D&D 5E Mobs in 5E

[akr71]

I've done similar things with custom swarms. Consider knock down and grapple/ restrain attacks. Since these are townsfolk it depends on how familiar they are with casters. If they know what to do they can throw a sack over a caster's head, bind their hands, gag them.

Also consider some rudimentary tactics while talking into consideration morale. Even if the commoners flee, it doesn't mean the PCs are safe, it just means they proved that the priest is right.

Oh yes, this whole arc is a big grey area where they are just trying to do the 'less wrong' thing. The mayor is a vampire (and the party knows it) who has some long standing grudge against the hag. The dire treant was the hag's curse on the village in an attempt to erode faith in the mayor. The priest is an unwitting pawn of the hag, but wants to do right by the townsfolk.

In a weird twist, the party made a deal with a vampire spawn who wants her freedom from the mayor. She needs to feed from the mayor, but can't do that unless the party subdues him first. She aided in their fight against the treant. They could have just left after defeating the dire treant, but they decided to go back to town. They talked about bringing the head of the treant with them (its as big as a small car), but that's where we ended the session. Which is also why I came up with the mob -> they just killed this town's god and they think they can just parade it about town? Nope. Consequences.

 

[payn]

I guess it depends on the engagement distance. A fireball or two and they'd likely scatter. The mob is not going to fight to the death and really only wants to take the party into custody.

This makes it sound like you dont really need any rules. Unless you think the PCs will go fist to cuffs non-lethal?

 

[akr71]

That won't happen. The PCs, unless the characters are very very good aligned and the players are very very invested in not killing the commoners, will likely kill every last villager, commoner, farmer, etc within miles to prevent themselves from being captured. For good or ill, most gamers seem to see loss of autonomy as worse than character death.

There's always the Monsters Know What They're Doing approach coupled with the knockout rules. The commoners aren't going to be stupid about their attack. Whatever ranged weapons they have, they'll use.

There is that possibility. I know some of the party will balk at that though. I strongly suspect that they will attempt to avoid the mob at all costs, but they've surprised me with stranger decisions. This started as a Halloween one-shot, but their compulsive need to look under every rock and explore every corner has grown it to a 4 or 5 session mini-arc.

 

[akr71]

This makes it sound like you dont really need any rules. Unless you think the PCs will go fist to cuffs non-lethal?

I have been wrong about the party's intensions before. It is best to be prepared, and now I know about the mob rules.

 

[Bolares]

I think the main question here is what story do you want to tell with this?

You want it to be a combat encounter with high chance of TPK or slaughter? You want it to be a social encounter where the party tries to defuse the situation? You want it to be a escape/chase? Depending on where you want it to go you can shape the encounter in different ways (but still preparing for the other possibilities, because players will mess up your plans)...

 

[Shiroiken]

I've found that swarms are much, much easier to use than mobs. In this case I'd probably just use a single gargantuan swarm that attacks everyone in its area. In addition to reducing damage, I'd reduce the size of the swarm at 50% too.
The party isn't going to be able to stay together, since the sheer mass of bodies would force them apart, and I'd use a trait that everyone who starts their turn within it has to make a Str save or be pushed 10 ft in a random direction. Remember also that the HP of the swarm doesn't necessarily correlate to the total HP of the people, since some of the swarm will flee as it gets smaller. If defeated, I'd describe the death of the last human, and 2-3 dozen or so fleeing in various directions (players will likely want pot shots, but it shouldn't matter except for storytelling purposes).

 

[Charlaquin]

There’s the rules for large groups of enemies on page 250 of the DMG. Alternatively, you could create a custom Swarm of Angry Villagers stat block (perhaps a Large or Huge swarm of Medium humanoids) and use one or more of those. If you’ve got a truly enormous number of bodies to deal with, perhaps even combine both.

 

[Stalker0]

Mob Damage Calculator for 5e Dungeons & Dragons

D&D 5e Mob Damage Calculator Use this form to calculate the amount of damage inflicted to a character from a mob consisting of many monsters. See page 250 of the Dungeon Master's Guide for details. Y...

slyflourish.com

For fun I looked at 100 creatures at +0 doing 3 damage (a simple 1d6 +0 damage) vs an AC 18. Came out to 45 damage a round....respectable.

If you want to give them advantage (aka +5) for basically having super flanking.... it comes out to 120. don't underestimate the mob of pitchforks!

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

While combat is certainly modeling something other than flesh damage with HP, it would be strange to have thousands of peasants able to stab at the same target in the span of six seconds. Unlike swarms, made of diminutive creatures compared to a human, once your fully surrounded a larger mob is just... larger, with more people far away. I can see the formula used for mob vs mob fights, or mob vs tarrasque fight, but not really for mob vs a single human fights.

 

[Stalker0]

While combat is certainly modeling something other than flesh damage with HP, it would be strange to have thousands of peasants able to stab at the same target in the span of six seconds. Unlike swarms, made of diminutive creatures compared to a human, once your fully surrounded a larger mob is just... larger, with more people far away. I can see the formula used for mob vs mob fights, or mob vs tarrasque fight, but not really for mob vs a single human fights.

On the flipside, such swarms don't often highlight the crushing weight of falling and having a dozen people literally trampling you. The way to think of it is not so much that the mob does "that much flesh damage", but that you are so completely overwhelming by bodies and attacks that you cannot really defend yourself.

Such HP damage is as much "evasive skill" as it is "flesh points", you can say that your ability to evade them is minimal, which is why do they do so much damage.