc, and one of my players had DM'd the same one earlier for his group which was probably much lower level. Some of it's probably relevant for your situation...
My players got a lot of time to organise the exact defenses - where all the NPC's were, what their assigned tasks were (including non-combatants who were assigned to fight fires etc), they also dug and covered pits with spikes to help defend the gates. They kept the NPC's out of much direct fire, most of the time, and made sure they all had good cover themselves. For invading forces were mainly Orcs, with Ogres that flung flaming stuff. My players made sure they never left the inside of the compound, and with cover I hardly hit them, but these are much tougher than level 2 or 3 PCs. A few common-folk were killed once some Orcs breached the main gates, until I had the rest run away and let the PC Fighter hold the Orcs back (I run morale for both sides). I didn't plan on rolling too many dice, but because everyone was spread out all over the whole battlefield, I ended up having too, but it was only about 40 orcs etc so not that big really. My players enjoyed the tactical aspects as a change of pace, and they all gave it much thought, so it ended up being an easy victory; next session the players actually took the fight to the survivors before the re-enforced, re-grouped and attacked again, which was also fun.
My player who had DM'd the same scenario, said his players put all the towns-folk up on the walls, using ranged attacks etc, and most of them got killed off. So there's lesson - same scenario, but different player tactics can lead to very different outcomes.
For a group of low-level PCs, vs an army, personally I'd be very worried that the players will get in over their heads and die too easily. Basically a PC only needs to get surrounded by enemies, and they are likely to go down and be un-saveable. Attacking a siege engine sounds cool, but realistically how can low level PC's do that without it being a suicide mission? If I was a player, I'd spend my whole time behind as much cover as possible, doing very little to draw attention to myself - maybe some stealth and/or intelligence mission, but I'd be very worried that my 20-30 hit points wasn't going to last if I got anywhere near a section of the army. I'm not sure what heroic actions your players might expect, maybe they can be commanders of a sort but hopefully not front-line ones. Remember - if this is Healm's Deep, your level 3 PC's are definitely NOT Legolas or Gimmli or whatever, at best they might be Merry or Pippin.
Your "rescue mission" ending does indeed feel like Deus-ex-Machina, so personally if I was going to use that device I *would* let the players know that external help is possible, and that it's on a count-down, and if there's things they can do to speed it up, stop the enemies from thwarting it, etc. That's actually a good chance to let them help influence the battle in meaningful ways. In other words, let the players help drive the conclusion of "reinforcements save the day", if that's what makes sense.
I think with such low-level PC's, and I'm assuming also inexperienced players, you owe it to everyone to be clear that the army is large and a few heroes obviously can't defeat them by themselves, but there might be some smaller-scale things that the heroes can do that will help swing the tide of battle. Don't make them guess what's going on, give them information and choices to make. By all means let them be creative in what they could do, but if they are not sure give them some decent options and if their ideas are clearly poor let them know and allow them to reconsider, i.e. don't let them get themselves killed just because you made them guess and they guessed wrong.
Last thing - pre-plan some basic stuff, in terms of numbers of attackers vs defenders, likely casualties at various times, etc, and where appropriate just narrate what the PC's can learn of what's going on around the place, e.g. 300 orcs armed with geataxes and battering rams storm the front gate, fire and arrows rain down and kill half of them before they crash though, then 100 defenders try to hold them back but each orc is worth two men, etc etc. Obviously the players can help influence the defenders actions, plans etc.
Good luck, it's a lot to chew off so early in your DM career.
Haha, thanks hastur_nz - it sure does feel like a lot to chew!
You've made me re-think my strategy on the count down dice a little. I think I will still be a little vague on the dice, but before the start of the battle one of the scouts will return and a PC can overhear the good news that reinforcements are coming. I'll keep the princess's brother coming as a surprise though, I think the player will be pretty thrilled when they show up and it is their actions that made it happen.
It sounds like you had a really fun game with that scenario, and the comparison between levels is very interesting.
I'm still trying to think of good ideas to give the players slightly more control, as they don't hold any particularly grand influence in the town. I'll be looking for any opportunity to give them interesting and important decisions to make (and we managed to get them all on the war council in a more or less narratively sound manner), but they aren't commanders. Having said that, being generally more charismatic and tough looking than most of the terrified townsfolk they should be able to gain control of local scale groups fairly easily, or bolster morales etc., and influence the battle by achieving key objectives that way. Quickleaf has suggested I ensure there are enough ways the players will get intel, which I will incorporate, so the players know how the battle is going and can make larger decisions based on that as well.
I am quite worried they'll all get killed, and the players know it so hopefully will be careful. Reflecting on what you've said a little though I think I have to be really careful in my description of surroundings and events. If a PC dies knowing the risks they've taken I think they'll consider it a fun and memorable death, but if they die because I wasn't clear about the nature of the threat then they'll probably be quite upset. I'll remind the players about the sheer enormity of the enemy at the start of the game and then via NPCs as well.
If I can be cheeky enough to ask another question, if you were pre-planning this then how much detail would you put in? Like anyone, I only have limited time to put into this so I don't want to over plan but I want to make sure I have everything I need. Would you know the time, location and objective of every part of each time or just have a general feel for where it is going, or somewhere in between? Currently the timeline I'm using is as I posted, but with numbers of losses on each side and where roughly dotted along it.
Thanks a lot for your input, its given me a lot to think about. xD
In a battle not everyone has to be defending the city from an attacker or directly involved in combat. The two rogues along with their motley crew of scoundrels prevented another thieving guild from stealing the food stores and selling it back to the city populace at inflated prices. For their reward they asked for exclusive rights to clearing the enemy dead from the field and disposing of any goods they find as they see fit.
One of the wizards who is rather a dandy decided to avoid the stench of battle and have a long relaxing bath and massage. From his respite of the grime of war he was forced to deal with a traitorous faction within the city walls.
Wow, that game sounds great! Clearly there are some very interesting characters in your game. x'D I hadn't really considered too heavily the actions of non-combatants and their impact on the battle. I will now though. I think there is a possibility that one player will try and avoid the combat now that you've gotten me thinking about it. I'll have to make sure there's plenty of interesting things going on inside the town as well!
You've given me some good inspiration there, thank you Draegn!
Most of the enemies should be 4e Minions: 1 HP, a fixed AC, hit them and they go down. The important NPCs will stand out because they stay standing.
Sketch out the enemy's plan:
-squads of longbowmen stop by the farmbuildings and snipe at anybody poking their head up on the wall
-a dozen Bruisers carrying a battering ram charge the gate
-slingers stop to pick up natural stones &c then close in to their short range and go after targets of opportunity
-officer stays on a hill in the back with a half-dozen runners
-two siege engines throw rocks at walls from just behind the creek
-one other siege engine throws bucket-fulls of gravel into the defender's courtyard ('shotgun' to mess with defenders counter-plans, and anybody on the back wall)
-special squad of Assassins tries to sneak up to the back wall and raise ladders; take down defending officers if they succeed in entrance.
By doing this, you can imagine what the NPCs will do when the PCs arrive to 'interfere' with their well-laid plans.
Thanks Eltab!
I do have a rough enemy plan already, I think I posted it up here in one of the earlier messages. Or do you think it needs significantly more detail? (I have a little more detail that I didn't type up here as it is too long). I like the idea of runners being potential key targets now that you've mentioned them, I hadn't really thought about them before but intercepting messages or just cutting off communications could have a pretty big impact. Of course, they'll be at the back. xD
I've had a look at the minions rules but even individual foes are tough battles for the PCs at the moment so I'm not sure they really work for me. (Unless the PCs choose high XP activities for next session and reach level 3 before the battle, in which case goblins can be minions). Quickly estimating the numbers, I think in the vast majority of cases one PC will take a goblin down in either 1 or 2 hits, or an orc down in 2 to 5 hits, usually 3. The guard NPCs are about as good as the PCs but the townsfolk need 2 or 3 hits to kill a goblin and are themselves minions. I'm thinking of going half way and using loom band wound markers where appropriate. If there's not enough damage to kill (or at least nearly kill) a creature I'll give it 1 or 2 wound markers based on a quarter-of-a-second estimate of what percentage of its health was lost and how many wounds it can take, weak things like goblins die on wound 2, a hard as nails orc dies on 5 and will be extremely intimidating to the players and reinforce the idea that they're going to need to be clever to make a difference and... Oh man, this is way too high level for the PCs, what have I done?! >.< ...erm... sorry. I'm having doubts but I still think it'll work, it'll just feel like a terrifying struggle for survival, which is good. I don't think loom bands will slow things down as the numbers are so easy to work with and most of the time it wont be needed as the PCs will be leading groups to deal (hopefully xD) massive damage. It might even run faster than running regular battles if I can get it right. Do you think it can work? I don't want to trivialise the threat of a goblin so early when actually, they still pose significant risk to the PCs when not part of an army.
Thanks for all your help everyone! I think I've done a slightly crazy thing in letting the PCs get into this situation so early, and I'll learn from that, but one way or the other this should be an extremely memorable session! All your guidance is really helping me out, I think we'll all have a much better game for it.
