How Many 1st Level Fighters Should a 10th Level Fighter Beat?

[keterys]

If you consider 10th level as low paragon, the average 10th level fighter would be equivalent to a platoon or two of inexperienced soldiers. He should defeat 25-50 first levels before death due to only natural 1's causing they to survive.

But a 10th level fighter who specializes at fighting many weak much weaker enemies would need over 200 first levels to be challenged. Literally Dynasty Warriors.

Any particular reason for that huge a swing? Thinking back on previous editions, I'm not seeing more than 20-40 to 1 ratios at most?

 

[the Jester]

I'd say 20-50, assuming a fairly high amount of "swing" based on the variables of armor, weapons, specific builds, etc.

I do think 100 dudes should overpower one almost every time until VERY high levels, but I love the visual of a 10th level fighter just mowing down enemy after enemy.

Put in terms of "10th level party of five fighters vs. army", this means a high level party of pc fighters can probably take out 100-250 guys.

 

[Mengu]

Does not apply.

PC's aren't meant to fight PC's so the answer is irrelevant for me.

What matters is, can I make an encounter where one Nth level fighter is reasonably challenged by 1 opponent or 10 opponents? If the answer is yes, it's mission accomplished. Levels are irrelevant.

A campaign is a story. DM needs to be able to create appropriate encounters to tell the story. The system must accommodate the DM's needs regardless of level. One set of players might like "Assault on the Keep" type scenarios at level 6, another group might like it at level 16. You might be doing a dungeon exploration at level 1 or level 20. It all needs to be scalable.

Levels are simply a progression that gives PC's a sense of accomplishment and improvement, and a chance to diversify. Other than that I don't really care if characters gain 2 HP's per level, or 20 HP's per level, it's all numbers on a paper.

 

[Minigiant]

Any particular reason for that huge a swing? Thinking back on previous editions, I'm not seeing more than 20-40 to 1 ratios at most?

In 3.5, I had a level ten mookkiller character kill about "fitty men" before taking more than twenty damage in 3.5. Sure the fighters used stupid tactics.

So I beloved he could have got to almost 200 if he were properly optimized and the waves kept coming.

 

[keterys]

I think the answer there is tied heavily to the stupid tactics. I mean technically a supreme cleave character could kill infinite 1st level fighters, but I'm not sure that's what we're really worrying about.

Assume equal levels of optimization on both sides - it's the only logical approach.

If they'd stayed spread out and used ranged weapons , for example, you can't kill more than 1-2 fighters per round, while even looking for 20s 20-50 fighters can do 1-2 hits per round. Makes it a much closer fight. You can even step things up a little bit with some weapon swaps and readied charges to amp damage a little when you expect to die, but you want to be careful to prevent full attacks or whirlwinds/cleaves.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I like the assumptions behind 3. 10th level is pretty fantastic, so I think a 3 to 1 fight at that point should be feasible. I struggle to imagine anyone successfully defeating 10 or more opponents in this scenario.

 

[Jawsh]

It seems people have very different expectations about what levels should mean, so here's a poll.

Take a 10th level fighter and N 1st level ones. Put them into a fair fight with no environmental effects. How large should N be for the odds to be 50% on the 10th level one dying?

I take it we're not supposed to crunch the numbers given in any established system, but rather we're supposed to say what we think is realistic?

There's the straight up arithmetic progression:

A level 1 fighter takes on one level 1 guy. A level 2 fighter takes on two level 1 guys. A level 3 fighter takes on 3 level 1 guys.

By level 10, the fighter is only fighting 10 guys. That seems low to me.

Then there's the geometric:

A level 1 fighter takes on one level 1 guy. A level 2 fighter takes on two level 1 guys. A level 3 fighter takes on four level 1 guys. A level 4 fighter takes on eight level 1 guys.

By level 10, the fighter is fighting 512 guys. That seems like a lot to me.

What other sequences are there? How about, let's say Fibonacci's sequence (skipping 0)

Level 1: 1 dude.
Level 2: 1 dude.
Level 3: 2 dudes.
Level 4: 3 dudes.
Level 5: 5 dudes.
Level 6: 8 dudes.
Level 7: 13 dudes.
Level 8: 21 dudes.
Level 9: 34 dudes.
Level 10: 55 dudes. and so on to 89, 144, ...

That feels right to me. I don't know how much it has to do with the actual math so much as a gut feeling, but Fibonacci's sequence seems to fit.

 

[Traveon Wyvernspur]

I didn't get all fancy with the math other than to think it through a bit as to how powerful a 10th level character is vs. level 1 characters. There are quite a few variables involved here. If we are talking melee w/o reach weapons being a factor a character can only be attacked by 8 people at a time at max with the 8 surrounding it. The other thing we need to think about is what kind of attacks/powers/spells are being used by everything and how many hit points the 10th level and the 1st levels have. For example are we talking 4E with a fighter who has a cleaving ability vs a mob of minions (who only have 1 hps each) or fighting an actual NPC that is level 1. This 10th level may be able out 2-3 per swipe or use some other kind of power to stagger a bunch of them. So I say he takes out 30 level 1's before he is brought down. It may be even more if the level 10 has a really high AC and the level 1's can't even touch him w/o rolling 20's...

 

[Hassassin]

I take it we're not supposed to crunch the numbers given in any established system, but rather we're supposed to say what we think is realistic?
[...]
Level 10: 55 dudes. and so on to 89, 144, ...

That feels right to me. I don't know how much it has to do with the actual math so much as a gut feeling, but Fibonacci's sequence seems to fit.

Yeah, that was the idea. (Hence, "should".)

Wow, that's even steeper than 3e, which was geometric with 1/2 steps added (root 2 as multiplier). I really think it gets quite ridiculous.

If ten is too low, I'd rather go with arithmetic and steps of two:

L1: 1
L2: 3
L3: 5
...
L10: 19

Edit: Oh and for grittier play inverse Fibonacci could work. To match 7 lvl 1s you'd need to be level 13. To match 10 you'd need level 55, so there'd be an effective cap.

 

[mmadsen]

This is a great question, but doing the math reveals just how important Lanchester's Square Law can be, if we don't grant the high-level Fighter special powers over and above his general lethality.

If our high-level Fighter always hits and always does enough damage to kill one low-level opponent, and our low-level opponents always get to attack -- let's say they have ranged weapons and don't get in each other's way -- then doubling their numbers more than doubles their threat. Ten mooks will end up making 10 + 9 + 8 + ... + 1 == 55 attacks on the lone high-level Fighter.

Anyway, a 10th-level Fighter who can take exactly 10 hits and only has a 10-percent chance of being hit (i.e. natural 19 or 20), can take out 14 low-level Fighters roughly half the time, and he stands no chance against 20.