Running a Grand Melee tournament.

[heavyfuel]

My players decided they wanted to compete in a tournament, with the promise of a Grand Melee to finish it all.

Is there a good set of rules for running a huge (60+ combatants), free-for-all tournament? Besides the obvious of rolling for every single random NPC?

[Werephilosopher]

Is there a good set of rules for running a huge (60+ combatants), free-for-all tournament? Besides the obvious of rolling for every single random NPC?

Suggestion: make a huge list of pre-rolled d20 results, and check them off as you go through them. It saves time from being spent rolling over and over and over.

[heavyfuel]

Suggestion: make a huge list of pre-rolled d20 results, and check them off as you go through them. It saves time from being spent rolling over and over and over.

That's great help. Thanks! Unfortunately that doesn't solve the problem of having to equip, stat all 60 of them

[JW86]

I'm at work so I don't have the page reference to hand, but the DMG has lists of pre-statted NPCs for all major classes (PC and NPC classes) in it somewhere... that should cover all of your non-remarkable combatants.

Maybe stat out five or ten of the more notable combatants, if you want to?

[morkendi]

Take the number of combatants and divide them between players. Actually play the fights with brackets with players playing.

[Vogonjeltz]

That's great help. Thanks! Unfortunately that doesn't solve the problem of having to equip, stat all 60 of them

Don't. Make a flow chart, some enemies will kill/yield prior to the PCs actually encountering them.

Figure out how many will fall or surrender each round, and then only stat out the ones your players are likely to fight with.

If it comes to it, use the same stats on multiple guys, it's not worth the effort to try and uniquely stat 60 enemies.

[gorilla-turtle]

Don't. Make a flow chart, some enemies will kill/yield prior to the PCs actually encountering them.

Figure out how many will fall or surrender each round, and then only stat out the ones your players are likely to fight with.

If it comes to it, use the same stats on multiple guys, it's not worth the effort to try and uniquely stat 60 enemies.

I agree with this: Unless the players go out of their way to attempt to take on all 60 opponents, you need not give them all special treatment in terms of abilities. Only those relevant to the challenge at hand need actually be countered: if the rest are not due to being beaten off screen, then there was not much reason to learn about them anyways, and their loses in battle can just as easily be narrated.