Running a mook massacre

[JusticeZero]

So, having discovered a very disturbing clue about the current BBEG, my five character party, all level 6 (homebrew Pathfinder 1 setting, low fantasy, Epic-6) is about to do a straight frontal assault on the more or less unsuspecting guard barracks.

The city guard in this case is CR 1/3 foot soldiers. All of them are Shaken at the sight of the party (supernatural hijinks happened) equipped with parade armor, a mundane spear, and slings, 5hp each.

I want to have a massive, mook-stomping massacre of terrified but fanatical cult-brainwashed farm kids facing down enraged heroes of legend, weakly bolstered by a wannabe goddess who will be sacrificing their souls for her plans as they fall but nonetheless completely and totally out of their league?

I'm doing the games over Discord voice, using a text box for my battlemap.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how to run this that won't bog down too badly? And ways to make it generally feel more like an intense gorefest of nonstop mayhem that brings home that they left the realm of "ordinary fighters" behind several adventures ago and are well into "action movie hero"?

[Troacctid]

Instead of running a combat, have the players describe how they mow down the terrified soldiers. You could also make it a skill challenge if you like.

[NotInventedHere]

If your players really like rolling tons of dice, but don't have a lot of things like Cleave, it might also be worth considering borrowing some of the Mook rules from 13th Age. Have the guards share a hit point pool; if a PC does 15 damage, they don't just massively overkill one guard, they take out 3 guards in a series of smooth strikes.

Also, do a bit of number-crunching: can the guards actually hit the PCs at all? If not, there's probably no point rolling for all their attacks over and over just fishing for a natural 20.

[QuadraticGish]

You could check out the troop (https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/rules-for-monsters/Creature-types/#Troop_Subtype) subtype.

[Draconi Redfir]

give all the guards one hitpoint and very low ac?

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by QuadraticGish
You could check out the troop subtype.

This was my first thought as well.

[Calthropstu]

I did mooks once, a small army of barbarians vs 5 mythic pcs. At lvl 1/1 they were fighting 4 and trouncing them, but always in danger of dying. By lvl 4/2, they were fighting 20. They trounced them, but were still in danger. At 6/3, they could no longer challenge the party.

So go nuts. Just have them try to press the pcs with sheer numbers.

[Fizban]

How many constitutes a "massacre?"

Either the PCs are so far above their foes that they barely need to roll anymore, or they aren't. If they aren't, then they shouldn't be slaughtering with impunity, they should be rolling dice and keeping their egos in check lest they hubris themselves to death. If by "Epic 6" you mean they're 6th level- isn't a major point of that cap to keep them in a place where they never stop being threatened by an army of normal people?

Some posts from an old thread on the topic:

How about a combination: they have a Cleric and Druid who both have access to AoE spells, which are the game's intended solution to piles of mooks. You don't even have to bother rolling when you know that even a successful save will drop a foe.

Combine that with some morale mechanics: Heroes of Battle calls for a DC 20 will save whenever an individual drops below half hp and whenever half of that individual's group drops- DC20 basically being an auto-fail for 1st level solidiers. Two failures is enough to make them run away, and failing by 10 or more (so 50% chance) means they run away immediately.

With that you can hit a pile of guys with an AoE and even if there's so many you can only hit half of them you'll still mess up the rest: half the remainder will run away, and the remaining 1/4 will be shaken so any additional fear effect (intimidate, fear auras, whatever) will stack and leave them running too. If the PCs absolutely refuse to do it, have one of the NPCs pack the heat instead. The party is of the level where army destroying spells are available.


Aside from spells, it's also unlikely any of these mooks have the AC (or hp) to resist basic attacks from characters of this level. A 13th level Crusader has BAB +13, that's three attacks per round with a bow even without class features. Humanoid mooks generally cap out at AC 20 (unless the DM is covering them in magic items or buffs), while the Crusader probably has some str bonus and can afford a masterwork bow with a str bonus. So about 2 kills per round until they run out of arrows that you don't really need to roll for. With melee attacks their bonus is probably closer to +20 so it's just three kills every round, and of course the Crusader has that nifty aura that says "I don't care if on in twenty attacks hit me because I'll heal it off in a single round." Unless you're running the hypothetical "200 archers all have a straight shot and target you in unison" method of combat, but if you were you wouldn't be asking.

Really the only thing limiting their ability to mow down mooks is some sort of time pressure, but you haven't mentioned what that might be. No time pressure means they should be able to wade in and cut their way through almost any number of mooks- no risk, no reward (by the xp chart or common sense), no need for rolling. Time pressure means you deal with them properly via AoE spells.


I suppose I didn't address rolling things for the mooks did I? Well obviously for starters you just have them move all on the same turn, which a lot of people do already. Then consider their attack bonus: just like their AC isn't enough to stop the PCs, this group of PCs can all wear medium armor so after magic it's likely that the +0 to +2 of a 1st level non-elite mook can't hit them without a 20 either.

Heroes of Battle has ranged guys covered again with volley of arrows rules, turning blocks of 10 guys into a single save for the PCs to make vs a bit of damage. Normally you're supposed to make an attack roll for the volley leader to see if it lands on target or deviates like a splash weapon- chuck that, this damage is just for flavor anyway (or make it take 20 guys to land one volley's worth of damage to account for say, 50% accuracy on the targeting roll). That'll be 1d8, DC15 ref negates, area is 10 squares just like the archers. For concentrated, 2d8, DC 15 ref for half against a single square. If you don't want to roll saves you can again just ignore them/ crank up the number required to get that 1d8 damage.

Melee guys don't have a "volley" mechanic, but you can basically turn them into one. Normally Aid Another requires a roll for each guy making the aid check- chuck the roll and just make it +2 for each extra guy (or +1 if you want to account for their 50% accuracy on the aid another roll), and another +2 if the group has a flank (because one of the flankers makes the attack). A medium PC approaching a flat line will only be threatened by 3 guys, for base+4. Once they're surrounded you need to do a little counting, but the max is base+18 for a full 9 man surround (8*2 for aid, +2 for flank). That's enough to hit, but still just for the 1d8 "flavor" damage.

*This could get complicated if you use a bunch of reach weapons, so just don't do that- you need a bunch of feats to use a reach weapon through even an allied square without penalty, so only count the front line of guys. A front line of reach weapons has 5 threats instead of 3, so base+8 for the one attack. A perfect surround of one line of reach weapons (a box 5 squares on a side with an empty middle and one medium PC in the center) is 16 guys- that's probably worth two attacks at +18. Just ignore AoOs altogether- they could theoretically ready their Aids to boost AoOs but that would require dividing up the bonuses and the point is to simplify. If one of the PCs charges a line of longspears just retroactively assume they braced for the charge: rolling double damage preserves the flavor but is still only 2d8, easy to roll but not huge enough to distract from the main event.


So for you, zero or one roll per 10 ranged guys and one roll against each PC that's in melee, with a bonus based on the number of guys threatening them, which you can tell at a glance. For the PCs, zero or one save per 10 guys making a volley attack and they just no-roll kill 1-3 guys depending on what they're doing (and once half are dead the rest are shaken and an inch from fleeing), or they kill/+rout 3/4 of a force with a single AoE spell. I think that's about as condensed as you can make it without completely leaving behind the underlying mechanics.

If you don't already, throw the damage die along with the d20 for attack rolls, that shaves off a bit more time as well. Note how all the standard mook weapons are d8s: longsword/battleaxe, longspear, longbow, light crossbow, even lance. Same die means less time switching dice. For lighter/skirmisher troops, it's all d6s: shortspears, shortswords, shortbows, clubs, etc. Heavier troops can all be d10's: halberds, dwarven waraxe/bastard sword, heavy crossbows. Anti-PC "suicide" troops would use greataxes to fish for 12's or scythes to fish for x4 crits. Note that the PCs don't really care about the other differences: they're so strong the difference in armor between conscripts and and heavies doesn't much matter, and chopping through "heavy" soldiers as easily as peasants is supposed to be one of the perks of leveling up. Their main limit is how many attacks they can make (and that's where Great Cleave and Whirlwind Attack used to fit in before people stopped using piles of actual mooks).
And back to now:

Instead of running a combat, have the players describe how they mow down the terrified soldiers. You could also make it a skill challenge if you like.
I know it's a popular roleplaying shtick, but I've always hated this suggestion. In narrative focused rules-lighter games where the players are supposed to describe their actions however they want, sure. In DnD, rules mean things. If you tell someone to "describe their kill," they will immediately go off the rails with ridiculous videogame fatality ideas, lopping off heads, limbs, putting dragons in headlocks, shooting holes through things they can't shoot through, etc.

But that's not how DnD works. Creatures do not die until they hit -10 hit points: unless you actually dropped them to -10, it is flat impossible to declare that you chopped their head off. If you didn't drop them to at least 0 or -1, you can't even declare that you've run them through or made a horrible gaping wound, no matter how devastating you think your however many damage crit was. And nothing in the rules ever seriously supports lopping off limbs, climbing up dragons to stab them in the mouth, or any of that.


So once again: if the PCs really are that far above their foes, you shouldn't need to make anything up to get the point across. If they only miss on a 1 and their minimum damage is a guaranteed drop, that's already huge, especially if they do it multiple times per round. Every strike causes an immediate knock-out via head trauma, pain, or system shock. If you make 1s stop auto-failing and their attack bonus is high enough, then they're not even rolling for hits anymore- they're rolling for the threat range of their weapon to see the difference between an auto-down, and a crit which actually does insta-kill, and thus earn a potentially ridiculous insta-kill wound. There is also the very real problem that if these foes are fanatical enough to stand atop the corpses of their fellows (somehow being Shaken and yet also ignoring morale checks that would break them), then yes there could be literal piles of bodies that become bad terrain or even cover.

And if the PCs can in fact be laid low by a couple d8's per round as they slowly chew through foes at one or less per turn, then they shouldn't be described as unstoppable action heroes, because they aren't.

[Particle_Man]

You could reverse it: Have the players play some of the terrified mooks, facing off against these action heroes (which you could run assuming you know the pcs’ SOP for this one-shot reversal) (cheat a bit to have the npc mooks get attacked before the pc mooks). See if the pc mooks figure out anything inventive to survive and flee the wrath of both the regular pcs and the wannabe goddess (the pc mooks won’t win, of course, but since “losing” just means that their real characters win that should be ok).

It might be cool for the players to realize how badass their regular pcs are from the outside POV.

Kinda like that Darth Vader combat scene in Rogue One, I suppose.

[JusticeZero]

They haven't really realized how they taste against normal people yet.
The BBEG is going full Vanessa DeVore on her conscripts, so they're in a fight to the death no matter what they do; their fates were sealed the moment the party hits the gates, which is going to hit lots of rage buttons on the party. I'm actually going to have a lot of them try to run and immediately die from their pacts. The barracks is basically a wide hallway, and they want to destroy something on the far end.

[Elves]

Instead of running a combat, have the players describe how they mow down the terrified soldiers. You could also make it a skill challenge if you like.
This but run the first 2-3 rounds of combat so that they get a chance to show off. Then just describe how they mow through the rest.

[Elkad]

How many is "massive"?

40? 400?

For 400 guys with slings and str12, you just assume every group of 20 rolls every number on a d20.
If 20 of them need a 19 to hit the wizard, he gets hit twice (and roll to try to confirm the crit on the 20).
If all 400 target the wizard, then he takes 41d4+41 damage. (40 hits, one of which is a double-20 for the confirmed crit).

Roll the damage dice anyway, cause that's the fun bit.

And the PCs will be happy they aren't at my table, where slings do D6, have 80' range increments, and bullets are 10 to the lb. (much closer to what their actual stat should be)

[PrismCat21]

There is a Mob template in DMGII. It's great for a massive amount of weak creatures attacking a small group.
You can do a quick internet search to locate it if you do not have ready access to Dungeon Master's Guide II.

[Kitsuneymg]

Use the aforementioned troop subtype. Make several troops. Be sure to describe the PCs dropping multiple individuals with every offensive action. Even misses.

When new guards join the fray, either add a second troop or just add hit points to the one they are fighting. Maybe have fast healing at a rate of 5/additional soldier joining the fray each round?

[Telonius]

I'd ask a question first. Do you want these cultists to actually pose any kind of a threat or challenge to the players? How you answer that will really determine how you proceed. If you want them to be a threat, you can do things like add templates, use terrain, go all-out Tucker's Cultists on them. But if you just want them to be a speed bump, or a challenge in a different way than physical danger (i.e. alignment stuff, how to morally deal with a bunch of brainwashed yokels), you'd want to approach it differently.

If you're wanting to maximize the gore, play it straight for a couple of rounds. Then, call for an Intimidate check from the players (with bonuses for each cultists massacred). If it succeeds, the cultists go from Shaken to Frightened.

[nedz]

The Mooks have to pose some threat to the party or there will be no tension.

A couple of options spring to mind.

Have 1d6 (say) mooks turn up each round from random directions and attempt to stop thje PCs doing whatever they are doing. This shouldn't ever bog down because there will never be that many mooks around at any time, and there will always be some new threat which apears. Run this until it gets old.

Have a column of mooks turn up from one direction. The PCs must then utilise the terrain, and some formation, to block them. This should be a relentless flow which has to be stemmed.
For a twist have a smaller column come from some other direction towards the end.

[rel]

for streamlining you can
treat any hit on a mook as a kill or use a combined hitpoint pool.
Use average damage rolls for mooks
make attack rolls for groups e.g. 20 rolls each representing the efforts of 5 mooks rather than 100 rolls
skip using the battle mat

[Feldar]

I once pitted a 15th level party against 100 standard Monster Manual bugbears. The party fighter, 15th level, decided to wade into combat. The bugbears reduced him to single digit hit points in one round with concentrated missile fire and a good number of crits.

Be careful what you call mooks. They might be low level, but that doesn't mean that they can't use basic sound tactics.

[Calthropstu]

I once pitted a 15th level party against 100 standard Monster Manual bugbears. The party fighter, 15th level, decided to wade into combat. The bugbears reduced him to single digit hit points in one round with concentrated missile fire and a good number of crits.

Be careful what you call mooks. They might be low level, but that doesn't mean that they can't use basic sound tactics.

Agreed. 100 lvl 1 wizards casting magic missle deal 100d4+100 damage.

[SangoProduction]

These can be represented with the "Minion" modifier.
Just set their HP to one. Or set it so they can take exactly 1 hit.

If you want to be a bit more awesome with "innate cleaves," group said minions into "mobs" or "swarms," and make them act in the mob, and an attack against the mob, which would take out all its hits/hp takes out every minion in suitably absurd fashion.
Perhaps the barbarian hits the guard upside the head so hard, the helmet flies off and knocks out the other 5 by ricochet.

If there are literally no other threats than just mooks, that's when it can go to pure narrative time, and simply remove the nonsense of the rolling... as they are mooks. It's a narrative device, not a challenge to be overcome.

[Sneak Dog]

Let the players churn through hundreds of nervous guards. Escalate. Make them try different things to deal with the unstoppable force afore them as the reality sets in.

Stand and fight. Use ranged weapons.
Use the siege weapon of 3d6 damage with poor to-hit.
Bury the PCs in numbers attempting to bog them down.
Flee.
Turn on the BBEG and eachother.
Or something like that.

Go down this list as their numbers dwindle, go up over time as their morale recovers or their methods bear fruit.

Let the players feel high-level. These mooks shouldn't be a big threat, make them not be. And figure out how to run it quick. Don't use a battlemap, just describe their rough positions. Don't roll damage for the mooks, just use their average damage as a static number. Get a digital diceroller to roll their attack rolls together. Run it fast and loose, grab the battlemap when the BBEG enters the fray.

Personally I'm not a fan of the troop subtype. It's a way to make low CR units a threat to high CR units. 3rd edition is all about the power curve making lower CR units trivial, letting a high-level fighter carve a path through an army barely breaking a sweat.
It should've implemented some other more holistic way to make low CR units a threat to high CR units if that was not the goal, like lowering all attack, save, DC and AC scaling.

[ChudoJogurt]

If its a curbstomp that has absolutely zero chance of not working then just get them to describe it. No chance of failure = no dice rolls required.

If you want to have a medium slightly-drain-their-resources enxounter then I recommend using some variation of the mob template.
Which essentially is like a swarm of larger creatures, making a single Huge (or bigger) higher-CR creature.
The exact numbers per swarm and exact stats can be fixed to your campaign needs.

When a swarm is defeated, you get to describe how the characters cut a bloody swath through the whole battalions, leaving dead, wounded and psychologically traumatised mooks behind them.

[Roninblack]

Heroes of battle may also have some useful ideas for large combats like you're describing.

[JusticeZero]

What I ended up doing:

At the front, there was a Troop (CR 5) of foot soldier types.
Behind that was about 150' of CR 1/3 foot soldiers with 5 hp.
There were a couple cranes with building materials. The ropes were AC 20 (size), hp 8. The archer took one out, crushing three soldiers, and all the soldiers within 10' had to make a save or panic and flee, so they got to watch three soldiers turn to flee, then scream and glow then fall dead as the BBEG ripped out their souls for disobeying her.
The rest of the hall was about 30 isolated guards rolling 1d20+0 to hit vs the party's 20+ ACs, with the Discord die roll tags all reading things like "d20 *cowers, jabs fearfully*", "d20 *crying*" and so on until they had cleared the entire barracks. I just stuck them on the map and they only moved if they needed to in combat to get to the PCs.