Okay got to ask

[terryrayc]

For the last few strips there's been a ton of killing going on. Even at only a few xp each if they are all low level fighters and archers attacking shouldn't they get at least a level out of this?

[2.5 cats]

Nope. In D&D 3.5 if your victim's challenge rating is too far below yours they're worth 0 XP.

This rule also applies in the Order of the Stick universe. See http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0439.html

[Ramien]

Any XP they get would likely be story or roleplaying xp.

[Weiser_Cain]

If they leveled it would have been for destroying the gate.

[terryrayc]

I think the issue is how far below their level are they? I know the kills seem easy but that entire army cannot only be run by 1 general. There has to be captains and squad leaders or something.

Mainly I just want to see what level Elan takes next. I'm guessing he'll stay with Dashing Swordsman but another caster level might be interesting.

[veti]

Surely the CR for the encounter is what matters, not the CR for each individual mook?

And the encounter level for a couple of thousand mooks is probably quite substantial, especially considering the dinosaurs added to the mix.

[diretiger]

The empire of blood seems to be constantly at war, so I would think their fighters wouldn't be total scrubs

[Amphiox]

Nope. In D&D 3.5 if your victim's challenge rating is too far below yours they're worth 0 XP.

This rule also applies in the Order of the Stick universe. See http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0439.html

Is there no modifier for defeating a large number/horde in a single engagement? ie the *army* is the opponent, not any individual soldiers in it.

Surviving and successfully escaping from the army commanded by Elan's evil tyrant father to kill them just for the sake of forcing Elan into a certain narrative role should net them some roleplaying XP, though.

[2.5 cats]

The OotS has leveled up as well since Belkar was getting little-to-no XP for killing tons of hogboglin mooks. So even if the soldiers are level 2 (or 3?) I'm sticking with 0 xp, plus piddly for the occasional officer or dinosaur and, as pointed above, something for role-playing or a holistic look at the encounter (for which escaping is every bit as good as killing everyone).

I highly doubt that most soldiers are above level 3, and probably not even level 2, given how we've never seen a hit from a sword or arrow do anything other than make a clean kill.

[Nordom]

Surely the CR for the encounter is what matters, not the CR for each individual mook?

And the encounter level for a couple of thousand mooks is probably quite substantial, especially considering the dinosaurs added to the mix.

This. If I'm remembering correctly, each time you double the number of enemies you add two to the CR. Double a single CR 1 mook 10 times and you you have 1024 mooks at a level 21 CR.

[Jasdoif]

And the encounter level for a couple of thousand mooks is probably quite substantial, especially considering the dinosaurs added to the mix.Thing is, the rules were meant for modeling "party vs party" or "party vs creature" scale, they don't do well for "party vs army". The Dungeon Master's Guide specifically says that using more than twelve creatures doesn't normally make for a good encounter because the individual creatures are probably too weak for any threat to be posed; and the encounter level table doesn't have a listing for using more than twelve creatures as a result.

[dtilque]

There are definitely some not-so-low-level mooks in Tarquin's forces. The Wall of Fire does 2d6 + 15 (V's level) fire damage to anyone going through it. That's a pretty certain kill for low-level mooks. I'm not sure what level it would take to get through, but I expect someone out there will tell us.

Yet, there are some that get through anyway: that dino rider Roy killed in #920 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0920.html), the lizard guy he engaged after that, as well as whoever V zapped in the first panel of 920 (I expect he wasn't wasting that spell on a mook outside the Wall of Fire).

They're probably still not high enough to give a non-trivial amount of XP, but the army seems to have a significant number of non-scrubs. More than just the officers, I think.

[Ramien]

Is there no modifier for defeating a large number/horde in a single engagement? ie the *army* is the opponent, not any individual soldiers in it.

Surviving and successfully escaping from the army commanded by Elan's evil tyrant father to kill them just for the sake of forcing Elan into a certain narrative role should net them some roleplaying XP, though.

Yes and no. If the army is just treated as a group of inidividual characters, then no actual xp is gained for defeating each soldier - and 3.5 gives experience for the creature, not the encounter.

However, I know there's a 'mob' or 'horde' template that effectively turns a group of similar creatures into effectively a swarm, often with a much higher effective level than considering them separately. If the army was using those rules (It doesn't seem like it is, though), then yes, we would see some combat xp here.

[Gray Mage]

There are definitely some not-so-low-level mooks in Tarquin's forces. The Wall of Fire does 2d6 + 15 (V's level) fire damage to anyone going through it. That's a pretty certain kill for low-level mooks. I'm not sure what level it would take to get through, but I expect someone out there will tell us.

Yet, there are some that get through anyway: that dino rider Roy killed in #920 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0920.html), the lizard guy he engaged after that, as well as whoever V zapped in the first panel of 920 (I expect he wasn't wasting that spell on a mook outside the Wall of Fire).

They're probably still not high enough to give a non-trivial amount of XP, but the army seems to have a significant number of non-scrubs. More than just the officers, I think.

Level two, really. The minimum damage is 17, so a 2nd level warrior has 10+1d10+2*con mod. Even with just a +1 in con mod (I'd say a +2 is plausible for the ones that survived), so on a roll of 6 or more (40%) they can make it. With a +2 it's 60% on the roll.

[King of Nowhere]

This. If I'm remembering correctly, each time you double the number of enemies you add two to the CR. Double a single CR 1 mook 10 times and you you have 1024 mooks at a level 21 CR.

You remember correctly, but you forget an additional clause: foes 8 levels below do not count towards the cr, as they are negligible enough that they don't pose a realistic treath. for example, 1024 mooks could easily be killed by a single summoned monster with the right resistances and area effects, and a fighter like roy with great cleave is probably capable of taking all of them on his own, or at most with the help of a couple healing potions or a potion of stoneskin.

On the other hand, cr is based on the expected treath, and I would say that a full army is actualy posing a realistic challenge to the oots, so I'd still award them xp for it. But those would not be the sum of each individual slayed, but rather an estimate of the level of challenge posed by the army as a whole.

Add in the xp for defeating the linear guild (twice), those for completing the dungeon, those for completing the gate subquest, maybe the silicon elemental depending on whether it was calculated as part of a redcloak encounter or a single encounter by itself...
I won't be surprised if they gained a level or 2 on the western continent.

[Finwe]

There are several ways this could go by RAW.

A good DM would estimate how difficult the encounter was as a whole, and award XP accordingly.

[Ermete]

Well,

I think that to determinate the overall level of the encouter we can look at its tactical difficulty and not only at the pure sum of the CR of each mooks. For instance we can say that without a good strategy (such as the one Roy implemented - having Belkar providing cover and Durkula control the battlefield via dominating gaze), those mooks (which I guess are trained to fight in coordination with each other) could definitely inflict some serious damage to the party. Moreover, we can also have a look at the resources they are forced to use to overcome the encounter. For instance, Durkula is using his potions and so expending resources (that are not infinite and probably might run out at some point, since Roy asked "do you have any potion left" - or something like that), spells are being cast by V and so on.

Looking at these points, I would award them some EXP - although I cannot tell how many yet. :)

of course this is my take :smallsmile:

[luc258]

I think that is a strange rule. Shouldn't the difficulty of the complete encounter have an impact on the XP? Even if a single soldier or a dozen of them are no challenge and therefore do not give XP a whole army could very well pose an approbriate difficult encounter and therefore should give xp.

[johnbragg]

There are several ways this could go by RAW.

A good DM would estimate how difficult the encounter was as a whole, and award XP accordingly.

And a lazy DM can use the guideline that 10 average encounters should level the party. Which means, at their level, around 1000 xp each.

Why is this encounter a Threat?
1. The mook's arrows/bolts are hitting Roy (at least, so OOTS is in danger from attrition. http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0917.html panel 1
2. Belkar is close to death. That changes the equation.
3. Durkon is almost out of spells until nightfall. (917)
4. As far as the PCs know, the Psion could unleash the pri-kraken at any time, and Miron could (and does) turn out to be a high(?)-level caster. (Or maybe he just has a few caster levels as a dip.)
5. With Haley and Elan up with Team Tarquin, the Party is Split. Tactical disadvantage.

Now, it turns out that 4 doesn't apply, and 5 turns to the party's advantage because the mooks won't touch Elan and aren't sure about Haley. But OOTS doesn't know that when they "roll initiative"

Maybe you cut the XP in half because some of the threatening conditions don't materialize, and the enemy is using sub-optimal tactics. (Does a field-grade officer suggest pulling back out of melee range soon? Why ARE you engaging the high-level adventurers in melee anyway?)

[NerdyKris]

I think that is a strange rule. Shouldn't the difficulty of the complete encounter have an impact on the XP? Even if a single soldier or a dozen of them are no challenge and therefore do not give XP a whole army could very well pose an approbriate difficult encounter and therefore should give xp.

As Jasdoif said, the rules were not designed to handle large encounters. They were designed for a small party versus a small group of monsters. You have to go outside RAW to find rules for armies, because armies aren't normally sent against groups of 1-6 people.

[Jasdoif]

I think that is a strange rule. Shouldn't the difficulty of the complete encounter have an impact on the XP? Even if a single soldier or a dozen of them are no challenge and therefore do not give XP a whole army could very well pose an approbriate difficult encounter and therefore should give xp.I believe the theory goes like this: It's not so much that a single soldier doesn't pose a challenge, but that a single soldier doesn't pose a threat. With a wide enough level difference, it's entirely possible for the higher level side to have near immunity to the other side. Even actual immunity is possible, like having damage reduction that outnumbers the damage that they could be dealt, negating every hit the soldiers manage to make. If no one in a group is capable of harming the party, then the group is incapable of harming the party, and no challenge is posed. No challenge means no XP.

This doesn't account for the potential of an especially large, coordinated group having the advantage of sheer force of numbers....But again, the rules weren't designed to support those numbers. D&D is a tabletop game, after all; the assumption is that the DM would be rolling physical dice for all the soldiers' rolls, and...you can probably imagine the tedium of rolling dice for each and every solider in an army, especially with the foreknowledge that any particular soldier is supremely unlikely to succeed.


Having said all that, the DM can (and I would say should) certainly issue an ad-hoc award of XP for overcoming the army, if the army's organization (or any other exceptional qualities/circumstances) makes it genuinely capable of posing a threat to the party despite the weakness of its individual members. But isn't there a formula or table for that award, because it's entirely dependent on the encounter being an exceptional scenario that the rules can't account for; the DM would have to more-or-less guess what was appropriate.

[johnbragg]

Having said all that, the DM can (and I would say should) certainly issue an ad-hoc award of XP for overcoming the army, if the army's organization (or any other exceptional qualities/circumstances) makes it genuinely capable of posing a threat to the party despite the weakness of its individual members. But isn't there a formula or table for that award, because it's entirely dependent on the encounter being an exceptional scenario that the rules can't account for; the DM would have to more-or-less guess what was appropriate.

Is the "ten encounters per level" rule-of-thumb written down anywhere official? Because I think that's the best guideline for this situation. STart with the number of xp that would level the party, divide by ten. Then decide whether the encounter was as threatening as an "average" encounter at that level.

Are Roy, Durkula and Belkar in as much danger as they were when they fought the Linear Guild in the pyramid? I'd say so, at least before V showed up. On the other hand, V _did_ show up, and HAley and Elan aren't in nearly as much danger. So maybe half the XP total. You could argue full XP for Roy, Durkon and Belkar, half for V and none for Haley and Elan, but that's not the best thing for a harmonious playing group.

[Jasdoif]

Is the "ten encounters per level" rule-of-thumb written down anywhere official?I don't have the DMG with me to check the exact wording, but I think it mentions something like "the tables were written with the expectation that the party will gain a level every thirteen-and-a-third encounters of equal CR." It's not actually a rule, though.

[SowZ]

Level two, really. The minimum damage is 17, so a 2nd level warrior has 10+1d10+2*con mod. Even with just a +1 in con mod (I'd say a +2 is plausible for te ones that survived), so on a roll of 6 or more (40%) they can make it. With a +2 it's 60% on the roll.

Yeah, but there is less than a three percent chance of minimum rolls. Further, the math is off. A level two warrior gets 2d8+con mod+con mod. Assuming 12 Con and average hp/damage rolls, the warrior would need to be fourth/fifth level to make it.

[Spoomeister]

It's a valid question and there's some good discussion in here already about how that aspect of D&D rules tend to work.

Also, logically, run through it:


Belkar: Is kicking up dust. MAYbe some roleplaying XP, not much else.
Elan: No one will fight him. MAYbe some roleplaying XP, not much else.
Haley: Picking off low number of mooks with multiple-shots, multiple-kills per round. CR can't be that high for her. Meh.
Vaarsuvius: Mowing down high number of mooks with magic heavy artillery. CR can't be that high for her. Meh.
Durkula: Steering Spiky, Dominating left-right-and-center. CR might be up there depending on how challenging dominating and controlling that many dudes is.
Roy: Cleave! Twain! Cleave! Twain! Likely the only one who could be getting XP from this in any significant amount, just from raw volume and variety of mook dudes and mook dinos being processed. Some of the (very good) rules metacomments before this post probably apply to Roy.


But more to the point: The Giant has recently stated that the comic is rarely about D&D rules anymore - mocking them, riffing on them, expressing them, using them, being aware of them.

And judging from Tarkie's recent comments, the fight with the army is more demonstrating Roy's existing badassery (and by extension, the OOTS') rather than really providing a new and different challenge that the characters are overcoming (and thus gaining XP for).

So apart from any RAW-related discussion upthread, for meta reasons, I can't imagine anyone in the OOTS gaining XP or levelling from this piece of the storyline, unless there is a specific story reason for The Giant to do so.

Put another way: I highly doubt that The Giant has a running tally of the XP gained in various encounters, strip-by-strip, such that he will level up characters in real time. If characters level up, they will do so Because Plot, not Because XP or Because Challenge Rating.

[Gray Mage]

Yeah, but there is less than a three percent chance of minimum rolls. Further, the math is off. A level two warrior gets 2d8+con mod+con mod. Assuming 12 Con and average hp/damage rolls, the warrior would need to be fourth/fifth level to make it.

You are right about it being a d8 (I assumed that it was the same as a fighter), but it doesn't need to be that high level, since any warrior that manage to pass is likely to be an outlier. So, among all the soldiers, the odds of at least one of them getting minimum damage and being able to survive it is not low.

With 12 Con, even a warrior might be able to survive the minimum damage.

[Roland Itiative]

There are definitely some not-so-low-level mooks in Tarquin's forces. The Wall of Fire does 2d6 + 15 (V's level) fire damage to anyone going through it. That's a pretty certain kill for low-level mooks. I'm not sure what level it would take to get through, but I expect someone out there will tell us.

Yet, there are some that get through anyway: that dino rider Roy killed in #920 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0920.html), the lizard guy he engaged after that, as well as whoever V zapped in the first panel of 920 (I expect he wasn't wasting that spell on a mook outside the Wall of Fire).

I assume they were already within the Wall of Fire when it was cast, and as such took no damage from it.

[EmperorSarda]

But more to the point: The Giant has recently stated that the comic is rarely about D&D rules anymore - mocking them, riffing on them, expressing them, using them, being aware of them.


Correction, the comic is rarely about making fun of D&D rules anymore. Durkon still has to pray for spells, V still has to study for spells, they still have their levels, they still level up, because the world is based loosely on D&D rules.

So the rules are still being used. But plot and funny often trump. But they're still there.

[Oko and Qailee]

Correction, the comic is rarely about making fun of D&D rules anymore. Durkon still has to pray for spells, V still has to study for spells, they still have their levels, they still level up, because the world is based loosely on D&D rules.

So the rules are still being used. But plot and funny often trump. But they're still there.

Most specifically, the comic is about a world under the rules of D&D, but these rules are below the importance of the actual story.

So the rules matter up until it's important that they don't

[johnbragg]

It's a valid question and there's some good discussion in here already about how that aspect of D&D rules tend to work.

Also, logically, run through it:

Belkar: Is kicking up dust. MAYbe some roleplaying XP, not much else.

Belkar is following Roy's orders, and not wantonly killing things. That indicates learning, which should indicate some XP.


Roy: Cleave! Twain! Cleave! Twain! Likely the only one who could be getting XP from this in any significant amount, just from raw volume and variety of mook dudes and mook dinos being processed. Some of the (very good) rules metacomments before this post probably apply to Roy.


No argument there, or about the rest. But Roy is still in a dangerous situation. Less so for everyone else, but they are also in a dangerous situation, in a way they weren't, oh, 30 seconds ago.


Put another way: I highly doubt that The Giant has a running tally of the XP gained in various encounters, strip-by-strip, such that he will level up characters in real time. If characters level up, they will do so Because Plot, not Because XP or Because Challenge Rating.

True. But that's just as true for the fights against the Linear Guild before the pyramid blew up.

So if the DMG guideline is 13 1/3 encounters per level, this should be maybe 1/20 of the XP to level. It's not a trivial danger, but there is no risk of a TPK.

[King of Nowhere]

It's a valid question and there's some good discussion in here already about how that aspect of D&D rules tend to work.

Also, logically, run through it:


Belkar: Is kicking up dust. MAYbe some roleplaying XP, not much else.
Elan: No one will fight him. MAYbe some roleplaying XP, not much else.
Haley: Picking off low number of mooks with multiple-shots, multiple-kills per round. CR can't be that high for her. Meh.
Vaarsuvius: Mowing down high number of mooks with magic heavy artillery. CR can't be that high for her. Meh.
Durkula: Steering Spiky, Dominating left-right-and-center. CR might be up there depending on how challenging dominating and controlling that many dudes is.
Roy: Cleave! Twain! Cleave! Twain! Likely the only one who could be getting XP from this in any significant amount, just from raw volume and variety of mook dudes and mook dinos being processed. Some of the (very good) rules metacomments before this post probably apply to Roy.


I think your reasoning is a bit one-sided. there are other factors you may want to consider


Belkar: is level drained to 1 and a single arrow may prove fatal to him. staying alive in that situation would already be a great accomplishment
Elan: No one will fight him, true. But he's fighting to save his friends.
Haley: She's also safe, but fighting to save her friends. If she don't kill the mooks fast enough, she fails. and there are literally thousands of them. killing them all before her friends are killed seems enough of a challenge to me.
Vaarsuvius: prepared a lot of divination spells because he started the day looking for something magically shielded in the middle of a natural maze. Can't have many offensive spells left. Once he runs out, he's stuck with a +7 bab and a str penalty.
Durkula: Does he have damage reduction? if he does, I fully exxpect tarquin to finish him off once the others are dead. Anyway, he's out of spells, and he must try to save his friends before the minions swarm them. Same reasoning of haley.
Roy: can go on cleaving almost indefinitely, but he's slowly taking damage. If nothing happens, he will eventually be worn down 1d8 hp at a time.


So, it seems to me they are definitely in danger and the army is definitely posing a challenge to them.

[dtilque]

I assume they were already within the Wall of Fire when it was cast, and as such took no damage from it.

They may have been, although probably not the dino-rider. Look at the area within the Wall of Fire on strip #919 (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0919.html). In the center is Belkar and the dead dino he's been using as cover. Around him are half a dozen or so dominated mooks defending him. Then there's Spikey, Roy and Durkon and their immediate opponents. Otherwise, I see dead bodies and a few mooks who were just killed by having been in the path of the Wall. However, it's hard to say for certain those are all dead because of the distance and the obscuring sand Belkar is throwing up, plus the Wall of Fire F/X. But I think we can safely say there's no living dinos within that circle, since they stand out.