[3.5] 5 PCs and two armies

[Lateral]

Okay, this is a thought exercise that I'd like to see people's opinions on. Say there are 5 10th level PCs and they are allies with one side of a war. There is a huge battle, in which both sides have committed their full force.

Assuming that each side has roughly the same number of soldiers, all soldiers are Warriors of between levels 1 and 3, the armies have about 10,000 soldiers each, and none of the PCs are allowed take levels in base classes above tier 3 or prestige classes of +2 tiers, how would you optimize the PCs to assist their army most effectively?

Edit: Forgot to specify. Assume normal WBL, with no one item above 1/3 of total, and all 1st party sourcebooks are allowed. No 3rd party or homebrew, please.

Edit 2: Please, no incredible cheese and no Leadership. I'm looking for realistic builds, not theoretical op.

[enigmatime]

Are all books available to use? What are restrictions on items? Are we allowed to use third party source books?

And we are assuming that we can not use stuff like chronomancy? :smalltongue: (then again, the Chronomancy books I have are AD&D, as well as a questionable 3e book).

Edit: I'll have to get back to you on this. I'll consult my people.

[grarrrg]

5 10th level PCs and they are allies with one side of a war.
all soldiers are Warriors of between levels 1 and 3, about 10,000 soldiers each,


Spoilered for length, and for the fact OP has now excluded leadership.

Note: I am being purposely ludacris, with minimal/no cheese, please follow along. Most of the relevant info can be found here (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20030301a), leadership rules can be found on the SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#leadership)

All 5 PC's are Orcs (Water Orcs if you prefer). All of them take at least 1 level of Barbarian, up to 6 levels of whatever, and 3 levels of "Orc Warlord". All take the feat "Might Makes Right", granting their Str score to their leadership total for purposes of followers. Each Orc has max Str (22) and max Cha (18), both level-up points went into, we'll say Cha.
Each Orc's Leadership score is 20 (10 level, +6 Str, +4 Cha)
Each Orc may now have followers as such:
50 Lvl 1's
5 lvl 2's
3 lvl 3's
2 lvl 4's
1 lvl 5's
Orc Warlord level 3 DOUBLES the number of followers, and there are 5 Pc's, multiply each by 10
500 Lvl 1's
50 lvl 2's
30 lvl 3's
20 lvl 4's
10 lvl 5's
But wait! There's MORE! Each Orc gets a Cohort of level 8, each of which could have 3 levels of Orc Warlord and a Leadership score of 18. Double for Warlord, x5 cohorts...
350 Lvl 1's
30 lvl 2's
10 lvl 3's
10 lvl 4's
AND THAT'S NOT ALL!! Each Cohort can have a Cohort of level 6, each of which could have 1 level of Orc Warlord and a leadership score of 15. Multiply by 5 for co-cohorts, x1.5 for Warlord level 1.
150 Lvl 1's
15 lvl 2's
5 lvl 3's

Add that all together and you have
5 lvl 10's
5 lvl 8's
5 lvl 6's
10 lvl 5's
30 lvl 4's
45 lvl 3's
95 lvl 2's
1000 lvl 1's

1195 total, almost 12% of the starting 10,000, added to one side of the engagement, 55 of which are a higher level than anything the opposing side has.
For the Undefined levels on the PC Orcs and cohorts, throw in some Bard/Marshal/Warblade (white raven), etc...

Edit: Add 3 levels of the Orc Paragon class to get a +2 Str and make the numbers jump even more!


New stat's with 3 levels of Orc Paragon on all PC's and Cohorts
10 lvl 6's
20 lvl 5's
30 lvl 4's
55 lvl 3's
115 lvl 2's
1185 Lvl 1's

1415 total followers. More if you allow the level 6 followers to take leadership...

[Lateral]

You can delete posts, you know.

Anyway... I was kind of looking for realistic scenarios. I wasn't asking for Leadership shenanigans.

[Kamai]

Illusions of really mean beasties could get the opposing army to break formation. A well placed Confusion spell could do the same trick. The scary thought is having a bard which can be heard from far away. +2 to attack and damage for the archers in the army increases the effective engagement ranges, and wears down the other army before they can start doing the same.

Edit: I don't know of a way to get Cloudkill on a T3 caster. If that can be done, it would be very successful at wrecking armies.

[Lateral]

Mmm. I was actually thinking that one of them should be a bard. Definitely with Masterwork War Drums- 1 mile Inspire radius is awesome. Dragonfire Inspiration, too. :smallamused:

[grarrrg]

5 10th level PCs and they are allies with one side of a war.
all soldiers are Warriors of between levels 1 and 3, about 10,000 soldiers each

Take 2:
Class ideas:
Bard > Inspire Courage based.
Warblade with White Raven.
Crusader with White Raven.
2-level dip in Marshal would benefit the Crusader without hurting maneuver progression much (still has 5th level maneuvers)
Dragon Shaman is similar to, but better than the Marshal.
Healer to get the squishies back on their feet (with Touch of Healing Reserve feat)

Theoretical thinking:
Most of the armies are probably made up of level 1's, we can assume no/small Con bonuses, and around a d8 hit die, so 10 hp or less on. So they'll be dropping after 1 or 2 hits.
Some form of cheap/mass healing would be good, to save the soldiers that drop into the negatives, almost doubling most soldiers hp (drop to low negatives, get stabilized/healed back to 1+).
OP said no Tier 1 and 2, so how about a Healer with the Touch of Healing Reserve Feat?

Also, surround the Inspire Courage Bard with as many archers as possible, and rain mass death on the enemy, the attack bonus of IC will help compensate for the range penalties.

[Zaq]

Having a Bard goes without saying. They're the force multiplying class for situations like this. Nothing else even comes close. They shouldn't be anywhere near the front lines, but if they are, Whirling Blade will have awesome results. At night, Summon Elysian Thrush (spell), Healthful Rest (spell), and Healthful Hymn (ACF) accelerate natural healing in a wide area, giving your troops more stamina as the days wear on.

The Marshal is usually a terrible class for more than a dip, but it might be quite effective here. There's no way for them to get the same radius of effectiveness that a Bard can, but even a +2 (or better, DR 2/– for Hardy Soldiers) can really add up when you affect a hundred-plus soldiers with it.

How deep into Frenzied Berserker can you get by level 10? This is a great chance for Supreme Cleave to shine. (Actually, how does Bloodstorm Blade work with Great Cleave? If you can get a thrown Cleave attack for every enemy you drop with a thrown weapon, that could be downright hilarious.) Sure, it's only a matter of time before you suffer the inevitable death-by-a-thousand-cuts that five digits of soldiers (at least some of whom will be archers who can shoot at you) will provide, but hey, at least there's no chance of running out of enemies and turning on your team.

Any caster, even a T3 and below caster, will of course make an enormous difference. A Warmage would actually be a viable choice (sure, Sorcerers are better, but they're banned). A heavily metamagicked Hail of Stone (even just Sculpted, Widened, and perhaps Twinned or Empowered if you can swing it) is almost guaranteed to drop everything it touches, since there's no save and no SR (and thus no nat 20s to avoid it). Even without Empowering it, an unavoidable 5d4 + Edge damage is going to come damn close to killing any level 1-3 Warrior it touches. Any wall-type spells you can get (hint: Arcane Disciple) will be amazingly helpful. A Beguiler will certainly be no slouch . . . sure, some of the enemies will save against the big scary illusion (or other misdirection you put up), but it's still going to have a devastating effect.

It's a real shame that the Dragon Shaman's auras are so damn small. They're great force multipliers when we're dealing with hundreds of soliders, but they can't really compete when we're dealing with thousands of soldiers. The Marshal only gets my consideration because its auras are twice as big (which, while still nowhere near a Bard who can affect the entire goddamn army if he has the right setup) and because Grant Move Action and/or Adrenaline Boost are just that nice when multiplied by an entire platoon. For either Marshals or Dragon Shamans, though, the feat Dilate Aura (FC2) is a must-have.

Ultimately, I think it's the casters who are going to win the day once again. A Beguiler, a Warmage, and a Dread Necro, all of whom are level 10 and intelligently built (I repeat: ARCANE DISCIPLE), can definitely swing the tide one way or another. Add in a Bard and you're damn near certain to win, assuming that the enemy doesn't have anything similarly high-level.