Only the Lonely: Why We Demand Official Product

[Maxperson]

Book just says from the ranks. You can have a smallish standing army and still recruit from the ranks.

Dude. It says GREAT WARS. Not raids. Not skirmishes. Not standing armies. Not a relatively few men.

I think our army is around 2000, in WW2 we mobilised 100k. You can still go through the ranks at 2000.

Our standing army before WW2 was a quarter million. We upped it to nearly 1.5 million in 1941 and to over 3 million by 1942. You had a small army. We had the ranks to fight and win a great war.

 

[Maxperson]

Just for the sake of argument, though. Let's assume 2000 dragonborn in the army. That's probably 10% or less of the total population, making the dragonborn population 200,000 or more. That's populous.

 

[Zardnaar]

Dude. It says GREAT WARS. Not raids. Not skirmishes. Not standing armies. Not a relatively few men.



Our standing army before WW2 was a quarter million. We upped it to nearly 1.5 million in 1941 and to over 3 million by 1942. You had a small army. We had the ranks to fight and win a great war.

PHB thing just says great wars. Alexander the Great had 30-40k.

Doesn't mean the Dragonborn make up huge numbers. The Spartans fought in great wars but only had around 5k troops dropping down to less than half that.

It's fluff it's up to the DM if Dragonborn even exist and in what numbers. A single city state would be enough for them to participate in great wars. Well even a village but I'm assuming the can field a few thousand.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Canon pedantry.

 

[Maxperson]

PHB thing just says great wars. Alexander the Great had 30-40k.

Doesn't mean the Dragonborn make up huge numbers. The Spartans fought in great wars but only had around 5k troops dropping down to less than half that.

30,000-40,000 would indicated a population of 10x that, probably more.

The Spartans population was 35,000. They fought in great wars, but did not make up THE ranks of the armies. They only made up some of the ranks, so it's a False Equivalency to bring them up and equate them to what the PHB says about Dragonborn.

It's fluff it's up to the DM if Dragonborn even exist and in what numbers.

Sure. I've already conceded that the DM can home brew them as less populous.

A single city state would be enough for them to participate in great wars. Well even a village but I'm assuming the can field a few thousand.

Sure, but that is also home brewing. The PHB does not say that they make up SOME ranks and participated IN great wars. It says they made up THE ranks of armies in great wars. That means that they make up the entire army that is in the great war.

 

[Maxperson]

Canon pedantry.

English. It has meaning. I don't really care if you(general you) change the PHB fluff and make Dragonborn less populous. As I said, I do that with Warforged. There likely aren't more than 10 Warforged in my entire world. However, as written in the PHB, dragonborn are very populous. They have the numbers to populate an entire army in a great war, and those number would be a small fraction of their population.

 

[Zardnaar]

30,000-40,000 would indicated a population of 10x that, probably more.

The Spartans population was 35,000. They fought in great wars, but did not make up THE ranks of the armies. They only made up some of the ranks, so it's a False Equivalency to bring them up and equate them to what the PHB says about Dragonborn.



Sure. I've already conceded that the DM can home brew them as less populous.


Sure, but that is also home brewing. The PHB does not say that they make up SOME ranks and participated IN great wars. It says they made up THE ranks of armies in great wars. That means that they make up the entire army that is in the great war.

Great wars doesn't mean much in demographs.

And you're making very large assumptions on that sentence in the phb. Never says they are the only ones in the wars.

 

[Maxperson]

Great wars doesn't mean much in demographs.

And you're making very large assumptions on that sentence in the phb. Never says they are the only ones in the wars.

Yes it does. They make up THE ranks. That what "the" means. If a museum has THE Mona Lisa, there aren't more of them anywhere else. If THE Beatles were somewhere, it was all of them. Not some of them. If Dragonborn make up THE ranks, they make up all the ranks, not some of the ranks.

 

[Zardnaar]

Yes it does. They make up THE ranks. That what "the" means. If a museum has THE Mona Lisa, there aren't more of them anywhere else. If THE Beatles were somewhere, it was all of them. Not some of them. If Dragonborn make up THE ranks, they make up all the ranks, not some of the ranks.

Probably taking that a bit to literally. Also implies that someone else is in charge.

Is it your contention that if Dragonborn are around there's great wars and the armies are made up of all Dragonborn?

 

[Maxperson]

Probably taking that a bit to literally. Also implies that someone else is in charge.

There is no such implication. It makes no mention of who the generals are. They could also be dragonborn without conflicting in the slightest with that line.

Is it your contention that if Dragonborn are around there's great wars and the armies are made up of all Dragonborn?

No. My contention is that of all the great wars, dragonborn comprised entire armies in at least some of them. It uses armies plural, so they would have to have been "the ranks" in at least 2 of them. It could be 2 our out of 10, 3 out of 6, 4 out of 5, or 2 out of 1 million. I don't know.