Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Crox 08-22-05, 11:54 AM	Let's imagine the situation: DM: (Describing a mob) You see a group of angry commoners heading to you ... Player: How many? DM: Something about 30 peasants, they occupy an area 20x20 feet... Player: Goood ... Fireball in the center. DM: (rolling 20 hp on the damage). You see some peasants fall down burning, but the rest still run at you with hostile intention Player: What ... ... ...? So how can I explain to my players why a commoner, who has no chance to survive in fireball, will do it while he is in a mob ? The same thing is with a rats, bats, spiders and so on. Why did they survive fireball while in the swarm? Obviously fireball (and other such spells) must be autokill spells for swarms and mobs, don't you think so?
valvorik 08-22-05, 11:57 AM	Packed so close some offer cover to others, muffling the spread of spells ~ like penguins huddled against the freezing winds (if you've seen March of the Penguins). Also remind a player that rules reflect dramatic reality not reality. How is it that a critical with a longsword can take down a 1st level character but not a 10th level character?
Crox 08-22-05, 12:20 PM	Packed so close some offer cover to others, muffling the spread of spells ~ like penguins huddled against the freezing winds (if you've seen March of the Penguins). It doesn't work: fireball is a spread effect, and neither thing can provide cover to it. It can even turn around corners. Also remind a player that rules reflect dramatic reality not reality. How is it that a critical with a longsword can take down a 1st level character but not a 10th level character? Ahhh, I see a dramatic hero rat that survives 20 hp of fire damage ... :) They are commoners and rats, and this reflects their (not heroic one) ammount of hp. The mob and the swarm is the organization structure and nothing more. And commoner in the mob is the same as the commoner in the tavern, don't you agree with me?
Algorithm_X 08-22-05, 12:32 PM	Description wise this may have been better "Your fireballs sears the flesh from the bones of the those who take the blunt of the blast, leaving ash, and small sizzling chunks of charred flesh clinging to the blackened skeletal remains, but the commoners are packed so tightly that a good portion are only slightly singed and charge you as an enraged mob." If the PCs want to raze a helpless village, I highly doubt they will use the necessary spell casting to prevent Divination from discovering their identity and thus a getting a bounty on their head that would make it unwise to ever bee seen in public again. Poisoned Food, Coup De Grace while sleeping, just a bit of magic would make claiming the bounty too easy. The scary thing is the first two can be done by anyone. Staying at an inn is much less an option. Crox, I don't agree with you. Swarms and Mobs have their own mechanics, technically if they were just a group 30 commoners couldn't fit in a 20 x 20 area (only 16 could) While yes, a mob or swarm is made up of individuals, together as a mob or swarm there is a synegy of those individuals. there is a difference between a group of individual rats and a swarm of rats, this synegy is the difference. The same is true with mobs.
tarkin 08-22-05, 12:37 PM	You failed to undestand. Mob and Swarm are not just organziation structures, they are different 'creature' types. If you read them, it clearly states that they are not all killed by area effect spells, your "explanation" is a major house rule that directly violates the Mob/Swarm description. While under normal circumstances, you can't get cover from a fireball it is a special ability of the Mob/Swarm that protects them. The "logical" in game explanation is that members of the Mob/Swarm grant each other a special kind of "improved cover" that protects them from the fire. He was describing that cover.
Enterik 08-22-05, 12:52 PM	The mob and the swarm is the organization structure and nothing more. And commoner in the mob is the same as the commoner in the tavern, don't you agree with me? Only if that commoner in the tavern is part of a mob :P Swarm and Mob are also mechanics, not merely behavioral descriptions You can disagree on these boards all you want, but I doubt it will convince your DM [to unkill your character?] Anyways, fireball allows a reflex save, so the damage is avoidable, so others providing cover seems reasonable. Personal anecdote: I have been in a non-magical fireball of sorts and the cinder anti-'shadow' I cast upon a nearby wall stood as a clear indication to me that I would have provided cover (Note: I did make my reflex save and I still took damage :embarrass )
Crox 08-22-05, 02:04 PM	Yes you are all correct, in this or that manner. And all your thoughts absolutly match up core rules (except that not even improved cover will provide any help vs. fireball, but I think it was said literally). And I understand rules exactly like you do. But, for me, swarms and mobs break some unwritten fantasy rules, I don't speak about realism, I speak about fantasy heroic realism, a realism of the world that is created by me and my players. And this realism dictates me the persistance of the physical laws, character personalities, time and so on. I mean it looks stupid when you see a commoner walking on the head, or when the same trip takes a month or a year to complete in equal situations, or when the same commoner peasant is killed by fireball when working in the garden and is not when going to the strike. What will you as DM say to your player when he throws a fireball in the center of peasant's crowd. All are killed, you will say, isn't it? But when you treat absolutly the same peasants as a mob then the same fireball will kill two or three peasants, a nonsense for me and, once more again, a violation of physical and fantasy laws. P.S. I don't like home rules and never use them, and I will not create some rule for swarms and mobs. I hope that anybody has any ideas how to cope with this problem with core rules and common sense. For this time I have only one idea: try not use swarms and mobs whenever it is possible.
Tony Vargas 08-22-05, 02:20 PM	Nod. The rules for swarms aren't that unclear - they're just really bad rules (or, at least, easy to aply badly). A key feature of a swarm is that the individual members of it are packed together far more tightly than can ever happen normally, and, rather than dispersing as they normally would, not only stay that way, but move and attack in concert. The formation of a swarm should thus be limitted to very unusual circumstances - like Tarken says, they're thier own creature, not just a mass of individuals - and the mechanics shouldn't be aplied every time you get a lot of individuals in one place.
Shatteredtower 08-22-05, 03:02 PM	I don't see what's so unfantastic about swarm rules. You don't get much more fantastic than the idea that the whole can be greater than the sum of its parts. "Yeah, I may not look like much and old Bess here can barely lift a milking jug these days, but that night, we were part of something bigger. It was one of those situations that just transforms you, you know?" I've got no problem with this idea of strength in numbers, something the mechanics of the game have otherwise failed to address up to this point. It's no less fantastic than the idea that a peasant could seem nearly invincible with the right cause, but "might makes right," mechanics would really throw play balance off. Mobs of peasants all dying in explosions sounds a lot less fantastic than the day the people of Morton's Harbour overcame their fears and defied the fireballs to at last bring Antagonistica of the Purple Flame to justice. I find the latter to be a lot more fantastic than, "Okay, the cleric casts resist energy (fire) on all of us while the bard casts mass cat's grace to boost our Reflex saves. Everyone got that ring of evasion on? Right, wizard, teleport us to her." It's all a matter of how you express it. There are moments that carry ordinary people to achieve the impossible, at least in fantasy. I can see how some people are going to lament this as just one more nerfing nail in the evoker's coffin, however, and how some will see it as a kick in the teeth for fighters who opted for the Great Cleave or Whirlwind Attack feats, but I don't see it that way. I don't think fantasy should have to render the presence of the common folk (or armies) completely meaningless, not even in the presence of demigods.
Dragonsblood 08-22-05, 03:48 PM	It's a broken mechanic, don't use it. Instead, make it a group of individuals with the same initiative. If you want, you can even give them the level 1 Barbarian rage stat adjustment.
Keenath 08-22-05, 04:18 PM	I don't really know where the Mob rules are from, so I'll just address Swarms, but -- don't area effects do double damage to swarms? Edit: Huh. That's strange. I could've sworn... Ah, well, still, it does full damage, which is better than anyone else. Just because your fireball isn't necessarily an instant kill, doesn't mean the evoker is useless. He's doing far MORE damage than anyone else in the party. By way of a game-rules explanation: The mass of bodies pressed around creates the effect of improved cover. Varying Degrees of Cover: In some cases, cover may provide a greater bonus to AC and Reflex saves. In such situations the normal cover bonuses to AC and Reflex saves can be doubled (to +8 and +4, respectively). A creature with this improved cover effectively gains improved evasion against any attack to which the Reflex save bonus applies.That's what's happening. Some of the creatures take the full blast and are killed, save or no, while others gain improved cover and have the effects of improved evasion, surviving unscathed on a successful save, and still others have full cover simply due to the press of bodies around them, just like you'd have full cover if there were a wall between you and the fireball's center.
Crox 08-22-05, 04:49 PM	2 Keenath: Once more again, cover doesn't work against fireball, cause it is a spread effect. 2 Dragonsblood: I wish I can, but what must I do with a player summoning a swarm? ;) 2 Shatteredtower: Well I begin to understand your ideas, by the way I think nothig bad about normal ranged and melee mechanics of swarms and mobs. I agree that the whole is better then the sum of it's parts, and may be a peasant in a mob will be so emotionally charged that he can do the same things as a hero, like surviving a fireball. And one interesting notice at last: When a mob of peasants is charging on you and you are on the same level, then you cannot throw your fireball exactly in the center of the crows, because it will stop early in the front lines.
smrtgmp 08-22-05, 06:10 PM	The way I think about mobs and Area Effect spells are as follows: While cover wont protect you from a spread, the bodies are so packed together that they effectively break line of effect. A fireball might go around a corner, but it wont go through the wall itself (assuming it doesnt do enough damage to destroy the wall, that is). I view the mob in the same light. With everyone packed nuts to butts, there is a lot of unexposed area that the fire just wont touch. Regarding this:It's a broken mechanic, don't use it.I am really starting to detest the term "broken." It is thrown around so often on these boards that it has lost all meaning. How the hell are mobs broken? Do they stop you from enjoying your game? Do they present an unbeatable enemy that will decimate PCs regardless of what they might try? Do they make the very fabric of the game break down? No, of couse they dont. As such, how can they be broken? To label them as such borders on moronic.
DungeonMaster 08-22-05, 07:24 PM	Mobs and swarms are very poor rules. Just don't use them. I agree with smrtgmp they're not "broken", but they're just really terrible rules. (The word broken is however acquiring a different meaning than that previously attributed to it, it is after all, lingo and mutable.) They not only violate the area effect spells but people who have taken specific feats geared towards defeating large groups of small things (cleave, whirlwind attack to name a few). They just don't make sense. Clearly they're for ease of play. Have the commoners fight normally, like commoners, and make them "aid another" in attack rolls and increasing the defense of the foremost commoner. Typically done as a readied action, when the warriors attempt to strike someone or the commoners attempt to strike them. With a large enough group and polearms (farm implements! Pitchforks!) you can easily grant greater than +10 AC and or +10 to hit to a plain farmer. Always give the front line guy a scythe if you're evil. :devil: Use readied partial charges (3rd edition only) so that those that are dropped in the press are immediately replaced. As a figure of merit 6th or 7th level characters that are prepared can level a good number of these with their abilities, roughly 100 critters taking perhaps a loss or two.
Tony Vargas 08-22-05, 07:45 PM	That's about what I was getting at: D&D has some good mechanics that allow a character to deal well with masses of lesser foes: AE spells, WWA, Great Cleave, etc... That's good, nice and heroic, very high fantasy. Then it takes and makes masses of little critters 'swarms' that don't act like masses of lesser foes, but like one BBEG. That's not good at all. Now, there's a similar 'mob' mechanic for medium creatures? Just awful.
Dragonsblood 08-22-05, 08:06 PM	I am really starting to detest the term "broken." It is thrown around so often on these boards that it has lost all meaning. How the hell are mobs broken? Do they stop you from enjoying your game? Do they present an unbeatable enemy that will decimate PCs regardless of what they might try? Do they make the very fabric of the game break down? No, of couse they dont. As such, how can they be broken? I meant "broken" as in the mechanic isn't reasonable. It's not abusive or overpowering. A group of commoners shouldn't gain special powers just because they're angry. The rules give mobs too much credit. No need to make things so personal. 2 Dragonsblood: I wish I can, but what must I do with a player summoning a swarm? ;) I'll have to look into this when I get home before I pass any judgement.
Rabscuttle 08-22-05, 08:36 PM	I'm with Crox, the mob/swam thing doesn't work. The unfortunate thing with rules like these is if you have a DM or player who enjoys the legal aspects of the game and will argue for its use in spite of its silliness.
Lord shadow35 08-22-05, 08:45 PM	I think a wall of fire would be a better idea. That swarm mod crap is just that crap! You can pack as tight as you want in the phb it say's other creature's count as soft cover. witch grant's no reflex save. Wotc has dropped the ball yet again.
Ut-Napishtim 08-22-05, 09:12 PM	I like mobs and swarms, gives you something besides the same old gnolls and undead to toss at the players every now and again. Never had anyone complain before.
TheGogmagog 08-22-05, 10:27 PM	I like mobs and swarms, gives you something besides the same old gnolls and undead to toss at the players every now and again. Never had anyone complain before. Our group has encountered mobs of undead and it didn't occur to me that they were broken in any way, even if my cleric couldn't destroy them anymore. It make for a much more interesting encounter than fireball, no experience, ok move on.
Wellby the Fountain 08-22-05, 10:42 PM	id like to know what motivated these commoners to continue pushing foward after half their friends were incinerated in an inferno of arcane fire... i guess they were all thinking that the wizard who casted it must be out of spells for the day.. being commoners, theres no reason they should think that continuing on their present course would kill them as well, should they? :rolleyes: consider this... a mob of protesters is getting violent. the athorities decide to toss a grenede at them... a bunch die. does said mob just regroup into one big mass of people and continue to push foward? of course not. they scatter, run and hide. no one in their right mind is going to continue the tactic that just got half their numbers killed.
TheGogmagog 08-22-05, 10:52 PM	Snarky comment removed.
Shatteredtower 08-22-05, 10:55 PM	id like to know what motivated these commoners to continue pushing foward after half their friends were incinerated in an inferno of arcane fire... i guess they were all thinking that the wizard who casted it must be out of spells for the day.. being commoners, theres no reason they should think that continuing on their present course would kill them as well, should they? :rolleyes: No, because commoners don't metagame. consider this... a mob of protesters is getting violent. the athorities decide to toss a grenede at them... a bunch die. does said mob just regroup into one big mass of people and continue to push foward? of course not. they scatter, run and hide. no one in their right mind is going to continue the tactic that just got half their numbers killed. Ah, but if you're going to insist on that degree of realism, then why aren't you insisting on the same degree of realism when a dragon, using Power Attack, crits on a bite against a 20th level fighter? You're maintaining that the fighter lives because he's heroic, but there's no way that band of desperate commoners could be heroic. I find this an inconsistent standard. Mob/swarm rules aren't perfect, but they're a lot better than rules that make 1 HD types of all sorts completely insignificant after a point. I don't mind the idea that your PCs weren't very powerful at one point in their adventuring careers, but it feels wrong for the early days to be viewed as a time when you were worthless and couldn't make a difference.
DungeonMaster 08-23-05, 03:36 AM	Ah, but if you're going to insist on that degree of realism, then why aren't you insisting on the same degree of realism when a dragon, using Power Attack, crits on a bite against a 20th level fighter? I'm not arguing that a band of commoners can't be heroic. Just as a side note, a dragon diving, just plain diving gets double damage on it's claw attack. Great wyrm red, let's say. 4d6+8 base +40 power attack. +5 greater magic fang from limited wish +6 divine favor +1 any simple strength buff = 4d6+60. Critical hit + diving means triple damage, 12d6+180 = ~222 damage. That's only 3 spells. Beware of dragons. Particularly the big ones, because you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.
Outlier 08-23-05, 10:05 AM	As a monster, mobs/swarms aren't that 'unbalancing' IMHO. But mob mechanics are 'broken' (i.e. inconsistant or indeterminate rules that violate common sense and disrupt role playing) for several reasons: 1) It stretches the 'suspension of disbelief' too thin when a mob fights better than a unit of trained soldiers and gains a sudden immunity to area effects for most of its members. What are they doing, forming up into a "super power ranger Villageozord?" (Picture a huge farmer made up of the bodies of villagers somehow stuck together, stomping around like Godzilla and complaining about the weather.) 2) A group of people can be either a mob or just a collection of individuals - there is no physical difference, just how you look at it, but the group then responds completly differently to player actions. This creates a metagaming challenge to the players - what spells to prepare, what tactics to use, all dependent on DM whim. Very bad - challenges should occur in-character, not accross the table. 3) If PC's recruit enough assistants (a couple of castings of Summon Monster would do the job for my party - we have 12 players when they all show up) - why don't they get to have 'mob' protection? 4) As the number of people in a small group increases or the number of members of a mob decreases, the rules do not mesh correctly - again, you get conflicting results from player actions depending on how the DM looks at things. Finally, my opinion is that the basic idea of mob rules is actually a good one, it harks back to the days of D&D when I first played it in the late 70's. The problem is that mathematically, power does not scale linearly with HD anymore, so you can't switch scales from unit size 1 to unit size N without a much more sophisticated rule.
solbergb 08-23-05, 02:59 PM	consider this... a mob of protesters is getting violent. the athorities decide to toss a grenede at them... a bunch die. does said mob just regroup into one big mass of people and continue to push foward? of course not. they scatter, run and hide. no one in their right mind is going to continue the tactic that just got half their numbers killed. Actually...in real life there are a number of examples of mobs pushing forward in spite of modern weaponry...or on the face of the guys in front being crushed to death against a barrier. Sometimes the guys with riot gear or even automatic weapons lose and get trampled or even torn to pieces. Usually they disperse the crowd, but it takes a while. See...the guys doing the pushing can't even see what is going on. The people being pushed can't control their actions. I was in a very small "mob" once at a sporting event and when it "surged" as the gates open, although I'm a pretty big guy, I was carried along and it was all I could do to stay on my feet. I coudn't control direction. It was hard to even breathe in the press. Were I to use the mechanic, I'd use the "foremost people provide improved cover for rear folks" explanation. It's pretty much what happens when folks are packed that tight. Spread or no spread, a guy behind an arrow slit has improved cover. A person with people on all sides wouldn't have much exposed to be fried.
Tony Vargas 08-23-05, 03:13 PM	Actually...in real life there are a number of examples of mobs pushing forward ...the guys doing the pushing can't even see what is going on. The people being pushed can't control their actions. Sure, but that's a mob of hundreds or thousands of people constrained by streets or gates or whatever - not 30 people willfully packed into a 20'x20' square for no good reason.
Wellby the Fountain 08-23-05, 03:49 PM	Sure, but that's a mob of hundreds or thousands of people constrained by streets or gates or whatever - not 30 people willfully packed into a 20'x20' square for no good reason. my point exactly.
Crox 08-23-05, 04:46 PM	Were I to use the mechanic, I'd use the "foremost people provide improved cover for rear folks" explanation. It's pretty much what happens when folks are packed that tight. Spread or no spread, a guy behind an arrow slit has improved cover. A person with people on all sides wouldn't have much exposed to be fried Well, I repeat myself, but according to the rules, a guy behind an arrow slit didn't have any cover bonuses vs fireball. Some lads say that in the mob situation, we have so titly packed crowd, that first rows provide total cover to back rows, like a wall. It is correct, but with one exeption. For example, we have a wall wit a height of 6' between us and point of origin of a spread area effect spell, and, unfortunately, the above mentioned wall will not provide any cover to us. The same situation with a mob "living wall". For my game I decided: 1) Do not use mobs in my game at all. 2) What concerning swarms, then I decided to rule that simple swarms, created from common rats, bats, vipers and so on will be destroyed if their elements can be destroyed solely by the spell effect with a 100% probability. More complex swarms either will not be used at all, or treated as they are in core rules. If any more advices how to solve the problem of swarms/mobs (and I still think that it is a problem) in our campaigns, please share it with us $)
Tony Vargas 08-23-05, 05:02 PM	Well, I repeat myself, but according to the rules, a guy behind an arrow slit didn't have any cover bonuses vs fireball. If you use optional rule for degrees of cover, he can, though. we have so titly packed crowd, that first rows provide total cover to back rows, like a wall. It is correct, but with one exeption. I don't know if this is the exception you meant, but an 'air-burst' fireball centered above the center of the crowd has a direct line on every member of the crowd: no possible cover (though it won't cover as large an area). For my game I decided: 1) Do not use mobs in my game at all. 2) simple swarms, will be destroyed if their elements can be destroyed solely by the spell effect with a 100% probability. More complex swarms either will not be used at all, or treated as they are in core rules. I agree about the 'mobs' - as a DM, I wouldn't ever use 'em, the standard combat rules might make modeling combat against overwhelming numbers a bit tedious, but I wouldn't want to inapropraitely 'nerf' hard-earned PC abilities like AE spells, Great Cleave or WWA, just to make my dice-rolling duties a little easier. 'Swarms' that consist of nothing more than large groups of smaller critters forced together by confined space or other circumstance, I also wouldn't use the 'swarm' type for - I might figure out some sort of shortcut for resolving combat with them, but ubering them up to swarms wouldn't be it. The only way I'd use the swarm is to represent an unnatural colony-creature of some kind - a single creature that absorbs smaller critters of some specfic type to form it's body, much like an elemental forms it's body out of it's respective element.
Derren S. 08-23-05, 05:19 PM	I agree with Tony and Dungeonmaster The Swarm/Mob rules are very poor and defy all logic. This rules were imo hastly put together to make low level creatures a threat to mid level adventurers. The is simply no logical way why creatures which, as individual, would be killed by a fireball with no chance of survival, suddenly survive because they are standing next to other creatures which would also normally die. The cover explanation doesn't work as explained multiple times but if you still want to use cover then explain to me why a mob of 30 commoner can charge through a Wall of Fire or Acid Fog and survive while 30 individual commoners would all die. I am really interested how they would provide cover from gas to each other. Next time I fight a dragon, I try to convince the other players not to fight as individuals but as Adventurer Mob. Coupled with leadership that should be a very strong mob.
Keenath 08-23-05, 05:20 PM	I agree with the comments on Mobs not making sense; actually, I've never heard of that mechanic except in this thread -- it's probably in a book I don't have. Probably the DMGII, eh? Well, Mobs aside, I really like Swarms. Whirlwind attack isn't of any use against beetles. Arrows will avail you naught against a cloud of bats. Three hundred tiny dinosaurs will barely notice when you cleave through five of their number. That's a great mechanic for making small creatures worth fighting, and area of effect spells can be explained by full cover (though I have thought before that AOE should probably deal double damage to swarms). Mobs, on the other hand, I tend to agree -- I could understand using this sort of mechanic for thousands of people, or at least hundreds. Too few people, no, not a mob -- it's a group of commoners.
Nom 08-23-05, 05:20 PM	Well, I repeat myself, but according to the rules, a guy behind an arrow slit didn't have any cover bonuses vs fireball.Au contraire. Unless the fireball is shot through the slit (using the special rules for doing so in fireball), an arrow slit is too small (less that 1 sq. ft.) to allow line of effect, and thus the effect does not spread through the slit.
Lafing Cat 08-23-05, 06:36 PM	While swarms do not take double damage from area of effect spells, they do take 150% damage. A free empower (+2 spell levels) is nothing to laugh about, assuming you use your highest level spells, thats like being 4 levels higher right there. However, I'm with you on the mobs thing. A mob should require a similar number of creatures to a swarm (150+), not this 30 thing.
Tony Vargas 08-23-05, 08:08 PM	On WWA & Swarms... Say you have WWA, a Spiked Chainand are flying. You threaten a huge area, a cube 25' across. If you're fighting tiny flying creatures, 8 can fit in each 5' 'square' (actually, cube) around you. Your reach allows you to threaten 124 squares (cubes) around you (not counting your own). If the air around you is just alive with individual bats, you could attack just under 1,000 of them in a single round. Coincidentaly, the number of tiny bats in a 5'x5' swarm is 1000. You'll auto-miss at least 50 of them from rolling '1's, but, you can do it. That's with 1000 bats flapping randomly about you. But, if they crowd together into a single square, suddenly you can only hit the 'swarm' once - for half damage, the same as someone else without WWA.
Colmarr 08-23-05, 11:19 PM	Addressed to no one in particular: Ultimately, this all comes down to two things: 1. Do you want mid-to-high level adventurers (good and evil), to be completely untouchable to low level creatures? If yes, then change the rules affecting area spells, mobs, and swarms. If no, then use mobs and swarms, and remind your PCs that the "little guys" are not just fodder and should not be underestimated. Personally, I'm in this camp. 2. Should an instantaneous flash of heat (which is what Fireball is) wrap around corners and pass through other creatures without loss or diversion of energy? Personally, I don't think it should. It's therefore arguable whether Fireball should be a spread effect. You say that the "spread" rule shows the illogic of the mob rules. I say that hordes of creature packed together tightly show that no instantaneous spell should have an area entry of Spread.
Graf Orlok 08-24-05, 07:19 AM	I agree with the comments on Mobs not making sense; actually, I've never heard of that mechanic except in this thread -- it's probably in a book I don't have. Probably the DMGII, eh? I also dont know where this rule is from. Could someone please answer this question?
Derren S. 08-24-05, 08:08 AM	Yes, they are in the DMG 2. 48 1HD commoners become a single 30 HD (d8) swarm creature which deal 5d6 damage to everything in it. Strangly a mob of 48 20th level warriors also become a 30 HD (d8) mob which deals the same amount of damage. Even more strange is that a commoner mob suddenly have +9 for saves (as a 30 HD creature)
JoeX 08-24-05, 08:42 AM	Addressed to no one in particular: Ultimately, this all comes down to two things: 1. Do you want mid-to-high level adventurers (good and evil), to be completely untouchable to low level creatures? If yes, then change the rules affecting area spells, mobs, and swarms. If no, then use mobs and swarms, and remind your PCs that the "little guys" are not just fodder and should not be underestimated. Personally, I'm in this camp. Commoner are cannon fodder; even in the REAL WORLD a group of trained knights could take an army made of untrained farmers ten times theirs size. Besides we don't need broken rules about mobs to deal with this kind of situations. AS somebody said previous poison into the food and CDG while sleeping are something that everybody can do. And if an EVIL-STUPID party raze a whole village well ...... this village is probly part of a barony wich in turn is a part of a kingdom so somedoby who is both rich and powerfull will get upset about that...
Keenath 08-24-05, 09:32 AM	While swarms do not take double damage from area of effect spells, they do take 150% damage. A free empower (+2 spell levels) is nothing to laugh about, assuming you use your highest level spells, thats like being 4 levels higher right there.I KNEW I'd seen that rule before, but I couldn't remember where, and when I looked up the swarm creatures I didn't see it. Grump! That's because it's hidden under that neat little heading of "Swarm Traits"! Grumble grumble bugs making me look stupid grumble... Say you have WWA, a Spiked Chainand are flying. You threaten a huge area, a cube 25' across. If you're fighting tiny flying creatures, 8 can fit in each 5' 'square' (actually, cube) around you. Your reach allows you to threaten 124 squares (cubes) around you (not counting your own). If the air around you is just alive with individual bats, you could attack just under 1,000 of them in a single round. Coincidentaly, the number of tiny bats in a 5'x5' swarm is 1000. You'll auto-miss at least 50 of them from rolling '1's, but, you can do it. That's with 1000 bats flapping randomly about you. But, if they crowd together into a single square, suddenly you can only hit the 'swarm' once - for half damage, the same as someone else without WWA.That's more a weirdness of the whirlwind rules, rather than an artifact of Swarms. I suppose we could stipulate that the bats are covering each other, thus protecting the rear ones from the attack. Seriously, though -- It may be game rules that you could strike a thousand bats in a huge area, but it isn't logical. Whirlwind attack -- in fact, the whole game! -- is built around the concept of macroscopic enemies. If you throw in very small creatures, they need totally different rules to make them a viable enemy. You can't just ignore swarm-type enemies; they're a staple of fantasy and horror!
Finarin Panjoro 08-24-05, 11:02 AM	I'm with Colmarr. The mob rules give the commoners a chance against higher level PCs (a small chance). As for why a mob isn't wiped out by a fireball it's partially becuase they're tightly packed granting some cover to the individual members and blocking line of effect. But more importantly, the mob shape is an abstraction used for mechanical purposes. If the fireball wipes out a large part of the group then they are replaced by others who were outside the area of effect (and not within that 20x20 square). So my description of the event would be "The blast of arcane fire dessimates the group approaching you leaving piles of charred bodies in its wake. However more people push in from outside the area of the blast and continue to advance upon you". The DM shouldn't be giving the PCs exact numbers on a mob anyway. Its not 40 commoners its a "large group of people". How are they going to know how many are in a constantly shifting crowd of people they don't know? With all that in mind I do apply some slightly different rules to mobs where the PCs are concerned. If you have cleave and do more damage than 1HD of the mob you may cleave it again. If you have great cleave you may do so for each square that you threaten. Same with WWA. A fireball into a mob would require a morale check afterwards (rules in Heroes of Battle). And I have military units behave as mobs as well. I increase their damage dice (5d8 damage for longswords rather than a mobs usual 5d6) and allow them to fire volleys of arrows as ranged attacks (volley rules are in Heroes of Battle as well) and use sheild walls to explain their greater durability. Mob rules also make it possible for the PCs to gain experience for fighting large numbers of small opponents. By about 6th level the PCs should get no experience points for defeating 120 commoners in battle because each individual commoner is like a CR 1/4 encounter. However if the commoners form mobs suddenly they are CR 9, an actual challenge, and worth experience points. Otherwise you pretty much have to just ignore the existence of common people once you get past about 6th level. And best of all it makes encounters with 120 creatures managable without switching to war-gaming rules. I can run a battle with three gargantuan mob creatures. Running a battle with 120 people would be to slow and boring. I love the mob rules and think they are a god send for the DM. Rules consistency is always less important than playability in my book.
Roxlimn 08-24-05, 11:40 AM	Tony Vargas: Actually the ridiculous nature of giving a WWA Fighter 1000 attacks in one round rather makes me favor the Swarm rules. A Fighter can damage a Tiny foe, but a Diminuitive one should be almost impossible to target with a blade, let alone 1000 Diminuitive ones. That sort of fighting feat sounds like a high level or epic level feat. Reminds me of the Jewish Samurai story.
Derren S. 08-24-05, 12:07 PM	As for why a mob isn't wiped out by a fireball it's partially becuase they're tightly packed granting some cover to the individual members and blocking line of effect. That doesn't work. Fireball is a spread and goes around cover. Also cover only reduces damage by 50% (save) which is still enough to kil a commoner. And please explain to me how a mob lets the commoners survive a Cloudkill or Blasphemy. But more importantly, the mob shape is an abstraction used for mechanical purposes. If the fireball wipes out a large part of the group then they are replaced by others who were outside the area of effect (and not within that 20x20 square). So my description of the event would be "The blast of arcane fire dessimates the group approaching you leaving piles of charred bodies in its wake. However more people push in from outside the area of the blast and continue to advance upon you".[/quote] And when there are not more people? When the 48 members of the mob are all inhabitants of a thorp? Rules consistency is always less important than playability in my book. Not when you want a serious fantasy world. As for impossible to attack dimutive creatures, have you ever seen the effect of a warhammer on a fly?
Roxlimn 08-24-05, 12:25 PM	Have you ever tried to hit a flying fly with a warhammer?
Derren S. 08-24-05, 02:53 PM	No, but that is already figured in the Size AC.
Tony Vargas 08-24-05, 03:26 PM	1. Do you want mid-to-high level adventurers (good and evil), to be completely untouchable to low level creatures? If yes, then change the rules affecting area spells, mobs, and swarms.Well, you'd also have to change the natural-20 autohit rule, among other things, but, yes, this is an heroic fantasy games and mighty warriors who can kill a dragon or Troll single-handed (and certainly those who can Cleave through hordes of disciplined hobgoblin soldiers) shouldn't be much discomfitted by a mob of untrained rabble. That's more a weirdness of the whirlwind rules, rather than an artifact of Swarms. I suppose we could stipulate that the bats are covering each other, thus protecting the rear ones from the attack. Well, in the non-Swarm scenario, they are giving eachother soft cover - but, assuming you start from the inside and work out, that won't matter much as they die and drop to the ground. Similarly, after you kill the 'outter layer' of creatures in a swarm, the next 'layer' doesn't have a lot of cover. Seriously, though -- It may be game rules that you could strike a thousand bats in a huge area, but it isn't logical. Neither is chanting and tossing a ball of bat guano producing a 20' roaring ball of flame exactly rational. The rules do allow both, though, and both work very well on masses of low-hp enemies. The swarm rules turn masses of low hp enemies into single high-hp enemies - yet effects that don't work on masses of individuals still don't work on swarms. Really, if the swarm were an option for PC rather than the DM, it'd reek of munchkinism. You can't just ignore swarm-type enemies; they're a staple of fantasy and horror! Certainly, they're a staple of horror, and present in at least some fantasy, and having a mechanic to represent them would be good - but the 3.5 swarm mechanic isn't good. Actually the ridiculous nature of giving a WWA Fighter 1000 attacks in one round rather makes me favor the Swarm rules. Actually, I think that perfectly illustrates what's wrong with the Swarm rules. They effectively take away a hard-won PC ability for no reason. If you're don't like that ability in the first place, not including it, or adjusting it until you find it acceptable would be fine. Giving it with one hand (sure, you can have WWA, it's in the PH :smirk: ), and then taking it away with the other (oh, look, anytime you fight a bunch of lesser creatures there a swarm or mob and your WWA doesn't work :pbbbtt: ), isn't fine. A Fighter can damage a Tiny foe, but a Diminuitive one should be almost impossible to target with a blade, let alone 1000 Diminuitive ones.Yet diminuitive foes gain an AC bonus, not immunity to attack. Then, swarms give them that immunity. It's an inconsistent mechanic. If swarms worked like a single colony-creature, like a black pudding, (immune to crits and so on, but still a single monster), or if they were a shortcut mechanic for dealing with a huge number of smaller individuals who still worked basically like a horde of smaller individuals, that'd be fine. But, that's not how they work, they work like individual creatures when you try to use anti-horde tactics on them, and like hordes when you try to attack them like individuals.
Crox 08-24-05, 05:06 PM	In the world where mobs of peasants roams over the fileds there is no need of fellow adventures, don't you think so? Let's take a small village with population about two hundreds. When formed up in 4 mobs this village will provide EL 12!!! Why did this peasants need to pay or ask adventures mto help them in overcoming evil, when they are such big force? Once more, for example I as DM write a low level adventure with about 50 goblins terrifying some trade road. "Standalone" versions of gobls will provide normal challenge, while a mob of them will wipe out party. This all breaks the consistence and believability of our imagine world. Then what about swarms, I think they are pretty good, when we hack them and slash them, but they fail to work when we use on them strong magic. But nevertheless they provide interesting challenges for the party, and I think they can be used, with some cautious. Au contraire. Unless the fireball is shot through the slit (using the special rules for doing so in fireball), an arrow slit is too small (less that 1 sq. ft.) to allow line of effect, and thus the effect does not spread through the slit. Nom, didn't ever thought that arrow slits are less then 1 sq ft. I am sorry but you delude yourself, they are larger %)
Keenath 08-24-05, 05:26 PM	Yet diminuitive foes gain an AC bonus, not immunity to attack. Then, swarms give them that immunity.Actually, this is the one thing I think should change about swarms -- no AC; any attack is an automatic hit. If a weapon hit kills a few individuals, then you shouldn't be able to miss the mass -- the reduction of weapon damage is the effect of their AC, not a difficulty to hit them. It's an inconsistent mechanic. If swarms worked like a single colony-creature, like a black pudding, (immune to crits and so on, but still a single monster), or if they were a shortcut mechanic for dealing with a huge number of smaller individuals who still worked basically like a horde of smaller individuals, that'd be fine. But, that's not how they work, they work like individual creatures when you try to use anti-horde tactics on them, and like hordes when you try to attack them like individuals.I see your point, I even agree, but I can't imagine a way to make the swarm a viable foe while at the same time allowing them to be utterly destroyed by Flaming Hands. By the same token, I can't imagine a monster movie that includes a horde of rats/bats/bugs that isn't utterly defeated by a single man with a flamethrower. The usual flamethrower problem is that they just keep coming until he runs out of fuel, which would be equivalent to just sending swarms until the wiz runs out of magic -- and that's not fair.
Colmarr 08-24-05, 05:54 PM	It seems to me that the problem many of the anti-mob (irony?) protestors have is that their DMs will use Mobs in every situation in which the PCs confront a large number of low-level creatures. With all due respect to those DMs, they'd be wrong to do so. A mob is not just a gathering of creatures. It is, if you will, a cluster driven by a common purpose and bullied by fervent emotion. It is 40 creatures controlled by one communal brain. It's the mass of villagers storming Dracula's castle, not the protestors at George Bush's latest motorcade. In the former situation, I think the mob rules appropriately reflect what should happen in a fantasy game - the villain (even if its the PCs) should be at reasonable risk of getting their just desserts. If it's the latter case, then the DM should use the standard Aid Another rules.
Tony Vargas 08-24-05, 06:06 PM	Actually, this is the one thing I think should change about swarms -- no AC; any attack is an automatic hit. For me it depends on whether it's swarm as colony-creature, or as mass-combat mechanic. In the former case, sure, the swarm could have an AC - a 'miss' could easily be a hit that fails to kill enough of the swarm-members to matter. In the latter, an attack or damage roll, alone, might be used to determine how many swam-members you kill, as a means of speeding up combat against so many monsters. I see your point, I even agree, but I can't imagine a way to make the swarm a viable foe while at the same time allowing them to be utterly destroyed by Flaming Hands. I don't see why they /need/ to be viable foes in that sense. Not everyone has access to area attacks all the time, so a mass of minor critters - something that, by all rights, should be whiped out by an area attack - being whiped out by an area attack doesn't make them non-viable any more than any other vulnerabilty makes a monster non-viable. Ogres have crappy will saves - the existance of charm person doesn't stop them from being a viable foe of thier CR. By the same token, I can't imagine a monster movie that includes a horde of rats/bats/bugs that isn't utterly defeated by a single man with a flamethrower. The usual flamethrower problem is that they just keep coming until he runs out of fuel, which would be equivalent to just sending swarms until the wiz runs out of magic -- and that's not fair. If the point of the swarm is that numbers are still dangerous, then, sure it's fair. Instead of packing 1000 rats into a single square and then arbitrarily making them immune to attacks, spread them out over the 250 squares they should occupy - no fireball, let alone burning hands, is going to take 'em all out now. Ditto vast numbers against fighter types, WWA or Great Cleave or high AC or otherwize, endless streams of attackers means dozens of attacks per round which will produce some 20's and some damage. All that's needed is a mechanic that streamlines such a combat, so that you don't need to make hundreds of attack rolls, but get consistent results.
Derren S. 08-24-05, 06:43 PM	A mob is not just a gathering of creatures. It is, if you will, a cluster driven by a common purpose and bullied by fervent emotion. It is 40 creatures controlled by one communal brain. It's the mass of villagers storming Dracula's castle, not the protestors at George Bush's latest motorcade. Comunal brain or not, a commoner (or any other creature) doesn't suddenly get thoughter when beeing around other people. Find me one logical explanation why 40 commoners will die in an acid fog but 40 commoners as a mob will survive. Or better how does a mob of 1st lvl commoners survive a cloudkill which would kill anything with less than 3 HD without save.
Colmarr 08-24-05, 10:09 PM	Find me one logical explanation why 40 commoners will die in an acid fog but 40 commoners as a mob will survive. Easy. Against the individual commoners, the acid fog deals 2d6 to each. Some of them will roll 2 and survive. Others will roll 6+ and die. Overall, some die and some survive. That is just as easily represented by the mob losing hp as by rolling for each individual creatures. Or better how does a mob of 1st lvl commoners survive a cloudkill which would kill anything with less than 3 HD without save. Again, easy. Because of the tightness with which the commoners are packed together, some of them manage to avoid the fog, or encounter it in such small doses that they survive. Or they actually consitute a "windbreak" which causes the fog to go around some of the mob's members, allowing them to survive. Or: normally, powerful spells or creatures can kill an average commoner without difficulty. But when that commoner is in a large enough group of worked-up like-minded individuals, he or she sometimes becomes "something else", something greater than they normally are. Whilst in that condition, they can shrug off effects and damage that would normally have killed them outright. You're making the mistake of saying "the rules equal in-game reality. A commoner has 1 HD and cloudkill kills anything with less than 3". The error is that the rules don't equal in-game reality. They simply represent a framework within which a story can be told. It's fallacious to say an existing rule invalidates a new one if they are independent of each other. There is no "logical" inconsistency because all of the bases upon which the rules are constructed are abstract anyway. All the mob and swarm rules say is that when a lot of certain creatures get together and think and act alike, they can achieve and survive things they otherwise would not have been able to. If you don't like that concept, don't use the rules. But don't try to argue that it's illogical, because it isn't. Would you object to a rule system as follows? (Not the balance, or the power of it. Simply its existence.) ANGRY MOB (EL+) [I]The natives are riled up. You can see it in their eyes. Something is about to happen. Something bad. This encounter modifier can be applied to any encounter involving at least 10 creatures of CR 2 or less. For the duration of the encounter, and for as long as the DM deems reasonable afterwards, all members of the mob gain +4 to all physical ability scores and +2 to saves. Further, whenever an attack or spell would normally reduce a member of the mob to 0 hp or less or otherwise kills or incapacitate them, that creature can attempt to remain conscious by making a DC15 Will save. If successful, the creature is placed on 1hp. It's the same concept. Just a different execution, and one that's infinitely harder to implement from a paperwork standpoint. If you don't agree that people can sometimes be more than they normally are, do you also object to the existence of barbarian rage, or the rogue special ability defensive roll?
moto 08-24-05, 11:45 PM	Would finger of death kill every one in the mob? or say weird? Now that would be funny, oh no, the fire ball kills only some, but the fFoD got em all!
Shatteredtower 08-25-05, 01:08 AM	Beware of dragons. Particularly the big ones, because you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup. Oh, sure, but should a dragon need to be of the largest size and greatest age, diving, and backed up by three preparatory spells to get that kind of impact? ;) I'm not saying I have a problem with the RAW for dragons, mind you. As for the size of mobs, like swarms, it's a gross simplification. The numbers are given for the number of creatures mainly so you have a mechanic for the results of breaking it up. This could have been much better spelled out for swarms, as dispersing a swarm of bats or rats should still leave you with a colony or plague to mop up. Mobs, on the other hand, leave you with sixteen creatures capable of offering serious opposition when you've "quelled" the mob, and another sixteen who can probably do nothing more than surrender. While the threat of the mob isn't relevant to individual hit dice while it's together, it will become apparent before the end. A dispersed mob of 1st level commoners is pretty well finished, while a dispersed mob of advanced medium monstrous scorpions could still be a real hassle. (At least the poison save gets a lot easier by then.) Obviously, mob mechanics do break down at a certain point. The commoners are a lot more dangerous as a mob, while a dozen fire giants are a lot more dangerous when considered individually. I don't see that as a problem -- I see it as part of the consistency displayed by mob rules. They're not about skill or training or tactics, as displayed by their inability to use breath weapons or spell-like abilities. (If they could, on the other hand, you'd want to mob dretches at every opportunity to boost the stinking cloud save DC from 13 to 28.) Elite troops would be less effective as a mob, so you'd probably not use them this way, though you could, if you feel it might improve the encounter on some level to have an initial rush of enemies, followed quickly by a skirmish with a smaller number of enemies. This might seem a bit odd, when the last few prove to be a lot better at fighting than the unit at the whole was, but this often happens when you wade through the rent-a-grunts to get to the crack troops anyway, so it may pass without notice. The point isn't the numbers. It's the challenge and the impression it gives. If the idea that overcoming a small group of commoners is going to take a little bit of work (very little, really, when you think about it) from your 10+ level party troubles you, consider whether you might be suffering from the Evil Overlord delusion that is usually expressed in the words: "No, it can't be! I'm invincible!" Mobs really aren't impressive for their CR. (Then again, I freely admit that there are ways to break that CR. Basilisk stampedes are very rude.) I just like them because they discourage players from ever thinking of low level types as complete nobodies. That kind of perception even trivializes their own early days as low level types in some ways.
Roxlimn 08-25-05, 03:13 AM	I honestly don't believe that taking away the ability to attack 1000 times in one round is any detriment to someone who takes WWA. When players ask me what this feat is all about, I honestly tell them that it probably amounts to no more than 6 attacks at full AB most of the time, and that having many Medium or Small creatures in a 3D space is about the most I'll allow for it. Even in the spirit of the feat, I don't believe that it allows you to use a Sword to clear a room of bugs or other sterilize an operating room for use in surgery.
Derren S. 08-25-05, 05:35 AM	Again, easy. Because of the tightness with which the commoners are packed together, some of them manage to avoid the fog, or encounter it in such small doses that they survive. Or they actually consitute a "windbreak" which causes the fog to go around some of the mob's members, allowing them to survive. Do you really believe that or are you just desperate to make something up? Not even a mob is so tightly packed that its members are shielded from air otherwise they would suffocate. And the windbreak is pure nonsense or do you really want to tell me that a mob creates a strong wind? And it doesn't matter how much of the cloud touches someone if it would there would be a reflex save. And whats your explanation that a Mob survives a Circle of Death? That the mob is so tightly packed to that Death can't find hist victim? And they survive a Blasphemy because they shield each other from sound?
JoeX 08-25-05, 07:47 AM	I just like them because they discourage players from ever thinking of low level types as complete nobodies. 1 level commoners (95% of the population) are nobodies .. That's way they need larger thn life heroes to save them. That's it's a trademark of HEROIC FANTASY. The seeming invincible OVERLORD is brought down by heroes not peasants . That kind of perception even trivializes their own early days as low level types in some ways. Not at all; everybody was a nobody in the beggining
theolorn 08-25-05, 08:17 AM	My 2nd. Edition party were sneaking through the largest section of a cave system filled with orcs. Our party Thief had detected a hall with four dozen orcs, within what we assumed to be a Mess Hall or feasting chamber. The Fighter told us to stay back as he removed all weapons and entered alone. The majority were 1st to 3rd level and could not beat his AC, the higher level orcs that did manage to strike him were the first to die from his bare knuckles. Even their individual grapple checks were nothing to concern the high level Fighter. This should be one reason why mobs should be 'improved' for 3.5 DnD. One Fighter should not be able to stroll into a mob and casually disable them. However my only concern is that the Optimisation section of this Board may use such rules against the DM and monsters. All it should take is a bard with a high Diplomacy; or a Fighter with sacks full of gold to recruit large numbers of humanoids to fight for their cause. Some of the CO Threads exploit Leadership to gain thousands of followers/worshippers which would definitely be considered a mob/swarm. This mob/swarm rule should be balanced to prevent rats/bats and peasants from world domination.
Derren S. 08-25-05, 08:23 AM	And would you also share the level of the fighter with us? Strangly when Aragon in LotR, James Bond in one of his movies, or one of the Greek heroes in the legends does something like this no one says a word except bay even saying that this is exactly how D&D should be, but when a PC does such a feat...
JoeX 08-25-05, 08:41 AM	This should be one reason why mobs should be 'improved' for 3.5 DnD. One Fighter should not be able to stroll into a mob and casually disable them. Why not ? Nor should be able to survive a fall from 100' feet. Nor be able to to shoot 6 arrows in 6 seconds in 6 different directions. and so on ... Sorry but i think yours experience is due to bad Dming. Heroic (high levels) players should fight heroic opponents not 1 HD orcs
Ellone 08-25-05, 09:01 AM	about the peasant crowd problem, take a look at the srd Swarms are dense masses of Fine, Diminutive, or Tiny creatures that would not be particularly dangerous in small groups A swarm of Tiny creatures consists of 300 nonflying creatures or 1,000 flying creatures. A swarm of Diminutive creatures consists of 1,500 nonflying creatures or 5,000 flying creatures. A swarm of Fine creatures consists of 10,000 creatures, whether they are flying or not. no peasant swarm, the swarm description don't cover this case.
Shatteredtower 08-25-05, 09:17 AM	1 level commoners (95% of the population) are nobodies .. You can't save nobody and nobody isn't worth saving. Try again. That's way they need larger thn life heroes to save them. Larger than life heroes who have more than once been run out of town by those nobodies. That's it's a trademark of HEROIC FANTASY.So's the lynch mob, or the peasants at the door with torches and pitchforks. The seeming invincible OVERLORD is brought down by heroes not peasants.I don't see the problem here. Looking at the mob rules, I don't see how they'd be able to pose more than an inconvenience to Not at all; everybody was a nobody in the beggining Not in heroic fantasy. Herakles didn't start out as a nobody. Regardless of their humble upbringing, most other figures of heroic fantasy were never nobodies either. Look at Arthur and you see most of them. Heroic fantasy never made any of them invincible, however. Indeed, heroic fantasy made pretty sure they'd all come to an end at some point, and usually a bad one, one that your typical 20th level monstrosity would sneer at. At 6th-10th level, the mob is a reasonable obstacle, regardless of its composition. Considering how slowly they move and how little firepower they have, it's not like a party can't handle them. It's just that the party doesn't get to autosmear them, which is as it should be.
Keenath 08-25-05, 09:41 AM	no peasant swarm, the swarm description don't cover this case.Yes, well, we are talking about MOBS, which are a mechanic from the DMG2, and allow things like peasants to form swarm-like entities. This was explained back on the first page of the thread.
Keenath 08-25-05, 09:50 AM	It's just that the party doesn't get to autosmear them, which is as it should be. I really think it's more a matter of the incredible hyper-effectiveness of spreads and the Whirlwind Attack feat that cause the problem. For example: Cover is useless against a spread? I understand this is supposed to represent a wavefront of flame washing through an area, but making spreads totally remove the benefit of cover and so on... seems too much. If I see an explosion, my first instinct is to dive for cover, right? On Whirlwind attack, I wouldn't at all feel weird telling somebody that, when they whirlwind, they're limited to one attack per point of dexterity. They'll get at LEAST 13 strikes, for the prereq, and that's far more than anyone should ever be using. It's ridiculous to have somebody with a spiked chain making over a hundred attacks against bats! I honestly think swarms are a better mechanic to represent large groups of individually non-threatening creatures than having... well... a large group of individually non-threatening creatures. You may be able to crush a beetle with a flick of a club, but it doesn't harm the group to lose three individuals. The game is designed around human-sized fighting. When you go to very small, weak things, the game's model goes weird. That's why commoners and cats stack up so strangely; the difference between them is very small compared to 20 class levels. Ah well. I'm not a fan of mobs, though I can see why they were created.
Finarin Panjoro 08-25-05, 10:30 AM	Not when you want a serious fantasy world. That's just not true. I have a serious homebrew fantasy world and my players agree playability is more important than nit picking rules consistency. It would take over an hour to resolve a battle with 150 commoners. They would present no challenge to the PCs. No experience would be gained for it. In the end it would be a very unsatisfying waste of time even if it was demanded by the world (the players did something that clearly attracted the wrath of 150 commoners). If however they are treated as mobs the encounter becomes worthwhile. If I as DM say that mobs behave differently than a gathering of individuals my players just accept it and move on. This seems to be the major point of contention between the anti- and pro- mob factions in this thread. The rules treat them differently. That is certainly true. If you need a reason for this to be the case its just not that hard to provide in a magical fantasy world. Perhaps the Gods of Chaos protect crowds of angry citizens and grant them power and resilience when gathered in common purpose. In my campaign world the gods actually could intervene in subtle ways like this. So its not inconsistent its a fantasy element that also helps playability. The thing about mobs is, as Colmarr stated earlier, that the DM must handle them appropriately. A fireball might not wipe them out, but it should definitely cause them to reconsider who they're attacking (morale check per Heroes of Battle). The PCs should not be given much information about them (such as specific numbers) and they should not be treated as normal monsters. A mob ISN'T 48 commoners total, its 48 commoners in a specific area at that moment. Next round half of them might be different people than the ones that were there in the previous round. IF 150 people/orcs/zombies attack the PCs it should be a frightening event. At least until about 13th level (4 mobs is a EL 13 encounter). Past 15th level mobs aren't a threat to PCs at all. Infact they're actually easier to handle than the 150 commoners because you can get multiple mobs in the radius of your save or die effects and your save DCs should still be high enough to take them down. A circle of death can kill multiple mobs, way more commoners than it could fit in its normal radius. Heck mobs really aren't a threat to any PC who can levitate (a 3rd level wizard) or fly (5th level wizard). The problem with D&D rules is that they are party centric and that makes it hard to justify the existence of some classic fantasy elements in the world. For example, the party centric system makes the economy of a D&D world totally unbelievable as a serious economy. An army of low level orcs is nothing against a party of 15th level characters. So why ever have an army of orcs? Take all that money and make a powerful magic sword for your 15th level fighter instead. A fourth level cleric disintigrates human skeletons and zombies so why ever make an army of them? They're expensive and easily destroyed. If Frankenstein was a flesh golem why did he fear mobs? His AC (18) and damage reduction (5/adamantine) should make dozens of people mere fodder for him. So players already have to accept all sorts of exceptions for playability's sake (wealth by level, D&D pricing, the CR system, the inconsistency of healing magic, etc) so why are mobs so hard to deal with?
Gilean 08-25-05, 10:38 AM	For swarms, I allow a melee attack to deal 1 point of damage (rejoice!), 2 with cleave, and full damage with great cleave.
JoeX 08-25-05, 12:42 PM	You can't save nobody and nobody isn't worth saving. Try again. Actualy saving nobody is quite easy Larger than life heroes who have more than once been run out of town by those nobodies. No hope if they can be run out of town they are no larger than life So's the lynch mob, or the peasants at the door with torches and pitchforks. No hope this is horror fantasy no heroic fantasy Not in heroic fantasy. Herakles didn't start out as a nobody. Herakles was the son of the king of the gods .. Regardless of their humble upbringing, most other figures of heroic fantasy were never nobodies either. Look at Arthur and you see most of them. Even arthur was a nobody in term of fighting power at some time in his life. Or do you think that it was born with the skill of a 20 level fighter Heroic fantasy never made any of them invincible, however. Indeed, heroic fantasy made pretty sure they'd all come to an end at some point, and usually a bad one, one that your typical 20th level monstrosity would sneer at. An heroic death who never involved mobs ... At 6th-10th level, the mob is a reasonable obstacle, regardless of its composition. Considering how slowly they move and how little firepower they have, it's not like a party can't handle them. At that level a party should have better things to do than fighting mobs. It's just that the party doesn't get to autosmear them, which is as it should be. You don't need idiotics rules to do that. A party who goes around torching villages will soon or later incur in the wrath of some baron , duke king or emperor. And they have enough resources to squash them
Tony Vargas 08-25-05, 01:05 PM	Find me one logical explanation why 40 commoners will die in an acid fog but 40 commoners as a mob will survive. Or better how does a mob of 1st lvl commoners survive a cloudkill which would kill anything with less than 3 HD without save. Well, going on the close-packed-cover theory of swarms, the gas or acid wouldn't reach all individuals making up the mob... of course, if gas can't reach 'em, neither can air, and they all suffocated within minutes of forming a swarm. :P I honestly don't believe that taking away the ability to attack 1000 times in one round is any detriment to someone who takes WWA. Honestly, neither do I. A circumstance where you're surrounded by that many enemies should be virtually non-existant, and would be prohibitively tedious to play out using the standard combat rules. What I find inconsistent is that abilities that are specifically ideal for dealing with large numbers of lesser foes (and, indeed, little good for anything else), should be rendered worthless against just such foes.
solbergb 08-25-05, 01:15 PM	Sure, but that's a mob of hundreds or thousands of people constrained by streets or gates or whatever - not 30 people willfully packed into a 20'x20' square for no good reason. True. And if I were to use the mob rules, it would be for scenarios like that..a packed city street where there is literally no room to move except with the ebbing and flowing of the mob. That would be a harder than usual challenge even for high level PC's (even something like holy word would just clear a space, then it would fill in...) I agree that a 20x20 group similar to a 10x10 swarm is pretty bizarre, in an open plain with no constraints. 30 people packed into a 20x20 room? Maybe. That would be kind of like a mosh pit. The bodies would get in the way of normal fighting and create a semi-solid barrier to some spell effects.
Colmarr 08-25-05, 06:05 PM	Do you really believe that or are you just desperate to make something up? Not even a mob is so tightly packed that its members are shielded from air otherwise they would suffocate. And the windbreak is pure nonsense or do you really want to tell me that a mob creates a strong wind? Do you know what a windbreak is? If a mob is not tightly packed enough to form one, explain to me how a grove of trees does. And it doesn't matter how much of the cloud touches someone if it would there would be a reflex save. Again, you are assuming that rules = reality. It doesn't. Would you really object if a someone cast cloud kill in a buffeting wind and the DM ruled that it worked, but all creatures in it counted as 5 HD higher because of the minimal contact with it? Same idea, different implementation. Anyway, one of the fundamental problems with dice-based systems is their "unreality". How is it that the first time you get hit by a spell that automatically hits its target (magic missile), you take 2hp damage, but the next time you take 5hp damage? How is it that the first time you get hit by a fireball you save, but when hit by the same spell from the same caster again you don't? The answer is "something changes". We don't know what, and we don't care what. We're satisified that it's allowed by the rules. Why do you have such a huge issue with the mob rules? They're no more logical or illogical that any other aspect of D&D. And whats your explanation that a Mob survives a Circle of Death? That the mob is so tightly packed to that Death can't find hist victim? And they survive a Blasphemy because they shield each other from sound? Circle of death affects a variable number of HD and allows a save. No explanation is necessary. The commoners roll REALLY well. As for Blasphemy, we once again come back to the problem of instantaneous spreads. You say that cover doesn't apply. I say there should be no such thing as an instantaneous spread. Why should we accept that the rules for instantaneous spreads are logical and the rules for mobs aren't? You still haven't answered my question about the Angry Mob, barbarian rage, and rogue defensive roll.
Derren S. 08-25-05, 06:20 PM	Do you know what a windbreak is? If a mob is not tightly packed enough to form one, explain to me how a grove of trees does. I heavent heared of a grove of trees which created a vacum inside which is exactly what is neccessary to protect them from a cloudkill. Again, you are assuming that rules = reality. It doesn't. Would you really object if a someone cast cloud kill in a buffeting wind and the DM ruled that it worked, but all creatures in it counted as 5 HD higher because of the minimal contact with it? Same idea, different implementation. It doesn't work that way. You touch the cloud, you die. And the commoners inside are not 5 HD higher, they are 29 HD higher. And its not about reality its about logic. People don't transform into a unrecognizeable mass of commoners when standing together. A mob isn't an ooze. And standing packed togehter doesn't make you any thoughter and shields you from air and neither does it make you stronger. A mob can damage a creature with DR 15/- and AC 20 easily what no normal group of commoner can do even if there are hunderds of them. This is way better than the rage of a lvl 20 Babarian. Circle of death affects a variable number of HD and allows a save. No explanation is necessary. The commoners roll REALLY well. So standing next to other people increases to fort saves? What logic is that. And when a wizards cast a circle of death which would kill 29 HD all commoners would survive and the spell would be wasted. Explain that logically. And while you are at it, explain logically why a wizard can target a mob only once with Chain Lightning. As for Blasphemy, we once again come back to the problem of instantaneous spreads. You say that cover doesn't apply. I say there should be no such thin g as an instantaneous spread. Why should we accept that the rules for instantaneous spreads are logical and the rules for mobs aren't? You are tring to change the subject. Cover simply doesn't help against a sonic effect, or does standing behind some other people make you deaf? Against a fireball you can at least claim a bonus to your reflex save but Blashphemy doesn't allow a save. Yet a mob of 1st level commone would survive a blasphemy from a 20th level caster unharmed. They would not even be dazed. While 48 normal commoners would die instantly. You still haven't answered my question about the Angry Mob, barbarian rage, and rogue defensive roll. Rage and Defensive roll don't break established D&D rules. The Mob rules do by making creatures invulnerable to effects which normally kill them without a explanation. A mob isn't a magical transformation like you want to make us believe. It are simply 48 individuals which have the same goal.
Tony Vargas 08-25-05, 06:25 PM	OK, I've been complaining, I suppose I should offer some alternatives. These are just ideas, and dashed off without benefit of rulebooks, but.... A completely different take on Mobs & Swarms (only the names have not been changed): Swarm Type A swarm is a collection of smaller creatures bound together by some unnatural force into a single entity. A standard swarm is a single creature 3 size-classes larger than it's constituent creatures. Swarms may be mindless or have a single consciousness. They are immune to critical hits and cannot be flanked. A swarm acts as a creature of it's size for most pruposes, but can move through or remain in squares occupied by other creatures, regardless of size. A swarm can attack by extending psuedopod-like collections of individuals; flying swarms have reach as a 'tall' creature of thier size, crawling ones as a 'long' creature. The movement of swarms is not reduced by rough terrain or most intervening obstacles. DR: Swarms have DR if thier constituent creatures do. Most swarms also have DR:bludgeoning, as slashing and piercing attacks can tend to pass between constituent individuals instead of damaging them. ER: Swarms have any ER of thier constituent creatures. Single-target & AE attacks: Even though they are composed of smaller creatures, a swarm is treated as a single creature for all purposes. They take damage from AE attacks only once, and can be affected by single-target attacks. Engulf: A swarm can engulf a creature of any size simply by ending it's movement with one or more of it's squares overlapping those of the other creature. The swarm gets a free attack against every creature it engulfs for each square of swarm overlapping the creature (so a large swarm occupying the same space as a large creature would attack it 4 times every round), only the engulfed creatures Armor and Natural Armor bonuses to AC count for this free attack. A swarm with Improved Grab can use that ability to drag creatures into itself, and hold engulfed creatures within it; otherwise, a creature can escape from being engulfed simply by moving out of the swarm, albeit, at 1/2 normal movement. Creatures engulfed by a crawling swarm have soft cover relative creatures outside the swarm, those engulfed by a flying swarm have half concealment (25% miss chance) relative to those outside it. 'Dead' Swarms: When a swarm is reduced to zero hps, it is dispersed, leaving a number of constituent individuals sufficent to fill 9 times it's facing. These individuals disperse to legal squares immediately, and determine new initiative and act as individuals on the following round. If there is not enough room for the dispersed individuals, they may take on the Mob condition, below. Mob condition: Creatures forced together under stress (usually fear or rage) can form a mob. The constituent creatures of a mob occupy 1/4 thier normal space, and can be represented by normal size figures of thier type (just at a 1:4 ratio). The mob condition persists only for figures that are surrounded by regular or mob figures of the same type, enemies, or unoccupiable spaces. If a mob figure ends it's turn adjacent to an unoccupied space, it 'ejects' a member to fill that space as an individual. These fringe individuals tend to continue fleeing or attacking as the rest of the mob and will be re-absorbed into the mob when the mob moves over them. Pooled hps: A mob figure has 4x the hit points of an average constituent creature, and can lose no more than 1/4 it's hps from a single attack. Attackers with cleave can inflict up to half a mob figure's hps with a single attack (once per round), those with Great Cleave or WWA can inflict full damage on a Mob figure. When mob figures in contact with eachother (or with other mob figures between them) is wounded, remove enough mob figures from the center of the mob to represent the damage taken and 'heal' the wounded figures the next time the mob acts. Saves: A Mob figure saves as a constituent creature of it's type, but with a +4 bonus to WILL saves against effects that do not induce either anger or fear, a +2 bonus to FORT saves. A mob figure takes double damage from a REF-save area-effect that fills it's space completely. Mobs automatically make REF saves against movement-restricting effects, and automatically fail other REF saves. Effects that target and kill, disable, or control a single individuals inflict 1/4 a mob figure's hps if successful, instead. Mass attack: A Mob figure attacks as would a single constituent creature, but with an AB of +6 (as if three of the 4 constituent creatures succesfully aided another), making only normal attacks, overrun, bullrush or grapple attempts, and never fighting defensively. A Mob figure can take up to 4 AoOs per round. AC: A mob figure has the flat-footed AC of it's constituent creatures. If the consitutent creatures in a mob are vulnerable to critical hits, they are thus subject to sneak attack, though each such attack can still inflict at most 1/4 of the mob figure's hit points. Surge: A mob has a +8 circumstance bonus to opposed, Trip, Grapple, Overrun, and Bullrush checks and STR checks to move barriers or break through obstructions like Webs or Entagles. An individual cannot chose to avoid an overrunning mob. Successful AoOs against a Mob figure do not spoil the action which provoked them. Cover: A mob figure blocks line of effect and movement as if it were a solid obstruction, rather than a creature (but the space of the mob figure /is/ affected). Burst effects thus, do not affect Mob figures with other mob figures between them and the center, and the number of mob figures affected by a spread will be reduced as the spread must roll over or around one figure, instead of through it, to get to the next. Movement: A mob moves at a hustle towards the object of it's anger, or away from the object of it's fear. It overruns anything else in it's way, and attacks objects of it's ire, or anything it can't overrun. 'Slain' mobs: When a mob figure is reduced to 0 hps, generally one or more of it's constituent creatures are left at 0 hps or lower, and the rest are left dead. As mob figures are killed, other mob figures will almost certainly be left facing empty spaces and begin dispersing into individuals. Anytime a mob moves over such creatures, they are re-incorporated into it, possibly restoring mob figures. If, at any time, no mob figures are present, the remaining individuals cannot re-form into mob figures, even if there are more than 4 of them present: the mob has been dispersed. Disciplined Mobs: A well-trained military unit can fight in a close formation that resembles a mob in some ways. Such a unit is represented by 4:1 figures, as with a mob and has most of the mob's characteristics, except that it moves and attacks according to the orders of it's officers, does not disperse on it's own when adjacent to empty spaces, and each figure can attack twice at +4 instead of once at +6, if so ordered. A disciplined unit gains it's +4 WILL save against all effects, but, if it fails a save vs fear or anger- inducing effects, it becomes a regular mob, instead. smaller creatures: Creatures smaller than medium can be combined into medium-size mob figures, if the DM desires. Twice as many small creatuers, and 4x as many tiny (and x4 as many for each smaller size category) combine to form medium-size figures. Mob figure hit points increase accordingly (the maximum damage inflicted by a single attack on the mob is similarly decreased), and STR and attack damage increases in proportion to the size difference between the medium figure and the individuals making up the mob, but other bonuses are unaffected.
Keenath 08-25-05, 07:04 PM	For swarms, I allow a melee attack to deal 1 point of damage (rejoice!), 2 with cleave, and full damage with great cleave.I think the idea is rather that swarm-members are so easy to kill that EVERYONE effectively has great cleave against them. Each single one you kill doesn't contribute even a single HP to the group's total, particularly swarms of insects. And I don't see how a sword or even a club does any damage to a swarm of a couple thousand beetles -- you crush a half dozen with a swing, big deal, there's two hundred times that number remaining... To Tony: These ideas look pretty good; a few comments... A swarm can attack by extending psuedopod-like collections of individuals; flying swarms have reach as a 'tall' creature of thier size, crawling ones as a 'long' creature. Um... why? I rather like the concept of having no reach -- and if they have engulf/swarm attack, why bother? Single-target & AE attacks: Even though they are composed of smaller creatures, a swarm is treated as a single creature for all purposes. They take damage from AE attacks only once, and can be affected by single-target attacks. Huh... you have effectively made swarms LESS vulnerable to fireball, et al. Right now they take damage once, but it's at 150%! Moving on to mobs... Effects that target and kill, disable, or control a single individuals inflict 1/4 a mob figure's hps if successful, instead. Huh? Could you explain what you meant more? Surely charming a single mobster doesn't even affect the mob as a whole... Ah, well -- I tend to think Mobs are not necessary anyway; if you want low-HD things like Commoners to be worth something, use the Unit rules from Heroes of Battle. They work MUCH more cleanly for what a ragtag band of farmers can and cannot do. You might impose some penalties for having no formal training, but I think that sort of thing is already covered in the book.
Finarin Panjoro 08-25-05, 09:18 PM	...if I were to use the mob rules, it would be for scenarios like that..a packed city street where there is literally no room to move except with the ebbing and flowing of the mob. That would be a harder than usual challenge even for high level PC's (even something like holy word would just clear a space, then it would fill in...) I agree that a 20x20 group similar to a 10x10 swarm is pretty bizarre, in an open plain with no constraints. 30 people packed into a 20x20 room? Maybe. That would be kind of like a mosh pit. The bodies would get in the way of normal fighting and create a semi-solid barrier to some spell effects. This is an excellent point and exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about. Personally I would never use the mob rules if there were only 48 individuals involved (enough to make one mob). I would probably rule that only half the individuals present actually form into mob "units". So to form one mob would actually take about 100 people. The remaining people "fill in" when the others drop and no rules inconsistency is created. In a mass of 1000 people only 500 of them would actively form mobs (about 10 of them). Which makes it fairly easy to gauge how many mobs a large crowd should generate, roughly 1 mob per 100 people/creatures/etc. Consistency is all in how you present it as DM.
Tony Vargas 08-25-05, 09:18 PM	ITo Tony: These ideas look pretty good; a few comments...Thanks. What I was going for was two very different ideas. The idea of the swarm was a single creature that, mainly as a 'special effect,' is made up of a mass of smaller creatures. As much as possible, I wanted it to act, mechanically, like a single creature. The 'mob,' OTOH, is more an idea for dealing with large numbers of creatures more efficiently. Um... why? I rather like the concept of having no reach -- and if they have engulf/swarm attack, why bother? Mainly so the swarm-creature can threaten. Huh... you have effectively made swarms LESS vulnerable to fireball, et al. Right now they take damage once, but it's at 150%! Yes, the idea is that a swarm-creature is a single entity, it doesn't take extra damage from each of it's component creatures being injured any more than a human takes extra damage for each additional skin cell exposed to a fireball. Note that this kind of 'swarm' is not just a collection of creatures, but an entity or force using such creatures as 'raw material' for it's body. Huh? Could you explain what you meant more? Surely charming a single mobster doesn't even affect the mob as a whole... The idea is that each mob figure represents 4 (or possibly more) individuals. Charming, sleeping, disentegrating, disabling or otherwise messing with a single one of those individuals takes it out of the mob. It's left sitting around in whatever new condition it's in (and probably trampled by the rest of the mob), and the mob figure is down 1 individual, or (typically) 1/4 it's collective hps. Ah, well -- I tend to think Mobs are not necessary anyway; if you want low-HD things like Commoners to be worth something, use the Unit rules from Heroes of Battle. I haven't seen those rules, but it sounds like a good idea - a way to streamline mass combat, rather than just taking a mass of enemies and smushing them into a single monster. I did draw a little inspiration from the old 'battlesystem' and my limitted experience with wargames in the early 80's in brainstorming the 'mob condition,' though, so I wouldn't be surprised if there were some vague similarities.
Colmarr 08-25-05, 11:46 PM	Again, you are assuming that rules = reality. It doesn't. Would you really object if a someone cast cloud kill in a buffeting wind and the DM ruled that it worked, but all creatures in it counted as 5 HD higher because of the minimal contact with it? Same idea, different implementation. It doesn't work that way. You touch the cloud, you die. And the commoners inside are not 5 HD higher, they are 29 HD higher. And its not about reality its about logic. People don't transform into a unrecognizeable mass of commoners when standing together. A mob isn't an ooze. And standing packed togehter doesn't make you any thoughter and shields you from air and neither does it make you stronger. A mob can damage a creature with DR 15/- and AC 20 easily what no normal group of commoner can do even if there are hunderds of them. This is way better than the rage of a lvl 20 Babarian. With all due respect, you're missing the point. A mob is not a single creature. It is simply represented as one within an abstract combat system to simplify bookkeeping and maintain playability. People can and do perform incredible acts in stressful situation. We lift fallen trees off children. We run for hours without stopping. We survive a week in sub-zero temperatures with nothing but a Mars bar. There is nothing wrong with allowing that to be represented in a heroic fantasy game. Mob rules are one way of doing so. They can't be illogical because the abstract nature of D&D combat isn't logical to begin with. So standing next to other people increases to fort saves? What logic is that. And when a wizards cast a circle of death which would kill 29 HD all commoners would survive and the spell would be wasted. Explain that logically. I'm beginning to think you are deliberately ignoring the fact that a mob is more than a bunch of people who happen to be standing next to each other. IMO, a mob is more about mentality than proximity. A well-placed bullet would kill me, regardless of whether I'm standing next to Jim or not. But if I'm off my head on PCP or adrenaline, and supported by 50 people also baying for blood, I might survive (at least temporarily) injuries that would otherwise kill me. And while you are at it, explain logically why a wizard can target a mob only once with Chain Lightning. Again, logic doesn't come in to it. Cover simply doesn't help against a sonic effect Says who? If I put a partition between you and I, or put on a motorcycle helmet, is your yelling the same volume? If you're saying that cover doesn't affect sonic effects because they don't have reflex saves (I'm not sure off the top of my head whether they do or not), again I say those rules are illogical in certain circumstances, and they can't be used to "trump" the mob rules. Rage and Defensive roll don't break established D&D rules. Define "break". I prefer the term "diminished". The rules say that a creature has certain stats based upon attributes assigned at creation. But the barbarian is allowed to change them when he rages. The primary rule is diminished. Is that diminution reasonable? Yes, but does Rage comply with the general rule? No. The rules say that when a creature hits you, you take damage equal to the dice rolled by it for damage. Defensive roll says otherwise. Reasonable? Yes. Is the original rule diminished? Yes. Cloudkill says it kills creatures with less than 5HD without a save. The mob rules say that when part of a mob, a commoner no longer counts as a creature with 1HD. Is cloudkill diminished? Yes. Is it reasonable? Ahh, now there's the real argument, but it's one that you don't seem to have reached yet. A mob isn't a magical transformation like you want to make us believe. It are simply 48 individuals which have the same goal. Says who? By virtue of the rules as written, a D&D mob is transformed into something else entirely. It's not a physical transformation; they don't turn into an ooze, but they are without doubt transformed. And I don't want to make you believe anything. I am simply pointing out that mobs are neither more nor less logical than the D&D combat rules themselves. You can't enshrine one as "reality" while condemning another as illogical.
Keenath 08-25-05, 11:49 PM	I haven't seen those rules, but it sounds like a good idea - a way to streamline mass combat, rather than just taking a mass of enemies and smushing them into a single monster.Actually, now that I get a chance to look it over more... It doesn't really have melee rules for that sort of thing. It has rules for massed archery, which allows the group to simply shower a target area and force reflex saves from everyone in it (similar to the Autofire rules from D20 Modern), and it has rules for Morale in units (when the unit takes 50% casualties, they have a chance of getting frightened or even fleeing), but it doesn't really cover massed melee against a single powerful character. I was thinking of the morale thing, but I thought it also included mass-melee rules. For large-scale combat, unit vs. unit, it suggests that the battle be pre-scripted -- that is, THIS unit will defeat THAT unit unless the PCs do X, Y or Z to change that outcome. Even if the PCs have NPCs fighting side-by-side, it suggests that NPC actions are generic and vague unless there's a reason not to be. You take a five foot step and whirldwind attack, the level 1 warrior NPC "engages an orc, though he's being driven back by the powerful blows". You just assume that weenies are helping or being injured, even if you don't handle their HP on a point-for-point basis. In other words, the little guys are there as scenery and props, not actual fighting. When powerful PCs take on a large group, it says you should simply not award XP for those kills, because they're not a challenge. The PCs may be accomplishing other tasks at the same time -- spearheading a breakthrough, turning the tide, rescuing a pinned-down unit, or some other goal -- that involve killing stuff that's not a challenge, but earn "victory points" towards an overall win for their side. The kills themselves aren't worth XP, though you may have quest-completion XP coming for completing your mission. So, oh, well... I guess that doesn't help much after all.
Colmarr 08-26-05, 02:24 AM	In case anybody cares, there is an alternate set of Mob rules on the Monte Cook D&D Rules boards. The main difference (at least in terms of the issues that Derren raises) is that any effect that would kill or incapacitate an individual member of the mob bestows a negative level on the mob. That obviously means that CR needs to be adjusted, but it's viable from a mechanics standpoint and might keep everyone happy.
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 03:10 AM	Actualy saving nobody is quite easy As easy as eating nothing. But nothing never satisfies you. Nobody can never make you feel welcome, ask you for help, tell your story to future generations... No hope if they can be run out of town they are no larger than lifeNonsense. If I have the strength of ten, pure heart or not, I am larger than life. No hope this is horror fantasy no heroic fantasy.Wrong. It's a melange of various fantastic types, some slightly less realistic than others. Any heroic reluctance to face a mob was never based on the notion that commoners were beneath their challenge level, you know. Herakles was the son of the king of the gods ..For the longest time, that was heroic fantasy. You were the hero because the gods either sired you or hand-picked you. Either way, it makes a lie of your claim that everyone starts out as a nobody. You don't get to suddenly say, "But I didn't mean Perseus, Herakles, Gilgamesh, Cuchalain, or..." There's pretty much no end to the list that makes a lie of the "nobody" claim. Even arthur was a nobody in term of fighting power at some time in his life.Ah, now we're trying to put qualifiers on what a nobody is. But all right -- you show me where he was mowing down peasants by the gross without taking so much as a scratch and maybe you have a point on fighting ability. An heroic death who never involved mobs ...Tell it to Orpheus. Are you saying that low-level PCs can't be heroes just because there's a chance that a nest of ordinary rats or an ordinary badger could kill one of them? At that level a party should have better things to do than fighting mobs.Nonsense. No, really, that's the biggest load of garbage I've ever heard. Heroes are defined by common people. They may shine on a level most of us can't, but without the average Joe, it means nothing. Besides, are you honestly claiming that a hero, upon being told, "There's rioting in the streets!" says, "Oh, let the town guard handle it; this encounter is unworthy of me." Doesn't sound very heroic, though there are a lot of ways to make such an event fantastic. You don't need idiotics rules to do that. A party who goes around torching villages will soon or later incur in the wrath of some baron , duke king or emperor.Who of course will come out to meet them in personal combat. Right. Oh, no, wait -- they'll send a champion to do it. Talk about idiocy. And they have enough resources to squash themBecause the game is always about individuals, whose power always comes from within. It can never be about the community. It can never about about the moment -- you've either got it all the time, or you don't. No, thanks. Mob rules may need a bit of work, but I'll take them over the laughable notion that the hero should, by the rules, automatically be able to slaughter peasants by the village load with never the possibility that something can go wrong unless there's another hero in the fold. Because, you know, the humbling of the mighty is also a pretty common theme in heroic tales.
Derren S. 08-26-05, 05:14 AM	With all due respect, you're missing the point. A mob is not a single creature. It is simply represented as one within an abstract combat system to simplify bookkeeping and maintain playability. A mob are 48 single creatures. Even the mob rules confirm this. People can and do perform incredible acts in stressful situation. We lift fallen trees off children. We run for hours without stopping. We survive a week in sub-zero temperatures with nothing but a Mars bar. Babarian Rage anyone? But compared to what Mobs recieve, a babarian rage is a joke. There is nothing wrong with allowing that to be represented in a heroic fantasy game. Mob rules are one way of doing so. They can't be illogical because the abstract nature of D&D combat isn't logical to begin with. They are illogical not from a reality standpoint but from a D&D rule standpoint. I'm beginning to think you are deliberately ignoring the fact that a mob is more than a bunch of people who happen to be standing next to each other. IMO, a mob is more about mentality than proximity. A well-placed bullet would kill me, regardless of whether I'm standing next to Jim or not. But if I'm off my head on PCP or adrenaline, and supported by 50 people also baying for blood, I might survive (at least temporarily) injuries that would otherwise kill me. With the mob rules you would be unharmed by a gun shot. Even someone firing full auto firing with a Heavy machine gun into the mob wouldn't kill the people making up the mob. And even when you "kill" a mob only 30% of those people die. The other 30% are only staggered and the rest has a 30% chance of beeing one of the above and a 40% chance to be unharmed. You can drop a nuke (or a Vegenzeful Gaze of God) on a mob and people would survive unharmed. Says who? If I put a partition between you and I, or put on a motorcycle helmet, is your yelling the same volume? Its a strange mob when people wrap other people around their heads. When the people can hear the Blasphemy they are affected. Or are you saying that members of a mob are suffocating and deaf? If you're saying that cover doesn't affect sonic effects because they don't have reflex saves (I'm not sure off the top of my head whether they do or not), again I say those rules are illogical in certain circumstances, and they can't be used to "trump" the mob rules. So logically you should be able to dodge sound? Define "break". I prefer the term "diminished". Break = Go against other established rules. *your idiotic examples which have nothing to do with the case* Cloudkill says it kills creatures with less than 5HD without a save. The mob rules say that when part of a mob, a commoner no longer counts as a creature with 1HD. Is cloudkill diminished? Yes. Is it reasonable? Ahh, now there's the real argument, but it's one that you don't seem to have reached yet. No. A mob are still 48 1 HD creatures. which survive a effect which normally kills them. That is breaking a rule. Chain Lightning is even better as an example. It allows you to target more than one creature. The mob is made up out of multiple creatures but you can target the mob only once. Says who? By virtue of the rules as written, a D&D mob is transformed into something else entirely. It's not a physical transformation; they don't turn into an ooze, but they are without doubt transformed. The mob rules itself says so. The mob is made up out of a small number of creatures and even gives rules what happens when some of them are killed or incapacitated. And I don't want to make you believe anything. I am simply pointing out that mobs are neither more nor less logical than the D&D combat rules themselves. You can't enshrine one as "reality" while condemning another as illogical. The mob rules are certainly not more illogical than all other D&D rules compared to reality. But the mob rules are even illogical compared to other D&D rules. You have the wrong point of view. YOur explanation how mobs manage it to ignore concealment like invisibility and how they manage it to deal enough damage to damage a adamantine wall with nothing but their bare hands.
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 07:30 AM	Chain Lightning is even better as an example. It allows you to target more than one creature. The mob is made up out of multiple creatures but you can target the mob only once.Are you sure about that? I'll have to review that when I get home, because targetted effects can take out individuals within the mob. It might not apply to chain lightning, but I will have to review that later. For now, however, I'm going to content myself with considering a few scenarios. Let's start with one featuring a mob of commoners vs. a four-member 8th lvl adventuring party, using the DMG's NPC guidelines for a cleric, fighter, rogue, and wizard. To keep it simple, I'll make them all human. Your mob has 135 hp, AC 6, and the save modifiers are +10 across the board. How does the party defeat them? One of the easiest methods would be to cast calm emotions. The save DC for that would be 16, possibly 18 with owl's wisdom. Considering how slowly a mob moves, the cleric certainly has time to cast both of these spells, so we're looking at something between a 25-35% chance of quelling the mob with a 2nd level spell. Even a 3rd level cleric with no further preparation has a 20% chance of success in a case like this. But if your cleric doesn't have such a spell prepared, the wizard can opt for a fireball. Hey, with mob rules, lightning bolt is now an equally viable option! With a 17 Intelligence and no further modifiers, either spell has a 30% chance of causing an average of 42 hp of damage to the mob, or 21 hp otherwise. Sure, individually you'd kill them all outright by current mechanics (not with lightning bolt, though), while now you'll need anywhere from four to seven fireballs to finish the job, but morale should be considered in cases like this. Would a mob always plow straight through a wall of fire, for example? Only if your DM treats all other creatures as automatons who base their actions solely on game mechanics. Fear can also do the trick quite nicely, with a 35% chance of beating the mob instantly. Even if the mob passes the save, they're now 10% more likely to fail any further saves they need to make that round. Sleep has a 20% chance of leaving the mob with 8 negative levels (down 40 hp), while deep slumber has a 30% chance of slapping it with 20 negative levels, at which point you can mop them up with 35 hp of damage. Naturally, the wizard has a large number of methods for overcoming a mob. In many cases, you'd get experience simply for getting past it, whether with fly, jump, spider climb, invisibility, or silent image. Assuming even just a longbow for the fighter, with no Dexterity enhancements or even archery feats, that's two shots a round that only miss on a roll of 1. It would take 30 rounds to finish things this way (or 32 if we assume a few 1s are rolled along the way), so it's a bit slower than the time it would take to shoot down 48 unarmed commoners (with a 95% chance of hitting on the first shot and 80% on the second, you'd still average between 27 and 28 rounds -- but tack on another 3 rounds, because you're going to roll a 1 for damage an average of 3 times in this time). The support of the party rogue with a masterwork shortbow nearly cuts this time in half (slightly less damage, but the same chance to hit the mob and a slightly better chance to hit individual commoners). Obviously, they're not going to get the time they need to do this without an advantage, but that's not out of the question at this point, what with spells like levitate and fly. Still, even if the fighter engages the enemy head-on and the rogue hangs back to maintain fire (firing into melee is of little concern here, even if the rogue can't aim for a portion of the mob more than 10 ft away from the fighter), it allows the option to be maintained for a time. The fighter takes an awful risk in engaging the mob toe-to-toe, but 60 hp should last an average of 4 rounds. The real concern is grappling. (Chances are that you're not going to be trampled by a mob that's focused on coming after you.) You only get two swings (including an attack of opportunity), maybe three, at this point and Great Cleave is not going to help you. On the other hand, chances are that you've got a +1 weapon and it's reasonable to suppose you've specialized with it, so you're good to do anywhere from 1d8+6 to 1d12+7 on a hit. This is assuming you don't use Power Attack, of course -- an overkill feat if you were to use it against level 1 commoner stats, but really, really useful against a mob. (Against AC 6, a +1 greatsword wielder PAing for +16 damage still hits the mob 95% of the time for 1d12+23 hp of damage). Now once grappled, said fighter is suddenly doing a lot less damage per hit (especially since it's going to be hard to draw a light weapon at this point), but even the -4 penalty on attack rolls isn't going to prevent chipping away. Nevertheless, once grappled, it's likely all over for the fighter unless the party can win this quickly. Fortunately, those two swings (especially if 2d12+46 damage is the expected result), preceded by a little archery and some magical firepower, should cover things pretty quickly. But these numbers don't give the full picture either. If you were just running this as a fight against 48 commoners, then every single positive modifier to the damage you do is overkill. It doesn't matter whether you can cause 2 or 50 hp of damage with a single swing -- it only drops one commoner. Great Cleave and Whirlwind Attack both change the dynamic, of course, but the fact remains that one hit equals one opponent out of commision. Meanwhile, a mob is the best target in the world for Power Attack. The more damage you can do, the better, in fact. You get your money's worth out of that composite bow with the 16 Strength pull, the flame arrow spell your wizard cast (yeah, it's a weak 3rd level spell, even against a mob, but don't sneer at an extra 3d6 hp of damage a round with Rapid Shot), and all those other little damage bonuses. (I think it's a great way to keep rangers from being punished for selecting kobold or goblinoid as a favoured enemy at earlier levels, rather than insisting that they made a dumb choice.) By combining their efforts and abilities, this party should be able to take a mob down in three rounds, with a chance of pacifying them in one with a lucky spell. This assumes they choose to fight the mob, of course; a rogue would be more than happy to arrange to sneak everyone past them or send them off in the wrong direction. (A rogue often measures heroism in outwitting and evading enemies after all, and they're pretty good at making a lot of enemies. You don't often see them going toe to toe with hordes of enemies in their tales, since it's just not how they handle things.) Consider another situation. Imagine you've got a leaderless squad of twenty orcs, eager to pillage a village that has had just about enough of this sort of behaviour. As the mob charges them, the orcs all hurl javelins, averaging 104 hp of damage in a single round (based on average damage vs the chance to hit the mob's abysmal AC), then draw falchions for battle. Assuming the mob wasn't broken by the initial assault, they take an attack of opportunity from the orcs (90% likely to hit) as they overrun them, for an average of 32 hp of damage from the first four they assault. Result: twenty 1st level orc warriors break the mob inside of two rounds, sustaining no casualties. Mopping up the survivors will be child's play. I'm not saying the orcs won't ever take casualties in such a scenario. And sure, goblins are going to have a rougher time of it, but let's look at what happens when we use a slightly larger force of goblins. How about... oh, I don't know... 48? Now the initial javelin volley averages 108 hp of damage (this factors in the number of javelins that miss as well), leaving the mob with 27. If the goblins switch to morningstars after the first volley, the mob will usually disband after it takes nine attack of opportunity. At most, eight goblins die, but that assumes the mob doesn't draw nine attacks of opportunity in the first round it gets to attack. Result: a mob of commoners does not hold its own against an equal sized force of goblins. If anything, it fares worse than it would as an organized militia. (It can get messier with kobolds, but then, everything gets messier with kobolds. There's a reason they prefer to avoid fights unless they've got a numerical advantage and prefer the range of slings to javelins.) So we see that mobs don't do well against low level military units of similar, even smaller, size. If the unit is too small, however, and careless, it's in for a rude shock. Does this mean that knights are no match for a mob? Certainly not! One horseman is more than capable of overcoming a mob unit quite easily. It's going to take awhile with Mounted Archery, but Spirited Charge and Ride-By Attack can pull it off at virtually no risk in five rounds -- less with Power Attack. A unit of four knights will break a mob within two rounds, three tops, taking no casualties as long as they don't do anything stupid. That ought to address the combat-focused side of the equation; now let's consider magic. Why should a mob be able to absorb fireball damage when its individual members would all be dead? For exactly the same reason a high level character can come through it unscathed, even without protection magic. Fortune favours the brave. Sure, you're tougher, which is why you would automatically wipe the floor with these guys if they all attacked you one at a time (which is usually how it goes in heroic fantasy when lesser enemies get a chance to attack the hero at all). No question that you're better trained as well, which explains why a peasant can never, ever get lucky enough to cut a high level character's head off at the start of a fight (not even by scoring a crit with a scythe). But when it comes to you surviving magic, it's mostly down to luck. That luck isn't always going to be against the peasants. If it usually matters to you, then it should occasionally matter to them. Think about it: 10th level characters aren't just likely to survive a fireball -- they're likely to survive even if they were asleep and failed the save when it struck! That's not just heroic luck -- that's freakin' insane. However, it's also relatively balanced and can sometimes add to the fun, so I've got no problem with it. Likewise, I've got no problem with an idea that makes ordinary citizens a potentially potent force (whether of friends or foes) against much smaller numbers that asssume their "greater levels" will protect them. Consider how D&D already defies so much heroic convention. Bellerophon was one of the Big Names because he and Pegasus defeated the Chimera. In D&D, that's the sort of thing that uses up a quarter of the resources of a 7th level party, as is a medusa, based on the monster Perseus slew. (Meanwhile Theseus only got a crummy CR 4 minotaur...) The fire giants were worthy foes of the Aesir and Vanir, but a 10th level party shouldn't have much trouble besting one. Some notable wizard soloed a demon I won't mention in a fairly well-known novel/trilogy -- well, okay, maybe that one's not such a great example. :P We've got a horde of monsters that trivialize the originals in much the same way that most contemporary ascents of Everest trivialize the accomplishment of the first expedition to reach the peak. All right, I can live with that. The game asks me to accept that I might have to face a quartet of medusas some day, possibly even half-fiendish medusas with class levels? All right, sure, it could be fun. Likewise, having to smuggle the crown prince out of the country during a revolution can be fun at that level -- and half the fun is knowing the trouble an angry mob can be in such circumstances. And if I feel like a real challenge, sure, make them a mob of wights, ghouls, or werewolves. I see no reason such monsters must be beneath me, even when I do outclass them one-on-one. It's not like Conan told his armies to stay home and let him handle things once he became king, which ought to tell us something about what he thought his chances would be if he tried it.
Finarin Panjoro 08-26-05, 09:54 AM	Even better is the fact that you can actually hit multiple mobs with your fireball which does 150% damage. Let's say a 10th level character fireballs two mobs for 52 points of damage each. He just nailed 96 people with that fireball instead of the 20 or so that could normally be fit in the spell's radius (at 1 person per 5 foot square). If multiple mobs are tightly packed he could nail 4 of them (by hitting an adjoining corner area) and effect 192 people with one fireball! A mob of human commoners has 135 hit points. 3 fireballs of this level are likely to take them out. But three such fireballs could take out multiple mobs! If you've empowered your fireballs already the average damage is 78 points. Two take down all the mobs they can touch. There is no way you could take down 200 people with 2 empowered fireballs normally (or even with four if they all make both saves). So from that perspective mobs make area effects much MORE powerful. As I reminder I do revise the mob rules a bit myself. No save versus area effect evocations in addition to the 150% damage. Great Cleave and WWA can be used on every square the mob occupies that you threaten (which makes great cleave massively powerful against mobs since they have to provoke an AoO to attack you by engulfing you virtually garaunteeing 5 attacks against them at full bab). Morale checks for spectacular spells wielded against them (per Heroes of Battle rules) and so on.
Derren S. 08-26-05, 10:14 AM	Except that you don't kill the people in teh mob when you reduce it to 0 HP, you only disperse them.
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 06:05 PM	That's not entirely true. You've killed 1/3 of them, reduced 1/3 of them to 0 hp, and only got 1/3 of them left intact. I've got no problem with the idea that a fireball explosion is not an autokill even then. After reviewing the mob rules on the subject, it turns out that chain lightning is very effective against mobs. At 11th level, the spell targets twelve members of the mob. Since it's powerful enough to drop any creature with less than 8 hp even on a successful saving throw, a mob of 1st level commoners (or humanoid skeletons, orc warriors, swarming dire rats, etc.) winds up with 24 negative levels, losing 120 hp in the process. The mob of commoners also suffers a -24 penalty on all save DCs, attack rolls, skill checks, and ability checks at this point, which means that they no longer stand a chance against the party fighter (even if said fighter had already been grappled), who ought to be able to finish the mob within the round. At 15th level, chain lightning disbands an entire mob automatically. At 20th level, you can use it to assign 10 negative levels to a pair of mobs, leaving both at 35 hp (with -20 penalties save DCs, attack rolls, etc). I grant that if there's a problem with the mob mechanic, it's that by the rules a circle of death does nothing at all to it unless it has taken 21 negative levels (by which time circle of death may feel like overkill), because that spell affects an area, not targets. I'd recommend an adjustment to the mob rules for this spell, so that a caster can divide 1d4 negative levels per caster level (maximum 20d4) among targetted mobs within range, provided that the members of the mob are themselves eligible targets for the spell. Hitting four mobs for an average of 7 negative levels each greatly shifts the odds. If the "Fortitude negates" save seems harsh, make it "Fortitude half" for mobs. Incidentally, my earlier notes on the saving throws for a mob of commoners was inaccurate, though one could dispute the assignment of the good save in this case based on where it usually goes for humanoids. (In the case of a mob, however, it probably was the right choice.) One other thing that's noteworthy -- the Great Cleave feat isn't completely useless against a mob. If you should happen to trigger the feat by reducing a mob to 0 hp, you can continue to whack individuals who are still standing after you dispersed it. Likewise, if your Whirlwind Attack cuts down a mob, you've got a few more eligible targets. Now doesn't this take us back to those good old, low-level days when the spellcasters softened up the enemy for the warriors to finish off? ;) Mob rules gives characters more leeway for breaking a riot or the like without killing nearly everyone involved. (It doesn't hurt that they're subject to nonlethal attacks either.) I fail to see how creating an exception to the rule (in much the same way that a rapier is an exception to the rules for Weapon Finesse and dwarves get an exception to the rules on encumbered speed) is broken in this particular case. Edit: I might not agree with all of Finarin Panjoro's suggestions for further adjusting mob mechanics, but I don't have any objections to them either.
Derren S. 08-26-05, 06:09 PM	Where does it stand that you can target people inside the mob with chain lightning? When you can do this, you can also attack the people inside the mob individually with other attacks and the whole mob mechanic is useless.
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 06:34 PM	Where does it stand that you can target people inside the mob with chain lightning?I can't quote it to you, since it's not covered by the OGL. But I'll assume you've got the book and show you exactly where it says that. It's found on pg 58, in the second column. The second paragraph of the mob anatomy special quality confirms what I'm telling you in its very first sentence. When you can do this, you can also attack the people inside the mob individually with other attacks and the whole mob mechanic is useless.Not at all. Read the sentence and you'll see it doesn't apply to melee attacks. Inflict light wounds will damage a mob, but it won't assign it any negative levels, because it's not a targetted effect. On the other hand, a 9th level caster casting mass inflict light wounds leaves the mob with 18 negative negative levels, because that spell's damage is targetted and more than enough to incapacitate any individual thus targetted. While I was writing up this example, I had to check the rules for negative levels, because I was concerned that this rule for mobs might collapse when applied to mobs of undead and constructs. Fortunately, this is not the case; those creature types are immune to energy drain, but not negative levels themselves, and these negative levels are not the result of energy drain.
Derren S. 08-26-05, 06:41 PM	Page 58 deals with chases but I found what you meant. I must have overread this sentence the first time. So it makes at least a bit sense. But there is still the Blasphemy issue where a mob is invulnerable to something which would kill every member of the mob under normal conditions. And there is also the question how the mob is able to increase its combat power so much than commoner are able to destroy stone golems and tear down andamatine walls with their bare hands. But I have to disagree that Inflict X wounds doesn't cause a negative level. it says specific amount of creatures not multiple creatures. So even when it only targets one creature the attack can be/is directed against a single member of the mob. Which leads to the question why can the cleric touch and kill a single member of the mob and the fighter with his sword can't?
Tony Vargas 08-26-05, 07:00 PM	I'm glad to hear that the mob mechanic makes some provision for affecting individuals. It's odd, though, that it only seems to aply to spells. One other thing that's noteworthy -- the Great Cleave feat isn't completely useless against a mob. If you should happen to trigger the feat by reducing a mob to 0 hp, you can continue to whack individuals who are still standing after you dispersed it. Likewise, if your Whirlwind Attack cuts down a mob, you've got a few more eligible targets. That still seems to me to be completely useless against the mob, itself. And, that's just wrong. Great Cleave and WWA are ideal for fighting large numbers of lesser foes, and, indeed, that's about all they're for (and they ain't cheap). Power Attack, OTOH, is the opposite, it'd ideal for hurting very high-hp individuals (and it is cheap). If you design a character to be very effective at taking down large numbers of weaker enemies in melee, you'd logically use Great Cleave or WWA or maybe GTWF. Even though, in the first case, you'd have Power Attack, it wouldn't make any sense to use it on low-hp individuals, however many of them you might be facing. That the mob and swarm mechanics reverse the logical use of these feats, rendering characters designed specifically to deal with such threats ineffectual against them, forces me to judge them ill-concieved mechanics. PS: I can agree that Finarin's suggestions (as usual, much less complicated than my own proposals) might help address the problem, and certainly wouldn't make it any worse.
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 08:10 PM	True, the mob mechanic does break down for spells like circle of death and blasphemy, though I don't have much problem with blasphemy and the other three spells of its ilk taking a hit from time to time. (Granted, this isn't really where they need to take that kind of a hit.) And while mob rules throw out the usual standard for spells, I'm not entirely unhappy with that. Those mechanics appear to exist for the purpose of balancing spell effects when player characters are involved. "Off-screen", I see nothing wrong with the notion that sleep could effect someone who is a 5th level warrior "on-screen", for example. Such things do have to be adjudicated carefully, of course: a 12th level party is likely to be awfully ticked if a unit of the king's elite guard are offed by a circle of death shortly after the party has had its butt kicked by a single average member of the unit. This may be one thing I like about mob mechanics: they may have the potential to make the game a bit less mechanically uncertain in ways that allow a riot (or similar situation) to become a meaningful encounter. Going strictly by the encouter rules on pp 48-51 of the DMG, a party of 8th level or higher gets no xp no matter how many 1st level commoners or warriors they defeat in a day, while the mob rules keep them viable as an encounter up until the party reaches 15th level. I'm not saying parties should run into mobs all the time after they reach 7th level, any more than they should always find themselves pitted against trolls from the time they reach 4th level. Both are just one more option you can elect to use any time it seems appropriate. One of the mob's advantage is a generic quality that allows you to tailor it more easily to a number of circumstances where other encounters might not work. ("How do these trolls keep winding up on Baker Street anyway?") One of the disadvantages is that there can be a temptation to abuse the mob rules, to the point that players might fairly observe: "You know, kobolds didn't give us this kind of trouble back when we were 1st level." I know the mechanics could benefit from at least some tweaking, but I like the option itself. It gives the impression that game designers trust GM judgment enough to suggest tools like this. (Well, okay, it can also give the impression that "they don't realize what they've done!" but I think it's a bit easier to see both sides of this coin than it is for some of the other hotly debated examples out there. ;))
Shatteredtower 08-26-05, 11:08 PM	But I have to disagree that Inflict X wounds doesn't cause a negative level. it says specific amount of creatures not multiple creatures.Yes, but it also uses the word "targets". Ah, I see what you mean -- my mistake. Inflict light wounds is indeed a targetted spell. So even when it only targets one creature the attack can be/is directed against a single member of the mob.Perhaps. I see a subtle difference, though it would help if the mob rules mentioned it. Keep in mind that this is my impression -- I accept that not everyone is going to take the same views of the RAW for mobs and is at least as justified in not accepting my interpretation as I feel for selecting it. You see, while both rays and touch spells strike a target, I'm seeing the target in this case as the mob, not an individual within the mob. The reason I take this view is because both spells require an attack roll, which is made against the mob's AC the same way an arrow or sword is. I feel this is an approach consist with the mob rules, but I accept that it's not worded clearly enough for it to be the only valid interpretation. All I can do is recommend this interpretation if you do use the mob rules in some fashion. Great Cleave and WWA are ideal for fighting large numbers of lesser foes, and, indeed, that's about all they're for (and they ain't cheap). Power Attack, OTOH, is the opposite, it'd ideal for hurting very high-hp individuals (and it is cheap).Generally true. I don't mind having conditions that provide a specific exception to the general rule, though. If you design a character to be very effective at taking down large numbers of weaker enemies in melee, you'd logically use Great Cleave or WWA or maybe GTWF. Even though, in the first case, you'd have Power Attack, it wouldn't make any sense to use it on low-hp individuals, however many of them you might be facing. That the mob and swarm mechanics reverse the logical use of these feats, rendering characters designed specifically to deal with such threats ineffectual against them, forces me to judge them ill-concieved mechanics.I think you're overstating that a bit here. As you note, the character with Great Cleave has Power Attack. The one with Whirlwind Attack has Spring Attack. And one with Greater Two-Weapon Fighting can get six or seven swings a round in at this mob, with the possible additional advantage of being able to keep up this pace even after having been grappled. (This assumes the character uses two light weapons. It's rougher for double weapon users.) Of those three options, the one that's most disadvantaged is indeed the one reliant upon a Whirlwind Attack. I would feel remiss if I didn't tell a player who declared the intention to use it against a mob (or swarm) that they are being treated as one creature for the purpose of the combat (and declaring when they cease to be considered as such). It would be only proper to inform them of this and of the fact that mobs are still vulnerable to targetted spells and effects. However, I don't feel the Whirlwind Attack takes a beating even if it doesn't work against a mob most of the time. I know it's unlikely that a player is ever going to get a chance to unleash this feat against four mobs at once and I'm aware of the logical disconnect this creates when the feat is still perfectly usable against any number of disciplined troops within reach. (The same logical disconnect that would make a 1st level warrior ask: "Hey, listen, since some moron is throwing fireballs at us, wouldn't it be better to say to hell with the formation and just run riot on him?" I admit. Then again, I can see that happening. Er. Sort of. :P) However, the Whirlwind Attack is typically getting used against no more than three enemies at a time, or eight with a spiked chain. I know that enlarge person can be used with the spiked chain to use it against as many as 74 at once, but this is only if they surround you on all sides and fill every square within reach. Most of the time, they're coming in from only one side and you're not giving them much time to surround you, unless they're high enough in level to take the hits while they're working to flank you. But despite what it does to every gathering but a mob, the thing you've got to ask yourself is this: Are you standing up to this group of 48 maniacs because you know for a fact that you're much, more better than them, or are you merely assuming it? Likewise, if you're fighting a small army, what is it that makes you assume that you won't need the extra oomph of the Power Attack to handle the troops? Cleave triggers itself, regardless of how powerful the enemy you were fighting was, but Power Attack is a conscious choice. If you're 8th level, would you use it against someone you've heard addressed as Sir Tanly or Colonel Corn? Would you use it if you knew both of these men were low level aristocrats and that the latter had merely purchased his commission? Should it? Not really. If you think you've got good odds of scoring a hit, what does it matter that you only need to do 2 or 3 hp of damage to drop your enemy and you wind up doing 20 or 30? There's no need to hold back on Power Attack once you've got Great Cleave and have determined how easy your enemies are to hit -- it's not like you've got a limited number of uses per day. :) No such assumption is required with Whirlwind Attack, at least when multiple targets are being considered. You might be better off focusing one or two hits on one foe per round if they're tough enough, but you've usually got a better chance of hitting all three of them each once per round than one of them three times per round, so it's hard to say Whirlwind Attack serves no purpose if you've got more than one foe to worry about. As for Greater Two-Weapon Fighting, sure, you're likely to do more damage to a mob with a two-handed weapon, but you're still able to dish out a good amount of damage. The edge here is during the grapple, as long as you're carrying a light weapon. You can't fight with two weapons any more, but you don't have the two-handed weapon user's problem, the need to win a grapple check against the mob in order to draw a smaller blade. I'm not sure how Finarin Panjoro's suggestion for Great Cleave works, to be honest. Is he suggesting that you automatically get an attack against each square every time you strike the mob with your normal attack? If he is, the result isn't 5 attacks per round against a mob -- it's 10-15 on a full attack. Even an 8th level fighter with only 16 Strength and a +1 greatsword is more likely than not to do 20d6+50 hp of damage to the mob each round, and that's not including Weapon Specialization (another +20) and Power Attack (another +20-160). Said fighter would merely have to charge up to the edge of the mob, make one attack (and cleave four times), then make the attack of opportunity (and cleave four times off that) to win the fight. Knowing that, do you really think this mob would qualify as a CR 8 encounter, especially against a more typical PC fighter of the same level?
FriendoftheDork 08-27-05, 04:12 PM	I like the mob concept. Ok, it's rather new and perhaps might need some improvement, yet it doesen't seem wrong that multiple creature can fight alot better than single ones. it would be cool, I think, that they could make similar rules concerning military units. That way a party of heroes can really charge a unit of orcs and rout them, in just a few and simple rolls and spells. But as said there are some flaws. One is psychology. Ok it is possible to make humans so mad that they will fight with total abandon and fanaticism, but these are rare circumstances and would require some serious brainwashing or rousing with great zeal. A group of people can easily band together to take a stronger person down, but if said person starts fireballing them or some such, they should scatter extremely fast. But against a 5th level fighter with a longsword? I don't think so. Then again a trained unit can and should fight better with dicipline. 30 1st level warrior in a phalanx will fight alot better than 30 individuals. They need not be experienced or very skilled fighters, but could win against a less organized foe charging their wall of spears. It's not that different with roman legions, 20 1st level fighters fighting as a unit will win against 20 experienced and individually tough 2nd level barbarians charging en masse. Or should, at least. Cloudkill is a special matter... but it is inherently illogical anyway. If this produces poison gas, then why does it matter if you're 1st level or 20th? It doesen't matter if it was a fresh recruit or hardened veteran in WW1, if you were caught in mustard gas without a mask you would probably die or suffer disabling damage. Now hp, levels and HD are abstract, but then so are mobs. They are treated as a single entity because it is convenient, and are dangerous because numbers and will do count, not just training and experience. Dangerous creatures will usually not immeadeatly die from a cloudkill, it is undramatic. If this spell worked realisticly then all who experienced it in a few seconds. Game over. But to make an angry mob a challenge they have turned it into a monster, just like angry mobs and fanatism can be in RL. So those who were individually negligable become something fearsome united. Now I don't have the DMG2, so I can't really propose good house rules, but a few things are important: 1: Angry mobs should not be as dangerous as a same sized group of professional armed soldiers. 2: spells and effects affecting multiple people at once should have greater effect on a mob than singular effects. No matter if it's a burning forest or a fireball. 3: Singular effects should be relatively useless at mobs. A man with a sword can only kill or disable that much. normal weapons deal less (or minimum) damage to swarms, and something similar should be for mobs. No matter how tough, how much powerattack is used a fighter can only kill a few with a single strike. 4: mobs should be fairly large, minimum 100 seems to be the consensus. 5: feats and abilities meant to make you better at fighting multiple opponents should do just that. That is, cleave, whirlwind attack etc.
Derren S. 08-27-05, 04:30 PM	But mobs don't represent fighting formations like the legion or phalanx. A phalanx would still be individual people and thus weaker than a mob.
FriendoftheDork 08-27-05, 10:22 PM	But mobs don't represent fighting formations like the legion or phalanx. A phalanx would still be individual people and thus weaker than a mob. That was my point, it would be nice for units as single entities, and such a unit has to be better than a common mob! Ok a bunch of horse archer individuals can still take down a mob, but that is because of speed. Same perhaps for knights, unless the mob can ready attacks against them. Do mobs even have reach, or are they like swarms in this respect? Angry mobs are dangerous because unlike normal throngs of unarmed people, they are maddened with fury and zeal, and will fight like fanatics. Even 30 untrained people willing to tear an enemy to pieces with no regard to personal safety will be dangerous, unless there is a way to avoid it. But usually people are never this willing to sacrifice themselves. Would it be possible to post the stats and special qualities of angry mobs here? I don't have the DMG2 and I've only seem them once.
Tony Vargas 08-29-05, 02:09 PM	Knowing that, do you really think this mob would qualify as a CR 8 encounter, especially against a more typical PC fighter of the same level?My problem with the mob idea is not that it's inapropraite for the CR it's assigned (though it may be), and I'm not concerned with keeping mobs at the same CR - if implementing them in a more consistent way means dropping thier CR a bit, so be it.
Finarin Panjoro 08-29-05, 04:08 PM	Tony, I agree with you about Great Cleave and WWA with regards to mobs. That's why I houseruled that both can be used to attack every square of the mob that the attacker threatens. Which means if the mob engulfs them both are likely to get 8 attacks against it. In all likely hood a fighter of that level is going to deal enough damage to disperse the mob with 8 attacks. With Great Cleave each attack must deal enough damage to drop an individual member of the mob to recieve the next attack. Friend of the Dork, I also agree that trained military units should be more powerful than mobs. Thus I use these Unit (what I call a military mob) house-rules: -Units add armor and shield bonus to their AC if over half of them are wearing armor and have shields. -Units use the class HD type of the most members (warriors have d8, fighters d10, barbarians d12). -Units may take AoOs (I'm pretty sure mobs can't). -Units may make ranged attacks if they have appropriate weapons (this includes volley attacks per Heroes of Battle). -Units may attack adjacent targets without engulfing them. -Units may use reach weapons as long as 1/3 of them are so armed. -Units damage die is changed to fit that of the primary weapon they use (so great axe wielding units do 5d12 damage rather than 5d6). Use the appropriate reach weapon damage for reach attacks. -Units recieve bonuses from their commander (per Commander Auras in Heroes of Battle). -Units may use feats possessed by atleast 1/3 of their members to a maximum of four additional feats, the unit does not need to meet the prerequisites as long as the members do. So a Unit could use combat reflexes (with its reach weapons), rapid shot (with ranged weapons), and power attack (with melee weapons) if it wanted too. This makes them significantly more powerful than mobs. Note these are off the top of my head I don't have my mob "revisions" with me, but I think that's all that I came up with.
Shatteredtower 08-29-05, 11:03 PM	Tony, I agree with you about Great Cleave and WWA with regards to mobs.I can't support the ideas, after further reflection. Most mobs become far, far too weak against such a means of attack. The mob is simply destroyed utterly, which defeats the entire purpose of mob rules in the first place. It's not designed to make low level creatures so much less powerful that a high level fight kills sixteen (where he'd otherwise have killed eight) and leaves sixteen more barely able to fight in the space of one round. No, if you'd use this sort of rule with mobs, you're better off to not use mobs at all. I'm not kidding. This has an encounter level of 4th vs. Great Cleave -- and 8th vs. a wizard. I also agree that trained military units should be more powerful than mobs. They are. Refer to my post earlier on what a squad of 20 orcs or 48 goblins can do to a mob within a round or two, complete with casualty rates. I even noted how quickly a cavalry charge can break a mob. Your unit idea is interesting. I'm not sure how evokers will view the trend, but let's consider a few of the points. Units add armor and shield bonus to their AC if over half of them are wearing armor and have shields. How do you handle this when the unit breaks up? Units use the class HD type of the most members (warriors have d8, fighters d10, barbarians d12). The trouble I see here is that unit of giants has d8 hp. They've also got high Constitution, but barbarian units may be comparable. They're certainly comparable to ogre units, especially while raging. Units may take AoOs (I'm pretty sure mobs can't).I believe you're right about this, but one thing you need to address is why mobs don't take AoOs. As a gargantuan creature, a mob would have a reach of 20 ft! But as for units, do they draw AoOs for swarming over an enemy? Units may make ranged attacks if they have appropriate weapons (this includes volley attacks per Heroes of Battle).I will get that book eventually. In the meantime, I have to say that this is one of the main advantages a disciplined unit has over a mob, the ability to use ranged weaponry. The other advantages include greater mobility (at least in light armor), readying and aiding actions, and the sheer amount of damage they can do as the mob hits them. (A mob can draw up to 16 attacks of opportunity from goblins each round -- or more, if they're moving through goblin ranks on each side as well -- plus at least 16 readied actions. Even assuming that all 1 goblins die, the mob has taken 32 attacks doing 1d6 hp of damage each if successful, as 85% of them will be. With morningstars, that means the goblins will do 95 hp of damage to the mob on average. In one round. From a third their number in goblins who didn't even need to use unit rules. Units damage die is changed to fit that of the primary weapon they use (so great axe wielding units do 5d12 damage rather than 5d6). Use the appropriate reach weapon damage for reach attacks.What bonuses are applied to the unit damage die, and do you realize that this makes a unit of halflings with short swords less powerful than a mob in terms of the damage output? This makes them significantly more powerful than mobs.It renders mobs entirely pointless. As it stands right now, the 8th level fighter with Great Cleave is already more than adequately equipped to crack a mob by using Power Attack and working with the rest of what is assumed to be a team of four. Mobs already lose to units a third their size (and of equal level) without further modifications to the rules. If you're going to make them worthless, don't use them. If you're going to use them, don't make them worthless.
Finarin Panjoro 08-30-05, 12:58 AM	Shattered Tower, Good points all. I'm home now and checking my notes. I should mention I haven't used mobs yet because my PCs are only 6th level. These are revisions I'm looking into for when they reach higher levels and are faced with such things. I must have reached similar conclusions to yours because instead of what I posted previously I have in my notes that a character with cleave gains a +2 damage bonus against a mob/unit, a character with great cleave gains a +4 damage bonus against a mob/unit, and a character with whirlwind attack gets a +6 damage bonus against a mob/unit, but they make all attacks normally. I don't deal with the unit once it breaks up (ie. the Unit is defeated). I would have all its individual members fall, flee, surender, etc. Once the Unit/mob is defeated the individual members are no threat. I should have mentioned with the weapon damage that the minimum is 5d6 even for a halfling unit armed with daggers (the same as for an unarmed mob). Also hit die would be by type or class whichever is better. A Unit does draw an AoO for swarming over an enemy. Unit reach would be by weapon type for the individual members, not for a gargantuan creature. So they would have a reach of 10 feet, but still be able to attack adjacent (via the non-reach weapon wielding members). You're right that using the normal rules a disciplined rank of goblins will devastate a mob by way of archery, readied actions, and AoOs. Remember however that I allow units to attack adjacent targets. They don't have to provoke an AoO to attack someone like a mob does. Also I don't use these for unit versus unit battles (I just decide who's going to win those based on CR). This would only be used in the case of a Unit facing the PCs. So I only really care if it works party vs. mob and/or party vs. unit. You do make some excellent points though. Clearly I'm going to have to give this some more thought before I use them in-game.
Rake 08-30-05, 05:14 AM	A key feature of a swarm is that the individual members of it are packed together far more tightly than can ever happen normally, and, rather than dispersing as they normally would, not only stay that way, but move and attack in concert. The formation of a swarm should thus be limitted to very unusual circumstances - like Tarken says, they're thier own creature, not just a mass of individuals - and the mechanics shouldn't be aplied every time you get a lot of individuals in one place. And a mob of commoners is traditionally a mob of angry commoners. Describe it as a side-effect similiar to a rage that ups the tenacity and the durability of said commoners.
FriendoftheDork 08-30-05, 05:17 AM	Tony, I agree with you about Great Cleave and WWA with regards to mobs. That's why I houseruled that both can be used to attack every square of the mob that the attacker threatens. Which means if the mob engulfs them both are likely to get 8 attacks against it. In all likely hood a fighter of that level is going to deal enough damage to disperse the mob with 8 attacks. With Great Cleave each attack must deal enough damage to drop an individual member of the mob to recieve the next attack. Friend of the Dork, I also agree that trained military units should be more powerful than mobs. Thus I use these Unit (what I call a military mob) house-rules: -Units add armor and shield bonus to their AC if over half of them are wearing armor and have shields. -Units use the class HD type of the most members (warriors have d8, fighters d10, barbarians d12). -Units may take AoOs (I'm pretty sure mobs can't). -Units may make ranged attacks if they have appropriate weapons (this includes volley attacks per Heroes of Battle). -Units may attack adjacent targets without engulfing them. -Units may use reach weapons as long as 1/3 of them are so armed. -Units damage die is changed to fit that of the primary weapon they use (so great axe wielding units do 5d12 damage rather than 5d6). Use the appropriate reach weapon damage for reach attacks. -Units recieve bonuses from their commander (per Commander Auras in Heroes of Battle). -Units may use feats possessed by atleast 1/3 of their members to a maximum of four additional feats, the unit does not need to meet the prerequisites as long as the members do. So a Unit could use combat reflexes (with its reach weapons), rapid shot (with ranged weapons), and power attack (with melee weapons) if it wanted too. This makes them significantly more powerful than mobs. Note these are off the top of my head I don't have my mob "revisions" with me, but I think that's all that I came up with. Not bad, not bad. I want a Phalanx unit! Shattered Tower, I read your example yet a bunch of goblins or orcs are never that good vs PCs. I want my armies to stand up to 10th, nay 20th level PCs!
Solidcobra 08-30-05, 08:57 AM	Yeah. An army has...what? (i have no idea, but bear with me) Say that they have a thousand units. just one pitiful thousand. that's 1000 ranged attacks. Let's say that 5% of them hit. (500) and that 5% of THAT actually crits. (25). that is 525d8, presuming javelins/light crossbows/longbows. No way will an army stand up to a lv.20 PC. nossire.
Finarin Panjoro 08-30-05, 09:39 AM	Thanks Friend of the Dork, I should clarify that I don't consider the Unit/Mob rules to be a good way of war gaming. These are only effective for encounters between PCs and large groups of weaker beings. Shattered Tower is right these rules don't work well for Unit versus Mob encounters. Its strictly PC centric (like the rest of the world ;) ). I believe the reason for mob/unit/swarm rules is that it is much easier for the DM to keep track of all of the large number of creatures involved. I can keep track of 5 units of soldiers a lot easier than I can keep track of 240 soldiers. It also makes it easier to describe the tactical deployment of forces to the PCs (Two infantry units are forming up to flank you and a cavalry unit is charging down the front). I don't use maps and minatures, but if you do then this is an unbelivable time saver. Solidcobra points out that a thousand soldiers can be a threat to the PCs (an easily arguable point with protection from arrows being only a second level spell), but what DM wants to have to run a thousand soldiers?
Tony Vargas 08-30-05, 02:41 PM	I can't support the ideas, after further reflection. Most mobs become far, far too weak against such a means of attack. The mob is simply destroyed utterly, which defeats the entire purpose of mob rules in the first place.That's assuming a mob /should/ have a CR of 8 (or whatever). Why should a bunch of CR 1/2 or less critters have a CR of 8? And, what, really is the /purpose/ of the mob rules in the first place? Is it to take away hard-earned PC abilities? Or is it to make running large encounters less problematic for the DM? It's not designed to make low level creatures so much less powerful that a high level fight kills sixteen (where he'd otherwise have killed eight) and leaves sixteen more barely able to fight in the space of one round.I don't think that's what Finarin's idea would have done, actually. I mean, the normal rules (no mobs), would allow a WWA to hit 8 opponents normally arrayed around the attacker. If you had 16 squeezed into those squares they'd be even more vulnerable, and he could still hit all of them. But, if those creatures call themselves a 'mob,' suddenly he shouldn't be able to kill any of them? No, if you'd use this sort of rule with mobs, you're better off to not use mobs at all. I'm not kidding.I think the mob rules are bad enough that you're better off not using mobs at all - but, if you must, a variant like Finarin's might keep your players from getting too annoyed with you... I mean, really, what mobs do is change the rules on the players. You tell a player, hey, if you learn fireball or pick WWA, you'll be able to kill a whole bunch of goblins (even if they aren't worth much exp anymore, at least they're not much of a threat). Then you say, oh, look it's a mob of goblins, your fireball only makes them angrier and you can't use your WWA at all! :devil: It renders mobs entirely pointless. The only points I can see for the mobs is (1) less dice rolling for the DM, (2) vindictively strip PCs of high-'cost' character abilities. As it stands right now, the 8th level fighter with Great Cleave is already more than adequately equipped to crack a mob by using Power Attack... And, so is a fighter with Power Attack but no Great Cleave. Why should the more potent fighter, who can normally slash through half a dozen foes at once, suddenly be exactly as effective as the one that can only cut down one at a time - just because those foes are standing closer together in an undisciplined mob? Why should a lightning bolt that normally could only kill part of a 20x20 collection of individuals become exactly as effective as the fireball that would normally engulf and kill all of them? There is no possible justification for such a mechanical reversal of tactical effectiveness.
FriendoftheDork 08-30-05, 04:09 PM	Thanks Friend of the Dork, I should clarify that I don't consider the Unit/Mob rules to be a good way of war gaming. These are only effective for encounters between PCs and large groups of weaker beings. Shattered Tower is right these rules don't work well for Unit versus Mob encounters. Its strictly PC centric (like the rest of the world ;) ). I believe the reason for mob/unit/swarm rules is that it is much easier for the DM to keep track of all of the large number of creatures involved. I can keep track of 5 units of soldiers a lot easier than I can keep track of 240 soldiers. It also makes it easier to describe the tactical deployment of forces to the PCs (Two infantry units are forming up to flank you and a cavalry unit is charging down the front). I don't use maps and minatures, but if you do then this is an unbelivable time saver. Solidcobra points out that a thousand soldiers can be a threat to the PCs (an easily arguable point with protection from arrows being only a second level spell), but what DM wants to have to run a thousand soldiers? I'm not certain what are good rules for war gaming (WHFB?), and most RPGs with mass combat rules have been tedious or to complex. The concept of unit=entity sounds good to me though, for simplicity and expedience. I'm not sure what you mean by unit vs mob encounters, as there is no such thing as a unit as entity in D&D yet. Yeah. An army has...what? (i have no idea, but bear with me) Say that they have a thousand units. just one pitiful thousand. that's 1000 ranged attacks. Let's say that 5% of them hit. (500) and that 5% of THAT actually crits. (25). that is 525d8, presuming javelins/light crossbows/longbows. No way will an army stand up to a lv.20 PC. nossire. This logic is flawed. First of all, and army is not likely to be made up of 100% archers. But let's say the archers are just part of it. Still, 1000 archers usually have a hard time coordinating attacks on the enemy, let alone a single person. There is a limit to how many ranks can fire at once, and of course a limit for how long a line can be when firing at a single target. Perhaps 200-300 can actually fire at once (See Hero for a spectacular example). If you figure 5% hits, then that's 10-15 hits, and no crits (+0.5-0.75). That's 10-15d8 damage. Not bad, but 45-70 damage average is no more than a maximized fireball. And that's without throwing magic into it, something a 20th level character usually has an abundance of. A single Protection from Arrows or Stoneskin makes a wizard (or potion-drinker) preactically immune to the damage rolled. Even a nonmagical adamantine full plate will shear off alot of damage, and god knows what PrCs and abilities out there will nullify the damage pretty much. A wizard should have no problem flying at the extreme range of his fireballs and firing away, at a range even outside the max range of longbows, even composite ones. The fact is that an army will have a hard time against a high level party, unless it contains similar high level people, preferably magic-users. Now if you look at melee (as I actually intended) the Army has a problem. Only 8 of them can attack the fighter at once, and the fighter can take out all 8 with whirlwind attack. He will basically wade through them, and since the soldiers will only hit on a natural 20 and deal little damage when they do, the fighter's HPs will last a long time, longer with sufficient healing potions. He could probably rout a small force by himself. Is this the way it's supposed to be? Now if a trained unit of 50 men fights against a single on, IMO the one should lose.
Derren S. 08-30-05, 04:18 PM	Is this the way it's supposed to be? Now if a trained unit of 50 men fights against a single on, IMO the one should lose. And when it is 50 men against a dragon, should the dragon also loose? Or 50 men agains a demon? When you talk about lvl 20 heroes, you aren't talking about experienced soldiers anymore. 20th level character are more like forces of nature way above ordinary humans.
FriendoftheDork 08-30-05, 04:27 PM	And when it is 50 men against a dragon, should the dragon also loose? Or 50 men agains a demon? When you talk about lvl 20 heroes, you aren't talking about experienced soldiers anymore. 20th level character are more like forces of nature way above ordinary humans. Unfortunately yes. Feel free to like that if you want. 50 men against a dragon? Depends on it's size really. A small to large dragon should not be invincible, but huge and greater can just roll over them (Smaug style). Now Bard may have killed Smaug, but he sure couldn't do the damage smaug did to his town now could he? I like my 20th level heroes able to defeat a Dragon, but not an army.
Tony Vargas 08-30-05, 04:31 PM	Now if you look at melee (as I actually intended) the Army has a problem. Only 8 of them can attack the fighter at once, and the fighter can take out all 8 with whirlwind attack. He will basically wade through them, and since the soldiers will only hit on a natural 20 and deal little damage when they do, the fighter's HPs will last a long time, longer with sufficient healing potions. He could probably rout a small force by himself. Is this the way it's supposed to be? Yes! :D 1E fighters got 1 attack per level per round against weaker foes like goblins or peasant conscripts. 3E fighters can get Great Cleave or Whirlwind attack. The mighty warrior cutting down lesser foes like wheat before the scythe is a classic bit of heroic fantasy. But, while such a character could concievably route a small force, numbers would eventually tell (and not just because there are likely to be more dangerous individuals mixxed in with any large group). 20's still hit, and magic (as might provide healing or high enough DR to negate that damage) is a limitted resource. Even if facing only 8 foes at a time, and taking hits only on a 20, 5 rounds into the combat, he'll have taken some hits - five minutes and some of them will have been crits. Battles can last hours. Of course, you'd never want to play through all that, but overwhelming numbers will overwhelm, eventually. Rules for 'units' or some such would be welcome if they streamlined such large-scale encounters - as long as that's all they did.
Finarin Panjoro 08-30-05, 05:26 PM	Rules for 'units' or some such would be welcome if they streamlined such large-scale encounters - as long as that's all they did. And that's what I think the mob rules are (or can be with a bit of tweeking)! Friend of the Dork, When I said mob vs. unit encounters I was refering to my Unit idea vs. a standard DMG2 mob. Shattered Tower had pointed out that my unit ideas screwed some things up, but his objections really only applied in Unit vs. Mob encounters. I would not use these rules to adjudicate Unit vs. Unit or Unit vs. Mob since they are intended only for use of the mob or unit against the PCs or heroic NPCs.
Finarin Panjoro 08-30-05, 05:30 PM	And when it is 50 men against a dragon, should the dragon also loose? Or 50 men agains a demon? When you talk about lvl 20 heroes, you aren't talking about experienced soldiers anymore. 20th level character are more like forces of nature way above ordinary humans. I'm not sure what you're objecting too here. Mobs are a CR 9 encounter as written. They aren't a challenge for a 20th level character. A 20th level fighter would make mince meat out of 10 mobs with little or no trouble. I like the mob rules becuase it gives them a respectable chance against mid-level characters. By about 6th level 50 orcs, commoners, or soldiers are no longer a challenge for the PCs by the standard rules. They're an annoyance that takes a huge amount of game time to deal with. The mob rules stretch this to about 12th level or so, drastically reduce game time, and greatly improve ease of use. Beyond about 12th level even a mob isn't a threat to a party of PCs.
Odin_666 08-31-05, 03:27 AM	that's 1000 ranged attacks. Let's say that 5% of them hit. (500) and that 5% of THAT actually crits. (25) either you mean 50% hit, or it has to be (50)+ 2,5 crits...
Shatteredtower 08-31-05, 03:43 AM	That's assuming a mob /should/ have a CR of 8 (or whatever). Why should a bunch of CR 1/2 or less critters have a CR of 8? And, what, really is the /purpose/ of the mob rules in the first place?It's to turn what should be a meaningful situation into a meaningful situation for PCs who are now capable of handling it. How does your 1st-4th level party handle a stampede. Is it to take away hard-earned PC abilities?Of course not. Nor does it do this. I don't think that's what Finarin's idea would have done, actually. I mean, the normal rules (no mobs), would allow a WWA to hit 8 opponents normally arrayed around the attacker. If you had 16 squeezed into those squares they'd be even more vulnerable, and he could still hit all of them.Right, so what you're saying is that mob rules should be designed to make enemies more vulnerable to attack? So instead of 10-12 CR 1/2 creatures making up a CR 7 encounter, you want a method that turns 48 of them into a CR 4 or less? That doesn't add up at all. But, if those creatures call themselves a 'mob,' suddenly he shouldn't be able to kill any of them?I don't know where you get this idea that he can't kill any of them with the tools he's got. Look, a 4th level barbarian with 16 Str, Power Attack, Weapon Focus, and a +1 greataxe has a 95% chance of hitting a mob of commoners if he rages and puts everything into Power Attack, and he averages 24 hp of damage per swing. He gets in two such swings, one from charging the mob and one attack of opportunity, before they get to injure him at all. So that's one 4th level barbarian without the benefit of bull's strength (when he'd average 27 hp of damage per swing) and on average he's taken a third of the hp out of the mob before he takes an average of 17 hp of damage from them. He's pretty well toast once the grappling starts, though, so it would only make sense to fight a mob intelligently, rather than relying on your great skill to carry the day. This whole concept of just rushing in and busting heads is overdue for a good kick in the head, since nothing else seems to induce one to think before doing something that stupid. "But I'm the hero!" Yeah, and for all you know, this group of commoners are all Blood War veterans on R&R, a secret society of cultists in disguise, or a gathering of green hags banded together by really powerful enchanter. Even if it is just a mob of commoners, that's a bloody stupid thing to do, and even a 20th level character deserves at least a few bruises for the stunt. I know I wouldn't cry for the 20th level character that took them on this way and died. Good grief, at least hit the mob from two or more sides at once if you're a small group. I think the mob rules are bad enough that you're better off not using mobs at all - but, if you must, a variant like Finarin's might keep your players from getting too annoyed with you...By making them completely unusable? That makes no sense. The only reason your players would get annoyed with you for using mobs would be if you used them all the time -- and the sort of DM that does that isn't fixed by nerfing mobs into gatherings of half-strength commoners. But maybe the DM should just balance things by making the commoners all 6th level. I mean, they won't accomplish anything anyway, which is just so accurate, since the PCs were meant to always dominate wherever they go unless a BBEG is involved directly in the fight. I mean, really, what mobs do is change the rules on the players.No, what they do is alter circumstances to better reflect the notion of a mob. You couldn't do that as the rules stood previously. You tell a player, hey, if you learn fireball or pick WWA, you'll be able to kill a whole bunch of goblins (even if they aren't worth much exp anymore, at least they're not much of a threat).And then you say, "Oh, I didn't mean it would work against all goblins. Just the ones that don't count for anything. No, these are... special goblins." Then you say, oh, look it's a mob of goblins, your fireball only makes them angrier and you can't use your WWA at all! :devil:This statement is untrue on several levels. If your player announced the intention to walk up and use Whirlwind Attack against a dragon when there was no other enemy in sight, you have a duty to note why this would be bad. If you'd do that, then you are obliged to inform the same player of the same problem when facing a mob. You are likewise obligated to inform the same player when the feat can be utilized against the enemy, because sooner or later the mob will be disbanded by smart PCs. So Whirlwind Attack is still effective. More importantly, so's Spring Attack, which always goes well with speed enhancements of any sort. Once you can move 30 feet before and after the attack, you own most humanoid mobs. And that "angrier mob" has fewer hit points and gains nothing in return for this undefined "angrier" state. The only points I can see for the mobs is (1) less dice rolling for the DM, (2) vindictively strip PCs of high-'cost' character abilities.Point number two is unfounded bias. There's nothing vindictive about providing a challenge that compels them to stop acting like one trick ponies who are going to get their butts kicked the first time they try this against enemies prepared with a seeming spell. Their abilities are no more gone than they'd be gone if the encounter was against flying archers or a lone dragon. Don't pretend otherwise. And, so is a fighter with Power Attack but no Great Cleave. Why should the more potent fighter, who can normally slash through half a dozen foes at once, suddenly be exactly as effective as the one that can only cut down one at a time - just because those foes are standing closer together in an undisciplined mob?Take a look at the usual arrangement of one human per 5 ft square. During how much of that Great Cleave is your axe in contact with a human being, assuming you hit all 8? Not very much of it, since neither you nor any of your enemies actually fill an entire 5 ft square. Most of the time, you're swinging through air. That's just not happening against a tightly packed mob. Neither is your Whirlwind Attack. Now if you try to override that with an appeal to fantasy, you're stuck, because it swings both ways. And the fighter with Great Cleave is still more potent. When the mob drops, he either gets a free attack on the next one or on all of those people who are left over from it. That's a big plus over the power attack, especially if you were facing a mob of bugbears of the like. Why should a lightning bolt that normally could only kill part of a 20x20 collection of individuals become exactly as effective as the fireball that would normally engulf and kill all of them?You mean why shouldn't a 3rd level offensive spell that causes electrical damage be as effective as a 3rd level offensive spell that causes fire damage? I've got no problem with making lightning bolt a very effective spell for fighting mobs or groups, especially with the fact that you can't cast it from the second rank without someone in front of you needing to make a Reflex save. So the spell apparently conducts itself very well through a group, so what? There is no possible justification for such a mechanical reversal of tactical effectiveness.Nonsense. Pure, dishonest nonsense. I see one-trick ponies, not tactics. And when you're creating one-trick ponies bigger than a mob and whining because they can't fight it the same way they'd fight that CR 7 encounter with ten goblins warriors, it's because they can't think beyond a single trick. If you're always about your best feat and no tactical spell variety, of course you should lose. If you're taking enemies for granted, you deserve to lose badly. Sadly, mobs aren't quite up to challenging of giving your characters the thrashing they truly deserve unless you really screw up, but apparently this is just too much to demand of some players. Apparently it can be nothing but vindictive. Nonsense.
FriendoftheDork 08-31-05, 04:20 AM	Yes! :D 1E fighters got 1 attack per level per round against weaker foes like goblins or peasant conscripts. 3E fighters can get Great Cleave or Whirlwind attack. The mighty warrior cutting down lesser foes like wheat before the scythe is a classic bit of heroic fantasy. But, while such a character could concievably route a small force, numbers would eventually tell (and not just because there are likely to be more dangerous individuals mixxed in with any large group). 20's still hit, and magic (as might provide healing or high enough DR to negate that damage) is a limitted resource. Even if facing only 8 foes at a time, and taking hits only on a 20, 5 rounds into the combat, he'll have taken some hits - five minutes and some of them will have been crits. Battles can last hours. Of course, you'd never want to play through all that, but overwhelming numbers will overwhelm, eventually. Rules for 'units' or some such would be welcome if they streamlined such large-scale encounters - as long as that's all they did. You mentioned goblin and peseant conscripts... well that's not exactly the same as a well trained disciplined unit now is it? The mighty warrior will kill quite a few still, mob rules or not, but instead of rolling for hours it's better to just roll for a few minutes. A mighty warrior can be fearsome, but anyone stupid enough to charge a military formation without caution deserve death. Finarin Panjoro: OK my misunderstanding.
Crox 08-31-05, 02:18 PM	IMO, It is better to understand mobs, not just like aggregation of medium and larger creatures. I think that mob can beorganized only under very special conditions, such hundreds of years of opression, very strong emotions accumulated for generations and so on. Not even very strong, but short lived emotions can create a mob (i.e. goblins mums cannot create a mob while party destroying their ofsprings). So, if I ever will use in my campaign mobs, and now I thinks about this wihtout recoil $)), then it will be very rare and special monster. It was a question about how mob can destroy adamantine wall with DR15, not know about DR15, but the Bastille was destroyed by french mob, totally! What concerning spells and spell efects, then it is magic and nobody can understand how does it works. So we always can say to our players, asking why did fireball didn't destroy all peasants: "Well, this long known but poorly understandable law of many peoples in one place also know as a Tenser's Big Numbers Law, unfortunatly you were a bad student and missed this lecture" or just say "freaking magic" :D
Derren S. 08-31-05, 02:29 PM	It was a question about how mob can destroy adamantine wall with DR15, not know about DR15, but the Bastille was destroyed by french mob, totally! And was the mob bare handed? The D&D mobs are. What concerning spells and spell efects, then it is magic and nobody can understand how does it works. So we always can say to our players, asking why did fireball didn't destroy all peasants: "Well, this long known but poorly understandable law of many peoples in one place also know as a Tenser's Big Numbers Law, unfortunatly you were a bad student and missed this lecture" or just say "freaking magic" :D Which are all illogical explanations to cover up illogical rules.
Tony Vargas 08-31-05, 02:57 PM	It's to turn what should be a meaningful situation into a meaningful situation for PCs who are now capable of handling it. I guess it hinges then on why it 'should' be a meaningful situation. Why should a fight with a largish number (48, in the OP) of contemptible foes who, individually or in groups of a dozen have no real chance against you at all become a 'meaingful' situation? Even if it 'should' be so, why should the mechanics be twisted around so that valid tactics against large numbers of lesser foes be rendered sub-optimal or worthless? Can't you streamline a combat with a horde without doing that? Right, so what you're saying is that mob rules should be designed to make enemies more vulnerable to attack? So instead of 10-12 CR 1/2 creatures making up a CR 7 encounter, you want a method that turns 48 of them into a CR 4 or less?What I'm saying is that it's OK for a mob-style mechanic to streamline a combat, but it shouldn't much alter the likely ultimate results, nor the kinds of tactics that should be effective. Look, a 4th level barbarian with 16 Str, Power Attack, Weapon Focus, and a +1 greataxe has a 95% chance of hitting a mob of commoners if he rages and puts everything into Power Attack, and he averages 24 hp of damage per swing. He gets in two such swings, one from charging the mob and one attack of opportunity, before they get to injure him at all. And one with Cleave would do /exactly/ the same, even though he can kill commoners twice as fast because of that feat. That's taking away the feat for all intents and purposes. The only reason your players would get annoyed with you for using mobs would be if you used them all the time -- and the sort of DM that does that isn't fixed by nerfing mobs. OK, yes, you have a point here. The mob and swarm mechanics are even worse if they start getting used /every/ time you face a largish number of creatures. In another thread a while back I mentioned an example that involved a half-dozen tiny bats in one square, someone shot back that it would be a /swarm/. A swarm of flying tiny creatures has 1000 members, but that poster had already made the leap to aplying the mechanic any time multiple small critters occupied the same square. If your player announced the intention to walk up and use Whirlwind Attack against a dragon when there was no other enemy in sight, you have a duty to note why this would be bad. If you'd do that, then you are obliged to inform the same player of the same problem when facing a mob. Again, this is a good point, but, honestly, it still doesn't make much sense to me. If a mob or swarm is to be treated as a single creature, why is it invulnerable or resistant to effects that work against single creatures (like disintegrate); if it's meant to be a mass of creatures, why is it invulnerable or resistant to effects that should work well against masses of creatures, like WWA or fireball? The answer is that it's a bad mechanic, a sort of DM's munchkin loophole. It punishes characters for using the apropriate tactics against it. Point number two is unfounded bias. There's nothing vindictive about providing a challenge that compels them to stop acting like one trick ponies It's not a matter of being a one-trick pony, at all. A character with Great Cleave also has Power Attack, one with WWA also has Spring Attack and Expertise. They have useful tactics against single creatures as well as multiple ones. That a mob or swarm goes part-way towards making a mass of multiple creatures into a single one is part of the problem. And, yes, when you pick character abilities are tactics for thier effectiveness against a certain type of foe, and the DM changes the rules so that they'er useless against that type of foe - at arbitrary times - then, yes, that can be seen as vindictiveness. Not very much of it, since neither you nor any of your enemies actually fill an entire 5 ft square. Most of the time, you're swinging through air. That's just not happening against a tightly packed mob. Neither is your Whirlwind Attack. So, what, it's /friction/? Sheesh. At least the cover idea made a little sense. Sure, if you're cleaving through a tightly-packed mob, you might not cut through every single member of the mob - but you'll still cut through more than one; if you're Whirlwinding the mob, you might not get the ones in the 'back' of a square, but you'll still get all the ones actually facing you - and that's still a lot more than one. Yet your attack will be /exactly/ as effective as a single attack. That's just wrong. It's taking away a character ability. You mean why shouldn't a 3rd level offensive spell that causes electrical damage be as effective as a 3rd level offensive spell that causes fire damage?No, I mean why should an area spell that doesn't touch some individuals have the potential to kill them, while one that engulfs them all has the potential not to? So the spell apparently conducts itself very well through a group, so what? Does the mob that has one of it's squares in the area of a fireball 'conduct' that fire, even as it also provides 'cover' from the fireball that detonates in it's midst? Nonsense. Pure, dishonest nonsense. I assure you I'm being quite honest, and, from my PoV, the current mechanics are the ones that seem nonsensical.
Tony Vargas 08-31-05, 03:01 PM	You mentioned goblin and peseant conscripts... well that's not exactly the same as a well trained disciplined unit now is it?Nod. I mentioned such example with regard to the 1E fighter because his multiple-attack ability was keyed to the HD of the targets ('less than one HD') 1E goblins with d8-1 hps, and peasants and ordinary men-at-arms with d6 hps qualified, a unit of veteran warriors (1st level fighters) or orcs (d8 HD), wouldn't.
FriendoftheDork 08-31-05, 06:48 PM	Nod. I mentioned such example with regard to the 1E fighter because his multiple-attack ability was keyed to the HD of the targets ('less than one HD') 1E goblins with d8-1 hps, and peasants and ordinary men-at-arms with d6 hps qualified, a unit of veteran warriors (1st level fighters) or orcs (d8 HD), wouldn't. Well I can see a fighter routing a bunch of very weak creature with poor morale, but not a well organized and fully armed warband of hobgoblins, for example. Heck, even 20-30 2nd lvl hobgoblin fighters have little chance against perhaps even a 10th level fighter as the game is now. Now that's not heroic fantasy, that's heroic fallacy. Aragorn is a scourge upon the hordes of mordor, but he can't take out the hordes by himself. His ancestor was even killed by some orcs shooting arrows.... after having cut the one ring off Sauron himself. Heroes can do amazing things but a single arrow can still fell them.
Derren S. 08-31-05, 06:54 PM	Aragorn is a scourge upon the hordes of mordor, but he can't take out the hordes by himself. How many orcs did he kill at the end of the first movie? Or in Moria? Heroes can do amazing things but a single arrow can still fell them. It tooke some more arrows to kill Boromir. Also in D&D a single arrow can also kill the hero, just with the HP system a arrow hits only when reduced to 0 HP or below. Its like the James Bond movies (Which I think are a very accurat representation of the heroism D&D wants to represent). A single bullet can kill Bond, they simply don't hit. Oh and don't get me started what some Heroes in Star Wars (Jedies) can do to organized units (Storm Troopers/Droids)
tiercel 08-31-05, 07:35 PM	OK -- we are worrying about why fireball doesn't work the way you would think, against a huge, teeming swarm/mob. This in a game where a naked rogue in an empty sealed 15' radius room can set off a fireball trap that fills the entire room with searing flame with no cover, and yet take no damage. This is also a game in which an inexperienced nomadic warrior can defeat a bloodthirsty swarm of five thousand bloodthirsty bats with a single swing of a big stick. (A first level barbarian with a greatclub, with a bit of luck, could hit a bat swarm for 13 points of damage, particularly if raging. Bat swarms take full damage from bludgeoning weapons. A swarm of Diminutive flying creatures has 5000 members.) What was that about nonsense? I mean, this bit about cover not working on spreads -- that works under normal game rules, when you have one Medium sized creature per 5 foot square (or, in unusual circumstances, say a grapple, maybe a couple). Map out a 5' square sometime and realize how big that is. In a mob, there are a lot more than one person or two in that square. Try getting on a train, say, on the London Underground out of the Theater District on a Saturday night, and you'll have some idea of what kind of densities we're talking about: easily 25+ people per 5' square. As has been pointed out, you probably barely have measureable line of effect to most of these folks. Besides, if you've ever been in a mob, or just a crowd, you know it doesn't act like people. It's not telepathy, just a weird social construct -- it's sort of like it exists as its own entity. Swarm/mob rules are just D&D slapping numbers on it. It may seem a little ridiculous in principle, but D&D is an abstract heroic gaming system in which some of those things are unavoidable.
Shatteredtower 08-31-05, 10:07 PM	I guess it hinges then on why it 'should' be a meaningful situation. Why should a fight with a largish number (48, in the OP) of contemptible foes who, individually or in groups of a dozen have no real chance against you at all become a 'meaingful' situation?My answer to that is one of scale, even though scale cannot be perfectly addressed in the D&D mechanics. By the time you've reached Great Cleave (4th-6th level), no amount of common enemies (including your standard mercenary warrior) can stand up to you. The odds have suddenly shifted from the point at which your 3rd level fighter has a real chance of losing against a dozen commoners to the point at which four dozen are always a drop in the bucket to a single fighter. I've got no problem with this usually being the case. I've got no problem with this eventually always turning out to be the case. I just don't think this should always be the case at 4th-6th level, when I feel a character should at least have to a little bit of effort into it. Even if it 'should' be so, why should the mechanics be twisted around so that valid tactics against large numbers of lesser foes be rendered sub-optimal or worthless?Because those tactics have always been based on a simplification themselves, one I think deserved to be addressed long before now. I've got no issue with "Seven in one blow!" but I don't see why it should achieve theoretically infinite limits either. Can't you streamline a combat with a horde without doing that?Not that I can see. Either they wind up completely ineffective compared to a field of commoners considered individually and get nothing in return, or they become something more meaningful in exchange for the disadvantages they're accepting (slower movement, lower AC, and the lack of ranged options are the main ones, but for some there's also the matter of diminished Intelligence and Wisdom and the lack of spell use). What I'm saying is that it's OK for a mob-style mechanic to streamline a combat, but it shouldn't much alter the likely ultimate results, nor the kinds of tactics that should be effective.I don't see it doing that. The mob should still wind up dead and the heroes should still be able to accomplish that at very little cost to themselves -- if they don't simply rush in. And one with Cleave would do /exactly/ the same, even though he can kill commoners twice as fast because of that feat. That's taking away the feat for all intents and purposes.No, it's not. You might as well claim that fighting a dozen 1st level commoners takes away his Power Attack feat, since he'd gain nothing for using it in such a case. The Cleave feat will still clean things up toward the end very quickly. It will still be relevant to the encounter if the mob can be broken up in any other fashion, especially methods that assign negative levels to the mob. The 4th level barbarian in question is able to destroy the mob in three rounds, assuming they don't grapple him (after which he almost certainly loses). Against an unmobbed group of 48 commoners, it would take 24 rounds -- or 12 if he gets attacks of opportunity from grapple checks each round, not that they'd bother, since he could easily beat them in a grapple. Once he's 6th level and has Great Cleave, however, he can likely drop three commoners in the first round, with that number increasing to six or perhaps nine as he gets to go with an attack roll both before and after the 5 ft step. Sure, he could go with a spiked chain and increase this to maybe twenty. Not bad... except the wizard finished the mob off last round with a fireball. So do mob rules take away the fighter's Great Cleave feat, or do they keep the wizard from making it and the fighter irrelevant (Cleave, Great Cleave, Power Attack, and all)? If a mob or swarm is to be treated as a single creature, why is it invulnerable or resistant to effects that work against single creatures (like disintegrate); if it's meant to be a mass of creatures, why is it invulnerable or resistant to effects that should work well against masses of creatures, like WWA or fireball?Both fair questions, especially in combination. All I can say is that I'm fine with them being viewed as a hybrid of both, even if this means they are usually considered whichever is most advantageous at the time. I'll agree that this sometimes gets heavy-handed with mobs, whose saving throws are quite good. I wouldn't be adverse to mobs receiving a penalty to their saving throws in that light, perhaps -4. That's still pretty tough to beat, but not after they've taken a few negative levels from earlier assaults. In any case, individual targetting isn't such a bad thing with mobs. True, disintegrate only assigns 2 negative levels to a mob, but scorching ray gets you up to six, while magic missile can get you up to ten. That's right, three barrages of magic missile from a 9th level sorcerer will break a mob of commoners, yet it would average between three and six castings of fireball (depending on the result of their saves). On the other hand, your fighter with Great Cleave would then be in a pretty good position to finish things completely after the second or possibly even first casting. Hmm. I have to admit that does sound weird, though that would only work against mobs of 1st level commoners, wizards, or sorcerers. Doesn't exactly help my case, though, so I'd better ignore it. :P No, no, seriously, the magic missile bug could be a serious problem. Chain lightning is fine, most other spells allow a save, but magic missile demands special consideration. With the rules as they are, I'd have to know what my players would do with that spell when facing a group. If they'd honestly assign one missile per creature, fine, but if they'd hit one foe with everything or pour it into two foes, we're looking at 2-4 negative levels. The answer is that it's a bad mechanic, a sort of DM's munchkin loophole. It punishes characters for using the apropriate tactics against it.I'd disagree that these are the appropriate tactics, however. I don't feel either Whirlwind Attack or Great Cleave are for killing dozens, let alone thousands, in a single shot, which means I don't feel they should be viewed as the best tactics once the numbers massed against you reach a certain point. I don't see the characters being punished at all. If the wizard is now much less likely to finish an enemy in a single stroke, there's more for the rest of the team, isn't there? What may seem to be their best resources might not come into play until later in the fight, but they're ready. So, what, it's /friction/?It's whatever prevents the fighter from being able to cleave through eight three foot wide trees that suddenly sprouted up on all sides of him. Sure, if you're cleaving through a tightly-packed mob, you might not cut through every single member of the mob - but you'll still cut through more than one.And yet this is no different from the fact that you're effectively getting more than one from your Power Attack against a mob, more than you'd ordinarily get from Cleave or Great Cleave. You're doing much more with PA against a mob than you could ever hope to do with it against a smaller group of commoners, and when that and everything else your group does finally adds up, you're doing more again with Great Cleave. But if that's not good enough, then I'd suggest that a successful attack from someone with Cleave against a mob of creatures that would each die if attacked as lone individuals assigns two negative levels to the mob, while Great Cleave would assign two negative levels per square the character could reach. Or do what's done for area attacks and increase the damage by 50%. That ought to get terrifying fast. Still, the negative levels seems preferable, since it costs the mob 10-20 hp a shot, not to mention making them much easier to disperse with further spell effects. (Our 4th level raging barbarian example would effectively do 70 hp of damage a round with Cleave alone. A fighter with Great Cleave might even be able to pass that.) if you're Whirlwinding the mob, you might not get the ones in the 'back' of a square, but you'll still get all the ones actually facing you - and that's still a lot more than one. Yet your attack will be /exactly/ as effective as a single attack. That's just wrong. It's taking away a character ability.Again, I disagree. It's capping the ability at a what I deem a reasonable level, though you might allow it to cause extra damage or negative levels. This is indeed rough on a rogue, but let's consider some other things a rogue can do well against a mob. Bluff and Disguise can both let you move with many mobs much more easily than usual, and if it fools the mob, you're not taking damage even while standing in the middle of it. The "I'm with you guys," approach suddenly only has to deal with one skill check against a not so impressive Sense Motive or Spot. This isn't something you can exploit in every mob encounter, but I'd allow it to be tried any time a player found it might be useful. Tumble is suddenly one check to move through a group of 48 people! What a great opportunity that would be for a rogue or bard. What a shame they don't ever get the chance to brag about that sort of thing because obstacles like that are always gutted by fireballs and the axe-wielding maniacs. Likewise, a good Hide check will get you around, possibly even through, the mob with no one the wiser. I'm not sure you can't get away with hiding unharmed in the middle of a mob, though. It depends on how one rules on total concealment. Since a mob can't break total cover, making a tower shield useful riot gear, I'm not sure it can be deemed to override total concealment, provided that it can't detect you. To rule otherwise, you'd pretty much have to declare that mob causes itself 5d6 hp of damage every round, which makes for very shor-lived mobs. ;) No, I mean why should an area spell that doesn't touch some individuals have the potential to kill them, while one that engulfs them all has the potential not to?Simplification, much like how four lightning bolts fired along diagonals that just brush an ogre's space at all four corners will hit that ogre. Obviously the ogre is not 10 ft wide, but somehow all four bolts get him. I assure you I'm being quite honest, and, from my PoV, the current mechanics are the ones that seem nonsensical.All right. I have almost certainly been too harsh and owe you an apology for that. I'd still prefer rules that made groups mean more. In 1st Edition, there was a recommendation to use Battlesystem rules for larger groups, making them far more effective (and durable) against smaller forces. That wasn't perfect either, since damage spells weren't capped as much as hit points were, but it was consistent with most fantasy heroes. They'd ride with an army or at the head of an army in battle, but they weren't known for taking on hundreds all the time all by themselves. Cyrano de Bergerac's duel with a hundred men, exaggerated or not, is certainly such a case, but since he only performed it once, it seems unlikely that he would have gone to war on his own, even without muskets and cannons as factors. Mob rules make defeating the assault of one hundred foes mean something. It stops being a race between Great Cleave, Whirlwind Attack, and fireball, making it worth a few xp along the way. It could require a bit more planning than a fight against many opponents of CR 8 or less would, though it's lack of ranged weaponry is one of its most telling weaknesses. Likewise, it doesn't even have to be a straight-up fight. There's experience to be had in redirecting, dispersing I'm still waiting for my copy of Heroes of Battle, so I can't compare the rules from that book. Nevertheless, I would like something that makes encounters with massed troops daunting for even high level characters (while still being a meaningful encounter), and I admit that mob rules doesn't quite cover that.
Finarin Panjoro 08-31-05, 11:02 PM	Shattered Tower, I have Heroes of Battle and unfortunately there really isn't anything in it that lets you accurately portray battle with hundreds of foes. Basically what it tells you to do is handle the large battle as a series of smaller encounters and to set victory conditions which the PCs can affect. So if the PCs choose to take out the enemies' catapults they get a certain number of points, if they cut off an avenue of attack or prevent a flanking manuever that's worth a different number of points. I would still be inclined to use the mob rules (as I've modified them for use with military units) in some of those encounters. For instance, if the first wave of the attack is a tide of goblins, I'd probably have the PCs face a "mob unit" or two rather than actually play out fighting 50 goblins (which I know they'd beat with minimal effort, they'd gain no experience for, and would take a lot of very precious game time to resolve). Also I'm not sure if you caught my post revising my recommendation for Great Cleave and WWA use on mobs/units. My variant idea is NOT to let them cleave/WWA each square of the mob they threaten. You rightly point out that this defeats the purpose of the mob in the first place. Instead I suggeest they get a damage bonus on attacks for possessing the appropriate feats (+2 for cleave, +4 for great cleave, +6 for whirlwind attack). They don't actually use the feats they just get a damage bonus to their normal attacks becuase they're skilled at this sort of thing. So your raging barbarian example would do an additional +8 points of damage to the mob that round (+4 on his charge, +4 on his AoO) if he also had great cleave as a feat. Tony, I don't have a problem with fireball working differently on mobs than on ranks of commoners. A fireball will do 150% damage to the mob and can hit multiple mobs. If it hits 4 mobs its effectively damaging 192 people, way more than would ever be affected by a normal fireball (its normal max is 44 people). The mob has a +9 reflex save (which is pretty good) but will still frequently miss its save (and more often the higher level the PCs are). A non-empowered fireball by a 10th level wizard is still going to seriously hurt a mob (about 52 points of damage average on a missed save). That's almost half the mob's hit points and can effect multiple mobs. That's still a very potent tactic. If its empowered its average is more like 80 points (over half the hitpoints of the mob in one shot!). In addition I'd rule that it requires a morale check by the mob. Common sense dictates that it would have hurt almost all of them and been a terrifying experience as people around you are turned into charred corpses. I also agree with those who say that mobs should only be used in special circumstances, that being angry people moving with a common purpose (usually to destroy or kill something). A panicking throng of people would be better treated as an environmental condition (slows/prevents/forces movement in certain directions, grants cover, blocks line of sight at some distances, Reflex Save DC 10 or be trampled for 2d6 each round, etc.)
dark_brand553 08-31-05, 11:07 PM	Let's imagine the situation: DM: (Describing a mob) You see a group of angry commoners heading to you ... Player: How many? DM: Something about 30 peasants, they occupy an area 20x20 feet... Player: Goood ... Fireball in the center. DM: (rolling 20 hp on the damage). You see some peasants fall down burning, but the rest still run at you with hostile intention Player: What ... ... ...? So how can I explain to my players why a commoner, who has no chance to survive in fireball, will do it while he is in a mob ? The same thing is with a rats, bats, spiders and so on. Why did they survive fireball while in the swarm? Obviously fireball (and other such spells) must be autokill spells for swarms and mobs, don't you think so? From your description it is a broken ill thought out rule.
Derren S. 09-01-05, 04:26 AM	A fireball will do 150% damage to the mob and can hit multiple mobs. If it hits 4 mobs its effectively damaging 192 people, way more than would ever be affected by a normal fireball (its normal max is 44 people). Which is also idiotic. Why doeas a fireball which only affects only one square of 4 mobs each deal way more damage than a fireball which affects all squares of a single mob?
FriendoftheDork 09-01-05, 05:48 AM	How many orcs did he kill at the end of the first movie? Or in Moria? It tooke some more arrows to kill Boromir. Also in D&D a single arrow can also kill the hero, just with the HP system a arrow hits only when reduced to 0 HP or below. Its like the James Bond movies (Which I think are a very accurate representation of the heroism D&D wants to represent). A single bullet can kill Bond, they simply don't hit. Oh and don't get me started what some Heroes in Star Wars (Jedies) can do to organized units (Storm Troopers/Droids) How many? Well I can't remember how many he killed in the books (which is what I'm talking about), and it is not important. The thing is, he did not kill them ALL. In fact, even with Boromir and Gandalf by his side (and some insignificant hobbits) they actually pulled back from the onslaught. In D&D they would just have killed the orcs and marched on. Boromir had a heroic death... a death nonetheless. He DID face an organized unit of Uruk-Hai, and died for his efforts. Ah I've always considered the Scene a perfect example of the Die-Hard feat in use :) None of the arrows were instantly lethal, and through sheer willpower and toughness and fueled by heroism, he managed to fight on with wounds that would incapacitate normal men. But such are the stuff of legends, not the way it usually works. Star wars is space fantasy alright, but even there heroes fear a unit of stormtroopers. Luke and Han fought stormtroopers, but only a few at a time. And when Han stormed them only to run into a whole bunch of them, he quickly ran back. Battledroids sucks, especially when you can deflect their puny blaster bolts with a lightsaber. Still, in AotC a goodly number of Jedies were almost defeated by waves of them, until they were saved by... guess what.. Clone troopers! That's right the supermen were saved by a bunch of faceless soldiers... And lets not look at "order 66"... how did your Jedis fare against blaster bolts in their backs?
Finarin Panjoro 09-01-05, 10:29 AM	Which is also idiotic. Why doeas a fireball which only affects only one square of 4 mobs each deal way more damage than a fireball which affects all squares of a single mob? It's not any more idiotic than the notion that you can only fit 16 people in a 20 ft x 20 ft square, but by the core rules that's all you get.
Derren S. 09-01-05, 10:35 AM	Because thats the space people need to fight effectivly which is realistic. You know that this whole grid thing is for compat, not for everyday life, do you?
edgy_rhinx 09-01-05, 01:12 PM	Standard DND rules are crap, swarm rules are correct. Even if your character is a 100 level fighter (short of a god) in more or less real life situation he won't have good chances to stand against 10 usual fighters. Swarm rules merely make a step from silliness of "my fighter can kill 0.1E99 commoners" to real life, where one of the commoners will shoot him in the head.
Derren S. 09-01-05, 01:20 PM	Even if your character is a 100 level fighter (short of a god) in more or less real life situation he won't have good chances to stand against 10 usual fighters. Even in real life a extremly well trained soldier can defeat 10 commoners with weapons. Also D&D is not real life. If you can show me magic and dragons in real life then you can come with such arguments but not before. As for "removing the sillines" is it more realistic that a high level archerr can kill dozens of people with one arrow? (When an archer destroys a mob with a single shot)
Crox 09-01-05, 02:11 PM	And was the mob bare handed? The D&D mobs are. Don't think so. May be many of them are but the mob has an ability to provide all needed tools for war. Example: In Russia in 1991, a mob find out many logs and even a key from the APC, so they can defeat it, in the center of Moscow. Which are all illogical explanations to cover up illogical rules. Well really I have more logical explanations, but do we need them? On any logical explanation I can find another, even more logical contrexplanation.:D
Derren S. 09-01-05, 02:14 PM	Don't think so. May be many of them are but the mob has an ability to provide all needed tools for war. Example: In Russia in 1991, a mob find out many logs and even a key from the APC, so they can defeat it, in the center of Moscow. Is it litsted which weapon mobs use? No. Does it matter? No. A unarmed mob deals exactly as much damage as a mob where everyone is armed with +10 artifact greatswords. Not even the damage type changes.
Tony Vargas 09-01-05, 06:42 PM	My answer to that is one of scale, even though scale cannot be perfectly addressed in the D&D mechanics. By the time you've reached Great Cleave (4th-6th level), no amount of common enemies (including your standard mercenary warrior) can stand up to you. The odds have suddenly shifted from the point at which your 3rd level fighter has a real chance of losing against a dozen commoners to the point at which four dozen are always a drop in the bucket to a single fighter. It's worth noting that the exp for these guys drops off quite a bit, too, and that casters also experience a lot of 'quantum leaps' in power - every other level, pretty near. But, while Great Cleave or WWA are pretty neat, offensively, against masses of opponents, when you first get 'em, those masses of opponents are still a real threat. A 4-6th level character's AC is not stratospheric, and orcs and 1st-level warriors and whatnot, can still hit them - maybe not often, but probably more often then a natural 20, especially with flanking likely coming into play. I've got no issue with "Seven in one blow!" but I don't see why it should achieve theoretically infinite limits either. It doesn't, really, it's limitted by your reach, the space occupied by your opponents, and the likelihood your Creat Cleave will be stopped by a very poor damage or attack (natural 1 if nothing else) roll. No, it's not. You might as well claim that fighting a dozen 1st level commoners takes away his Power Attack feat, since he'd gain nothing for using it in such a case. I'm sorry if I seem obstinant on this point, but, seriously, feats like Great Cleave and area spells like fireball exist largely to whipe out masses of 'weaker' enemies. A mechanic that takes away that use, basically takes away the ability. While I could handle the idea of a 'swarm' type that really /is/ a single creature (just made out of bugs or whatever the way a plant is made up of cells), or a mob mechanic that simply streamlines mass combat (the same tactics aply, the mechanics are just speeded up), I can't coutenance 'changing the rules' on players to the extent that the existing mechanics do. All I can say is that I'm fine with them being viewed as a hybrid of both, even if this means they are usually considered whichever is most advantageous at the time. See, that just sets off alarm bells for me. It's the kind of exploit that munchkin players like to go for - they want thier Monk to have a +1 shirt that takes the Heavy Fortification armor enchantment, but isn't armor; they want attacking with a greatsword to be an 'off hand attack' when using Improved Buckler Defense but not when TWF with armor spikes (and, preferably, both at once) - only it's the DM (or, rather, the fellow who came up with swarm rules) pulling it. The DM doesn't need exploits. In any case, individual targetting isn't such a bad thing with mobs. Aparently so - it's worse for swarms. If you hypothetically hit a 300-creature swarm with an effect that killed 299 individuals, it'd do nothing. At least mobs take the negative level thing. I'd disagree that these are the appropriate tactics, however. I don't feel either Whirlwind Attack or Great Cleave are for killing dozens, let alone thousands, in a single shot, which means I don't feel they should be viewed as the best tactics once the numbers massed against you reach a certain point. Compared to hitting them one at a time, yes, it should still be the best tactic. Against such overwhelming odds, perhaps, not a winning tactic, but better than hitting one guy really hard. I don't see the characters being punished at all. It's like telling the Ranger who took FEB: Goblinoids that Hobgoblins stop being goblinoids after 4pm and become monsterous humanoids instead. It's /is/ punishing the character for having the right ability for the situation by taking that ability away, it is arbitrary, and it is nonsensical. It's whatever prevents the fighter from being able to cleave through eight three foot wide trees that suddenly sprouted up on all sides of him. In 3E, trees aren't creatures - technically you can't Cleave or WW through them - even if you could, the hardness and hps of a 3'-wide tree are probably more than you can do with a single swing. Swarms, mobs and thier constituents still are creatures, and the individuals aren't any hardier. But if that's not good enough, then I'd suggest that a successful attack from someone with Cleave against a mob of creatures that would each die if attacked as lone individuals assigns two negative levels to the mob, while Great Cleave would assign two negative levels per square the character could reach.Anything that's remotely consistent with what the ability actually does would be a step in the right direction. Counting WWA as an Area Effect might make at least some sense, for instance... Again, I disagree. It's capping the ability at a what I deem a reasonable level It's not capping, it's nullifying. 'Capping' might be something along the line of not allowing a character using an AE or GC style attack to kill more members of a mob (in effect) than could normally fit in it's area - then at least, it's no /less/ effective than it would be absent the mob mechanic. I'd still prefer rules that made groups mean more. "Mean more?" I don't know, maybe, as long as they don't make the characters facing them mean /less/. I wouldn't have much problem with a mechanic that allowed a mob or swarm to do more damage or have a better AB than a normal group of it's consitutuent creatures would individually or in some sort of statistical aggregate. A little synergy makes some sense. In 1st Edition, there was a recommendation to use Battlesystem rules for larger groups, making them far more effective (and durable) against smaller forces. I remember Battlesystem. It did make units a bit more durrable, in that an attack couldn't destroy an unwounded unit unless it could affect all the individuals in a unit. Thus, for instance, a fighter took two rounds to destroy a unit, unless it was made up of less-than-one HD creatures, and the fighter was 10+, in which case, he could. That'd translate fine to 3E, actually, since WWA or GC would have similar effects.
Shatteredtower 09-03-05, 01:19 AM	I have Heroes of Battle and unfortunately there really isn't anything in it that lets you accurately portray battle with hundreds of foes.I feared as much. Sadly, I shall probably have to purchase the book anyway, even if only to cannibalize it heavily. I would still be inclined to use the mob rules (as I've modified them for use with military units) in some of those encounters. For instance, if the first wave of the attack is a tide of goblins, I'd probably have the PCs face a "mob unit" or two rather than actually play out fighting 50 goblins (which I know they'd beat with minimal effort, they'd gain no experience for, and would take a lot of very precious game time to resolve).I'm thinking along lines like this myself in some situations. I'm aware of the concerns there are with such an approach, but I'll discuss that a bit further down in replies to points made by Tony Vargas. Also I'm not sure if you caught my post revising my recommendation for Great Cleave and WWA use on mobs/units. My variant idea is NOT to let them cleave/WWA each square of the mob they threaten. You rightly point out that this defeats the purpose of the mob in the first place.You're right; I did miss that. Instead I suggeest they get a damage bonus on attacks for possessing the appropriate feats (+2 for cleave, +4 for great cleave, +6 for whirlwind attack). They don't actually use the feats they just get a damage bonus to their normal attacks becuase they're skilled at this sort of thing. So your raging barbarian example would do an additional +8 points of damage to the mob that round (+4 on his charge, +4 on his AoO) if he also had great cleave as a feat.The idea has merit, though if you feel they deserve a boost, you might want to consider slightly upgrading that damage, to +5 for Cleave and +5 per square (not including the first) within reach for Great Cleave, and perhaps +10% per square (not including the first) within reach of the Whirlwind Attack. Strange that I would feel it's not really necessary but would suggest a slight upgrade if an adjustment is made, I know. Sometimes it's not about necessity, but what makes people feel they're being treated fairly. (The other figures might work for swarms, though.) In addition I'd rule that it requires a morale check by the mob. Common sense dictates that it would have hurt almost all of them and been a terrifying experience as people around you are turned into charred corpses.I'd be inclined to agree with such a ruling, though a 30HD mob can get pretty good morale checks. I also agree with those who say that mobs should only be used in special circumstances, that being angry people moving with a common purpose (usually to destroy or kill something). A panicking throng of people would be better treated as an environmental condition (slows/prevents/forces movement in certain directions, grants cover, blocks line of sight at some distances, Reflex Save DC 10 or be trampled for 2d6 each round, etc.)I agree with this as well. It's a point I've kept forgetting to bring up, though I think it's perhaps more important than the issue of combat in many cases. It's worth noting that the exp for these guys drops off quite a bit, too, and that casters also experience a lot of 'quantum leaps' in power - every other level, pretty near.Well, not quite, though the curve seems almost exponential for them after the first few spell levels. Nevertheless, my concern isn't so much with the spellcasters in this case as it is with the non-spellcasters. Those with spells should be just fine in a case like this. But, while Great Cleave or WWA are pretty neat, offensively, against masses of opponents, when you first get 'em, those masses of opponents are still a real threat. A 4-6th level character's AC is not stratospheric, and orcs and 1st-level warriors and whatnot, can still hit them - maybe not often, but probably more often then a natural 20, especially with flanking likely coming into play.This is true. Their ability to miss is also more of a factor at this levels, which can be critical in cases involving Great Cleave in particular. I just don't think this should always be the case at 4th-6th level, when I feel a character should at least have to a little bit of effort into it.I don't think I understand what you mean here. I can agree with the sentence itself, but I'm having a hard time figuring out how to fit it into the context of the sentences preceding it. Yet while I agree with it, I like the idea of creating situations in which it can remain the case up until even 11th level. It doesn't, really, it's limitted by your reach, the space occupied by your opponents, and the likelihood your Creat Cleave will be stopped by a very poor damage or attack (natural 1 if nothing else) roll.The point about very poor damage doesn't really hold against opposition with very low hp - by 4th level, every swing should kill the average 1st level warrior (human or orc -- hobgoblins might stand a chance if you're wielding a one-handed weapon). In theory, the point about poor attack rolls is sound, but I'd prefer to balance this against the type of people who have crazy, crazy luck. (Back in early 2nd Ed, one of my DMs ruled that another player, attacking goblins with his bow as a club, would miss on anything less than a roll of 18 and would break his weapon on a roll of 20, and that further he would break the bow on a roll of 6 for damage. How do you account for a guy who rolls 18-19 close to a dozen times in a roll and gets 4-5 for damage every time? This man was a freak for luck.) And while you're normally correct about the limits of reach, note that the reach of a Colossal creature starts at 30 ft (or 20 ft if long, rather than tall), with no maximum listed. But even with that limit, do you want to know calculate how many attacks the tarrasque could get against what would ordinarily be swarms of hellwasps? If you calculate in only two dimensions, the answer is 3700 (considerably less than infinite, I know). Now I doubt anyone's luck is going to hold out that long, but when a creature gets six attacks per round and has Great Cleave, I'd rather skip the dice rolling. Even going to only ten rolls before a 1 comes up would be too much. I'd be even more enthusiastic about skipping it if the DM decided to take the calculations into three dimensions. It would, however, be much, much worse with Whirlwind Attack Now that's an extreme example, and unlikely to be an issue with anyone. Most of the time, it gets no worse than an enlarged spike chain wielder with 76 targets (probably less, though it can get as high as 304 against pixies), but even this gets to be a hassle. Swarms and mobs don't care about having enough room to fight properly (a mechanically simplification anyway -- otherwise creatures should overlap spaces when they fight), which can serve to explain why they don't take AoOs and why their damage is not relevant to the weapons they use. But I digress; the point is that all of this is a huge hassle and I wouldn't mind giving my players a chance to occasionally beat hundreds in a fight that isn't going to take all day -- and that will still earn them xp and the feeling that they overcame a challenge. The point of contention between us seems to be, if I understand correctly, that I feel a large number of low level enemies should qualify as such a challenge and you don't (since anything that can be mopped up in groups of 44 with a single fireball at 5th level isn't it). We may never be able to find common ground on that specific point, but I'd like to consider the issues that surround it nonetheless. I'm sorry if I seem obstinant on this point, but, seriously, feats like Great Cleave and area spells like fireball exist largely to whipe out masses of 'weaker' enemies.Well, yes, it's an important point and I agree up to a point. The spells you refer to do make short work of most swarms, though. Mobs take much longer than would unmobbed individuals. Mobs take Great Cleave and Whirlwind Attack out of the equation, while Swarms even tend to leave you without Power Attack, which makes the effect they have on fighting units a lot worse than it is on wizards. (At least a warrior type can fight a mob, however. Hellwasp swarms are just nasty against melee-intensive types.) However, these abilities aren't limited to their use against 1 HD (or less) opponents. The fireball is a good prelude to a charge/Great Cleave combo (possibly repaying the charge bonus for a -2 Power Attack penalty to cause more damage) against bugbears and ogres. It's not the ultimate tactic, but I like it for the cooperative nature it displays. A mechanic that takes away that use, basically takes away the ability. While I could handle the idea of a 'swarm' type that really /is/ a single creature (just made out of bugs or whatever the way a plant is made up of cells), or a mob mechanic that simply streamlines mass combat (the same tactics aply, the mechanics are just speeded up), I can't coutenance 'changing the rules' on players to the extent that the existing mechanics do.Whereas I can, simply because I'm willing to accept a limit on both how far a targetted effect may extend and on how much an area affecting spell may do. As for a mechanic taking away an ability, I don't agree because of how it makes other abilities (such as Spring Attack, Power Attack, chain lightning, or fear -- even on a successful save) much more effective. Likewise, other abilities that aren't immediately effective (or as effective as they'd normally be) still get to come into play near the end of the encounter. If you're concerned with the 48 human commoners, however, consider 12 ogres. Ordinarily, they'd be a CR 10 encounter, but a mob makes them less effective (no ranged weaponry, no reach, and a lot less damage), so long as you don't get within range of their grapple modifier. With this encounter in mind, where Great Cleave is probably not going to help you all that much and you'll need more than one fireball anyway, are you losing Great Cleave or gaining more from Power Attack? Magic missile won't help against this one and chain lightning is a lot less effective at first. (At 11th level, it might not even be able to leave the mob with 2 negative levels, but it eventually has the same chance to disrupt the mob as though it was human commoners.) They've got a little over 50% more hit points and a great Fortitude save, but you'd probably prefer to be pounded on by this mob than by individual ogres, all things considered. Why do the humans become stronger and the ogres weaker? Without question, this shows a flaw in the mechanic, but I don't consider it a disastrous one. The ogre mob is slightly harder to put down and slightly harder to finish off completely, but if it speeds up a battle with giants and lets the players know they took on such a force successfully, I'll accept the flaw. The real headache begins when we hit true giants or some undead types, but there may be times I feel this would be suitable and won't be worried about the number of casualties the party can inflict, so long as they feel they had to put some effort into it and got something in return for that. See, that just sets off alarm bells for me. It's the kind of exploit that munchkin players like to go for - they want thier Monk to have a +1 shirt that takes the Heavy Fortification armor enchantment, but isn't armor; they want attacking with a greatsword to be an 'off hand attack' when using Improved Buckler Defense but not when TWF with armor spikes (and, preferably, both at once) - only it's the DM (or, rather, the fellow who came up with swarm rules) pulling it. The DM doesn't need exploits.There's no exploit, any more than using greater shadows or dread wraiths would be utilizing an exploit. And yes, using either of the mentioned creatures against a party ill-equipped to fight them would be an exploit, but it's hard to find a party of 6th level or above ill-equipped to handle a mob. It is not an exploit to require something other than mindless violence from your group against something that nearly defines mindless violence. Remember, the mob isn't getting something for nothing. A mob of dretch can't use spell-like abilities even if directed to do so. Fireballing a mob of jovocs means that those nearby take 50% more damage from the fireball, not 48x more (with a nearly meaningless save for 1/2 damage by that point). A mob of giants does not amount to a hail of a dozen stones a round, and a mob of commoners can't even break out slings to almost assuredly cause a whopping 2d4 hp of damage a round from those two 20s they're likely to average on their attack rolls. The mob of ghouls is more easily deceived, for what it's worth. A mob of vargouilles can get a lot of mileage out of their poison, but they can't shriek and thus can't deliver the kiss until they've been reduced to more manageable numbers (with easier save DCs to beat). A mob of dire apes thankfully can't rend. So a lot of mobs are giving up a lot to be mobs. Everyone just tends to focus on the mob of commoners because of how much they seem to gain. But all they really gain is the ability to absorb damage and the ability to cause it more consistently -- and even then, they have to take at least one hit from each and every creature they're about to put a hurt on first, because they don't get attacks of opportunity and they don't get to make ranged attacks. And let's not forget how slowly they move. They are most certainly not getting something for nothing. They are merely getting enough to keep them from being taken for granted as an encounter. All this adds up to point out that the real challenge a mob presents is not measured in beating it. You ought to be able to beat a mob pretty easily. The real challenge is often in directing it -- either away from certain residences or toward other ones. Aparently so - it's worse for swarms. If you hypothetically hit a 300-creature swarm with an effect that killed 299 individuals, it'd do nothing. At least mobs take the negative level thing.With swarms, it's an academic point anyway -- there just aren't that many spells that list the target as "100 creatures/level (see text)." As for mobs, the negative levels get punitive pretty fast and it's very easy to pile those negative levels on against commoners. Compared to hitting them one at a time, yes, it should still be the best tactic. Against such overwhelming odds, perhaps, not a winning tactic, but better than hitting one guy really hard.But you're not. You're hitting one group very hard. By virtue of how tightly they're packed together, you don't even need Great Cleave to effectively hit several of them at once. In other words, maybe it's not so much that you lose the benefit of Cleave and Whirlwind Attack against a mob as it is that mobs are where many others come close to what you can do all the time. (Obviously a halfling wizard with Strength for a dump stat is not going to be duplicating that feat to any degree.) It's like telling the Ranger who took FEB: Goblinoids that Hobgoblins stop being goblinoids after 4pm and become monsterous humanoids instead.Bad analogy. First of all, no matter what I do, I can't change the clock, but there are circumstances in which I can get to use both Cleave and Whirlwind Attack in the manner you desire, though Whirlwind Attack is the harder of the two to pull off, since it requires a full attack action. However, with Cleave, breaking one mob allows me a swing at one next to it. If I've got Great Cleave, it's a swing at the second mob or all of those little stray people now milling about -- or possibly both the second mob and all of the little stray people that will be left over from both of them. So the ability is not lost; it's just that you might need to prepare things a bit more before it lets you get that little extra edge out of it. You aren't being punished by being told that it's going to take a bit longer and a bit more effort to deal with a problem like this, especially if the reward you'll receive is thus justifiably more meaningful. Your feat still works. You enemy should still be easy enough to beat. They can't open fire on you from up to 500 ft away with slings, not that they'd hit all that often, but would you prefer 5d6 hp of damage you can easily avoid or 2d4 hp of damage for as long as you're within 500 ft or didn't prepare protection from arrows for just such an occasion? In 3E, trees aren't creatures - technically you can't Cleave or WW through them -I'm aware of their non-creature status, but it's irrelevant to the point. The point is that you can't get the momentum you need to make the kind of swing Great Cleave or Whirlwind Attack involves if you experience constant resistance. There's simply no room to adjust the swing to keep carrying through, not that you're even all that sure of your targets with a swarm/mob anyway (especially not a swarm -- you may as well try to split water molecules with a sword, what with how few of them are going to be where you're swinging anyway), which is going to mess up your swing even more. Anything that's remotely consistent with what the ability actually does would be a step in the right direction. Counting WWA as an Area Effect might make at least some sense, for instance...Possibly. It's not capping, it's nullifying.It's not nullifying. The feats have a harder time achieving the conditions necessary to perform a cleave or whirlwind attack, but can still achieve those conditions. "Mean more?" I don't know, maybe, as long as they don't make the characters facing them mean /less/.The only way the characters wind up meaning less is by taking their abilities for granted. That's the only way this occurs. "Why aren't they all dead? I've got Whirlwind Attack!" "Maybe this isn't the time to be pondering questions like that. You get an attack of opportunity, after which there will be a grapple check [or maybe a Reflex save vs. trample damage, depending on the circumstances]." I wouldn't have much problem with a mechanic that allowed a mob or swarm to do more damage or have a better AB than a normal group of it's consitutuent creatures would individually or in some sort of statistical aggregate. A little synergy makes some sense.How? Fine creatures can only congregate 100 to a square in most circumstances, but bees swarm a lot more tightly than that. You'd also going to get a lot more than 25 rats to a square when those swarm. I feel that needlessly complicates things while skewing the balance. The main reason I feel that way is because such an adjustment makes CR almost entirely relative to both fireball and Great Cleave. If I picked up Great Cleave at 4th level, I win and barely have to worry about taking a scratch. If my 3rd level spells at 5th level are fireball and dispel magic, this was an easy encounter. But if I took Weapon Specialization or fly, my party just takes a beating. I accept the idea that there can be consequences to poor choices, but I don't know if that line should be drawn at one specific spell or one of two feats. Maybe mobs do seem to punish those who selected those options to some, and I'll certainly admit that anyone who uses mobs for the majority of mass encounters is likely not being fair to players who picked them. But if it's not too difficult for characters without them to overcome something like this as a team, I don't have much problem with it. It might not appeal to everyone, but another charm of mobs is that they can present overwhelming odds to lower level parties in a fashion that should make it pretty clear to avoid direct confrontation -- and make it easier to do so, due to their slow movement and lack of ranged combat options. It's just a matter of making it apparent how dangerous they are to a 3rd level group, though it's easier to do that with a mob than certain other powerful creatures that are capable of keeping a low enough profile to be underestimated (or don't rely on such heavy-handed symbols as glowing swords or impressive titles to hint to players that maybe they shouldn't try pushing their luck here).
Finarin Panjoro 09-03-05, 02:28 PM	Because thats the space people need to fight effectivly which is realistic. You know that this whole grid thing is for compat, not for everyday life, do you? Derren S., While that's a cute response, it is totally inaccurate. The beginning of the combat chapter (pg. 133) clearly states that the 5 foot battle grid is used to show "the relative location of the characters in any given situation." That means more than just combat situations. It even gives the example of walking down halls "they can walk two abreast down a 10-foot-wide dungeon corridor or single file in a 5-foot-wide tunnel" I'm willing to bet you can walk more than two people abreast down a 10 foot wide corridor in real life. Just like I'm willing to bet you can fit more than 16 people in a 20x20 square. But by the normal rules, you can't. The grid system is an abstraction, just like the mob system. Niether of them is designed to pefectly depict reality, they are designed to allow or increase playability. Contradictions are inherent in any system. Having fireball effect mobs normally (in other words wiping them out) defeats the purpose of having mobs at all (that is to make them a fun rewarding encounter for characters above 6th level). Shattered Tower, It seems we are of like mind on this after all. You make some excellent points.