What defenders would a large settlement have?

[azmodean]

I am DMing a game with an evil party who wants to take over the world (bwa-ha-ha-ha and all that). I'm trying to come up with some idea what challenges they and their allies would have to overcome in order to take over individual enemy settlements.
One challenge would be to kill or drive off the high-level residents of the settlement, but of course the question then is how many of them are there, what are their classes/levels/etc...

Also I am wondering if there is some way that the lower level inhabitants could be mobilized to drive off attaks or raids by a party of mid-level (party average 11) PCs.

Thanks for your help in advance.

 

[Fynn]

I am DMing a game with an evil party who wants to tak over the world (bwa-ha-ha-ha and all that). I'm trying to come up with some idea what challenges they and their allies would have to overcome in order to take over individual enemy settlements.
One challenge would be to kill or drive off the high-level residents of the settlement, but of course the question then is how many of them are there, what are their classes/levels/etc...

Also I am wondering if there is some way that the lower level inhabitants could be mobilized to drive off attaks or raids by a party of mid-level (party average 11) PCs.


Depends upon how large the settlement actually is, and how much warning they are given. As a standing force (guards, soldier and Noblemans Levies) you would not expect any more than 10% of the population. Most of these will be fairly low level characters and are not likely to pose much of a threat to your evil characters. Any more than this and the drain on resources for the town would become too onerous to support for any period of time. During a seige situation you would temporarily have a lot of retired and inexperienced people joining up to help defend the settlement. Say 30-40% of the population max. Many of these individuals however will be first level with little or no equipment. So the question becomes do the evil characters give the settlement time to organise an appropriate defence? Otherwise, only the standing defence force will be available to fight them...until the resistance movement starts (Viva le Resistance)

If they give the settlement time to get organized even extremely low level characters have the ability to do serious damage in terms of mundane traps for the unwary attackers, EG pit traps, area effects like molotov cocktails thrown from the rooftops, and poisoning the food.

If they had enough warning they could also fire the crops to deny the attacking army the forage, the old "An army walks on it stomach" defence. Your evil characters' allies are not going to want to fight if they are starving and will probably start to desert if the combat becomes protracted. Low level characters because they know they are outclassed will fight extremely dirty so expect them to do things like stampede cattle through the streets, target the evil guys horses and wagons, rig houses to fall into the street, coat all roads with hastily made caltrops and marbles and things like that.

Hope this helps

 

[Tonguez]

You need lots of Druids - miles of entanglement is a major impediment and effective at low levels and it then gives the defenders extra time to plan a defense. Moreover Druids can keep the defenders feed and watered during a seige. You absolutely need trenches, pits, walls an anything else that can keep the bad guys out.

 

[Undead Lincoln]

The settlement might not even try to defend themselves after a sufficiant show of force. At least apparently. If the PCs attempt to stay in the settlement, they might attack in their sleep. They might just accept it and wait for some good adventurers to show.

Alternatly they might have some protector. What if the settlement is currently paying tribute to a red dragon? It could be an interesting encounter depending on who is actually percieved as worse by the townsfolk. It would probably freak the players out to get a welcome as liberators and heros. (And then manipulated into fighting the dragon.)

 

[azmodean]

Traps, of course! That should really help. With a very nature-oriented settlement I can see druids holding off an army, but I just can't see most larger settlements having much in the way of druidic defenders. I'll have to use that idea about the dragon, but just with something besides a dragon. It'll really make this group angry to be seen as the "lesser of two evils".

I guess I should have been more detailed with the current scenario, though. The party burned down some small villages to prove their allegiance to a nation of hobgoblins. (Actually they overdid it a bit, they were sent out to collect some ears for bounties, and ended up torching two entire villages, which has both nations gearing up for war) More recently they strafed the town with a dragon (a ghost in the party got incredibly lucky when he tried to possess the dragon, so they essentially had an adult dragon as a party member for about ten hours (the duration of the possession))

The settlement in question is either a small or large town by the reconing of the DMG, but it is heavily fortified due to it being the settlement nearest to the border with the hobgoblins. The settlement is definitely on it's guard, as it is gearing up for war and was also heavily damaged by the dragon attack. (about 5 minutes long, with a 12d6 lightning bolt going off every 1d4+1 rounds, oh, and did I mention the demons that were tagging along? It was one crazy game.)

I am also interested on people's thoughts of what smaller settlements could do to protect themselves. With anything smaller than a small city, the highest level characters are lower level than my PCs. Is there anything the hundreds or thousands of lower level inhabitants could do to protect themselves from a group of 11th level evil PC types?

Just for clarity, I don't have a problem with my players burning down towns left and right, I just don't want to miss out on an opportunity for an interesting encounter that this situation may provide.

 

[Tonguez]

I am also interested on people's thoughts of what smaller settlements could do to protect themselves. With anything smaller than a small city, the highest level characters are lower level than my PCs. Is there anything the hundreds or thousands of lower level inhabitants could do to protect themselves from a group of 11th level evil PC types?

The people of most small settlements will survive by running away hopefully to the protection of a larger settlement which because this is frontier country ought to have walls and a few magical defenses too (like an annual casting of Hallow ground).
Also being frontier why wouldn't a few druids be available? In fact all you need is one high level druid in the entire district (iirc at around level 17+ some Druid spells (like Earthquake and Storm of Vegeance can be cast at a range of 400 miles!!!!).

 

[NewJeffCT]

I am DMing a game with an evil party who wants to take over the world (bwa-ha-ha-ha and all that). I'm trying to come up with some idea what challenges they and their allies would have to overcome in order to take over individual enemy settlements.
One challenge would be to kill or drive off the high-level residents of the settlement, but of course the question then is how many of them are there, what are their classes/levels/etc...

Also I am wondering if there is some way that the lower level inhabitants could be mobilized to drive off attaks or raids by a party of mid-level (party average 11) PCs.

Thanks for your help in advance.

Well, by historical real world standards, the largest standing army an economy could support would amount to 1/2 of 1% of the population, or .005 of it. So, a city of 10,000 could support a full time standing army of 500.

However, this does not include part-time forces like militia (i.e., every Spring, the city calls up 500 militia to help the standing army deal with the orc hordes that come out of the mountains with the Spring thaws... that call-up lasts for about 1 month, however)

 

[Pyrex]

(iirc at around level 17+ some Druid spells (like Earthquake and Storm of Vegeance can be cast at a range of 400 miles!!!!).

One of us is missing something.

A Long range spell (400' + 40' per level) comes out to 1200' at caster level 20. Which is just over 1/5th of a mile.

If you've found a way to extend spell range by 100x, I'd like to know how...