That's just flat out false. You may not agree with the evidence, but there is evidence.
Same response as above. There is evidence, even if you don't agree with it.
You have provided no evidence. Only your opinions.
My opinion is based on game facts called rules.
So you can quote a game rule that explicitly supports the statement in question? It was this one, in case you've forgotten: "Mercenaries prefer not to fight. They want easy patrol jobs and guarding places that are unlikely to see much action. They're going to avoid almost certain death like the plague."
So, please, quote me the game rule that tells me that mercenaries prefer to get hired for easy jobs.
You're conflating people who like to fight with simple mercenaries. And Discworld? Really? A humorist, albeit a brilliant one who is worth reading every book of his, is not a shining example. LOL
Again, lots of conflation going on. It's like claiming that Norse berserkers are an example of why mercenaries who just want to get paid and not risk their arses, love battle.
You claimed that mercenaries (people who get paid to do jobs involving violence) avoid fighting whenever possible. I said that there are fantasy tropes of mercenaries who love fighting.
Now, you want to claim that "people who like to fight" shouldn't be conflated with "people paid to fight" because... why? Clearly those two things are not mutually exclusive, clearly someone who loves to fight would seek ways to be paid to fight, so they could support themselves doing the thing they enjoyed. And it is a relatively common trope.
Is their some rule that "people who like to fight" can't be called mercenaries? After all, I never claimed that every single mercenary ever was like this, only that it is a common trope. So, what is your problem with it?
Are you saying that because they are not involved in government sponsored war against another nation or because you just refuse to use that term for "people hired on a contract basis to use violence to solve problems"?
I don't really care about your definition of mercenary, you realize, because I know you are going to make it hyper-specific and fit only a narrow band of exactly what you want it to fit, but you must realize that adventurers check all the boxes for being a mercenary.
Nope. There was no personal attack, nor any sort of slippery slope. Nothing I said implied things would get worse and worse if you did something.
"Because you did Y thing I don't like, let's go even more extreme and do ZZZ because that follows you doing Y"
All slopes have an end, and you are implying that I did not consider why I did the math the way I did. A complete lie, since I have told you repeatedly why I did so.
If you hire them as a scout, then they are going to scout. Good like trying to find 30 scouts who all want to stop scouting and get into a fight to the death for 6 gold a day.
Again, based on no evidence except assuming that the title is all they can possibly be. Your position is still weak and lacking any sort of support.
Are you honestly saying that all types of NPCs are listed in that very, very small list of NPC jobs?
You seem to honestly think that if they don't have the right job title they can't do the job. And you are quite adamant that the job exists and that you have a pay scale for it. Now you are claiming that it doesn't exist. Therefore you don't need to support your position with any facts.
Have the DM make it. Oh. Nevermind. I found the mercenary stat block. It's ridiculously high, though, so I wouldn't use it as a DM and I wouldn't recommend you do it, either. The price would skyrocket from where I've been saying. It's in the MM under the listing veteran.
"Veterans are professional fighters that take up arms for pay or to protect something they believe in or value. Their ranks include soldiers retired from long service and warriors who never served anyone but themselves."
They are 9 hit dice and a full CR 3. That's going to be some serious spensive to hire 30 CR 3 dudes with 9 hit dice.
So they aren't mercenaries who can be hired for 2 gp, the thing I asked for. Remember, you've claimed that there is a "bottom of the barrel" mercenary that can be hired for 2 gp. And now you conveniently can't find it.
So, the rules allow for mercenaries to be hired for 2 gp, and then there is no mercenary that could possibly be hired for 2 gp. The only mercenaries in the book would cost, oh let's see you hate me using CR, so I'll use HD. HD 9 means level nine, your third level character won't get out of bed for less than 18 gp a day, I'll round to make it easier (note, I am doing this for ease, yes I could do it exact, but also leveling isn't a straight line, a 5th level character is multiple times more powerful than a 4th level character, so a straight additive measure would likely not be accurate anyways) so tripled the rounded number is 60 gp a day.
So, the rules are wrong. The only mercenaries you can hire cost 60 gp a day, minimum. Man, these guys are rolling in the cash.
Think about that for a moment. Stronger than guards, people paid to actually fight. As sell as bandits and tribal warriors. That's elite.
Guards are paid to police, not to fight. Saying a soldier in the army is better in a fight than a cop isn't saying that you are dealing with an elite soldier. Bandits are generally desperate peasants or deserters, beating them also isn't an elite.
Tribal warrior is tricky, and generally, I hate that it exists. But, a lot of the stuff in the game takes the position that "tribal" makes them worse than normal. Beating them doesn't make them elites.
Yes, seriously. Adventurers are much better than common mercenaries or even scouts once they get a few levels under their belts.
Right. Which my model shows too. But also, you've shown that your earlier objections are completely baseless. You objected to the 5th level troll hoard offering 3,000 gp, but you have a standard adventure for a 3rd level party earning them half that.
By 5th level, that hoard I was referencing is just going to be their standard pay for an adventure.
Lords don't suffer numerous cuts and bone breaks like gladiators do. Massive medical costs and good treatment would combine to make gladiator upkeep for more expensive than some lord paying to have some good food and some entertainment.
If only there was magical healing available.. oh wait. There is. And with healing potions being instant, there would logically be slower versions of them that would be a 1/5 or less the price. I mean, it is only logical.
Countries don't "hire" armies in the same manner as adventurers. You get drafted or you volunteer because you are poor as dirt and you suffer whatever they will pay, which is far less than you are worth.
Interesting. So, you remember that an origin for scouts is that they worked for the army right? USed to getting paid far less than they are worth. So... why won't they take 6 gold a day, which is likely far more than the army paid them, again?
Oh right, because you want to tell me that I'm wrong.
Played 30 of them at a time did you? I mean, talk about a massive False Equivalence. One dude with a bow in a tight dungeon corridor is the same as 30 dudes with bows in a tight dungeon corridor!! Edit: Sorry, 34-36 dudes. I forgot the party there.
Further edit: If you want to continue this conversation, please PM me with your answer. We can finish there.
Didn't see this til the end, but I really don't have an interest in continuing this. You clearly have no interest in doing anything except making things up to support your own view that I'm wrong, and none of this actually applies to the point I was making. Which is still unchanged
