Armies in D&D Settings

[androkguz]

Well, first of all I kind of disagree with you premise. The way it really works in D&D is that armies of low level minions can't effectively attack and kill high level adventurers. But adventurers aren't good at killing entire armies. In other words: high level adventurers are very good at defending themselves from armies. They are not, however, that great at defending civilians from other nation's armies. That's why as a ruler you hire armies and adventurers.

The real use of an army in D&D is to provide support to the higher level warriors and to be at everywhere at once in a battlefield. You can think of armies as another one or two party members that cover a role in the team but still require aid.

There is also the fact that high level adventurers just don't exist by default which means that you can't always simply train 15th level wizards. Those are special guys.

But to answer what I think is your question...
If I was the one creating an army for a kingdom that fears being under attack by high level adventurers or expects to have to kill some party of lvl 12+ the first thing I would pay attention is to who is on my team that has high levels. Those people would play a mayor critical role.

Depending on my alignment I would train my soldiers to expect their families to be wiped if they don't die heroically when commanded and to get a resurrection if they do (I would pay those resurrections with the dead party's gear and the state budget. Before doing it I would have the battle scried upon to see who is and who isn't worth it).

All of the army would be trained to support our own high level adventurers the best way they can (by flanking for rogues, by being hard to kill so the assassin can get her 3 rounds for death attack, by tanking for the wizard and learning to fight under mass boosts, etc.)

There would be many teams of elites (I would expect them to be low level PC classes) that would be extremely overgeared and prepared to fight particularly troublesome adventurer types.

Anti-magic tactics would include:
-At least 1 of every 5 warriors should get the feat "Improved Grapple" and jump ASAP on into grapple with whatever wizard-sorcerer-bard or even cleric-druid they encounter. They are instructed to disarm this characters from spell component pouches, holly symbols, spellbooks, staffs, etc. Being grappled is a lot more troublesome to cast spells than taking damage from mooks and casting defensively is a cake for high levels.
-Disperse. Never be too close to your comrades. Phalanxes are good to fight cavalry, not to survive fireballs. Unless of course your commander considers otherwise.
-If possible, I would have a mage killing squadron. It would include as many strong damagers as it can and they would drink potions of fly and invisibility and sneak up on any Vaarsuvious or Xykon that is blasting from the sky.

Anti-Bigshot warriors (such as Roy) tactics would include:
-If possible, I would have a debuff squadron. It would include a bunch of magewrights, adepts, low level casters and people trained in use magic device. It would be important to have more than 30 members of a this team. They would be instructed to remain always out of melee from the target and to bombard it with the use of wands or scrolls of incapacitating spells such as Hold Person, Shatter, Blindness/Deafness, Command (drop weapon! Then a melee mook is to run and pick it up and get it away from the guy), etc. He is bound to roll a natural 1 on some save and then is when you throw the army against him.

[The MunchKING]

You appear to have missed lucky crits and unlucky saves vs. spells. Not that I'm saying a level 1 character, or even a horde of them, is likely to do substantial damage. It's just that the possibility is there and with an infinite number of mooks etc. etc.

DR Armor is available for non-epics. by Epic levels, there's DR feats.

[Amphiox]

To clarify, as it seems from some of the replies that I wasn't sufficiently clear in the OP, I'm not trying to argue that armies are useless in a D&D setting. I was trying to say that *if* armies were useless in the setting, they would not exist, but since they obviously do, then they must be.

But my question was how? How, with D&D RAW do you make an effective army in a scenario where marauding bands of evil adventurers are a potential threat that one has to defend against?

For example, can you do it by numbers alone? If level one mooks are hopeless, what about level 5. Can a several thousand strong force of level 5-10 characters beat a team of level 15-20 characters?

If mid level adventurers are common enough, you could just have your own teams standing by to counter them. But if higher level adventurers are rarer, not every nation may have access to them. What would those nations do? If the goal was to assemble a force to take out a team like Team Tarquin, and you didn't have another team of similar level, what could you do? Could you do it with an army of mostly level 5 characters? Would you need level 10 characters? Imagine that you as a ruler of a wealthy nation could break the level-wealth rules and equip your forces with equipment more advanced than their levels would otherwise allow? Or would it be most cost effective to take your 12 best level 1 recruits and train them into epic level special forces (one team and one backup team, just in case)?

[jere7my]

But if armies cannot thwart them, then armies in D&D worlds should not exist. No point in wasting the money raising and maintaining them.

That doesn't follow.

Leaving adventurers aside, there are monsters in D&D that are literally untouchable by soldiers without access to magic. They could stroll through an army of fighters without breaking a sweat, and eat the general for tea.

Your response seems to be "Non-magical armies cannot thwart these monsters, so non-magical armies in D&D should not exist." A more appropriate response would be "These monsters are really rare, and difficult to prepare for. Let's raise an army to deal with the 99% of situations we're likely to find ourselves in, and then talk about maybe hiring some specialists."

Same thing with adventurers. They're rare, and when you need to deal with them you hire specialists (or you lose). In the day-to-day business of waging war and dealing with the populace, your basic army does just fine. Taken to the extreme, your argument says that no crime boss should ever hire a couple of bruisers to guard the warehouse, because they'll get taken apart if Elminster shows up to steal this year's grain shipment. After all, in a world with high-level adventurers, low-level mooks are useless, so why waste money paying them?

This is why D&D castles have walls: not every soldier can afford wings of flying.

[stavro375]

That doesn't follow.
Same thing with adventurers. They're rare, and when you need to deal with them you hire specialists (or you lose).

I find this premise dubious. If Nale acting alone can recruit 3 Linear Guilds' worth of mid-level adventurers within the span of (presumably) a few weeks each, then how much time would an entire country need to build even a single battalion of adventurers?

And why bother recruiting adventurers anyway? What exactly is stopping militaries in the OOTS-verse from sending their soldiers on adventuring missions every few months to grind XP? Just build a fortress in a remote part of your terrority, abandon it and let the monsters move in, send in some soldiers to kill everything and grind XP, rinse & repeat until you have several hundred mid-level soldiers who can carve a path through every horde of low-level mooks they face.

[The MunchKING]

And why bother recruiting adventurers anyway? What exactly is stopping militaries in the OOTS-verse from sending their soldiers on adventuring missions every few months to grind XP? Just build a fortress in a remote part of your terrority, abandon it and let the monsters move in, send in some soldiers to kill everything and grind XP, rinse & repeat until you have several hundred mid-level soldiers who can carve a path through every horde of low-level mooks they face.

The problem is challenge rating. If the monsters are too tough, you lose all your soldiers that way. If the monsters aren't tough enough, then the XP scale will pewter out before the Soldiers can get to High levels.

Also I think when you start sending hundreds of soldiers in, what counts as a "challenge" to get XP is significantly raised.

[Reddish Mage]

That doesn't follow.

Leaving adventurers aside, there are monsters in D&D that are literally untouchable by soldiers without access to magic. They could stroll through an army of fighters without breaking a sweat, and eat the general for tea.

Your response seems to be "Non-magical armies cannot thwart these monsters, so non-magical armies in D&D should not exist." A more appropriate response would be "These monsters are really rare, and difficult to prepare for. Let's raise an army to deal with the 99% of situations we're likely to find ourselves in, and then talk about maybe hiring some specialists."

Same thing with adventurers. They're rare, and when you need to deal with them you hire specialists (or you lose). In the day-to-day business of waging war and dealing with the populace, your basic army does just fine. Taken to the extreme, your argument says that no crime boss should ever hire a couple of bruisers to guard the warehouse, because they'll get taken apart if Elminster shows up to steal this year's grain shipment. After all, in a world with high-level adventurers, low-level mooks are useless, so why waste money paying them?

This is why D&D castles have walls: not every soldier can afford wings of flying.

Your treating adventurers and monsters as extraordinary oddities. However, adventurers are certainly not rare, and the rarities of monsters are listed in the monster manual.

Its worse in many settings and in OOTS in specific, since adventurers and adventuring seems to be downright mainstream (everyone we run into seems to know all about them, and how they work, not to mention the game rules; Also even high level magical items are available at a marketplace and you have to stand in line).

Also, OOTS commoners don't seem to be living on a budget of a silver a day, magic seems a lot more common.

[Scow2]

For example, can you do it by numbers alone? If level one mooks are hopeless, what about level 5. Can a several thousand strong force of level 5-10 characters beat a team of level 15-20 characters?

A force of level 5-10 characters can, but you can't get people in that number in a concentration large enough to threaten the level 15-20 characters except as a small level 5-10 special forces team (Ranging from 5-20 individuals in any unit). Fortunately, adventuring parties higher than level 15 are very, VERY rare.

Facing an adventuring party in the 15-20 range is the same as trying to fight a Wyrm lesser true dragon (Brass/Black), Adult Greater true dragon (Red, Silver, Gold, Bronze), Titan, or Tarrasque. A party of level 15 characters is CR 19. A 4-person party of level 16 characters is CR 20. A party of level 17 characters is CR 21. A 4-person party of level 20 characters is CR "WTF!?"

[stavro375]

The problem is challenge rating. If the monsters are too tough, you lose all your soldiers that way. If the monsters aren't tough enough, then the XP scale will pewter out before the Soldiers can get to High levels.

Also I think when you start sending hundreds of soldiers in, what counts as a "challenge" to get XP is significantly raised.

Fair enough -- maybe my exploit won't work, but that still doesn't mean that creating large forces of mid-level soldiers isn't possible. For example: Azure City. On the eve of Xykon's invasion there were at least 100 Paladins in Azure City itself, implied by O-Chul to be a fraction of the total size of their Paladin corps itself.

The scale of the Battle of Azure City raises some questions -- the Hobgoblin horde was about 30,000 strong, opposed by ~10,000 low-level soldiers. Would Azure City have fared better if it structured its military the way it structured its Azure Guard, sending platoons out on adventuring missions every few months until the military as a whole is mid-level?

Quick mechanics question: Do XP requirements to level up increase with level? Because if so, the Azure Guard probably could've distributed XP among its members much more intelligently than it did.

[Gray Mage]

Fair enough -- maybe my exploit won't work, but that still doesn't mean that creating large forces of mid-level soldiers isn't possible. For example: Azure City. On the eve of Xykon's invasion there were at least 100 Paladins in Azure City itself, implied by O-Chul to be a fraction of the total size of their Paladin corps itself.

The scale of the Battle of Azure City raises some questions -- the Hobgoblin horde was about 30,000 strong, opposed by ~10,000 low-level soldiers. Would Azure City have fared better if it structured its military the way it structured its Azure Guard, sending platoons out on adventuring missions every few months until the military as a whole is mid-level?

Sending a bunch of low level Warriors on adventuring missions is a great way of getting them all killed. Plus, while it could have helped, if it worked, against the hobgoblins, Xykon could probably still kill the whole army by himself anyway. Sure, it'd take some days.

Quick mechanics question: Do XP requirements to level up increase with level? Because if so, the Azure Guard probably could've distributed XP among its members much more intelligently than it did.

Yes, not only do lower CR challenges give you less XP, but you need more XP to level (Level * 1000 for the next level).

[The Giant]

Parties of high-level adventurers don't have time to piss around with wars and sieges and such; they're busy preventing all the horrible things that fill up 3-5 Monster Manuals from taking over.

Plus, any character who gets to be high level gets to be too expensive for any kingdom to actually afford to hire, whether that's because their fees are too high or they just don't care about money as much as they care about lost artifacts. The GNP of most countries is less than the expected wealth of a 20th level adventurer. So your nation ends up with a handful of high-level folks that are personal friends or family members of the ruling class, a slightly larger pool of mid-level people who are pricey but effective, and then a lot of low-level people who are good for keeping order among the peasants or warding off goblins.

The idea that you can walk into any tavern and 2-5 adventurers of high level will be there is literally a joke. It may be how it works in OOTS, but only because OOTS is a parody. It's making fun of the fact that because every D&D game needs to start with the players "meeting" each other, lazy DMs have them all walk into the same tavern at the same time looking for work. The truth is, in an average D&D world, you can walk into a tavern and find 2-5 adventurers under 5th level—people who are just starting their career and looking for any lead they can get—and then it gets harder the higher level you want. No wizard of Vaarsuvius' level hangs out in a tavern waiting to be hired by a kingdom to go rough up the baron next door, though. If he wants money, he plane shifts to the Elemental Plane of Earth and digs out a diamond the size of a watermelon.

[Scow2]

Quick mechanics question: Do XP requirements to level up increase with level? Because if so, the Azure Guard probably could've distributed XP among its members much more intelligently than it did.

Exponentially so - but then again, so does the power level of the characters. The issue with raising character's levels is that it forms a logarithmic positive-feedback loop: Higher-level characters are more likely to survive more dangerous situations than lower-level characters, and you're constantly having to replace losses, driving the "Average" level down. It's also difficult gauging the exact level of a character, usually off by one (Unless it's a Full Caster), so you end up sending out mixed-level parties. There isn't enough wealth in a kingdom to give them all even NPC-level WBL, though, making it harder for higher-level characters to be systematically "power-leveled". The strongest characters are those that seek out challenges of their own initiative (Like Miko), or are tough enough to survive hell, high water, and acid-breathing sharks that cast Scorching Ray from their heads (Like O-Chul).

The idea that you can walk into any tavern and 2-5 adventurers of high level will be there is literally a joke. It may be how it works in OOTS, but only because OOTS is a parody. It's making fun of the fact that because every D&D game needs to start with the players "meeting" each other, lazy DMs have them all walk into the same tavern at the same time looking for work. The truth is, you can walk into a tavern and find 2-5 adventurers under 5th level—people who are just starting their career and looking for any lead they can get—and then it gets harder the higher level you want. No wizard of Vaarsuvius' level hangs out in a tavern waiting to be hired by a kingdom to go rough up the baron next door, though. If he wants money, he plane shifts to the Elemental Plane of Earth and digs out a diamond the size of a watermelon.

On this note... there ARE a few times adventurers of high level hang out at taverns. They're usually following intuition (Or estabilished cross-border adventuring support netowrks) to either fill lost roles in previously-established parties that can't bring their previous ally back to life, or look for someone trying to do so. However, it usually amounts to chance encounters, frequently out in the wilderness. The odds of a band of high-level adventurers recently losing a party member (And NOT on the verge of imminent collapse) and a lone high-level wanderer being in the same area are so infinitesimally small that, by the laws of Drama, it's guaranteed to happen. They defy and deny probability, not reinforce or indicate it.

[Amphiox]

You are ignoring the other option: Armies in the setting are not used to defeat adventuring parties. Empires have other adventuring parties with class levels for that. Those parties, like Tarquin's, may lead the armies, but in the end it is they who are expected to take out other high level characters.

If this were true, and if adventurers over level 10 are supposed to be rare, as others have pointed out, then national leaders in D&D settings really should be losing a lot of sleep of "Adventurer Gaps", and doing everything they can to attract adventurers into their territory, and create adventurers among their citizenry.

High level adventurers become nukes.

You might even see conspiracies between Lawful Evil nations to eliminate adventurers (except state sanctioned ones) from their territories, and to have laws prohibiting characters from attaining levels beyond level 10 (without official approval).

Lawful Good nations might attempt to pre-emptively eliminate all powerful creatures within their territories, so that no one will have a chance of obtaining the xp necessary to get beyond level 10. Level 10+ adventurers are simply too dangerous to allow to wander around freely as loose cannons.

Invasions would be prefaced by a rash of assassinations as the aggressors preface open hostilities with an attempt to purge their target's territory of adventurers that might be recruited to help defend the nation.

Really wealthy and powerful nations would be setting up schools of wizardry with the express purpose of training at least a handful of level 15+ wizards (and making sure they are brainwashed to be loyal to the state).

Pretty much all of geopolitics would need to revolve around adventurers, who they are, where they go, and what they are doing.

[Poppatomus]

But my question was how? How, with D&D RAW do you make an effective army in a scenario where marauding bands of evil adventurers are a potential threat that one has to defend against?

I am no rules lawyer, but I think the answer is items. Hire people who can make, say arrows of slaying in crossbow bolt form, and give them to level one sorcerers who know how to cast true strike. Now you can create an, admittedly expensive, musket line, who will basically hit with every shot, and frequently do tremendous damage. I am sure there are other similar items out there, not to mention poisons, magic suppressors, etc . . . There are also seige weapons.

I also think that, even for this question, the catch all rule of sanity makes some sense. The DM has some freedom when the rules would give an unreasonable result (like a very inexpensive ring of true strike, that is in effect a +20 weapon), and I think it would be fair, for instance, to say that members of an army get certain bonuses to damage or to hit when they've completely engulfed you, or are firing hundreds of arrows in a round. Of course, that's not quite the world that the OoTS are in, but that's also a way to deal with it within the rules, at least in spirit.

I will mostly stay out of the argument about whether armies have a place in a world with high level adventurers and high level monsters, since you've said that's not really what this is about, but I did want to say that I think that the analogy isn't "why have an army when fighter jets exist?", but rather, "why don't police forces have fighter jets?"

[Amphiox]

Parties of high-level adventurers don't have time to piss around with wars and sieges and such; they're busy preventing all the horrible things that fill up 3-5 Monster Manuals from taking over.

Plus, any character who gets to be high level gets to be too expensive for any kingdom to actually afford to hire, whether that's because their fees are too high or they just don't care about money as much as they care about lost artifacts. The GNP of most countries is less than the expected wealth of a 20th level adventurer. So your nation ends up with a handful of high-level folks that are personal friends or family members of the ruling class, a slightly larger pool of mid-level people who are pricey but effective, and then a lot of low-level people who are good for keeping order among the peasants or warding off goblins.

It follows from this that a group of level 20 adventurers who wanted to destroy/overthrow a nation could do so, so long as all the other handful of level 20 adventurers were too busy with the eldritch abominations to care.

It seems that this is essentially what Team Tarquin did.

If you were the ruler of a small nation there might not be anything you could do about that, and you can only regard the high level adventurers as forces of nature and hope none of them notices you enough to care about destroying you.

But if you were the ruler of a very powerful and wealthy nation and you were a responsible leader, I would think that you would at least make an attempt to try to keep tabs of all the high level adventurers in your world, so that if some of them looked like they were planning on conspiring against you, you would have at least some advance warning and time to make preparations.

[The Giant]

If this were true, and if adventurers over level 10 are supposed to be rare, as others have pointed out, then national leaders in D&D settings really should be losing a lot of sleep of "Adventurer Gaps", and doing everything they can to attract adventurers into their territory, and create adventurers among their citizenry.

High level adventurers become nukes.

You might even see conspiracies between Lawful Evil nations to eliminate adventurers (except state sanctioned ones) from their territories, and to have laws prohibiting characters from attaining levels beyond level 10 (without official approval).

Lawful Good nations might attempt to pre-emptively eliminate all powerful creatures within their territories, so that no one will have a chance of obtaining the xp necessary to get beyond level 10. Level 10+ adventurers are simply too dangerous to allow to wander around freely as loose cannons.

Invasions would be prefaced by a rash of assassinations as the aggressors preface open hostilities with an attempt to purge their target's territory of adventurers that might be recruited to help defend the nation.

Really wealthy and powerful nations would be setting up schools of wizardry with the express purpose of training at least a handful of level 15+ wizards (and making sure they are brainwashed to be loyal to the state).

Pretty much all of geopolitics would need to revolve around adventurers, who they are, where they go, and what they are doing.

Any or all of those could be true, but you're making a huge assumption that nations are the factions with true power in a D&D world. They're not; adventurers have power, and kings rule at the sufferance of adventurers. Most adventuring parties owe no loyalty to any crown, and will happily overthrow any government that looks at them funny. Governments who target adventurers are governments that get meteor swarmed.

Also, remember that outside of OOTS, people don't recognize the causal relationship between fighting monsters, gaining XP, and gaining levels. People know adventurers are powerful, but the exact process is not something that can be scientifically pinned down. So it's not really plausible for kingdoms to "farm" adventurers like that.

[IW Judicator]

On top of all that there is the issue of what happens if said adventuring party changes its mind. If they decide they don't want to work for you anymore (better offer somewhere else, they discovered that their philosophical views clash with yours, they're just sick of the job, what have you) what is to stop them from crushing you? If you don't have something in reserve, like that army of mooks, then you're going to experience a very short and painful destruction of your ruling class either because of the power vacuum caused by their absence, or because the adventuring party decided to wipe you out themselves.

[Scow2]

But if you were the ruler of a very powerful and wealthy nation and you were a responsible leader, I would think that you would at least make an attempt to try to keep tabs of all the high level adventurers in your world, so that if some of them looked like they were planning on conspiring against you, you would have at least some advance warning and time to make preparations.

And yet, most high-level parties have so many extraplanar and supernatural enemies that they have enough counterdivinations that there's no way to know anything about them more than what they want you to know.

[The Giant]

It follows from this that a group of level 20 adventurers who wanted to destroy/overthrow a nation could do so, so long as all the other handful of level 20 adventurers were too busy with the eldritch abominations to care.

It seems that this is essentially what Team Tarquin did.

If you were the ruler of a small nation there might not be anything you could do about that, and you can only regard the high level adventurers as forces of nature and hope none of them notices you enough to care about destroying you.

But if you were the ruler of a very powerful and wealthy nation and you were a responsible leader, I would think that you would at least make an attempt to try to keep tabs of all the high level adventurers in your world, so that if some of them looked like they were planning on conspiring against you, you would have at least some advance warning and time to make preparations.

Yep, all true. Look at a setting like Forgotten Realms; there are tiny nations that are only independent from the huge evil conquering empires nearby because everyone knows that one or two specific world-famous high-level adventurers live there.

[stavro375]

Parties of high-level adventurers don't have time to piss around with wars and sieges and such; they're busy preventing all the horrible things that fill up 3-5 Monster Manuals from taking over.

Plus, any character who gets to be high level gets to be too expensive for any kingdom to actually afford to hire, whether that's because their fees are too high or they just don't care about money as much as they care about lost artifacts.

So it's not possible to recruit the hundreds of adventurers that any noticeable military would need? Fair enough.

But it's still clearly possible to train a large force of level 3-7 soldiers -- we know it is, because Azure City did it. From a mechanics standpoint, how effective would the ~150 (I'm guessing) paladins Azure City fielded be against an army of 500 level 1 soldiers? 1000? 3000?

And why is Azure City unique in having a corps of mid-level paladins? Do the economics of sending soldiers out adventuring just not work out, or does every city-state have such a force that just isn't relevant to the plot?

[The Giant]

Also, everyone's getting it wrong with the "soldiers/fighter jets" analogy.

The real question is, "Why have foot soldiers when you have the Justice League?" And the answer is, "Because the Justice League isn't always available, and doesn't always agree with you when they are."

[The Giant]

And why is Azure City unique in having a corps of mid-level paladins? Do the economics of sending soldiers out adventuring just not work out, or does every city-state have such a force that just isn't relevant to the plot?

Mostly the, "Not relevant to the plot," point. But also, in the specific case of Azure City, they weren't there to defend the country. They were there to defend the Gate, and the country happened to be around the Gate. It was a unique aligning of a national interest with an adventurer-type interest.

[androkguz]

Given what the Giant has said about armies and superheroes adventurers I would like to post the question:
What would armies have to do to be effective against High level adventurers? I think there is many things but most require preparation

[Scow2]

If this were true, and if adventurers over level 10 are supposed to be rare, as others have pointed out, then national leaders in D&D settings really should be losing a lot of sleep of "Adventurer Gaps", and doing everything they can to attract adventurers into their territory, and create adventurers among their citizenry.

High level adventurers become nukes.

You might even see conspiracies between Lawful Evil nations to eliminate adventurers (except state sanctioned ones) from their territories, and to have laws prohibiting characters from attaining levels beyond level 10 (without official approval).

Lawful Good nations might attempt to pre-emptively eliminate all powerful creatures within their territories, so that no one will have a chance of obtaining the xp necessary to get beyond level 10. Level 10+ adventurers are simply too dangerous to allow to wander around freely as loose cannons.

Invasions would be prefaced by a rash of assassinations as the aggressors preface open hostilities with an attempt to purge their target's territory of adventurers that might be recruited to help defend the nation.

Really wealthy and powerful nations would be setting up schools of wizardry with the express purpose of training at least a handful of level 15+ wizards (and making sure they are brainwashed to be loyal to the state).

Pretty much all of geopolitics would need to revolve around adventurers, who they are, where they go, and what they are doing.

In order for a Lawful Good nation to "Pre-emptively eliminate all powerful creatures from their borders", they either need to hire high-level parties, or they find the guys they sent on the task end up being the high-level parties they tried to prevent. And, they'd be giving the world high-level parties on top of a "Morally Justified Genocide" from a Supposed-to-be-Good nation.

Seriously - they're not killing the monster because they've been a direct menace to society or even 'are evil', but because they might be Experience-Fodder for adventuring parties!? A remedial course in Lawful Goodness ethics this natio needs. Hrmm... as amusing/ironic as bringing the huge spectacle surrounding a specific case of overenthusiastically misapplied mass murder that's been flaring around the threads I've been visiting into THIS thread as a joke, I think I should drop it.

However... a more morally-grey nation might accuse mid-level parties that are getting so strong as to become uncontrollable of crimes they didn't actually commit, to try and turn the local populace against them and make it easier to track them down before they get TOO strong... but this ALSO has a high chance of backfiring.

[RolkFlameraven]

It all has to do with the setting. In FRCS there are country's who's whole army are made up of low to mid level NPC's, undead and golems. But that is a very high magic world.

The best point to make as to how and why army's work would be Cormyr. Between the Purple Dragon's, the Purple Dragon Knights and the War Wizards they have almost every base covered and then they also make all adventuring parties get a permit to operate and THEY can be drafted if needed.

This is why Cormyr is (one of) the most powerful country(s) on Faerun and how they can beat just about anything that is tossed their way. You use an army, they use theirs you use an adventuring parting they toss one your way. You attack with Dragons and Wizards of nigh unstoppable might? Well Vangi would like to say "hi!"

To put it simply High level adventures are WMDs and are to be thought of and used as such. They can solve almost any problem you might have but you might not have anything left once they are done.

[stavro375]

Given what the Giant has said about armies and superheroes adventurers I would like to post the question:
What would armies have to do to be effective against High level adventurers? I think there is many things but most require preparation

My first instinct is liberal application of siege weaponry. If it can demolish castle walls it can demolish adventurers... but actually *hitting* could be a major problem. My second instinct application is liberal application of archers -- you can get more soldiers doing damage and take less losses, although against an adventuring party with ready access to ranged weaponry I'm sure how much good it would do.

Maybe some sort of super-heavy crossbow, manned by a crew of 4-6 firing long-range, high-damage bolts could work? But again, a single wizard with Fly and Chain Lighting is all it'd take to ruin the plan...

[Gray Mage]

My first instinct is liberal application of siege weaponry. If it can demolish castle walls it can demolish adventurers...

I wouldn't count on that if I were you. High level adventurers can survive falls from the stratosphere and short lava baths (as in full imersion) with HP alone. They're pretty tough.

[bguy]

Also, everyone's getting it wrong with the "soldiers/fighter jets" analogy.

The real question is, "Why have foot soldiers when you have the Justice League?" And the answer is, "Because the Justice League isn't always available, and doesn't always agree with you when they are."

Would you have foot soldiers when you have the Justice League though? Wouldn't conventional militaries be pretty much worthless in such a world? After all there's not much reason to spend 3 billion dollars on an aircraft carrier or armored division if Superman's around. If he's on your side you don't need those forces, and if he's against you then they aren't going to do you any good. You are a lot better off investing that 3 billion in something like Cadmus tech, so you actually have the means to fight the Justice League if necessary. Just as a D&D nation would need to focus its military spending on having the means to fight high level adventurers.

[jere7my]

Would you have foot soldiers when you have the Justice League though? Wouldn't conventional militaries be pretty much worthless in such a world?

"Because the Justice League isn't always available, and doesn't always agree with you when they are."

[Scow2]

Would you have foot soldiers when you have the Justice League though? Wouldn't conventional militaries be pretty much worthless in such a world? After all there's not much reason to spend 3 billion dollars on an aircraft carrier or armored division if Superman's around. If he's on your side you don't need those forces, and if he's against you then they aren't going to do you any good. You are a lot better off investing that 3 billion in something like Cadmus tech, so you actually have the means to fight the Justice League if necessary. Just as a D&D nation would need to focus its military spending on having the means to fight high level adventurers.

The issue's not that black+White. What if Superman's off fighting Doomsday when rebels in Elbonia threaten allies in Quarac, or a natural disaster strikes Supermegatopia while the Justice League is suppressing the Elbonian uprising? You work around adventurers, not against them.

There is a whole range of power levels, most of which are gathered around the bottom, in which armies are exceptionally effective.