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what do you want in a mass combat system?
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<blockquote data-quote="Altin" data-source="post: 253722" data-attributes="member: 3107"><p>Well, to yank this back in the direction of the orginal poster's question, what I'd like in a mass combat system is something which produces D&D stat blocks for a group. What I essentially need is a Monsterous Manual entry for '20 Archers' which lets me allow PCs interact with '20 Archers' as well as figure out when they interact with '20 infantrymen'. A bit like you could fight swarms of insects in the old D&D as if they were one critter. </p><p></p><p>These units should probably have fairly good BABs to reflect the fact that, when you roll 20d20 in D&D, you should statistically hit anything once (but won't always do so) and they should have hit points which reflect that you need to do a fair bit of killing to eliminate the unit as a threat. The ACs could probably be the same as that of a single individual, the other 'stats' (abilities and saves) the reflections of an average. How you'd do dammage is anybody's guess. I'd probably assume that 20 people concentrating on one guy would hurt like all hell if they were effective (ie. if the unit 'hits') and give them something in the order of five times the base dammage of a single archer (or whatever) and more if they crit. </p><p></p><p>This sort of approach produces a system which makes masses of people more effective than they would be if you ran them mano-a-mano (as it were) but that isn't always a bad thing. Also, it is stupidly, stupidly unrealistic but if you want realism in your combats you've really playing the wrong game and should look into something like GURPS. Most of all, it is quick, easy and makes mass combat fully compatible with the D&D game if in a somewhat arbitrary way which admitedly fits rather poorly with the existing spell system (what happens when a mage casts sleep on a unit? Or some sort of charm effect? I guess you could rule that anything which effects individuals in ways which are complicated to resolve would be more or less wasted on a massed unit but this weakens non-evokers in this type of situation).</p><p></p><p>Anyhow, just some thoughts.</p><p></p><p>Yours,</p><p>Altin</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Altin, post: 253722, member: 3107"] Well, to yank this back in the direction of the orginal poster's question, what I'd like in a mass combat system is something which produces D&D stat blocks for a group. What I essentially need is a Monsterous Manual entry for '20 Archers' which lets me allow PCs interact with '20 Archers' as well as figure out when they interact with '20 infantrymen'. A bit like you could fight swarms of insects in the old D&D as if they were one critter. These units should probably have fairly good BABs to reflect the fact that, when you roll 20d20 in D&D, you should statistically hit anything once (but won't always do so) and they should have hit points which reflect that you need to do a fair bit of killing to eliminate the unit as a threat. The ACs could probably be the same as that of a single individual, the other 'stats' (abilities and saves) the reflections of an average. How you'd do dammage is anybody's guess. I'd probably assume that 20 people concentrating on one guy would hurt like all hell if they were effective (ie. if the unit 'hits') and give them something in the order of five times the base dammage of a single archer (or whatever) and more if they crit. This sort of approach produces a system which makes masses of people more effective than they would be if you ran them mano-a-mano (as it were) but that isn't always a bad thing. Also, it is stupidly, stupidly unrealistic but if you want realism in your combats you've really playing the wrong game and should look into something like GURPS. Most of all, it is quick, easy and makes mass combat fully compatible with the D&D game if in a somewhat arbitrary way which admitedly fits rather poorly with the existing spell system (what happens when a mage casts sleep on a unit? Or some sort of charm effect? I guess you could rule that anything which effects individuals in ways which are complicated to resolve would be more or less wasted on a massed unit but this weakens non-evokers in this type of situation). Anyhow, just some thoughts. Yours, Altin [/QUOTE]
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