Protecting Troops from Fireball

[Plane Sailing]

The troops don't march forward praying their protections defend them from fireballs, they march foward praying the fireballs land somewhere else.

Excellent comment!

 

[Nail]

... and for those who think fireball is a pain to incorporate into large-scale battles against low level troops...

Please see Savage Species, pg. 65. Earth Reaver.

The look on my poor GMs face when I broke out that spell on a large group of infantry that was moving to engage the group of soldiers under the command of our party...

AoE is 20ft r., +10 ft per level!

So for a Clr 7, that's a 90ft radius spell, 7d6 damage, save or knocked prone as well. Yoowsa.

There's no cap on the size, too. Ouch. My Clr 19 (with some help from my Ioun Stone, Bead of Karma, and Divine Spell Power feat) would be throwing around 300 ft radius ones of these.....and given his Wisdom, he could have 8 of them. Eight 300ft radius spreads for 4d6 impact damage and 3d6 fire damage, Ref save DC 26 or fall prone.

Just for the record, that's 180,955 squares. D'ya think that might cover a battlefield?

Good luck with that, 1st level Warriors.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

No, nothing should ever have the mob mechanic from the DMG 2. It's one of the worst mechanics ever dreamed up by WotC R&D as it completely reverses the effectiveness of nearly all the things PCs can do. Against 29 weaker individuals, Whirlwind Attack, Combat Reflexes, and Great Cleave are the feats your warrior wants, but if you put the mob template on them, suddenly all those feats that are supposed to help a character fight multiple individuals at once become useless (but Power Attack becomes handy). The only place that is not true is magic where area effect damage spells are STILL the order of the day though more interesting spells like cloudkill, circle of death, and wail of the banshee mysteriously cease to function as they should.

The mob template is one of the worst ideas in the history of 3.x and should never be recommended for any reason. (Swarm mechanics are pretty rotten too).

Non-skirmisher military units should always have the Mob template (from DMG2). This almost single-handedly restores them to the primacy they have on the sword & sorcery/epic fantasy battlefield, making them a significant CR challenge for heroic characters.

 

[Shadowbane2]

Excellent comment!

Then I suppose that in a fantasy setting appearing to be well protected might be just as important as actually being well protected.

Just like Vlad the Impaler. A crummy warlord, but was able to appear very powerful to the Ottomans with his 20,000 man forest.

 

[Shadowbane2]

Thats assuming the first fireball doesn't just destroy the typical 5 hardness, 20 hp tower shields. If you want tougher shields the cost will be astronomical on an army scale.

It's just supposed to protect you untill you can menuver into position. (2-5 turns depending where the unit enter battle.) Then, you charge! Or disapper. Or advance. Or make some other productive action.

 

[Errant]

It's just supposed to protect you untill you can menuver into position. (2-5 turns depending where the unit enter battle.) Then, you charge! Or disapper. Or advance. Or make some other productive action.

That's just it, fireballs have 'spread' areas of effect, they go around corners. I can't imagine any shield formation that would present a completely unbroken barrier for a moving/maneuvering body of troops so a fireball would spread through the gaps and make the shields effectively useless. Even if you do grant they present a spread-proof barrier, the shields themselves can be destroyed.

(I did forget that the shields would take half damage from fireballs but that only means they'd take a couple of hits before being destroyed)

 

[Kmart Kommando]

I have used Wall of Force as a counterspell before. You just ready to drop it right in front of the caster as he casts an area effect spell. The fireball bead goes like 5 feet and detonates against the wall.

Forcecage would work as well.

Research a new version of Wall of Force that just makes a 5ft square wall at long range, and instantly screw over your fireball-tossing enemies.

Solid fog is a good delaying tactic, toss that over your enemy.

I read somewhere about groups of troops doing a move, then ready to scatter, rinse and repeat..

I'd have to go with the turtle formation though. There are plenty of feats to support turtle-and-negate-fireball tactics. If there aren't, then why would anyone wage war on someone hiring wizards anyway? Just because it's a fantasy setting, doesn't mean everyone is automatically retarded. :\

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

50 enemy cavalry appear, and

Gets fireballed by the other side's wizard.

There are a number of things here that need to be addressed.

First is the number of wizards. How many wizards can an army of 10,000 field? The best method I can think of to figure that out is to treat that army like a town of 10,000 people, with all the NPC classes being warriors, for the most part. That 11th level wizard with the wand of fireballs is probably one of three for his army - and there will be relatively few NPC wizards below him (the standard is double the number for half the level, IIRC) - less than ten capable of casting fireball (3 around 12th, 6 more around 6th level), though I don't have the books in front of me, and that information doesn't seem to be in the SRD.

Secondly, each of those wizards is going to cost money. What's the cost for blowing up 30-40 men with a fireball? A Wand of Fireballs (CL5) costs 11,250 gp, or 225 gp per charge. Lets assume you get 35 soldiers per fireball. That cost you 6 gp, 4 sp to kill each man. That could buy you a months wages for several footsoldiers, who can kill multiple men over multiple battles.

Thirdly, the other side has wizards, too. If you want to have traditional battle formations, simply declare that the PC-types are busy countering other PC-types - doing commando style raids, etc. If you're paying big bucks for a wizard, is it really worth it to have him mowing down grunt militia?

Take these elements into consideration, and the effects of wizards are seriously mitigated.