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General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Ship to Ship Crew Combat Options
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<blockquote data-quote="77IM" data-source="post: 7788143" data-attributes="member: 12377"><p>I like your reasoning, but I think you should scale the HP and damage by the number of crew members. 10-40 is just too big of a spread. Swarms typically do half damage when they are at half hit points, although I think a better idea is to give them multiple attacks.</p><p></p><p>So you could do something like: The swarm has X hit points per 10 crew members, and 1 attack per 10 crew members. This lets you very easily represent crews of different sizes. E.g. if the PCs have 24 crew members, they get 2X hit points and can make 2 attacks; if you're repelling a longboat with 80 vikings, the enemy crew has 8X hit points and can make a whopping 8 attacks. (I think that 8 attacks is not too many, but YMMV.)</p><p></p><p>I feel icky about the resistance/vulnerability based on effect area. I'd just say "resistant to single-target attacks; vulnerable to area effects" and leave it at that. Things that are neither attacks nor area effects deal normal damage (e.g. <em>magic missile</em>, ending your turn next to a <em>flaming sphere</em>, etc.).</p><p></p><p>I also don't like the area-effect archery volley. If you go the route of multiple attacks, then a large swarm can just target multiple people.</p><p></p><p>You could actually make this a restriction on the multiattack: "The swarm makes 1 attack per 10 crew members, but can't attack the same target twice." This lets your 24-person crew live a little longer against the 80-person longboat, while making the enemy crew into more of a hazard for the players. A slightly softer restriction would allow them to attack the same target twice, but not 3 times, or maybe each attack against the same target after the first is at disadvantage (because it's hard for all the attackers to reach the target).</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="77IM, post: 7788143, member: 12377"] I like your reasoning, but I think you should scale the HP and damage by the number of crew members. 10-40 is just too big of a spread. Swarms typically do half damage when they are at half hit points, although I think a better idea is to give them multiple attacks. So you could do something like: The swarm has X hit points per 10 crew members, and 1 attack per 10 crew members. This lets you very easily represent crews of different sizes. E.g. if the PCs have 24 crew members, they get 2X hit points and can make 2 attacks; if you're repelling a longboat with 80 vikings, the enemy crew has 8X hit points and can make a whopping 8 attacks. (I think that 8 attacks is not too many, but YMMV.) I feel icky about the resistance/vulnerability based on effect area. I'd just say "resistant to single-target attacks; vulnerable to area effects" and leave it at that. Things that are neither attacks nor area effects deal normal damage (e.g. [I]magic missile[/I], ending your turn next to a [I]flaming sphere[/I], etc.). I also don't like the area-effect archery volley. If you go the route of multiple attacks, then a large swarm can just target multiple people. You could actually make this a restriction on the multiattack: "The swarm makes 1 attack per 10 crew members, but can't attack the same target twice." This lets your 24-person crew live a little longer against the 80-person longboat, while making the enemy crew into more of a hazard for the players. A slightly softer restriction would allow them to attack the same target twice, but not 3 times, or maybe each attack against the same target after the first is at disadvantage (because it's hard for all the attackers to reach the target). [/QUOTE]
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