How would your characters contribute against this army?

[JaronK]

Since we were having fun in the Monk thread with this concept, here's the basic deal: using characters from levels 6-15, show how you'd contribute in the following scenario (it's one of the scenarios hinted at in the tier system, by the way). You don't have to win outright by yourself... it's more of a free form "hey, how would you deal with this" thing. If you want, you can ask things like "if I roll X on this knowledge or gather information check, how much do I know?" and similar. Likewise, feel free to ask other details I might have forgotten to mention. So, here's the basic scenario. And try to restrict yourself to things you think your party would know. Note that the scenario is harder if you're higher level (as outlined below). And feel free to decide how characters in real games you're currently playing in might do in such a scenario (I'm really curious... I know my current game is horribly over optimized and we'd crush this scenario, but other games I've played in have been much weaker and we'd barely do better than the local garrison).

In fact, this would be most fun if people don't make custom characters for this scenario, but rather use characters they've used in games (or are currently using) to see how they do. Heck, feel free to make parties among yourselves to see how the parties do.

General Army Makeup:

The basic idea is that you're in a town on the norther border of the main country you've been in, and you learn that there's a massive Orc army that's gathering steam and headed your way. You've got about two weeks before they hit. How would you fight them? The army is melee focused with a high number of Barbarians that would likely focus on attacks at night (being Orcs). Special teams would include a few Bards with War Drums (some use Bagpipes and Alphorns) to boost the main army and intimidate the enemy (and pass on basic orders via the drum beat), a scouting and commando team made of of Scout/Barbarians (including a few Water Orcs who can do commando water crossings, and a few Orcs mounted on flying mounts such as Dire Bats), a few siege engines to pound through walls, and archers (likely Goblins) that use spotters and the volley fire rules in Complete Warrior to keep the enemy's heads down while the melee forces close. Their casters (a limited number) focus on wide area buffs where possible as well as crowd control spells to supplement the main push during the fight, and focus on keeping the army in good health during the approach, and are mostly divine casters unless the PCs are very high level in which case there's Kobold Sorcerers. There's also mounted troops, in the form of heavy cavalry Orc Fighter/Barbarians and lighter outrider Orc Barbarians who use composite shortbows to harass enemies and cause distraction. Against higher level PCs, the Outriders ride Dire Bats, and the heavy cavalry rides huge, savage mounts... in lower levels they're all on Dire Wolves. At higher levels, there are other monsters mixed in with the army, such as Ogres and Giants and Gnolls.

Standard troopers are Warriors and Barbarians, generally equipped with Great Axes and Slings, along with Hide Armor (at low levels) or Breastplates (at higher levels). They also wear cold weather outfits and furs, if that matters, and have basic tools for survival. Generally they'll have ranks in Survival, Listen, and Climb, as they're barbarians who've been surviving in the wild north for a long time.

Army Logistics

Depending on the level of the encounter, logistics support may be in the form of the Barbarians and Scouts foraging via Survival at low levels while Adepts and Druids and Clerics keep food supplies pure and such and food is stored in a well guarded wagon train, or at higher levels the use of magic items can feed the entire army without trouble an Everfull Basin and Everfull Larder, kept safe in extra dimensional space by a few of the commanding officers... most likely that's the Cleric and his retinue.

Army Leaders

Higher level special characters can be found through the army, including a Half Minotaur Orc War Hulk who often leads the main charge, a high level Orc Bard who leads the drummers and thus provides a better bonus with his Inspire Courage than the rest (and who plans the strategies in advance), and a shock trooper who's an Orc Warlord/Horizon Walker 1 and leads his elite force of Barbarian/Horizon Walker 1 Orcs. There's also an Orc Cleric of Grummish who uses divinations to get a basic idea of whether their attacks will be successful and leads his group of Adepts, Clerics, and Druids, and of course an Eye of Grummish is another officer. There's also a Water Orc Scout/Barbarian who leads the scouting and commando teams. An Ogre Mage may show up against higher level PCs, along with his troop of Ogres, while at very high levels a dragon is involved and has a troop of kobolds laying traps about the battlefield and providing Sorcerer spell support as well as sabotaging the village defenses. Each of these special characters leads their own fragment of the army (as it's actually an alliance of tribes), so killing the special characters and then focusing on their troops for a bit can potentially fragment the army when combined with morale hits and the like. Generally there should be about as many special characters as there are characters in the party. Each special character leads about 1000 troops, most of which are Warriors and Barbarians but each has their own special team. More on that if people can scout the special teams better.

Army levels

The levels of all of these are dependent on the PCs. Generally, standard troopers are about half the level of the PCs or 4 levels behind, whichever is higher. Officers are around the level of the PCs. Monsters have a CR equivalent to the level of the PCs with a few being higher and a bunch being lower. Some monsters only show up in the PCs are higher level (Giants, a dragon, an Ogre Mage).

Army Tactics (Don't read this unless you have a way of finding this out in advance!)

The general tactics they plan to use involves moving into position at night outside the town walls, then fortifying there that night while they set up siege weapons (at higher levels, they'll use a Lyre of Building to quickly create basic dirt walls, at lower levels they'll do it with manpower). All the while they'll be playing loud war drums, making it hard for anyone to sleep. That day they'll rest, but they'll still direct war drums and Alphorns at the town to prevent sleep (they're more used to these sounds, so they can sleep okay with this going, and the horns are somewhat directional). The next night they'll attack, most likely using siege weapons with flaming ammunition along with (at higher levels) Giants throwing rocks to hit any walls that have been set up while still playing the drums while the Water Orc commandos swim across the water (see below for the basic layout of the village) and try to cause disruption in the rear ranks before retreating again. Then the main attack will commence while volley fire from their archers (with the targets lit up by the flaming siege ammo that's already landed) and at higher levels dropped flaming attacks from the flying cavalry supports that attack. They'll rush in and try to overwhelm the defenses in one major hit that takes less than 30 minutes, hoping the arrow fire and the disruptions from behind have pulled some defenders out of position, then clean up, loot and pillage, and move on. Augery spells will tell them if it's a good idea to attack... if those indicate failure, they'll feint an attack while doing more commando raids, then try again. At least, that's their plan. What the PCs do could change things, as the Orcs do have some scouting abilities (they'll have some scouts up on the mountains looking down with spyglasses at the very least).

General Makeup 2

The overall army feels like a barbarian horde that smashes through the enemy. Generally, more savage classes are used... Scouts and Wilderness Rogues are their scouts, Barbarians make up the majority of their melee classes (though some Tiger Claw Warblades might show up), Sorcerers are their arcane support (only if the dragon is there), while Adepts, Druids, and Clerics with the right domains are the divine support (there's more divine casters than arcane casters, and many are Half Orcs due to the better Wisdom). There's of course NPC classes running about (mostly Warriors and Adepts, with some Commoners that just handle basic needs like tending to animals and packing up tents and such). Note that your character won't know much about their tactics unless you have the right skills for it. Gather Information checks could reveal the general tactics they use, or with a really good check might reveal information about the officers and the forces they command. Knowledge History checks could tell you about traditional orc tactics, or a really good check could tell you how the officers of this army like to fight (if your Gather Information check told you that). Knowledge Nobility and Royalty could tell you about some of the officers, as could Knowledge Local.

The Village of Highpass

As for the village, it was once a fort that protected the north lands from the Orc hordes. But decades of peace and the position of the village as a perfect spot on the trade route meant the village expanded well past the fort borders, and the walls of the fort were cannibalized in many places for the houses of the people who lived there. A river runs along the west side of the town, providing some security along that border (but the Water Orc Scouts will likely make a commando raid from that direction, which the PCs may not be prepared for), while the valley the town sits in means it's most likely that the primary attack will come from the north or east (it's not easy for the enemy army to circle to the south). There's plenty of forest lands in the area as well as farm land, and the nearby mountains have a good bit of stone if you can use it. There's still a town guard and the king has sent a detachment to help with the local defense (they're pretty much all the same level as the enemy troopers), but a major army can't be raised quickly enough to provide serious support, so the village will be heavily outgunned without the PCs to help. There's also a decent number of Commoners and Experts who could be pressed into service as militia forces, but they're untrained so it would take a good bit to make them actually useful for anything more than pre fight constructions. The town absolutely does not have prismatic walls or anything like that. The old fort walls were made of superior masonry (but, as stated before, have been cannibalized in parts and will need repair to be made useful again). You could make walls out of stone with the right abilities if you wanted.

Local soldiers

The local town guard is made up primarily of Urban Rangers and Experts, equipped with Chain Shirts and Longspears or Lucerne Hammers, and they've got Longbows or Light Crossbows they could pull out if they had to. There's also a garrison of soldiers here that normally patrol to keep bandits and highwaymen off the trade roads, made up of heavy cavalry (Knights, Paladins, Crusaders, and Fighters on Heavy Warhorses with Full Plate Barding and Full Plate Armor, using Lances and Heavy Shields) and light outriders (Rangers and Targeteer Fighters using Composite Shortbows and Chain Armor on Chain Barded Heavy Warhorses). They're the same level as the enemy army (half the PC level or 4 levels lower than PC level, whichever is higher). Generally, there's 1 guardsman for every 10 enemy soldiers and an equivalent number of garrison cavalry). There's also twice that number (2 per 10 enemy soldiers) of Experts and Commoners who could be convinced to fight if you can get their morale up, but they're not well trained so you'd have to figure out how to use them effectively. They could also be used for manual labor. The garrison is lead by a Marshal who's the same level as the PCs, and who's a older veteran who's competent as a soldier but a bit of an ass (hence being relegated to this outpost). He'll gladly work with the PCs if they seem to know what they're doing.

Additionally, if you can hold out for a week after the Orcs show up a detachment of the king's army will show up to help, with 1000 men. These are mostly Warriors and Fighters in Breastplates with Lucerne Hammers and Longbows, but they have bard support (Bards with Trumpets) as well as a few Marshals, and a small elite force of 100 Crusaders. Hold out longer than that and more reinforcements will show up, steadily getting larger and larger, while the Orcs are liable to fall apart if stalled for too long (they're there for victory and aren't accustomed to sieges).

JaronK

[ArcturusV]

I'll tackle this one in a bit with my last DnD character... but I have to artificially inflate her to level 5, as I stopped short of that goal due to... well... bad DMing. But I'm interested in seeing how Tsundaki would handle it. Not going to be terribly optimized though due to me being too lazy to borrow enough books to look through everything, and a relatively low tier class.

[JaronK]

Note the scenario was for level 6-15, so inflate her by one more level! If you want you could group her up with a few more players and have a proper party for it.

JaronK

[ArcturusV]

Oops, level 6 then.

Though having some whipped up party members for it almost seems... wrong. Less "What would Tsundaki do" and more "What would theoretical wizard, Cleric, Fighter, and Tsundaki do", etc. If that makes sense. I mean I'm probably not going to come up with some way for her to solo the army, not in the least. Just want to see how much impact she can make.

Though having backup from a Scout, Ranger, Druid, etc, would have all been nice. Though probably would far outshine Tsundaki's contributions.

[Yuukale]

Jaron, how should I post my character reply to this?

I want to contribute with my faithful swift hunter. I played with him up until 13th and is kind of my alter-ego =)
He'll likely focus on disrupting their scouts and sentries, preferably killing the Scout leader.

or... Arcturus, we could form a party right here right now

[JaronK]

Honestly, it's perfectly fine to say "here's what my character is (roughly) and here's what I'd try." I can give you back whether I think it would work or not, and you can feel free to ask for specific details if they'd be relevant. This isn't a competition, more of a free form thing.

If you want, you could do things like make various checks and ask what the result might be of that. But it's also fine to say things like "he has a hide bonus of +10 at level 6, how would he do?" and I can give answers like "from the position you describe he'd be fine, with a roughly 10% chance of getting picked up via scent by the patrolling dire wolves."

This is more of a thought experiment than a real game, so feel free to play around.

Also, I'm totally open to suggestions for how to make this scenario more fun (I do like to use it on players who prefer a more wargame style).

If you pick a level, I can give you a more specific set up for the commando leader (he's the guy who leads the main scouts). Or you can tell me how you plan to gather info on him and I can tell you as much as you'd know based on that.

JaronK

[Fortuna]

Let me see... I have two characters, one of whom is a bit unusual. I'll set them both against it.

First contender is Aleus, a level 9 spontaneous cloistered cleric with a significant social bent. With his ranks in Knowledge (History) (it made sense at the time) he can probably guess at the general composition of the army based on major powers in the region and a knowledge of how orcish armies tend to be put together. Not only that, but with his Lore class feature he can almost certainly recall stories of this particular horde, and maybe even glean a few tactics. We'll assume for the sake of fairness that he rolls 10 on each check, which is 25 on Knowledge and 23 on Lore - if you want to give me more specific results from that, I'll give you specific countertactics he might employ.

Even without that knowledge, however, he's still capable of rallying the townsfolk. With his +20 to Diplomacy he'll ensure that every man, woman and child does their part to build up walls, prepare fallback points, and generally do whatever they can to protect their homes. Knowledge (History) may help here again, allowing him to suggest tactics and defences that have been effective in similar situations in the past.

All of that, of course, leaves aside Aleus's greatest asset - his spells. With Sending he can make contact with any major enemies of the orcs besides the kingdom being defended and ask them for assistance - if they're willing to provide it, and have any individuals of particular power, he may be able to use Teleport to collect them for the effort. Divination allows him to learn in advance which defensive tactics will serve best against the oncoming horde. Speak With Dead, if he can find an orcish casualty from previous engagements, can provide specific information on the army's composition. Stone Shape can be used to produce sheer stone walls in appropriate places. When it comes to the actual battle his ability to contribute will be sadly limited - about the extent of it would be Summon Monster, Hold Person and perhaps an opportune Enthrall or two, as well as Obscuring Mist and Prayer to sow confusion and assist the defenders. Depending on the nature of the siege, he may be able to use Augury to vet defender deployments. Of course, this leaves out his last and most daring possible tactic...

Aleus is a changeling, you see, and quite capable of adopting an orcish form if it suits him. While not trivial, it would certainly be possible for him to attempt an infiltration of the army - Divine Insight would allow him to succeed at key bluff checks. Once in an advantageous position - somewhere within arm's reach of the enemy leaders - he can attempt to cast Hold Person in the surprise round and Teleport away with one of their greatest assets, or just with himself if the save is passed. In the process he could gather valuable information about the army's composition. The greatest flaw with this plan is his inability to speak Orcish and his lack of the Tongues spell (and I have cursed the lack of that spell many times, I can assure you). Most likely he would need to pretend to be mute or similar in order for this ruse to work, and it would be risky in any event. I include it here only for completeness.

I also include a link (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=441695) to his character sheet. Note that he has Able Learner despite being neither human nor doppelganger - since changelings are supposedly the offspring of the two, this seemed reasonable to me. Versatile Shapeshifter is a homebrew feat whose capabilities I left out of this discussion.

My other character, Feiliacan, is a gestalt level 11 character with unusually permissive rules regarding monster characters, and as such would probably be pitted against the uppermost reaches of this challenge. He is an adapted faerie dragon (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon-faerie). Unlike Aleus, he has no real way to contribute to knowledge about the army beyond scouting... but he is very capable of doing that. With a high Fly speed (at perfect manoeuvrability to boot) and Tiny size, he can easily do flyovers of the army to get a rough idea of composition. At nighttime he can easily evade sentries with his Hide and Move Silently checks being what they are, using this ability to sneak through the camp for more precise counting, or if need be wetwork. If he catches an enemy off-guard he can combine Hunter's Eye with a volley of Scorching Rays (courtesy of Cunning Surge) to deal 38d6 damage to his chosen target in a single round with ranged touch attacks before flying off upwards, leaving the camp with a sea of Black Tentacles and his chosen target with another 19d6 fire damage as a parting gift. After the first night he probably won't have so easy a time of it, although despite the best precautions the army will be hard-pressed to spot him even if he doesn't choose to deploy his Greater Invisibility racial ability, so repeating this against high-value targets on successive nights is entirely possible. The chaos resulting from the night attacks (and possible leader deaths) should significantly slow the oncoming army as well, though maybe not enough to allow reinforcements to arrive. If he chooses to be a bit more subtle about it (and with his Intelligence score how it is, there's no reason not to), he can use Major Images of the leaders to sow distrust among them, making their eventual disbanding that much faster - Divine Insight will help with the required Bluff checks, pushing his modifier into the high thirties, and his few psionic powers are ideally suited to exactly this sort of play.

Assuming that the army ever arrives after he subjects them to that array of confusion, his contribution to the battle will be much more tame. Stinking Cloud and Black Tentacles will render bottlenecks no-go zones, and he can attempt his death ray attack against any leaders or casters making themselves too obvious.

Once again, his sheet (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=510158) - due to the array of abilities which he has, I store everything but the most basic stuff separately. It's copied into the spoiler below for convenience.
Spellcasting
Caster Level 11
Cantrips - 6 per day, DC 18

Dancing Lights
Ghost sound
Mage Hand
Open/Close
Detect Magic
Light
Prestidigitation
Acid Splash
First level spells - 8 per day, DC 19

Grease
Silent Image
Obscuring Mist
Unseen Servant
Ray of Enfeeblement
Second level spells - 8 per day, DC 20

Locate Object
Blur
Minor Image
Scorching Ray
Divine Insight (Advanced Learning)
Hunter's Eye (Advanced Learning)
Third level spells - 8 per day, DC 21

Major Image
Slow
Stinking Cloud
Fourth level spells - 6 per day, DC 22

Black Tentacles
Unluck

Manifesting
Manifester level 7, 35 pp per day
First level powers - DC 18

Psionic Charm
Mindlink
Telempathic Projection
Know Direction And Location
Attraction
Compression
Second level powers - DC 19

Read Thoughts
Psionic Suggestion

Martial Manoeuvres
6 manoeuvres known, 4 manoeuvres readied, 1 stance known
Manoeuvres (those marked with [R] are typically readied)

Distracting Ember
Shadow Jaunt [R]
Moment of Perfect Mind [R]
Mind Over Body [R]
Action Before Thought [R]
Counter Charge
Stances

Assassin's Stance

So yeah. That's how my characters would deal with it. How'd I do?

[Togo]

I can contribute:
Teplin, a gnomish ranger/MoMF
LeThey, a wizard alienist (not optimised)
Durian, a small dwarf with a big axe
Canarius - a human barbarian/marshal

as my own characters that I know well, that would work well at the 12-13 scale.

I'm also happy to scale up previously played characters, such as Shasa the bard/ seeker of the song and Svirikiki the sahaughin master thrower. That would take more work though.

Should I just go with the top four as a party, and see how it goes? It's not terribly balanced...

[ArcturusV]

Well, the good news for Tsundaki is that she could probably have limited success on this, and what she does could work on the small scale. The downside is that she lacks a lot of "high impact" methods to deal with this scenario. As I want to focus on "What Tsundaki" will do, I'm not going to cover any other party members, or what I might be able to get from the local garrison. As I am merely level 6 (And no leadership or real Charisma to speak of), going to assume Tsundaki is operating on her own rather than being made some defacto militia leader for the village.

Pertinent information for Tsundaki:

Vashar Ninja 6, Alignment: Lawful Evil. Uses Daggers primarily. Nothing fancy. Didn't bother to get proper WBL, which wouldn't have mattered anyway since my DM was fond of imprisoning me and stealing everything other than my mundane equipment anyway... so she's pretty "Naked" for not only 6th level, but where she actually left off.

Is a Disciple of Darkness, skill monkey focus on stealth skills, rogue skills (sleight of hand, disable device, bluff, intimidate), and Craft - Trapsmithing.

So we can presume the enemy orcs are level 3.

First step would be intuiting what route they'd take to the City. This shouldn't be something requiring a skill check, armies are kinda large and obvious, the city is a known landmark, the scenario kind of presumes I know where the army is (2 weeks out).

Day One: Use stealth and scouting skills (Taking 10 should give me a comfortable margin against the enemies) to find their outriders/scouts and figuring out a basic pattern to their movements. Do not engage today. If needed use Ghost Step to give any random DM screw to stealth a slip and evade the Scouts/Outriders.

Day Two: Use the day to pick likely routes for the first scout teams to cross on day three. Set up basic traps in this area that will take enemies out non-lethally (Snares, Snap Cages, etc). Night of Day Two I take my rest, and wait for the outriders to possibly stumble into the traps. I should be able to set up enough that I can bag at least a few of the Scouts/Outriders, though I doubt I'll get them all.

Day Three: Morning. Check my traps for Orcs. Using Intimidate torture information out of living Orcs in the traps with my dagger. Probably going to kill most of them during torture. But should get some decent information on army movements, supplies, numbers, and officers. Once I'm satisfied? Heck, Sacrifice the rest of the Orcs to my dark demonic patron for possible ritual sacrifice bonuses (Not guaranteed and not going to presume it is, but possible). Spend the afternoon setting up a few more traps (Of a lethal variety like pit traps with spikes, falling spike traps, etc) to pick of scouts/outriders and fall back to buy myself some time. Hide bodies.

Day Four: Wait until daylight when the vision edge is neutral, rather than clear orc advantage. Figure out a path around the Scouts/Outriders, avoiding engagement at this time. Locate main army camp, survey it quietly, studying deployment patterns and matching it up against what I got out of interrogating the Orcs earlier. Find a nearby place to hole up for the night.

Day Five: Daring daylight raid. Sneaking into the camp. Sabotage supply wagons or siege equipment, whatever is less guarded and thus more likely to get away with. Not looking for fatal damage but to slow down the rate the army moves by crippling their slow moving (And necessary) supply wagons or siege equipment. While my skill ranks should be high enough to render this (Along with Ki ability use) very doable, this does present the highest risk yet and the chances of a death. Again, avoiding enemy contact. I'm not here to pick off enemies, I'm here to slow down the army and buy time, so hopefully their alarms won't be raised.

Day Six: Avoid the main army. After the sabotage they should be on high alert. Scouts will be actively searching knowing they missed something. No more shadow games with them, full retreat. Attack targets of opportunity that I think I can handle (Small groups such as 1-3 depending on situation), otherwise I'm sticking to the trees and keeping out of sight and out of fight as much as possible, and focusing on trying to get as far out from the Scout/Outrider coverage area as possible heading north from the army, back in the direction they cam.

Day Seven: Rest, recoup, give the Orcs time to stand down their guard, shadow their rear which is probably less well scouted than the point (after all, they are coming from already secured lands).

Day Eight: Close with the Camp again, avoiding contact. Keep watch over the camp during the day and look for obvious patterns in the watch and holes in their security, with an eye towards a way out. Set up traps to the north of the camp, where they are less likely to accidentally spring them or discover them.

Day Nine: If possible, find their air cavalry staging area in the camp. It's my next target priority. Plan for A) Burning them all down, because Fire Solves all Issues, and furthers the idea that like the Siege Engines/wagons it might have been an "Accident". Or B) Go for straight murdering of the Dire Bats if all else fails. They should go down, depending on luck and skill differences I can get what might amount to either a couple, or most of them. If plan A works, we fade away again and lead any scouts that pick up my trail on a merry chase through the back country northwards, through traps set up on Day Eight to help aid my escape. If it's plan B, I'm probably hosed, they will know I'm up. And it'll be a high matter of luck if I manage to escape in the confusion, burning up Ki like crazy, running like a fool... hopefully some hindering terrain I could jump but I'm not going to imagine I'll be that lucky. If I do survive, it'll be the end of my shadow ops and having to completely ditch in that case, they'll KNOW a crazy ninja is going around screwing with them.

Day Ten: Presuming things are still going well? Orcs are probably slowed down, lacking air recon, and having to "buddy up" and run in squads I can't manage to kill solo anymore. So the game is probably still over, but they've been significantly slowed down and the Air Advantage they had is gone or significantly depleted. With little else I could realistically hope to accomplish I head back towards the town, avoiding contact with the enemy until I'm ahead of the army.

Day Eleven: Regardless of how day nine went, I'm probably at this point anyway, only question is how many more stab wounds I've suffered getting here. If I'm in good health, it's back to the early tactics. Trying to slow down the enemy by trapping obvious, logical locations their scouts and outriders would be moving through. No sparing for interrogation/sacrifice, straight lethal traps. The more I can slow down the enemy scouts... especially if they know there are traps and have to take time to constantly check, the more time I buy for the locals to drum up some reinforcements from the next county over or something.

But at that point... I've exhausted most of what Tsundaki could do without actually having specific backup... or the items I might have had if not for the DM screwing with me so much. I haven't accomplished much. Even in the best case scenario I've only marginally slowed down the enemy. Maybe killed off... roughly estimated guess... 25? Maybe 30. Important thing would have been eliminating Air and forcing their recon to be done entirely by ground, where they are vulnerable to further hampering by Tsundaki prepping the ground in front of the army. She can't make enough traps to stop them. But it can slow them down. And hopefully in that time someone more effective than her can sweep in and crush them.

[thethird]

Okay one of my latest (and more fun) characters is a murderous frost elf hobo who was in the army once. He served in defense of one of the big cities of the north and well, it affected him, nowadays he is a crazy survivalist who would only consider taking jobs for money and doing them from as far as possible. Note that my DMs campaign setting is homebrewed and he uses cross setting stuff if it fits.

The build is ranger 5 / deepwood sniper 1 / Cragtop archer 4 (ranger levels are spiked with elven ranger substitution levels and shooting star levels)

It has quite a few ranks in handle animal and thus it has some animal friends, in particular two Corolax (MM II seriously a lvl 1 character with handle animal as a class skill SHOULD get these guys), an elven hound (races of the wild) and a valenar riding horse (eberron campaign setting). The Corolax know a few words in Elvish, like "danger", "run", "Aer" (which is my character's name), "Yul" (horsie's name), "Wirf" (doggie's name), "pancakes" (they like pancakes) etcetera

It has some ranks in knowledge (local), knowledge (nature), knowledge (arcana), listen and spellcraft. Obviously it also has ranks in climb and balance (it normally fights from the tree tops).

It also has maxed hide, move silently, spot and survival.

The main objective is first to get information. Assuming that the character is working on a party he will leave the survivors of the horde (assuming there are), the local forces and/or the formation of a militia to the party's face while he adventures into the wilds.

Searching for a high terrain from which to glimpse the horde my elven ranger could use its friendly animals as animal messengers (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/animalMessenger.htm) to communicate with the defending forces.

It would also work as a spotter both for scouting parties (he won't tackle those unless they are small and he is confident that he can wipe them from afar before being spotted and make any evidence of his meddling disappear) and leaders. Leaders would be tackled differently depending on their attire but poisoned arrows (dealing different stat damages), slaying arrows or spellstoring arrows (in conjunction with the party spellcasters, an animal messenger can carry the arrow and a note) can cripple the chain of command. Since the first hit has to count (using surprise) a slaying arrow aimed at someone who looks spellcaster-y is probably a good starting point.

Once they are alerted of its presence (it will happen eventually if it keeps firing arrows at people) and assuming that they take defense against extreme range assassination the focus of the ranger will change. Dealing with problematic scout parties that get to close to some necessary resources (such as a farm, or a well) trying to divert the scouting. If they choose to follow the pew-pew (meaning if scouts die, orcs go there) he will happily comply and kill scouting parties that are going in the totally wrong direction. Of course, if they are stupid enough to not cover the leaders he will still try to assassinate those from afar.

Averting enemies should be possible via high ranks in hiding skills, high ranks in spotting skills, fast movement mode (the horse is fast), and a preference for extreme range firing.

The main objectives are thus 4.

Objective 1: Survive to fight another day (i.e. when the horde reaches the city).

Objective 2: Gain knowledge (and share it with the party) of the composition of the horde and its leaders.

Objective 3: Cut/Cripple the chain of command.

Objective 4: Cut/Cripple the scouts of the army, reducing their resources and their intel on the area.

[SillySymphonies]

How optimized would one need be for this?
We basically only use (with some notable exceptions) PHB, DMG, MM and ECS (we're in an Eberron campaign). Optimization level is basically meatshield, healbot, blaster, scout.

Party (until recent intraparty events) (ECL 9):
Teresa: half-elf cleric 9 (healbot): dumped Str, Con and Int (think 'priest'); low concentration; only noteworthy feat is Leadership (half-celestial human paladin 3 cohort); still access to 5th level spells and is the country's highest-ranking cardinal ('pope' currently MIA).
Jean Jacques: human paladin 5/exorcist of the Silver Flame 4 (meatshield): ridiculous (for our optimization level, that is) damage output due to lance, Spirited Charge and Power Attack; subtlety of a sledgehammer ('smite evil first, ask questions later'), so not useful in any non-combat situation.
'Howard': psionic yuan-ti pureblood rogue 1/assassin 2 (spy) (evil alignment hidden with a ring of mind shielding): Bluff +9, Hide +15, Move Silently +17; psionic charm (animals, fey, humanoids, magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, giants) at will (Will DC 14 negates); +2d6 sneak attack; free access to Con poison (Fort DC 11 negates) due to being a snake.
DV-01: warforged artificer 9: severely gimped due a lack of loot; still a warforged artificer and all the synergies that come with this race/class combo.

Howard would borrow DV-01's hat of disguise, wand of alter self and have it craft some scrolls of glibness, then head out and infiltrate the horde, hopefully 'replacing' a key officer and then use their own mindset against them ('We shouldn't use catapults or archers: it's cowardly!').

DV-01 would probably dam the river and blow up the mountain to create some big-ass 'traps'.

Teresa wouldn't bother with divination spells, rather head out to the surrounding duchies together with Jean and gather our own reinforcements.

Edit: I once DMed for a group of munchkins of the same ECL; it occurs to me that the unoptimized group would actually fare (marginally) better due to looking for answers in the game world, instead of on their character sheet.

[Togo]

Ok, so the participants are:

Teplin, a gnome ACF ranger/MoMFs
Darian, a midgard dwarf fighter type guy
Canarius, a marshal/barbarian/divine crusader
Lethey, a wizard alienist
and his heavily buffed familiar, Quip, a psuedodragon

All about 12th level.
These are all characters I've played, in most cases for several years

Step 1: rally the townsfolk

Canarius is a figure of godlike inspiration, with high charisma (24), diplomacy (+29), and divine purpose (divine crusader). He also has a few ranks of knowledge (warfare) and should be able to work with the existing marshal of the town (who will be better than Canarius at actual marshal skills).

Work on an evacuation plan to keep innocent villagers and their valuable supplies out of reach on the oncoming army.

Step 2: Scout the threat

Meanwhile, Teplin and Lethey's familiar Quip go off to do some scouting. We need to confirm what's out there, and how fast it is likely to be moving. Teplin can fly thanks to wildshape, and turn invisible thanks to his ring of invisibility. He also has a very high spot (+44, all distance penalties halved), and a decent hide (+18 or so).

Quip the pseudodragon is mainly there for his vast collection of (Lethey's) knowledge skills, and so should be able to identify what they're looking at.


Step 3: Fortification

Meanwhile Durian the dwarf is working on fortification. with his ranks in profession (seige enginneer), and consulting with Canarius on knowledge (warfare), he should be able to get an ambitious plan of fortifications and defences mapped out. He'll then start supervising anyone who can craft to start filling in any gaps in weapons and/or ammunition and working out what the missing logistical needs are for a long seige.

Canarius to use his lyre of building. Teplin will offer the use of his crane. (yes, he carries a crane as standard equipment)


Step 4: Magical resources

Lethey will survery all the magical resources, using local help wherever possible because he's frankly a bit of an ass (wis 4, chr 8). He'll make sure any local spellcasters and he swap spells that might be useful, cast his usual compliment of permenant spells - (typically just blockade, and shrink item) and then rest for 8 hours, to learn new spells.

Teplin, when he returns, will do the same with alchemical resources, aided by Durian, (who is better than him at craft alchemy, but only Teplin has any ranks in it)


DAY 2
Hold a council of war to consider the results of scouting and various surveys of defences and resources. Decide what to ask for from the capital.

Lethey, Quip, Canarius and Teplin teleport back to wherever reinforcements might come from, armed with a letter from the local marshal, and any other local dignataries that might be useful, and a full and frank assessment of the orc threat. Convince them to send reinforcements. Lethey does some shopping for whatever we're missing that can reasonably be bought. Cast shrink item on the largest items, and store some in teplin's portable hole or lethey's bag of holding. By turning Teplin into a large beast of burden, loading him up, and then transforming him again, a large amount of material can be transported. I estimate roughly 20 wagonloads of supplies can be acquired. Offer to teleport local adventurers, brave knights, or anyone else who wants to go or is available back with us. (I'll assume there's noone available for the purpoes of the scenario)

Meanwhile Darian continues on defences and weaponcrafting, and is generally visible so the townsfolk don't think they've been abandoned.

Lethey casts wall of stone, fabricate, blockade as necessary to help with the fortification effort. Best musician in town to use Lyre of building while canarius is away

More scouting, this time at night, to get a feel for how fast they're moving, and in what kind of formation.

DAYS 3-14

So we start with the counterstrikes. The main targets are the vedette screen (scouts) and/or fliers. First attack is a daylight flying raid on the baggage train, to try and lure out flying scouts and/or vedette sentries, which we then engage as targets of preference. Lethey will be accompanied by a summoned augmented buffed flying psuedonatural rhino. Darian will be riding Teplin, Canarius and Lethey (and Quip) can all fly anyway. Darain is there for dealing the heavy damage, Teplin is mainly there as transport and to spot what countermeasures are triggered. Canarius will be tripping flying mounts and doing some damage, and Lethey will be causing havok with cloudkill, wall of fire, and similar, and by removing shrink item from previously prepared bonfires and dropping them on flammabe targets. Leave tough opponents for the rhino, and important opponents for the Teplin/Darian kill team. Once the odds become too great, pop smoke (from eversmoking bottle), and flee and heal. If necessary, d-door.

Teplin immediately doubles back to spy on the enemy from a distance with his telescope - he's trying to work out where any targets he identified previously (important people or countermeasures) might be based. After things settle down, we go for attack #2

This time we burrow under the camp (Teplin as UmberHulk making a tunnel) and straight up into the target under cover of silence, gank the target and withdraw.


Next attack, Teplin sneaks in (invisible and +28 hide check and +24 move silently and perfect flight), and tries to gather intelligence (Lethey casts tongues on him so he can understand orcish) Use to plan future attacks.

In terms of defence, we're relying on the townsfolk to keep watch for the most part. Take standard precautions while we sleep, such as black threaded rooms for Lethey and Canarius, and sleeping in disguise for Teplin. Cast detect posion on food and water supplies on a regular basis. Darian sleeps in shifts, since thanks to his magical forge he doesn't need much rest anyway.


Basically, keep hitting the orcish transport, food supplies and fliers. Definitely get some casters or character models if we can, but it's not vital. Once they get closer to the town start hitting the seige. By the time they reach the town, (late ideally) it should resemble a crude but solid fortress, defended by one or two catapults, and several hundred archers, armed with cold iron arrows made by Darian (and silver if he can get the materials). The land around it will be churned up into a sea of mud (Teplin churns, and the river is deliberately flooded), and important points will be defended with obstacles, hazards, and Teplin's trusty 200ft of barbed wire. A night attack will be illuminated by battlefield illumination, gust of wind will be memorised, and Teplin will pitch in with entangle at critical moments.

How's that do?

[Story]

Well my party is level 4-5 except for one ECL20 Hill Giant, so we're lower level than intended.

Here are the only tactics I can think of

Buy Fell Drain scrolls and try to start a Wightpocalypse
Convince the airship captain to help and let us scout and strafe the army with ballistas
Buff up the Hill Giant and have him try to take out as much of the army as he can.

[Dusk Eclipse]

We were level 10 when the campaign ended and the party included a Rogue/Swordsage/Ninja Spy (me), Kinetist/Quori Nightmare, Swift Hunter/Dervish, Duskblade/Pyrokineticist and a Ranger/Cleric (more of a face character really)

Me (the rogue)
I have a +7 Gather information so what would I know with an end result of 17 (or 19 assuming I can get an aid another bonus from my team-mates)?

I would mostly try to take out the leaders, which I can easily reach undetected (+19 to both Move Silently and Hide, in addition to flying thanks to wings of flying) and start the fight with a poisoned attack from my Spiked chain (I favour Black Lotus extract, which I can use thank to having a friendly psion with Psionic Minor Creation and a custom magic item that could create 5/day any poison I have already used). Sneak attack is enabled via surprise rounds and Cloak of Deception.

The general idea would be to use hit and run tactics on the leaders and once they are dead focus on the supply wagon to try and steal their supplies generator.

The Kinetist can rain death from the sky via Energy Balls which have a lot of utility thank to being able to change the Energy type on the fly and having some tasty rider effects. Against Melee brutes Electricity is the best option since it has a "free" DC increase and targets reflex which is usually a weak save. Against scouting parties (which will usually have good Reflex saves) Cold Enery Balls is the best option because it targets fortitude and finally against fortifications Sonic/Fire balls are the way to go.

The Duskblade and the swift hunter can probably engage some of the lesser troops in melee combat and probably come on top, though they definitely have to be careful since the barbarians definitely have itterative attacks.

The Ranger can help them with some ranged support and probably can get support from his church in addition to giving us some access to healing and some buffs.

[Vaz]

Hmmm, most of my characters I design are for hitting their true power at 20.

However, one of my parties is currently;

at Level 8, a spellstitched Necropolitan Unseelie Fey Dragonborn Desert Orc Dread Necromancer 8/wizard 1/master Necromancer 6

Artificer 15

Dragonshaping Druid 11/MoMF/Psychic Warrior 1; Something to do with using Enlarge in Dragon Shape.

Pokemaster: A Druid/Windlord/Prestige Ranger (orcs, oddly enough)/Griffon Rider with Wild Cohort and Dragon Cohort and Natural Bond.

Spellthief/Trapsmith/Cloistered Cleric

It is an odd old bunch, but very well played I think. The Druid, Griffonrider (and Cohorts)/Animal Companions), DN's Improved Familiar using the DN's spellcasting and Undead Fliers could be used to scout and waylay the enemy, perhaps locating isolated pockets of troops, savaging them, or picking up more dangerous opponents and dropping them from a great height. The griffon rider has Endless Javelins, so could just rain down hell on them from afar. These could leaed local troops to attack isolated scouts and drag the dead bodies to the City Walls.

Meanwhile, the Artificer and Trapsmith take on apprentices and create huge War Machines, making vast stocks of alchemical goods, war machines and traps to place in chokepoints- with the DN's help also making a stock of Necromantic Ballista Bolts.

When the enemy arrives spend more time focussing on thinning enemy numbers from afar, then use Necromancy to raise the dead, the spells targeting the big boys sk I can raise them using my Corpsecrafted, chain the Ballista bolts to cause Anarchy in the enemy lines.

The Pokemaster and Druid have the morepowerful NPC's take to battle on his cohorts and their own backs- say a Scout/Ranger, High Level Warrior/Fighter, Mage, and a Cleric etc. These act as a strikeforce to disable enemy force multipliers like the siege engines ogremage, fliers, giants, drummers and other spellcasters etc.

When the enemy finally closes with the walls, the fighting becomes more brutal: traps are.set off and infused NPC's lead the defence, while the more combat PC's strike as and when things begin to get lairy. Repeating arrow traps, mines, acid splash things, while alchemical bombs take out enemy units.

[Deophaun]

Meh. Just use any level 11 druid I had. Wildshape into a bird and cast blizzard in the middle of their army. Even protected from cold weather, a lot of orcs within a 720 foot radius are going to suffocate buried under 11 feet of snow. Cast it twice for good measure. Armies have been routed by less.

Call Avalanche would be more direct at the same level, but it would only have a measly 110 ft radius spread. But, you do have 2 weeks to harass them.

You don't send an army against an 11th level druid.

[Derpldorf]

I actually made a character that would be eerily suited for the task of defending the town. He was a Warforged Wizard with max ranks of knowledge: Architecture and Engineering, a lyre of building, a good deal of landscaping and fabrication spells, and a penchant for building crap. He would probably be able to whip up a fortified castle in that amount of time with just a little bit of help. His name was Bob....

If you were wondering, I originally built him for a mostly non combat campaign, he would probably be horribly murdered if he tried actually fighting, he was Heavily optimized into construction and landscaping.

[jaybird]

Guy Montag, the (PF) Evoker? At level 9, he can do empowered Fireballs as a 3rd level slot (2 traits), then widen them with a lesser rod. Any troop concentration...goes away.

[thompur]

I'm in a 3.5 campaign right now, and our (grossly under-optimized) 15th level party just took out an(grossly under-optimized) army of 231. My character is a Halfling Warlock, and I used Chilling Tentacles to great effect.
(Just out of curiousity, if CT is maximized, would that include the grapple check? at 15th level, that would be 43.)
I would start out by taking out the seige engines, CTing around them, then using Baleful Utterance to render them inopperable.
On the other hand, I, being somewhat tactically challenged, would defer to a more experienced military mind, and do what they wanted me to. I have the following invocations: Baleful Utterance, See the Unseen, Dark One's Own Luck, Fell Flight, Flee the Scene, Eldritch Chain, Chilling Tentacles, Warlock's Call, Noxious Blast.
I would think, being able to spam, a Warlock would be very useful in a seige against an army.

[Togo]

Meh. Just use any level 11 druid I had. Wildshape into a bird and cast blizzard in the middle of their army. Even protected from cold weather, a lot of orcs within a 720 foot radius are going to suffocate buried under 11 feet of snow. Cast it twice for good measure. Armies have been routed by less.

Sadly, there's nothing in the spell description to place the orcs under the snow. They can just walk around on top of it. It'll panic them, but outside a combat I don't think it will do more than merely annoy them.

On a small hoard this might work but given the sheer number of orcs involved, I think that 14 days of spellcasting is unlikely to kill them all simply with area effects. Even cloudkill, one of the best spells for killing formations of troops, would be hard pressed to make much more than a dent. That's why I went for slowing them down, instead.

[Ravens_cry]

Oh, my Pathfinder Ninja would have so much fun with this!
Infiltrate the camp using my wands of fly and invisibility (Ninja invisibility is only rounds per level, wand of invisibility is minutes. Do the math.) activate improved invisibility, walk through the walls of the tent of the nicest tent, coup de grâce anyone sleeping, leave, rinse, lather, repeat from tent to tent, perhaps not even walking through walls, until someone rolls a 20 on their Fort save, or until I am almost out of ki points, and then dust off, repeating again the next night and the next.
For added fun, I'll come by some time in the daytime and just start killing while invisible.
By the time I am done, I am going to have them completely freaked out and their leadership decapitated, and anyone who might become leader afraid to actually take the position, least they make themselves a target, to me.

[Deophaun]

Sadly, there's nothing in the spell description to place the orcs under the snow. They can just walk around on top of it.
Page 12 of Frostburn. You aren't dealing with iced-over or old snow. This is new snow, there is nothing to keep them from falling through. And as for slowing them down, that snow doesn't go away at the end of the spell's duration.

Again, though, if you don't like that, there's call avalanche.

Plus, if they're coming in with cold-weather gear already on, then it's likely winter, so cold snap could be brutally effective. If you can get the temperature down to -20, clothing doesn't make a difference.

Cloudkill is a terrible spell for trying to kill a horde of anything that isn't stuck in a bunch of ever descending tunnels. Boreal wind does a better job over open terrain, does it 2 levels sooner, and can be redirected to do it again. And again. And again. And again.

[Fouredged Sword]

The fairy death squad - had fun with this as a theoretical party
ECL 10
Pixi duskblade 6
Pixi Spellthief 6
Pixi Wizard 6
Pixi Cleric 6

Now the trick is that everyone can fly and is invisible. Everyone gets Planer Touchstone (catalogues of enlightenment) at 6th except the cleric.

Everyone has the granted power of the air domain.

Everyone commands a pair of Sylph, also invisible as casts as a 7th level sorcerer.

Give each sylph a wand of fireball.

Doom rains on the incoming army for two weeks, and the duskblade and spelltheif do targeted assassinations of the command structure.

[Bonzai]

Here are the last two characters I played.

Malvo The Malificent, Arch Conjurer, Tamer of Beasts, Lord of the Dead, Master of Elementals, Binder of Fiends, and Defiler of Virgins
NG Human Male Focused Conjurer 3/Master Specialist 10/Thaumaturgist 2 Barred Schools: Necromancy, Evocation, Enchantment

Malvo would start off by scrying the armies disposition, and instruct the towns people to fortify the town as best they could. He would then begin series of hit and run raids, attempting to deplete their forces an sow fear.

Favored Tactic: Scry and die nova attacks. Greater Invis, teleport in, use Evards and caustic mire from a spell sequencer to create a kill zone. Then use multiple dimensional shuffles to throw large chunks of the enemey into the evards and mire. Follow up with Acid Storms where needed, and Summons for good measure. He can cast three swift action conjurations, and with his alternative class feature summon monsters are included in that (and are a standard action normally). He will also have dimensional jumper prepped, which will let him teleport around as a move action, and is a swift action to cast. So he will port around the battle field invis, blowing his load, and then port out.

These raids should inflict significant damage on the cannon fodder. He will employ similar tactics when and if they finally reach the city. Larger summons will be used against the siege engines. Solo the dragon? Heh, my favorite tactic is to spam summon undead 4- Allips. A swarm of the will make quick work of it with it's abysmal touch AC.

Bennett White Castle
LG Illumian Truenamer 15

Ok, first thing to say is that my DM gave me a home brew feat. It allowed me to target multiple targets at once with an utterance by raising the DC. My True Speak modifyer was a +64. This would mean that I could easily hit 25 or so CR1 Orks with a single utterance at a time. Not nearly as impressive as Malvo, but he can dish out respectable damage. Ironicly, he is probably best suited for nullifying leadership. Dragon? Prevent it from flying, while flying himself and dealing steady damage over time. I was anal about his save bonuses, and he has several rerolls. Combined with a buff of fast healing, he can hopefully survive the ensuing spell battle and out last the dragon.

His best bet would be to attempt to focus on isolated groups and take them out as best he can. Unfortunately he isn't ideally suited for this sort of thing, but he could definately contribute. One on one, I would think that he could hold his own against whatever is thrown at him.

And my current character.

Jake Scarlet
CG Changeling Gestalt (Rogue 2/Swashbuckler 3/ Theif Acrobat 3/Nightsong Infiltrator 4)(Factotum 9/Montblank 3)

This character is for a role play heavy campaign. He is designed to be a mimic/infiltrator.

Ironicly, this character could have the biggest impact on the invasion. Infiltrate the force, he can learn their plans, and even do things to turn the various warbands and leadership against each other. He can be anyone, leaves no tracks, and is noticed only when he chooses to be. He may assassinate targets of opportunity, but is not a real front line fighter.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Here are the last two characters I played.

Malvo The Malificent, Arch Conjurer, Tamer of Beasts, Lord of the Dead, Master of Elementals, Binder of Fiends, and Defiler of Virgins
NG Human Male Focused Conjurer 3/Master Specialist 10/Thaumaturgist 2 Barred Schools: Necromancy, Evocation, Enchantment

Malvo would start off by scrying the armies disposition, and instruct the towns people to fortify the town as best they could. He would then begin series of hit and run raids, attempting to deplete their forces an sow fear.

Favored Tactic: Scry and die nova attacks. Greater Invis, teleport in, use Evards and caustic mire from a spell sequencer to create a kill zone. Then use multiple dimensional shuffles to throw large chunks of the enemey into the evards and mire. Follow up with Acid Storms where needed, and Summons for good measure. He can cast three swift action conjurations, and with his alternative class feature summon monsters are included in that (and are a standard action normally). He will also have dimensional jumper prepped, which will let him teleport around as a move action, and is a swift action to cast. So he will port around the battle field invis, blowing his load, and then port out.

These raids should inflict significant damage on the cannon fodder. He will employ similar tactics when and if they finally reach the city. Larger summons will be used against the siege engines. Solo the dragon? Heh, my favorite tactic is to spam summon undead 4- Allips. A swarm of the will make quick work of it with it's abysmal touch AC.

Bennett White Castle
LG Illumian Truenamer 15

Ok, first thing to say is that my DM gave me a home brew feat. It allowed me to target multiple targets at once with an utterance by raising the DC. My True Speak modifyer was a +64. This would mean that I could easily hit 25 or so CR1 Orks with a single utterance at a time. Not nearly as impressive as Malvo, but he can dish out respectable damage. Ironicly, he is probably best suited for nullifying leadership. Dragon? Prevent it from flying, while flying himself and dealing steady damage over time. I was anal about his save bonuses, and he has several rerolls. Combined with a buff of fast healing, he can hopefully survive the ensuing spell battle and out last the dragon.

His best bet would be to attempt to focus on isolated groups and take them out as best he can. Unfortunately he isn't ideally suited for this sort of thing, but he could definately contribute. One on one, I would think that he could hold his own against whatever is thrown at him. [SBLOCK]

And my current character.

Jake Scarlet
CG Changeling Gestalt (Rogue 2/Swashbuckler 3/ Theif Acrobat 3/Nightsong Infiltrator 4)(Factotum 9/Montblank 3)

[SBLOCK] This character is for a role play heavy campaign. He is designed to be a mimic/infiltrator.

Ironicly, this character could have the biggest impact on the invasion. Infiltrate the force, he can learn their plans, and even do things to turn the various warbands and leadership against each other. He can be anyone, leaves no tracks, and is noticed only when he chooses to be. He may assassinate targets of opportunity, but is not a real front line fighter.

Problem with yout Truenamer character is that mooks are CR = Your level -4 or in your case CR 11

[Coidzor]

Hmm, well, my last character of the relevant level ranges was a wizard-gish of 10th level with 8th level wizard casting, he didn't just have gish spells though, so he could sub in for a cohort equivalent arcane support, though my memory isn't particularly clear on what 1-4 level wizard spells are relevant to this sort of thing. Given player prep-time I'd likely be able to research some decent ones, though most of the ones I know of offhand are Druid spells.

Ranger 1/Fighter 1/Wizard 4/Spellsword 1/Abjurant Champion 4 IIRC. If he could get an additional level he'd be able to help patch up the fortifications with wall of stone, I suppose.

Because of his backstory as having gone through officer's school and reading JaronK's treatise on Leadership Mechanics in D&D 3.5 (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=3065.0), I included a fair number of ranks of Knowledge History in addition to some stealth skills and general arcanist skills as well as feeding his Knowledge Devotion feat.

Sadly I didn't get to play him much, so I don't have a full feel for him, as the Red Hand of Doom campaign I joined part-way went on indefinite hiatus and then died right before the Battle of Brindol while the party's archivist and wizard were discussing what they might be able to do to bolster the city's defenses or soften up the horde before it got there because they'd managed to gain a lot of downtime due to gaining a source of flight, possibly via zombified former foes.

He'd likely start out by attempting to take out scouting capabilities of the enemy so that he'd have a bit of breathing room for hobbling the supply line if such existed, but that's mostly because I can't remember offhand if 6th level characters can reliably feed an army while moving at full speed and I can't recall what level that entirely magically self-sufficient food supplies would really come on to the table for an army.

Depending upon his spare petty cash at the time and what creatures were available, he'd possibly try using a couple of nasty mindless undead as shock troops if he can get some with enough HD that mild rebuking optimization wouldn't result in the lot being stolen. He has an azun-gund, so he'd likely consider simply creating uncontrolled undead out of any suitable candidates depending upon what he encountered of the arcane and divine magical support of the enemy. If he runs into kobold sorcerers or is able to gain intelligence about them, well, command undead (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commandUndead.htm) says oh no, unless he thinks he can lay a trap of some sort where the undead cause enough detriment to the enemy to outweigh the utility of them gaining said undead.

His obvious strength is in personally dispatching enemy champions, depending upon their level of optimization, as he does have the spell repertoire of 1-4th level spells for getting in with a fair chance of being undetected the first time at least, I think, depending upon the number of enemy casters and how they're arrayed anyway, though he doesn't have the panic button of teleport to get back out again after dumping his spells per day like he really should.

If it wasn't woefully obvious already, I'm not particularly good at turning my mind to this sort of thing as fascinated as I am to read others' thoughts on the subject.

The rest of the party was comprised of a 10th level Archivist, a 9th level Wizard (managed to get surprised at 6th level by the dragon they'd thought was dead when they split the party for the bridge fight), a 12th or 13th level Monk(very peculiar set of drawings from a Deck of Many Things led to a couple of fights that granted him instant level-ups combined with a huge packet of bonus XP from one of them), a 9th level Healer/Favored Soul(no comment, though you might find the thread about that), and something else which I've since forgotten, most likely.

And the Archivist's player did think about things like sieges and armies and destroying them utterly and was a very devout student of the Druid's spell list for such things as using hit and run tactics to wear down an army with little chance of them getting him without having people strong enough for scry and die tactics and he had some contingency plans for that too, and with convincing we'd likely have been able to get the wizard to look into such things as well, though he was primarily a blaster at first and was starting to branch into battlefield control and buffing.

[A_S]

Hmmm...not running in a campaign right now, so I'll use the last character I posted on here (as a suggestion in Piggy's new Shadowcaster handbook (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=268661)). Call him Merle. For sweet spot purposes, let's say level 12.

StatsWhisper Gnome, Beguiler 1/Shadowcaster 3/Noctumancer 4/Mindbender 1/Noctumancer +3

Ability Scores (28 point buy + 3 level increases): Str 6, Dex 16, Con 16, Int 21, Wis 8, Cha 6

Feats: Versatile Spellcaster, Darkstalker, Still Mystery (b), Shadow Familiar, Quicken Spell (b), Mindsight, Rapid Metamagic

Important skills: Balance 5, Concentration 15, Hide 15, Move Silently 15, Sleight of Hand 5, Spellcraft 12, Skill Trick (Conceal Spellcasting)

Important Mysteries: Bend Perspective, Piercing Sight, Flicker, Bolster, Shadow Evocation

Important Spells: Charm Person, Dispel Magic, Greater Invisibility, Greater Mirror Image, Solid Fog, Dominate Person

Merle spends the first week collecting intelligence about the army's makeup and plans, but especially about the locations and defenses of its major leaders. He should excel at this task, with extraordinary stealth abilities (maxed Hide and Move Silently with big Whisper Gnome bonuses, Darkstalker, tons of illusions to help out), and lots of ways to collect information (Mindsight helps him notice everybody; Beguiler divination spells and mysteries like Bend Perspective and Piercing Sight help out too; Charm, Suggestion, and Glibness help him get information out of any rank-and-file grunts he can isolate; and he's got a familiar with the Dark template he can use for additional scouting).

He then spends the second week (maybe 9-10 days, really) going on a campaign to Dominate (via Dominate Person) as many of the important figures in the opposing force as possible, focusing on those with low Will saves and limited ways of protecting themselves against magic (the War Hulk, the Warlord, and the Scout look like good candidates). If they've been protected by others (say they had some of their spellcasters hit them with Protection from X for the mind-affecting immunity), he's got Dispel to fall back on. With his stealth skills and the Conceal Spellcasting trick, he should be able to get some of the more important figures under his control without anybody noticing, and once they're Dominated, he'll order them to resume their normal activities until the battle, effectively turning them into sleeper agents.

Once the battle comes, he'll order his Dominated minions to turn coat at opportune times. Having done that, he'll avoid direct conflict, focusing on two main tasks:

1. Shutting down enemy spellcasters. With 2/day immediate action counterspells from Noctumancer and plenty of dispel goodness for removing low-level buffs, Merle should be pretty effective at neutralizing the effect of the enemy's spellcasters. Every successful dispel or counter grants him a benefit, too, thanks to Noctumancer class features.

2. Battlefield control. Solid Fog is the standout here, creating big chunks of the battlefield where nothing's going on, allowing the good guys to focus their efforts elsewhere.

He can also still shut down targets of opportunity, even those he hasn't dominated ahead of time, via spells like Charm Monster and Hold Monster, or turn the tides in battles between large groups of mooks with Invisibility Sphere, Confusion, Crushing Despair, and similar.

If he gets in trouble, he's got lots of ways to defend himself, stars of the show including the Flicker (1/round immediate action teleportation) and Bolster (lots of temporary HP) mysteries, and Greater Mirror Image/Greater Invisibility to keep from getting hit.

*edit* Ideally, to avoid the Augury issue, Merle would introduce some misinformation to the system. Ideas for that include:
-If he can get the spellcaster who will cast Augury dominated, he can make them lie about the results.
-If not, he can try and intercept the message, or use Suggestion to change some or all of the commanders' impressions of whether attacking is a good idea.
-He's likely to have the scout dominated, so he can have them lie about scouting information.

*edit 2* Oh, I missed some of the stuff about the villagers. Merle could also use a Glibness-enhanced bluff check to get the commoners and experts willing to fight, though he'd have to rely on a different member of his (hypothetical) party to train them into something useful.

[JaronK]

First contender is Aleus, a level 9 spontaneous cloistered cleric with a significant social bent. With his ranks in Knowledge (History) (it made sense at the time) he can probably guess at the general composition of the army based on major powers in the region and a knowledge of how orcish armies tend to be put together. Not only that, but with his Lore class feature he can almost certainly recall stories of this particular horde, and maybe even glean a few tactics. We'll assume for the sake of fairness that he rolls 10 on each check, which is 25 on Knowledge and 23 on Lore - if you want to give me more specific results from that, I'll give you specific countertactics he might employ.

Gonna answer your knowledge checks in spoilers just in case people don't want to know. But also note that with that knowledge you can get a Strategic Advantage (Heroes of Battle) which basically means you character knows how wars are fought and thus does a little better automatically. It's DC 25 though, so you just missed on the lore check.

A 25 Knowledge History tells you a bunch of things. First of all, the Orcish armies of the north almost always attack at night, primarily using howling melee warriors. They also love making a lot of noise with their main force to scare enemies and make it so enemies can't hear commands. But because they come from mountainous regions, they often use secondary attacks that climb over surprising obstacles to come in from weird angles. The Orcs of that region are tribal, and have been long thought to not be a threat because of infighting. If they're actually working together, something's changed. But they also aren't set up for sieges... if a battle isn't going their way, they may end up deserting after a while. They've been known to use a limited number of giants or siege weapons to punch holes in walls before charging in.

Lore tells you that there are many different tribes up north, each with their own way of fighting.

The Deathcliffs tribe is from an area of cliffs against the waters of the North Sea that got that name due to currents pulling ships against the cliffs. They're actually made up of Orcs, Water Orcs, and Aquatic Orcs, and have more wealth than the other tribes due to plundering destroyed merchant ships. They're well known for being good climbers and great in the water, as well as using agile mounts to patrol around looking for wrecked ships.

The Sacred Watchers are a devout group of Orcs and Half Orcs from near Port Haven, a major trading town to the north (which has already been sacked). They have lots of Clerics and Adepts, and it's surprising that they would be part of this attack force. They're usually more peaceful, and mistrust the Bloody Eyes.

The Bloody Eye tribe is from farther north, and they're also devout to Gruumish but they look down on the Sacred Watchers due to their inclusion of Half Orcs, who they feel are weak and pathetic. Those groups have long fought, so it's surprising they'd work together at all. They Bloody Eyes get their name from their practice of ritually scaring the area around one of their eyes, while their leaders are known to remove one eye. They're zealots.

And then there's a large group of smaller tribes found to the north that usually only follow something strong that might get them something. Perhaps they've gotten a champion to rally them, or perhaps one of the other three has done so.


Even without that knowledge, however, he's still capable of rallying the townsfolk. With his +20 to Diplomacy he'll ensure that every man, woman and child does their part to build up walls, prepare fallback points, and generally do whatever they can to protect their homes. Knowledge (History) may help here again, allowing him to suggest tactics and defences that have been effective in similar situations in the past.

Since they're already friendly (they want your help!) that's enough to make them helpful. Knowledge history gives you a rough outline of what things should be like, but without Knowledge (architecture and engineering) you don't put up anything truly amazing... mostly just rebuilding the fort walls and putting up some forward palisade walls and ditches. Note that if you work the people too hard, they won't be able to fight so well (I'm not sure about your rally checks... it's a Charisma check + commander rating to improve morale. If you want them to fight in the battle you'll need to do that as they'll start out shaken).


All of that, of course, leaves aside Aleus's greatest asset - his spells. With Sending he can make contact with any major enemies of the orcs besides the kingdom being defended and ask them for assistance - if they're willing to provide it, and have any individuals of particular power, he may be able to use Teleport to collect them for the effort.

Clever. This kingdom is the only one the Orcs generally threaten, but you could potentially teleport in allies of the kingdom from other areas.


Divination allows him to learn in advance which defensive tactics will serve best against the oncoming horde.

What questions would you ask?


Speak With Dead, if he can find an orcish casualty from previous engagements, can provide specific information on the army's composition.

Won't help, it's been over 60 years since there was any significant fighting.


Stone Shape can be used to produce sheer stone walls in appropriate places.

That would be useful, and should give you something better than wooden palisades.


When it comes to the actual battle his ability to contribute will be sadly limited - about the extent of it would be Summon Monster, Hold Person and perhaps an opportune Enthrall or two, as well as Obscuring Mist and Prayer to sow confusion and assist the defenders. Depending on the nature of the siege, he may be able to use Augury to vet defender deployments. Of course, this leaves out his last and most daring possible tactic...

Yeah, that won't do too much, but you've improved the defenses in the field pretty well, and bringing in allies could really help.


Aleus is a changeling, you see, and quite capable of adopting an orcish form if it suits him. While not trivial, it would certainly be possible for him to attempt an infiltration of the army - Divine Insight would allow him to succeed at key bluff checks.

Not speaking Orcish is going to make this VERY hard. The Orc army regularly challenges each other and has a bunch of factions inside. Your cover could be blown very quickly.


Once in an advantageous position - somewhere within arm's reach of the enemy leaders - he can attempt to cast Hold Person in the surprise round and Teleport away with one of their greatest assets, or just with himself if the save is passed. In the process he could gather valuable information about the army's composition. The greatest flaw with this plan is his inability to speak Orcish and his lack of the Tongues spell (and I have cursed the lack of that spell many times, I can assure you). Most likely he would need to pretend to be mute or similar in order for this ruse to work, and it would be risky in any event. I include it here only for completeness.

If you spoke Orc, I think this would work... maybe. Without that, I don't think it will. Also, the Deathcliff Orcs keep wolves with them, as do the orcs of the minor tribes... they're trained to notice if your scent is wrong. You'd definitely be challenged and found out. I'm going to assume one of your uses of Divination would be to see if this plan would work, and it really wouldn't.


My other character, Feiliacan, is a gestalt level 11 character with unusually permissive rules regarding monster characters, and as such would probably be pitted against the uppermost reaches of this challenge. He is an adapted faerie dragon (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/dragons/dragon-faerie). Unlike Aleus, he has no real way to contribute to knowledge about the army beyond scouting... but he is very capable of doing that. With a high Fly speed (at perfect manoeuvrability to boot) and Tiny size, he can easily do flyovers of the army to get a rough idea of composition. At nighttime he can easily evade sentries with his Hide and Move Silently checks being what they are, using this ability to sneak through the camp for more precise counting, or if need be wetwork. If he catches an enemy off-guard he can combine Hunter's Eye with a volley of Scorching Rays (courtesy of Cunning Surge) to deal 38d6 damage to his chosen target in a single round with ranged touch attacks before flying off upwards, leaving the camp with a sea of Black Tentacles and his chosen target with another 19d6 fire damage as a parting gift.

You know you only get one sneak attack with a Scorching Ray attack because it's a volley, right? But yes, you should be able to jet around the camp for scouting purposes pretty effectively. They'll likely pick up your existence via scent but they won't be able to track you fast enough. With this guy, the dragon and the ogre mage would be in play... but note that Kobolds won't shoot at a dragon given the choice, so that's an advantage for you.


After the first night he probably won't have so easy a time of it, although despite the best precautions the army will be hard-pressed to spot him even if he doesn't choose to deploy his Greater Invisibility racial ability, so repeating this against high-value targets on successive nights is entirely possible. The chaos resulting from the night attacks (and possible leader deaths) should significantly slow the oncoming army as well, though maybe not enough to allow reinforcements to arrive. If he chooses to be a bit more subtle about it (and with his Intelligence score how it is, there's no reason not to), he can use Major Images of the leaders to sow distrust among them, making their eventual disbanding that much faster - Divine Insight will help with the required Bluff checks, pushing his modifier into the high thirties, and his few psionic powers are ideally suited to exactly this sort of play.

Gonna have to be careful of the Black Dragon with Blindsense who'll be looking for you when you come back. But sowing distrust among the leaders could be very effective.


So yeah. That's how my characters would deal with it. How'd I do?

Not bad, overall. Building up better fortifications with your first character is certainly quite effective (without speaking Orcish, his attempts at infiltration would fail). Divinations might warn you of the rear commando attack during the battle. You only got one Strategic Advantage (the Orc army actually has a bunch), but it's a solid start.

As for your dragon, I can't tell because a lot of chaos would have ensued. If you really worked at the sowing discord thing, you might actually have been able to break the army apart with infighting before they ever made it to the village. But you'd have to deal with the dragon (if you're gestalt 11th level with permissive rules, I'd do the max level for this I think... he's a Mature Adult Black Dragon with Kobold support). That could be tough. Plus there's the Kobolds, who won't want to hurt you but who will follow the orders of the their leader (and thus would do things like try to hit you with Glitterdust and then lock you in place). That could be dangerous indeed... of course, they have to spot you, but after the first raid the wolves would get used with their scent to try and pick you up, which could be a problem for your illusions.

JaronK

[Mithril Leaf]

Current relevant bits of character info. Level 7 psion, maxed craft alchemy with a +29 modifier. Knows Minor Creation and Fabricate. Feats are Psicrystal affinity with artiste personality. He has 70 power points. He is immune to black lotus extract.

Day one, use fabricate to produce a large number of sprayers, attached at the tips so as to constitute one item. Order villagers to begin gathering raw material for the walls. Send out Urban Rangers to scout a bit on the war path, never getting close to the main horde. Have some experts produce flame arrows.
Day 2-7, More of the same, try to get enough sprayers for all the villagers.
Day 8-11, the rangers ideally come back and I begin building the distribution system of poison and other liquids to various places throughout the city. Arm the citizens with sprayers.
Day 12-13, Wall repair as available, hopefully the raw material and fabricate is enough. Get everyone inside. Go to be early as possible.
Day 14, Wake up early in the day. Begin by minor creating a large number of amber spheres. Use my advanced levels of alchemy to fill them with distilled jeffrey pine resin. Load my distribution system with black lotus so that the basins placed around the town are filled. Army arrives. Peasants use sprayers filled with black lotus extract to defend themselves in groups, each square being hit a few times by the sprayers. Roll the jeffrey pine filled spheres into the midst of large groups of enemies after lighting them. Distilled Jeffrey Pine resin is incredibly and violently explosive. Basically exploit the cheapness of psionic minor creation and my large craft alchemy checks.

That's the basis of the plan at least, the town would take down a large portion of the army in theory, at the very least, the enemy army would be on fire and heavily poisoned. It's what my current character could do at that level in a general sense by himself.

[JaronK]

By the way, a quick look at the commanders (note: without a solid Knowledge Local check, you won't know about them). They're equipped following the basic outline of the Orc Army commanders from the back of Heroes of Battle (exact equipment depends on level). Note that some of these only show up for some levels, and that there's one commander per PC. Note that all special characters, as well as all members of their elite guard, have the Orc Commander Aura from Heroes of Battle, which gives all Orcs within 30' +1d6 damage on melee attacks. All Special followers have the Opportunistic Commander Aura, which gives all allies within 30' +1d6 damage on attacks of opportunity.

Gruum, Half Orc Herald of Gruumish.

Cleric 6 or Cleric 10 or Cleric 15, War and Strength Domains. Wears black full plate with a holy symbol of Gruumish on the front and a Dragoncraft White Dragonscale cloak passed down from his ancestors, and wields a Masterwork Spear or +1 Spear. At level 8 or above he supplies the army with water and food via an Extradimensional space with an Everfull Larder and Everfull Basin in it. Motivated by a vision from Gruumish of himself ruling over all the Orcs in the north lands and holding the lower kingdoms in tribute. His followers are a mix of Orc and Half Orc Warriors and Experts and Barbarians (900), his special followers are mostly Half Orc Clerics and Adepts with a few Druids (90), and his elite guard are 8 Clerics and two Druids.

Kraluum, Orc Zealot

Orc Lion Totem Barbarian 4/Fighter 2 or Lion Totem Barbarian 4/Fighter 2/Eye of Grummish 4 or Lion Totem Barbarian 4/Fighter 2/Eye of Grummish 9. Wields a Masterwork Orc Double Axe or +1/+1 Orc Double Axe, and wears +1 Chain Shirt Armor and AC boosting items. At high levels his axe is made of Pandemonium Silver which he uses to scare the crap out of enemies. Feats include Exotic Weapon Proficiency and Weapon Focus with the Orc Double Axe and the TWF line along with rage boosting feats. Motivated by the idea of crushing all before him and ruling all that he knows exists. Plans to have Orcs (and only pure blood Orcs) rule. His followers are a mix of Orc Warriors and Barbarians with Great Axes (900), his special followers are Orc Lion Totem Barbarians with Orcish Double Axes (90), and his elite guard are 10 Barbarian/Fighters who at higher levels also have Eye of Gruumish levels, and who wear earplugs and such to avoid the Pandemonion Silver issue.

Grenar, Orc Commando

Water Orc Scout 4/Lion Totem Barbarian 1/Ranger 1 or Scout 4/Lion Totem Barbarian 1/Ranger 5 or Scout 4/Lion Totem Barbarian 1/Ranger 10, with the Dungeoneering Scout variant to give him a climb speed. Wields a pair of Razor Sharp (Drg 358) Adamantium Kukris and a Shortbow, along with camoflagued Shadowsilk Leather Armor, and he's got access to a large amount of lamp oil that he keeps in a Handy Haversack. Motivated by the promise of greater wealth to the south, as recent events have resulted in fewer ships being wrecked by his shores and his tribe wants more wealth, and is closely allied with Kaelgras. His followers are a mix of Orc and Water Orc Experts and Barbarians and Scouts and Rangers (900), his special followers are Orc and Water Orc Scouts and Rangers riding Dire Wolves or Dire Bats (90), and his elite guard are Water Orc Scout 4/Lion Totem Barbarian 1/Rangers who have climb speeds and can climb enemy walls in the night to wreck havoc.

Grak, Orc titan

Half Minotaur Orc Wolf Totem Barbarian 4/Fighter 2/War Hulk 3 or WT Barbarian 4/Fighter 2/War Hulk 8 (doesn't show up for lower level parties). Wields a massive (Huge, technically) adamantine spiked chain and wears Hide armor and Strongarm Bracers, and also has rocks that he can fling. Has been said to be able to arm wrestle giants. Is probably motivated by the idea of crushing his enemies, seeing them driven before him, and hearing the lamentations of their women, but he doesn't really talk about that. His standard followers are a mix of Orc Barbarians and Warriors along with various dire beasts of the northlands (900). His special followers are a few giants (2) and some ogres. His elite guard are the longaxes, a cleverly named group of Barbarians who wield longaxes and have Power Attack.

Kaelgras, Orc Leader

Orc Ranger 3/Orc Paragon 3 or Ranger 3/Orc Paragon 3/Horizon Walker 1/Orc Warlord 3 or Orc Ranger 3/Orc Paragon 3/Horizon Walker 1/Orc Warlord 5/Barbarian 3. Wields a Mighty Compound Shortbow and an Adamantine Glaive. Is motivated by the idea of uniting the Orc tribes to the north into a great kingdom on par with that of the south, but feels that major victories and plunder would be a great way to do that. Is in many ways the social glue that keeps the army together and stops the endless infighting. His followers are a mix of Orc Experts, Barbarians, Warriors, and Scouts (800), some of which are capable of building siege weapons. His special followers are 100 Goblin Archers (Targeteer Fighter/Rogues who have the Archery Commander Aura) and 90 Orc Fighter/Barbarians on Dire Wolves who act as heavy cavalry. His elite guard are 20 Orc Barbarian/Horizon Walker 1s (who have the Desert ability to avoid fatigue). Due to his final rage ability, these warriors are always raging in battle.

Hursilon, Orc Bard
Orc Bard 6 or Orc Bard 10 or Orc Bard 15 with Bardic Knack. Uses massive Masterwork War Drums that echo for miles, and has Never Outnumbered and Imperious Command. Is motivated by the rush of battle and the joy of the power of his mighty music. He'll give a terrific speech to boost the morale of the troops before fights, and is the master strategist of the group. His followers are Orc Warriors and Barbarians (900). His special followers are Orc Bards who play War Drums and Alphorns and Bagpipes to scare his enemies (90). His elite guard are a group of Bards with the Inspire Awe variant who play the Bones and Bagpipes to terrify their enemies.

Gurthrasi, Ogre Mage
Ogre Mage Sorcerer 2 or Ogre Mage Sorcerer 7. Only shows up for characters level 10 and up. Uses Disguise to look like a standard Ogre, and wields a Greatclub. Additionally wears a Dragoncraft Red Dragonhide Cloak and Dragoncraft Black Dragonhide Leather Armor (Feycraft with Thistledown), which provide him with Fire and Acid resist 5. Plans to raid the south lands for valuable magical artifacts and knowledge as part of a longer term plan to enslave the lesser races. His forces are made up of Ogre Barbarians (450). His special forces are Ogre Barbarian/Hulking Hurlers (45). His elite guard are two Giant Hulking Hurlers. Unlike the others, his elite guard has no commander aura, and his commander aura is Spellslinging Aura (which generally only helps him).

Theirlacor, Dragon
Mature Adult Black Dragon, only shows up for high level parties. His motivations are unclear. His followers are Kobold Experts and Combat Trapsmiths and Trapsmiths (900). He also has a special group of Kobold Sorcerers and Rogue/Combat Trapsmiths (90). His elite guard are a group of Kobold Sorcerers that attend to him. His troops do not have commander auras. His people are far more defensive oriented, creating traps to protect the army and constantly checking for infiltrators.

*Whew!*

JaronK

[Lans]

How well does the army deal with invisible enemies? My current strat based around kiting the enemies with ranged, under the cover of silent image once the invisibility breaks. I figure the mooks to have under 30 hp so I could thin their numbers down, using dark speech to confuse any enemies in the area. 10% chance of them doing something if they fail there save, as the nearest creature is an incorporeal panther.

Use the imp familiars commune to find out information. If it can get a drop on a giant, it will get animated to help with other fights.

Here is most of the party i was building it when Iron Tarkuss was running his dungeon thing.
http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetindex.php?sg=78366

I never finished the 4th member that was going to be a kobold warmage with draconic rite so the spell thief could spam a good level 1 sorcerer spell. I was looking at create trap and sticky floor but I haven't decided on anything.

Can sleep in an area of silence so they are refreshed the next day.

My friend and I, might be miss reading the spell-thief's ability to steal spell-like abilities, in which case this entire strategy becomes a dud

[JaronK]

How well does the army deal with invisible enemies? My current strat based around kiting the enemies with ranged, under the cover of silent image once the invisibility breaks. I figure the mooks to have under 30 hp so I could thin their numbers down, using dark speech to confuse any enemies in the area. 10% chance of them doing something if they fail there save, as the nearest creature is an incorporeal panther.

Depends on level. Mostly, they use scent (from the Dire Wolves) or Blindsense (from the Dire Bats). The Cleric might be able to deal with invisibility if he knows where it's coming from. But at very high levels, suddenly there's a dragon and a bunch of Kobolds.

Note that damn near everyone has listen as a class skill.

So, invisibility could be very useful, but it's not a guaranteed win.


Use the imp familiars commune to find out information. If it can get a drop on a giant, it will get animated to help with other fights.

Yes, that should help.


I never finished the 4th member that was going to be a kobold warmage with draconic rite so the spell thief could spam a good level 1 sorcerer spell. I was looking at create trap and sticky floor but I haven't decided on anything.

Can sleep in an area of silence so they are refreshed the next day.

My friend and I, might be miss reading the spell-thief's ability to steal spell-like abilities, in which case this entire strategy becomes a dud

That does work, but it's a question of which level 1 spell would be worth it.

JaronK

[Amphetryon]

My contribution, not super-optimized but generally appropriate, and in search of an appreciative party (virtually equipment-free, save the studded leather armor and the Sweeping Guisarme +1):


Gurval, LN Necropolitan Darfellan Dread Necromancer 8/Crusader 2.

STR: 16 DEX: 10 CON: - INT: 12 WIS: 10 CHA: 20

Feats: (MWP: Guisarme - it's a +1 Sweeping weapon), Corpsecrafter, Deadly Chill, Sudden Widen, Stitched Flesh Familiar.

Advanced Learning: Kelgore's Grave Mist, Black Sand.

Skills: Concentration 13, Disguise 3, Intimidate 13, K. Arcana 3, K. History 3, K. Religion 5.

Familiar: Vargouille

Maneuvers/Stances: Vanguard Strike, Revitalizing Strike, Mountain Hammer, Leading the Attack, White Raven Tactics/ Leading the Charge, Thicket of Blades.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Hey Amphwletryon so you mind leveling him to 10 and join forces with my Rogue? or I could de-level him in any case.

[Lord Haart]

I don't often have a luxury of having a level 6 (or more) characters, but i prefer to perceive this thread in a roleplaying rather than roll-playing angle, so i'll just pick some characters i've played recently enough and for long enough time to answer without much guessing. I'll not include their party members for some reason.

My first participant would be Lord Gastron (aka Edmund), a runaway student of magic who decided to become the evil overlord whom the world would fear (and managed to lose his spellbook, which limited him to the stuff randomly stuck into his memory). He was a 4e character, a fullplate-clad broadsword-wielding sorcerer/warlord focusing on melee powers on warlord side and self-protecting, self-buffing and self-centered powers on sorcerer side (though his most used spell was Thunder Step or whatsitsname — i don't currently have rulebooks with me — refluffed as a tiny force lightning, which he used to boil people and intimidate water); when later a necessity arose to translate him into 3.5, he became warlock 1/battle sorcerer 1/fighter 1 (for some shenanigans necessary to not suffer ACF in heavy armor) with spells he would choose to know himself (reduce person to look down on people, summon monster to summon infernal minions from hell), going to qualify for Chaos Mage (wielding a Rod of Wonders would make him just as dangerous as he wanted to be, if for all the wrong reasons; rerolling it will make him a bit less incompetent, and after that he would be free to take levels in eldritch disciple) . I had big plans for him (he was to become a monkey with grenade blewing up the game big scheming evil dudes are playing), but, alas, campaign died early (of course, i keep his character in mind to recreate on good occasion). Of his trained skills i remember only Intimidate and Bluff, which he used well to make himself be perceived as a real deal among NPCs, and knowledge of tactics and history (he used to read historical books instead of doing his homework — that was what made him idolise DnD analogues of Alexander the Great and Attila; in return, his Knowledge: Arcane was very subpar).
So, let's say: warlock 1/fighta (or psychic warrior with homerule that would allow taking battle caster twice) 1/battle sorc 3/wild mage 1 (invocations and spells: baleful utterance, summon monster 1, reduce person, control undead). Items - rod of wonders, nonmagical broadsword, fullplate with armor spikes, rust bag of tricks (i include at least some kind of bag of tricks in inventory whenever i can; in theory they are very useful, in practice they were very useful in those rare moments when i didn't forget about their existence).
Let's say he came to town with a pair of minions (without party, his first priority would be finding someone to serve him, most probably some well-intimidated commoners), zapped rod of wonder into town gates until they were destroyed or turned ethereal (turning from permanently red to permanently green in the process, but that's what menacing Sauron-style armors with face-covering helmets are for!), walked in, dealing quickly with city guard, proclaimed himself the new overlord of the place and demanded for current highest authority in town to come and bow to him. The Marshal comes and tells him to screw himself because a) otherwise his codpiece will be kicked; b) the King won't tolerate dark lords reigning over distand border villages… Okay, screw the King; and real b), orks will pillage this town in two weeks. After dismissing first notion by turning the Marshal into halfling, Gastron proclaims that if locals will not resist but pledge their allegiance to him immediatly, he'll take care of the orcs.
Let's assume that citisens in general were convinced (and those that weren't begun to flee from this town). Overlord Gastron's first order is to rally a militia. Overlord Gastron's second order is for all military forces to sell their souls. Boom, now the town has three first-level warlocks (with third of them having other meaningful levels and all of them having slightly more bulk than usual) for every ten enemy soldiers.
Then he'll send some people far and wide (that is, to every other town and village in a week of ride radius) to search for good mercenaries, adventurers and sellswords to serve him.
Then when the orks will come, he'll offer them to kneel before his dark power. They'll refuse, i suppose. Then he'll challenge their leader for a duel. If enemy leader agrees, that'll be a flashy duel with Gastron's unarmed "servants" standing nearby, ready to invoke if things go badly for him (i. e., he'll keep reducing himself); if enemy leader doesn't, ever-so-confident overlord will use his knowledge of tactics and history to decide where and when to begin a battle, in which his warlocks will open a can of visibility control, weapon shattering, minor debuffs, "one guy uses frightful blast, then other intimidates with beguilling influence turned on" combo, summon swarm/eldritch blast focus fire and underwater scouting of their own. Gastron's military insight will certainly let him manage an army that has access to every least invocation (assuming commoners'll choose them at random), and he'll try to take care of casters and leaders, personally (with some debuffers at his side) if needed (and intimidate enemies into switching loyalties). And don't forget mercenaries.
If it still goes badly, through, he'll die surrounded by giant butterflies and rampaging elephants, which is as cool as it gets.


Next is Nobb. Nobb is shaman of good spirits of Stone Fist tribe (one of them; about a half of mountain troll tribes in homebrew setting he was played in were called "Stone Fist tribe"). He came from mountains. He is sent to find the highest shaman of human tribe. He came in peace (and he keeps telling that to people, despite utter lack of acting convinced).
Stats: Male Troll (homebrew; LA +2, medium size, regen 1/fire or acid, some stat adjustments) Bard 1 / Dragon Shaman 1 / Warblade 1. 16, 14, 21, 6, 9, 13. Feats: martial weapon proficiency (greatclub) (now obscure due to warblade, was picked before that), Extra Music, Obscure lore (he uses bardic knowledge, fluffed as asking spirits, a lot), White raven song. That was back on ECL 5; on ECL 6, he'd picked up another level of warblade. By the way, low intelligence did a great job to justify me constantly forgetting my inventory. Except bonus to perform from masterwork ritual drums — that's a shame on me.
So, let's assume than in his quest to find and meet the higher shaman of the human tribe (also known as Pope) he stumbled upon this town. For the sake of a good story let's also make a few more assumptions: that town guard, despite being warned of future ork attack, didn't attack him on sight (which wouldn't kill him, but would drive him to go away from this town; he had enough of those misunderstandings in his journey) and did give him time to explain himself, and that when he asked if there is any job for him to do for gold (he was told once that it's impossible to get to the Pope without a lot of gold), guards took a long look at this huge mass of living rock, realised that troll healers with big clubs rock and told him about the orc problem in hopes that he would help. He would eagerly agree, of course, and then… Hm. I guess, he would advocate not waiting for orcs but taking arms and intercepting them in the wilderness. Of course, nobody would agree to that plan. So he'll do whatever a local warchief (that is, The Marchal) will tell him to do (speeding up building and similar manual tasks, epically screwing up everything else); in the free time, he'll sacrifice cattle to the spirits and ask them for blessings. On paper, he would do just that 'till the day orcs arrive; in practice this character can get into a hundred of events and switch his allegiance seven times in four days, but that requires details and screw-ups i can't simply think of. When the battle begins, he'll provide support with all the combined might of a first-level bard, energy shield aura (which would be very useful, since most orcs are supposed to wade into melee, but he just won't affect enough people to change the big picture in a battle of hundreds to thousands), White Raven and a wand of CLW. Did i mention coloring everything and everyone in 10 ft radius into, say, lime?
Well, that didn't went so well. A purely reactive (if pretty clever when situation calls to it) character without either a way nor incentive to take command (or to do any heroics solo) won't change anything without a stream of lucky and unlucky coincidences, which usually surround him but which i may neither count on nor account for.

Two more characters of mine will probably follow soon (tomorrow, perhaps).

[Amphetryon]

Hey Amphwletryon so you mind leveling him to 10 and join forces with my Rogue? or I could de-level him in any case.

Only if you edit my name to its correct spelling. :P

EDIT: In response to JaronK's post 2 below mine, Dusk Eclipse's Rogue and my DN 8/Crusader 2 seek interested party members. Officially LFG, apparently.

[urandom]

I'll try this alone as a level 8 Cerebromancer (early entry erudite, focused specialist conjurer). I'll get the townsfolk to transfer anything useful behind the walls, and start rebuilding the fortifications as fast as possible. I'll travel with phantom steed to get close to the army, then sneak into the orc encampment(s) with psycarnum infusion midnight augmented inertial armor, heart of earth, heart of water, share pain,shield, sense danger, vigor, invisibility (rod extended), and fly (rod extended). I'll try to figure out who the leaders are, composition of the forces, plans. I'll reapply fly and invis 2 times if necessary. I'll try to find water, supply, booze, food and poison with psionic minor creation made poison. I'll grab a moderately important fellow to interrogate and retreat to see how that goes. If caught I have sense danger up, so can't be flat footed - I'll celerity and dimension door out of there. I'll retreat once buffs are close to running out, and rope trick nearby. Assuming I didn't learn anything particularly unusual, I plan on hounding the army with caster and leadership assassinations over the two weeks, while keeping in touch with the town (either with message or phantom steed if close enough for a commute). Assassinations will probably involve dropping solid fog/black tentacles,haboob/engulfing terror/midnight augmented amythest burst/energy stun/energy missiles/contact poison. Belt of battle will make this hit pretty fast. I'll celerity and dimension door out if apparently in danger. If the army is still intact by the time it reaches the fort, and I know about the water orcs I'll put slow release bags of contact poison upstream of the river. I'll have flyers dump contact poison on the siege weapons. I'll continue trying to kill any casters. I'll open the enemy strategy spoiler now.

[JaronK]

Due to large amounts of interest, I think I'm going to stop dealing with individuals and rather go with groups. So... party up! You can have up to 5 people in a lower level (9-) party, 7 people in mid to higher level party, and 8 in a max level (14-15) party. Then tell me as a group what you do (preferably in a "week 1 we do this, week 2 we do that, during the battle time we do this" sort of format).

JaronK

[Lans]

Note that damn near everyone has listen as a class skill.

So, invisibility could be very useful, but it's not a guaranteed win.
My characters are in an aura of silence, from the whisper gnome, so listen checks are a no go. Characters were going to have Drow Sighn language, and the imp has telepathy and mindsight.








That does work, but it's a question of which level 1 spell would be worth it.
I was looking at sticky floor or create trap

[JaronK]

My characters are in an aura of silence, from the whisper gnome, so listen checks are a no go. Characters were going to have Drow Sighn language, and the imp has telepathy and mindsight.

Good point, but remember that the orcs continually play drums and alphorns all the time (on the march, it's only drums). This means a silence field becomes pretty obvious... they'd suddenly not hear drums anymore. Also remember you can only use silence a few times per day.

A silence field can be useful for not waking enemies that you're trying to assassinate, but with the drums going it'll actually show the orcs pretty much exactly where you are (since they can quickly establish the borders of the field).

Telepathy + mindsight is great for locating the Orcs, but they're not too stealthy anyway.


I was looking at sticky floor or create trap

That should allow you to create quite the swarm of traps.

JaronK

[Lans]

Good point, but remember that the orcs continually play drums and alphorns all the time (on the march, it's only drums). This means a silence field becomes pretty obvious... they'd suddenly not hear drums anymore. Also remember you can only use silence a few times per day.

A silence field can be useful for not waking enemies that you're trying to assassinate, but with the drums going it'll actually show the orcs pretty much exactly where you are (since they can quickly establish the borders of the field).

I figure between the silence, minor image, and keeping the enemies at range it would let them hit and fade with the warlock, warmage, spell-thief, and the rodent. I can use silence at will via spell thief. Silence also keeps my characters from being hit by words of creation.


Telepathy + mindsight is great for locating the Orcs, but they're not too stealthy anyway. Its also for unit cohesion as only 2 characters can see invisibility.




That should allow you to create quite the swarm of traps.
3600 by my count. Which should whittle away a chunk of the opposition.

[Coidzor]

3600 by my count. Which should whittle away a chunk of the opposition.

How quickly, again? Might serve as an effective roadblock or even something to channel their forces a certain way or along a certain route.

[ArcturusV]

Heh. Second one up, but still too late to get eval'd. :smallbiggrin: Just my luck.

Sadly Tsundaki was low level enough, and thanks to historic DM screw very, very weak due to lacking any items of note, that I wouldn't dare hoist her off on some other party. She'd be a negative modifier.

[JaronK]

I figure between the silence, minor image, and keeping the enemies at range it would let them hit and fade with the warlock, warmage, spell-thief, and the rodent. I can use silence at will via spell thief. Silence also keeps my characters from being hit by words of creation.

It can be helpful, it's just not that great for keeping you from being detected. The minor images could be very useful.


Its also for unit cohesion as only 2 characters can see invisibility.

True.


3600 by my count. Which should whittle away a chunk of the opposition.

Yeah, though as I recall those traps won't kill much... but they should cause some noticeable damage.

JaronK

[A_S]

Aight, I'd throw Merle (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14669599&postcount=27) into the ring as part of the mid-level party. Anybody else in that range?

[Lans]

Yeah, though as I recall those traps won't kill much... but they should cause some noticeable damage.

JaronK

What are the AC's of the orcs foot solders? I was thinking scything blade, +8 d8 and it auto resets.


How quickly, again? Might serve as an effective roadblock or even something to channel their forces a certain way or along a certain route.
It takes 2 rounds per trap, so its going to be an overnight thing

[Fortuna]

So not too badly, but not cleaning up by myself either. All things considered, I'm fairly happy with my performance.

[Threadnaught]

Personally I'd catch a couple of Wights, release them in the city the Orcs are approaching then kill off a few of the town guards and nuke the churches, so the Wights can work without interruption. Then leave everything as a surprise for the Orcs. :smallamused:
If they survive the Wights, I'll just capture some lone Orcs and make up a raiding party completely under my control, make them make raids against surrounding states powerful enough to easily crush them (with the help of illusions for more Orcs), wait for the inevitable backlash and Cloudkill the survivors. If any step of this (besides the Wights killing the Orcs) fails, my character would go straight to the ninth layer of Hell.

Edit: I prefer Drow Wizard, but my only ever PC was a Drow Sorceror. The only characters I actually get to use are DMPCs. :smallfrown:

[JaronK]

What are the AC's of the orcs foot solders? I was thinking scything blade, +8 d8 and it auto resets.

Depends on your level. Their level is half yours (or your level -4 if you're 9th level or above). If they're level 3 to 5 they're wearing hide armor, at 6 and up they have breastplates, and they all have heavy wooden shields on slings (which they switch to their backs so they can pull out their axes). They use standard arrays. So... 15 or 17. Note this is on average. The forces of the Cleric and the commandos are better equipped, while the forces supported by the Orc Titan are worse off.


It takes 2 rounds per trap, so its going to be an overnight thing

Well, you've got two weeks.

JaronK

[8wGremlin]

Hawthorn and Company, ECL 6
N with NE tendancies, Strongheart halfling

From out of the near by woods, green robed figures appear. Each wearing a wooden masks of the green faced man with sad looking eyes, and each carrying a quaterstaff.

The slow as they some to the main gate, and call out a welcome,

We are here to lend you our assistance, if you can pay the price... none shall enter the great forest; to hunt, cut wood, or defile nature from this day forth


---------

Hawthorn is a worshipper of Galaeros, the wood god, but an unusual one
Hawthorn is also a master of shrouds, he is a very charismatic individual, and as such has a number of followers. Hawthorn's followers are a bit like him, in his outlook and use of shadows

Hawthorn build notes


Cloistered Cleric\Archivist 2\Master of Shrouds 3


Dynamic Priest
Circle Magic
Summon Elemental
Leadership
Augment Summoning (flaw)
Spell Focus (conjuration) (flaw)
Spontaneous Domain ACF (plant)


Leadership = 18 (4) + stronghold (2) + fair (1) + generous (1) + level (6) = 14

Which gives me:

4th level cohort
1 x 2nd level follower
15 x 1st level followers

All followers are Strongheart Halfling

5 x 1st level Druids of Galearos, and all have the circle feat, as well as Elemental Companion (CM, p 33) ACF
5 x 1st level Archivists of Galearos, and all have the circle feat
5 x 1st level Mystic Rangers of Galearos, and all have the circle feat


Hawthorn's companion "Doktor Knox" is a 4th level Divine Bard, Beguiler (shining south)



Every day we performance circle, this gives me 16 spell levels, which I heighten one spell to 9th level! Which I use to fuel the summon elemental reserve feat. the rest I use to raise my caster level.

Every evening up leading up to the battle I spontaneously convert the heightened spell in to the 9th level Plant Domain shambler (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/shambler.htm)
This summons 1d4+2 shambling mounds, and if set to guard the city against attackers, they will guard for 7 months!

This averages out to 4 Shambling mounds a night (4 x 7 = 28 Shambling Mounds)

Whilst this is going on, we'll get any spys or criminals due to be executed and get them drained as a shadow, creating more shadows.

All shadows will be given the instructions to only kill Orcs, and to obey Hawthorn's commands for ever as if he was their creator, and pass these instructions on to any and all spawn they create.

We then send these newly spawned shadows to kill any Orc with in a 50 mile radius of the town, and point them in the direction of the oncoming army. Any orc killed will raise as a shadow and attack its comrades, creating yet more shadows...

Note that Shadows are incorporeal and can fly are silent and need magic to hurt them. (these will also provide air cover)

Mean while my cohort and followers will use any and all means to create defences, create their own circles (if they have spells left to use) , also they will share any spells they have with each other, and sell and make items that the general population can use

Companion
4th level Divine Bard
Beguiler

Feats:

Fell Conspiracy (http://dndtools.eu/feats/exemplars-of-evil--64/fell-conspiracy--1102/)
Circle Magic



All this for a Single ECL 6 character...

[Darjh]

Joseph, a 15th lvl bard from a campaign long ago, would be ill suited to directly handle the army.
However, he has a lyre of building in his possession and a few scrolls of sending. First course of order would be to use a sending to request assistance from his artificer cohort to teleport himself there along with 13 of the best men from Joseph's fort. The lyre of building can be used to fortify the garrison and walls, plus construct additional earthen defenses as needed in the time the army arrives. Joseph's high charisma and diplomacy could convince the commoners and experts to help out. However, he is quite weak in combat and couldn't do anything to the army before it arrives on his own. Once the siege begins, he can easily use inspire courage to buff up the defense or lyre of building to protect the walls from any siege weapons while the cohort targets them with wands of various evocations to destroy them.

Paramonos: a 4th level dragonborn whisper gnome totemist (advanced to 6th level by requirements)
Paramonos would start by scouting out the army from a distance. For scouting, he would use the worg pelt (feet chakra) for bonus movement and bonus to stealth checks, the blink shirt (totem) for more mobility, Hunters circlet (crown) for track, and Rageclaws for more survivability, along with the claws of the wyrm soulmeld (hands). (shape soulmeld was used for the additional soulmeld)
This makes Paramonos a capable, fast (40 ft/round), and tough scout, allowing him to find out the general size and details of the army approaching. If need be, he could potentially capture a scout, if found alone. If needed, he could throw out an entangling exhalation then blink or escape through other ways.
In the battle itself, his limited range abilities would like have him defending the wall with entangling exhalation and a long spear to prevent orcs from scaling. If the water orc commandos are discovered, he would defend the river.

[JaronK]

Personally I'd catch a couple of Wights, release them in the city the Orcs are approaching then kill off a few of the town guards and nuke the churches, so the Wights can work without interruption. Then leave everything as a surprise for the Orcs. :smallamused:

Well, that's one way to do it! Might stop the Orcs (they do have Clerics, but not enough to handle a whole towns worth of wights... and while they can certainly fight the wights effectively, that gives you a LOT more troops than they were expecting).


If they survive the Wights, I'll just capture some lone Orcs and make up a raiding party completely under my control, make them make raids against surrounding states powerful enough to easily crush them (with the help of illusions for more Orcs), wait for the inevitable backlash and Cloudkill the survivors. If any step of this (besides the Wights killing the Orcs) fails, my character would go straight to the ninth layer of Hell.

This is not how you were expected to solve the issue, but it's pretty hilarious.

JaronK

[Derpldorf]

Joseph, a 15th lvl bard from a campaign long ago, would be ill suited to directly handle the army.
However, he has a lyre of building in his possession and a few scrolls of sending. First course of order would be to use a sending to request assistance from his artificer cohort to teleport himself there along with 13 of the best men from Joseph's fort. The lyre of building can be used to fortify the garrison and walls, plus construct additional earthen defenses as needed in the time the army arrives. Joseph's high charisma and diplomacy could convince the commoners and experts to help out. However, he is quite weak in combat and couldn't do anything to the army before it arrives on his own. Once the siege begins, he can easily use inspire courage to buff up the defense or lyre of building to protect the walls from any siege weapons while the cohort targets them with wands of various evocations to destroy them.

Paramonos: a 4th level dragonborn whisper gnome totemist (advanced to 6th level by requirements)
Paramonos would start by scouting out the army from a distance. For scouting, he would use the worg pelt (feet chakra) for bonus movement and bonus to stealth checks, the blink shirt (totem) for more mobility, Hunters circlet (crown) for track, and Rageclaws for more survivability, along with the claws of the wyrm soulmeld (hands). (shape soulmeld was used for the additional soulmeld)
This makes Paramonos a capable, fast (40 ft/round), and tough scout, allowing him to find out the general size and details of the army approaching. If need be, he could potentially capture a scout, if found alone. If needed, he could throw out an entangling exhalation then blink or escape through other ways.
In the battle itself, his limited range abilities would like have him defending the wall with entangling exhalation and a long spear to prevent orcs from scaling. If the water orc commandos are discovered, he would defend the river.

Any chance he would welcome the assistance of Bob the the one warforged construction crew? He's a level 15 wizard with Max ranks in knowledge: Arcitecture and engineering, and profession engineer. He has access to various creation and fabrication spells as well as some blank to blanks and shape/move blank spells, and he's got his own lyre to boot, with half ranks in preform letting him pass the check... most of the time.

I figured he'd make an engineering check to design effective fortifications and then spend all of his spell slots chain casting relevant spells like wall of stone and such until he's spent, then spend the rest of his day playing the lyre until he needs to rest. Lets make a fortress my friend :)

[NichG]

Once Superior Invisibility comes into play (could happen via scrolls as low as the Lv6 character) then the 800ft invisible fireballing mage becomes a real army-killer against things like this. 800ft is beyond the range of most easy sources of breaking Invisibility and the distance penalties kill Listen by that range unless you run the army as all simultaneously giving Aid Another to the commander. But thats kind of a boring answer, honestly. You could do Exploding Runes fields and things like that with such a character. So I'm going to mostly avoid magic from here on in.

A more interesting thing involves the army's water supplies. You say the food is kept pure and is magical in nature, but what about the water? Do they use Decanters for it, or do they drink from local sources? Dysentery is good against armies, and with 2 weeks before they arrive you have lots of chances at it, and can be caused by mixing waste into their drinking water. But lets say they're being careful about their water too, since they're careful about their food.

Are the orcs superstitious about anything? It might not be that hard to create a morale problem by putting up the right decorations for their arrival. Perhaps not as extreme as soloing the entire army, but every little bit helps. Another option is to high-tail it to where they came from and attack their homes. Make sure riders escape to tell the army about it. Hopefully it'd cause dissent and hesitation as to whether to march on or return to defend home.

Assassination of the leadership is really a rough thing to try, but you might be able to create some dissention in the ranks. Find someone who wants to rise but is incompetent, do some spying and find out which particular simple missions were ordered by which commanders, and target one commander to make him look weak by consistently thwarting every single mission he sends out. This is more of a thing you do when you have months rather than weeks though. Magic again can do this in a dozen ways, sending dream visions or messages from thin air to the confused Lv4 orc lieutenant saying that if he is strong enough to grab control there are powerful demonic/etc allies waiting for him, or whatever.

If I were playing an orc or half-orc, join the army and then challenge for leadership. If orcs work that way.

[ArcturusV]

Well, remember that Purify Food and Drink is a level 0 clerical spell. That's the key weakness to using poisoned/diseased food/water. Even if it's low level enough that it's not using the Decanter of Endless Water and Everful Larder... even a 1st level NPC class can end up casting it several times per day and the volume is large enough that one casting can cover company level units. So they don't need something but what... 1 adept per 250 soldiers or something to guarantee pure food and drink regardless of source.

[Magnera]

I have a few characters, but one in particular that I would like to try out.
My Stoney Half-Copper-Dragon Five Headed Hydra! (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=508085) along with Random_Person's Fei is a character from the wonderful Protectors of Humanity (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=270691) campaign and they would probably work out very well. With the hydra burrowing under the army and then have Fei tell him where to spring out and attack. He could spring up, attack a major target (such as that half minotaur guy) and use Psychic Vampire (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Psychic_Vampire) to drain him of his low intelligence.

What is MORE likely is the hydras use of expansion to make its self colossal, then I proceed to go to town with a combination of, Shock Trooper's Domino Rush (http://dndtools.eu/feats/complete-warrior--61/shock-trooper--2614/), Knockback (http://dndtools.eu/feats/races-of-stone--82/knockback--1724/), Knock Down (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Knock-Down) Cleave (and if I get to level 12, Great Cleave), Imp Trip/Bullrush and Extended Reach (http://dndtools.eu/feats/savage-species--47/extended-reach--1012/). The process of attacks would look like, Attack-> Knockback into second guy-> Trip both-> Attack-> Knockback into two+ MORE bad guys,-> Improved Trip everyone that has been hit-> Send them flying into EVEN MORE bad guys! Did I mention this was with one head? And that I can cleave into more? And that there are five heads to attack with?
:smallbiggrin:

[JaronK]

Once Superior Invisibility comes into play (could happen via scrolls as low as the Lv6 character) then the 800ft invisible fireballing mage becomes a real army-killer against things like this. 800ft is beyond the range of most easy sources of breaking Invisibility and the distance penalties kill Listen by that range unless you run the army as all simultaneously giving Aid Another to the commander. But thats kind of a boring answer, honestly. You could do Exploding Runes fields and things like that with such a character. So I'm going to mostly avoid magic from here on in.

I imagine fireballs would give away where you're shooting from (since they launch from that spot) which means the Dire Bats can home in on you pretty easily. Plus, you can only kill so many via this method. But it could do some real damage.


A more interesting thing involves the army's water supplies. You say the food is kept pure and is magical in nature, but what about the water? Do they use Decanters for it, or do they drink from local sources? Dysentery is good against armies, and with 2 weeks before they arrive you have lots of chances at it, and can be caused by mixing waste into their drinking water. But lets say they're being careful about their water too, since they're careful about their food.

Everful Basin for water. At low levels they've got Adepts with Purify Food and Drink.


Are the orcs superstitious about anything? It might not be that hard to create a morale problem by putting up the right decorations for their arrival. Perhaps not as extreme as soloing the entire army, but every little bit helps. Another option is to high-tail it to where they came from and attack their homes. Make sure riders escape to tell the army about it. Hopefully it'd cause dissent and hesitation as to whether to march on or return to defend home.

Hmm, I'm not sure. At least some of the Orcs are driven by visions of victory, so they might not believe anything telling them otherwise. But attacking their homelands is an interesting response worth considering. At least a few of the Orc leaders wouldn't like that at all and would want to protect their homelands. Some of the others would rather just take revenge on your town, of course, but the divisive aspect could be good.


Assassination of the leadership is really a rough thing to try, but you might be able to create some dissention in the ranks. Find someone who wants to rise but is incompetent, do some spying and find out which particular simple missions were ordered by which commanders, and target one commander to make him look weak by consistently thwarting every single mission he sends out. This is more of a thing you do when you have months rather than weeks though.

Yeah, not sure you can do this in time. Also, the only missions you could thwart I think would be killing the scouts... which might be useful anyway of course.


Magic again can do this in a dozen ways, sending dream visions or messages from thin air to the confused Lv4 orc lieutenant saying that if he is strong enough to grab control there are powerful demonic/etc allies waiting for him, or whatever.

Heh, that could get hilarious.


If I were playing an orc or half-orc, join the army and then challenge for leadership. If orcs work that way.

Some of the tribes would actually respond well to that. Others would not. If you could kill the Half Minotaur Orc War Hulk in what looks like a fair melee fight, you could probably command his troops... of course, the other Orc leaders wouldn't like that.

JaronK

[Lord_Gareth]

Due to large amounts of interest, I think I'm going to stop dealing with individuals and rather go with groups. So... party up! You can have up to 5 people in a lower level (9-) party, 7 people in mid to higher level party, and 8 in a max level (14-15) party. Then tell me as a group what you do (preferably in a "week 1 we do this, week 2 we do that, during the battle time we do this" sort of format).

JaronK

But...but...but I had a solo concept planned out and everything T_T

[Twilightwyrm]

But...but...but I had a solo concept planned out and everything T_T

Depending, I might be able to help. I was about to try a two-party concept anyways. Depending on your character's level, we might be able to work out an effective two-person strategy.

[Lord_Gareth]

Depending, I might be able to help. I was about to try a two-party concept anyways. Depending on your character's level, we might be able to work out an effective two-person strategy.

Well, the basic skeleton at the moment (I haven't made her) is a gray elf wizard 5/assassin 1/Ultimate Magus 6 (CR 12) - Loraiva of the Caress, Killer for the Crown. The royal assassin.

[Twilightwyrm]

Well, the basic skeleton at the moment (I haven't made her) is a gray elf wizard 5/assassin 1/Ultimate Magus 6 (CR 12) - Loraiva of the Caress, Killer for the Crown. The royal assassin.

This works more or less perfectly, with the caveat that I would have to raise my character to 12th level (not difficult, as I have it more or less planned in advance). Still, I was anticipating working with an assassin anyways (the other character in my normal group is one). Since I have not yet rebuilt the character in the campaign he is involved in (was going to go Rogue/Swordsage), he is currently as follows:
Nero Cornisro, Elf Rogue 7/Eidetic Wizard 1/Unseen Seer 4
Though I suppose I could go with the rebuilt version if there would be greater synergy there.

[Lord_Gareth]

Well, no offense ATM but I was sorta champing at the bit to see if the plan I had in mind was going to work out. We'll see if JaronK permits me to attempt an illustration of what a solo run might look like. If not, then by all means - just keep in mind that I know literally nothing about anything in your writeup but Rogue.

[JaronK]

Well, no offense ATM but I was sorta champing at the bit to see if the plan I had in mind was going to work out. We'll see if JaronK permits me to attempt an illustration of what a solo run might look like. If not, then by all means - just keep in mind that I know literally nothing about anything in your writeup but Rogue.

If you really want to try, okay, but realize that solo success means your character was too powerful for this scenario!

JaronK

[8wGremlin]

Absolutely no comments on my ECL 6 entry... gesh...
I'm Happy to team up with any other E6 builds

the main orc forces are ECL 3 are they not?

[JaronK]

[SIZE="5"]Cloistered Cleric\Archivist 2\Master of Shrouds 3

I'm guessing that's Cloistered Cleric 1 in there.


Every day we performance circle, this gives me 16 spell levels, which I heighten one spell to 9th level! Which I use to fuel the summon elemental reserve feat. the rest I use to raise my caster level.

I'm not familiar with circle magic, but I'll take your word on that one.


Every evening up leading up to the battle I spontaneously convert the heightened spell in to the 9th level Plant Domain shambler (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/shambler.htm)
This summons 1d4+2 shambling mounds, and if set to guard the city against attackers, they will guard for 7 months!

Clever, though note that they're restricted to a roughly 200 foot range limitation doing that. Still, against a mostly melee force they'll be very helpful, as they're a lot stronger than the level 3 Orcs. But even with two weeks of summonings, they'll be heavily outnumbered. But it's still a clever tactic that's bound to be helpful and should provide a strong front line defense.


Whilst this is going on, we'll get any spys or criminals due to be executed and get them drained as a shadow, creating more shadows.

All shadows will be given the instructions to only kill Orcs, and to obey Hawthorn's commands for ever as if he was their creator, and pass these instructions on to any and all spawn they create.

How are you controlling these shadows?


We then send these newly spawned shadows to kill any Orc with in a 50 mile radius of the town, and point them in the direction of the oncoming army. Any orc killed will raise as a shadow and attack its comrades, creating yet more shadows...

Note that Shadows are incorporeal and can fly are silent and need magic to hurt them. (these will also provide air cover)

Very effective if you can make this work, but I'm not seeing how you're controlling them. Note that the Orc Cleric can actually rebuke your shadows, though he'd only control two that way. There's also a bunch of level 3 Clerics who can do a little, but not much, to those shadows.


Mean while my cohort and followers will use any and all means to create defences, create their own circles (if they have spells left to use) , also they will share any spells they have with each other, and sell and make items that the general population can use

Should be useful.


All this for a Single ECL 6 character...

For a lone level 6, it's pretty damn impressive.

JaronK

[LordBlades]

How are you controlling these shadows?


Presumably he's using the shadow he can summon from Master of Shrouds 2 (which albeit temporary is under his control) to drain the first dude and then order the spawned shadow to obey his commands forever then go from there.

[Vizzerdrix]

Two whole weeks to prepare?! Merry Christmas to me!

Okay. My last played D&D character was a Necropolatin strongheart Halfling Dread Necro-8/MotaO-4.

With two whole weeks, I'd use Suspension to get buildings up in the air, Then I'd start binding, killing, and animating Arrow demons and skeleton archers (A total of 90 HD worth of undead) to deal with any flying threats. Any buildings left on the ground I'd fill up with uncontrolled undead (anything that can make spawn + my prized collection of undead spiders) and ghoul Glyphs.

During the first day, I'd use my folding Boat (Also under the effects of Suspension) to fly far overhead, and drop X number of cows worth of Black Sand on their camp. Maybe even a few pebbles with Heightened Daylight on them just to mix things up a little.

Between the sand and the constant undead archer pelting I'd try to push them into the remains of the village so the undead swarm could deal with them. Any buildings that they manage to fully take can then be burned from the top down.

Primary targets (Clerics and officers) get a salvo of heavy metamagiced enervation when they show themselves. I'd have the town militia use whatever ranged weapons they had to deal with flyers with support from the undead archery club.


On a side note: I could also pass around my Azun-Gund. Letting everyone get a zombie or two of their very own.

[Amidus Drexel]

This summons 1d4+2 shambling mounds, and if set to guard the city against attackers, they will guard for 7 months!

This averages out to 4 Shambling mounds a night (4 x 7 = 28 Shambling Mounds)


Actually, that averages to 4.5 a night, so you get 31.5 total. :smallamused:



For a lone level 6, it's pretty damn impressive.

JaronK

Aye. Incorporeal undead are nasty against an army of relatively low-level creatures. The hardest part is getting control of one to begin with at a reasonable level; master of shrouds is the way to go. Even if they don't destroy the army entirely, they'll severely weaken it.

I considered doing something along those lines, actually, although I prefer wraiths.

[Lord_Gareth]

If you really want to try, okay, but realize that solo success means your character was too powerful for this scenario!

JaronK

I'm actually hoping that clever planning will get me further than actual personal power.

[Threadnaught]

Two whole weeks to prepare?! Merry Christmas to me!

Okay. My last played D&D character was a Necropolatin strongheart Halfling Dread Necro-8/MotaO-4.

With two whole weeks, I'd use Suspension to get buildings up in the air, Then I'd start binding, killing, and animating Arrow demons and skeleton archers (A total of 90 HD worth of undead) to deal with any flying threats. Any buildings left on the ground I'd fill up with uncontrolled undead (anything that can make spawn + my prized collection of undead spiders) and ghoul Glyphs.

During the first day, I'd use my folding Boat (Also under the effects of Suspension) to fly far overhead, and drop X number of cows worth of Black Sand on their camp. Maybe even a few pebbles with Heightened Daylight on them just to mix things up a little.

Between the sand and the constant undead archer pelting I'd try to push them into the remains of the village so the undead swarm could deal with them. Any buildings that they manage to fully take can then be burned from the top down.

Primary targets (Clerics and officers) get a salvo of heavy metamagiced enervation when they show themselves. I'd have the town militia use whatever ranged weapons they had to deal with flyers with support from the undead archery club.


On a side note: I could also pass around my Azun-Gund. Letting everyone get a zombie or two of their very own.

Glad to see I'm not the only one who doesn't take the survival of the defenders seriously. After all, the only objective we're given is "defeat Orc army" so I see anything as fair game. No matter how devious or unnecessarily cruel. :smallamused:

Maybe Wraiths would be better than Wrights, just get a Wraith under my command to kill 5 townspeople, get each of those Wraiths to kill another 5 each and keep going until the whole town are Wraiths. Sit in my extradimensional lair and wait for the Orcs to break down my crappy stone wall. Then send in all my Wraiths in order of the last ones created first.
But Wrights make more sense for a worldwide zombie apocalypse. :smallfrown:


I win if I wipe out all life on the planet, right?

[Darjh]

Absolutely no comments on my ECL 6 entry... gesh...
I'm Happy to team up with any other E6 builds

the main orc forces are ECL 3 are they not?

Yeah, if you're lvl 6. My totemist could work with you.


Paramonos: a 4th level dragonborn whisper gnome totemist (advanced to 6th level by requirements)
Paramonos would start by scouting out the army from a distance. For scouting, he would use the worg pelt (feet chakra) for bonus movement and bonus to stealth checks, the blink shirt (totem) for more mobility, Hunters circlet (crown) for track, and Rageclaws for more survivability, along with the claws of the wyrm soulmeld (hands). (shape soulmeld was used for the additional soulmeld)
This makes Paramonos a capable, fast (40 ft/round), and tough scout, allowing him to find out the general size and details of the army approaching. If need be, he could potentially capture a scout, if found alone. If needed, he could throw out an entangling exhalation then blink or escape through other ways.
In the battle itself, his limited range abilities would like have him defending the wall with entangling exhalation and a long spear to prevent orcs from scaling. If the water orc commandos are discovered, he would defend the river.

What kind of gesh are you using?

[Darjh]

Any chance he would welcome the assistance of Bob the the one warforged construction crew? He's a level 15 wizard with Max ranks in knowledge: Arcitecture and engineering, and profession engineer. He has access to various creation and fabrication spells as well as some blank to blanks and shape/move blank spells, and he's got his own lyre to boot, with half ranks in preform letting him pass the check... most of the time.

I figured he'd make an engineering check to design effective fortifications and then spend all of his spell slots chain casting relevant spells like wall of stone and such until he's spent, then spend the rest of his day playing the lyre until he needs to rest. Lets make a fortress my friend :)

Our only limiting factor will be these silly humans who have to man the walls!

[JaronK]

Presumably he's using the shadow he can summon from Master of Shrouds 2 (which albeit temporary is under his control) to drain the first dude and then order the spawned shadow to obey his commands forever then go from there.

Ah. As a DM, I never allow that move, as I tend to say that the magical control you have over one makes it ineligible to control the others (beyond the numbers you could control via your various abilities). It stops that particular abuse. Obviously, it's a DM ruling for the sake of balance, but hey, I'm the DM on this one. So, the shadow thing wouldn't work in this game (though he could still create a shadow, sick it on a few low level Orcs, and then let the uncontrolled shadows run amok in the enemy army. Of course, if the shadows actually get out of control and do a lot of damage they might be scarier than the Orcs! But I imagine the Orc Clerics could handle the outbreak in reasonable time).


I'm actually hoping that clever planning will get me further than actual personal power.

Sure, but I like to match player creativity with threats that challenge that creativity. If it were a long running campaign, a defeat of the Orcs here via really creative methods might result in some of the surviving Orcs retreating to regroup, and some of the more insane Orcs among the group taking command via the theory that "wacky stuff works." The result is enemies coming back with equally creative tactics in the future. The resulting games are... entertaining to say the least.

@Other, less kind folks: I'm enjoying hearing the solutions that come down to "screw the town, you just said beat the Orcs!" Always hilarious to watch the murder hobos come out of the woodwork and destroy all before them. ...I love playing murder hobos sometimes.

JaronK

[GreenETC]

How well would a Desert Orc Barbarian (Bear Totem City Brawler [Drag349] Barbarian 5/Crusader 1/Fist of the Forest 3) with 24 STR and Crushing Weight of the Mountain Stance (through his 9th lvl feat) do if he challenged the War Hulk to a wrestling match as a contest of strength?

During a Rage his grapple mod would be 9+4+4+9=26. If he spent cash on a +4 Str item and Gloves of Titan's Grip, he could boost that to 36. I'd try if possible to avoid using Enlarge Person, so that they wouldn't consider it an unfair fight.

I would assume that a large Half-Minotaur Orc would probably be willing to put down his weapon and wrestle a man wearing no armor who was one size smaller than him if he challenged him in front of his clan.

[Answerer]

I have a level 10 Binder 1/Ardent (I think?) 4/Anima Mage (psionic adaptation) 5 I could throw in with the DN 8/Crusader 2 and the Rogue. Assuming that variant is allowed. It's not online and I don't have access to it here; I'll try to get it up tonight (with adjustments for this game's rules).

[JaronK]

How well would a Desert Orc Barbarian (Bear Totem City Brawler [Drag349] Barbarian 5/Crusader 1/Fist of the Forest 3) with 24 STR and Crushing Weight of the Mountain Stance (through his 9th lvl feat) do if he challenged the War Hulk to a wrestling match as a contest of strength?

During a Rage his grapple mod would be 9+4+4+9=26. If he spent cash on a +4 Str item and Gloves of Titan's Grip, he could boost that to 36. I'd try if possible to avoid using Enlarge Person, so that they wouldn't consider it an unfair fight.

I would assume that a large Half-Minotaur Orc would probably be willing to put down his weapon and wrestle a man wearing no armor who was one size smaller than him if he challenged him in front of his clan.

The hard part would be getting him to put down his weapon once he gets going... you'd probably have to somehow challenge him before the main battle. I mean, he's a War Hulk... with No Time To Think he's not really stopping to listen. He's mostly just howling.

Anyway, Half Minotaur Orc gives insane stat mods (+16 Str!) and he's elite array with +2 Str from levels (so 33 right there), raging (+4), and has +4 from his War Hulk levels at level 9 (+1LA), so that's 41 strength, for a total strength mod of +15. He's also got +5 BAB and he's large. So he's got a +24 Grapple modifier. It would be a close fight if you didn't spec for it!

If you won that fight and just held him down until the rage wore off (leaving him fatigued) you might be able to take leadership of his group, but the other Orc leaders wouldn't like you at all, and that group is there to smash things and kill things. They won't let you be leader for long unless you give them things to smash (and they're not planning on attacking the other Orcs while they're heavily outnumbered). If you just walked up, wrestled the leader into submission, and walked away you might demoralize them pretty heavily though. That might be worth it.

Note that if the Orc Cleric saw you do this it's likely he'd cast Augery before the fight and thus know if you were going to win. If he knew that, he might cheat and buff the War Hulk a bit. You could still win in theory if you were speced for it, as he'd probably only be able to give a +4 Str bonus.

JaronK

[GreenETC]

If you just walked up, wrestled the leader into submission, and walked away you might demoralize them pretty heavily though. That might be worth it.

My options if I won through luck and the power of constrict damage would probably amount to either just walking out to demoralize them or just forget the party and join the Orc horde as a new leader, giving them the group's strategies. Gotta know when to fold em. :smallwink:

[SowZ]

I'll use my most recent D&D character. A lesser tiefling Rogue 4/Swash 1/Ass 1.

Stats after item boosts-

Str 10
Dex 22
Con 12
Int 21
Wis 13
Cha 10

BAB-
+4

Saves-
Reflex 13
Fort 4
Will 2

Weapons-
Shortbow w/ MW arrows
+1 Keen Rapier
MW Adamantine Dagger

Other items of note-
Bracers of Murder
Belt of Healing
Leather Armor
Basically any mundane equipment you can think of, tons of MW tools
Lots of poisons and traps

Feats-
Two Weapon Fighting
Craven
Daring Outlaw

Skills- Lots of them but most relevant, Maxed out Move Silently:19, Hide:19, Craft (Trap:16,) Craft (Poison:16,) Sleight of Hand: 17

Alright, so now you know the essentials, I'll try and think of my plan and get back to you.

[Shining Wrath]

OK, rolling out my Warforged Warblade, level 7.
My opinion is that slowing down the advance is key. So I'm going to team up with someone who can scout (my perception is not the best) and harass their scouts and foraging parties. Not having to sleep, or rest, will be key. I've actually got decent ranged ability for a Warblade, so I'll be sniping on small parties, and actually hoping they'll charge me thinking I'm a ranger. Out comes the sword, Mithral Tornado, and then chop up the survivors.

Yes, I can repair myself.

S 18 D 18 C 18 I 15 W 12 C 10
+1 Keen Bastard Sword (use 2H)
I'd buy a +4 damage MW Composite Longbow for the occasion
AC 22 + Displacement
84 HP
BAB 7

Have to stay away from the main body of the army but I can probably kill an entire scouting party by myself.

[SowZ]

OK, rolling out my Warforged Warblade, level 7.
My opinion is that slowing down the advance is key. So I'm going to team up with someone who can scout (my perception is not the best) and harass their scouts and foraging parties. Not having to sleep, or rest, will be key. I've actually got decent ranged ability for a Warblade, so I'll be sniping on small parties, and actually hoping they'll charge me thinking I'm a ranger. Out comes the sword, Mithral Tornado, and then chop up the survivors.

Yes, I can repair myself.

S 18 D 18 C 18 I 15 W 12 C 10
+1 Keen Bastard Sword (use 2H)
I'd buy a +4 MW Composite Longbow for the occasion
AC 22 + Displacement
84 HP
BAB 7

Have to stay away from the main body of the army but I can probably kill an entire scouting party by myself.

You can afford to just drop the money needed for a +4 Longbow as needed at level 7?

[Shining Wrath]

You can afford to just drop the money needed for a +4 Longbow as needed at level 7?

I've been saving up for Strongarm Braces. And not +4 ... Master work composite with +4 to damage.

[SowZ]

I've been saving up for Strongarm Braces. And not +4 ... Master work composite with +4 to damage.

Ah, okay, I read that wrong. Sorry, that is a lot more reasonable. Hehe.

[8wGremlin]

Ah. As a DM, I never allow that move, as I tend to say that the magical control you have over one makes it ineligible to control the others (beyond the numbers you could control via your various abilities). It stops that particular abuse. Obviously, it's a DM ruling for the sake of balance, but hey, I'm the DM on this one. So, the shadow thing wouldn't work in this game (though he could still create a shadow, sick it on a few low level Orcs, and then let the uncontrolled shadows run amok in the enemy army. Of course, if the shadows actually get out of control and do a lot of damage they might be scarier than the Orcs! But I imagine the Orc Clerics could handle the outbreak in reasonable time).
JaronK

Sorry to hear that JaronK You've introduced a houserule that effectivly shuts down any necromantic advantage. So any undead that spawns is no longer effective (no Shadows, Ghouls, Wraith, etc..)




Spawning

Once undead have created their spawn,they may command their children as they see fit.


It goes on further about hierarchy chains of undead. But its your Game and you are the GM, so fair enough



But I imagine the Orc Clerics could handle the outbreak in reasonable time).


These Clerics with Rebuke undead, will have to be quite potent
Shadows have a 3hd and so would only be able to be controlled by a cleric of 6th level
(probabally one of the Orc generals?)

Even lower level cleric will may be rebuke the shadows, but this Awes them (giving any attack rolls against them a +2 bonus).

So whilst a concerted effort could be made on them, the hidden nature intelligence of the shadows and their orders, would mean that they would attack weaker more exposed creatures, such as the scouts, and riders first, building up their numbers before a full out assault. and by that time its too late... most of the Orc troops would not be sufficiently armed to deal with them... Oh and their would be no orc with in 50 miles after the event, and a massive amount of shadows who can only kill Orcs...

But as you said , you're the GM and this tactic is disallowed, so lets move on...

[Shining Wrath]

Ah, okay, I read that wrong. Sorry, that is a lot more reasonable. Hehe.

Yeah, it's not a bad plan. Team up with a ranger, engage at range, when they close switch weapons and make them wish I was still using the bow. Ranger can fall back and continue to pepper them with arrows as I slash away merrily.

Bonus points if ranger is an elf and doesn't have to sleep very much.

[Amphetryon]

Any and all input from prospective party members or bored observers on additional equipment purchases for my Necropolitan Darfellan DN 8/Crusader 2 (beyond the +1 Sweeping Guisarme, a Nightstick, and +1 Studded Leather) is welcome. Equipment shopping is always my least favorite part of creation.

[Twilightwyrm]

Well, no offense ATM but I was sorta champing at the bit to see if the plan I had in mind was going to work out. We'll see if JaronK permits me to attempt an illustration of what a solo run might look like. If not, then by all means - just keep in mind that I know literally nothing about anything in your writeup but Rogue.

Fair enough. Well let me know then. (Unseen Seer, btw, is basically a PrC combining Rogue and Wizard)

[8wGremlin]

Any and all input from prospective party members or bored observers on additional equipment purchases for my Necropolitan Darfellan DN 8/Crusader 2 (beyond the +1 Sweeping Guisarme, a Nightstick, and +1 Studded Leather) is welcome. Equipment shopping is always my least favorite part of creation.

Tell me about it....


takes longer than building a character, and I'd rather just play them...
Take Hawthorn, he's an actual character in a game I'm in... i only have the barest of equipment and I have followers etc.. all whom can teach him 1st level ranger, divine bard, and druid spells.. book keeping nightmare!

[Vizzerdrix]

Glad to see I'm not the only one who doesn't take the survival of the defenders seriously.

Hmm? My method could work either way. After all, every town has a graveyard, and my build allows for cherry picking with lesser planar binding/ planar binding for undead creation, more or less.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

If you really want to try, okay, but realize that solo success means your character was too powerful for this scenario!

JaronKFine by me. The original request was to talk about how previous characters would contribute to the situation, and that's what I'm doing.

Sapphire Hierarch...zilla: Depending on level, he has immunity to crits, DR 9/evil, fast healing ~30, high AC and high saves; this means they're not doing much to him outside of dispel magic (and his CL against dispel might be prohibitive depending on their caster level). Given the amount of time available, clerical/sapphire divinations and long term spells (sending, stone shape, see previous posts) become an option, but this dude's MO is to roll up and smash the crap out of high value targets. High level DFI bards would be problematic, but it's possible to get energy immunities (or at least high resistances) up before smashin' things. Divinations are nice here. He also has a bunch of auras and group buffs up for when the battle actually commences. At 13th level he can persist Righteous Glare and kill/rout most of the army by himself on round 1.

Contribution specifically in a party setting: Lots of group buffs, healing/support spells.

Rogue/Wizard/Mindbender/Spellwarp Sniper/Unseen Seer
With Darkstalker + hide and move silently around level + 35, he could probably snipe his way through most of the high value targets before they found him (locating with divinations/mindsight), and then he just dim doors/teleports away if need be. Spellwarped Scintillating Sphere for long range sniping and Spellwarped Frost Breath for when he needs someone to sit still for a few moments, sneak attack providing the damage necessary to kill. Note that talking/yelling is a free action, so no alerting your friends allowed.

Against the army as a whole he's less useful, but one would hope a horde of murderous orcs might not function well with a power vacuum.

Contribution specifically in a party setting: If the whole team is a super-sneaky gank squad this guy works really well as the "setup," making sure the targets (and/or nearby guards) don't move while they're being murderized.

[8wGremlin]

Would it be a good idea to have a range of characters for each level band

Like this

1-6
7-11
12-15
16+

And see if we could put different players characters together


E6


Hawthorn and Comany (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14671661&postcount=50) Defence Consultant
Tsundaki (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14667018&postcount=9) Head of Intelligence?
Paramonos (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14671707&postcount=51) Combat specialist?




E11


xxx



E15


xxx

[ArcturusV]

Well, between Paramonos and Tsundaki, we should be able to buy a lot of time and slow down the army appreciably. Just having one more guy who's specced for stealth like that, but also a much harder hitter, would increase the viability of several options for Tsundaki to pick off scouts, conduct nuisance raids, etc. Tsundaki's superior spotting and trapping abilities would compliment his combat efficiency nicely. And more time means that well, you'll have a greater horde of unstoppable damned when they do get there with Hawthorne. Not to mention between the two elements a lot of good intelligence passed on, and two operatives who could tackle Priority Target issues for you, like clearing out low level clerics so the shadows have more freedom to operate.

[urandom]

I wouldn't mind teaming up in the 7-11 category. I'm a reasonably high op level 8 cerebromancer (using a lenient early entry trick - but still a theurge).

Here's what I previously planned, so anyone who wants to jump on board and either contribute in their own way, or recommend a change of plans feel free. I also have control sound to assist with sneaking, and caster control. Not sure what to do about scent though - any alchemical solutions? I realize they are purifying their food and drink, but are they doing so immediately before eating, or storing it for a bit. Another humorous thing would be to apply contact poison to weapon handles and cutlery (do orcs use cutlery or just hands?) When they start dropping during dinner and go to grab their weapons, they'll get hit again.


I'll try this alone as a level 8 Cerebromancer (early entry erudite, focused specialist conjurer). I'll get the townsfolk to transfer anything useful behind the walls, and start rebuilding the fortifications as fast as possible. I'll travel with phantom steed to get close to the army, then sneak into the orc encampment(s) with psycarnum infusion midnight augmented inertial armor, heart of earth, heart of water, share pain,shield, sense danger, vigor, invisibility (rod extended), and fly (rod extended). I'll try to figure out who the leaders are, composition of the forces, plans. I'll reapply fly and invis 2 times if necessary. I'll try to find water, supply, booze, food and poison with psionic minor creation made poison. I'll grab a moderately important fellow to interrogate and retreat to see how that goes. If caught I have sense danger up, so can't be flat footed - I'll celerity and dimension door out of there. I'll retreat once buffs are close to running out, and rope trick nearby. Assuming I didn't learn anything particularly unusual, I plan on hounding the army with caster and leadership assassinations over the two weeks, while keeping in touch with the town (either with message or phantom steed if close enough for a commute). Assassinations will probably involve dropping solid fog/black tentacles,haboob/engulfing terror/midnight augmented amythest burst/energy stun/energy missiles/contact poison. Belt of battle will make this hit pretty fast. I'll celerity and dimension door out if apparently in danger. If the army is still intact by the time it reaches the fort, and I know about the water orcs I'll put slow release bags of contact poison upstream of the river. I'll have flyers dump contact poison on the siege weapons. I'll continue trying to kill any casters. I'll open the enemy strategy spoiler now.

[8wGremlin]

Well, between Paramonos and Tsundaki, we should be able to buy a lot of time and slow down the army appreciably. Just having one more guy who's specced for stealth like that, but also a much harder hitter, would increase the viability of several options for Tsundaki to pick off scouts, conduct nuisance raids, etc. Tsundaki's superior spotting and trapping abilities would compliment his combat efficiency nicely. And more time means that well, you'll have a greater horde of unstoppable damned when they do get there with Hawthorne. Not to mention between the two elements a lot of good intelligence passed on, and two operatives who could tackle Priority Target issues for you, like clearing out low level clerics so the shadows have more freedom to operate.

Quite agree! I can see some awesome synergy between the two of you!

Now who else can we recruit for our Seven Samurai scenario (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Samurai)?

What else do we need?
Hawthorns ground staff can basically cast any 1st level cleric, bard, druid, and ranger spell in the system...

[Thebar99]

An army of mostly non magical forces with little in the way of detection abilities... what stops a level 9 Druid with a CL of 15 from just soloing everything with a tornado, if anything? Other than natural 20s and the few casters that'd survive of course which you can deal with either alone or with a good party.

If we pretend that an army is a credible threat and treat this as though it were an actual challenge, then Ebon Eyes and attack at night. Their visibility is 60 feet, yours is near infinite. You pick the time, place, and nature of the engagement and attack at medium or long range until either you get bored, your DM gets bored, or you are 8 levels higher than the enemy units and can no longer level off them.

Either I'm missing something here or everyone else is because every other response makes out as if this is hard.

[urandom]

An army of mostly non magical forces with little in the way of detection abilities... what stops a level 9 Druid with a CL of 15 from just soloing everything with a tornado, if anything? Other than natural 20s and the few casters that'd survive of course which you can deal with either alone or with a good party.

If we pretend that an army is a credible threat and treat this as though it were an actual challenge, then Ebon Eyes and attack at night. Their visibility is 60 feet, yours is near infinite. You pick the time, place, and nature of the engagement and attack at medium or long range until either you get bored, your DM gets bored, or you are 8 levels higher than the enemy units and can no longer level off them.

Either I'm missing something here or everyone else is because every other response makes out as if this is hard.

The point is to compare how different characters do against the threat. I agree that most casters are only going to be threatened by other casters after level 7 or so.

[Amphetryon]

I suspect most folks don't consider a Druid 9 with a CL 6 levels higher than Character level to be SOP in their campaigns. That's not to say it's not possible, or WrongBadFun, but it's not what I'd consider the "default assumption" for a 9th level Character.

[Togo]

Quite agree! I can see some awesome synergy between the two of you!

Now who else can we recruit for our Seven Samurai scenario (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Samurai)?

What else do we need?
Hawthorns ground staff can basically cast any 1st level cleric, bard, druid, and ranger spell in the system...

I've listed four 12th characters, and a what they would do as a team (see first page of this thread, post #12). You're welcome to borrow one or more of them to round out your numbers.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

An army of mostly non magical forces with little in the way of detection abilities... what stops a level 9 Druid with a CL of 15 from just soloing everything with a tornado, if anything? Other than natural 20s and the few casters that'd survive of course which you can deal with either alone or with a good party.

If we pretend that an army is a credible threat and treat this as though it were an actual challenge, then Ebon Eyes and attack at night. Their visibility is 60 feet, yours is near infinite. You pick the time, place, and nature of the engagement and attack at medium or long range until either you get bored, your DM gets bored, or you are 8 levels higher than the enemy units and can no longer level off them.

Either I'm missing something here or everyone else is because every other response makes out as if this is hard.1. In theory we're supposed to limit this challenge to characters we've actually played. A high level Druid or Archivist would indeed handle the challenge with a yawn.

2. Ebon Eyes is a 1st level cleric spell, meaning it works at most one night (more likely the time it takes to find Bob the Orc Cleric 1, who always prepares at least one copy of Ebon Eyes because why not) until they're able to find you. That said you really just need a modicum of stealth capabilities to overcome this due to distance penalties and the abundance of cover, until the bats with blindsense start flying around looking for you... and all of a sudden it requires more than a fleeting thought.

[ArcturusV]

Well Gremlin, the obvious answer would be a Ranger or Druid. Round out the "Wilderness Scout" side. I'm loathe to say Druid because at the point you start throwing out a lot of druids at level 6 it's usually a case of why are we even there? So a Ranger would be nice. Long range sniper support with decent stealth skills. Wild Empathy could be useful, particularly as the orcs start using wolf outriders more often. Unfortunately I can't think of much for your side since you already have a huge support crew, though I have no idea what your level 2 guy is. I don't think it was mentioned.

[8wGremlin]

Well Gremlin, the obvious answer would be a Ranger or Druid. Round out the "Wilderness Scout" side. I'm loathe to say Druid because at the point you start throwing out a lot of druids at level 6 it's usually a case of why are we even there? So a Ranger would be nice. Long range sniper support with decent stealth skills. Wild Empathy could be useful, particularly as the orcs start using wolf outriders more often. Unfortunately I can't think of much for your side since you already have a huge support crew, though I have no idea what your level 2 guy is. I don't think it was mentioned.

We have no Arcane support, my crew is purely divine, I'm the equivalent, or a 4th level Archivist, 1st level Cleric. Perhaps we need someone to bolster the troops?


Oh and I missed my 4th level stat upgrade so I actually have more followers.
but these are all 1st level

my full build is here [http://wiki.greyveil.com/E6_Circle_Saviour] - transferring it off my old paper based character to my wiki

[Thebar99]

I suspect most folks don't consider a Druid 9 with a CL 6 levels higher than Character level to be SOP in their campaigns. That's not to say it's not possible, or WrongBadFun, but it's not what I'd consider the "default assumption" for a 9th level Character.

It's still any Druid + core spell + core item + non core item. Not hard. And control winds/karma bead/ankh of ascension all have many other uses.

Point is armies lack any of mobility/independence/individual power and you need all those to be a threat.

[Amphetryon]

It's still any Druid + core spell + core item + non core item. Not hard. And control winds/karma bead/ankh of ascension all have many other uses.

Point is armies lack any of mobility/independence/individual power and you need all those to be a threat.

It's "Druid + specific core spell + specific core item + specific non-core item. I didn't say it was hard; I said it was unlikely to be the default setup for a Level 9 Druid in a majority of games across a random sampling.

Secondary point is, JaronK already acknowledges that Druid/Wizard/Archivist/Erudite/Cleric/Artificer can break the game, particularly with foreknowledge of the particulars of the encounter. Demonstrating that this is true is not a significant accomplishment.

[JaronK]

Sorry to hear that JaronK You've introduced a houserule that effectivly shuts down any necromantic advantage. So any undead that spawns is no longer effective (no Shadows, Ghouls, Wraith, etc..)

Yeah, but it's just too easy to abuse.


It goes on further about hierarchy chains of undead. But its your Game and you are the GM, so fair enough

Sure, but the idea is that your control abilities can only control so many... you can't control the whole hierarchy. So you lose those that pass the limit.


These Clerics with Rebuke undead, will have to be quite potent
Shadows have a 3hd and so would only be able to be controlled by a cleric of 6th level
(probabally one of the Orc generals?)

One of the leaders is in fact a 6th level Orc Cleric of Grummish. The rest could only rebuke to slow them down.


Even lower level cleric will may be rebuke the shadows, but this Awes them (giving any attack rolls against them a +2 bonus).

Stops them from moving too IIRC.


So whilst a concerted effort could be made on them, the hidden nature intelligence of the shadows and their orders, would mean that they would attack weaker more exposed creatures, such as the scouts, and riders first, building up their numbers before a full out assault. and by that time its too late... most of the Orc troops would not be sufficiently armed to deal with them... Oh and their would be no orc with in 50 miles after the event, and a massive amount of shadows who can only kill Orcs...

The Orcs would notice if they were losing scouts like that. They might just fall back for a while. But yeah, they'd be uncontrolled shadows (due to that ruling, I know it's not nice but it's just so easy to break) so that might prove disasterous!

JaronK

[Threadnaught]

Okay how about this one, the Wizard and Druid, possibly with either another Wizard or a Cleric, 'port in, kill the biggest/meanest/scariest looking Orc in the area and demand to see their leader.

For example the Half-Minotaur guy, one of us challenges them for leadership of the horde claiming that only the strong deserve to lead. Slaughter the former leader in one round, then as a new leader use the rest of the party to get rid of the other leaders, take charge of the entire army and "unite" the Orc tribes.

Alternatively there's this Spell called Invisibility that makes a character invisible, it's Greater variety allows for using actions such as casting (by level 10 there has to be a way of making it last at least several minutes), there's another Spell called Flight, or a slower but longer lasting version called Overland Flight. Then there's Cloudkill which I've mentioned before in this thread. :smallamused:


Okay I've mentioned stuff Wizards could do, I've sort of implied Druids can do similar things, but I haven't even mentioned my other favourite Class yet, I wonder what kind of things I could do with a lone Monk. Besides run away really, really fast. :smallbiggrin:

[Kuulvheysoon]

Only if you edit my name to its correct spelling. :P

EDIT: In response to JaronK's post 2 below mine, Dusk Eclipse's Rogue and my DN 8/Crusader 2 seek interested party members. Officially LFG, apparently.

I've got a LN Spirit Shaman based caster 'round here somewhere. Shall I dig it out?

[JaronK]

It's funny how well this works as a tier test, too. My reactions to a lot of the T1 and 2 strategies, at least instinctually, are either "oh god that's brutal" or "that shouldn't even be allowed." My reactions to the Tier 3 strategies are "that would be effective, but not enough on its own." So far the few Tier 5 strategies have gone from "that wouldn't do anything" to "well, I guess that might help a little."

I wonder if anyone can slap together a T5 party that could meaningfully do something.

JaronK

[Shining Wrath]

It's funny how well this works as a tier test, too. My reactions to a lot of the T1 and 2 strategies, at least instinctually, are either "oh god that's brutal" or "that shouldn't even be allowed." My reactions to the Tier 3 strategies are "that would be effective, but not enough on its own." So far the few Tier 5 strategies have gone from "that wouldn't do anything" to "well, I guess that might help a little."

I wonder if anyone can slap together a T5 party that could meaningfully do something.

JaronK

Commoners with hordes and hordes of chickens. After the Orcs gorge themselves they are easy prey.

[A_S]

I posted a level 12 character (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=14669599&postcount=27) and his schtick earlier. He'd be up for the seven samurai.

[tyckspoon]

I wonder if anyone can slap together a T5 party that could meaningfully do something.

JaronK

Well, just as a quick thought: using level 10 as the benchmark, Ninja and (CW) Samurai get a couple of interesting abilities. Ninja can go Ethereal (and more relevantly can strike *from* Ethereal without exposing itself, which is probably the best thing Ninja gets) and Samurai gets its AoE Intimidate. An Intimidate-specced Samurai at that level could hold a point indefinitely, pretty much on his own.. only thing he might need is the Healer at his back to keep him standing from attempts to bring him down with ranged attacks from outside of his zone of control. Ninja gets the usual stealth skills, potentially allowing for any of the scouting tactics already mentioned, as well as a legitimately good assassination technique in (potentially couping a sleeping victim) Sudden Striking from the Ethereal Plane.

Healer.. uh.. Healer can ride its unicorn around and make the villagefolk happier with its majestic presence, I guess? There's not a lot Healers can do without significant spell-list expansion, and when they get that they move out of Tier 5 pretty rapidly.

[ArcturusV]

*is in the Does Nothing Category*

Then again as a solo T5 mundane, I guess it's to be expected. Even I knew it while writing it. I could have possibly done more but I was also operating on the idea that the locals wouldn't be Idiots. I think that's one of the big problems. People presume an Army would fight like PCs do. And PCs are kinda... tactically stupid most of the time. Strategically brilliant maybe. But Tactically stupid. So things like "Assassinate the Leaders" never occurred to me, because if the leadership wasn't stupid, there'd be little chance I could get at them. Much less best them with something that is not really a hand to hand fighter and more of a skill monkey.

[Derpldorf]

Our only limiting factor will be these silly humans who have to man the walls!

Speaking of walls, assuming we have the time and we can finagle ourselves a dread necromancer, we should consider building a wall at a choke point of the pass ala Helms Deep and lining it with skellybone archers. It might fall, but it would serve as a possible deterrent forcing them to head south... Or at least a roadblock they have to waste time and soldiers breaking through before they even reach our squishy little meat creatures. It may even buy enough time for the royal meatbags to get here.

[8wGremlin]

Actually if you dropped the shadow aspect of Hawthorn and company
Hawthorn could quite easily be a straight healer, with a DOMAIN ICON (faiths of eberron) allows you to lose a prepared spell for one of the domains spell list of an equal or lower level.

Healers being divine spellcasters and can worship Galearos, Hawthorn would have to be good, and would drop all the classes, and be 100% 6th level Healer.

now the Domain Icon does cost 10k gp, that might be a problem... but he is the leader of a small warband

Interesting..... a Teir 5 e6 may write him up.

[Threadnaught]

I wonder if anyone can slap together a T5 party that could meaningfully do something.

What tier is a Paladin again? Go Pun Pun on their asses and it's game over. :smallamused:

Anyone wanna help out my Monk? He focuses on hitting stuff first and being able to get away, yeah, low optimization. I could probably post a stat sheet for a level 6 DMPC as the one I'm referring to, built using the normal rules for character creation.

If your players are the shoot first, investigate later kind of guys, who run headfirst into trouble and then whine at the DM. Give them an equal level Monk and play that character as competently as you can without cheating or breaking the fourth wall. They'll hate both you and the Monk, but they'll have some respect for the Monk Class. :smallamused:

[Amphetryon]

I've got a LN Spirit Shaman based caster 'round here somewhere. Shall I dig it out?

Would be lovely. I believe that makes us a foursome, if I read Answerer's post correctly.

[Thebar99]

It's "Druid + specific core spell + specific core item + specific non-core item. I didn't say it was hard; I said it was unlikely to be the default setup for a Level 9 Druid in a majority of games across a random sampling.

Secondary point is, JaronK already acknowledges that Druid/Wizard/Archivist/Erudite/Cleric/Artificer can break the game, particularly with foreknowledge of the particulars of the encounter. Demonstrating that this is true is not a significant accomplishment.

Druid realizes they need to go smash an army. Between him and his party they have Teleport and Plane Shift. If there are any Karma Beads or Ankhs anywhere in the worlds they find them and buy them with pooled gold then go smash the army.

If it isn't common, it's because armies aren't common.

Also, the CL boosts are only required if you need to increase wind strength by 5 bands to get a tornado. If you only need 3, no CL boosts are required and absolutely any Druid everywhere can wake up and do this. The only thing is that natural wind speeds of > 30 MPH are conditional, and relying on uncertainty to defeat easy challenges isn't something the good classes want or have to do.

Psions also have this as a psionic power, and it's one of the better ones. There are fewer ML boosters than divine CL boosters but it can still work.

Point being if you take the important casting/monstrous members of the army, and then encounter them without that army in the context of a typical adventure, they are harder to deal with than when you can just create a 1,200 foot diemeter effect to go kill them all.

[rweird]

I present:

Naetha Baetha Taetha Leaetha the Summoner (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=371670)
Male LG Gnome Wizard 11, Level 11, Init -2, HP 40/40, Speed 20 ft.
AC 9, Touch 9, Flat-footed 9, Fort +4, Ref +1, Will +7, Base Attack Bonus 5, Action Points N/A
Metamagic Rod, Extend +3 or +1/+1 (1d4-3, x2)
(-2 Dex, +1 Size)
Abilities Str 5, Dex 6, Con 12, Int 28, Wis 10, Cha 16
Condition None

He'll basically Call a bunch of good outsiders (Astral Project the entire party via nightmares if allowed). He'll use Glalaes to Control Winds/Weather to make Tornados and bad weather to delay/weaken them as other prepare. If Astral Projection is allowed, he'd have Called Astrally Projection'd monsters constantly attacking the Orcish horde.

[Answerer]

Would be lovely. I believe that makes us a foursome, if I read Answerer's post correctly.
I haven't gotten confirmation of whether or not a psionic adaptation of Anima Mage is acceptable. The build is Kalashtar Binder 1/Ardent 2/Anima Mage 7, though it has to be Ardent 1 (take Practiced Manifester and a Metapsionic feat), Binder 1, Ardent 2 (take Improved Binding). Which, it just dawns on me, requires a Flaw; I can't find whether or not those are allowed...

[Amphetryon]

I haven't gotten confirmation of whether or not a psionic adaptation of Anima Mage is acceptable. The build is Kalashtar Binder 1/Ardent 2/Anima Mage 7, though it has to be Ardent 1 (take Practiced Manifester and a Metapsionic feat), Binder 1, Ardent 2 (take Improved Binding). Which, it just dawns on me, requires a Flaw; I can't find whether or not those are allowed...

Hmmm, could throw a spanner in the works.

[JaronK]

Well, this was originally based on the idea of using real characters that have been played. So, it would depend if flaws are allowed in your games! I know my character had two.

JaronK

[Amphetryon]

Well, this was originally based on the idea of using real characters that have been played. So, it would depend if flaws are allowed in your games! I know my character had two.

JaronK

Given that, how would you prefer to handle Characters grouping together, where some of them were allowed Flaws and some were not? Everyone in a given group gets the same number of Flaws, or accept that some of us get them and some of us do not?

[JaronK]

Not really important, because this isn't about fairness or anything, it's about how real characters can deal with stuff.

I mean, let's face it, anybody could optimize a character to destroy this scenario if they wanted... that's really not the point.

JaronK

[Answerer]

Well, the character was pre-made but not for an actual game; I just used Flaws and 32 PB cuz that's what games I play in frequently use. But if that's the case, the character may be inappropriate; she's incomplete (never bothered to figure out gear, mantles, or powers known) which means she might wind up too tailored for the challenge. Which I haven't read in detail but I know involves fighting an army.

[NichG]

I don't think I've played a character thats actually valid for this exercise in years, so thats rough. My current Lv7 character is in a game with such extensive homebrew that I'd be dubious about any sort of conclusions one might draw from how he'd approach this. Probably by accidentally summoning something beyond his ability to control that's dangerous enough that the village and orcs have to join forces or both perish...

[8wGremlin]

Hawthorn is a character I currently play in a group, we use 32pt buy and flaws
GM is a killer GM, in all senses of the word...

[Kuulvheysoon]

Are these supposed to be setting specific or setting inclusive (AKA nothing setting specific, or anything we bloody well have)?

[JaronK]

They're supposed to be characters you play in games. That's about it.

JaronK

[Thebar99]

Not sure why the actual character thing is being empathized so much. I've made Druids before. They made no anti army tornados but encountered no armies. If they did that's how they'd handle it. Unless this thread is for both actual characters and those that have dealt with the same/similar situations before it still works. So does Ebon Eyes.

[JaronK]

Well, truthfully it's not supposed to be a build challenge. Knowing about it in advance means you could absolutely customize characters to beat the snot out of it (heck, a party made entirely of Dragonfire Inspiration Bards, each with a different element, could get the job done quite effectively). It's more of a "hey, how would folks do in situations like this"?

But, you know, you can play with it however you like.

JaronK

[Thebar99]

You said you know of it two weeks in advance. Between you and your party you have Plane Shift and Teleport. You also get different spells every day. So it doesn't matter. You know there is an army, you get the two items from anywhere in the worlds that has them (or wait until the winds are 30+ MPH naturally), then you cast the Control Winds you prepared in the morning and you're done. Specifically having to build for something to have any chance of defeating it is the purview of weak classes and not good ones.

You could also just use Ebon Eyes, if you'd like to pretend that it is an actual challenge. If they use Ebon Eyes back you either:

- Leave, return when their spells expire but your higher CL spells have not.
- Leave, return when their single spell has expired but yours has been recast.
- Kill them. You'll know them because they're the ones giving targeting orders to everyone else. In the meantime you're acting and reacting in real time and they are not. Even the most uncreative tactics, such as Fireball spam at max range would work fine as any counterattacks would take huge penalties so unless you stick around a while (and you shouldn't) there's not enough 20s to pose a threat.

[JaronK]

...You realize this originally comes from a scenario that in part demonstrates which classes are stronger than the game was designed for (what you're calling "good classes") and which are at expected levels or below (what you're calling "weak classes"), right? I mean, heck, I stated when I started this that my current character is in a high powered game and thus could trivially slaughter the entire army (using Persistent Boreal Wind at CL 25 due to Persistent Consumptive Field, save DC 27).

If this army is not "an actual challenge" then you're playing a T1 or T2 class, most likely, and your character is much stronger than the game was designed for. You're not supposed to be able to defeat a challenge like this solo. But let's face it, with the right spells, you can.

JaronK

[Starbuck_II]

...You realize this originally comes from a scenario that in part demonstrates which classes are stronger than the game was designed for (what you're calling "good classes") and which are at expected levels or below (what you're calling "weak classes"), right? I mean, heck, I stated when I started this that my current character is in a high powered game and thus could trivially slaughter the entire army (using Persistent Boreal Wind at CL 25 due to Persistent Consumptive Field, save DC 27).

If this army is not "an actual challenge" then you're playing a T1 or T2 class, most likely, and your character is much stronger than the game was designed for. You're not supposed to be able to defeat a challenge like this solo. But let's face it, with the right spells, you can.

JaronK

A Non-Tier 1 can do it if they are immortal.
A Learnean Lumi is virtually impossible to kill, but starts out at ECL 10. Take some Warblade levels and go to town.
It might take time, but you will win.

[JaronK]

A Non-Tier 1 can do it if they are immortal.
A Learnean Lumi is virtually impossible to kill, but starts out at ECL 10. Take some Warblade levels and go to town.
It might take time, but you will win.

A Learnean Lumi could, however, be shut down by the army (nothing stops the War Hulk from grappling it and pinning it, allowing the others to put together some kind of shackles to hold it permanently, and the Cleric by that time could imprison it in a few ways). Also, it can really only do so much damage.

I mean, it's possible to do it below Tier 2, but by no means easy, and generally requires some serious cheese (infinite damage Warblade archers come to mind).

JaronK

[ArcturusV]

Yeah. Seems this challenge also breaks down into Spellcaster/Non Spell Caster lines mostly. I mean no martial character will be able to just throw down with the army and be successful. You end up with the Kobold Problem. Unless you houserule in something like the old Heroic Fray rules from 2nd Edition. Which as a DM I sometimes do.

[SillySymphonies]

Well, truthfully it's not supposed to be a build challenge. (...) It's more of a "hey, how would folks do in situations like this"?
That's why I wonder how our party would fare (cf. first page of replies). If I didn't give enough information for you to make such an estimate, please let me know. :smallsmile:

[JaronK]

That's why I wonder how our party would fare (cf. first page of replies). If I didn't give enough information for you to make such an estimate, please let me know. :smallsmile:

Oh! I must have missed them. Can you repost what they are and what they're trying to do to deal with the situation?


=ArcturusV]Yeah. Seems this challenge also breaks down into Spellcaster/Non Spell Caster lines mostly. I mean no martial character will be able to just throw down with the army and be successful. You end up with the Kobold Problem. Unless you houserule in something like the old Heroic Fray rules from 2nd Edition. Which as a DM I sometimes do.

It does seem like most T2+ casters have little trouble finding a spell that destroys all, while non casters just can't. But a good assassin character could wreck havoc on the leadership... of course, that's not as easy as it sounds. You have to at least deal with alarm spells on the tents of the leaders and whoever their elite guards are.

I could see an assassin archer getting the job done from long range by sniping the army while they travel, but that's not easy either without spells as it's tough to get kills at long range and seeing through the darkness isn't so easy either.

JaronK

[SillySymphonies]

Oh! I must have missed them. Can you repost what they are and what they're trying to do to deal with the situation?


Originally Posted by SillySymphonies http://www.giantitp.com/forums/images/buttons/viewpost.gif (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14667189#post14667189)
How optimized would one need be for this?
We basically only use (with some notable exceptions) PHB, DMG, MM and ECS (we're in an Eberron campaign). Optimization level is basically meatshield, healbot, blaster, scout.

Party (until recent intraparty events) (ECL 9):
Teresa: half-elf cleric 9 (healbot): dumped Str, Con and Int (think 'priest'); low concentration; only noteworthy feat is Leadership (half-celestial human paladin 3 cohort); still access to 5th level spells and is the country's highest-ranking cardinal ('pope' currently MIA).
Jean Jacques: human paladin 5/exorcist of the Silver Flame 4 (meatshield): ridiculous (for our optimization level, that is) damage output due to lance, Spirited Charge and Power Attack; subtlety of a sledgehammer ('smite evil first, ask questions later'), so not useful in any non-combat situation.
'Howard': psionic yuan-ti pureblood rogue 1/assassin 2 (spy) (evil alignment hidden with a ring of mind shielding): Bluff +9, Hide +15, Move Silently +17; psionic charm (animals, fey, humanoids, magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, giants) at will (Will DC 14 negates); +2d6 sneak attack; free access to Con poison (Fort DC 11 negates) due to being a snake.
DV-01: warforged artificer 9: severely gimped due a lack of loot; still a warforged artificer and all the synergies that come with this race/class combo.

Howard would borrow DV-01's hat of disguise, wand of alter self and have it craft some scrolls of glibness, then head out and infiltrate the horde, hopefully 'replacing' a key officer and then use their own mindset against them ('We shouldn't use catapults or archers: it's cowardly!').

DV-01 would probably dam the river and blow up the mountain to create some big-ass 'traps'.

Teresa wouldn't bother with divination spells, rather head out to the surrounding duchies together with Jean and gather our own reinforcements.

Addendum: Howard doesn't speak Orc, but the artificer could provide him with potions of tongues if intelligence doesn't reveal the presence of kobolds (Howard does speak Draconic and Abyssal). Howard's alternate form ability (snake) should make it relatively easy to infiltrate even without 'replacing' anyone. (Howard was the PC played by yours truly, hence why I can provide the most details for his part of the plan.)

[Thebar99]

...You realize this originally comes from a scenario that in part demonstrates which classes are stronger than the game was designed for (what you're calling "good classes") and which are at expected levels or below (what you're calling "weak classes"), right? I mean, heck, I stated when I started this that my current character is in a high powered game and thus could trivially slaughter the entire army (using Persistent Boreal Wind at CL 25 due to Persistent Consumptive Field, save DC 27).

If this army is not "an actual challenge" then you're playing a T1 or T2 class, most likely, and your character is much stronger than the game was designed for. You're not supposed to be able to defeat a challenge like this solo. But let's face it, with the right spells, you can.

JaronK

You realize none of that matters? See, here you have an army - something in which the strong units are held back by the weak units, then you have them built very poorly, then you have them trying to fight historical warfare instead of D&D warfare. End result? Anyone that can handle any challenge can easily handle this one. The only characters that'd have a hard time with this also could not manage anything else.

If it's with a party, instead of a single character that is still 4-6 units defeating thousands. Which is easy to do and does not require Tier 1-2... that just makes it the most amusing. As I mentioned before, Ebon Eyes trivializes this. It's just a matter of time. If I devoted more than five seconds of thought to it I'm sure I could construct a few dozen other ways to deconstruct this army, but honestly this "challenge" is so easy so as to be insulting. I expected better.

PS: Anything with DR about 10/army does not have it could completely ignore most of the enemy units.

[NichG]

I think really what it comes down to is that there are non-caster methods for "solo-ing" this army, but they are methods that literally any character backed by smart RP should be able to use. That is to say, manipulating the details of the relationships of the leadership of the army (the provoke-the-lieutenant-into-taking-charge trick), doing things that take advantage of the army's situation and psychology (stage an attack on home), or even simply going around to the nearby power centers of the world and convincing them to use this opportunity to wipe out the orc threat (basically bring your own army to the fight).

But mechanics-wise, the non-casters aren't really bringing much to the table that influences things of this scale, and scale is really the issue here.

Of the characters I've actually played within this level range, we have:

1. Gnomish wizard favoring divination and illusion. Would not be able to directly take out the army mechanically due to spell selection and his style of play, but would be able to contribute to most plans involving multiple PCs (mostly distractions via illusions) and could come up with and perform many of the non-mechanical techniques.

2. Changeling beguiler who never ended up higher than Lv5. Doesn't meet the lower end of this challenge, but he was moving towards a multi-wand sneak attack type.

3. Githzerai Monk from Sigil with a nice AC and a philosophical objection to receiving magical healing. He might try to challenge the head orc or something, and has a few surprises in his bag of planar tricks (like that purified elemental water from MoP that forces you to pass 10 escalating Con checks in a row or die, without any other cure, or the 2ed eggs you can eat that jump you to the Astral), but he's pretty strictly solo scale.

Thats basically the 'normal' D&D characters in this level range I've played barring various pre-gens from modules. After this the list gets weird.

4. Slayers-based wizard. Can cast any level of spell regardless of his actual character level if he makes a high enough Fort save. He uses PaO to dynamically alter the battlefield to his liking and a 40ft d8 fireball variant energy-admixed with fire and amped up with Arcane Thesis and other sources of +CL when he needs crowd damage. 600ft/round flight with Raywing and no practical limit on spell slots. He'd pretty much crush the scenario through magic, but mostly because the system he's from is broken.

5. Swordsage with a bit of cleric using very weird homebrew and the 'my hitpoints are measured in lives' school of design. He can be killed 3-4 times before finally dropping, via Death Pact, and Item Familiar with True Res, and other such things. This character could probably just go toe to toe in melee with the army and stand a chance of winning, but again, the homebrew is contributing a lot here and without it he'd be limited to the non-caster methods.

So from my actual characters that have seen play, I'd say that very few of them (even the one standard wizard) would be able to just up and solo the army. Most of them would be able to contribute to a larger plan, but it'd either have to be a plan that is fundamentally party-scale (such as raiding the orc homelands, picking off the leadership, etc) or would win or lose based on non-mechanical cleverness and not anything the characters' mechanics let them do explicitly.

[ArcturusV]

Part of my problem with the challenge I guess. I mean as a Ninja, and as a player, I'm smart enough and I had the stealth skills I probably could have broken into a level 3 Orc Encampment (And I presumed I could). Based on how most DMs run it. But I was thinking in terms of how I would run it. In which case you're not getting in range of the leadership without magic. Even then it might be hard to get a shot at them.

Which I guess is where it breaks for mundane characters. If your DM is smart and a bit sadistic... you can throw out all the builds you want that can possibly solo the Orc Warchief or something... but good luck getting there. It's like... when I used to DM for 2nd Edition, and players would look up some God's Stats and go, "Oh yeah... we can totally kick Lolth's ass!" Because they could. Theoretically. If Lolth was stupid and gave them a fair fight and basically had no one else around (Which makes no sense for a vain goddess), and doesn't use her ability to just yoink in dozens of Handmaidens of Lolth and other Demons to her side at will.

So I might have been able to kill the cleric in his sleep.... with a good Coup de Grace on a Sudden Strike and such. But how would I have ever gotten a shot at doing that? Why wouldn't he have guards nearby? Why wouldn't he have basic wards and abjurations that would warn him if someone was inside before they got the Coup de Grace shot? Why wouldn't he say "Screw fighting fair!" and not just dogpile you with dozens of Orcs that he buffed up to be more than a threat to you?

[JaronK]

Well, there are certain defenses that would make it very hard to assassinate the leadership as a Ninja. There's alarm spells on their tents (something a Ninja would have trouble spotting, but anyone with Detect Magic could notice quickly enough). There's guards, though their spot scores aren't great... you could probably sneak past them. There's a few other defenses, but remember this army is a bit low on magic, so there's openings you could take. It's not easy, but characters with Dispel Magic could take out the alarm and sneak past the guards if they know what they're doing. Of course, assassinating one means the others go on high alert, but it could be done. You certainly can't just walk up and coup de grace them without worries.


You realize none of that matters? See, here you have an army - something in which the strong units are held back by the weak units, then you have them built very poorly, then you have them trying to fight historical warfare instead of D&D warfare. End result? Anyone that can handle any challenge can easily handle this one. The only characters that'd have a hard time with this also could not manage anything else.

If it's with a party, instead of a single character that is still 4-6 units defeating thousands. Which is easy to do and does not require Tier 1-2... that just makes it the most amusing. As I mentioned before, Ebon Eyes trivializes this. It's just a matter of time. If I devoted more than five seconds of thought to it I'm sure I could construct a few dozen other ways to deconstruct this army, but honestly this "challenge" is so easy so as to be insulting. I expected better.

PS: Anything with DR about 10/army does not have it could completely ignore most of the enemy units.

Except this actually started because one person was completely unable to think of a way to be useful against this army. Other players have come up with ways to be useful, but no guaranteed wins. Still others with high magic characters can trivialize this. But plenty of characters that handle real challenges in real games have trouble with this. And again, this is not a "can you figure out how to defeat this" challenge... that's why you expected "better." You had the wrong idea about the point. It's kind of like going to a minor league game and saying "any major leaguer could totally beat these guys, I expected better!" You're missing the point. If it seems too easy, that's because the characters you usually play with are WAY stronger than average.

Also, DR 10 isn't easy to come by at levels where it would do anything serious other than prevent damage from the archery barrages.

JaronK

[Togo]

But mechanics-wise, the non-casters aren't really bringing much to the table that influences things of this scale, and scale is really the issue here.

Hm.. That's not what I found. My post on an party taking on this challenge is on the first page, and consists of 3 noncasters and a poorly-built wizard. The plan has them all contributing more or less equally, although the dwarf struggles a bit.

Then again, noone has commented on my party or their tactics, so I have no idea if what I proposed would work. :smalleek:

Reposted below:
Ok, so the participants are:

Teplin, a gnome ACF ranger/MoMFs
Darian, a midgard dwarf fighter type guy
Canarius, a marshal/barbarian/divine crusader
Lethey, a wizard alienist
and his heavily buffed familiar, Quip, a psuedodragon

All about 12th level.
These are all characters I've played, in most cases for several years

Step 1: rally the townsfolk

Canarius is a figure of godlike inspiration, with high charisma (24), diplomacy (+29), and divine purpose (divine crusader). He also has a few ranks of knowledge (warfare) and should be able to work with the existing marshal of the town (who will be better than Canarius at actual marshal skills).

Work on an evacuation plan to keep innocent villagers and their valuable supplies out of reach on the oncoming army.

Step 2: Scout the threat

Meanwhile, Teplin and Lethey's familiar Quip go off to do some scouting. We need to confirm what's out there, and how fast it is likely to be moving. Teplin can fly thanks to wildshape, and turn invisible thanks to his ring of invisibility. He also has a very high spot (+44, all distance penalties halved), and a decent hide (+18 or so).

Quip the pseudodragon is mainly there for his vast collection of (Lethey's) knowledge skills, and so should be able to identify what they're looking at.


Step 3: Fortification

Meanwhile Durian the dwarf is working on fortification. with his ranks in profession (seige enginneer), and consulting with Canarius on knowledge (warfare), he should be able to get an ambitious plan of fortifications and defences mapped out. He'll then start supervising anyone who can craft to start filling in any gaps in weapons and/or ammunition and working out what the missing logistical needs are for a long seige.

Canarius to use his lyre of building. Teplin will offer the use of his crane. (yes, he carries a crane as standard equipment)


Step 4: Magical resources

Lethey will survery all the magical resources, using local help wherever possible because he's frankly a bit of an ass (wis 4, chr 8). He'll make sure any local spellcasters and he swap spells that might be useful, cast his usual compliment of permenant spells - (typically just blockade, and shrink item) and then rest for 8 hours, to learn new spells.

Teplin, when he returns, will do the same with alchemical resources, aided by Durian, (who is better than him at craft alchemy, but only Teplin has any ranks in it)


DAY 2
Hold a council of war to consider the results of scouting and various surveys of defences and resources. Decide what to ask for from the capital.

Lethey, Quip, Canarius and Teplin teleport back to wherever reinforcements might come from, armed with a letter from the local marshal, and any other local dignataries that might be useful, and a full and frank assessment of the orc threat. Convince them to send reinforcements. Lethey does some shopping for whatever we're missing that can reasonably be bought. Cast shrink item on the largest items, and store some in teplin's portable hole or lethey's bag of holding. By turning Teplin into a large beast of burden, loading him up, and then transforming him again, a large amount of material can be transported. I estimate roughly 20 wagonloads of supplies can be acquired. Offer to teleport local adventurers, brave knights, or anyone else who wants to go or is available back with us. (I'll assume there's noone available for the purpoes of the scenario)

Meanwhile Darian continues on defences and weaponcrafting, and is generally visible so the townsfolk don't think they've been abandoned.

Lethey casts wall of stone, fabricate, blockade as necessary to help with the fortification effort. Best musician in town to use Lyre of building while canarius is away

More scouting, this time at night, to get a feel for how fast they're moving, and in what kind of formation.

DAYS 3-14

So we start with the counterstrikes. The main targets are the vedette screen (scouts) and/or fliers. First attack is a daylight flying raid on the baggage train, to try and lure out flying scouts and/or vedette sentries, which we then engage as targets of preference. Lethey will be accompanied by a summoned augmented buffed flying psuedonatural rhino. Darian will be riding Teplin, Canarius and Lethey (and Quip) can all fly anyway. Darain is there for dealing the heavy damage, Teplin is mainly there as transport and to spot what countermeasures are triggered. Canarius will be tripping flying mounts and doing some damage, and Lethey will be causing havok with cloudkill, wall of fire, and similar, and by removing shrink item from previously prepared bonfires and dropping them on flammabe targets. Leave tough opponents for the rhino, and important opponents for the Teplin/Darian kill team. Once the odds become too great, pop smoke (from eversmoking bottle), and flee and heal. If necessary, d-door.

Teplin immediately doubles back to spy on the enemy from a distance with his telescope - he's trying to work out where any targets he identified previously (important people or countermeasures) might be based. After things settle down, we go for attack #2

This time we burrow under the camp (Teplin as UmberHulk making a tunnel) and straight up into the target under cover of silence, gank the target and withdraw.


Next attack, Teplin sneaks in (invisible and +28 hide check and +24 move silently and perfect flight), and tries to gather intelligence (Lethey casts tongues on him so he can understand orcish) Use to plan future attacks.

In terms of defence, we're relying on the townsfolk to keep watch for the most part. Take standard precautions while we sleep, such as black threaded rooms for Lethey and Canarius, and sleeping in disguise for Teplin. Cast detect posion on food and water supplies on a regular basis. Darian sleeps in shifts, since thanks to his magical forge he doesn't need much rest anyway.


Basically, keep hitting the orcish transport, food supplies and fliers. Definitely get some casters or character models if we can, but it's not vital. Once they get closer to the town start hitting the seige. By the time they reach the town, (late ideally) it should resemble a crude but solid fortress, defended by one or two catapults, and several hundred archers, armed with cold iron arrows made by Darian (and silver if he can get the materials). The land around it will be churned up into a sea of mud (Teplin churns, and the river is deliberately flooded), and important points will be defended with obstacles, hazards, and Teplin's trusty 200ft of barbed wire. A night attack will be illuminated by battlefield illumination, gust of wind will be memorised, and Teplin will pitch in with entangle at critical moments.

How's that do?

[Thebar99]

Except this actually started because one person was completely unable to think of a way to be useful against this army. Other players have come up with ways to be useful, but no guaranteed wins. Still others with high magic characters can trivialize this. But plenty of characters that handle real challenges in real games have trouble with this. And again, this is not a "can you figure out how to defeat this" challenge... that's why you expected "better." You had the wrong idea about the point. It's kind of like going to a minor league game and saying "any major leaguer could totally beat these guys, I expected better!" You're missing the point. If it seems too easy, that's because the characters you usually play with are WAY stronger than average.

And there are people that cannot figure out how to defeat dragons that do something other than full attack while standing on the ground, or how to defeat simple non magical ambushes, or any number of other things. What is your point? That most players are bad? Because I'd agree with that. It'd be like going to a minor league game and being able to unfavorably compare their play to a bunch of kids goofing off and hitting a ball around.

A major league game is far more serious business than this. A major league game can manage far better than a poorly equipped and designed army.


Also, DR 10 isn't easy to come by at levels where it would do anything serious other than prevent damage from the archery barrages.

JaronK

DR about 10. And O rly? (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20031003e)

It's enough to disregard the attacks of weak, low level soldiers, aka most of the army. Which is what I said.

[Menzath]

Posted By: Deophaun
Meh. Just use any level 11 druid I had. Wildshape into a bird and cast blizzard in the middle of their army. Even protected from cold weather, a lot of orcs within a 720 foot radius are going to suffocate buried under 11 feet of snow. Cast it twice for good measure. Armies have been routed by less.

Call Avalanche would be more direct at the same level, but it would only have a measly 110 ft radius spread. But, you do have 2 weeks to harass them.

You don't send an army against an 11th level druid.

Same but with blood snow and a few other tricks thrown in, incase they don't suffocate. Ah and maybe if I want to risk it A widen'd cloudburst w/ Sculpted Call lighting(Or equivelent) on thier clerics/bards. All done at max range if possible.

[NichG]

Hm.. That's not what I found. My post on an party taking on this challenge is on the first page, and consists of 3 noncasters and a poorly-built wizard. The plan has them all contributing more or less equally, although the dwarf struggles a bit.

Then again, noone has commented on my party or their tactics, so I have no idea if what I proposed would work. :smalleek:

...

How's that do?

I think this is a reasonable way to proceed, though I'm not sure whether or not your guys can survive the raids you've proposed. It really depends on how quickly responsive and unified the army is. Realistically it'd take awhile to coordinate a full-force retaliation, which would give you time to do some damage and retreat to safety. If on the other hand all relevant forces converge on your location immediately following the first attack then you might be in trouble - can you outrun the army's fliers?

All together this does combine in some of the non-mechanical approaches (like getting your own troops from nearby sources of power). Almost all of the relevant fortifications are being done via magic here. Furthermore much of what makes the airborne artillery raid work is Shrink Item, Wall of Fire, Cloudkill, Invisibility, ... So that is also very much hinging on the magic user, even if the non-magic-users are contributing support.

I do think this reveals one or two avenues that haven't been as heavily explored by previous posters - the multiplicative power of a Marshal or Bard on many otherwise incapable low level characters (though someone did mention Dragonfire Inspiration users). At level 11 you're dealing with the rank and file of the orc army being level 7 though. I guess in my mind I was trying to do all of this with Lv6 characters, because the advantage of keeping the orc army's levels down to 2 is a big one. With Lv7 orc troops you have the problem that six of their average soldiers could probably wipe out the town without PC intervention (well, at least if the town is composed mostly of NPC-class Lv3 characters), so more of the brunt of the challenge lies on the PCs themselves.

[Shining Wrath]

I think you could make this a little harder for the spellcasters by specifying that preserving the lives of the population and the usability of the surrounding terrain both matter.

Unleashing a wight / wraith horde harvested from the townspeople would no longer work.

With a little more information about the terrain might help. If there's a place where a single tough party can hold a pass like the Spartans at Thermopylae, that's important info for the sword-swingers.

[JaronK]

And there are people that cannot figure out how to defeat dragons that do something other than full attack while standing on the ground, or how to defeat simple non magical ambushes, or any number of other things. What is your point? That most players are bad? Because I'd agree with that. It'd be like going to a minor league game and being able to unfavorably compare their play to a bunch of kids goofing off and hitting a ball around.

A major league game is far more serious business than this. A major league game can manage far better than a poorly equipped and designed army.

And this isn't a major league game. That's not the point. This is not a challenge I bring out for the "let's see if you can survive via optimization and tactics, I doubt you can." This is a basic measuring stick.


DR about 10. And O rly? (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20031003e)

It's enough to disregard the attacks of weak, low level soldiers, aka most of the army. Which is what I said.

That template requires a high level Wizard to cast a spell to give it to you. Are you really going for tactics like that? I mean come on, a low level character could totally destroy this army if someone cast PAO on him... but that's really not the point. Hey, I bet I could make a level 3 Fighter who could beat this challenge too... A Necropolitan Fighter that a Druid cast Owl's Wisdom on before the Wizard Spell Stitched him and gave him Animate Dread Warrior so he could control an army. Then he raises 2 level 20 Wizards a day and they fight the battle for him. Yay I win! No wait, I've got another idea... A Complete Warrior Samurai with a Candle of Invocation. I gate in some Efreetis and win with endless wishes. I win again!

Wait, that's not the point.


How optimized would one need be for this?
We basically only use (with some notable exceptions) PHB, DMG, MM and ECS (we're in an Eberron campaign). Optimization level is basically meatshield, healbot, blaster, scout.

Party (until recent intraparty events) (ECL 9):
Teresa: half-elf cleric 9 (healbot): dumped Str, Con and Int (think 'priest'); low concentration; only noteworthy feat is Leadership (half-celestial human paladin 3 cohort); still access to 5th level spells and is the country's highest-ranking cardinal ('pope' currently MIA).
Jean Jacques: human paladin 5/exorcist of the Silver Flame 4 (meatshield): ridiculous (for our optimization level, that is) damage output due to lance, Spirited Charge and Power Attack; subtlety of a sledgehammer ('smite evil first, ask questions later'), so not useful in any non-combat situation.
'Howard': psionic yuan-ti pureblood rogue 1/assassin 2 (spy) (evil alignment hidden with a ring of mind shielding): Bluff +9, Hide +15, Move Silently +17; psionic charm (animals, fey, humanoids, magical beasts, monstrous humanoids, giants) at will (Will DC 14 negates); +2d6 sneak attack; free access to Con poison (Fort DC 11 negates) due to being a snake.
DV-01: warforged artificer 9: severely gimped due a lack of loot; still a warforged artificer and all the synergies that come with this race/class combo.

Howard would borrow DV-01's hat of disguise, wand of alter self and have it craft some scrolls of glibness, then head out and infiltrate the horde, hopefully 'replacing' a key officer and then use their own mindset against them ('We shouldn't use catapults or archers: it's cowardly!').

You mention him not speaking Orc, so that's not going to work at all. Those wolves they have are trained to recognize the scent of not-Orc, and you'll be challenged very quickly. Tongues won't help... it lets you understand, but they still know you're not speaking the right language. Trying to sneak in as a snake is also a bad plan... the Orcs are used to foraging for food, and the magical food they get is bland. They'll probably just try to eat you if you try to sneak around as a snake.


DV-01 would probably dam the river and blow up the mountain to create some big-ass 'traps'.

How do you plan to blow up the mountain? That's not easy at this level. Note that the river is actually some small streams that are dammed up just below the town to create a fishery. They're not that great for flooding the enemy in this case.


Teresa wouldn't bother with divination spells, rather head out to the surrounding duchies together with Jean and gather our own reinforcements.

I did mention that the kingdom doesn't have nearby resources available yet (they're trying to get them there, but it'll take at least three weeks). So, you've pretty much just got the town to work with here unless you can teleport in troops (possible, but you can't bring in that many).

Not seeing much of this work well.

JaronK

[Thebar99]

And this isn't a major league game. That's not the point. This is not a challenge I bring out for the "let's see if you can survive via optimization and tactics, I doubt you can." This is a basic measuring stick.

And it doesn't even do that well.


That template requires a high level Wizard to cast a spell to give it to you. Are you really going for tactics like that? I mean come on, a low level character could totally destroy this army if someone cast PAO on him... but that's really not the point. Hey, I bet I could make a level 3 Fighter who could beat this challenge too... A Necropolitan Fighter that a Druid cast Owl's Wisdom on before the Wizard Spell Stitched him and gave him Animate Dread Warrior so he could control an army. Then he raises 2 level 20 Wizards a day and they fight the battle for him. Yay I win! No wait, I've got another idea... A Complete Warrior Samurai with a Candle of Invocation. I gate in some Efreetis and win with endless wishes. I win again!

It requires you take an LA 1 template. The flavor text of how is immaterial.

Are Draconic, Feral, Lolth Touched etc creatures now suddenly unacceptable as well? Because last I checked taking an LA of 1 or 2 on a melee character was a good idea if it offered enough benefits to offset the HD loss. DR 8 is not very useful normally as enemies hit for several times that amount but the template does offer other benefits other than completely ignoring most of the army.

PAO meanwhile is a high level spell. You shouldn't need any spell level higher than 5 to do this and that's only if you want the flawless victory.

[JaronK]

And it doesn't even do that well.

It seems to be working for everyone but you.


It requires you take an LA 1 template. The flavor text of how is immaterial.

It's not flavor text, it's actually a spell that does it. Mineralize Warrior (http://dndtools.eu/spells/underdark--34/mineralize-warrior--3511/). What you're trying to do is akin to saying that you'd just buy two PAOs to become a 10 Headed Pyrohydra or something. Yes, theoretically you can, but at that point you're saying you need a much higher level character to do it.


Are Draconic, Feral, Lolth Touched etc creatures now suddenly unacceptable as well? Because last I checked taking an LA of 1 or 2 on a melee character was a good idea if it offered enough benefits to offset the HD loss. DR 8 is not very useful normally as enemies hit for several times that amount but the template does offer other benefits other than completely ignoring most of the army.

None of those require an 11th level Wizard to make you one, so they're more reasonable... and yet many games don't allow most of those. High powered games do. Shockingly enough, if this is a measuring stick of basic power level, we'd expect higher powered characters to succeed, while weaker ones struggle. And look! That's what's happening. Neat, isn't it?


PAO meanwhile is a high level spell. You shouldn't need any spell level higher than 5 to do this and that's only if you want the flawless victory.

Mineralize Warrior is a 6th level spell.

JaronK

[Thebar99]

Dude. Lolth Touched requires you to be directly chosen by a deity. Named Lolth. Dragonborn, which doesn't even have an LA also requires direct divine selection, and a god is a fair bit more powerful than a mid level Wizard.

So you have a mid level Wizard in your backstory somewhere who otherwise plays no role. Big deal.

Are melee characters also completely prohibited from using shields? Because Animated requires you have a high level caster in your backstory cast a 6th level spell as well (Animate Objects), therefore every single melee character that uses a shield has indirect, distant help from a high level caster! Alternately you'll try to claim there are melee characters that hold shields in their hands, but then that'd explain why "an army" is such a big and scary thing now wouldn't it? Everything is to them.

Now you can keep changing the rules as we go, or you can admit that it's insane troll logic to classify something that helped you get an item, or to exist in the first place as belonging to the same category as something directly and immediately helping you by turning you into a high level monster.

[SillySymphonies]

Tongues won't help... it lets you understand, but they still know you're not speaking the right language.

This spell grants the creature touched the ability to speak and understand the language of any intelligent creature, (…). The subject can speak only one language at a time, although it may be able to understand several languages. (…)




They'll probably just try to eat you if you try to sneak around as a snake.
lol :smallbiggrin:
I was kinda hoping his at will psionic charm could mitigate such, but in the end it’s probably all pretty hopeless anyway.




Not seeing much of this work well.

This is a basic measuring stick.
At least we’ll be going down with our boots on. Except Howard, who’ll end up in an orc stew – I seem to keep finding new and interesting ways of ‘retiring’ my PCs. :smalltongue:
Well, thanks for reviewing our case. :smallsmile: I hope the data’ll prove useful for your little research. :smallsmile:
Speaking of which, do you plan on reviewing the tier system in a similar manner for the other two scenario’s mentioned in your original assertation? (Black dragon and underground resistance.)

[Lans]

DR about 10. And O rly? (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20031003e)

It's enough to disregard the attacks of weak, low level soldiers, aka most of the army. Which is what I said.

Most of this army is made up of warriors orcs who would be dealing at least 1d12+4 or 6. Your not exactly able to disregard them. The barbarians would be dealing d12+9/10. This is before feats, items, or command auras or bards come into play.

[JaronK]

lol :smallbiggrin:

Oh! Somehow I thought it was just translating. Okay, then you can speak it, but the wolves would know something is up and you'd get caught almost certainly due to that unless you can find a way around that issue.


I was kinda hoping his at will psionic charm could mitigate such, but in the end it’s probably all pretty hopeless anyway.

Charming the wolves? Maybe, if you can get them before they bark too much.

I think there's some clever ideas here, but I don't see them doing enough.


Speaking of which, do you plan on reviewing the tier system in a similar manner for the other two scenario’s mentioned in your original assertation? (Black dragon and underground resistance.)

Not sure. I've run the underground resistance one a few times... it's certainly fun, and I guess I could write it all out, but that would take a lot of time. Maybe if it really becomes important? I dunno. It's a pretty low level encounter (designed for level 6) while the dragon is a much higher level encounter... I picked those three specifically because it was across many levels.


Most of this army is made up of warriors orcs who would be dealing at least 1d12+4 or 6. Your not exactly able to disregard them. The barbarians would be dealing d12+9/10. This is before feats, items, or command auras or bards come into play.

Specifically, the generic Orcs are just Orc Barbarians based off the ones in Heroes of Battle (the genetic Orc army). Actually, even the level 2 Orcs from that are Str 19... and remember the command auras give +1d6 damage to melee attacks from Orcs. Plus there's a Bard (level 6, if we're using the lowest level minions) with War Drums, so that's +2 damage from Inspire Courage (War Drums increases the damage boost but decrease the saves against fear boost, see Complete Adventurer for more).

So they're actually doing 1d12+1d6+8, or +11 with Rage, while the Mineral Warrior template he thought made you invincible gives DR 8. Average damage is 18, or 21 in Rage... that'll start to hurt pretty quick. Mineral Warrior really doesn't make you invincible, and with only 5HD the LA+1 Mineral Warrior would be in trouble pretty quick if he just tried to wade into the fight.

The Orcs have +9 to hit at level 3 (assuming a regular Greataxe, the generic Orcs at level 2 are actually listed as having Masterwork but that's not appropriate, I think). +11 when raging. It's not easy for a character that low level to ignore them if they get into melee range.

JaronK

[AgentofHellfire]

Although the character sheet isn't a complete account of my character by any stretch (also, he's only debatably Lawful Good), here is spider (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=330352)

He was absolutely one of the most fun characters I've ever gotten to play, but he's ridiculously underpowered for his level (at least in standard combat terms), so...I'll assume he at least had standard gold for the moment, which lets him at a Hat of Disguise plus Periapt of Wisdom +6, for fun bonuses.

Even with these, there's no way he could personally take out the army, and any plan he makes will take that into account.

He could however, pretty easily take out the Orc Bard, if he wished. And that could matter a lot. So he'd most likely use his epic Bluff/Disguise modifier to "replace" a relay/messenger or grunt, so as to get close to the Bard--perhaps feigning a need of healing, or something. He might pick up a weapon along the way, too, even if he isn't proficient, it might come in handy.

Then he'd open up a Stunning Fist, which would be, with the Periapt, DC 20. Fortitude being something Bards don't favor, usually, would with luck be in his favor there. Following this, of course, would be a coup-de-grace if possible (Spider'd most likely be bluffing the Bard in to taking a more solitary position--perhaps trying to convince him that he's needed on a different front--so it is possible).

EDIT: ...aaaand then I checked the duration of Stunning Fist, which is annoying. Get rid of Coup-de-grace and throw in either two sneak attacks via flurry of blows, or sneak attack, followed by a move action away, followed by a taunt to get the bard attacking me.

[JaronK]

Although the character sheet isn't a complete account of my character by any stretch (also, he's only debatably Lawful Good), here is spider (http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheetview.php?sheetid=330352)

He was absolutely one of the most fun characters I've ever gotten to play, but he's ridiculously underpowered for his level (at least in standard combat terms), so...I'll assume he at least had standard gold for the moment, which lets him at a Hat of Disguise plus Periapt of Wisdom +6, for fun bonuses.

Even with these, there's no way he could personally take out the army, and any plan he makes will take that into account.

He could however, pretty easily take out the Orc Bard, if he wished. And that could matter a lot. So he'd most likely use his epic Bluff/Disguise modifier to "replace" a relay/messenger or grunt, so as to get close to the Bard--perhaps feigning a need of healing, or something. He might pick up a weapon along the way, too, even if he isn't proficient, it might come in handy.

Then he'd open up a Stunning Fist, which would be, with the Periapt, DC 20. Fortitude being something Bards don't favor, usually, would with luck be in his favor there. Following this, of course, would be a coup-de-grace if possible (Spider'd most likely be bluffing the Bard in to taking a more solitary position--perhaps trying to convince him that he's needed on a different front--so it is possible).

I'm not seeing how you'd get the Bard close to you. They're not going to heal you as you're not an Orc, and again, their Dire Wolves have scent. Hat of Disguise, I believe, does not cover scent. Also, Stunned doesn't let you Coup De Grace.

I swear, these wolves are foiling like 90% of the plans I'm seeing. Wolves are evidently amazing.

JaronK

[AgentofHellfire]

I'm not seeing how you'd get the Bard close to you. They're not going to heal you as you're not an Orc, and again, their Dire Wolves have scent. Hat of Disguise, I believe, does not cover scent. Also, Stunned doesn't let you Coup De Grace.

I swear, these wolves are foiling like 90% of the plans I'm seeing. Wolves are evidently amazing.

JaronK


Oh, scent?

That's actually pretty easy to deal with, if I can smear myself with enough orc fluids, or other noxious substance. Powerful smells of another type ruin the scent ability (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/specialAbilities.htm#scent)

I edited my plan to factor in the constraints of my Stunning Fist ability.

[JaronK]

...Making yourself extra stinky won't won't help, as they'll still bark (growl?) at you if you smell weird. Strong scents make it so the creature can't pinpoint your location or tell exactly who you are, but it's the equivalent of masking your visual identity by turning yourself into a giant lightbulb... they don't know what you are, but they sure as heck know you're different!

Fiening Injury would get you visited by an Adept or trooper Cleric first, not one of the generals of the army, by the way. That'll get someone hitting you with heal checks (but almost certainly seeing through your illusory disguise). The leaders of the army don't just pop over and say hello to the first random injured Orc they see.

JaronK

[Thebar99]

I find it entertaining you're going to such great lengths to say no, non casters are useless after all and lose to wolves of all things.

[AgentofHellfire]

...Making yourself extra stinky won't won't help, as they'll still bark (growl?) at you if you smell weird. Strong scents make it so the creature can't pinpoint your location or tell exactly who you are, but it's the equivalent of masking your visual identity by turning yourself into a giant lightbulb... they don't know what you are, but they sure as heck know you're different!

True...but the orcs wouldn't necessarily be tipped off by that, either. With the strength of the scent, I'd be smelly to them as well, so they might just chalk it up to whatever the frike I have on me.



Fiening Injury would get you visited by an Adept or trooper Cleric first, not one of the generals of the army, by the way. That'll get someone hitting you with heal checks (but almost certainly seeing through your illusory disguise). The leaders of the army don't just pop over and say hello to the first random injured Orc they see.

Well, yeah, but I figure that if I'm really close to the Bard by the time I let anyone know I'm injured, and, again, took the form of one of the relays, the Bard might just come to me because he's right there, and I have something for him anyway.

[Amphetryon]

It's not my Character, but I'm curious about the viability of a Whirling Frenzy Lion Totem Barbarian 5/Ashworm Dragoon 4 in this scenario. Even with Scent, the wolves would have a hard time finding and dealing with a Burrowing opponent, who could theoretically make good use of guerrilla tactics and Charge-monkey shenanigans to take out large swaths of the horde. Creative use of the Burrowing ability could potentially alter the battlefield in other ways to hamper the horde's approach, but it may be veering into houserule territory.

[XmonkTad]

There is always the commoner 1/survivor 5. I once brought a commoner 1/survivor 1 to my DM because it looked like we were going to have a lot of homebrew/low tier stuff (other party members included a Goliath barbarian and a grig that dropped nets on things). The idea got shot down, but if I finish out the prestige class it will qualify for the bottom end of this encounter.

Anyway, with max ranks in handle animal, a decent charisma (I was playing a spellscale), and the +10 competence item (A&EG) hitting the 25 on handle animal with taking 10 to push the animal would work pretty easily. So without having to actually teach anything a skill trick, I could get use of them.

So I guess what my horrible, ultra low tier commoner tank could beat the orcs by hitting their supply trains with bat swarms (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:Bat_Swarm). With the bleeding they cause, their immunity to weapon damage, they can harass the mules/donkeys drawing the supply carts. At 3HD but with an int score of 2, they can be treated like animals, and purchased for 150gp a swarm. Food may not be super important, but ammo will be, especially in a siege.

But really, this would be the time for my character to find a local NPC and start using fluff to his advantage rather than crunch. Wolves keep screwing up attempts to infiltrate the enemy army? Maybe there is a flower in the valley that when crushed, produces a strong smell that makes it hard for them to use their scent ability. Maybe the orcs can be made to march over (and thereby crush) the flower by diverting a river, allowing for raids and the eventual assassination of their leaders!

I can't quite tell if this is an exercise in crunch, fluff, or somewhere in between; but I do like reading it!

[JaronK]

I find it entertaining you're going to such great lengths to say no, non casters are useless after all and lose to wolves of all things.

There are ways to get around things, but some of the plans won't work. Yes, scent destroys most disguise attempts (unless the character is already an Orc, or possibly a Goblin). People keep trying that. But there are mundane ways to bypass the defenses... long ranged archery can defeat most of the defenses the Orcs have. If you can fly in stealthed (such as via a flying mount) while there's fog out there, you might pull in a similar attack while still staying above their attacks (at least at lower levels). If you want to sneak in, there are feats (Like Darkstalker) or magic items that can actually defeat Scent (and at higher levels Blindsense) will make life a lot easier. That could allow for disguises or for simple hiding... you just have to do it right.


True...but the orcs wouldn't necessarily be tipped off by that, either. With the strength of the scent, I'd be smelly to them as well, so they might just chalk it up to whatever the frike I have on me.

You'd have to deal with heavily increased scrutiny at that point... the wolves are barking at you, which is the general symbol for "something's wrong here." I think that might get you in some trouble.


Well, yeah, but I figure that if I'm really close to the Bard by the time I let anyone know I'm injured, and, again, took the form of one of the relays, the Bard might just come to me because he's right there, and I have something for him anyway.

Assume the leaders of these groups are as guarded as, well, any other military higher up. They don't generally wander up to people, especially people the dogs are warning are weird, without as much armed escort as they can get. They're not going to just wander up alone, and I don't see how your character can take a group of them by yourself.


It's not my Character, but I'm curious about the viability of a Whirling Frenzy Lion Totem Barbarian 5/Ashworm Dragoon 4 in this scenario. Even with Scent, the wolves would have a hard time finding and dealing with a Burrowing opponent, who could theoretically make good use of guerrilla tactics and Charge-monkey shenanigans to take out large swaths of the horde. Creative use of the Burrowing ability could potentially alter the battlefield in other ways to hamper the horde's approach, but it may be veering into houserule territory.

Interesting. Yeah, they don't really have defenses against burrowing. Scent won't help when you're underground, though you'd need a way to find your targets successfully (or just pop up, attack randomly, and disappear). I'm not sure how many large swaths of enemies you could kill though. But you might do some noticeable damage.

JaronK

[Gavinfoxx]

There's scentbreaker stuff -- it's an item, right? Alchemical, I think?

[JaronK]

Those all make you stink more than usual... they make it so scent doesn't work for tracking, but it won't help if you want to not piss off the wolves since they do it with overpowering other smells. You need magic items for it, or Darkstalker. Sandals of the Light Step might do it, based on how Pass Without Trace works.

JaronK

[tyckspoon]

Those all make you stink more than usual... they make it so scent doesn't work for tracking, but it won't help if you want to not piss off the wolves since they do it with overpowering other smells. You need magic items for it, or Darkstalker. Sandals of the Light Step might do it, based on how Pass Without Trace works.

JaronK

There are stealth characters that don't have Darkstalker? It's so fundamental to making stealth work in the face of unusual senses that the only reasons I can think of not to have it are that your DM banned it or nobody has tipped you off to its existence yet.. *shrug*

If you don't have Darkstalker, you probably have to resort to magic. I would direct challengers to Hide From Animals and Gwaeron's Boots. Hide From Animals is of course a level 1 Druid or Ranger spell, and might reasonably be purchased in the town in potion or scroll form. It renders you invisible to animals until you attack somebody, and while this might still provoke some strange reactions if you have to be closely examined by guard dogs/wolves it should be helpful in attempts to bypass pickets and scout groups and not get caught out when you have to sneak by the kennels.

Gwaeron's Boots are a 6k GP item in the Magic Item Compendium that provide continuous Pass Without Trace, and explicitly (and redundantly, considering what Pass Without Trace does, but whatever, it's a useful redundancy here) state that you have no scent and cannot be detected by Scent while wearing them. Again, you probably don't want to have to face direct examination, but they'll remove a couple of evidence trails that might get you caught while moving in and out. (Although sticking these on your character for specifically this challenge is rather against the point, they're a useful and inexpensive item.. and part of the value of public challenges like this is bringing neat stuff you might not have thought of to broader attention, so hey, take a look at these.)

[JaronK]

There are stealth characters that don't have Darkstalker? It's so fundamental to making stealth work in the face of unusual senses that the only reasons I can think of not to have it are that your DM banned it or nobody has tipped you off to its existence yet.. *shrug*

None of the characters that have tried the infiltration route have had it, hence me saying Scent would stop them. I notice most of the people trying to infiltrate aren't specifically stealth types though, so that's I assume what's going on.


If you don't have Darkstalker, you probably have to resort to magic. I would direct challengers to Hide From Animals and Gwaeron's Boots. Hide From Animals is of course a level 1 Druid or Ranger spell, and might reasonably be purchased in the town in potion or scroll form. It renders you invisible to animals until you attack somebody, and while this might still provoke some strange reactions if you have to be closely examined by guard dogs/wolves it should be helpful in attempts to bypass pickets and scout groups and not get caught out when you have to sneak by the kennels.

Since the Orcs are just assuming the Dire Wolves will pick up infiltrators, you don't get directly challenged unless you do something foolish or act suspicious. So yes, this should work relatively well. As long as you can make it into their camp successfully (which any decent stealther should be able to pull off) you should be good to go.


Gwaeron's Boots are a 6k GP item in the Magic Item Compendium that provide continuous Pass Without Trace, and explicitly (and redundantly, considering what Pass Without Trace does, but whatever, it's a useful redundancy here) state that you have no scent and cannot be detected by Scent while wearing them. Again, you probably don't want to have to face direct examination, but they'll remove a couple of evidence trails that might get you caught while moving in and out. (Although sticking these on your character for specifically this challenge is rather against the point, they're a useful and inexpensive item.. and part of the value of public challenges like this is bringing neat stuff you might not have thought of to broader attention, so hey, take a look at these.)

Well, I know the character I'm currently playing has enough spending money that he could just buy something like that. You do have two weeks to prep, so securing cheaper items should be plausible.

I do find it interesting how many characters are shut down by something as simple as an army using dire wolves (riding dogs would work just as well).

JaronK

[ArcturusV]

Hmm. You know, I'm not sure how RAW Scent works. I mean based on real world logic you don't have to make yourself stink worse to prevent a wolf, or a dog, from tracking you by scent or picking you up. But I seem to recall scent got a little exaggerated in range and ability to pick up in DnD. In reality I could just rub some dirt on me and unless a dog or a wolf actually SEES me, they won't even know I'm there, scentwise you don't stand out from the rest of the world. But I don't think RAW actually allows that. It's the sort of thing that if RAI was in use, or it did work, Tsundaki would use it. If not? Well then I'm boned.

Also, never heard of that feat. So that would explain why she doesn't have it.

[JaronK]

From the SRD:


This extraordinary ability lets a creature detect approaching enemies, sniff out hidden foes, and track by sense of smell.

A creature with the scent ability can detect opponents by sense of smell, generally within 30 feet. If the opponent is upwind, the range is 60 feet. If it is downwind, the range is 15 feet. Strong scents, such as smoke or rotting garbage, can be detected at twice the ranges noted above. Overpowering scents, such as skunk musk or troglodyte stench, can be detected at three times these ranges.

The creature detects another creature’s presence but not its specific location. Noting the direction of the scent is a move action. If it moves within 5 feet of the scent’s source, the creature can pinpoint that source.

A creature with the Track feat and the scent ability can follow tracks by smell, making a Wisdom check to find or follow a track. The typical DC for a fresh trail is 10. The DC increases or decreases depending on how strong the quarry’s odor is, the number of creatures, and the age of the trail. For each hour that the trail is cold, the DC increases by 2. The ability otherwise follows the rules for the Track feat. Creatures tracking by scent ignore the effects of surface conditions and poor visibility.

Creatures with the scent ability can identify familiar odors just as humans do familiar sights.

Water, particularly running water, ruins a trail for air-breathing creatures. Water-breathing creatures that have the scent ability, however, can use it in the water easily.

False, powerful odors can easily mask other scents. The presence of such an odor completely spoils the ability to properly detect or identify creatures, and the base Survival DC to track becomes 20 rather than 10.

It's the part about sniffing out hidden foes that I'm going with here. Likewise the bit about "identify familiar odors" implies you can identify strange ones too. Also "The creature detects another creature’s presence but not its specific location" So, that's what the wolves use to identify "not Orc or Goblin" which is what they're sniffing for. They should be able to notice (if they get within range, but they're allowed to run around in the camp and along the marching lines) any non Orc as easily as a human would spot a non human walking around, and you can't disguise yourself from that without taking special precautions.

Darkstalker, by the way, is just a feat that lets you make Hide or Move Silently checks to avoid Scent, Blindsight, Blindsense, and Tremorsense. It's pretty much the default feat for any stealth class, precisely because of how easily those abilities shut down stealth normally... but it's found in a relatively rare book (Lords of Madness). A Pass Without Trace effect (which many magic shoes grants) will also negate Scent.

JaronK

[tyckspoon]

Hmm. You know, I'm not sure how RAW Scent works...

Passive detection within 30 feet, 60 feet if wind is carrying your scent toward the creature, 15 if away. Move action to note which direction the scent you found actually is, can only pinpoint location within 5 feet. Also the statement that

Creatures with the scent ability can identify familiar odors just as humans do familiar sights.

So while it may be fairly easy to prevent Scent from actually specifically locating you, it'd be somewhat difficult to foil in this application as an alarm system- if you pass within 30 feet of a wolf and have failed to sufficiently erase your scent, that wolf starts making noise and triggers a search by the Orcs. It'd be easier to do if you merely needed to smell like something non-threatening, but here you are required to erase any hint of being unfamiliar, which is.. not a simple thing to do; you can overlay other scents onto your own, but it's not so easy to completely remove the signature traces of elf/human/dwarf/whatever that the wolves are triggering on. (And you probably don't want to actually apply enough Essence of Orc to have an 'overpowering' Orc smell, not if you want to be accepted back into civilization any time in the next three months.)

[ArcturusV]

Well now I know...

*cue cheesy memory from decades past*

Yeah. Seems RAW that dirt wouldn't work. Even though logically it should. So weird. Probably something if I was DMing I'd rule RAI and say if you thought up something practical like that, that it would work. But I could understand people not necessarily doing it.

Question is, how much do these Orcs tolerate the wolves going off after strange scents? I mean they're not in their usual haunts by the scenario as I recall. So basically everything other than the Orcs and Gobbos are new scents to them. They might consider it a safety feature to let them run and guide Orcs where they need to go back home. But then they're also familiar with the territory back home. Over the course of a long march having the wolves run off hundreds of times because they picked up the scent of a new plant and just HAAAAAD to scope it out (And I think we've all seen out Canines go crazy about having to sniff everything when they are brought to a new neighborhood so I don't think it's too out of line to mention this). A new animal, etc, you'd think the Orcs would put a tighter leash on them after a while and be more like "Shut up Mutt, I'm not going on a wild chase after a chipmunk again!"

[JaronK]

Well now I know...

*cue cheesy memory from decades past*

Yeah. Seems RAW that dirt wouldn't work. Even though logically it should. So weird. Probably something if I was DMing I'd rule RAI and say if you thought up something practical like that, that it would work. But I could understand people not necessarily doing it.

Maybe that's what Darkstalker is... you know stuff like how to foil scent with local flora and fauna and dirt.


Question is, how much do these Orcs tolerate the wolves going off after strange scents? I mean they're not in their usual haunts by the scenario as I recall. So basically everything other than the Orcs and Gobbos are new scents to them.

I imagine they can sense humanoids or at least stuff made of meat.. they're not going to yip like crazy at every rock. But a humanoid? Sure, that should be simple.


They might consider it a safety feature to let them run and guide Orcs where they need to go back home. But then they're also familiar with the territory back home. Over the course of a long march having the wolves run off hundreds of times because they picked up the scent of a new plant and just HAAAAAD to scope it out (And I think we've all seen out Canines go crazy about having to sniff everything when they are brought to a new neighborhood so I don't think it's too out of line to mention this). A new animal, etc, you'd think the Orcs would put a tighter leash on them after a while and be more like "Shut up Mutt, I'm not going on a wild chase after a chipmunk again!"

Actually, since the Orcs do forage a bit (they're used to living that way, and at low levels that's in part how they feed the army) I imagine they absolutely do want the wolves taking down squirrels and such. That's just dinner! If it's meat, they're going to eat it. Everything else should be a similar enough scent anyhow. They're not THAT far outside of normal lands, after all... this is the northern border of the kingdom, and just south of their tribal lands.

JaronK

[Umbranar]

My character is not highly optimised but alot of fun to play.

Cant post a detailed sheet but here are some basics:

Paladin 2/Sorcerer 4/Silver Dragon Disciple 6
Gear of note: boots of speed
Feats: improved initiative, dodge, mobility, elusive target, power attack and combat casting.

My general tactic here is to hit and run (boots of speed) the big strong melee fighters. Power attack is useless for them as long as I target them with my dodge feat thanks to elusive target. Of course I buff myself first with False Life, Shield and See Invisibility (in our party bears endurance and bulls strength come from our transmutation wizard so i dont have those as spells known.)

DM gave me darkvision 40 ft due to a blessing in-game but even without that I should be able to find my targets with detect evil.

[JaronK]

See Invisibility won't matter this time (it's a good precaution, it just doesn't matter this time). I'm not sure how well you could hit and run anybody... you don't have Ride By Attack or anything. I think you might just get squashed.

JaronK

[Umbranar]

Well I cant post the sheet but my stats are basicly AC 29 HP 100+ and I have a breath weapon. Your probably right though, I wont pull it off alone.
What I mean is that Ill be where the fight is the hardest, in the front line and even then Ill prolly focus on the big hitters and activate my boots of speed for Full Round Attacks which are: Weapon Attack, Haste Weapon Attack, Weapon attack -5, Bite Attack. Since power attack of 1 enemy is negated by Elusive Target (target takes his penalty to attack but does not get bonus on damage) I think ill survive for a while and my AC is pretty decent. Then again its not optimised at all and its basicly a fighter rather then a caster.

Even getting flanked is a laugh with Elusive Target since the first attack is auto-miss and might hit the guy at the other side.

[JaronK]

I think the War Hulk might actually be the only one with Power Attack, funnily enough. But yeah, you'd need superior positioning and buffing and stuff, and backup from the friendly troops... the front lines would be very dangerous!

JaronK

[Umbranar]

I recon it is but thats why i build this character for my party, to soak damage/attacks :).

Guess ill try to get a 1 on 1 with that war hulk then.

I assumed all the barbarians had power attack :smallbiggrin:

[ArcturusV]

You know, just realized this exercise confirms something that I always suspected...

... I am one of the weird, weird people for actually using Mounted Combat. I don't think I've seen even a single character in this who knew so much as how to ride a mount, much less actually used a mount in combat. Just kind of interesting to see. I know there's probably reasons like people will point out that a 2 (Or was it 3?) HD Warhorse gets sniped out pretty easy and stuff.

But still. Just weird to see it's not really used. If I could FIND my old mounted combat character, the fact that most mounts around the level 6 threshold should be able to outrun wolves and so forth would open up a lot of hit and run options. And you'd have a cadre of NPC knights who could back you up. Unless the terrain was REALLY unfriendly to mounted combat it could be a decisive advantage.

Except that no one takes Mounted Combat feats. :smallbiggrin:

[super dark33]

My Lizardfolk ranger barbarian fighter would make the army sorry it ever formed.
I once cleaved an entire camp with it.
And now with more knowledge he would be even more effective.

My old idea of the Band of Black Riders would work too.
A gang of mounted characters with specialties.

The last one would be my Warlock acolyte of the wound who would just fly there, kill the leaders, and go away safely by ogling disconcertingly at the soldiers.

[Ifni]

Except that no one takes Mounted Combat feats. :smallbiggrin:

I've been thinking about posting how my old Living Greyhawk characters would deal with this, but the post got... long. I had five characters who made it into the relevant level range (three played from L1-16, one from L1-14, one from L1-9). The last one, the L9, was a dire-bat-riding druid-based charger; from memory at L9 she was Fighter 2 / Druid 6 / Hospitaler 1.

(No, she wasn't optimized in general - she gave up all those casting levels! The build was an exercise in seeing how fast I could get "full attacks with flying shocktrooper lance charges" online in the Living Greyhawk environment, while keeping the character playable from L1, and the answer turned out to be L9. If I remember correctly her feats at that point were Mounted Combat, Ride-By Attack, Spirited Charge, Natural Bond, Power Attack, Improved Bull Rush, Shock Trooper and Lion's Pounce (no flaws allowed). Lion Totem Barbarian would've been a better way to get pounce if it'd been available, but it wasn't. She worked out pretty well - having an effective-druid-level-equals-character-level flying animal companion with Perfect maneuverability + Ride-By Attack fixed some of the common issues with chargers, and she had her partial druid spellcasting to fall back on. She was fluffed as a "paladin of nature" and that's basically how she played, but with a better animal companion, better spells, more feats, less in the way of other class features.)

Not sure how she would've done in this challenge. I might try to post tactics for her and my other characters (cleric / sacred exorcist, sorcerer / wild mage / fatespinner, falchion-power-attacking dervish, sorcerer / shadowcraft mage) at some point. Short version is I think the two sorcerers would have done very well (they both had tricks that would work well here), the cleric would've made do but not more so than any generic cleric with access to her spell list (her feats and equipment were not particularly optimized for this challenge), the dervish would've probably been most useful in duels and alpha strikes, but likely would've needed support from someone else to have a viable exit strategy, although I haven't crunched the numbers.

[super dark33]

You know, just realized this exercise confirms something that I always suspected...

... I am one of the weird, weird people for actually using Mounted Combat. I don't think I've seen even a single character in this who knew so much as how to ride a mount, much less actually used a mount in combat. Just kind of interesting to see. I know there's probably reasons like people will point out that a 2 (Or was it 3?) HD Warhorse gets sniped out pretty easy and stuff.

But still. Just weird to see it's not really used. If I could FIND my old mounted combat character, the fact that most mounts around the level 6 threshold should be able to outrun wolves and so forth would open up a lot of hit and run options. And you'd have a cadre of NPC knights who could back you up. Unless the terrain was REALLY unfriendly to mounted combat it could be a decisive advantage.

Except that no one takes Mounted Combat feats. :smallbiggrin:

You just have to pick the right mount and let the lance show them his stabs plus cleave.

[Othniel Edden]

If you were a rogue with a wand of alter self, would that also replicate the scent of being an orc?

[AgentofHellfire]

You'd have to deal with heavily increased scrutiny at that point... the wolves are barking at you, which is the general symbol for "something's wrong here." I think that might get you in some trouble.


Fair enough. If it's absolutely necessary, I may trade out the Periapt of Wisdom +6 for a +4 version and a wand of Extended alter self. (perhaps also ditching the hat of disguise.




Assume the leaders of these groups are as guarded as, well, any other military higher up. They don't generally wander up to people, especially people the dogs are warning are weird, without as much armed escort as they can get. They're not going to just wander up alone, and I don't see how your character can take a group of them by yourself.

Well, I got rid of the dog problem, though if the general way the Bard goes about things is to keep himself surrounded, that may not be enough.

Which I think is alright, if we've got anything resembling a town cleric. Nothing fancy, mind you, just someone capable of quickly getting people into the fight. Plus maybe a Potions shop and a town mage.

Hell, with this plan I might even get to take out the general...:smallbiggrin:

The Plan (I hope it sounds as good to you as it does in my head...)

If the Bard really will fixate on staying surrounded by guards at all times, I might just try and get the healers to station in a specific building, then put up all the alchemist's fire/oil/alcohol in one other building, having some town trappers or the like help me link up the materials in question so that, with the tripping of the right wire, everything comes crashing down.

Then I tell the bard the healers are in the trapped building, and maybe trade out the Hat of Disguise that I might have enough money for a scroll of Major Image (it's pretty cheap, actually), that I might give to a town wizard or something (I don't think it's assuming too much to think there might be one...), to use when he sees orcs on the horizon, so as to make it look as if, yeah, the healers are in here. And, moreover, the wires aren't.

So when the group of orcs charge in and commence the raid...

[Thebar99]

There are ways to get around things, but some of the plans won't work. Yes, scent destroys most disguise attempts (unless the character is already an Orc, or possibly a Goblin). People keep trying that. But there are mundane ways to bypass the defenses... long ranged archery can defeat most of the defenses the Orcs have. If you can fly in stealthed (such as via a flying mount) while there's fog out there, you might pull in a similar attack while still staying above their attacks (at least at lower levels). If you want to sneak in, there are feats (Like Darkstalker) or magic items that can actually defeat Scent (and at higher levels Blindsense) will make life a lot easier. That could allow for disguises or for simple hiding... you just have to do it right.

Long range archery takes massive penalties, likely the same as their own ranged attacks. For ranged to be an advantage you need to not take penalties while they do... which is why even the uncreative Fireball works as they take -10 or more and you don't.

Mineral Warriors also have a burrow speed.

Mostly I'm amused because you 180ed your stance in an instant simply to oppose my own.

http://finkweb.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/rabbit_fire.jpg

All that said there is also the Murdering Hobo way - simply kill a few detachments, and use the resulting levels to go smash the rest of the force.

[JaronK]

If you were a rogue with a wand of alter self, would that also replicate the scent of being an orc?

I have no idea, actually. The line "You acquire the physical qualities of the new form while retaining your own mind. Physical qualities include..." implies you might, since it only says what physical qualities include... it never mentions scent, but it's not an exhaustive list. It's an interesting question.


Long range archery takes massive penalties, likely the same as their own ranged attacks. For ranged to be an advantage you need to not take penalties while they do... which is why even the uncreative Fireball works as they take -10 or more and you don't.

Mineral Warriors also have a burrow speed.

Mostly I'm amused because you 180ed your stance in an instant simply to oppose my own.

I didn't 180 any stance. I said Mineral Warrior wasn't a very good solution for a low level character because it requires a 6th level spell just to become one, and you yourself said solutions shouldn't require above 5th level spells. That hardly makes you a good low level melee character... you're just a character buffed with high level magic. I also said the DR of Mineral Warrior wouldn't actually protect you as well as you stated, which it wouldn't... the Orcs blow through that DR pretty effectively. You for some reason thought the DR 8 would make you nearly invincible. In fact, it only makes you protected from the volley fire of arrows (a minor component of the army).

Burrowing would help a good bit... but getting PAO'd into a burrowing creature would work great too. Having a Wizard build you a super flowing time Genesis plane where you could build equipment would work great as well, but that's silly too. I'm far more willing to take "I can burrow because my character has the ability to do so" than "I can burrow because somebody much more powerful gave me the ability to do so."

You'll notice that nobody who isn't trying to custom make characters for this challenge even has a mineral warrior or a high DR from any other source, so I'm not sure why you even bothered to bring that up.

And yes, long range archery takes penalties, obviously it does. But it's quite possible to make a long range archer that deals well with those penalties, and can use them for long range assassination attempts (since all of the primary detection security of the Orcs is short range, mostly scent and spotting with a touch of blindsense at higher levels). Even simple things like Swiftwing Arrows (range increment penalties are halved) and a Wand of Sniper's Shot or access to Psionic Minor Creation could be used to assassinate one of the big guys relatively safely. Wands of Hawkeye and Accuracy are pretty cheap too (being level 1 spells, and you've got enough time to purchase minor wands). Heck, combining a Wand of Hawkeye and a Wand of Accuracy and Swiftwing Arrows gives you +150% range and half penalties... a Composite Longbow at that range on a character with Farshot has a range increment of 330 feet that way, so at 980 feet out you've only got a -2 to hit. And unless a patrol happens to stumble upon you, at that range they'll never spot you if you hide. From there, you just have to make the shot count.


If the Bard really will fixate on staying surrounded by guards at all times, I might just try and get the healers to station in a specific building, then put up all the alchemist's fire/oil/alcohol in one other building, having some town trappers or the like help me link up the materials in question so that, with the tripping of the right wire, everything comes crashing down.

Then I tell the bard the healers are in the trapped building, and maybe trade out the Hat of Disguise that I might have enough money for a scroll of Major Image (it's pretty cheap, actually), that I might give to a town wizard or something (I don't think it's assuming too much to think there might be one...), to use when he sees orcs on the horizon, so as to make it look as if, yeah, the healers are in here. And, moreover, the wires aren't.

So when the group of orcs charge in and commence the raid...

Just as a basic thing, because the Orcs actually do infight a bit and don't trust each other, all the tribal leaders (the special characters) always have their honor guard with them. In the case of the Bard, he's got his special creepy singers with him as well as a few Barbarians. I don't know if you saw that post, but they're Inspire Awe (A variant that swaps out Inspire Courage for the ability to force nearby enemies to save vs their perform check or be Shaken) Bards who use Bones (a musical instrument that lowers your saves against fear if you can hear them).

Anyway, as to your plan... if you can somehow get the Bard to actually listen to you (generally you'd talk to one of his special guys, they're like the sargents of the army), you might be able to convince people that those buildings are special... but the Bard actually stays back during the fight playing his drums. He's got no need to get close... he actually directs the army with his drum playing. So the only ones of his people that would go into a building are his random Barbarian minions. You might do better trying to convince the Water Orc commando... he's actually planning to sneak in by jumping over the walls and causing havoc in the back, and he'd personally go in. Of course, he has trapfinding, but it's not that amazing.

JaronK

[AgentofHellfire]

Anyway, as to your plan... if you can somehow get the Bard to actually listen to you (generally you'd talk to one of his special guys, they're like the sargents of the army), you might be able to convince people that those buildings are special... but the Bard actually stays back during the fight playing his drums. He's got no need to get close... he actually directs the army with his drum playing. So the only ones of his people that would go into a building are his random Barbarian minions. You might do better trying to convince the Water Orc commando... he's actually planning to sneak in by jumping over the walls and causing havoc in the back, and he'd personally go in. Of course, he has trapfinding, but it's not that amazing.

JaronK


I can gun for the Water Orc instead. Certainly. XD

I'd have to alter my story a bit, but not too much--possibly just shift to one of his scouts fanning out and finding things, who figured the clerics and stationed guards might be something to call in others for.

EDIT: Also, having looked the spells I'm using over, I'll need more than one scroll. In fact...I may ditch the Periapt entirely and get a wand of the spell...plus use a windowless building for the "place with healers...

[Thebar99]

I didn't 180 any stance. I said Mineral Warrior wasn't a very good solution for a low level character because it requires a 6th level spell just to become one, and you yourself said solutions shouldn't require above 5th level spells. That hardly makes you a good low level melee character... you're just a character buffed with high level magic. I also said the DR of Mineral Warrior wouldn't actually protect you as well as you stated, which it wouldn't... the Orcs blow through that DR pretty effectively. You for some reason thought the DR 8 would make you nearly invincible. In fact, it only makes you protected from the volley fire of arrows (a minor component of the army).

You have an extremely well deserved reputation for not only defending mundane classes but greatly exaggerating their abilities. To admit they're actually shut down by scent, while correct is a complete reversal of your usual stance.

Anyways, this army has changed from the poorly built and designed thing it was originally to something that could actually do a half decent amount of damage, just because I made you aware it was necessary.

Also, you still have not addressed how Mineral Warrior is just a 6th level spell cast in your backstory and not as part of the game and so are Animated shields and yet no one is complaining about shield using melee.


Burrowing would help a good bit... but getting PAO'd into a burrowing creature would work great too. Having a Wizard build you a super flowing time Genesis plane where you could build equipment would work great as well, but that's silly too. I'm far more willing to take "I can burrow because my character has the ability to do so" than "I can burrow because somebody much more powerful gave me the ability to do so."

Mineral Warrior: My race lets me digdug.
PAO: My spell lets me digdug.


You'll notice that nobody who isn't trying to custom make characters for this challenge even has a mineral warrior or a high DR from any other source, so I'm not sure why you even bothered to bring that up.

True, DR is useless for anything else except vs large numbers of weak units. However Mineral Warrior also does other things for a melee, so really you're not seeing it because you're not seeing many melees.


And yes, long range archery takes penalties, obviously it does. But it's quite possible to make a long range archer that deals well with those penalties, and can use them for long range assassination attempts (since all of the primary detection security of the Orcs is short range, mostly scent and spotting with a touch of blindsense at higher levels). Even simple things like Swiftwing Arrows (range increment penalties are halved) and a Wand of Sniper's Shot or access to Psionic Minor Creation could be used to assassinate one of the big guys relatively safely. Wands of Hawkeye and Accuracy are pretty cheap too (being level 1 spells, and you've got enough time to purchase minor wands). Heck, combining a Wand of Hawkeye and a Wand of Accuracy and Swiftwing Arrows gives you +150% range and half penalties... a Composite Longbow at that range on a character with Farshot has a range increment of 330 feet that way, so at 980 feet out you've only got a -2 to hit. And unless a patrol happens to stumble upon you, at that range they'll never spot you if you hide. From there, you just have to make the shot count.

So these guys are just standing out in the open where they could be hit a thousand feet away? I was giving them some amount of credit and assuming you could only even hit them at long range if you were doing an air attack, otherwise there'd be stuff in the way between you and them.

The only way to get anywhere near good single shot damage is with Hunter's Mercy. Which works I suppose, but does it work with all that? And even then if the target has > 30 HP all you've done is annoyed him.

[Icewraith]

Instead of using 7th level orc barbarians as mooks in a high level army, couldn't you use swarms or adapt the swarm template and use first level barbarians? We're getting into homebrew at that point, but it's fairly reasonable.

[TuggyNE]

You have an extremely well deserved reputation for not only defending mundane classes but greatly exaggerating their abilities. To admit they're actually shut down by scent, while correct is a complete reversal of your usual stance.

… You are talking about JaronK, the founder of the tier system, no? I'm not aware of any reputation he may have, well-deserved or otherwise, for exaggerating any classes' abilities. (With the possible exception of the Factotum, which seems to earn him a bit of flak at times.)


Also, you still have not addressed how Mineral Warrior is just a 6th level spell cast in your backstory and not as part of the game and so are Animated shields and yet no one is complaining about shield using melee.

Has anyone so far proposed using an animated shield as a substantial part of their strategy, or even at all?


Mineral Warrior: My race lets me digdug.
PAO: My spell lets me digdug.

Mineral Warrior is not, to my knowledge, a template that can be inherited. The only way to acquire it is to have mineralize warrior cast on you. So there's no "race" involved here.

[Kane0]

Well, my most recent character (level 2 Undead Servitor (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=223940)) would probably have a lot to do. I guess ill take him up to level 6 to be fair though.

Things he could/would do:
- Blast. As a warlock kind of class, the Servitor can blast and blast well. In combat he will be found behind the front line throwing damage around at every opportunity. He would be using bursts (10' radius), beams (30' line) and spears (100'+ range).
- Send his pet (pretty much a harmless ghost) around for scouting and recon before and during combat. Given that the character himself also has a decent stealth score he would be floating around nearby before combat too.
- the Darkness invocation gives good low level area control
- decent intimidate skill means he could possibly taunt foes into stupid(er) decisions or cow them before attacking
- his single lesser invocation would likely be flee the scene, allowing good mobility in a fight to set up blasts, aid allies or escape danger
- his single lesser patron power would be using magic items like an arcane caster of his level, allowing him to use scrolls, wands, rods, etc that the party may have picked up for various purposes. he would be on the look out for necromancy items because of his undead patronage.
- using his good diplomacy and bluff scores to get more support from anyone else that could lend a hand, getting better prices for supporting the war economically, rallying speeches, etc
- if s*** goes down he will drop his ace in the hole (changing his ghost pet into four combat-ready low-level ghosts). If things get worse then that he will bail and run for it. (This is an in game ability my DM gave him after he devoured a few souls. This guy was the groups favorite RP wise)

So yeah, he'd be pretty busy... good thing he only sleeps 6 hours a day tops.

[Gavinfoxx]

I didnt know wands could have metamagic versions of spells in them...

[Thebar99]

… You are talking about JaronK, the founder of the tier system, no?

Correct. And not just one class.


Has anyone so far proposed using an animated shield as a substantial part of their strategy, or even at all?

Don't think anyone's gone melee. If they did, he wouldn't complain about a magic item. Fact is he's so eager to contradict me I can easily maneuver him into contradicting himself.


Mineral Warrior is not, to my knowledge, a template that can be inherited. The only way to acquire it is to have mineralize warrior cast on you. So there's no "race" involved here.

Not all templates are. Some are acquired. What is your point?

[8wGremlin]

Well I changed my existing character and came up with a T5 e6 healer that can play a significant role in the defence of the city.

You can see the full build on my wiki http://wiki.greyveil.com/E6_T5_Circle_Healer

But basically its a Healer5, Mystic Warder 1 Gold Dwarf of Galaeros
It still uses circle magic, leadership and a domain idol, to summon 31 X 11HD shambling mounds every night, up until D-day, each one guarding a 180' radius zone.

Also planing shrubs and bushes and every day casting plant growth to create hampering movement, to allow our archers and siege engine crew to pound the enemy

She also can cast a surprising number of non-healer spells, due to the charm domain, and Gold Dweomercrafter - this will allow her to cast flame arrow to help out with additional damage to the villages archers

If the Orcs on foot come through the plant growth area (its huge!) they reduce their speed to 5' a round! and its 180' wide.

So tactically they would need to go around.

[TuggyNE]

JaronK credential OT:
Correct. And not just one class.

Which other classes, then? I hate to say it, really, but this is a case where a citation or three seems needed. (Although ideally we'd stop cluttering up this thread and avoid bringing in baggage from other sources… :smallannoyed:.)


Don't think anyone's gone melee. If they did, he wouldn't complain about a magic item. Fact is he's so eager to contradict me I can easily maneuver him into contradicting himself.

How do you know ahead of time what he would or wouldn't do? Guessing about someone's probable logical inconsistencies is tempting, but unfair and irrational. If a poster is really given to exaggeration and rampant bias, it should be practical to demonstrate this without any need for unfounded assertions. Most of the time, in fact, it's fairly evident to anyone who looks carefully. (And no, that's not an excuse to go around telling everyone that they're obviously not looking carefully. :smallsigh:)

Also, there have been quite a few melee characters so far, including the one that started the thread, though most of them don't seem to have used shields particularly, animated or otherwise.


Not all templates are. Some are acquired. What is your point?

That, indeed, is what I'd like to know of you. :smallconfused: You can't reasonably claim "my race lets me do such-and-such" when it's impossible to be born a member of that race; it's a bit like saying "well, I'm a baby lich, but I still have paralyzing touch as a racial ability, even if I can only cast spells at CL 1". A template that can only be gained by the intervention of high-level casters is not comparable (in a level-limited context) to one that can be gained by happenstance or ancestry.

For the same reason, Mineral Warrior is not a template that an E6 character can reasonably assume exists; you can houserule other ways of acquiring that, but strictly by RAW it wouldn't work. (And, of course, in E6 it's likely to be both unnecessary and rather strong, so most of the time such houserules are unlikely.)

[8wGremlin]

For the same reason, Mineral Warrior is not a template that an E6 character can reasonably assume exists; you can houserule other ways of acquiring that, but strictly by RAW it wouldn't work. (And, of course, in E6 it's likely to be both unnecessary and rather strong, so most of the time such houserules are unlikely.)

Er You can get that spell in E6
Sha'ir 3 > Mystic theurge 3.

+1 level of existing arcane spellcasting class/+1 level of existing divine spellcasting class is being applied twice to Sha'ir.. at level 6 you have the same casting as a level 9 Sha'ir thus 5th level spells!

Add in Versatile Spellcaster and a CHA or 20 and you have two 5th level spells to sack to create a 6th level spell, Which your Gen can go and get (higher DC, but do able....) See my (Sha'ir Cheat (http://wiki.greyveil.com/Sha%27ir_cheat) for mor details.

[JaronK]

You have an extremely well deserved reputation for not only defending mundane classes but greatly exaggerating their abilities. To admit they're actually shut down by scent, while correct is a complete reversal of your usual stance.

I have no idea where this is even coming from. You realize I wrote the system that says that mundane classes are below (int terms of power and versatility) the vast majority of casters, right? And that I also wrote the scouting handbook, which clearly says that scent will shut down any stealther that doesn't specifically prepare for it, namely with darkstalker? Feel free to check my signature for verification.

I think you're attacking a strawman at this point.


Anyways, this army has changed from the poorly built and designed thing it was originally to something that could actually do a half decent amount of damage, just because I made you aware it was necessary.

Recheck the initial post. The existence of dire wolves was in there from the start. So was the fact that they're an army composed primarily of standard Orc Barbarians. Maybe you didn't figure out that when I said it was an army of Orc Barbarians that I would use the generic Orc Barbarian soldiers from Heroes of Battle, but frankly I think that was pretty obvious and hardly a stretch.

I think it's far more likely that you just made a bunch of assumptions (like these oddball assumptions about my reputation) and are only now figuring out they're untrue. That's not me changing things... that's you figuring out what's been going on the whole time. And I'm not just taking down your ideas when they don't work... that Monk guy was very upset when I said that trying to dump plague ridden bodies in local water supplies would fail due to the Barbarians all having Survival anyway and the use of Purify Food and Drink or Everful Basins for water. Some of the other people have been shot down too, mostly for forgetting to deal with Scent or trying to disguise themselves but not speaking Orcish, or for trying to use Silence to sneak around without remembering that the Orcs constantly play drums so the silenced field is very obvious.


Also, you still have not addressed how Mineral Warrior is just a 6th level spell cast in your backstory and not as part of the game and so are Animated shields and yet no one is complaining about shield using melee.

Animated Shields haven't even been brought up, so I have no idea why you're bringing them up... more strawman? But while it's possible to use WBL to buy a casting of PAO or Mineralize Warrior, it's something nobody's actually used in any game as far as I can tell. You're still trying to talk about this as though it's an optimization challenge that you have to build for, when the actual goal is to see how players would face this challenge using their existing characters. Since none of them have used an Animated Shield or a Mineral Warrior, the entire discussion is downright bizarre. It seems to me you just have ideas about how the challenge should be and are hurt that it's not what you thought.

I mean, it's not like you can start as a third level character with the Dry Lich template either... because we know you can only get that template via the Walker in the Waste class. The same applies to Mineral Warrior... you can only have that template via a 6th level spell. There's no other way.


Mineral Warrior: My race lets me digdug.
PAO: My spell lets me digdug.

Well, no, because the way you're treating it it's PAO: That Wizard over there made me able to digdug vs Mineral Warrior: That Wizard in my backstory made me able to digdug. Still a bit weird. Why not say the Wizard in your backstory PAO'd you into something far more awesome?


True, DR is useless for anything else except vs large numbers of weak units. However Mineral Warrior also does other things for a melee, so really you're not seeing it because you're not seeing many melees.

I think most of the challengers have involved melee (or at least a fair number). And I'm aware of how strong the Mineral Warrior template is... I never said otherwise. What I said was that the DR provided by it doesn't trivialize the challenge, as you claimed, and that the use of high level magic isn't a good example of an easy to obtain low level mundane solution. These are both quite true claims.


So these guys are just standing out in the open where they could be hit a thousand feet away? I was giving them some amount of credit and assuming you could only even hit them at long range if you were doing an air attack, otherwise there'd be stuff in the way between you and them.

They have to march to the village, do they not? An archer could set up an ambush along the way. Remember that the scenario occurs in a mountain pass, which necessarily means at some point there's going to be mountains above where the Orc army marches. There's some potential there. The Orcs do have scouts which you'd have to avoid, but that should be possible. In general, this should give you a chance if you play your cards right and deal with the Orcish defenses appropriately. And of course they need a way to figure out which Orc they want to target (I'd probably require Sense Motive checks to figure out who's giving the big orders, or maybe Knowledge Local or Knowledge Nobility and Royalty to recognize the tribal leaders among the Orcs).


The only way to get anywhere near good single shot damage is with Hunter's Mercy. Which works I suppose, but does it work with all that? And even then if the target has > 30 HP all you've done is annoyed him.

Psionic Minor Creation for Black Lotus Poison makes a lot more sense, though it's a very optimized option. But a scroll or other magic item of that power (do Psions do scrolls? I'm not very familiar with psionics) or the Hidden Talent feat could allow you to generate plenty of such poison. It also doesn't have to be a single shot... surely a decent archer at least has Rapid Shot. You can also use a flying mount and still be mundane. I could also see a crossbow character doing decent damage due to the variety of ways to get Dex to damage with a crossbow. Meanwhile, since this challenge is done with a party, couldn't a party of ambushing archers all target the same guy? That could be an interesting thing.

JaronK

[TuggyNE]

Er You can get that spell in E6
Sha'ir 3 > Mystic theurge 3.

+1 level of existing arcane spellcasting class/+1 level of existing divine spellcasting class is being applied twice to Sha'ir.. at level 6 you have the same casting as a level 9 Sha'ir thus 5th level spells!

Add in Versatile Spellcaster and a CHA or 20 and you have two 5th level spells to sack to create a 6th level spell, Which your Gen can go and get (higher DC, but do able....) See my (Sha'ir Cheat (http://wiki.greyveil.com/Sha%27ir_cheat) for mor details.

Ow. OK, fair enough. You can, with sufficient cheese, do nearly anything; however, a common E6 houserule/interpretation/whatever is that higher-level spells are not only inaccessible to casters, but just don't exist.

So let me revise my earlier statement: "Mineral Warrior is not a template that an E6 character can reasonably assume exists." Oh wait, that's already what I said, almost….


Psionic Minor Creation for Black Lotus Poison makes a lot more sense, though it's a very optimized option. But a scroll or other magic item of that power (do Psions do scrolls? I'm not very familiar with psionics) or the Hidden Talent feat could allow you to generate plenty of such poison.

Yeah, they're called power stones. Should work fairly well.

[Thebar99]

JaronK credential OT: [spoiler]

Which other classes, then? I hate to say it, really, but this is a case where a citation or three seems needed. (Although ideally we'd stop cluttering up this thread and avoid bringing in baggage from other sources… :smallannoyed:.)

Anything skill and/or stealth based. Just he mostly focuses on the Factotum because he's obsessed with Tier 3, which is where many other people get it from.


How do you know ahead of time what he would or wouldn't do? Guessing about someone's probable logical inconsistencies is tempting, but unfair and irrational. If a poster is really given to exaggeration and rampant bias, it should be practical to demonstrate this without any need for unfounded assertions. Most of the time, in fact, it's fairly evident to anyone who looks carefully. (And no, that's not an excuse to go around telling everyone that they're obviously not looking carefully. :smallsigh:)

I don't have to know ahead of time. I can point at what he's doing right now and say he's doing it. I did predict it in advance, but that's beside the point.

Anywhere else he's all like sneaking around can solve this problem, mundanes can solve that problem... and here, when faced with a simple problem he admits they cannot. Simply because I said they can. If I had entered the thread and said such characters were worthless, blah blah blah he'd have stuck with his usual stance.


Also, there have been quite a few melee characters so far, including the one that started the thread, though most of them don't seem to have used shields particularly, animated or otherwise.

At what levels? An Animated shield is over 9,000 gold. It's possible they simply couldn't afford it.


That, indeed, is what I'd like to know of you. :smallconfused: You can't reasonably claim "my race lets me do such-and-such" when it's impossible to be born a member of that race; it's a bit like saying "well, I'm a baby lich, but I still have paralyzing touch as a racial ability, even if I can only cast spells at CL 1". A template that can only be gained by the intervention of high-level casters is not comparable (in a level-limited context) to one that can be gained by happenstance or ancestry.

It is impossible to be born as:

A Dragonborn.
A Lolth Touched.

And yet those are still standard races/templates melees take.

You are still completely missing the point. The point is, having some random thing happen in your backstory with no direct impact on the game is not comparable to someone casting a high level spell that does have a direct impact on the game.

Backstory spell gives you a template = fine.
Backstory spell gives you an item which you still have to pay for = fine.
PAO into some random high level monster = not fine.


For the same reason, Mineral Warrior is not a template that an E6 character can reasonably assume exists; you can houserule other ways of acquiring that, but strictly by RAW it wouldn't work. (And, of course, in E6 it's likely to be both unnecessary and rather strong, so most of the time such houserules are unlikely.)

When did this ever become about E6? Level 6 is the low end of this (it's also the only level you might not be able to trivialize the army in some manner, but Ebon Eyes Fireballs still works).

But if it were you have 5 class levels and Mineral Warrior.

[Thebar99]

Animated Shields haven't even been brought up, so I have no idea why you're bringing them up... more strawman? But while it's possible to use WBL to buy a casting of PAO or Mineralize Warrior, it's something nobody's actually used in any game as far as I can tell. You're still trying to talk about this as though it's an optimization challenge that you have to build for, when the actual goal is to see how players would face this challenge using their existing characters. Since none of them have used an Animated Shield or a Mineral Warrior, the entire discussion is downright bizarre. It seems to me you just have ideas about how the challenge should be and are hurt that it's not what you thought.

As stated multiple times, to create an Animated Shield you must cast Animate Objects... which is also a 6th level spell.

So if you are saying no 6th level spells at all, even if they're just random backstory stuff with no direct impact you're also saying no melees ever... interestingly enough, excluding 6th level spells does not impact the guys that actually cast them at all since they don't need Mineral Warrior, or hands free shield use.


They have to march to the village, do they not? An archer could set up an ambush along the way. Remember that the scenario occurs in a mountain pass, which necessarily means at some point there's going to be mountains above where the Orc army marches. There's some potential there. The Orcs do have scouts which you'd have to avoid, but that should be possible. In general, this should give you a chance if you play your cards right and deal with the Orcish defenses appropriately. And of course they need a way to figure out which Orc they want to target (I'd probably require Sense Motive checks to figure out who's giving the big orders, or maybe Knowledge Local or Knowledge Nobility and Royalty to recognize the tribal leaders among the Orcs).

Which means either these Orcs are really bloody stupid, or they have people watching their heads. Not because they care about a few people with ranged weapons, but because they don't want someone wrecking their ranks with a landslide.


Psionic Minor Creation for Black Lotus Poison makes a lot more sense, though it's a very optimized option. But a scroll or other magic item of that power (do Psions do scrolls? I'm not very familiar with psionics) or the Hidden Talent feat could allow you to generate plenty of such poison. It also doesn't have to be a single shot... surely a decent archer at least has Rapid Shot. You can also use a flying mount and still be mundane. I could also see a crossbow character doing decent damage due to the variety of ways to get Dex to damage with a crossbow. Meanwhile, since this challenge is done with a party, couldn't a party of ambushing archers all target the same guy? That could be an interesting thing.

JaronK

Because then instead of one big hit you do several tiny ones.

And if you make the entire party this, then... what? You use your entire party, shoot at one guy, and at best kill one guy? Meanwhile all the other guys are still there, and you're a party of archers. The Fireball method kills dozens per use. Are you that vastly inferior to Fireball? It isn't even a tier thing at this point as you could very well have a Warlock cast Animate Dead on some flying creature then him and his three Warmage friends go carpet bombing.

[JaronK]

Anything skill and/or stealth based. Just he mostly focuses on the Factotum because he's obsessed with Tier 3, which is where many other people get it from.

I don't "mostly focus" on the Factotum. My current character that I actually mentioned in respect to this challenge is a Binder/Archivist/Anima Mage, which is by the way not Tier 3. All I've said is that I prefer to play Tier 3 while I prefer to DM for Tier 4, but that I actually play everything from 1 to 6. It's almost like you have no idea what you're talking about here.

By the way, the Factotum thing actually came about because one poster on another board got really upset that I wouldn't put his suggestions for class positions into the tier system without reviewing them myself, and as a result he decided to make his own system (which turned out to be far too heavily biased towards his own playstyle). As part of that, he claimed that Rogues were as powerful as Sorcerers but that Factotums were about the same as Hexblades, and I showed why that was wrong (turns out a class that can break the action economy and cast most of the spells of a Wizard, allbeit slower, is actually stronger than one that can't hurt elementals or oozes effectively). That's it. They're just a class I used as an example for why he was wrong, and that I happened to be playing at the time.


Anywhere else he's all like sneaking around can solve this problem, mundanes can solve that problem... and here, when faced with a simple problem he admits they cannot. Simply because I said they can. If I had entered the thread and said such characters were worthless, blah blah blah he'd have stuck with his usual stance.

You mean "he expressly stated in advance that they cannot", right? Seriously, go click on the link at the bottom of my post that mentions the scouting handbook. Now look at the first section, where I mention that scent will completely shut you down if you don't have countermeasures (usually Darkstalker). How do you reconcile the fact that I've been literally saying that for years with the idea that I must be only saying it now because you in some way changed my mind?

If you'd come in and said they were worthless, I'd have told you that they could work, but only if you successfully deal with things like scent and, at higher levels, the blindsense that the bats have.

It's not all about you.


At what levels? An Animated shield is over 9,000 gold. It's possible they simply couldn't afford it.

Sure, and many people don't think the AC boost of an animated shield is worth that much. Even the high level melees haven't had one. I believe the only character to use something close was mine, but that involved an unseen servant carrying a tower shield near him just in case.


It is impossible to be born as:

A Dragonborn.
A Lolth Touched.

And yet those are still standard races/templates melees take.

Nobody has taken any of those either.


You are still completely missing the point. The point is, having some random thing happen in your backstory with no direct impact on the game is not comparable to someone casting a high level spell that does have a direct impact on the game.

Backstory spell gives you a template = fine.
Backstory spell gives you an item which you still have to pay for = fine.
PAO into some random high level monster = not fine.

How can you claim that someone turning you into a Mineral Warrior has "no direct impact on the game"? It requires someone casting a high level spell on you that you actually thought trivializes the whole encounter here! And furthermore, no one has used that template, so evidently it's not nearly as common as you think, nor is it relevant! Nor did it do what you claimed it would do, so why do you care?


When did this ever become about E6? Level 6 is the low end of this (it's also the only level you might not be able to trivialize the army in some manner, but Ebon Eyes Fireballs still works).

But if it were you have 5 class levels and Mineral Warrior.

You claimed it was trivially easy for a low level melee to have a DR around 10, and that that would make someone immune to most of the encounter. Your example was Mineral Warrior. You even stated players shouldn't need spells above 5th level. But that is not trivially easy for a low level melee... it requires the help of at least an 11th level Wizard with a 6th level spell willing to spend some experience on it, and it doesn't actually make you immune to the vast majority of the encounter (only the goblin arrow volleys and maybe the scouts' bow attacks). That's why E6 is coming up... because what you're trying for wouldn't be available unless you had access to higher level folks.


As stated multiple times, to create an Animated Shield you must cast Animate Objects... which is also a 6th level spell.

So if you are saying no 6th level spells at all, even if they're just random backstory stuff with no direct impact you're also saying no melees ever... interestingly enough, excluding 6th level spells does not impact the guys that actually cast them at all since they don't need Mineral Warrior, or hands free shield use.

One requires a high level Wizard being right there casting spells that cost exp on you (which is actually harder to get than a Wizard casting PAO on you, as I imagine random high level Wizards don't actually want to burn exp on random low level characters). The other requires that a magic item be created at some point, then ownership transfers a few times, and then it ends up in some store where you buy it or something. Animated Shields (which I don't think low level characters can afford anyway) are something you can buy in any store without having to claim there was a powerful Wizard in your backstory who grants you powerful favors.


Which means either these Orcs are really bloody stupid, or they have people watching their heads. Not because they care about a few people with ranged weapons, but because they don't want someone wrecking their ranks with a landslide.

They're not stupid, but they have weaknesses. With that said, they do have scouts who check the area for places where a landslide might occur (those don't happen everywhere), so they're at least trying. I could see a clever player trying to use explosives to make a landslide work. But the fact is, a stealthy character probably could set up some form of long ranged ambush, because it's hard to find a character that's hiding reasonably well at long range. This actually isn't a super hard encounter, but you do have to think a bit... the ranged guys do need a way to avoid the scouts.


Because then instead of one big hit you do several tiny ones.

And if you make the entire party this, then... what? You use your entire party, shoot at one guy, and at best kill one guy? Meanwhile all the other guys are still there, and you're a party of archers. The Fireball method kills dozens per use. Are you that vastly inferior to Fireball? It isn't even a tier thing at this point as you could very well have a Warlock cast Animate Dead on some flying creature then him and his three Warmage friends go carpet bombing.

Well, again, one guy could do it with poison (two shots via Rapidshot from a bow with Black Lotus Poison, doable at level 6 using Hidden Talent or a level 1 Power Stone of Psionic Minor Creation, would almost certainly kill any one army leader). Or a party could do it with a rapid series of attacks. Or, yes, you could carpet bomb with fireballs, though an undead flying mount (where are you getting the flying creature from?) is hardly stealthy so you'd have spells from the Cleric and such as well as arrow fire (depending on your range) coming at you pretty soon.

But look, you're so obsessed with Mineral Warrior and you desperately want to show off how easy you can make it look, so why don't you make your mineral warrior low level melee who was supposed to dominate this. Pay for the casting of Mineralize Warrior (250xp per HD, 500gp per HD, 6th level spell) and the level adjust, make your melee, and show how you'd do. That is, by the way, 660gp (minimum, CL 11) + 1750gp per HD you have at the time of casting. The earliest you could potentially afford this spell is level 6, where it would be 11150gp out of your total 13kgp wealth (leaving you otherwise bankrupt... also you have to serve the caster for a year and a day). If we assume you can't spend more than half your wealth on this effect (as normal for an item, this isn't an item) you could do it starting at level 9, where it would cost 16410gp out of your total 36kgp. By the way, your definition of "easy for a low level character" is clearly different from mine.

Since I'm sure you'll think I'm horribly biased against this plan, feel free to ask others how they think you'd do given the scenario... I've give most of the details. It's against the spirit of the challenge to build characters for the purpose, but that's okay. You can have fun with it. Maybe you can show how you were right all along and that DR 8 will totally make you immune to... something. And is available at low levels.

You can even have an animated shield if you really want.

But remember, the random Orcs are the standard Barbarian Orc soldiers from Heroes of Battle.

JaronK

[Lord_Gareth]

Hey JaronK, non-horrible question:

By RAW, I cannot Death Attack with spells such as Shocking Grasp that require a melee touch attack, since Death Attack specifies "a melee weapon". Would you mind if I assumed that this was houseruled differently and that I can use such spells (specifically melee touch spells) to Death Attack?

[JaronK]

Complete Arcane 85 talks about "Weaponlike spells" which in fact function "as a weapon in certain respects... such spells can threaten critical hits, can be used in sneak attacks, and can be used with favored enemy damage bonuses." That seems close enough, as assassins base their death attack on the question of whether you can sneak attack (in addition to other restrictions). So, if the spell is a melee weaponlike spell and can be used for Sneak Attack (Shocking Grasp can), it should be fine.

But just in case, show how you would do it if you had to use a standard (summoned or manufactured) weapon instead.

JaronK

[Darius Kane]

JaronK, I'd advise ignoring that Thebar99 guy. He's not worth your energy.

Question: Ho likely would it be for a troll or war troll to get into enemy camp by posing as a mercenary (or actually hiring himself to them, but in reality being a double agent)?
I'm not yet sure what that could accomplish, other than possibly giving him access to some, more or less, vital information, or maybe allowing him to "assassinate" someone important.
Also, I know this scenario is only up to 15-16 level, and feel free to ignore me, but what would be your suggestions for scaling it for high-op 20th level game?

[JaronK]

JaronK, I'd advise ignoring that Thebar99 guy. He's not worth your energy.

Question: Ho likely would it be for a troll or war troll to get into enemy camp by posing as a mercenary (or actually hiring himself to them, but in reality being a double agent)?
I'm not yet sure what that could accomplish, other than possibly giving him access to some, more or less, vital information, or maybe allowing him to "assassinate" someone important.
Also, I know this scenario is only up to 15-16 level, and feel free to ignore me, but what would be your suggestions for scaling it for high-op 20th level game?

So, you mean you're not pretending to be an already hired mercenary, but rather a troll who just wants to join up? That depends entirely on who you approach. The Cleric's forces might use Sense Motive to figure out your bluff, but the War Hulk's forces actually really love big guys with strength, so they'd likely just grapple you... if you win, you're hired. They haven't got any trolls yet so you can't pretend to be a pre hired guy, but they might be willing.

Honestly I don't think this scenario works great even at 15, because there's such high level magic abilities, so at level 20 and high op it's a bit much. Also, the idea of a swarm of thousands of level 16 Orcs seems a insane (even a swarm of so many level 11s is odd). But if I were to scale it up, I'd probably have it actually be an army of Dread Warrior Orcs controlled by a UA Variant Necromancer Wizard who spell stitched himself (as a Necropolitan) and has been building up the army for a long time. Thus, all the minons get all the Dread Warrior stat boosts plus the boosts of the UA Wizard... so that means they all have (assuming they're created in a Desecrated area near an evil altar) +8 Str, -6 Int, -4 Cha, +4 Dex, and D12+4 HP/HD. Plus many of them would have Lifesense, and they'd be disguised so they look like normal Orcs (thus making it hard to notice what they are and take countermeasures). Meanwhile, I'd fill the army with flying beasts and creatures with lots of detection methods. Giants with War Hulk and Hulking Hurler levels would be the siege artillery, while the initial push would include lots of Druid using Boreal Wind to sweep away forward defenders. Generally speaking, there would be lots of casters using area attacks to screw over your forces. Plus, there would be multiple dragons who are clever enough to disguise themselves (with Hats of Disguise) as their opposite type (like a Red Dragon pretending to be White) so as to throw off attacks, and the Kobolds would have a great time defending with more and more creative tricks (like Enveloping Pits that have Ghoul Glyph cast in them and are full of water, so you get paralyzed with no save and fall in and drown if you get hit by them).

So... basically I'd pump up the intensity a lot, give the army far better detection methods, and use a lot more serious monsters.

Also, the commandos would be burrowing, while the army would use divination to detect attacks in advance.

JaronK

[Noctani]

Character LVL 7-8
Wizard7

Human Warblade7/shadow walker
Half Ogre Martial Monk4/Ftr2/Argent Fist1

Whisper Gnome 7rogue/Shadow walker gather information is +20 same for diplomacy (roll and tell me what I get. The roll will be aided by the druid’s recon & the other characters asking other local townsman/gaurdsmen for information.) trap making +17 this will be aided by the druids stone working of course.

Dwarf Druid7 +18 stone work will lead repairing the walls and organize the digging team of diggers to trap orcs who come too close to the wall. Once groups of 15 or more get too close to the wall they will fall into pits of heavy mud. Orcs may be tipped off that something is unusual if people usually work close to the wall. Of course, repairs will be made prior to the trap. So villagers will be asked about the typical comings and goings.

this will be greatly speeded up by the druids badger, spells, and 1200 townsmen.

Day1: Scout & divine the enemy forces and prepare a town hall meeting for the following day. Check to see if there are any inhabitants with orcish ties or suspicious behavior prior to the meeting. Organize the intelligence and form a plan. Contact key community leaders prior for a meeting prior to the town hall presentation. Find spell casters and healers in the town. There must be a few.

Scouting the outskirts will be done by the whisper gnome and half ogre. Both will have pass without a trace and are buffed by the druid to prevent detection. The gnome leads while the ogre follows as backup with discrete hand signals. (They are a protective team who have grown up with each other in a community of humans since they were children.) Both are stealthy.

The whisper gnome specializes in shutting down casters. The half ogre-comes in as an enforcer archtype, picks up the gnome and runs if things get too crazy, his speed and strength to jump over foes gets him out of most situations. Their job is to capture an orc scout on the first day.

Divination will be the job of the wizard.

The druid will gain knowledge through animals, including sending an air elemental for surveillance from air.

The War blade will help martial the troops, reinforce the ranger training teams, and help the draw up tactical plans with the marshal.
Plans for day two will change depending on Day1 but here is the outlook.
If enough information is gleamed to where it’s possible to impersonate another tribe leader the party may think of impersonating one tribe leader to kill another. The war blade grew up in the bloodstone lands of Vasa among half-orcs and speaks the language and is will practice on his accent when he speaks to the orc captive.

A back up tunnel may eventually be planned as an emergancey escape route for the villagers.

Day2: Present the intelligence and tactical plan to key leaders in the community for support prior to the town meeting to adjust any deficiencies and create a good support base. Present the intelligence and organize the community based upon competencies and needs.

Depending on the intelligence gleamed and home support different decisions will be made.

Overarching view
Minimum requirement: Hold out until reinforcements arrive.
Primary goals:
-Find out who is holding the alliance of tribes together.
-Fracture the alliance
-Take out the commando unit

A commando unit is typically fast, lethal, and expert at initial infiltration. Cutting off this part makes striking all others much more feasible and makes counter attacking more difficult. A commando unit is typically not designed for full force combat and favors quick hit and run tactics.

If an opportunity presented itself where the commando unit could be isolated and turned combat ineffective by full forces to bear where terrain could be used to create a killing box and traps. We would shoot for a direct engagement on some future date.

-Destroy the supplies and foraging logistics. Focus on one tribe, because it’s likely each tribe is responsible for it’s own supply. Orcs aren’t known for their sharing.

-Assassinate enemy commanders
Our Forces: Assuming Full Support
300 Heavy Calv
300 Light Calv
300 Rangers (light inf/bowmen)
300 Experts (light inf/bowmen)

1200 untrained experts and commoners will be utilized to man the walls with short bows and work to retrofit the walls and prepare defenses. Fifty urban rangers will be chosen as instructors to train the experts and commoners. When preparing defensives leading experts in the community will be selected as leaders. Ten rangers with the most prominent knowledge will be chosen to observe, resolve issues, organize, and coordinate with the other branch forces. During training every ranger will have command over 24 people. Five platoons will form a company. Ten companies will be split into different zones to help defend the city and make transferring support of different areas easily accomplished.

If a decent amount of the "untrained" show a much greater proficiency with swords, they'll be a light infantry unit break down as well.

The untrained "troops" dont need to be able to stand toe to toe with an orc. If the training instills them with standing their ground and working as a team. That will be enough, and with their homes and families threatened it may just work.

With the opposing force numbering around 6,000

Current Plan

At night the War blade and rogue will make a surgical strikes on key leadership or to disrupt supply trains. Both will be in disguise and even the warblade has a +10 on the check Both will be buffed by casters with night vision, blindsight, typical stealth buffs, camo, pass without trace, and a few others buffs. Meanwhile the wizard and druid will fly above the enemy and cast aoe spells from above to soften up the enemy from afar. Wind wall will prevent arrows from striking. Siege equipment will take too long before they retreat.

Caster attack time: 1 minute then retreat
Melee attack time: 5-15 minutes depending upon detection & recon. (shadow walk)

[JaronK]

Character LVL 7-8
Wizard7

Human Warblade7/shadow walker
Half Ogre Martial Monk4/Ftr2/Argent Fist1

Whisper Gnome 7rogue/Shadow walker gather information is +20 same for diplomacy (roll and tell me what I get. The roll will be aided by the druid’s recon & the other characters asking other local townsman/gaurdsmen for information.) trap making +17 this will be aided by the druids stone working of course.

Dwarf Druid7 +18 stone work will lead repairing the walls and organize the digging team of diggers to trap orcs who come too close to the wall. Once groups of 15 or more get too close to the wall they will fall into pits of heavy mud. Orcs may be tipped off that something is unusual if people usually work close to the wall. Of course, repairs will be made prior to the trap. So villagers will be asked about the typical comings and goings.

this will be greatly speeded up by the druids badger, spells, and 1200 townsmen.

Day1: Scout & divine the enemy forces and prepare a town hall meeting for the following day. Check to see if there are any inhabitants with orcish ties or suspicious behavior prior to the meeting. Organize the intelligence and form a plan. Contact key community leaders prior for a meeting prior to the town hall presentation. Find spell casters and healers in the town. There must be a few.

The town is low on casters (like the Orcs) but there are a few low level adepts and Clerics around. Mostly the town has Experts and Commoners, in addition to the garrison. It's unlikely there are Orc sympathizers, but that was a good thing to check.


Scouting the outskirts will be done by the whisper gnome and half ogre. Both will have pass without a trace and are buffed by the druid to prevent detection. The gnome leads while the ogre follows as backup with discrete hand signals. (They are a protective team who have grown up with each other in a community of humans since they were children.) Both are stealthy.

Note the army starts two weeks away, so you can't scout like this in just one day. You'd have to travel a bit unless you can move much faster (which you may well be able to).


The whisper gnome specializes in shutting down casters. The half ogre-comes in as an enforcer archtype, picks up the gnome and runs if things get too crazy, his speed and strength to jump over foes gets him out of most situations. Their job is to capture an orc scout on the first day.

How do you plan to shut down the casters with the Whispergnome? Capturing a random Orc scout shouldn't be impossible, but again I don't think this is a one day operation.


Divination will be the job of the wizard.

What sort of Divinations will you cast?


The druid will gain knowledge through animals, including sending an air elemental for surveillance from air.

Animals won't help much, as the Orcs are killing most animals near by for snacks. The air elemental could at least tell you the location of the enemy force and their size.


The War blade will help martial the troops, reinforce the ranger training teams, and help the draw up tactical plans with the marshal.
Plans for day two will change depending on Day1 but here is the outlook.
If enough information is gleamed to where it’s possible to impersonate another tribe leader the party may think of impersonating one tribe leader to kill another. The war blade grew up in the bloodstone lands of Vasa among half-orcs and speaks the language and is will practice on his accent when he speaks to the orc captive.

It would be very hard to impersonate an Orc leader due to the fact that they're quite well known. Maybe you can, maybe you can't, but it would not be easy.


A back up tunnel may eventually be planned as an emergancey escape route for the villagers.

Probably wise.


Day2: Present the intelligence and tactical plan to key leaders in the community for support prior to the town meeting to adjust any deficiencies and create a good support base. Present the intelligence and organize the community based upon competencies and needs.

Depending on the intelligence gleamed and home support different decisions will be made.

This is probably much later than Day 2 due to distance issues.


Overarching view
Minimum requirement: Hold out until reinforcements arrive.
Primary goals:
-Find out who is holding the alliance of tribes together.
-Fracture the alliance
-Take out the commando unit

Depending on your intelligence gathering abilities, it might be hard to even know the commando unit exists at this point. Very high knowledge checks might tell you that some of the Orc leaders are keeping the alliance together (the Orc Warlord, Half Orc Cleric, and Orc Bard are the primary ones doing this).


A commando unit is typically fast, lethal, and expert at initial infiltration. Cutting off this part makes striking all others much more feasible and makes counter attacking more difficult. A commando unit is typically not designed for full force combat and favors quick hit and run tactics.

Correct, and they'll flee if they encounter superior resistance.


-Destroy the supplies and foraging logistics. Focus on one tribe, because it’s likely each tribe is responsible for it’s own supply. Orcs aren’t known for their sharing.

At this level, they're probably all foraging for food, and would have wagon trains full of grain, meat, and captured supplies from up north. In this case, because the Orc Warlord and Cleric want to be considered leaders, they're sharing their food around. Taking out them might break down that arrangement.


-Assassinate enemy commanders
Our Forces: Assuming Full Support
300 Heavy Calv
300 Light Calv
300 Rangers (light inf/bowmen)
300 Experts (light inf/bowmen)

1200 untrained experts and commoners will be utilized to man the walls with short bows and work to retrofit the walls and prepare defenses.

Neither of those are proficient with short bows (simple weapons only). Note that doesn't matter for volley fire, if that's what you were up to.


Fifty urban rangers will be chosen as instructors to train the experts and commoners. When preparing defensives leading experts in the community will be selected as leaders. Ten rangers with the most prominent knowledge will be chosen to observe, resolve issues, organize, and coordinate with the other branch forces. During training every ranger will have command over 24 people. Five platoons will form a company. Ten companies will be split into different zones to help defend the city and make transferring support of different areas easily accomplished.

If a decent amount of the "untrained" show a much greater proficiency with swords, they'll be a light infantry unit break down as well.

D&D sadly lacks rules for such quick training. I doubt any experts will be able to handle swords or bows (crossbows and longspears, however...).


At night the War blade and rogue will make a surgical strikes on key leadership or to disrupt supply trains. Both will be in disguise and even the warblade has a +10 on the check Both will be buffed by casters with night vision, blindsight, typical stealth buffs, camo, pass without trace, and a few others buffs. Meanwhile the wizard and druid will fly above the enemy and cast aoe spells from above to soften up the enemy from afar. Wind wall will prevent arrows from striking. Siege equipment will take too long before they retreat.

Caster attack time: 1 minute then retreat
Melee attack time: 5-15 minutes depending upon detection & recon. (shadow walk)

Okay, Pass Without Trace should deal with the scent issues, but how will you make a Whisper Gnome look like an Orc? And where's the Wind Wall being cast so that it protects you if you're flying around?

You've certainly got the start of something here, though I think you're relying too much on training people to fight in 2 weeks who aren't even proficient.

JaronK

[Darius Kane]

So, you mean you're not pretending to be an already hired mercenary, but rather a troll who just wants to join up?
If it's not an option to actually get hired by them. I assume 2 weeks is a little too short to have time for making contact and getting myself into the army.

[Kane0]

Would anyone care to review my character's contributions? I know they are a bit broad sorry.

[charcoalninja]

My main mode of attack would be on a 9th level cleric who would use his resources to arrange for a small platoon of 21 or so Lantern Archons to join him in hit and run attacks against the horde via Lesser Planar Ally (3 Archons per cast). It would be tough to judge how many he could bring to bear since I don't really have too much wealth context. With a few good diplomacy rolls he might be able to get the town in on funding the Celestial strike force, but that's a big maybe.

The Archons with their DR and at will aid would be immune to most arrow attacks while they focus fire their light rays at the orcs to pick them off war of the worlds style. Then they could teleport to the other end of the army and repeat, harry supply lines and generally cause untold problems for the encroaching forces.

The cleric himself would use air walk on a heavily armoured steed and cast Sanctuary and entropic shield upon it to help protect it from attacks. While mounted in such a way he'd fire off spellcasts at the army below, use other spells to mask his attack and ensure that he hits the army at night when the light from the lantern archons allow him to cast his spells at full range, while completely out of sight of most of the horde. A protection from evil spell is needed to save him from compulsions if he's discovered by a caster, and he'd have selected spells on hand to get out of there if things turned against him such as plane shift.

A few helpful buffs on the lantern archons will allow his glowy buddies to be a little more durable. But generally the idea is to use a series of hit and runs to harry the force as best he could. If there are any other adventurers in the area he'd ask them to make moves against the heads of the army while he and his strike force distracted and harried the main force.

This would be so fun to play against!

[NichG]

IIRC, retraining a feat takes 50gp in materials and a week of time. So you could have all the villagers retrain two feats by the time of the attack. For low level combat, Diehard is king (you function for two blows instead of one), so perhaps Diehard and Martial Weapon Proficiency.

[Zeb]

This reminds me of the Keep the Keep (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=232757) games that were run awhile back.

As for recent characters that I have used the Factotum/Master of masks with hidden talent and a penchant for poisons would make heavy use of deception and alchemical items to get to and bring down the leadership. Of course he would have the unfair advantage that the DM kept throwing cursed items at us that we would take and turn against opponents. Scarab of death, necklace of strangulation and bag of devouring aren't really standard gear but man do they help with assassination.

The cleric of light/morninglord/radiant servant/eye of Horus Re wouldnt have much to contribute verses this specific horde beyond making fighting at night not a problem and giving them that -1 for light blindness. really he shines at stopping undead and evil outsiders.

My wu jen/warmage/argent savant/force missile mage comes online late but in the levels at play with invisible spell and the other metamagic on her magic missile spell she could do some damage while staying relatively safe.

The most recent character I ran had access to gestalt and templates with story line justification. So at lvl 9 with dragon shaman, DFA, Dragonborn, crusader, deepwarden, Kensi A con score of 38 3 breath weapons, meta-breath feats and an AC of 30 plus whatever armor he is wearing. He would probably have a fun time against the horde. Especially if he can get a bard, wizard and cleric to back him up with buff spells counters and on the spot protections from the other side of a ring gate a safe distance away.

Speaking of ring gates my favorite character to run is the crazy gnome with high int and low wis who solves/creates problems with illusions and creative use of magic items. I used to Magi-commute via the scry skill and a familiar, now he keeps the familiar with him and uses a silver raven figurine, ring gates, and whatever magic musical instrument he can get his hands on to phone it in.

Because Pipes of Pain (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#pipesofPain) + ring gate (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#ringGates)+ Silver raven (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#silverRaven) + Eversmoking bottle (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#eversmokingBottle) = Death cloud of good times, and thats just SRD items on a cheap budget.

I think that any "lack of contribution" from any character is more player based rather than character based. Of what I have recently/regularly play the least contribution comes from an overspecialized cleric who is still able to provide a counter to some of the hordes tactics with his regular spell load-out.

[Animastryfe]

JaronK, you are handling yourself well in this thread with regards to TheBar99. I have gained more respect for you.

TheBar99, you seem to have misunderstood the purpose of this exercise. I suggest that you read the introduction of the original post again. Also, you seem to have a personal vendetta against JaronK. Perhaps you only disagree with his ideals regarding this exercise, but your posts feel very hostile and aggressive towards not only JaronK's in-game decisions, but towards him personally.

[Story]

What's the big deal about Scent? Isn't it defeated by a 1st level spell? (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/passWithoutTrace.htm)

[JaronK]

Yes, and it's also defeated by a feat available to first level characters (Darkstalker). But forgetting to use such options gets you caught, which I've brought up every single time someone's tried to infiltrate the camp without accounting for the dogs. A few people have learned from this and are now including appropriate defenses.

@Animastryfe: Thank you, that's very kind of you.

@Zeb: Ah, you're the sort of player who steals the traps and cursed items designed to be used against you and uses them against your enemies. So am I. If you can get such items into position to use against the enemy, they could be effective. Daylight is useful for the front lines, though it would have to be unexpected... the more elite Orcs (and all the Orc scouts) do all have goggles that prevent daylight dazzling (Sunlenses) which they can put on to avoid the problem, but they wouldn't be wearing them at first if they didn't expect such a trick. Blasting with Magic Missiles will do some damage, but it won't kill enough to make a serious difference. I would worry about that character and your gestalt character just getting bogged down by the sheer number of enemies... it doesn't take that many hits to ruin your day. And illusions always have potential.

JaronK

[Woodzyowl]

Well, the last character I played was an optimized monk (don't ask). Their strategy would probably just be "kill the leaders", since that's how he beat an army later in the campaign when there was a final alliance of men and elves trying to make a last stand to keep him from taking over the world (again, don't ask).

[ArcturusV]

I dunno. The "Kill the Leaders" plan only really seems acceptable if you presume that Evil=Stupid, as often is safe to presume in RPGs. The closest I could come to figuring out a way to really, realistically force an encounter like that without presuming they are stupid (Lets you into the camp armed and alone with a leader, or totally incompetent and unwilling to protect their leadership, the area that should probably have the MOST protection) is to do something which shows you're able to fight. (Even just having every peasant in town manning the walls)... then giving the Orcs a chance to "Honor Duel" for it instead of fight out a bloody war. Again if their culture supports it.

Of course that means they'll pick the biggest, meanest warrior they can to oppose your champion. Probably the War-Hulk. And since Evil=/=Stupid, they'll probably "Cheat" and try to buff the CRAP out of him, give him all the magic items and spells he'd need to be a real terror. And since Good (Least of the Lawful variety) tends to be Stupid, and would be honor bound to win the fight on its own, would NOT cheat in that manner...

... making the outcome of the fight far from a sure thing.

[Lord_Gareth]

Out of curiosity JaronK, do the orcs march during the day and sleep at night until they attack, or do they march at night (since they can see comfortably/are nocturnal) and sleep during the day?

[JaronK]

Out of curiosity JaronK, do the orcs march during the day and sleep at night until they attack, or do they march at night (since they can see comfortably/are nocturnal) and sleep during the day?

If you scout ahead to find this out, you could easily enough determine that they march at night (and, given the opportunity, fight at night), and rest during the day in tents (sometimes they dig fox holes to sleep in, with tents in those). During the day time they have guards who wear sun lenses (which is why they had those to begin with) who do basic patrolling and protection.


I dunno. The "Kill the Leaders" plan only really seems acceptable if you presume that Evil=Stupid, as often is safe to presume in RPGs. The closest I could come to figuring out a way to really, realistically force an encounter like that without presuming they are stupid (Lets you into the camp armed and alone with a leader, or totally incompetent and unwilling to protect their leadership, the area that should probably have the MOST protection) is to do something which shows you're able to fight. (Even just having every peasant in town manning the walls)... then giving the Orcs a chance to "Honor Duel" for it instead of fight out a bloody war. Again if their culture supports it.

Of course that means they'll pick the biggest, meanest warrior they can to oppose your champion. Probably the War-Hulk. And since Evil=/=Stupid, they'll probably "Cheat" and try to buff the CRAP out of him, give him all the magic items and spells he'd need to be a real terror. And since Good (Least of the Lawful variety) tends to be Stupid, and would be honor bound to win the fight on its own, would NOT cheat in that manner...

... making the outcome of the fight far from a sure thing.

Kill the leaders isn't easy, but it's doable in a game where people can even sneak up on dragons. You just have to know what you're doing. The different leaders are protected in different ways. The commando Orc leader leads his commandos from the front, so it would be possible to intercept him and take him out. The War Hulk leader also charges in head first, as does the Orc Warlord. But the Bard and Cleric lead from the back and stay well protected at all times, because, well, they're smart that way.

JaronK

[Threadnaught]

I dunno. The "Kill the Leaders" plan only really seems acceptable if you presume that Evil=Stupid, as often is safe to presume in RPGs.

How so? I assumed these Orcs would panic if they knew someone had taken out the awesome badasses who united them with their badassery alone.
The Orcs can't beat their commanders, what hope would they have against someone who can? They're not stupid and most certainly not suicidal.


The giant spider that constantly eats Orcs of a great evil army is almost killed by what the Orcs assume to be a high level Wizard, the Orcs find a lone Halfling paralyzed by the spider's venom. They take the Halfling prisoner and are on the lookout for a high level Wizard, what follows them into their citadel and causes them to trip up over each other and die by impaling each other on their own blades while trying to get away, is a Halfling Commoner.
Yes this is based on what Woodzyowl's post looks like.

[TuggyNE]

How so? I assumed these Orcs would panic if they knew someone had taken out the awesome badasses who united them with their badassery alone.
The Orcs can't beat their commanders, what hope would they have against someone who can? They're not stupid and most certainly not suicidal.

His point was more that getting to where you can beat the commander (especially one on one) is the hard part. They have decent personal guards, and are unlikely to abandon them on a whim (especially since there's some tension in the camp already), so without some compelling reason it'll just turn right back into one man vs an army, or party vs army.

[Threadnaught]

That explains it better. Though as long as you sneak around during the day with anti-Scent, it should be much easier. So long as you're Hide/Disguise Skills are high enough.

[JaronK]

Yes, the Orcs aren't stupid, and note that the different tribes follow their leaders based on different things. Assassination only helps in certain ways... it doesn't instantly disband the whole army (or even just that tribe). Mass assassination might do the trick, of course, but again, the Orcs aren't stupid... the leaders always have their personal guard nearby, and they have other defenses as well (the wolves, the fact that their tents have Alarm spells on them when they rest, the divination spells that the Cleric uses, and so on).

JaronK

[super dark33]

It's enough to have a fighter cleaver intimadateor to massacre at encampments to sink their morale lower then *insert pop culture reference here*.

[Thebar99]

I don't "mostly focus" on the Factotum. My current character that I actually mentioned in respect to this challenge is a Binder/Archivist/Anima Mage, which is by the way not Tier 3. All I've said is that I prefer to play Tier 3 while I prefer to DM for Tier 4, but that I actually play everything from 1 to 6. It's almost like you have no idea what you're talking about here.

You do. You're always talking about skill this, stealth that... and usually the example character is a Factotum. It's also obvious from the description of the tier system which you favor, which is why there's so many people with an obsession for tier 3 - they get it from you.


By the way, the Factotum thing actually came about because one poster on another board got really upset that I wouldn't put his suggestions for class positions into the tier system without reviewing them myself, and as a result he decided to make his own system (which turned out to be far too heavily biased towards his own playstyle). As part of that, he claimed that Rogues were as powerful as Sorcerers but that Factotums were about the same as Hexblades, and I showed why that was wrong (turns out a class that can break the action economy and cast most of the spells of a Wizard, allbeit slower, is actually stronger than one that can't hurt elementals or oozes effectively). That's it. They're just a class I used as an example for why he was wrong, and that I happened to be playing at the time.

Thinking a Sorcerer and Rogue are anywhere near the same level is rather dumb. But that isn't where the Factotum Fetish comes from.


How can you claim that someone turning you into a Mineral Warrior has "no direct impact on the game"? It requires someone casting a high level spell on you that you actually thought trivializes the whole encounter here! And furthermore, no one has used that template, so evidently it's not nearly as common as you think, nor is it relevant! Nor did it do what you claimed it would do, so why do you care?

Because the caster is not present, nor are they replacing your character with a high level monster. So it's no different than item creation.

The rest is just you not understanding my point and undermining your own so I won't bother responding.


One requires a high level Wizard being right there casting spells that cost exp on you (which is actually harder to get than a Wizard casting PAO on you, as I imagine random high level Wizards don't actually want to burn exp on random low level characters). The other requires that a magic item be created at some point, then ownership transfers a few times, and then it ends up in some store where you buy it or something. Animated Shields (which I don't think low level characters can afford anyway) are something you can buy in any store without having to claim there was a powerful Wizard in your backstory who grants you powerful favors.

Magic item creation also costs XP. Thanks for playing!


Well, again, one guy could do it with poison (two shots via Rapidshot from a bow with Black Lotus Poison, doable at level 6 using Hidden Talent or a level 1 Power Stone of Psionic Minor Creation, would almost certainly kill any one army leader). Or a party could do it with a rapid series of attacks. Or, yes, you could carpet bomb with fireballs, though an undead flying mount (where are you getting the flying creature from?) is hardly stealthy so you'd have spells from the Cleric and such as well as arrow fire (depending on your range) coming at you pretty soon.

Except for the part where you are using Ebon Eyes and attacking at night, so you're 640 feet away. Even if you don't make the mount invisible (and you might as well, since it isn't attacking), they're still going to have a hard time seeing you unless you stick around a while. And since all you need to do is burn your 3rd level spells then leave, you won't.

Oh and what long range Cleric spells pose a threat here?

Lastly, I don't actually think a melee strategy would work. You have even less faith in them than I do. I just pointed out Mineral Warrior because someone was wrong on the Internet.

[Deophaun]

Even though we've basically shown that a druid can just brute force the whole army at once, I do have a druid that would be quite adept at assassination. The main issue is a greater alarm spell, which probably won't be a thing here, but even the lowly alarm can be a problem. However, if they are alarming things, make sure you trip each and every one every day until you decide to act. Nothing diminishes an alert's effectiveness like continuous "false" positives.

Level 9 druid with aberration wild shape.

Use Enhance Wild Shape, turn into a will-o'-wisp. Scout the enemy for a few days to identify the leaders and figure out how they protect their camp. When they're bedded down for the day/night, assuming they have private tents, turn into a dharculus (Planar Handbook). DM call on whether you can coup de grace them with your ethereal bite, but you should be able to drag their corpses and any evidence with you onto the ethereal plane. If you manage to stealth kill anyone, the orcs are going to have the mystery on their hands finding their missing comrades. Target casters first so they can't figure it out.

Otherwise, you're a druid alone with a sleeping orc and all the time in the world to buff yourself, and escape is just a standard action away (have heart of water active in the event it all goes pear shaped and you get grappled). For fun, steal their magic items and then make sure they appear in the possession of other commanders' subordinates. Kill targets of opportunity and leave evidence of another tribe's involvement, preferably the one with all the clerics so no one trusts their self-serving exculpatory divinations. Let the orcs do your work for you.

[Threadnaught]

One requires a high level Wizard being right there casting spells that cost exp on you (which is actually harder to get than a Wizard casting PAO on you, as I imagine random high level Wizards don't actually want to burn exp on random low level characters). The other requires that a magic item be created at some point, then ownership transfers a few times, and then it ends up in some store where you buy it or something. Animated Shields (which I don't think low level characters can afford anyway) are something you can buy in any store without having to claim there was a powerful Wizard in your backstory who grants you powerful favors.


Magic item creation also costs XP. Thanks for playing!

Nice, you're basically saying that there aren't any Magic Items created, by owners who have since died in your setting. However this isn't your setting, so your point is invalid.

@JaronK, how many years would this setting have existed? I just want to get a good estimate of how many really awesome Magic Items have been created, if any Caster with the right Feat and enough Skill Points can create them.


Lastly, I don't actually think a melee strategy would work. You have even less faith in them than I do. I just pointed out Mineral Warrior because someone was wrong on the Internet.

Congratulations, the DM still disallowed it.


Thinking a Sorcerer and Rogue are anywhere near the same level is rather dumb. But that isn't where the Factotum Fetish comes from.

And it comes down to a grudge you have with JaronK for daring to create the Tier System. I'll say the exact same thing about this he'd probably say.
Factotum vs Rogue, is not about showing the difference between a Sorceror and a Rogue/Tier 2 and Tier 4. It's about explaining the difference between Tier 3 and Tier 4.

[Thebar99]

{Scrubbed}

[JaronK]

How would you make these false alarms? It only goes off when a tiny or larger creature enters, and said tiny or larger creatures would likely be killed. It would also be very suspicious... it's likely they'd assume someone's probing their defenses (since with all the foraging Orcs and the Dire Wolves around, not many normal creatures would be around to trigger the alarms).

Note that you are high enough level to just Dispel the Alarms.

Your use of Wild Shape is certainly clever and hard for them to deal with.

JaronK

[Deophaun]

How would you make these false alarms? It only goes off when a tiny or larger creature enters, and said tiny or larger creatures would likely be killed.
Standard action to appear on the material plane. Stick a tentacle out. You've triggered the alarm. Go ethereal. Rinse, repeat.

There is a lot of DM interpretation required here. Can I just stick a tip out, or do I have to fully manifest all six, for example. The problem with dispelling the alarms is that I still need line of effect to them, and the alarm is likely set inside the tent. There's no way to dispel it without setting it off first.

Now, I realize that there's actually an easy way. Alarms have passwords. That password is going to be spoken by the commander. Just be by the tent when he speaks it, which is easily do-able if you're a will-o-wisp or dharculus. You now have free access. Kill the cleric first. Frame the bard commander whose subordinate likely cast the alarm spell that suspiciously didn't trigger.

[Lans]

IIRC, retraining a feat takes 50gp in materials and a week of time. So you could have all the villagers retrain two feats by the time of the attack. For low level combat, Diehard is king (you function for two blows instead of one), so perhaps Diehard and Martial Weapon Proficiency.

Diehard requires endurance, for creatures with 13 con shape soulmeld can provide a superior diehard.

[JaronK]

Standard action to appear on the material plane. Stick a tentacle out. You've triggered the alarm. Go ethereal. Rinse, repeat.

There is a lot of DM interpretation required here. Can I just stick a tip out, or do I have to fully manifest all six, for example. The problem with dispelling the alarms is that I still need line of effect to them, and the alarm is likely set inside the tent. There's no way to dispel it without setting it off first.

Right, that makes sense actually. Though I do think if alarms kept being triggered some of the smarter Orcs (mostly the Cleric, I think) would start seriously investigating. Also, I think you'd leave an obvious scent behind if you did that, which means the dogs would freak out. So they'd know something was up. They might even use Speak with Animals to ask the dogs what's going on, at which point the dogs could at least communicate that there was a really strange smell that kept popping up.


Now, I realize that there's actually an easy way. Alarms have passwords. That password is going to be spoken by the commander. Just be by the tent when he speaks it, which is easily do-able if you're a will-o-wisp or dharculus. You now have free access. Kill the cleric first. Frame the bard commander whose subordinate likely cast the alarm spell that suspiciously didn't trigger.

That's much more clever, I think.

By the way, it was the commando guy who was in charge of the alarms, because he's in charge of base security. But you could try to frame the Bard anyway. If you had a high enough knowledge, or simply observed the camp enough, you'd notice that the Eye of Grummish and the Cleric were not on good terms, due to the Eye of Grummish not liking Half Orcs. That might prove useful to your "frame someone" plan.

JaronK

[Threadnaught]

{Scrub the original, scrub the quote}

{Scrubbed} How could anyone argue with you? It's not like the world has a backstory including several nations rising and falling, while Casters go around creating all sorts of wondrous items and magical weapons.
Even if it's someone else's setting, because if that happens you'll just whine.

And even though Magic Items from past adventurers are absolutely unreasonable to you, you are under the impression that a Wizard somewhere is willing to sacrifice their own life energy so... What? Basically. What does the Wizard get out of giving you the Mineral Warrior Template?


{Scrub the original, scrub the quote}

Doesn't matter, he's the DM. That means he gets the final say over the rules.


{Scrub the original, scrub the quote}

And why is that exactly?
Every player has their own preferences, if mine is toward Classes you don't like and you try to convince me they're bad, then that's where I do one of these.
1: Demand that you leave my game.
2: Request that you be kicked out of the game if I'm to continue playing.

No need for number 3. If you're the DM, I wouldn't touch you with an extendable pole. :smallyuk:


{Scrub the original, scrub the quote}

Enlighten me. Why?


BTW your post almost made me vomit, though everyone here is vomiting so I could just be getting what they have.

[Thebar99]

{Scrub the original, scrub the quote} How could anyone argue with you? It's not like the world has a backstory including several nations rising and falling, while Casters go around creating all sorts of wondrous items and magical weapons.
Even if it's someone else's setting, because if that happens you'll just whine.

When someone points out an easy solution, and the response is to implement poorly thought out bans with far worse implications... yeah, that's insane troll logic. Saying there's no magic items, especially Animated Shields anywhere in the world just so there can't be any Mineral Warriors that wouldn't work anyways? Same deal.

And missing that I only pointed out Mineral Warrior to show it is in fact possible to get a DR of about 10 at low levels? Yeah.

Now that turned into Jaron trolling himself by contradicting and undermining his own points, and reversing his typical stance on mundanes but hey.


And even though Magic Items from past adventurers are absolutely unreasonable to you, you are under the impression that a Wizard somewhere is willing to sacrifice their own life energy so... What? Basically. What does the Wizard get out of giving you the Mineral Warrior Template?

{Scrubbed} See, I'm totally fine with old magic items. However Jaron is not, or else he wouldn't object to a caster spending their XP on something. And in order for magic items to exist someone did this at some point. So, following Jaron's logic of "spending XP on random low levels is unreasonable"... there's no magic items, or at least no low level ones. And because there are no low level magic items, people stop surviving to high levels. See how this works?


Doesn't matter, he's the DM. That means he gets the final say over the rules.

When you make a test and then very obviously make calls based on whether or not you like the person, no one cares what you say?


And why is that exactly?
Every player has their own preferences, if mine is toward Classes you don't like and you try to convince me they're bad, then that's where I do one of these.
1: Demand that you leave my game.
2: Request that you be kicked out of the game if I'm to continue playing.

Because they don't work? That said, if you're a player this is self evident. You can just keep dying, and giving the rest of your party your loot. And if the DM doesn't like that, and decides I'm the problem even though you're the one going down like a drunk college chick, he's obviously a bad DM, so I'd just not waste my time with him. If you're a DM, you're obviously a bad DM, so I'd just not waste my time with you. Simple.


Enlighten me. Why?


BTW your post almost made me vomit, though everyone here is vomiting so I could just be getting what they have.

Why what? Why did I post a picture of a trollface after taking a shot at ImperatorK? Because that is the only thing you can do with that user. Troll him, and watch him troll himself. However don't confuse him for JaronK. While Jaron has made a number of stupid mistakes, he does at least attempt to do something positive.

[JaronK]

Saying there's no magic items, especially Animated Shields anywhere in the world just so there can't be any Mineral Warriors that wouldn't work anyways? Same deal.

Nobody said that.


And missing that I only pointed out Mineral Warrior to show it is in fact possible to get a DR of about 10 at low levels? Yeah.

You know the costs of having a spell cast on you. They're right there in the PHB. You know the cost of Mineral Warrior. Turns out you can't even afford it until level 9, and even then it's really expensive. There is literally no other way to get that template than to have that spell cast on you. None. So make a character that pays for that spell, and show how awesome it is. But it's still not going to be a low level character, and it's still not super easy as you initially claimed.


Now that turned into Jaron trolling himself by contradicting and undermining his own points, and reversing his typical stance on mundanes but hey.

Show where I have ever had the stance you claim about mundanes. Considering I literally wrote the book on balance in D&D, including the fact that mundanes are, as a group, significantly weaker and less versatile than the majority of casters, your strawman of my opinion seems to be about as nonsensical as claiming that Gary Gygax didn't like role playing until you made him change his opinion by mentioning that you thought D&D 3.5 was pretty cool.


You're bad at this reading comprehension thing, aren't you? See, I'm totally fine with old magic items. However Jaron is not, or else he wouldn't object to a caster spending their XP on something.

I never objected to a caster spending their xp on something (go ahead, try to find me saying that). I simply said that would cost you something... they don't do it for free (unless it's your party mate or something). When you buy a magic item, you have to spend money based on the costs the caster spent, including gold and exp. When you buy a spell casting, you also have to spend money based on the gold and exp the caster spent. This is found in the PHB.

If you want spells cast free of Xp, have a Runesmith 5 in your party. They could do it for free.


And in order for magic items to exist someone did this at some point. So, following Jaron's logic of "spending XP on random low levels is unreasonable"... there's no magic items, or at least no low level ones. And because there are no low level magic items, people stop surviving to high levels. See how this works?

It doesn't work at all, because what I actually said was that you can't randomly decide that a higher level caster cast a spell on you at some point in your backstory (at least, not free of charge) and then say that doing so is easy for low level characters. If you want to come into play with PAO on you, you'd have to pay for two castings of PAO (and you certainly can't claim it's easy to do at low levels). If you want to come into play with Mineralize Warrior cast on you, pay for that. If you want to come in with the LA+1 Bone Creature as created by a Dread Necromancer with Corpse Crafter and Nimble Bones and Deadly Chill and Hardened Flesh and Bolster Resistance, you'd have to pay for that too.

Now make the character (paying the appropriate costs instead of just getting things for free) and play the scenario if you actually care about it at all!

Seriously, you can use the Mineral Warrior template, as long as you pay for the casting of the spell that gave you that template, and if you find that you can't do so then stop trying to claim it's easy for low level characters to have. Note that I never even said you couldn't have it, only that it wasn't showing that it was easy to have as a low level character because it required a high level caster. And remember the usual rules for how much you can spend at a given level as a percentage of your WBL.

JaronK

[Lans]

You're bad at this reading comprehension thing, aren't you? See, I'm totally fine with old magic items. However Jaron is not, or else he wouldn't object to a caster spending their XP on something. And in order for magic items to exist someone did this at some point. So, following Jaron's logic of "spending XP on random low levels is unreasonable"... there's no magic items, or at least no low level ones. And because there are no low level magic items, people stop surviving to high levels. See how this works?

He was objecting to a mid+ level caster spending on XP on some low level adventurer. That still leaves low level casters creating items for low level characters.


I think its perfectly reasonable, you can get the spell you just have to pay the 1750Xlevel+660gp cost.

[ArcturusV]

His point was more that getting to where you can beat the commander (especially one on one) is the hard part. They have decent personal guards, and are unlikely to abandon them on a whim (especially since there's some tension in the camp already), so without some compelling reason it'll just turn right back into one man vs an army, or party vs army.

Tuggyne here has the right of what I was getting at. Most of the "kill the leaders" plans I've seen have basically presumed that they could easily talk their way into the camp. No one would question them. And would take them directly to the leader. And leave them alone with the leader or allow them to goad the leader into some "Duel" that they could then kill them with.

Now if your cover story is that you're some Mercenary hiring on... it probably wouldn't give you access to the leaders. They have more important things to worry about than every Tom, ****, and Harry sell sword. They got underlings for that. Chain of Command and all. And you don't become a leader in a society like the typical Orcs if you're stupid. They're Chaotic and Evil. Becoming the leader means that you're tougher, faster, smarter, and more cunning than the rest typically. If a simple ploy could get to them, or if someone could sneak into their tent that easily and kill them while they were sleeping... someone would have done it already to take the leadership themselves.

Now using their Chaotic nature, and trying to flip the lower peons on the higher ups might eventually work. But that's the sort of plan that requires a bit more than the 2 week window, typically. And creating enough factional strife that no one figure/group could assert authority over them.

Just seemed like a lot of the "Assassin" plans thought they could just bluff right to the leadership, get them alone. Then slaughter them with no issues, no reinforcements, etc. And walk right back out. Least to me. I mean if you played it out on the table and the enemy actually WAS that foolish... bonus. But probably not something safe to assume. Particularly if Jaron K here was DMing it as seems to be the point of the exercise, who is accounting for more cunning leaders as appropriate.

[JaronK]

Exactly, most of the assassination plans I've heard have assumed you just automatically get access to the leaders if you get into the Orc camp. But in actuality, you have to deal with the dogs and the occasional person with Sense Motive, and that still doesn't actually let you just walk up to these guys. They have their honor guards with them at all times (in part to protect them from the other Orcs!) and they don't deal with day to day stuff like healing a random injured person for the most part. There are some you could approach if you took the right tack, such as trying to strength challenge the War Hulk (I liked that, and it fits his character) or setting a trap for the commando, but you can't just walk up to them any more than you could just waltz up to an army general if you happened to look like a private.

JaronK

[Threadnaught]

You're bad at this reading comprehension thing, aren't you? See, I'm totally fine with old magic items. However Jaron is not, or else he wouldn't object to a caster spending their XP on something. And in order for magic items to exist someone did this at some point. So, following Jaron's logic of "spending XP on random low levels is unreasonable"... there's no magic items, or at least no low level ones. And because there are no low level magic items, people stop surviving to high levels. See how this works?

I really want to open up by insulting this guy in a similar way to how he seems to be attempting to insult me. Mah gawd, that entire post of his... My brain feels like it's shutting down. Mostly because of the above, but I'll rise to the challenge.

Okay, so you see that party of Wizards, Clerics, Druids and Artificers? They start at low levels, create low level Magic Items, they sell these when they get better versions. Low level Magic Items are now available. As they get better and better stuff that doesn't stack with the old, they sell off their older items to make room for their trophies, gold and their library of DEATH.

You know what happens here? The Casters get something out of creating their Magic Items, taking the time to Mineralize some random schmuck is unlikely to benefit them as much as creating a new head dress, or animating a shield so it can go beat up any Undead the Cleric forgets to turn.


So I'll ask again... What does the Caster get, from Mineralizing you?
I'm not the only one who wants an answer.

[Thebar99]

Oh, this guy...


I really want to open up by insulting this guy in a similar way to how he seems to be attempting to insult me. Mah gawd, that entire post of his... My brain feels like it's shutting down. Mostly because of the above, but I'll rise to the challenge.

"Your posts make me vomit." Yeah, don't pretend you're holding any moral high ground here. I entered the thread to mock the OP's points. You entered the thread to mock me personally. So yeah.


Okay, so you see that party of Wizards, Clerics, Druids and Artificers? They start at low levels, create low level Magic Items, they sell these when they get better versions. Low level Magic Items are now available. As they get better and better stuff that doesn't stack with the old, they sell off their older items to make room for their trophies, gold and their library of DEATH.

You know what happens here? The Casters get something out of creating their Magic Items, taking the time to Mineralize some random schmuck is unlikely to benefit them as much as creating a new head dress, or animating a shield so it can go beat up any Undead the Cleric forgets to turn.

Yes, I see them. You know what else I see? A lack of consistency.

Turns out if you actually look, there are very few low level magic items that can actually be made by a low level caster. Indeed, most low level items require high level or at least mid level prerequisites! Any Metamagic Rod, Animated Shields of course, any magic ring... Know those stat boosters that are standard for everyone? You need level 8 to make them and end up using some of them at level 3.

Even regarding the few that can be made when they are level appropriate, instead of at least a few levels later... those are the items casters don't really need to make. For that matter, most caster made items they don't need to make for themselves. Spellcasters are the only ones that can hold a shield in their hands without penalty. They don't need an Animated shield for anything.

So making one just costs them XP - exactly what casting Mineralize Warrior does.

Any train of logic that says "the mage has no reason to help you" is just as accurate here and if followed to its logical conclusion is just a big **** you to Fighters.

So other than proving that non casters are screwed yet again, what have you accomplished?

And if you are trying to convince me of this, as if this were somehow a revelation you really aren't paying attention.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

Exactly, most of the assassination plans I've heard have assumed you just automatically get access to the leaders if you get into the Orc camp. But in actuality, you have to deal with the dogs and the occasional person with Sense Motive, and that still doesn't actually let you just walk up to these guys. They have their honor guards with them at all times (in part to protect them from the other Orcs!) and they don't deal with day to day stuff like healing a random injured person for the most part. There are some you could approach if you took the right tack, such as trying to strength challenge the War Hulk (I liked that, and it fits his character) or setting a trap for the commando, but you can't just walk up to them any more than you could just waltz up to an army general if you happened to look like a private.

JaronKWell, in the case of "constant honor guard" they're at least easy to locate once you're in the camp. Optimized hide and move silently + darkstalker should take care of getting to your target (dark template or collar of umbral metamorphosis seal the deal). Then you just need a way to kill the leaders before they can 'port away or sic their honor guard on you. Bonus points for 'porting away with the leader's body, and double bonus points for making it look like another faction within the orc tribe did it (still workin' on that last part).

[Threadnaught]

"Your posts make me vomit." Yeah, don't pretend you're holding any moral high ground here. I entered the thread to mock the OP's points. You entered the thread to mock me personally. So yeah.

1: The actual line was about how your post almost made me vomit. Seriously, gippy tummy and low tolerance for whatever that is.
2: I entered the thread to take on the challenge in the OP.
3: You still haven't answered my question.


as if this were somehow a revelation you really aren't paying attention.

Nice deflection.

Thank you for continuing to assert your own position while refusing to justify yourself. Thank you for admitting you only came here to waste time while conveniently dismissing everyone who questions or disagrees with you as a waste of time. And thank you for not answering a simple question.


I don't need to take a moral high ground. I've had the high ground in this discussion since you started digging. And I'm done with you by the way, though I will take your suggestion of the Mineral Warrior.


@JaronK: Would you allow players to start in your games at level 1 with Mineral Warrior if the Wizard that gave them the template owns their soul when they die, for Magic Item Creation purposes? Granted, it does step away from the real characters and more towards theoretical optimization.

[rweird]

Thebar99: The point about magical items is they don't have to be made for you. If a 20th level artificer made a animated shield or whatever 1000 years ago, and then he died of old age, willed it to a friend, who died in adventuring, and then monsters have it, they pass it down, until someone comes, kills the monsters, and takes the shield.

Magic items don't require a wizard or other caster investing in you, he could have invested in another adventurer, or one of his friends, or himself, but over time, property changes hands so either you or some other adventurer kills someone and takes it, and later sells it, or someone is short on cash and sells it. The crafter doesn't need to know you, though for mineralize warrior, a wizard that lives thousands of years ago can't cast the spell on you. He needs a reason to spend a lot of EXP and GP on a low-level warrior, though the shield could have been made thousands of years ago.

[Kirgoth]

Ill put my 5th level wizard, horribly unoptimised in this situation. He would leave with his girlfriends and stuff on day one and travel south.

Really any invading army must be pretty confident of victory or they wouldn't invade, a sensible defence would be to quickly pack up all food, quickly harvest crops near ready or burn them and take anything which might be considered pillage or valuable and head south, leaving empty windowless houses and no one to fight which would horribly dissapoint the orcs and leave them hungry.

Then have the town defenders join up with the kings army and when its numbers have swelled sufficiently return and kick the orcs out. Fighting the invaders with a small garrison then a small part of the kings army then dribs and drabs of troops as they arrive is called HASTE and is a common mistake in war. Spend the time, marshall a big army and take them head on or force them to withdraw with no pillage.

Why fight when we pay taxes for the king to defend us.

Afterwards he would be happy to help in the rebuilding and tracking down and killing groups of orcs after their army has broken up. Especially if there are bounties to be collected.

Of course if the people insisted on staying and fighting and dying then he would leave, wait in some pleasant southern inn and look for another town to settle in, possibly somewhere a bit warmer with a beach.

[Vaynor]

The Red Towel: Thread locked for review.

Edit: Opened. Please treat other with the courtesy they deserve.

[Kane0]

Ill put my 5th level wizard, horribly unoptimised in this situation. He would leave with his girlfriends and stuff on day one and travel south.

Really any invading army must be pretty confident of victory or they wouldn't invade, a sensible defence would be to quickly pack up all food, quickly harvest crops near ready or burn them and take anything which might be considered pillage or valuable and head south, leaving empty windowless houses and no one to fight which would horribly dissapoint the orcs and leave them hungry.

Then have the town defenders join up with the kings army and when its numbers have swelled sufficiently return and kick the orcs out. Fighting the invaders with a small garrison then a small part of the kings army then dribs and drabs of troops as they arrive is called HASTE and is a common mistake in war. Spend the time, marshall a big army and take them head on or force them to withdraw with no pillage.

Why fight when we pay taxes for the king to defend us.

Afterwards he would be happy to help in the rebuilding and tracking down and killing groups of orcs after their army has broken up. Especially if there are bounties to be collected.

Of course if the people insisted on staying and fighting and dying then he would leave, wait in some pleasant southern inn and look for another town to settle in, possibly somewhere a bit warmer with a beach.

Now that is something more like what my character would do :smallbiggrin: good thinking.

[Thebar99]

Thebar99: The point about magical items is they don't have to be made for you. If a 20th level artificer made a animated shield or whatever 1000 years ago, and then he died of old age, willed it to a friend, who died in adventuring, and then monsters have it, they pass it down, until someone comes, kills the monsters, and takes the shield.

Magic items don't require a wizard or other caster investing in you, he could have invested in another adventurer, or one of his friends, or himself, but over time, property changes hands so either you or some other adventurer kills someone and takes it, and later sells it, or someone is short on cash and sells it. The crafter doesn't need to know you, though for mineralize warrior, a wizard that lives thousands of years ago can't cast the spell on you. He needs a reason to spend a lot of EXP and GP on a low-level warrior, though the shield could have been made thousands of years ago.

Doesn't matter. It's still someone at some point spending XP on a person that is not them.

If you assume this does not happen because unreasonable, only caster items exist in the world.

Also, any item that isn't a weapon or shield breaks in one hit from anything. You'd be stupid to break them but they can break. In mundanes are screwed land you might as well assume that as well. Suddenly items don't last forever.

[TuggyNE]

Doesn't matter. It's still someone at some point spending XP on a person that is not them.

However, it is not someone spending XP on a person who can't reasonably compensate them for that or make good use of that XP expenditure to help the creator.

That is, a Wizard 20 creating a magic item for a Barbarian 20 who adventures with him (especially if the Barbarian reimburses the gold costs) is rather more plausible than a Wizard 11 boosting a random Fighter 1 out of the goodness of his heart.

Note that JaronK has specifically said that if Fighter 1 can in some way recompense the Wizard, Mineral Warrior would be acceptable. You just have to specify why it's definitely worth the caster's effort.


Also, any item that isn't a weapon or shield breaks in one hit from anything. You'd be stupid to break them but they can break. In mundanes are screwed land you might as well assume that as well. Suddenly items don't last forever.

Why would you assume that? That's not especially implied by earlier remarks, especially sensible in or out of character, or even necessarily all that big a deal. (After all, you were objecting to the lack of animated shields, which are not so easy to sunder.)

Don't introduce unrelated assertions that no one has actually made and then proceed to attack them, please. (http://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/strawman)

[Story]

Also, it's not actually necessary to spend XP while crafting. You can easily get the recipient to provide the XP instead. I don't think that's possible to do with spells.

[NichG]

Ill put my 5th level wizard, horribly unoptimised in this situation. He would leave with his girlfriends and stuff on day one and travel south.

Really any invading army must be pretty confident of victory or they wouldn't invade, a sensible defence would be to quickly pack up all food, quickly harvest crops near ready or burn them and take anything which might be considered pillage or valuable and head south, leaving empty windowless houses and no one to fight which would horribly dissapoint the orcs and leave them hungry.

Then have the town defenders join up with the kings army and when its numbers have swelled sufficiently return and kick the orcs out. Fighting the invaders with a small garrison then a small part of the kings army then dribs and drabs of troops as they arrive is called HASTE and is a common mistake in war. Spend the time, marshall a big army and take them head on or force them to withdraw with no pillage.

Why fight when we pay taxes for the king to defend us.

Afterwards he would be happy to help in the rebuilding and tracking down and killing groups of orcs after their army has broken up. Especially if there are bounties to be collected.

Of course if the people insisted on staying and fighting and dying then he would leave, wait in some pleasant southern inn and look for another town to settle in, possibly somewhere a bit warmer with a beach.

I think this is by far the most sensible suggestion so far actually. When the scenario appears to be no-win (in the case of several of the mentioned characters at least, putting aside strategies that have already gotten the pass), reject the premise of the scenario and choose a different position that works better. Good call.

[rweird]

Doesn't matter. It's still someone at some point spending XP on a person that is not them.

If you assume this does not happen because unreasonable, only caster items exist in the world.

Also, any item that isn't a weapon or shield breaks in one hit from anything. You'd be stupid to break them but they can break. In mundanes are screwed land you might as well assume that as well. Suddenly items don't last forever.

As tuggyne pointed out, the item could be for another party member, who's getting the item allows that party member to contribute more effectively to combat, and allow then to kill higher level things. A crafter can reduce EXP and GP costs greatly (and non-crafters rarely pick up an item creation feat in my experience), and the EXP cost (if you allow a certain WotC article) could be spent by someone else, or other ways can pay for the EXP (ambrosia, liquid pain).

On the other hand, unless you find a Dweomerkeeper (or other build for EXP free spells) to Su Miracle/Wish the spell on you, then the caster will pay an EXP cost, and an 11th level wizard casting Mineralize Warrior on a 1st level fighter is an investment that very well may not pay off.

For magic items breaking, I have never witnessed that, sure it happens from time to time, but that just makes it slightly less likely to get a magic item, and doesn't change much. Do you agree?

What do you think wizards and stuff do for creating Mineral Warriors and magic items? What do you think wizards and stuff should do?

[shaikujin]

Ill put my 5th level wizard, horribly unoptimised in this situation. He would leave with his girlfriends and stuff on day one and travel south.

Really any invading army must be pretty confident of victory or they wouldn't invade, a sensible defence would be to quickly pack up all food, quickly harvest crops near ready or burn them and take anything which might be considered pillage or valuable and head south, leaving empty windowless houses and no one to fight which would horribly dissapoint the orcs and leave them hungry.

Then have the town defenders join up with the kings army and when its numbers have swelled sufficiently return and kick the orcs out. Fighting the invaders with a small garrison then a small part of the kings army then dribs and drabs of troops as they arrive is called HASTE and is a common mistake in war. Spend the time, marshall a big army and take them head on or force them to withdraw with no pillage.

Why fight when we pay taxes for the king to defend us.

Afterwards he would be happy to help in the rebuilding and tracking down and killing groups of orcs after their army has broken up. Especially if there are bounties to be collected.

Of course if the people insisted on staying and fighting and dying then he would leave, wait in some pleasant southern inn and look for another town to settle in, possibly somewhere a bit warmer with a beach.


I humbly submit my level 1 Carmendine Monk with 18 int.
...who sees what the level 5 wizard does, and takes off after him.

Thus proving beyond doubt that a level 1 Monk can handle this scenario as well as a level 5 Wizard :D



Jokes aside, it's really hard for other melee characters to do better in this scenario compared to a monk.

Let me see if I can cook up a monk and have a go at this heh.

Btw, is a monk 6 with PRCs like Sacred Fist 1 and Shou Disciple 5 still considered mainly monk?

[GreenETC]

Actually, I'd like to see a Forgery-based attempt, focused on getting a piece of one leader's handwriting and then attempting to frame a leader for assassination in order to cause confusion in the ranks.

Something like a Forgery/Stealth based Beguiler with Darkstalker maybe? It would probably work better with an entire party working towards it.

Actually, I'd like to see the way a good Forgery could potentially disrupt the entire army.