Party wants to conquer the town

[Zancloufer]

So started a new game not long ago with some PCs of, dubious alignment. Had a simple plot for the first 2-3 levels: There is a town beset by Goblins and the party ends up there. I had a solid 3 different ways that they could "advance" the story (different hooks to next plot points depending on how they "resolved" the problem). They seem to have found the non-existent plan D:

Conquer the town with the Goblin Raiders. Now depending on how this goes I can still set up further points, but I'm not 100% certain how to play this out. It is a decent sized battle, but I honestly think the PCs are on the loosing side here.


All level 2 now, MIGHT get level 3 by the time they invade the town. They kind of have to find/deal with the goblin's current handler before they except the PC's plan of domination.
Beguiler//Warblade. Rouge//Paladin (Anti-Paladin really). Main PCs that are always there
Black Dragon Wrymling//Wizard. Sorcerer//Swordsage. Usually there, but not 100% attendance due to schedules.


About 150-200 goblins. Over 80% of which are level one, will drop with one solid Long Sword hit and almost impossible to hit an AC over 23. Few level 2-3 ones slightly better off. Really the goblins probably never could take the town out with their power/numbers.

23 Guards, all level 2, with 4 more "Sergeants" around level 3-4. A comparable amount of clerics, in both numbers and levels that tend to the various shrines in the city. There is also at least two dozen other NPCs with some decent levels (4-6), including at least three full casters, and the Mayor who is probably the most dangerous individual in the city. The entire town has a population of over 2000, so if it comes down to random murder of Commoners/Experts I honestly expect MASSIVE attrition. I mean Bob the Farmer with 4-5 HP and +0-2 to hit with his Pitchfork/Scythe isn't that scary, but there are at least 1000 Bobs around to fight if it comes down to the only means of survival.

So what I'm not certain is:
A) How to run the actual battle. Especially if it comes down to statistical die rolls I run in the background. Pretty sure the Farmer Hoard can attrition 90% of the Goblins themselves if cornered.
B) Possible tactics for both town defence, and what kind of logistics are involved in a full town conquest.
C) How not to cause a TPK before/by level 3 because the PCs thought their >200 Goblins could fight 1000+ Scared Farmers with a good 50+ level 2-6 NPCs behind them.

[Vogie]

I don't know - I really wouldn't mind them running headlong into a TPK if they're in over their heads; on the other hand, I'm not entirely sure why they want to do so, but if they really want to conquer the town and have the ability to do so, you shouldn't ex machina them to death.

As for the actual invasion I'd break it down in a series of fairly defined encounters.

Farmer's field -
Two phase fight - Initially it would be an overrun of a group of Farmers, but then a wandering patrol of guards join the frey. The PCs must dispatch all of the guards nearly-simultaneously, because as soon as half of the guards die, the rest will retreat, falling back to the garrison, alerting the rest of the town. You don't tell them that beforehand, obviously. This is more of an attrition fight.

Garrison -
If the guards are alerted - the gates are up and the PCs have to figure out how to get over the walls while getting sniped at by a flurry of archers.
If the guards are not alerted - they can either go full frontal or try to sneak in.

Full Frontal - Attrition fight, with a race-against-time element as they close the gates
Sneak in - More of a Dishonored-style fight, where the goblins are waiting for the PCs to clear the way, then invade when the PCs give the signal.


Town square -
This'll be a full melee of whatever's left of the invaders & PCs vs the full onslaught of the upper level guards and one or two of the casters.

Mayor's Residence -
Basically, this is the boss fight vs the Mayor, highest level guards, and the rest of the casters.

[Karl Aegis]

There's pretty much no way the party doesn't get wiped out. Even commoners throwing rocks out of slings they aren't proficient with hit on a 20. If they do manage to take the town there is a baron or count who owns the land and will come to take it back with an actual army. NPCs really have no business in genocide, so either you don't have enough goblins to occupy the town or the goblins rout after taking a handful of casualties. Really, the only way you're going to conquer the town is if you convince the town the party is the rightful owner of the town of the owner of the town appoints them into a leadership position within the town. Goblins won't help them conquer at all.

[Coidzor]

Does the party actually have a plan for getting the town to surrender to them that also satisfies the aims of the goblins?

Because while, yeah, they might be able to kill a lot of people and cause an evcauation of the town, they're not going to be doing well if they try to genocide, and they don't have the numbers to hold or repopulate the town without the cooperation of the original inhabitants.

Even if they succeed in slaughtering the population of the town, there's very little value in a ruin, especially if fires break out (insanely likely) and destroy the material goods that most of the raw wealth of the town is concentrated in. Also, they'll get reprisals from basically everyone in the area and attract higher level adventurers.

[lylsyly]

When they confront the Goblins "handler" he can be hesitant about any plan to conquer the town because HE knows more of what will be waiting for them. Maybe they get the hint, maybe not. When I DM, this is about what I would do. If they decide to attack, well, de dice dey have no pity. I would play it straight up, defending the town to the best of my ability, and let the pieces fall where they may (and the players know this about me). Still no smiley for :bigevilgrin:

just my 2 coppers,
YMMV

[Scorponok]

I agree with the above poster in regards to dividing the town into sections and rolling a few times to determine the outcome of those battles. One villager (commoner) can represent 10 commoners, 1 goblin can represent 10, and roll those battles either beforehand or if the PCs want to intervene when their side is losing, roll in front of them. Then take the percentage of HP left over for each unit and that is how many of the group of 10 survive.

And a TPK should be a risk. Conquering a town is a high risk activity, especially when the guards are higher levels.

[Kelb_Panthera]

A -very- clever strategist might be able to pull something off but without knowing the local terrain or the disposition of the enemy generals, the only workable strategy I can see here is a siege and even that's a bit of a long shot -if- you can even get the goblins to go for it.

Your PC's have signed their own death warrants. Best case for likely scenarios is that they realize this soon enough to cut and run.

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A) How to run the actual battle. Especially if it comes down to statistical die rolls I run in the background. Pretty sure the Farmer Hoard can attrition 90% of the Goblins themselves if cornered.

The miniatures handbook has the rules for mass battles. I'd suggest using those. This is just too small a battle to engage the full-on war rules from heroes of battle. I'd -strongly- advise you not go this way. This is certain doom for your PC's.


B) Possible tactics for both town defence, and what kind of logistics are involved in a full town conquest.

The (very obvious) strategy for victory is to station the militia on the walls with as many bows as can be mustered and just pin-cushion the goblins. Send a runner to call for reinforcements, sit-out the siege if the gobbos try. If reinforcements aren't to be had, arm and armor the millitia as best you can and break the siege (see A). It'll be a blood-bath but the town will almost certainly win.


C) How not to cause a TPK before/by level 3 because the PCs thought their >200 Goblins could fight 1000+ Scared Farmers with a good 50+ level 2-6 NPCs behind them.

... Lay down -every- heavy handed clue you can think of, short of outright forbidding the action, that following through on this plan is going to end badly at best.


If you got a map, I may be able to come up with a strategy for the goblin side but if it's just a town in a field wiith a well in the middle, this won't just be a hard row to hoe, it'll be breaking rocks if they try to do this directly.

I can think of one winning strategy; I suspect the PC's best bet would be a trojan horse. If it's not already known that they've flipped sides and the militia hasn't already been mustered, they can get themselves into a position to assassinate the enemy leadership and open the front gates just in time for the gobbos to come pouring into the town, preferably at night. The chaos might be enough for them to overcome the trained guard and give them the opportunity to cow the civilians.

If the militia has already been mustered, it gets a bit dicier but the devastation such an attack does to morale -might- be enough.

[PacMan2247]

I can't imagine that your players understand the situation as you've described it here; no sane, intelligent being would attempt to take over a town which outnumbers their force 10:1, even giving them the benefit of the doubt and assuming they don't have the slightest clue how many characters there are of higher level than their own. The Monster Manual gives goblins and Int score of 10, which is enough for them to refuse to commit mass suicide; harrying the borders of a town like this is one thing, but committing to battle against an overwhelmingly greater foe would require Diplomacy checks that I'm fairly certain aren't going to happen at second level. I would have the goblins refuse their plan, and if they push it, they might as well end up fighting the goblins after all as they try to stay alive.

Edit: I'm sorry; I was so stunned by the situation that I forgot to respond to your actual questions. I don't actually have much to add to what Kelb_Panthera has had to say except that the goblins would lack sufficient numbers to besiege a town of this many people. There is *no* way for them to besiege this town. The townsfolk will use whatever ranged weapons they can manage from whatever vantage points they can find, and the goblins will die en masse. If you allow them to lead the goblins into this battle, the only way to avoid a TPK is to handwave it and have them captured (though if they were put on trial, they'd probably be executed anyway)- I'm having doubts that they'd be bright enough to run for it before that point.

Second Edit: Just described the situation to my wife, who is our group's most regular DM, and she shook her head, waved her hand, and said "Kill them. Kill them all." So there's another endorsement for that route.

[WbtE]

I think it's fairly straightforward. Have the goblins question the plan. What are the PCs going to do again? How will that work? Maybe your players are brilliant rather than overconfident and can show their new allies an audacious method for seizing the town. If not, the players will either think twice about rushing to their deaths or lose the confidence of the goblins.

[Efrate]

Take a look at the Arsenic and Old Lace, the poisoners handbook.

http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=4854.0

You don't have a chance in a stand up fight. If they go that route, they die. Simply put. Gestalt does not mean invincible.

If you are nice, have them face some guard and stiff resistance who won't pursue them if they retreat after being bloodied. If they press on despite this, and lose teammates, they die.

Their best chance is cloak and dagger. Poison the well. Destroy food stores. This may or may not be practical depending on the layout of the town and their resources. But you have a beguiler and a rogue, a little luck, a little magic, and you can get the intell you need and set up a plan of attack. Taxine is super cheap to make and can more or less wipe out the populace of low levels in a short time. Better if your beguiler can make some of the guard believe other canidates for major or such are using it to help swing elections. Or the church is to give them more of a foothold. Or whatever.

After you poison most of the people, and those that are left are weakened, then you assualt. You do not go all out though. You blockcade the road in case someone rides out for help, and make quick surgical strikes. Make the populace who can still stand fear going outside. You cause terror and fear. You fine a breech in the wall, disguises can be huge in setting this up for your stealthy characters, then you go murder some peasants, get some loot and get out. Keeps the goblins happy. Better at night because darkvision. Any soldiers etc. you can you want to slit their throats or otherwise eliminate. You isolate and destroy. The vanish. Silent image, and ghost sound go a LONG ways, as does charm person, or just a really good bluff check.

Always attack a different place. If you can capture any young/attractive/important NPCs, children, teenage sons and daughters, etc, and use them as a further threat when it comes time to face the big movers and shakers in town. But be careful, that might marshal a ton of retribution before you are ready. Sending a finger or a toe or an ear back will help put the town in the right mindset. You can also sacrifice them to perform a ritual to summon an outsider which can be a HUGE boon depending on what you can get. Barghest's are easy enough to get, work well with goblins, and can feed on the NPCs inspiring more terror and gaining more power. Just make sure you maintain control. Demons are great for random destruction, it doesn't take much to use them as expendable fodder. If you manage to snag a succubus you can have wightpocalypse happen. A few charms and kissea makes a lot of wights in a short time, which makes more wights. Sadly you do not have a cleric to rebuke them.

Kill everyone who tries to leave. Do not let them get word out.

Rinse and repeat these and they can do it, but it will take a decent bit of planning and work. If word gets out though, be ready to cut and run. Or change targets to where they are sending reinforcements from, you could do an entire campaign of bloody conquest and terror over a massive area just by hitting everyplace that send help if your recon is good enough.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I don't actually have much to add to what Kelb_Panthera has had to say except that the goblins would lack sufficient numbers to besiege a town of this many people. There is *no* way for them to besiege this town.

For a hard siege where they surround the walls just out of arrow range, you're absolutely right. Raze the crops, skirmish around the horizon and kill -every- person that tries to sneak through, and it's just barely possible.

Again, it's a -bad- idea. Attrition will probably screw them if a sizable expeditionary force sorties basically at all. It's a war of morale more than one of strategy and tactics if they're gonna have any real shot. Terror is the weapon they need.

[PacMan2247]

For a hard siege where they surround the walls just out of arrow range, you're absolutely right. Raze the crops, skirmish around the horizon and kill -every- person that tries to sneak through, and it's just barely possible.

Again, it's a -bad- idea. Attrition will probably screw them if a sizable expeditionary force sorties basically at all. It's a war of morale more than one of strategy and tactics if they're gonna have any real shot. Terror is the weapon they need.

Even then, I really don't see it as doable. When an enemy can field two forces, each twice the size of your own, and still leave enough defenders behind to guard the town, you might be able to escape if you have a mobility advantage, but you're not going to win. The closest historical example I can think of was the English sack of Caen in the Hundred Years' War, and that had much more favorable circumstances even before the French abandoned their walls in favor of a barely-defensible island. Here we're talking about a population that's been dealing with nuisance-level incursions by goblins for some time now; stepping up the harassment is going to hit 'anger' and lot sooner than it could get to 'terror'.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Even then, I really don't see it as doable. When an enemy can field two forces, each twice the size of your own, and still leave enough defenders behind to guard the town, you might be able to escape if you have a mobility advantage, but you're not going to win. The closest historical example I can think of was the English sack of Caen in the Hundred Years' War, and that had much more favorable circumstances even before the French abandoned their walls in favor of a barely-defensible island. Here we're talking about a population that's been dealing with nuisance-level incursions by goblins for some time now; stepping up the harassment is going to hit 'anger' and lot sooner than it could get to 'terror'.

That's where we get back to whether the militia has been mustered and whether or not the leadership -can- muster the militia. If we're dealing just with soldiers, then we're only talking 70~ish. Getting a bunch of dirt-farmers (who you should murder piece-meal so they're not added to the town's forces), shop keeps, and artisans to take up arms when they're not under a direct assault can be quite difficult. Dealing with goblins is the guards' job, after all. By the time they reach the point of wanting to take the fight to the goblins, things should already be getting pretty desparate. Guerrila tactics are the only real shot for a more traditional approach.

The trojan horse still has much better odds.


Don't get me wrong, this would probably take most of the campaign season for that year and even into early winter but it's not impossible, just up-hill all the way. I do not envy the general trying to execute this strategy, at all.