Hireling, henchmen, extras and redshirts.

[AE020704]

I've got my cohort who comes with us (played by me, so not counted as an NPC, per se), but he can look after himself, believe me!

My followers look to the general day-to-day running of our 'base'. I can't stomach the idea of using my blesséd little Expert1s as fodder

 

[Herobizkit]

I currently have only one player (a Swashbuckler/Dread Pirate), so NPCs abound. Every captain needs a crew, after all.

This is the same case for me as well. My NPC's become more like the supporting cast (like the Scooby gang on Buffy, for example) than redshirts. In fact, my player loves to "collect" NPCs and has a hard time letting even minor ones disappear...

 

[Kestrel]

Zapp Brannigan refrence...cool.

Love the Sig

 

[quetzyl]

It varies a lot. One game I run the PC's are part of the crew of a ship, so they have 25 regular NPC crewmembers accompanying them at all times. Recently they recruited an extra 60 Orc Berserkers for a dangerous assault on an enemy base. The player of the captain in particular is constantly trying to recruit new and interesting NPC's to join the crew. In another game, they not only had no hirelings, they decided to leave the druid's animal companion behind because they found it a liability. In the WLD game I am playing in, we have an evil orc who follows us around and hides from fights. It varies a lot.

Cheers,
quetzyl

 

[DragonShadow]

WTF? Breach the gate?

I'm the DM.

I don't give them their tactics, I give them the situations.

They're the dumb ones that tried to assault a fortress with brute force whilst undermanned and without siege weapons. :/

 

[Celebrim]

WTF? Breach the gate?

How tall were the walls?

Hmmmmm.
50 men...

Invisibility Sphere+Sculpt Sound would let you get close to the wall without taking fire, Spider Climb Potions to climb the wall easily, use Tanglefoot bags to keep say, five guys in position on the wall while others lower the chains tied elaborately around their bodies (ends of the chain are "glued" together with Stone Shape's clay-like stone molded around the ends of the chain--high DR and HP should keep the chain or stone from being easily sundered, barring a Stone Dragon enthusiast) while the rest climb the chains attached to the men.

If any of this was ordinary, there wouldn't be armies or castles.

I think you are quite wrong to think what you suggest is normal. If it was in the remotest bit normal in a campaign world, it would be perfectly normal to a) build all fortresses underground, b) have magical defenses that countered invisibility, illusions, and such on the approaches to the fortress.

The very fact that there is a castle barbican suggests that spider climb potions are considered rare and wonderful and not ordinary equipment.

 

[the Jester]

Animal companions, cohorts, a few hirelings from time to time, etc... and the party generally protects their animals and cohorts MUCH better than the npcs they travel with. :\

 

[kolikeos]

sometimes horses or animal companions and familiers, but nothing else

 

[VirgilCaine]

If any of this was ordinary, there wouldn't be armies or castles.

I think you are quite wrong to think what you suggest is normal. If it was in the remotest bit normal in a campaign world, it would be perfectly normal to a) build all fortresses underground, b) have magical defenses that countered invisibility, illusions, and such on the approaches to the fortress.

I didn't say it was normal, I said it was average for a D&D campaign world.

The very fact that there is a castle barbican suggests that spider climb potions are considered rare and wonderful and not ordinary equipment.

You actually don't need spider climb potions to do what I just said. Spider climb potions just make it much faster to get up the wall. Even with 3 minutes, I think you could get up a DC 20 wall with a climber's kit.

If there's brush within running distance of the wall (And why would there be? It invites scenarios like this.) you could feasibly get soldiers over the walls without needing Invisibility Sphere and Sculpt Sound spells.
Or if they moved up under cover of tower shields (or improvised tower shield-like panels) and stayed under full cover spread out with 10 between each sheild all the time, so it would be hard to kill them with fireballs or area spells.

This plan would probably be complicated by having lots of attackers or lots of defenders, but I think it could work.

All you really need for the plan is climbing kits, potions of invisibility, tanglefoot bags, lots of chain and some really strong guys.

Potions of invisibility seem like they would be in demand for scouting and a top item to be produced for sale by spellcasters and it's a popular spell, so that doesn't seem that unreasonable to get ahold of some. How many you need depends on the attack force and how many chains you want to run down the walls.

Other than being faster than making scaling ladders and siege towers and such, there's not a lot different about this plan than actual medieval warfare, I don't think. You still got guys climbing the walls, they're not walking through it or flying over it or whatnot.

I'm the DM.

I don't give them their tactics, I give them the situations.

They're the dumb ones that tried to assault a fortress with brute force whilst undermanned and without siege weapons. :/

And you have my sympathy.

 

[frankthedm]

Once in the past, they had to hire extra muscle to assault a fortress. For whatever reason, they felt that 50 men would be enough to take out a fortress rumored to hold 150 hobgoblins. (Hobgoblins that were rumored to be battle hardened, aka - with class levels.)

50d8 more HP can really matter! Especially when it only can be stripped of at 1d8 per non area affect action