Balancing the Assassin Devil (Dogai)

[Lord Loss]

I'm running a wargame in which armies of 500-900 soldiers of CRs 1-7 (all equally balanced, more or less) are led by ECL 13 generals.

One of the players is a level 13 Shadowcaster with a good deal of optomization (making optimal use of Killing Shadows and the Dark Reflections path, as well as Flood of Shadow) and a few of Mouseferatsu's fixes applied.

Another wants to play an Assassin Devil (Dogai) from FCII: Tyrants of the Nine Hells. The entry reads as CR 11, giving the creature 14 RHD. I'm not sure how many levels in the Assassin class I should give the creature, as in terms of power it won't be nearly as powerful as a caster in terms of leader of an army. How much LA (Including RHD) would make this creature playable in an adventuring party. Also, would it be more balanced to only count class levels for HP, to give the HP without counting RHD , or somewhere in between.
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The final player will be playing a vampire and either going cleric or blackguard (11 levels).

[Drelua]

This is homebrewed, so I'm not sure how balanced it is, but look near the bottom of the page and see what you think:

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=9557.500

Edit: upon taking a closer look, I realize that this monster class would need some work. (+3 dex and con at level 11?) But I guess all you need is that he seems to think its ECL equals its CR.

[tyckspoon]

I'm.. a little confused. Do you want to know what the actual rules say, or what sort of houserule adjustments you should make to make it actually work? Because 'ECL 13' and 'Level 11 Vampire Cleric' do not mesh, and the RHD alone mean the devil would be ECL 14 before you added any class levels or ruled on a Level Adjustment.

[Lord Loss]

You're right about the vamp, I was accidentally using the CR adjustment instead of the LA one. I guess what I'm asking is how many levels (by Houserule, not RAW) should I give a Dogai and a Vampire to balance them with a level 13 Shadowcaster.

[Urpriest]

I think we had best have some idea of what sort of wargame rules you're using before we comment on balance.

[tyckspoon]

Hmm. That's not an easy question. I'd be tempted to just use the Dogai as written and let it go at that- he'll have an advantage in having more HD than his competitors, and Outsider dice are generally pretty good. Sure, he's not a great leader or information-gatherer, but if your player is looking at something called an Assassin Devil he probably doesn't mind about that. What he will be is a terrifying battlefield presence. If his opponents are relying on any kind of special units to lead or force-multiply their troops (Bards, Marshals, White Raven-using Warblades/Crusaders, etc).. well, they're dead. Ranged units? At-will Fog Cloud and Dimension Door. Basically, give it a chance- if your player is at all clever I think you'll be surprised how effective he can be (but give him the chance to repick the feats and skills, if only to let him customize a bit.)

The vampire is a pretty hard question. Since he's going to be a caster, it basically comes down to what level of spells you want him to have access to, and how powerful you think Create Spawn and Dominate are going to be for him (the other vampire stuff is nice, but not likely to be a major factor in the context of a wargame- it'll pretty much need the other generals to directly counter the presence of another general anyway, and the other two players should have the means to deal with a vampire.) Assuming he's a Cleric, maybe 9 levels? That'll give him access to 5th level magic and hopefully enough actual HD to not get instantly blown up by the other two generals.

[Lord Loss]

Units are bought under the following rules, by CR:

CR 1 (5 Points)
CR 2 (7 Points)
CR 3 (10 Points)
CR 4 (14 Points)
CR 6 (20 Points)
CR 7 (40 Points)

One of th armies (demonic) had fewer unit choices available to him and was allowed to purchase CR 8s at 56 points. Everyone agreed to this.

The players were each assigned 10 000 points. A non-PC spellcaster's maximum level in spellcasting progression is the first level he can cast 3rd-level arcane spells. For instance, a wizard can be level five, a dread necromancer six. From there, templates can be applied or other class levels can be added on, from different classes.

The armies:

Infernal Army: (Newest/Least Experienced Player)

300 Imps (FC II) CR 2
300 Legion Devils (FC II) CR 3
250 Spined Devils (FC II) CR 4
50 Narzugons (FC II) CR 5
10 Pain Devils (FC II) CR 7

(910 Soldiers)

I gave him 120 000 GP to equip himself and his army. He made a few poor choices and declined help when it was offered. His gear is decent, but it's not optimal and he kept no money for tool-type stuff like potions and whatnot, using it all on armor and weapons.

Undead Army: (Most Experienced Player)

CR 1:

100 Troglodyte Zombies
100 Golbin Warrior Zombies (CR 1/2)
48 Wolf Skeletons
6 1st level necromancers.

CR 2:

10 Werewolf Zombies (Hybrid Form)
10 Black Bear Zombies
11 Heavy Warhorse Skeletons

CR 3:

10 Quell (LM)
20 Skin Kites (LM)
20 Ogre Zombies
20 Sample Ghost Brutes (Ghost Hound, LM)

CR 4:

10 Minotaur Zombies
10 Nine-Headed Hydra Zombies
30 Corpse Rat Swarms (LM)

CR 5:

10 Sample Mummified Creature (LM)
50 Elephant Skeletons
50 Megaraptor Zombies
25 Necromancers

CR 6:

10 Bone Drinkers (MM3)
10 Bloodmote Clouds (LM)
20 Sample Evolved Undead (Evolved Wraith, LM)
10 Voidwraiths (LM)
10 Plague Blights (LM)
25 Dread Necromancers

CR 7:

20 Crypt Chanters (LM)
10 Ettin Hooded Pupils (LM)
10 Skirr (LM)
17 Vampire Necromancers

666 Soldiers :smallbiggrin:

Equipment hasn't been bought, but the player's contemplating making a Blackguard or Cleric, with the Vampire Template.

Demonic Army (Has some experienced, not much of an optimizer)


CR 1: 200 Manes (FC I)
CR 5: 100 Bar-Lguras (FC I)
CR 6: 40 Broodswarms (FC I)
CR 7: 50 BovD Babaus (BoVD), 50 Arrow Demons (MM 3), 65 Advanced Ekloids
CR 8: 30 Shadow Demons

His character has been created (Shadowcaster), but he has yet to buy equipment.


The armies are trying to invade a city, but the goals of the Undead (claim magical resources within the city to create Dracolich) only partially conflict with those of the Devil/Demon armies, so alliances are possible. The Devils want to enslave the population and take over the city whereas the Demons want to drag them off to the abyss and sacrifice them all.

[Urpriest]

So how are you handling mass combat? Using Heroes of Battle, or Miniatures Handbook, or some other ruleset?

[Lord Loss]

We're going to be running skirmishes/battles with rules akin to those in the D&D Minis games (Boxed minis, not sure if they're the same as in Minis Handbook).

For the non-combat phases, each turn is a few in-game hours where each player tells me what he wants to do and the PCs can communicate through magical communication or emissaries. Combats are resolved through, well, combat and skill based things are resolved through skills. For stealth, the observers use the highest listen/spot check amongst them +1 for every additional sentinel and those attempting to use stealth use the highest move silently/hide check amongst them, -1 for every additional spy or assassin and +4 if they are alone.

We hadn't given this much thought, so advice is appreciated, but for combat the gist of things is that each turn, one, a few, or many (we're not sure) take their turn, then it's the next player's turn. The process repeats itself until evey unit has taken a turn. Initiative checks will feature somewhere in here, and each battle will be played out completely. As you probably guessed, none of us have wargamed. Like, ever. We've all played a few RTS games and I've played the D&D Minis wargame once or twice. That's it.

Please Help? I don't know much about wargaming and our rules probably suck (I have no idea what to do for initiative) :smalleek: