Balesir said:
Hey, hey!
Howdy!
Heh, OK, I see what you're driving at. I guess my visions run just a bit smaller - I see a million "grunts" as a force the like of which you just don't see all in one place!
Its unlikely yes, in fact I'd say its something only likely to happen in the (outer) planes, clashes between Abyssal hordes, Hellish legions, the Einheriar army at Ragnarok etc.
+8 gives us 1 - 9 - 17 - 25 - 33 for 10,000 first level creatures per level 30th level character as a stiff challenge. That seems pretty Epic, to me; 50,000 is a huge army to be in a small enough area to fight a party of five!
I sort of don't think there is an actual wrong answer here (between +6 and +8). Simply one of scale.
That said, I am leaning towards your idea of +8.
Lets give it the orc test.
Level 3 = Orc Warrior
Level 11 = Unit of 10 Orc Warriors
Level 19 = Unit of 100
Level 27 = Unit of 1000
Level 35 = Unit of 10,000
Level 43 = Unit of 100,000
Level 51 = Unit of 1,000,000
Actually looking at the above I think I agree that +8 is better. It allows epic characters to influence a mass battle, but not necessarily win one on their own...saving that for Immortal Tier characters.
...and Pit Fiends:
Level 26 Elite = Pit Fiend
Level 34 Elite = Unit of 10 Pit Fiends
Level 42 Elite/37 Solo = Unit of 100 (A company of Pit Fiends)
Less than twice that number was the total Union force at Gettysburg. Armies of a million are in the realm of the First Battle of the Marne (1914), which happened over miles of countryside stretching around the East and North-East of Paris!
Its only a thousand squares deep by a thousand across (a square mile single unit).
We only need an 84 foot square gaming table to represent it.
Basically, I think even Epic characters against a force of near a million would have issues simply with the range of their powers!
One of the few times we ever see 'epic' level characters against an army is in the movie "Hero".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kpkWQmIdMo
