Creating a good Siege Battle - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Creating a good Siege Battle

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
Janx_14
Aug 27, 2008 17:21:16 How does one create a good siege battle in D&D? My party will soon be involved in such a siege a battle, and im lucky we're too busy to do my campaign this week as i've become rather troubled as in to how to run it.

What im thinking of is a smaller version of the battle of helm's deep. So of course, plenty of minions. Are there any good tips for setting up a castle map for an interesting siege defence? What could be some exciting events i could have happen? I don't want to make this into a minion slug fest.

I've tried using the dungeon tiler program on wizards and while it turned out other dungeons beautifully, it doesnt seem to do castle exteriors well.
#2
orloff
Aug 27, 2008 17:50:30 I've been working on a similar problem myself, and have hit upon a couple of ideas.

In my scenario, the player characters are part of the defensive forces of a city under siege. My first thought was to have their superior place them in charge of defending a major gate into the city, but I couldn't think of any reason why only 5 people would be holding such an essential position. I wanted the PCs to be by themselves so the combat wouldn't descend into a slugfest between NPCs.

The idea I hit upon was to have the PCs be doing something else when the attack started (finishing up another adventure, taking a moment of rest, whatever works best for you). The main forces of both armies are already engaged when the PCs find out about the attack, getting them out of the way. Unfortunately, the opposing army has managed to breach the wall in a relatively undefended place. The PCs are deployed to guard the breach.

This makes for a tactically interesting combat. First, the players have to clean up anybody who already made it in through the wall before they can do serious damage to the city (or castle). Then, the PCs have a choke point through which enemies have to charge; they can stick a Defender there to cause havoc. Buildings inside the walls can induce interesting positioning. In my campaign, the PCs were defending a walled city, not a castle. The buildings immediately inside the wall had thatch roofs, and some of the attackers carried torches....

I chose minion soldiers and non-minion commanders, which come through the breach in increasing waves. The battle culminates with the characters fighting an elite monster which the opposing army had enslaved.

I suppose the key is focusing on the small picture. Rather than calculating how the overall battle is going, focus on the PCs' portion of it. Don't bother mapping out the whole thing, just the area where the characters will be fighting.
#3
voidraithe
Aug 27, 2008 18:19:39 I had my characters in a mass battle in my first D&D 3.0 and just had them operate as a party taking on units their size or larger. I would then describe what I as a DM felt like (eg. the unit to your left is getting decimated and Orc are starting to break through.)

I also created a table I called the Chaos of War and would roll each round on it. I had just random things that would occur in battle like getting flanked, strange occurances, allowing the PC's to flank, targetted by a mass volley, targetted by siege equipment and a few more.

I went great. The players loved it, they felt like they had a real impact on the battle and also felt part of it as I would describe things like "A rain of arrows comes whizzing down peppering the area." and "A large boulder comes bouncing past you mowing down both friend and foe, leaving broken bodies in it's wake."
#4
werral
Aug 27, 2008 18:32:21 The PC's might have mission such as helping an important personage out of the warzone, stealing enemy gold to pay mercenaries, delivering a message, finding a traitor, preventing the theft of an important magical item such as the Key to a ward that prevents supernatural beings from entering (so if the enemy gets the key they can bring in the demons), leading a band of militia (who are either feckless peasants or condemned criminals).

You can make things really tense by having an important big mission and then having them run into groups of their soldiers being overrun, buildings burning down with people stuck inside and so forth -do they temporarily drop or risk their main mission in order to help or do they carry on?

For any battles not involving the PCs either simply decide in advance who's winning and use stats for the minion post-battle (so they may face the wounded survivors of a previous battle) or if you want some randomness, just use each sides encounter level as a modifier and make an opposed roll to see who wins (unless the PC's intervene).

For maps, you can look up actual castle maps on the internet or local library and mix and match. Decide in advance where breaches might occur and when (barring PC intervention of course). So your notes might say (after 10 roundsof battering the the West Gate will give way and 20 goblins will rush in).

Keep it interesting by having the PC's recognise faces from the castle's defenders (maybe their blacksmith is in the militia).

Watch: The Lord of the Rings animated version, Evil Dead: Army of Darkness, Enemy at the Gates. Read about the 1527 sack of Rome and steal ideas.
#5
strand0
Aug 27, 2008 20:58:43 The defensive position has to give real advantage over the attackers. The warriors climbing the walls get big AC minus. Dropped rocks can knock several warriors off the ladders. Attacking archers just can get a decent shot at the defenders.
#6
Janx_14
Aug 28, 2008 20:55:59 Well the forces are coming from where we need to go, and while this may seem like an easy "well just have them go around the massive army". There's the Paladin. He isnt going to leave the castle to defend itself, as he's defended everything else so far that could possibly be defend for any reason. I can guaruntee a 95% chance that they'll be stuck in this battle, and i'm not gonna railroad them and tell them they have to leave (besides, giant siege battle could be kind of cool). Now of course, watch i'll do all this stuff and the paladin will assume we arent doing the siege battle.:P

Im not having much look googling castle maps, i tend to get maps of england, or pictures of castles (not maps of them). Anyone have any good sources?
#7
jdudley1121
Aug 28, 2008 21:30:11 Don't forget to keep the battle 3 dimensional. Climbing on walls, artillery, jumping roof to roof, and battle towers are just a few examples of this. also, if you think your group can handle it, use flying attackers to press the advantage during the attack. An army of orcs becomes much scarier when they use even 1 battalion of fighters mounted on the backs of giant birds.
#8
matthewswift
Aug 29, 2008 1:30:11 a generous supply of minions and you've got Dungeons and Dynasty warriors... interesting.

As far as sieges, they were historically long term battles, but if you start applying magic you've got all sorts of interesting means of employing the PC's. An enemy warlock strike team manages to feystep in, and attempts to assassinate the leadership. Bad guys have a dragon on their side. The city the hero's are defending is under aerial siege (gimme giant bird/bat mounted baddies with alchemists fire or spells) and can respond by scrambling the PC's.

Or make a plan as to how the battle should go, where the main thrusts will be, play the outlying battles something like risk and have the PC's remain or travel as they like.
The western wall is under siege, while the pcs are at the Eastern wall shooting and pushing off ladders. the other wall may or may not get breached, depending on how well the pc's have boosted defences there (bonus' to their hold-the-fort check against the enemies ****-the-castle check).

Whatever level of detail you prefer.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 Janx_14 Aug 27, 2008 17:21:16	How does one create a good siege battle in D&D? My party will soon be involved in such a siege a battle, and im lucky we're too busy to do my campaign this week as i've become rather troubled as in to how to run it. What im thinking of is a smaller version of the battle of helm's deep. So of course, plenty of minions. Are there any good tips for setting up a castle map for an interesting siege defence? What could be some exciting events i could have happen? I don't want to make this into a minion slug fest. I've tried using the dungeon tiler program on wizards and while it turned out other dungeons beautifully, it doesnt seem to do castle exteriors well.
#2 orloff Aug 27, 2008 17:50:30	I've been working on a similar problem myself, and have hit upon a couple of ideas. In my scenario, the player characters are part of the defensive forces of a city under siege. My first thought was to have their superior place them in charge of defending a major gate into the city, but I couldn't think of any reason why only 5 people would be holding such an essential position. I wanted the PCs to be by themselves so the combat wouldn't descend into a slugfest between NPCs. The idea I hit upon was to have the PCs be doing something else when the attack started (finishing up another adventure, taking a moment of rest, whatever works best for you). The main forces of both armies are already engaged when the PCs find out about the attack, getting them out of the way. Unfortunately, the opposing army has managed to breach the wall in a relatively undefended place. The PCs are deployed to guard the breach. This makes for a tactically interesting combat. First, the players have to clean up anybody who already made it in through the wall before they can do serious damage to the city (or castle). Then, the PCs have a choke point through which enemies have to charge; they can stick a Defender there to cause havoc. Buildings inside the walls can induce interesting positioning. In my campaign, the PCs were defending a walled city, not a castle. The buildings immediately inside the wall had thatch roofs, and some of the attackers carried torches.... I chose minion soldiers and non-minion commanders, which come through the breach in increasing waves. The battle culminates with the characters fighting an elite monster which the opposing army had enslaved. I suppose the key is focusing on the small picture. Rather than calculating how the overall battle is going, focus on the PCs' portion of it. Don't bother mapping out the whole thing, just the area where the characters will be fighting.
#3 voidraithe Aug 27, 2008 18:19:39	I had my characters in a mass battle in my first D&D 3.0 and just had them operate as a party taking on units their size or larger. I would then describe what I as a DM felt like (eg. the unit to your left is getting decimated and Orc are starting to break through.) I also created a table I called the Chaos of War and would roll each round on it. I had just random things that would occur in battle like getting flanked, strange occurances, allowing the PC's to flank, targetted by a mass volley, targetted by siege equipment and a few more. I went great. The players loved it, they felt like they had a real impact on the battle and also felt part of it as I would describe things like "A rain of arrows comes whizzing down peppering the area." and "A large boulder comes bouncing past you mowing down both friend and foe, leaving broken bodies in it's wake."
#4 werral Aug 27, 2008 18:32:21	The PC's might have mission such as helping an important personage out of the warzone, stealing enemy gold to pay mercenaries, delivering a message, finding a traitor, preventing the theft of an important magical item such as the Key to a ward that prevents supernatural beings from entering (so if the enemy gets the key they can bring in the demons), leading a band of militia (who are either feckless peasants or condemned criminals). You can make things really tense by having an important big mission and then having them run into groups of their soldiers being overrun, buildings burning down with people stuck inside and so forth -do they temporarily drop or risk their main mission in order to help or do they carry on? For any battles not involving the PCs either simply decide in advance who's winning and use stats for the minion post-battle (so they may face the wounded survivors of a previous battle) or if you want some randomness, just use each sides encounter level as a modifier and make an opposed roll to see who wins (unless the PC's intervene). For maps, you can look up actual castle maps on the internet or local library and mix and match. Decide in advance where breaches might occur and when (barring PC intervention of course). So your notes might say (after 10 roundsof battering the the West Gate will give way and 20 goblins will rush in). Keep it interesting by having the PC's recognise faces from the castle's defenders (maybe their blacksmith is in the militia). Watch: The Lord of the Rings animated version, Evil Dead: Army of Darkness, Enemy at the Gates. Read about the 1527 sack of Rome and steal ideas.
#5 strand0 Aug 27, 2008 20:58:43	The defensive position has to give real advantage over the attackers. The warriors climbing the walls get big AC minus. Dropped rocks can knock several warriors off the ladders. Attacking archers just can get a decent shot at the defenders.
#6 Janx_14 Aug 28, 2008 20:55:59	Well the forces are coming from where we need to go, and while this may seem like an easy "well just have them go around the massive army". There's the Paladin. He isnt going to leave the castle to defend itself, as he's defended everything else so far that could possibly be defend for any reason. I can guaruntee a 95% chance that they'll be stuck in this battle, and i'm not gonna railroad them and tell them they have to leave (besides, giant siege battle could be kind of cool). Now of course, watch i'll do all this stuff and the paladin will assume we arent doing the siege battle.:P Im not having much look googling castle maps, i tend to get maps of england, or pictures of castles (not maps of them). Anyone have any good sources?
#7 jdudley1121 Aug 28, 2008 21:30:11	Don't forget to keep the battle 3 dimensional. Climbing on walls, artillery, jumping roof to roof, and battle towers are just a few examples of this. also, if you think your group can handle it, use flying attackers to press the advantage during the attack. An army of orcs becomes much scarier when they use even 1 battalion of fighters mounted on the backs of giant birds.
#8 matthewswift Aug 29, 2008 1:30:11	a generous supply of minions and you've got Dungeons and Dynasty warriors... interesting. As far as sieges, they were historically long term battles, but if you start applying magic you've got all sorts of interesting means of employing the PC's. An enemy warlock strike team manages to feystep in, and attempts to assassinate the leadership. Bad guys have a dragon on their side. The city the hero's are defending is under aerial siege (gimme giant bird/bat mounted baddies with alchemists fire or spells) and can respond by scrambling the PC's. Or make a plan as to how the battle should go, where the main thrusts will be, play the outlying battles something like risk and have the PC's remain or travel as they like. The western wall is under siege, while the pcs are at the Eastern wall shooting and pushing off ladders. the other wall may or may not get breached, depending on how well the pc's have boosted defences there (bonus' to their hold-the-fort check against the enemies ****-the-castle check). Whatever level of detail you prefer.