Whats the CR/ECL of 400 Kobolds?

[Numion]

Surprize doesn't matter anyway. How many could you kill in a round? The rest rush in and do some damage. PCs are still shoe-ins to win, but they will have to do more than blink. Hence the CR. Why do you keep skipping that point?

Overcoming a challenge doesn't necessarily require a fight. Read the DMG for examples. Why do you keep skipping that point?

 

[Bauglir]

Why are the kobolds kamikaze anyway?

Noone expects the kobolds to win yet they always fight to the end without trying to negotiate with the players..

 

[Hypersmurf]

Noone expects the kobolds to win yet they always fight to the end without trying to negotiate with the players..

Can't speak for the kobolds, but IMC the Goblin Resistance managed to extract a promise of aid from the PCs in their struggle to free their people from the tyranny of the Hobgoblin Empire.

Sure, they're evil... but they're disorganised as well, so they'd make less threatening neighbours than the hobgoblins...

-Hyp.

 

[LokiDR]

Sure I do, but I also appreciate that in these cases I'm not just fighting my opponent, I'm fighting the situation (to some degree). Any situational modifiers significant enough to make kobolds a threat to a 13th level party will easily be the dominating factor in the challenge presented.

I don't believe that. If it were true, 10 kobolds would be nearly the challenge of 400. The small group just can't do the volume of fire the larger can, and that is important tatical difference.

And the cash supply of a single CR 13 NPC

Your PC wouldn't be very powerful without their equipment, would they.

Wouldn't be a good brainstorm without the dumb situations

I suppose so. I still wouldn't want to run the encounter.

Granted, but the challenge presented by the 399 others is near negligible alongside that sorcerer. Like I said in an early post they could all be illusions and fill more or less the same function.

No, the others can dog-pile and disrupt the the party the way illusions never could. Even if a decent portion of them just ready to disrupt spellcasting, they are a huge difference. Illusions can't cause damage.

 

[LokiDR]

No, they are not, according to the treasure rules. Read DMG p. 171 under "NPCs with Treasure". NPCs are characters "worth about three times the average value of a treasure"... if kobolds have "Standard" treasure, then they do not qualify as NPCs in the context of this rule.

The lot of them are a CR 13, and the average "standard" treasure for a CR13 is 13,000 gp. If you want to give them 3 times that in equipment, the scales just tip in favor of the kobolds.

 

[LokiDR]

Overcoming a challenge doesn't necessarily require a fight. Read the DMG for examples. Why do you keep skipping that point?

And you can defeat the kobold in all cases without a fight and without spending any resources?

You are ambused, they get off shots, you say "wait, lets talk" you have at least lost some hit points. Statistically, they can do enough damage to kill in that open round. I would call that resources used.

 

[LokiDR]

Why are the kobolds kamikaze anyway?

The same reason they have no allies, leaders, traps or a lair?

Perhaps they are compelled. 1 vampire could dominate the lot of them. The setup IS stupid, but the kobolds are dangerous none the less.

 

[Bauglir]

The same reason they have no allies, leaders, traps or a lair?

Fair point

 

[green slime]

As to the point about the traps and equipment:

Each individual kobold earns the PCs zero XP. (CR 1/6 for 13th level party)

Each individual trap, created by these kobolds earn the PCs zero XP (Max CR3 traps for 13th level party)

When you put it all together, in a situation determined by the DM and interacted with by the players who make decisions on how to act/react according to their resources, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

This is how you can have a collection of traps, leaders, and 400 CR 1/6 Kobolds come out to be about CR 13.

 

[Corlon]

in some book, it might be savage species or...mabye it was the monsters hand book or something, but it gives a template for "swarms" meaning a pack of 400 kobolds = one creature with special grappling and attacking abilities that makes it easier to handle than...400 kobolds

I didn't read this entire thread, so I'm not sure if this has been mentioned, just my thoughts.