Downside to Construct / Effigy Army?

[kalos72]

So considering how strong some of these guys can be...where is the downside to having 1000 battlehorrors as the main force with say cavalry as a reaction force or flying constructs even?

Only thing I can come up with is the control part...the fact they have to be ordered specifically to do or not do something.

[tyckspoon]

Aside from being unfeasibly expensive and time-consuming to create unless you're cheesing out Wishes? (And if you are, it's basically a matter of choosing the manner in which you wish to Win D&D anyway.) Nothing much - based on mindless undead, an Int - creature can still obey general instructions like 'kill everything that tries to pass you' or 'go here and kill everybody who isn't wearing the right uniform', which is basically all you expect of most troops when you get down to it. If you need to you can assign commanders to them to change the orders on the fly, same as you would for a unit of 'smart' creatures.. except the commander gets to ride around in an Effigy power armor, so he's way better protected.

[TuggyNE]

Constructs are extremely expensive and have a few little-known vulnerabilities to niche abilities. Also, they're awfully pricey. Did I mention they cost a lot?

[unseenmage]

The Warforged Domain from Faths of Eberron will wreck your toys.

The Rod of Construct Control from Arms and Equipment guide will just ruin your day.


And there's a weapon in the DMG that just auto-kills Constructs too IIRC.


So yeah, Constructs are nice but what weaknesses they do have are mostly save-or-die, when they allow a save at all.

Just something to keep in mind.

[kalos72]

I was thinking about like scout effigies or even magic item searching effigies.

Scouts to say explore all the underground in an area or one with magic detection to search for items or areas that are magical?

Even simple ones to just scout out a hilly region and search for orcs maybe...

[Drachasor]

As far as making an army goes, Pathfinder's rules allow for pretty cheap low-level constructs. The price is just 500gp*CR^2, or just 250gp*CR^2 to craft. For animated objects, which it has rules for crafting permanent ones, this is pretty cheap, especially since you can give them good hardness values easily.

Outside of that there's not really a good system. Potentially using a modified Leadership or changing the undead-making spells into construct-making spells could work.

[unseenmage]

I was thinking about like scout effigies or even magic item searching effigies.

Scouts to say explore all the underground in an area or one with magic detection to search for items or areas that are magical?

Even simple ones to just scout out a hilly region and search for orcs maybe...

If that's the case you'll probably want Intelligent Constructs. Without Intelligence there isn't much they'll be able to tell you even if they do find something while scouting.

And before someone suggests Homunculus, remember that homunculus cannot speak. The Amulet of Freedom of Speech from the adventure Icy Heart could fix this though with DM permission.

[kalos72]

So to scout out the local hills, say magebred, warbeast dire wolf effigies hit with an awaken? Not sure how the Awaken concept works on constructs/effigies... :(

My mage also said " We need a magical map of automapping" to map out the dungeons we go through now too. I love the idea...especially if you give it to the dire wolves as they roam the region.

[unseenmage]

So to scout out the local hills, say magebred, warbeast dire wolf effigies hit with an awaken? Not sure how the Awaken concept works on constructs/effigies... :(

My mage also said " We need a magical map of automapping" to map out the dungeons we go through now too. I love the idea...especially if you give it to the dire wolves as they roam the region.

There's a magical map in the Arms and Equipment Guide.

There's also a Druid and/or Cleric spell which will reveal terrain traits to you over quite a distance IIRC. Can't recall it's name right now though.

Awaken Construct frees subject Constructs from control and grants them free will.

Augment Automotons from Dragon 327 pg 72 sets the price of making a Construct intelligent during creation at +8,000gp.

The Sacred Guardian Template from Dragonlance: Bestiary of Krynn will also grant intelligence, superpowers, and languages.

[Coidzor]

And before someone suggests Homunculus, remember that homunculus cannot speak. The Amulet of Freedom of Speech from the adventure Icy Heart could fix this though with DM permission.

The real problem with Homunculi, as I've always understood it, is that the creator is hurt if they're destroyed, so that's just far too much of a vulnerability for an army.

There are one or two variants from Eberron that are ideally suited to scouting due to their stealth skills though.

[unseenmage]

The real problem with Homunculi, as I've always understood it, is that the creator is hurt if they're destroyed, so that's just far too much of a vulnerability for an army.

There are one or two variants from Eberron that are ideally suited to scouting due to their stealth skills though.

For me the "real" problem with Homunculus is that they die when their creator dies. And though their creator may benefit from the revolving door afterlife, without homebrew, the Homunculus cannot be restored to functioning.

My apologies for not mentioning that in the previous post.

[kalos72]

I loved the idea of the Homu...until I saw the dmg done when they die. :(

Is there a construct/effigy book or just the online stuff mostly? Looking for a more consolidated source of data since I am pretty new to the concept.

Thanks all!!!

[unseenmage]

I loved the idea of the Homu...until I saw the dmg done when they die. :(

Is there a construct/effigy book or just the online stuff mostly? Looking for a more consolidated source of data since I am pretty new to the concept.

Thanks all!!!

There is the Mechanomicon (http://community.wizards.com/forum/previous-editions-character-optimization/threads/1156126) a guide to Constructs that seems to have never been completely finished.

There's also a couple of places where creatures have been cataloged that one could search for the work "Construct". The Monster Index (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/lists/monsters) and Monster Finder (http://monsterfinder.dndrunde.de/) among others.

[Grollub]

Beyond what everyone else has said.. I would think any creature with an Int - score would be fairly easy to fool, and slow to react to any immediate changes/ surprises, compared to smarter armies.

Just try to reverse engineer it.. if you were a pc group vs a construct army, what sort of things would you do to get around that... close those loopholes as best you can.

[kalos72]

The group came up with a fairly unique scenario I think...

Pair up 2 medium effigies (dire worgs or something) with a single soldier supported by a couple of effigy ballista or arebelists maybe.

Start the attack with a bullete charge... :)