Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Rashomon 04-29-05, 07:45 AM	Yeah, so I was just wondering what kind of army an Evil Empire would field. Basic Assumptions: The Evil Empire is a very high-magic society. The Evil Empire has no scruples and will do anything to achieve victory. The Evil Empire does not like risking its citizens - it believes in making the other guy die for his country. The Evil Empire favors efficient means, then expedient means. That aside, what I came up with was hordes of undead. Undead are cheap (Raumathari Battlemage's Sword Focus lets you ignore material components costing up to 50gp) and easy to create (Warlocks have The Dead Walk so they can raise up gigantic droves of minions to hurl at their opponents, clerics and wizard can both cast Animate Dead, etc.). The undead hordes are paired with extremely mobile wizard bombardiers, to destroy strongpoints with torrents of magic, while the zombies and skeletons swarm over the survivors and control terrain. Assuming the average level of every spellcaster is 6, that means they can each lead 12 HD of skeletons or 24, with one of the spells for undead control, and that is doubled if they have the LM item which doubles number of undead controllable. Does anyone have any comments and suggestions for improvement? What holes are there in this strategy?
Magilla450 04-29-05, 11:59 PM	Radiant Servant of Pelor?
Timespike 04-30-05, 12:06 AM	Wights & wraiths. They're intelligent, powerful, ruthless, and self-replicating. Undead are extremely vulnerable to good clerics & paladins, exalted characters, and creatures from the positive energy plane, and, to a lesser extent, druids & rangers who still have access to healing magic and therefore the means to harm undead with positive energy. Deathless are also just deadly against undead, sharing many of their strengths without as many weaknesses. But the worst are positive energy creatures. A group of 10 Xag-Yas can wreak absolute havoc on an undead army. 1 xag ya (CR 4) can kill an atropal (CR 30) without any real fear of reprisal, just by floating into its body and lashing away with positive energy rays.
MorandirNailo 04-30-05, 01:36 AM	Why bother fielding an army? An empire with no scruples would have no problem with guerilla, "terrorist" tactics; teleport a few mages into key areas and cast some Meteor Swarms, assassinate leaders, destroy crops, etc. Huge armies of undead, while cool, are unpractical. There's simply no need for them when you have guys who can cast Apocalypse from the Sky. Assuming the enemy nation doesn't have the resources to defend against magic of this kind, this method is the most ruthlessly effecient, and is the one I would use if I had that kind of power... Mor
MikeN 04-30-05, 01:53 AM	Why bother fielding an army? An empire with no scruples would have no problem with guerilla, "terrorist" tactics; teleport a few mages into key areas and cast some Meteor Swarms, assassinate leaders, destroy crops, etc. Huge armies of undead, while cool, are unpractical. There's simply no need for them when you have guys who can cast Apocalypse from the Sky. Assuming the enemy nation doesn't have the resources to defend against magic of this kind, this method is the most ruthlessly effecient, and is the one I would use if I had that kind of power... Mor How many level 17+ mages in your hypothetical evil empire? Characters of that experience are supposed to be quite rare after all... That's one thing done for "consistency" sake...otherwise, quite a few high-level adventurers could make sure that there are no more --insert race here-- anymore...
MorandirNailo 04-30-05, 02:15 AM	FR; need I say more? *lol* Seriously though, I know that they're supposed to be rare; even so, it just takes 2 or 3 over the course of maybe a week to wreak all the havoc you need to. Plus, the original poster did say the society is very high magic; maybe the place is just crawling with them. Even if it isn't, teams of mid-level warmages + a few Wayfarer guides = BOOM. I don't care if you're using fireballs, gather up enough lvl 5 mages, and you're good to go. My point was that for someone with access to lots of magic, it makes more sense to assault key positions within your enemies' infrastructure than it does to point one gi-normous army at another and see which survives longer. Teleport combined with offensive, sneaky, and mind-altering magic is a very, very scary thing. Mor
Rashomon 04-30-05, 06:42 AM	Thanks for the input, everyone. I was kind of wondering what the fodder was for when there were enough mages to set a continent on fire to begin with. Rule through fear of force, rather than force itself - a single demonstration of withering firepower later, nobody will be able to stand against you. Thanks again.