Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Bjorn Borg 05-02-04, 03:56 PM	Alright, I'm going to need some help here because I accidently got involved in a war with a few thousdand orcs and some trolls and giants. I am a lvl 11 human wizard and I have a few ideas on how to stop/harm them (never will be able to kill them all). :invasion: It's an invasion and I'm trying to corrale them into narrow confines, like the battle of Thermopalye, so I can fireball em to death. So i want to also soak the ground in a flammable substance, like oil, so the ground will be a giant firewall after the fireballs that will burn them even more. however, the area i need to soak is huge (10000 square ft?). what im asking is how im going to get that much oil overnight and how im going to transport it all to the battlefield and soak the ground, so please give me some ideas with spells and such. thanks.
Wizard 05-02-04, 04:38 PM	10,000 square feet... I don't know, man, you might be safer just casting protection from arrows and going wild with flaming sphere. Do you have to protect a certain item/area, or are they just coming for you? I don't know that it's possible to get that much oil from any spell I can think of. Cloudkill is your friend.
Steelwill 05-02-04, 05:48 PM	I am not sure right off the top, but aren't the substances produced by both the Web and Grease spells flamable? Couldnt you lay down several of those spells then burn on top with fireballs? Like I said, I am not sure right off the top, I don't have my PHB with me at work, and am not certain. My 2 cents.
Grox 05-02-04, 05:51 PM	I did a little research on this for the "Charge!" book, for the "Oiling the Fields" section. The upside is it doesn't take a LOT of oil to light up an area large enough for several creatures to be standing in, ENOUGH for fire to spread that way. There don't necessarily have to be large, black, squishy pools for the target creatures to walk through. Of course, if you are an accomplished illusionist, don't worry about discretion and just go crazy with the oil, hiding it from troops walking over it with Mirage Arcana. Hallucinatory Terrain might be better for your purposes, though --- while it's a lower level spell, it causes a slightly larger area, and the enemy you are facing probably won't generally fare too well with their saves vs. illusion magic. The downside, beside finding enough oil, is to get it laid out in the right areas far enough in advance. You don't want orcish scouts seeing your workers ladelling out the oil, so you can't do it *just* before they arrive (unless they're dumb enough to travel without foreward scouts) --- but you don't want to go *too* far in advance, lest they change their route, or your plans are foiled by some unforeseen natural occurrence (IRL, what foiled this plan most often was rain). This plan is less effective if the orcs are travelling with wolves (or other beasts with Scent), who get a +10 bonus on the DC 30 Spot check to sense "something wrong" with the ground as they walk on it. The most valuable thing about fire damage in this case is that you can inflict damage over more than one round. So I suggest you concentrate this on whatever portion of their army is most likely to contain their spellcasters (continued Concentration checks against a cluster of them would be ideal, making it harder for them to interfere with YOU while you're flying around doing what you do best). If you know what part of their procession contains a concentration of enemy spellcasters, you can try to refine this tactic against them in PARTICULAR, making use of this tactic a lot less expensive. Do NOT disdain the use of oil just because you can cast fireballs. The most valuable resource you HAVE is your hard-earned, versatile spell slots. Anything you can do to free them up, you should definitely do.
Vanigo 05-02-04, 08:07 PM	Well, if you can find enough oil in one place, you could polymorph into something with a really high carrying capacity, pick up the oil, teleport with it to wherever you're going, and use unseen servants to spread it. The only problem is finding someone with that much oil who's willing to sell it all to you. Well, that and having enough money, I suppose. As for other useful tactics: Wall of fire has a duration of concentration+1 round/level. You can keep it up as long as you need to. It can get really long, too, and the orcs may well be unable to bring it down. If they have to go throug a narrow enough pass, you may be able to hold them off indefinetly.
Wizard 05-02-04, 08:15 PM	If you can find a scroll of polymorph any object real quick, you can find a piece of coal somewhere and turn it into oil. Same or lower intelligence, same kingdom, and related, as they're both fuel.
Thraxious 05-02-04, 08:17 PM	Hmm... Polymorph Any Object to turn water into oil? Would be easier to attain that much water.. Of course spell would be beyond your caster level right now.. so you would need to get a scroll. *shrug*
Bjorn Borg 05-03-04, 06:01 PM	yea. thanks so far guys for your insights ill try my best to incorporate all your advice into my tactics ill also let u know how i do when the time comes (keep giving more ideas please) Bjorn