[Grim Tales] Mass Combat: EL for mounted combatants

[Durifern]

Are there any guidelines how mounts fit into the BR?
The spreadsheet which comes with the MC-pdf has as an example a mounted cavalry:
8 elite knights and 4 heavy warhorses. Does that imply that mounts get a multiplier of 1/2?
Makes sense to me but that wasn´t mentioned in the pdf afaik, nor in the EL-rules of the DMG.

Any opinions?

 

[Garnfellow]

Are there any guidelines how mounts fit into the BR?
The spreadsheet which comes with the MC-pdf has as an example a mounted cavalry:
8 elite knights and 4 heavy warhorses. Does that imply that mounts get a multiplier of 1/2?
Makes sense to me but that wasn´t mentioned in the pdf afaik, nor in the EL-rules of the DMG.

Any opinions?

You know, I've never really thought a lot about this question -- which has important ramifications for ALL d20 games. Considering how iconic the mounted warrior is to most fantasy settings, and given all the mounted combat feats, it seems strange that this corner of the d20 ruleset is so empty.

Maybe all mounts should provide a CR adjustment to the rider, just like templates. Maybe a wardog or riding horse is a +0 CR mount, war horse is +1, wooly mammoth is +2, whatever.

Actually, it doesn't seem like this would be /too/ hard to do.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Just count the mounts-- factor them right into the spreadsheet.

But don't consider the unit "mixed."

 

[Durifern]

You know, I've never really thought a lot about this question -- which has important ramifications for ALL d20 games. Considering how iconic the mounted warrior is to most fantasy settings, and given all the mounted combat feats, it seems strange that this corner of the d20 ruleset is so empty.

Maybe all mounts should provide a CR adjustment to the rider, just like templates. Maybe a wardog or riding horse is a +0 CR mount, war horse is +1, wooly mammoth is +2, whatever.

Actually, it doesn't seem like this would be /too/ hard to do.

Just fiddled around a bit with some numbers and as it turns out that lower CR creatures don´t change the overall BR much.
CR7 combatants with CR2 mounts have the same BR as without mounts. Does that make sense? There is the increased speed and the +1BR for mounted vs unmounted combatants but on the other hand this group would suffer from a higher unit size modifier.

Awarding mounted troops a CR bonus sounds reasonable but looking at the ELs shows that justifying a +1CR bonus the mixed unit would have to be 7-5, 7-3-3, 7-1-1-1-1 (if I´ve done the math right).

Bottom line: As long as the BR numbers foots on the EL rules there´s probably no way around it and as soon as you kick the EL scheme everything will get complex again.
So to answer my own question: yes, it makes sense as it seems.

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Just fiddled around a bit with some numbers and as it turns out that lower CR creatures don´t change the overall BR much.

Well, that's probably a good thing. Take the opposite case: A heavy warhorse (CR2) with 1st level Fighters (CR1) (a heavy cavalry unit such as a wealthy king might field).

CR7 combatants with CR2 mounts have the same BR as without mounts. Does that make sense? There is the increased speed and the +1BR for mounted vs unmounted combatants but on the other hand this group would suffer from a higher unit size modifier.

Doubling the size of a unit (ie, going from "10 men" to "10 men and 10 horses"), regardless of unit size, has the same effect: the unit size modifier increases by 2.

Personally, I think it's reasonable that the Command checks of mounted units suffer a -2 penalty as compared to an unmounted unit of the same size-- after all, the riders have the added distraction of controlling their mounts. It is far easier to field an army of 5000 men than a cavalry unit of 5000.

But if you found that unreasonable, you could allow the cavalry unit to make a Ride check, which if successful, adds +2 to the Command check (essentially negating this -2 unit size modifier 'penalty').

 

[Durifern]

But if you found that unreasonable, you could allow the cavalry unit to make a Ride check, which if successful, adds +2 to the Command check (essentially negating this -2 unit size modifier 'penalty').

Sorry, I didn´t want to break loose a big argument, with the points I listed I just tried to get the pros and cons from a number-crunching/powergamer pov (i.e. "What?! the BR doesn´t get better, why buy horses?!" which isn´t vaild, of course).

One last thing I´d like to add for future endeavours in mass combat rules.
BR seems to be quite unresponsive: you can reduce an army by up to 30% without changing the BR, perhaps a finer scale could be helpful.

I have to admit that I only had time to skim the rules but I´m looking forward using them in our campaign.
Thanks for the reply!

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

BR seems to be quite unresponsive: you can reduce an army by up to 30% without changing the BR.

That's entirely subject to the CR of the base creature and the number of creatures in the unit.

100 CR5 creatures is EL24-- but 97 of them are EL23.

100 CR1 creatures is EL14-- but 76 of them are EL13.

Bottom line is that you could play around with the numbers to optimize (ie, min/max, ie, twink) every unit.

Or you could step in as the GM and say, "Bob, I notice this unit here has 73 members, and this one has 19. Does your general have something for prime numbers or are you trying to min/max the system? How's about you round those units up to 20 and 75 and quit trying to cheese the system?"

Perhaps a finer scale could be helpful.

Perhaps you'll need to find a Mass Combat System that uses a finer scale.

Seriously, it's based on CR/EL, which is exponential/logarithmic. This is a feature, not a bug.

Double the number of creatures, +2 EL. Handy metric.