D&D (2024) Rogue's Been in an Awkward Place, And This Survey Might Be Our Last Chance to Let WotC Know.

[Maxperson]

From what I was able to find on various message boards, the best argument I found on your end of the spectrum was, "the percentage of people in an army is roughly 5%, and increases up to a maximum of 10% during wartime. This means in a town of 1000, not currently fighting any wars, there should be approximately 50 trained guards. "

I then also saw, "The statistic is, in a medieval society, you're looking at about 90% of the population being subsistence farmers. 5% of the population being full-time military would mean that every other non-farmer is a guard. Remember that a town of 1000 people is actually not very big at all, and in an age where taxation is woefully unreliable, the government is fairly small. You'd be lucky to get 5 guards."

I also saw that the trained folk of a town would often be out of town on patrol, so many wouldn't even be in town ready to battle a dragon suddenly swooping in for an attack on the town.

So the estimate seems to range from 5 to 50 for a town of 1000. They're not beating an adult Red Dragon.

Your claim of 30% of the population being trained for warfare matches just one country: modern north Korea. That's it. No other nations were listed (old or modern) with such a high trained population level. Though nobody has good stats on, for example, Sparta.

Not guard. Militia. A lot of able bodied men were given a minimum amount of training so that during wartime or an emergency, they could be called up to fight. These are not the guards you mention, but additional men that are proficient in a few weapons. They generally also had low morale, since they were not drilled constantly to fight and not run like soldiers and guards were.

I saw numbers that some cities trained every able bodied man like that, so you'd see 10-20% of the population able to be called up in an emergency. So going to that town of 1000, there would be 50-100 guards and another 100-200 militia. That's IF it were one of the hardcore towns that trained EVERY able bodied man for the militia. Many towns did not do that.

 

[Yaarel]

This is a quick glance from Wikipedia. Here is an example of how an area of England did it.

"The Statute of Winchester in 1285 introduced two more non-feudal categories to impose a general military obligation on ALL ABLE-BODIED MALES, including non-free, between the AGES OF 15 and 60, and updated the prescribed weaponry in the light of developments in warfare at the time."

They are required by law to train regularly in the military.


In D&D terms, by the time such characters become level 1 at age 20, they are already proficient in a choice among helmet, shield, spear, axe, longbow, and longsword (in the sense of a knightly arming sword). Typically peasants, namely the nearby farmers, are required to know how to use longbow. Some towns are all veterans with combat experience.

These are normal citizens who have other things to do.

In a magical setting, some of these citizens are training in the Wizard militia.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Ignoring the unequalled importance of how many randos would be 'good at bow', that does nothing when we're talking about whether in D&D, it's a good thing that a battery of said randos can take down the titular living superweapon when the central conceit of the game is that the player characters are explicitly heroes who rise to the occasion in the face of threats randos would die to instead of, say, ending it with a few volleys of cheap, mundane arrows.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Wait what?

I’ve rarely seen a barbarian that isn’t all about protecting team mates and holding the line. Barbarians are commonly team players.

Nah, I didn't mean that they don't do their part. I meant that it's often seen as "stay out of the Barbarian's way" (while they do their part), rather than "coordinate tactics with them". It's more an RP thing than a game tactics thing, and I didn't mean it strongly.

 

[Pauln6]

Obviously, the DM sets the parameters and decides how much of a chance those villagers have but broad brush, commoners are averaged adults and settlements have GP based resource limits. You can roll the townsfolk up individually if you really have the time or even roll them up using something like this: https://donjon.bin.sh/d20/demographics/ or use the 1e write-ups like those in Greyhawk to define the strength of the military and supporting militias. Yes, you could even do a training montage as the plucky villagers prepare to fight for their very existence and should have a chance to score some hits. Dragons could rule the world if humans didn't have the advantage of numbers after all.

There is one other thing that 5e abandoned, which I think should have been retained in monster stats: the Morale Score. This could represent the base DC to frighten or intimidate and adds a sliver of personality to monster stat blocks. In 2e, I think the score ranged from Cowardly to Fanatic, so goblins might have had shaky morale at 8-9, while hobgoblins had steady morale at 11-12.

Page 273 of the 5e DMG discusses the optional rules for morale albeit unsophisticated ones requiring a DC10 Wisdom Save. It says that a monster might flee if:

• The creature is surprised
• The creature is reduced to half of it’s hit points
• The creature has no way to harm it’s opponents

or a group of creatures might flee if:

• The group is surprised
• The group’s leader is reduced to zero hit points, incapacitated, taken prisoner, or removed from battle
• The group is reduced to half of it’s original size with no losses on the opposite side

You can further refine this:

• If their leader is killed in a bloody or disgraceful way.
• If escape would be easy and more beneficial for their mission.

Opposite factors, those that would have even a coward stay to fight, would be:

• Risk of torture or imprisonment.
• Their leader inspires them to fight on.
• Their leader's death was inspiring and tragic.
• The enemy is clearly going to kill everyone behind them, so they need to stay and protect them.

Then there was the Unearthed Arcana: Mass Combat playtest rules:

Morale Ratings
–10 Openly rebellious
–8 Mutinous
–4 Disgruntled
–2 Shaky
+0 Typical
+2 Motivated
+4 Stalwart
+8 Fanatic
+10 Unbreakable

Militia is going to have unsteady morale and soldiers typical morale, possibly boosted by a powerful or charismatic leader. So when 50%+ of your allies flee due to dragon fear, that doesn't mean the ones who saved are not going to join them unless as DM, you decide that they don't.

Upshot, is that there is enough discretion in the rules that villagers can or can't kill a Schrodinger's dragon. There isn't a right or wrong answer but there are plenty of rules that can tweak the odds in either direction. It's almost like the game is flexible...

 

[Mirrorrorrim]

I was distracted by many pages of a dragon vs. town sidetrek.

Is there anything else to discuss that is on-topic about Rogues?

If they don't nerf the new monk, I think I'd be ok with rogues getting Extra Attack (Barbarians may need a nudge too, if monk stays as is.)

 

[Maxperson]

I was distracted by many pages of a dragon vs. town sidetrek.

Is there anything else to discuss that is on-topic about Rogues?

Smart rogues hide when a dragon shows up, they don't shoot it with an arrow.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Ignoring the unequalled importance of how many randos would be 'good at bow', that does nothing when we're talking about whether in D&D, it's a good thing that a battery of said randos can take down the titular living superweapon when the central conceit of the game is that the player characters are explicitly heroes who rise to the occasion in the face of threats randos would die to instead of, say, ending it with a few volleys of cheap, mundane arrows.

You do make a good point, and there’s also the fundamental difference in asking ‘could town militia even harm a dragon in the first place with improvised bowmen’ and ‘sure they can harm the dragon but what are the chances they survive long enough against the onslaught to actually defeat it’

 

[Vaalingrade]

Smart rogues hide when a dragon shows up, they don't shoot it with an arrow.

Unless it's a cartoonishly huge arrow for the most famous sneak attack of all time.

 

[Yaarel]

The Morale Score.

I use the Intimidation Skill to intimidate, frighten, break morale, and force surrender.

But I also use Intimidation to maintain morale and rally others in battle.

Intimidation is familiarity with threats as well as facing them.

I still experiment with the best way to go about it, but using Intimidation for morale is great.

I make morale checks each time a teammate gets Bloodied or Downed.