Help Me Set Up a Mass Combat Involving Dinosaurs and Robots

[Stoat]

The PC's in my 4E game are 8th level. It's a rainy day, and I'm starting to think about what to do when they reach the end of the heroic tier.

The answer is obvious: A mass combat involving robots mounted on dinosaurs fighting invaders from the Far Realm.

From a story perspective, this won't be too hard to set up. My game is set on the Isle of Dread, and the PC's are already in the process of training dinosaurs to serve as mounts. They've recently expressed an interest in building/recruiting a contingent of warforged/golems to guard their home base. The Far Realm has been a brooding presence in the campaign from the start.

But what's a good way to do this from a mechanical perspective? How have y'all run mass combats in 4E, and how has it worked? I'm open to any suggestions, but I'd rather do things "wargamey style" -- i.e. give the players some NPC's to push around the map, than "narrative style" -- i.e. focus on the individual PC's and mostly narrate what goes on around them.

Any help?

 

[Aenghus]

How many units per player are you envisioning? A "robot" on a dinosaur is two units.

In a wargame type scenario I would tend to use monster stats rather than PC character stats for units, including any warforged. Using minions for enemy foot(or tentacle) troops would reduce book keeping.


Consider how much time combat takes in your standard game - more units on the board at the same time will slow it down, in a roughly proportional ratio would be my guess.

The higher the number of units the more likely further abstraction would be called for - simplified hit points perhaps as in the last two versions of the D&D miniatures rules, or even lower as in wargames rules; or allowing one unit to represesent multiple units in the game world.

Do you use "theatre of the mind" combat, maps with tokens, or maps and minis?

The more units involved and the more wargamelike you want it to feel, the more necessary are maps and unit tokens of some sort.

Strategic play is helped with larger scale maps and some sort of scouting rules, so the enemy force can be spotted and it's constituents identified as soon as possible. (if they know exactly what's out there, scouting is less important)

Typical flow of this sort of game, with a defensive mission is roughly as follows:

• The players set up the base defenses and friendly unit dispositions
• Scouts and spies provide information about the enemy force and movements
• The players make last minute adjustments to their defenses based on intelligence received
• Sometimes the party will perform one or more personal skirmish attacks to delay part or all of the enemy
• The setpiece battle itself
• The aftermath - Victory! or Defeat and a desperate retreat (with the party often acting as rearguard)

I hope this helps.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

The PC's in my 4E game are 8th level. It's a rainy day, and I'm starting to think about what to do when they reach the end of the heroic tier.

The answer is obvious: A mass combat involving robots mounted on dinosaurs fighting invaders from the Far Realm.

I find this part a bit confusing. Are the PCs robots? Piloting robots? With dinosaur mounts?

 

[Trit One-Ear]

Incredibly vague and unhelpful post, but a third party 3rd edition pirate setting had an interesting (as I remember it) mass combat system for ship to ship fights. Health determined attack rolls and damage, representing the loss of crew as the loss of effectiveness. I wish I could remember what the book was called (I'll have to call my friend who had the book after work). But it might be worth glancing at after I post the title. I never played with the system so I can't vouch for it in practice, but tweaking it to use monster stats like recommended above would be my advice.

Trit