But what if we change that idea? Instead of Shadow amongst us, what about a blatant invasion? What if a D&D style evil nation suddenly opened a portal into New York City and began a war of conquest? Undead hordes and demons running down 5th avenue. Cops shooting sidearms at Minotaurs raging through Tiffany's. The National guard and eventually the military called in to face Drow armies and goblin and kobold battle-fodder. F-22 Raptors against Githyanki on Dragonback.
Set the campaign several months or even a year or so after the invasion. What would the state of the invasion be? Would it have succeeded or failed? What races would be available ot players? What classes? What abilities and equipment? Would the portal be open still or closed? Any thoughts? Ideas?
1) Group are Government agenets who slowly discover the advance scouts for the invasion, then the invasion happens and they are behind the lines or sent to close the portal or something like that as the war rages on
2) Everyone are normal Modern characters (cops, teachers, models, actors, students, etc) who get caught up in conquered territory, say New York City, and have to survive, maybe strike back at the invaders, and deal with the invasion itself
3) The invasion is completed, the modern world lost, and the characters are now Urban Arcana characters surviving in the conquered world. Maybe freedome fighters, maybe D&D style adventurers.
4) The invasion is completed, the modern world winning, and the characters either part of a group sent through the portal to return prisoners, or learn more about the invaders, or something like that.
I've also tossed two different ideas for magic around as a variant of UA's style. An invasion form a D&D style world would mean D&D level magic eventually being learned by the characters. So, I've had two thoughts on this. One is very simple. Replace the spell progression table of the US mage with that of the D&D mage. The other thought is make the D&D mage a prestige class that requires the US mage Advanced class first. Have the mage casting levels combine though, so a Lvl 1 D&D mage with 4 levels if US mage is actually a Lvl 5 caster.
. The National guard and eventually the military called in to face Drow armies and goblin and kobold battle-fodder. F-22 Raptors against Githyanki on Dragonback.
Dragons would have to rely on their spells to hit the raptors, and even then that's kinda iffy as the F22's would be attacking from over a mile away, none of this silliness about catching jets with breath weapons. ;) Now helicopters would be in trouble...
In fact, of all the fronts, I see the US/Europe doing best in the air since their munitions can hit from far beyond the range of magic. Of course you have to wonder if a dragon will have a big enough heat signature for a sidewinder to hit it. I'm pretty sure it's radar signature will be enough to lock onto, though.
Ground forces will not do well because of enemy mages. Orcs and other melee fighters are not the problem, as autofire and placed shots will drop them like flies (that is, if they are following Modern's MAS rules... which would be best, otherwise your players will get probably be annoyed).
A day after the conflict starts (or whenever forces get the chance for a briefing [in-field or otherwise]), mages will be marked as priority targets and hunted by snipers and, if the sucker's powerful enough, planes.
Set the campaign several months or even a year or so after the invasion. What would the state of the invasion be? Would it have succeeded or failed? What races would be available ot players? What classes? What abilities and equipment? Would the portal be open still or closed? Any thoughts? Ideas?
Define "succeeded". It's really up to the guy who runs the story who wins and who doesn't. 'Cause I like the goodguys, I'd say the invasion would probably not succeed if they popped up in the USA (assuming the raiding country was of comparable size and population). They could, however, have conquered some other country with a less organized/capable military.
As for playable races, whatever comes through the gate that A: is playable in D&D; B: doesn't exceed the starting party level with its LA; and C: is approved by the GM.
I don't see the invading races being accepted into any earth-native society; they certainly won't be entering the US or any country with a boarder patrol legally (bribery isn't legal :P).
There will probably be an underground society of the invaders in every superpower; how they run is completely up to the GM.
D&D classes might be playable, but only the invading races get them as base classes (others treat base as advanced, or prestige classes, I suppose). The invaders get the same skill lists as in D&D, which means no computers/non-spell healing/driving/piloting for the average foot soldier or even officer.
If that doesn't quite balance them out, find a few more disadvantages to tack onto high-level casting.
Just my thoughts. :P
That's an awesome idea. I could work the other way around, too: modern, technological forces invade a D&D world. You'd probably need d20F tech to justify it as a real fight (the US Army versus a few D&D wizards... that wouldn't last long). This could be a fun way to introduce d20M to a D&D gaming group.
THIS has been done numerous times already, especia;lly back in the TSR days of D&D - Expedition to the Barrier Peaks and Tale of the Comet spring to mind.
The idea here is to reverse the idea and try it the other way.
Dragons would have to rely on their spells to hit the raptors, and even then that's kinda iffy as the F22's would be attacking from over a mile away, none of this silliness about catching jets with breath weapons. ;) Now helicopters would be in trouble...
In fact, of all the fronts, I see the US/Europe doing best in the air since their munitions can hit from far beyond the range of magic. Of course you have to wonder if a dragon will have a big enough heat signature for a sidewinder to hit it. I'm pretty sure it's radar signature will be enough to lock onto, though.
Question is, would the AMRAAMS and Sidewinders really hurt the dragon? DR is a big deal here. And anything coming within range will have the various breathweapons to deal with. Not to mention the Psionics of the Githyanki riders.
Ground forces will not do well because of enemy mages. Orcs and other melee fighters are not the problem, as autofire and placed shots will drop them like flies (that is, if they are following Modern's MAS rules... which would be best, otherwise your players will get probably be annoyed).
A day after the conflict starts (or whenever forces get the chance for a briefing [in-field or otherwise]), mages will be marked as priority targets and hunted by snipers and, if the sucker's powerful enough, planes.
Well, orcs, kobolds and such, yes, autofire would be a problem. What about high AC and Dex creatures, like Drow? Reflex save mean not hit by auto-fire, especially if they have EVASION.
And, again, there's things like undead - skeletons take 1/2 damage form piercing, I think this would apply to bullets too. And even the minorest of Demons and Devils have DR. Even DR 10 would stop ALOT of guns or make their damage negligible.
Define "succeeded". It's really up to the guy who runs the story who wins and who doesn't.
Well, the whole point of these questions was asking for help brainstorming on when to set this. Would the invasion succeed and if so, the consequences? Would it fail and if so, the consequences? Things like that
Something to figure into all of this. The invading force would be from oh, something on the level of The Kingdom of Iuz in Greyhawk, Thay from forgotten Realms, or even Mordor/Angmar from Lord of the Rings. Or even better, a combination of all those
Question is, would the AMRAAMS and Sidewinders really hurt the dragon? DR is a big deal here. And anything coming within range will have the various breathweapons to deal with. Not to mention the Psionics of the Githyanki riders.
Disclaimer: I know AMRAAMS and Sidewinders are only air-to-air.
Tanks have hardness, a LOT of hardness [20], and we have missiles that pop them in one shot.
Anyhow, sidewinders deal 20d6 according to the Menace Manuel... So yeah, assuming average damage rolled a sidewinder would do 50 damage to a great wyrm (I already factored in DR)... which is not something you'll often encounter on the battlefield.
Dragons won't go down with one missile (unless MAS applies to them too), but they certainly won't be happy after a sidewinder explodes in their face.
According to Wikipedia (hate using Wikipedia as a reference), the AMRAAM has a warhead weight of just under 2.5 times that of the sidewinder's. I'm not really a missile engineer, but I'd put the AMRAAM's damage at 44d6 of ouch.
134 damage against a great wyrm on average.
I'm not sure if Air to Air missiles use attack rolls or reflex saves... If you are going by the starship rules, attack rolls.
As for the psionic attacks... I don't recall any having a range of over a mile, unless the manifester was epic.
Well, orcs, kobolds and such, yes, autofire would be a problem. What about high AC and Dex creatures, like Drow? Reflex save mean not hit by auto-fire, especially if they have EVASION.
But how common are drow, or drow frontliners for that matter? Aren't they more interested in becoming mages/clerics, and as such subject to high-level sniper-fire?
And, again, there's things like undead - skeletons take 1/2 damage form piercing, I think this would apply to bullets too. And even the minorest of Demons and Devils have DR. Even DR 10 would stop ALOT of guns or make their damage negligible.
I'm not very savvy about the divine contracts and such in D&D, but wouldn't such an assault violate it?
What about earth's pantheon (or single deity if you wish)? I suppose earth could simply not have one, but where's the fun in that? :P
Skeletons and zombies are in the MSRD, and the former does have the 1/2 damage from ballistic... But they're also not intelligent. At first they'd likely have the advantage, but later on earth forces would probably start setting traps (mass pitfalls and such) to render them useless.
Well, the whole point of these questions was asking for help brainstorming on when to set this. Would the invasion succeed and if so, the consequences? Would it fail and if so, the consequences? Things like that
If the world invasion succeeded, life would suck for native earth-inhabitants. There might be a force of good from the other side as well as the evil one, trying to free earth from the dark army's influence.
Something to figure into all of this. The invading force would be from oh, something on the level of The Kingdom of Iuz in Greyhawk, Thay from forgotten Realms, or even Mordor/Angmar from Lord of the Rings. Or even better, a combination of all those
Unfortunately, I don't know what the first two examples you posted are... I'll just assume they're powerful. :P
I'm just offering counterpoints; I'm not trying to troll or anything like that. Hopefully nothing I have said comes across as hostile. lol!
I'm just offering counterpoints; I'm not trying to troll or anything like that. Hopefully nothing I have said comes across as hostile. lol!
Not at all. This is what i was looking for. Brainstorming and debating of ideas and concepts to solidify things into something that might work as a campaign concept
Disclaimer: I know AMRAAMS and Sidewinders are only air-to-air.
Tanks have hardness, a LOT of hardness [20], and we have missiles that pop them in one shot.
Anyhow, sidewinders deal 20d6 according to the Menace Manuel... So yeah, assuming average damage rolled a sidewinder would do 50 damage to a great wyrm (I already factored in DR)... which is not something you'll often encounter on the battlefield.
Dragons won't go down with one missile (unless MAS applies to them too), but they certainly won't be happy after a sidewinder explodes in their face.
According to Wikipedia (hate using Wikipedia as a reference), the AMRAAM has a warhead weight of just under 2.5 times that of the sidewinder's. I'm not really a missile engineer, but I'd put the AMRAAM's damage at 44d6 of ouch.
134 damage against a great wyrm on average.
Yes, we pop tanks with weapons all the time, and DR in D&D is gotten trhough as well. I admit, the missles are gonna hurt and fell lots of dragons, but the spells and breath weapons of the dragons as well as the spells/psionics of their riders are gonna drop alot of fighters too. And dead falling dragons will still cause alot of damage to buildings and civilians/ground troops below.
And the dragons are only one idea. What if there's things like Flying citadels from dragonlance or Netherese Flying Cities from Forgotten Realms as well? Troops dropping form the sky routinely with spells and magic weapons over NYC. Do you risk shooting ti down (can you even shoot it down?) over a city?
But how common are drow, or drow frontliners for that matter? Aren't they more interested in becoming mages/clerics, and as such subject to high-level sniper-fire?
I'm not very savvy about the divine contracts and such in D&D, but wouldn't such an assault violate it?
What about earth's pantheon (or single deity if you wish)? I suppose earth could simply not have one, but where's the fun in that? :P
Skeletons and zombies are in the MSRD, and the former does have the 1/2 damage from ballistic... But they're also not intelligent. At first they'd likely have the advantage, but later on earth forces would probably start setting traps (mass pitfalls and such) to render them useless.
Sorry bout the multiple posts.
Actually, there are plenty of drow males that are front line fighters. And how effective is a sniper going to be after a fireball goes off in his spot after the first shot? Remember, even a Barret Light 50 only does 2d12 damage. No called shots in Modern, so, even a mid level mage will survive that. And, do not forget Protection from Normal Missles. Shoot all you want, the mage has DR vs. bullets.
As for religions, well, in D&D and UA there seems to not be any kind of agreement to keep deities from stepping on each others toes, and even mages can animate dead. As for the traps, uhm, this is tried in D&D too. Yes, skellys and zombies are mindless, but armies of them are ALOT and they just...keeep...coming
As for the invasion itself, any campaign run during the invasion would have ot be a small part of it. Say, one city or such. I dont; think it could be done on a global scale and be viable as anything but a wargame.
If you run AFTER the invasion, you again need to decide the outcome of the invasion to begin with. I'm kinda leanign towards the idea of characters are norms in a city that the invasion begins in and they get stuck fighting against it.
Sorry bout the multiple posts.
Actually, there are plenty of drow males that are front line fighters. And how effective is a sniper going to be after a fireball goes off in his spot after the first shot? Remember, even a Barret Light 50 only does 2d12 damage. No called shots in Modern, so, even a mid level mage will survive that. And, do not forget Protection from Normal Missles. Shoot all you want, the mage has DR vs. bullets.
Read the Urban Arcana web enhancement for more info on how that light fifty can REALLY hurt something. The Sniper Prestige Class is hard to get into, but it does some really nasty stuff like autocritting (5th level ability), and the ability to push the DC for MAS up by twice his sniper level.
If you want to be liberal with how high-leveled your sniper can be, give him 3 strong levels, 10 soldier levels, and the Power Crit feat. Spend action point, hit target, autoscore a critical. :P
And like I said before, if a sniper can't take out a mage, an A-10 (T-bolt II) or AH64 (Apache) can hit him with something he doesn't have DR against.
I'm not so familiar with the D&D alternate settings, so I can't really argue about the air anymore.
Anyhow, I'm going to back off for a bit and let other people talk.
Read the Urban Arcana web enhancement for more info on how that light fifty can REALLY hurt something. The Sniper Prestige Class is hard to get into, but it does some really nasty stuff like autocritting (5th level ability), and the ability to push the DC for MAS up by twice his sniper level.
If you want to be liberal with how high-leveled your sniper can be, give him 3 strong levels, 10 soldier levels, and the Power Crit feat. Spend action point, hit target, autoscore a critical. :P
And like I said before, if a sniper can't take out a mage, an A-10 (T-bolt II) or AH64 (Apache) can hit him with something he doesn't have DR against.
I'm not so familiar with the D&D alternate settings, so I can't really argue about the air anymore.
Anyhow, I'm going to back off for a bit and let other people talk.
I forgot all about the Sniper prestige class actually. And we do seem to be falling to one side or the other of this discusion, which is not what I wanted
Anyhow, I can see what you're saying, and the sniper vs mage thing means that in addition to other factors, you need to know how many mages the invading army has at its disposal. Heck, you ened to know how many clerics too, now that I think of it.And, I think you mentioned a while back there, a force for good as well. Its a good point. Is the world the invasion is coming from wholly evil? Or is the invading force just one small evil nation? If it's one nation, is it truly na invasion to conquer or just an attempt to get their hands on a source of superiro technology? Maybe the invasion is meant to only hold one city. Provide a source of modern weapons and technology for a war back on the evil empire's homeworld? That would mean the modern charactr, if they go through the portal, would definitely find allies against the evil.
The magical army might get hard hits in the first parts of the war but once earth's population starts to understand what's going on, things get really nasty, really quick
studdents of the Kabbalah start prepping those Kabbalah rituals ( mimicked by giving them occultist levels and maxed out spellcraft and arcane lore for incantations) The vatican sanctions it's exorcists and visiting holy sites for "special prayers" (Acolytes from core modern, Visionaries from Dark Matter, mystics from UA). Worse, just about anybody with a real good handle on mythological lore (archeologist, university professors, secret society members, etc) starts paying attention to those archaic pratices of lost cultures like the egyptians, the greeks, ancient china etc.
Suddenly you have guys pulling earth magic out of their hats who while it might not start as powerful gets some pretty good stuff quick (like the synchronicitry spell, incantations, etc) and earth artefacts
Pretty soon you've got on the earth side: Modern Tech+earth Magic and on the invading side Medieval Tech plus DnD Magic
Result: Game over for the invading army, Modern tech+magic= over destruction (ever seen F-16 fighter plane primed with Dimension Door spells and and a readied teleport incantation
)or a Tank with a fast4/mage10 inside casting True Strike spells when firingSeriously if the worlds armies had magic and Tech, wars would not last a third as long before the battle was over...
I wouldn't knock the modern world in the magic department either. I mean if magic is real for the invading army, then it's logically real for earth characters also.
The magical army might get hard hits in the first parts of the war but once earth's population starts to understand what's going on, things get really nasty, really quick
studdents of the Kabbalah start prepping those Kabbalah rituals ( mimicked by giving them occultist levels and maxed out spellcraft and arcane lore for incantations) The vatican sanctions it's exorcists and visiting holy sites for "special prayers" (Acolytes from core modern, Visionaries from Dark Matter, mystics from UA). Worse, just about anybody with a real good handle on mythological lore (archeologist, university professors, secret society members, etc) starts paying attention to those archaic pratices of lost cultures like the egyptians, the greeks, ancient china etc.
Suddenly you have guys pulling earth magic out of their hats who while it might not start as powerful gets some pretty good stuff quick (like the synchronicitry spell, incantations, etc) and earth artefacts
Pretty soon you've got on the earth side: Modern Tech+earth Magic and on the invading side Medieval Tech plus DnD Magic
Result: Game over for the invading army, Modern tech+magic= over destruction (ever seen F-16 fighter plane primed with Dimension Door spells and and a readied teleport incantation
Seriously if the worlds armies had magic and Tech, wars would not last a third as long before the battle was over...
Some great points there. Things I hadn't thought of. However, while the Modern side of the invasion is learning magic and how to use ot, the DnD side is doing the same with Technology. By the time you have those tanks and F-16 you speak of, you have the same for the invaders.
1 - Speed. The fastest creature in the Monster Manual is 250 feet per round. That's a 160 mph burst speed on a dragon, 80 mph sustained. Our combat aircraft, even helicopters, go faster than this.
2 - Communications Technology. Message, the simplest communications spell, has a range of 110 to 600 feet (CL 20, enlarged), and the standard magic item, the Ring of Communication, has a range of 1 mile. A simple FRS radio has an effective range of 1760 to 5280 feet (1/3 to 1 mile), and GMRS is about 2 to 5 miles (as it has a higher wattage). Higher level magic has an increased range (even inter-planar), but so does higher powered radios (as well as the internet and telephony).
Plus, we have a larger population, more dispersed military, and a lower cost of entry into the effectiveness arena. Bombs, mundane, non-nukes, can take out entire formations of orcs, gobbos and hobos. Sure, if they attack a metropolitan area with a concentrated force (and a high level force at that), they might have a beachhead, but it won't last long. There's a reason why we don't use swords and have mass battles, the technology has made those deadly.
I think Earth's powerhouses would get some powerful tip-offs about the invasion from the aforementioned organizations.
Who's to say D7 or the Institute doesn't have agents magic-side?
Just a few elements to add. Vanishing again. :P
Some great points there. Things I hadn't thought of. However, while the Modern side of the invasion is learning magic and how to use ot, the DnD side is doing the same with Technology. By the time you have those tanks and F-16 you speak of, you have the same for the invaders.
I have to disagree with you on this one. Not to say that people from your Dnd world aren't as smart as modern people are but Modern technological level people have a significan't advantage on the learning process. Not out of intelligence but because the modern person is exposed to technology from the beginning of his life. Just compare families these days, the kids are much better at computer use them the parents. not because the kids are smarter but because the technology was in their learning process from the beginning
Simply put, trying to explain the complexities of satellite technology, advanced computer schematics, etc. Will be a lot harder for them to learn since they have no basis on wich to compare and help the learning process. Worse they understand science on a medieval level, wich is to say very low.
On the contrast, we'll have on the modern side generals with years of experience involving massive destruction weapons like surface to air missile that can strike from miles away, sattelite imaging, etc. Worst soldiers are trained to survive such conditions by avoiding it all together. in contrast medieval warfare, even with magic expects melee at some time or another. Comparitevely, the modern world avoids direct confrontation at all costs if possible. Scientists can elaborate war scenarios months in advance thanks to computers, etc
Why is this unfair? because spells in many way on the battle field are the equivalent of heavy weaponry, fireballs are like bombs, meteor swarms are like missiles, etc. Meaning tactics effective against explosives will be usually effective against fireballs
Not only that but not anybody is a capable mage, not everybody has the true faith to wield divine magic, but anybody can press a button and send a tactical nuclear missile. In comparaison skilled mages will be few and far between. Bomb their base to kingdom come from the other side of the atlantic a wipe a whole contigent of mages out. Spells have much lesser range then technological weapons, planes and helicopters are much faster and more mobile, etc. Most good spells require you to see you target, while technological weapons don't have that problem thanks to radar and sattelite
not only that but you're forgething the implication of advanced science used with magic. Scientists will have a field day thinking up new and creative ways to use modern science in conjunction with magic. Think what Einstein could have though up if he'd been a mage...
Think modern bacterial warfare combined with magic to create a dragonbane super virus or any other horrors you can think of like an ethereal missle to strike incorpearal oponents and leave physical troops unscated. Worse, tanks protected by spell resistance, etc
To really keep the battle fair even on both sides, your magic world will need a significant access to many, many powerful spells and creatures. Worse the ressources required for a theoretical success will require years of scouting an planning that could lead to their discovery by organizations like the Hoffman institute, Department 7, The vatican and who knows else.
I'm not saying this to discourage you from creating this campaign (wich sounds awesome) but I'm only teminding you to carefully understand the implications of modern warfare before running it to keep it realistic (so to speak)
I really recommend you read up on the First Golf war before running this scenario so you can see how devastatingly effective and quick the full force of the U.S military can be when it's allowed to use weapons of mass destruction
If I remember correctly the US ended the war within hours by blowing half the country away...
I have to disagree with you on this one. Not to say that people from your Dnd world aren't as smart as modern people are but Modern technological level people have a significan't advantage on the learning process. Not out of intelligence but because the modern person is exposed to technology from the beginning of his life. Just compare families these days, the kids are much better at computer use them the parents. not because the kids are smarter but because the technology was in their learning process from the beginning
Simply put, trying to explain the complexities of satellite technology, advanced computer schematics, etc. Will be a lot harder for them to learn since they have no basis on wich to compare and help the learning process. Worse they understand science on a medieval level, wich is to say very low.
On the contrast, we'll have on the modern side generals with years of experience involving massive destruction weapons like surface to air missile that can strike from miles away, sattelite imaging, etc. Worst soldiers are trained to survive such conditions by avoiding it all together. in contrast medieval warfare, even with magic expects melee at some time or another. Comparitevely, the modern world avoids direct confrontation at all costs if possible. Scientists can elaborate war scenarios months in advance thanks to computers, etc
Why is this unfair? because spells in many way on the battle field are the equivalent of heavy weaponry, fireballs are like bombs, meteor swarms are like missiles, etc. Meaning tactics effective against explosives will be usually effective against fireballs
Not only that but not anybody is a capable mage, not everybody has the true faith to wield divine magic, but anybody can press a button and send a tactical nuclear missile. In comparaison skilled mages will be few and far between. Bomb their base to kingdom come from the other side of the atlantic a wipe a whole contigent of mages out. Spells have much lesser range then technological weapons, planes and helicopters are much faster and more mobile, etc. Most good spells require you to see you target, while technological weapons don't have that problem thanks to radar and sattelite
not only that but you're forgething the implication of advanced science used with magic. Scientists will have a field day thinking up new and creative ways to use modern science in conjunction with magic. Think what Einstein could have though up if he'd been a mage...
Think modern bacterial warfare combined with magic to create a dragonbane super virus or any other horrors you can think of like an ethereal missle to strike incorpearal oponents and leave physical troops unscated. Worse, tanks protected by spell resistance, etc
To really keep the battle fair even on both sides, your magic world will need a significant access to many, many powerful spells and creatures. Worse the ressources required for a theoretical success will require years of scouting an planning that could lead to their discovery by organizations like the Hoffman institute, Department 7, The vatican and who knows else.
I'm not saying this to discourage you from creating this campaign (wich sounds awesome) but I'm only teminding you to carefully understand the implications of modern warfare before running it to keep it realistic (so to speak)
I really recommend you read up on the First Golf war before running this scenario so you can see how devastatingly effective and quick the full force of the U.S military can be when it's allowed to use weapons of mass destruction
If I remember correctly the US ended the war within hours by blowing half the country away...
As I said before, very good points. However, there's a few things your missing
1) the proposed invasion was to take place within a major city. US is not gonna drop Nuke, FABs, and such in the middle of Manhattan. Least not until the city is evacuated.
2) Dept 7 and The Hoffman Institue do not exist in the real world, which is how this was proposed. So, saying they'd find out is meaningless. The Vatican...maybe, but the inital scouts should be fine, especially if they ar ehuman. I think the CIA and FBI have other things on their mind than some 'magic users' in Manhattan
3) If the invasion is well planned and excecuted, and just because the technological level of the supposed DnD world is medieval does not mean it won;t be, then the invading army will have precautions against the technological advantage of the Modern World. Again, DR against bullets to begin with, and let's not forget Wall of Force - Impenetrable to anything short of disintegrate. Nukem all you want, the mage and forces in the wall of Force are fine.
As has been shown, every arguement made CAN be countered, on both sides. Personally, I think neither side would have a distinct advantage.
That could be interesting. :P
Edit: You never said before that it was the exact real world, nor that D7/Hoffman didn't exist in the champaign setting... and the title is "Magic Invasion of Modern", which leads us to think that it's invading the Modern setting. If it was the real world, the light fifty would be doing much more than 2d12. :P
Still, I'd say the earth natives would have the edge, simply because they are defending and already well-entrenched. If Modern somehow attacked D&D, I'd say the same of the D&D side.
Anyhow, in a magicless/psionicless society, there is no Hoffman Institue of Department 7. No need for them.
OK, let's narrow this down some, as we're getting to the point now of dealing with world wide conquest. Like it says in my original post, what if the invasion were limited to New York City?
Yea, I assumed everyone would know what I mean form the implications. Thats what I get for assuming
Anyhow, in a magicless/psionicless society, there is no Hoffman Institue of Department 7. No need for them.
OK, let's narrow this down some, as we're getting to the point now of dealing with world wide conquest. Like it says in my original post, what if the invasion were limited to New York City?
Well if it was limited to NYC then of course there arn't going to be any Hiroshima incidents:D. But, If there was merely one place then the United States Military could focus their power on that focal point. If you want a good example then go to http://www.hellgatelondon.com/. This is pretty much what ur talking about besides the point of origin.
Well if it was limited to NYC then of course there arn't going to be any Hiroshima incidents:D. But, If there was merely one place then the United States Military could focus their power on that focal point. If you want a good example then go to http://www.hellgatelondon.com/. This is pretty much what ur talking about besides the point of origin.
NO! Not THAT game!
Sorry. One of my fgirends is in the Beta and goes on INCESSANTLY about it. Though, form what he says, its a pretty phenomenal game.
Anyhow, Hellgate: London aside, say this invasion starts in NYC. As the foothold. The NYPD and civilians certainly won;t be able to do a whole lot other than annoy the inading forces, right? What about the military and Government? Do we have NYC cordoned off by the navy and army? Does the military risk counterattacking in one of its largest cities? Do we get 'Transformers' like battles in the city streets? And, what baout the PCs?
I'm beginning to firmulate a beginning. A scouting force is first sent and causes an incident that gets itself noticed by the PCs, who are normal, everyday people. One of them, who is an NPC, convinces the others to investigate, and they learn of the coming invasion. Maybe even try to stop it. Then it happens and they fight against it with the rest of the city, eventually getting drafted by the Government as resident experts. Whatcha think?
Anyhow, Hellgate: London aside, say this invasion starts in NYC. As the foothold. The NYPD and civilians certainly won;t be able to do a whole lot other than annoy the inading forces, right? What about the military and Government? Do we have NYC cordoned off by the navy and army? Does the military risk counterattacking in one of its largest cities? Do we get 'Transformers' like battles in the city streets? And, what baout the PCs?
I'm beginning to firmulate a beginning. A scouting force is first sent and causes an incident that gets itself noticed by the PCs, who are normal, everyday people. One of them, who is an NPC, convinces the others to investigate, and they learn of the coming invasion. Maybe even try to stop it. Then it happens and they fight against it with the rest of the city, eventually getting drafted by the Government as resident experts. Whatcha think?
Speaking of New York City and battles in the streets, here's an idea: steal the plot to Ghostbusters. No, seriously.
The invaders from whichever D&D campaign setting you're using for UA (Ebberon or Spelljammer for the win!) sent out an scouting party to get intelligence on this world, as well as to find a way to get the main body of the invading force across whatever seperates there from here. Some of this scouting party involves the usual werewolves, trolls, elves, and what not, but the vast majority of it involves things that don't have a full grip on our reality, like ghosts, the undead, and possessed people (read: Outsiders, Abberants, and the Undead). The players would be normal people or so-called whackjobs that staked their entire career on the idea that there are ghosts out there, but one way or another they wind up hunting these things down.
Eventually, it turns out that the bad guys are looking for decendents / reincarnations of the people they inhabited the last time the tried to pull this invasion stuff (say, a coven that existed just before the height of the Inquisition), and one of em' happens to be someone the heroes know and care about. This all comes to a head when the possessed coven attempts the invasion ritual at the top of an apartment building engineered by a decendent of the coven to make sure the ritual would work at full mojo when the star align or some such. And depending on who the players are working for, the players could get to the ritual early enough to deal with the Grendelspawn that just came out of the portal or late enough to see the F-16's scramble to take down the dragon circling the Empire State Building's antenna tower.
This would be an awesome minis game! Set up rules for modern minis (military, civilian resistance, etc...), and let fly the heavy artillery!
Good Idea, BUT, thats exactly what he didnt want it to turn into. I apologize for the offense but he said he didnt want a wargame, although i would :D . If you could just throw some rules out there, cause i would play it!
I only really play Star Wars minis, but I use the RPG rules (saga)
So, I started with a Magical Invasion of Modern (Urban Arcana), then threw in a Zompocalypse (d20 Apocalypse), and then let sit for 300 years, ending with a nice, integrated, Medieval Industrial setting (D&D's Points of Light).
The Magical Invasion of Modern would be two-fold. Groups of refugees begin appears throughout the world at the beginning of the second decade (2010). They tell of a grave evil that has been chasing them, and how they escaped with the help of their gods and heroes. They come from many different worlds, but all tell of the same evil, a plague of undead lead by an epic lich. People accept or reject them as appropriate, but they keep coming. At least 3 million the first year, 6 million the second year, and 9 million the third and final year. Then, on December 21, 2012, the Winter Solstice and the end of the Mayan Long Count, large portals simultaneously open above the hundred largest population centers across the Earth, and out from them swarm hordes of zombies, skeletons, ghouls, ghasts, and other undead. They begin to tear through the populations quickly, infecting their victims with a plague that causes zombieism. Within a year these former metropolises have a new moniker, Necropolis. Within a month, over a billion are dead. By the end of 2013, only half the initial 7 billion population are dead from the war. By the end of the decade, only 2 billion humanoid are alive on the planet do to environmental factors. People are settling in isolated areas in small towns against both the undead horrors, and the dangerous beasts and monsters that now roam the wilds.
Dragons, goblinoids, orcs, kobolds, undead, demons, devils, and other monsters keep what little population growth there is contained. Chaos reigns across the globe.
Within a hundred years the former refugees and the native humans have mostly integrated, though there are still enclaves of isolated peoples. Trade begins to happen between the towns, the forests begin to regrow, and the environment begins to settle, though still noticeably warmer than before the invasion. Life goes on.
Within two hundred years the pre-invasion world is the stuff of myths and legends, stories told in taverns and pubs. The technology level settles into an odd mixture of medieval, industrial, post-industrial, and magical. Printing presses, steam engines, and electricity mixed with scrolls, wands, and alchemy. Apprentices and masters replaces colleges and universities, though reading, writing, math, and the basic sciences are still taught beside the new reality to monster lore, magic lore, and mythology.
After three hundred years the world has reached a stagnancy. Without the institutions of a world-wide, or even a continent-wide society, technology has stalled. Materials cannot get from where they are to where they are needed, at least not in large enough quantities. Without factories, supplies are limited to what can be locally produced by craftsmen, and although the Necropolises contain unused, if old, pre-invasion commodities, they are still overrun by the undead, making acquisition problematic at best. So, individuals either brave enough, experienced enough, or stupid enough to try, begin to make forays out of their villages and towns, into the wilds, looking for relics of a lost age. Knowledge, power, or fame lure them. Some survive, most die, but still, it continues.
(1.) you can't introduce newer and better things unless they were ancient, (kinda defeats the purpose)
(2.) You don't have an inspiration to fix anything if everytime they try they are squashed down.
So I abandoned the idea for a time until it struck me, why not the modern world city invade a D&D like setting. The basic idea is that some how a large portal swallows a city and lands it in a new world. Now the game becomes very much a exploration and survival game as the inhalations of the new world come to explore this new city that just appeared out of nowhere. Then the character have to decide what to do fight and to hold the city and make a new life here or try and find a way back or maybe both. Well I have just started the idea but thought it was a cool spin on the Modern invading a D&D setting.
I have look at somewhat the same idea for my own D20 Modern game, as I was wanting something that was maybe world changing but not so much world ending and a magical invasion would fit the bill for world changing as everyone came to realize that magic was real and so was everything else that went along with that. As I thought of how to introduce a magic invasion to the world I thought of setting the beginning of the invasion in a small city with the characters on the frontlines more by chance than their occupation. In the end though I knew this would be a very fast pass game and very destructive and although it would make for a shot term game it would not last for a long running game at list in my running of it.
So I abandoned the idea for a time until it struck me, why not the modern world city invade a D&D like setting. The basic idea is that some how a large portal swallows a city and lands it in a new world. Now the game becomes very much a exploration and survival game as the inhalations of the new world come to explore this new city that just appeared out of nowhere. Then the character have to decide what to do fight and to hold the city and make a new life here or try and find a way back or maybe both. Well I have just started the idea but thought it was a cool spin on the Modern invading a D&D setting.
Sorta like the 1632 books? I like it!
In regards to the invasion I have to say that in my opinion any force actually opening up a war on an entire world would need to be pretty powerful (not necessarily world spanning evil empire but still at least major nation status otherwise its going to be concerned with potential enemies who'd take advantage of its militaries distraction).
That said if I was an evil overlord invading modern day earth I'd probably do it something like this.
1) Send through a small force (human based as their the dominant species on most DnD worlds) to scout out the land with orders to do everything possible to avoid detection including dieing without using their powers.
2) Send through a second force to a major civilian centre to secure a place to open a permanent gate for my forces to march through and invade.
3) Send through a third force to some small out of the way area to establish the real beachead and fortify it while the threats to my actions are engaged elsewhere.
4) Then start the real invasion.
In regards to magic vs technology I've got to say any military (including the US one) is going to get smashed to pieces in the first few engagements simply because they wont be expecting what they run into.
1) Creatures who shrug off bullets from anything but the heaviest weaponary like they were nothing and just keep coming.
2) Creatures who get back up after being "killed" over and over again.
3) Seemingly desperate civilians fleeing the invaders who suddenly sprout fangs and use superhuman strength to rip their rescuers apart.
4) Invisible creatures and possibly incorporeal creatures that can age you to death in seconds.
5) Leaders who are able to spy on your top secret conferences no matter where you are.
6) Seemingly normal people that with a wave of the hand can create massive explosions, vanish from the area you thought you'd trapped themin, even turn your own men against you and if you allow splat books like vile darkness rip the memories and knowledge of your technology out of captured civilians/soldiers.
Of course after the initial losses the balance would shift to a more even exchange as the modern advantages start coming into play.
1) Tactics developed to deal with single person explosives.
2) Long range attacks.
3) High speed attacks.
4) Advanced/simple communication options.
5) Probably larger armed forces.
6) More advanced military tactics.
7) Mass production.
Thing is learning magic would take a fair amount of time especially without teachers and with the opposition to it probably increasing in certain circles now that a magic using force is actually invading and slaughtering people and without magic your vulnerable to a lot of things. How do you fight a war when the enemy can use spells to locate your best military minds, teleport ghosts to that location and then watch as something you can't fight ages you to dust and the same with any attempts to learn magic. Sure that jet fighter can take even a great wyrm down with one or two shots but what happens if a dragon strike force is teleported to right above airforce bases?
Honestly it really could go either way depending on how things are run.
Well, we have Shadow Chasers and Urban Arcana for dealing with magic in the real world. Though, its a magic that is hidden, behind the scenes. People don;t know the drow in that band are drow, they see them as humans, except for a special few.
But what if we change that idea? Instead of Shadow amongst us, what about a blatant invasion? What if a D&D style evil nation suddenly opened a portal into New York City and began a war of conquest? Undead hordes and demons running down 5th avenue. Cops shooting sidearms at Minotaurs raging through Tiffany's. The National guard and eventually the military called in to face Drow armies and goblin and kobold battle-fodder. F-22 Raptors against Githyanki on Dragonback.
Set the campaign several months or even a year or so after the invasion. What would the state of the invasion be? Would it have succeeded or failed? What races would be available ot players? What classes? What abilities and equipment? Would the portal be open still or closed? Any thoughts? Ideas?
This has been done to some extent in OGL material - the best example off the top of my head would be Monte Cook's World of Darkness. The game was a rush job and the book desperately needs errata, but it is one of the most exciting modern-themed OGL products I have ever seen.
I'm about to kick off a MCWoD campaign in which the PC's are representatives of The Hoffman Institute (yep I'm using the d20 Dark*Matter book too). The two books work really well together with minimal adjustment required.
I also ran a d20 modern campaign about three years ago that featured a post-apocalyptic setting and an incursion of D&D and d20 future races. I have the campaign backgrounder on my PC at work will paste it up tomorrow for you to look at.
cheers
You might make your D&D invaders more interesting and effective if what streams through the gate is not orc and zombie armies (although they might be used in certain battles) and rather chose stealthy, magical and intelligent invaders.
Doppledangers, mindflayers, wizards, devils and intelligent dragons for instance, can infiltrate and dominate using etherealness, teleport, shapechanging, invisibility, domination spells/effects, to get around modern defenses. Even a handful could replace political, military and business leaders and gain control of ships, satellites, etc.
You could have modern heroes travel to Forgotten Realms to find away to close portal, find allies etc...or they could hunt down rogue intruders or bands that are hidden and making terrorist like attacks.
Characters could also be from D&D world but sent to this one to help us against invaders (thus getting d&d powers but in our world).
How many modern humans would "cooperate" for a chance to have their diseases healed or to get to a wand of charm person?
You might make your D&D invaders more interesting and effective if what streams through the gate is not orc and zombie armies (although they might be used in certain battles) and rather chose stealthy, magical and intelligent invaders.
Doppledangers, mindflayers, wizards, devils and intelligent dragons for instance, can infiltrate and dominate using etherealness, teleport, shapechanging, invisibility, domination spells/effects, to get around modern defenses. Even a handful could replace political, military and business leaders and gain control of ships, satellites, etc.
You could have modern heroes travel to Forgotten Realms to find away to close portal, find allies etc...or they could hunt down rogue intruders or bands that are hidden and making terrorist like attacks.
Characters could also be from D&D world but sent to this one to help us against invaders (thus getting d&d powers but in our world).
How many modern humans would "cooperate" for a chance to have their diseases healed or to get to a wand of charm person?
.I agree that in a heads up fight between the US (or chinese, EU or russian) armed forces and a D&D style army, the moderns could wipe out the invaders with superior firepower. I came up with a couple of other ways to make things more interasting.
First, the invaders have been active in the world for some time, and have forged a secret allience with a powerful earth nation. Lets say Russia. The Russians launch an offensive war to re capture their former empire as well as western europe. The invaders either open portals in the US and behind the defending lines or they open them in Russia. This pits the good guys against the modern Russian army, backed with dragons, beholders mages and whatnot. They would use the advantages of majic and technology together while the sucker punched US and EU forces would have only tech. and be wondering what the hell these things were. The Majicals harass the backfield destroy lugistical lines and strike terror into defending troops, making it very difficult to effectively fight the russians.
The second scenario also assumes that the invaders have had operatives of some kind here for years. They use influence or subtrafuge to create and arm various terrorist groups (apologies to the writers of Jericho). They also have influence over people in various governments. The invaders use this to aquire and distribute nuclear warheads and other weapons of mass distruction. They place them and set them off in most of the large urban centers of the world. That does a number of things. It severely disrupts the ability of the modern world to function. Communications are cut, transportation and manufacture of ammunition fuel and other warfighting materials is near impossible. It also allows the invaders to get a better foothold before the moderns figure out that anything beyond the WMD attacks is happening. The attacks also act as mass sacrifices completing the spells nessisary to open the gates.
Before the dust settles, a horde of undead fan out from ground zero. (I assume undead would not be harmed by radiation or nerve gas) They attack and overwhelm most of the first responders who were expecting hordes of refugees not zombies. Other more powerful creatures then begin surgicaly striking surviving military and infrastructure targets.
This scenario leaves the humans with limited ability to get more ammo, fighting in isolated groups who will not know what is going on at first. They will be more focused on survival and will not have any kind of command structure beyond the local level. Humans will have to get orginized before they can mount an effective resistance. By that time, the creatures from D&D world may own enough territory that they will be very difficult to dislodge.
Unlike many or most of the movies you watch, the military has access to high powered anti tank and vehicle weaponry such as the stinger and dragon. Just the stinger for instance once launched moves at Mach 2 at full speed to target so the dragon dodging or breathing on the weapon would not be a factor and one can drop a fighter jet.
The military also has heavy weapons. These are like the M240 which replaced the M60 such as you see Rambo wielding in the movie. They also have M203 grenade launchers under-slung on their main combat rifle the M16A4. If the units fighting are special combat units (close combat) they will most likely utilize the M4 QCB which is an M4 combat rifle with M203 and sights. If this invasion take place in a couple of years then they combat units might be using the OICW which is in development currently and is a 5.62mm assault rifle and 20mm low velocity grenade launcher. The US currently intends to implement this weapon in 2010 as the standard troop weapon.
Now they will not have it all their way for sure, but they do have a few advantages. Most US soldiers are trained in close quarters fighting and know how to use buildings and other cover to allow them to shoot at their opponents at a distance. Most troops will be in combat gear which does include a Bullet proof vest and if it is in the near future might include the new combat armor the US is developing. 14th century armor (chain mail, breastplate, and Studded Leather) is going to do next to nothing against high velocity rounds from combat rifles.
Magic will be a problem to an extent, but think about it any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. As far as the invaders are concerned the enemy they are fighting will be using magic as well, just an unknown type which will cause them to hesitate more than usual since they do not have the counter at hand like normal.
Your early infiltrators will also be at a disadvantage. They will have no clue how earth society works and so will make errors while trying to gather their Intel. With the high level of awareness that currently exists in agencies both foreign and domestic there is a real possibility that one or more agency will realize something is going on, just not what nor would they ever dream of an invasion from another reality.
Also if your invaders show up in a large city like New York they also have to deal with the civilian population just as the police have to every day. Ask your self how many people in New York own a hand gun of some type? How many gang territories is the invasion going to cross and how much fire power do the gangs have at hand? Is there a drug cartel or other illegal organization in the area being invaded and what can they bring to bear against the invaders? How many national guard depots exist in the city?Never count the average Joe out of these equations.
I think the invasion will run like this.
In the beginning due to surprise and planned operations the enemy will be able to establish a large beachhead before the world, government, or even citizens realize what is really happening. During the next couple of hours they will be able to double their original area of control with little resistance.
Now information will be getting out and people will begin to understand that something is going on, but if the enemy is using the right magics the people of the government and city will still be unsure exactly what is happening because of reports which can not be true such as monsters or magic. Regardless they will begin to resist the forward movement of the invaders and also start sending out reconnaissance patrols to gain some hard facts.
In the next couple of hours the enemy will gain about half the territory they gained previously due to increasing resistance from military, city forces, and the population. The government will realize that there is a real danger which will require much larger forces. Additional units will be call from surrounding bases and special forces will be called in as well. Also I would bet that the national guard would be activated as well.
Now things will become even more confused because the enemy moving through will have acquired advanced weapons as they moved, you can bet smaller forces like Kobolds and Orcs will have taken the weapons to use while many others might have taken them as souvenirs. Now some of these weapons will begin to be used against the defenders which will make the stories coming out even harder to believe. Think about it how many people even military are going to want to report that monsters in archaic armor using archaic weapons are marching through the city?
As more troops arrive on site the resistance will stiffen reducing the area taken to again half of what they took during the previous couple of hours. Now many things will begin to happen. The dragons and riders will start to appear to open holes in the defenders lines, but so will Helicopters and Jets from local military bases, so no main advantage to either side. The number of military forces will reach a point where they can stop the advancement of the enemy, but doing so will cost a large number of troops.
After a couple of more hours they enemy might have been forced back a bit but the lines will mainly remain static. High explosives and machine guns are keeping the lines of conflict contained. Magic and Psionics are causing holes and problems but Snipers and heavy weapons are managing to counter these when they arise.
I personally believe that the enemy would retain a beachhead and area of control unless the military and government were willing to nuke or use significantly heavy bomb to remove them. I do not think that the enemy would be able to continue to push forward unless they had an entire world of troops to draw from the societies you used as references had finite levels of troops.
At some point the government would either have to negotiate, or just bomb the city into the stone age to remove the threat. At the same time the enemy will be constantly trying to develop better spells to counter the defenders abilities, and creating more troops.
My $2.30 worth.
AothRa
The military also has heavy weapons. These are like the M240 which replaced the M60 such as you see Rambo wielding in the movie. They also have M203 grenade launchers under-slung on their main combat rifle the M16A4. If the units fighting are special combat units (close combat) they will most likely utilize the M4 QCB which is an M4 combat rifle with M203 and sights. If this invasion take place in a couple of years then they combat units might be using the OICW which is in development currently and is a 5.62mm assault rifle and 20mm low velocity grenade launcher. The US currently intends to implement this weapon in 2010 as the standard troop weapon.
A well thought out and interesting post anyway I just wanted to say be grateful your not playing first ed with its version of damage reduction:D . No DR 10 vs Slashing here it was can only be hurt by a +x weapon. Which means no matter how powerful your militaries weapons were if they weren't magically enchanted to +1, +3 or +4 (most common requirements) they'd do nothing. I shot the demon with my M4 QCB I roll 4d8 and get 20 points of damage. "It had to be hit with +3 weapons your bullets bounce off the demon that is now looking around or you."
On top of that attacking a holy site might cause problems for your demons summoned by those casters. There are so many locations inside Jerusalem which have been consecrated and then lost that you would never be able to locate a safe place to summon an evil outsider.
Now if you attack Rome you’re going to have a slightly better time of it. One as the Papal City Roma does not have the kind of standing army that Jerusalem or New York can boast. Hell Jerusalem would have military troops in before New York because they are already there. The holy part might be a pain and there are many different sects of the church all there waiting, you might even come across some who can cast.
All in all if you want your invasion to succeed I suggest Rome. If you definitely want it to fail then hit Jerusalem. If you want it to work to some extent then get stalled, then hit a US target.
Also, I know we're talking about a "real-world" setting, but would you discount conspiracy theories about the Vatican and such? I think some of those would be fun to include, if only for "SMACK" moments in the humans' benefit (there are so many easy ones available to the invaders.)
Acolyte of Christ to cleric of Hextor, who fails to beat the divine SR in the church: "Where's your god now, outsider?" *proceeds to perforate cleric of Hextor with blessed M4*
Would clerics retain their magic abilities when their gods are a dimension away? Would evil clerics be able to cast in a church?
Also, I know we're talking about "real-world" situations, but would you discount conspiracy theories about the Vatican and such? I think some of those would be fun to include, if only for "SMACK" moments in the humans' benefit (there are so many easy ones available to the invaders.)
Acolyte of Christ to cleric of Hextor, who fails to beat the divine SR in the church: "Where's your god now, outsider?" *proceeds to perforate cleric of Hextor with blessed M4*
This brings up a good question. How real is the Earth magic? IF you're saying that Earthly churches have SR, then you're saying that there is magic to create that SR. How much magic is there? How blessed is the Holy Water of the Catholic Church? Would an exorcism work on a Sucubus? If the Cardinal blesses his gold clubs, will it go through DR/Good when used as a improvised weapon?
If you accept that the divine magic of the various faiths of the Earth are real, then what advantage do they give the Earthlings over the Invaders?
In my D&D campaign set 300 years post invasion, only the outsider gods grant divine magic. The gods of Earth do not (I did this so that my Mormon Theocracy could be run by necromancers that tamed the undead horde that attacked SLC). It's only through obfuscation that the Old Faith can even win converts against the salient divine powers of the New Faith. I'm using the pantheon of the Sovereign Host (with the Dark Six) to represent my New Faith, with the most prominent Old Faith of the area (the Rocky Mountains of Central Colorado) in the Mormons.
Now, if I were to set my campaign during the actual invasion, I'd have to have a plan from the beginning. Are the invaders going to win, or lose. Once I have that plan, then I can make the rules adjustments that need to happen to have the outcome I desire. I would, of course, allow the PCs to shape the course of the war, and if they work against my plan, they might just change it, but it would be that plan that guide the campaign.
For instance, if I were to have a plan that lead to my current v.3.5 campaign, I'd make it so that the PCs were fighting for survival and coexistence with the invaders, rather than repulsion. I'd give them allies from the invading world that would allow them to fight, though in the end, they'd have to retreat to less hospitable realms. If my zombie horde doesn't like cold, then the Northern/Southern extremes as well as the mountains become a refuge in which to grow strong enough to destroy the undead.
1) Lack of faith and by this I don't mean that their atheists/agnostics/pick your flavour of disbelief but that they lack the soul deep certain knowledge that somehwere out there a power greater than you is listening. I don't enforce it in my games (too difficult) but I've always been a subscriber to the concept that gods grant powers to those who prove themselves in their service. Someone who pays at best lip service to their god regardless of XP/level is NOT going to be able to pray for any spells becaue the god wont grant them. You need to genuinely worship and have faith in them + show that your willing to suffer/work on their behalf to get access to mid level spells much less the highest ones. Now obviously there are even today people who genuinely have that level of belief/dedication but they are individuals not a uinversal priest hood.
2) Second reason (assuming magic is real) is that most magics fade with time if not renewed and many religious sites were only given the ceremony not the actual divine boosted power to protect it. So alot of places would have lost the defense they would have traditionally had either because it was never put in place, not renewed or ruined by violence and suffering on that site.
3) Finally you've got the fact that gods do change with time some die, others leave, still others move on to other roles. Take Thor or Zeus for instance how many people still worship them? 2-3 hundred maybe a couple of thousand (if your pushing the definition). So again a lot of faiths could well be relying on a source of power that went onto the next stage (above godhood) and hasn't existed in a tangible sense (at our level) for over a millenia.
As for the other dimension issue I'm not sure what world changing does but I remember in 1st or 2nd ed you would lose powers depending on how far away you went. E.g. if you went into the evil outer planes (hell, the abyss) and your god was in the good ones (Elysium, Olympus) you couldn't regain spells above 3rd level till you returned to the prime material. Also if I remember right the dragonlance setting has jelous gods who prevent any power except that given by them from working.
Arcane and divine casting invaders shouldn't be able to cast much either. If magic fades when not in use, the only useful FX characters would be psions as they use power from themselves to manifest.
In my Modern games that include magic, magic has either just entered Earth's dimension, or it has always been there, but has been frozen for a long time. In the latter case, mages need to be careful how much magic they use, or they'll restart the flow of arcane power and bring total chaos to the dimension... and possibly open the gates of hell.
In other words, no casting spells of level 5 or higher without risking the aforementioned repercussions.
Not fun for high-level casters. >_>
So this means the building blocks as it were are readily available. Raw magical energy (leylines to take an assumption) is still there for wizards to tap into if they're able to handle it (trained to x level), divine power assuming the divinity in question hasn't died/abandoned the world is there for priests to tap into. Inherent power (psions) is there to tap into. The problem is there isn't the training for people to draw on its full potential (and yes I'm talking in a game world not real life so yours may be different) and the spells/items created previously have largely faded and degenerated because no one had the ability/interest in strengthening them.
Of course there'll be exceptions artifacts would be able to sustain themself, the occasional truly devout and humble priest (of whatever religion) may have some abilities e.g. they pray and people get over illnesses for example. The thing is the invading force would have people with the proper training to cast X level spell, a devout priesthood praying to a strong and active diety for their spells and items fashioned and strenghtened by regular use. Of course this means if you grab that magical sword or girdle of gender reversal they'll work just as well for you and if you learn the spells (wizardry), found a diety who'd listen (priest) you could use those as well. Its just a matter of time to much time without using magic and knowledge, existing items/spells weaken but the potential remains constant.
Hope that clears things up. Incidently your version sounds alot like mage the awakening.
And your explanation does make sense. I simply like the idea of something magical in the modern world catching the people used to magic off-guard.
As for your wanting something in the modern world to catch magic users offline the hellgate series (mistakes lead to 2 pandimensional empires going to war) does that quite well. In the first encounter the magic users demolished a scouting force using theire fireballs (although they took a large number of casualties as well). In the 2nd one their prepared military got decimated because the modern weapons were able to (a) go through the portals (spells got stopped) and (b) go through their defenses (as the spells were high damage low penetration while rifles were low damage [relatively speaking] high penetration).
Very neat stuff... but we're kinda going off topic. Sorry about that... But now that we're here, in your game does plate armor only grant half the AC bonus against firearms?
OH! I did make a portal spell that could be used in this campaign, though it's inspired by Portal and I have no idea what the spell level should be. >_>
Portal
Evocation
Level: Sor/Wiz ??? (mage?)
Components: V, F
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Effect: Two Portals
Duration: 1 round + 1 round per level
Saving Throw: See text
Spell Resistance: No
Make two ranged touch attacks against separate areas as though attacking with two weapons at once. The spell fires two bright colored orbs, one blue and one orange, to the areas you attack. When the orbs strike their targets, they become 5'X5' portals leading from one to the other. You can see clearly and cast/attack through the portals as though you were casting from the place the portal is located, plus the distance you are from the portal you are casting/attacking into. You may dismiss this spell any time before its duration ends. This attack cannot target a living creature (plants do not count) and must target a space with at least a 5'X5' relatively flat surface.
If you create a portal beneath an unwilling creature, that creature gets a reflex save to escape without falling in. Each time it would fall through the portal (for instance, during a "falling loop"), the creature is granted a reflex save against an increasingly difficult DC (cumulative +1 to DC).
Focus: An Enrichment Center pass.
Portal
Evocation
Level: Sor/Wiz ??? (mage?)
Components: V, F
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: medium (100 ft. + 10 ft./level)
Effect: Two Portals
Duration: 1 round + 1 round per level
Saving Throw: See text
Spell Resistance: No
Make two ranged touch attacks against separate areas as though attacking with two weapons at once. The spell fires two bright colored orbs, one blue and one orange, to the areas you attack. When the orbs strike their targets, they become 5'X5' portals leading from one to the other. You can see clearly and cast/attack through the portals as though you were casting from the place the portal is located, plus the distance you are from the portal you are casting/attacking into. You may dismiss this spell any time before its duration ends. This attack cannot target a living creature (plants do not count) and must target a space with at least a 5'X5' relatively flat surface.
If you create a portal beneath an unwilling creature, that creature gets a reflex save to escape without falling in. Each time it would fall through the portal (for instance, during a "falling loop"), the creature is granted a reflex save against an increasingly difficult DC (cumulative +1 to DC).
Focus: An Enrichment Center pass.
I'd say it's about right for a level 4 spell. It's got a duration, which dimension door doesn't, but it's also a much shorter range and much more limited with it's target area. Also don't forget the limit of stationary objects. Can't have unstable wormholes on unstable surfaces, now can we?
Also, I'd change it to Conjuration (Teleportation), or even take a page from D&D, can make it a dual-school spell, Evocation/Conjuration (Teleportation). No matter what, it's going to be a conjuration spell, since that's where the type of effect goes. You could also make it a Psychoportation power, and give it some augments to increase it's duration (2 pp, 1 minute per manifestor level, 4 pp, 1 hour per manifestor level, 6 pp, 1 day per manifestor level)
i have not yet seen any mention of illusion magic, which i think would be one of the biggest advantages the invaders would have. the power of modern weapons would not matter if what they were being shot at was not actually there. also, modern weapons like missiles are used up quickly, so if they were used against non-existent targets, their benefits would be taken away. overcoming this would be one of the biggest probelms the modern forces would face.
about how the invaders would match up against modern militaries:
i have not yet seen any mention of illusion magic, which i think would be one of the biggest advantages the invaders would have. the power of modern weapons would not matter if what they were being shot at was not actually there. also, modern weapons like missiles are used up quickly, so if they were used against non-existent targets, their benefits would be taken away. overcoming this would be one of the biggest probelms the modern forces would face.
That is until they figure out that all you need is a bullet to interact with the target before the illusion is nullified. It doesn't even need to be a particularly powerful round, all it has to do is fail to hit the target, and the illusion is blown. Mind, this wouldn't work with some types of targets, but nothing's foolproof.
Decoys aren't anything new to humanity.
Oh, and Nobodez, I'll fix the spell sometime soon.
That is until they figure out that all you need is a bullet to interact with the target before the illusion is nullified. It doesn't even need to be a particularly powerful round, all it has to do is fail to hit the target, and the illusion is blown. Mind, this wouldn't work with some types of targets, but nothing's foolproof.
this is true, but it would not need to fool them for very long. it would just need to distract them, to make them look somewhere else for a threat. also, to do this successfully there would have to be some real attackers mixed in with the illusions, ideally looking nearly identical to the illusions. while they did this, the invaders would send another strike team to attack the bases, warehouses, and other places where weapons and ammo is stored. these attackers would be invisible for as long as possible, though they would be discovered eventually. however, they would probably only be seconds from completing their tasks when they became visible, so even a few seconds distraction would be very useful. also, all of this presumes extensive scouting by the invaders before they fully attacked, probably done with naturally invisible, or otherwise undetectable creatures, that found the locations of the majority of military bases and weapons and ammo depots.
Radar Decoy: Creates a false image on radar detection systems. Usually used in combination with more traditional images.
Programmed image: When shot it twists an falls spurting blood.
Prevent Determination: prevents detection by radar systems.
Radar Decoy: Creates a false image on radar detection systems. Usually used in combination with more traditional images.
Programmed image: When shot it twists an falls spurting blood.
Prevent Determination: prevents detection by radar systems.
i like these ideas. also, i was thinking of them using illusions to affect how the persons montoring the technology percieves it.
That would depend on the illusion used. The standard DnD spells probably wouldn't be that effective but they could always develop new ones to counter modern weapons e.g.
Radar Decoy: Creates a false image on radar detection systems. Usually used in combination with more traditional images.
Programmed image: When shot it twists an falls spurting blood.
Prevent Determination: prevents detection by radar systems.
The invaders would need to acquire, reverse-engineer, analyze, and then utilize a RADAR system before they would even know what kind of signal to create, much less what an accurate signal would be.
In short, these spells would be developed later in the game.
Not to mention all of this assumes the invasion is coming from a culture that hasn't done this before and actually uses technology/techno-magic freely. How would you like to be invaded by a high-magic/high-technology culture that's used to invading other worlds? Mages armed with blaster rifles and subdermal armour.
As for wizards/mages suddenly gaining two spells a level, I always assumed they were researching those spells during downtime, and thus not simply acquiring them from thin air.
As for clerics knowing the inner workings of the human body, no, but their god certainly does. :P
Who said I thought the invaders were too weak? I think they're powerful enough as-is without the additional missile-fooling illusion spells and what-not.
You also have to decide whether invisibility simply blocks the invisible light spectrum, or all light. Do they show up on infrared?
And again, they'd have to wait awhile for the counters even with the scouts. I think spell authoring, especially for spells with the range and technique needed to fool jets' RADAR, would take a decent amount of time to develop back home. And considering everyone is assuming they would only enter through a few portals, as opposed to thousands, I'd guess communication with the homeworld would be limited (since portals seem to be so hard to make.)
So here's another set if questions: how often are these super-portals possible? Does it take a high-level spell to shift to Earth's dimension, or do they need to use an artifact? If it is difficult to get to Earth's dimension, shouldn't it also be difficult (though slightly less so) to communicate from Earth to the homeworld?
Even with invisibility, it would be difficult to get into facilities that carry military secrets and such. Mainly because there just might be a guard able to beat the invisibility's +20 to hide.
Plus, invisibility is only a visual illusion, not an auditory, olfactory, or tactile illusion. You can still trip sensors that don't rely on sight, such as tremor sensors, pressure sensors, or just plain canine sensors (guard dogs).
You also have to decide whether invisibility simply blocks the invisible light spectrum, or all light. Do they show up on infrared?
And again, they'd have to wait awhile for the counters even with the scouts. I think spell authoring, especially for spells with the range and technique needed to fool jets' RADAR, would take a decent amount of time to develop back home. And considering everyone is assuming they would only enter through a few portals, as opposed to thousands, I'd guess communication with the homeworld would be limited (since portals seem to be so hard to make.)
Well, it depends on how they get here. If they get in through the shadow plane (and its deep shadow connection between alternate primes) then it's just two plane shifts (though there's still the 5-500 miles variance). If it's just a spacial shift (as in both on the same plane, but different planets), then it's more difficult because of the limits of spells like teleport, in which it would actually be easier to go though the planes than to not.
So here's another set if questions: how often are these super-portals possible? Does it take a high-level spell to shift to Earth's dimension, or do they need to use an artifact? If it is difficult to get to Earth's dimension, shouldn't it also be difficult (though slightly less so) to communicate from Earth to the homeworld?
The D&D sending spell works even across planes (though with only a 95% success rate and a 25 word (each way) limit), and there are items that allow a sending to be done once per day. IF they are a techno-magic society (like Dragonstar's Dragon Empire), then they could use satellites with small portals akin to ring gates that allow for communication between worlds.
Personally, in my campaigns (which are linked, on in Eberron and one in a 300 year post-invasion PoL setting), I'm using the Plane of Shadow for my transit. The BBEG grabbed a susceptible person from Earth, gave her great power and prestige, then milked her for information about Earth, including locations, technology, politics, what have you. He's been able to grab some items for his invasion plans, such as maps, which will allow him to better place his forces. The key will be the invasion will be a date and time when the border between Earth and the rest of the multi-verse will be weak, which means the timing it critical. In my PoL game, the invasion came off without a hitch (aside from the concurrent transference of non-undead, though even 300 years hence hasn't changed anything, yet), but in my Eberron game, the PCs have a chance of foiling the BBEG's plan, and saving Earth, as well as a large number of innocent non-undead (who would otherwise be thrown to Earth as well).
So, in my magical invasion plot, I'm using incantations to power the super-portals. They are one-time, and all the prep work is going into planning and orchestrating the event towards a set time. The BBEG is looking for a fresh world where the limits of Eberron are not in place, where he has not been limited by the Gatekeepers and the Dragons, and the Silver Flame. Where he can reign death without limits.
On the subject of sneaking around the base I figure your not going to be dealing with simple mooks but instead the best of the best. Assuming sources other than core that could be a void incarnate now those are NASTY. Been awhile since I read the stats but they essentially cease to exist in a detection sense. One can walk up to you, stab you and then walk away leaving you wondering how you got stabbed. There are to my knowledge no counter spells/abilities to detect them except being a higher level member of that class. One of those could stroll into the most highly guarded military base triggering all sorts of alarms (assuming technology picks them up at all), and then just sit behind the chiefs of staff as they discuss all sorts of classified information since even if they were recorded on camera you wouldn't remember seeing them and would call a technician for the glitch that kept triggering the alarms. Of course the BBEG would be puzzled where the detailed information on the new worlds defenses kept coming from but no plan's perfect.
Now admitedly the actual abilities aren't that impressive but in the descrition it say's "NPC void incarnates might as well not exist, for all that anyone can remember about them. You could live right next door to a void incarnate and not only would you be unaware of his talents, but you also might not even know you had a neighbor at all." and of course there's the little matter of "Opponents of a void incarnate unconsciously ignore the void incarnate's presence starting at 3rd level." since the BBEG isn't an opponent maybe he's not unconciously ignoring them.
Also remember your not dealing with humans so what if preparing the invasion takes a hundred years there are plenty of races to whom that's rushing things. That's plenty of time to get this one off chance RIGHT first time. Maybe the first spies slipped in during the chaos of WWI and have spent the time since observing, cataloging, developing new spells as technology developed (counter to radar), sendind technology samples home and assuming positions of authority in the area the portals are being made all in the knowledge that come July 4 2009 they can abandon the fleshy mortal frame of the chief of police they ate and become once more Zukanora demon of devouring.
P1) If your campaign is in the modern world, MAS is used. As such, most
troops will be easily defeated before they REACH a range where they can
start throwing fireballs.
R1) MAS What is MAS? Honestly I've never heard of it and I'm curently running a modern game so I need to know. Whatever it is however it applies to your modern troops too.
P2) Add in that the range of a sniper with a scope and far shot is 2400 feet
and a fireball's is 400-600 feet it means that the medieval guys lose
R2) Except for all the other options that we can use instead of the low level fireball. I'm regular jim bob just going into town to see the new cars and oh look I've cast Xendricks Holocaust (an actual spell) that has the same effect as a nuke going off in downtown new york AND teleporting me clear across the country to do the same thing in LA. Or maybe I have contingent teleport to bring me in behind any long range sniping or a contingent of monks with deflect/reflect projectile to send that bullet right back at you.
P3) As for dragons vs planes, Dragons move a lot slower and will never get
close enough to hit the planes plus Sidewinders do 20d6 points of damage(50
after damage reduction on average) which will bring in MAS pretty much
every shot. End Result: Modern 2 Medieval 0.
R3) Teleport again or maybe invisibility (or a modern spell to achieve the same effect), damage protection spells, ranged attack diversion spells, other more maneuverable flying creatures protecting them, goblins in their own jets, or maybe a dracolich that's immune to crits (which I assume will negate massive damage) and has all sorts of fun abilities. Plus invaders aren't stupid just teleport the dragons in above the airfields you'll be fried before you can launch all but a few of your technological machins. Score tied.
P4) Ok, sure they have fireballs, we still have LAW's; 10ft blast, sure it's smaller than a fireball but it has the damage of a high level mage, longer maximum range, armour penetration and the ability to be used by your average human (not very well but it's better than nothing)
Miniguns: 4d10 150ft range increment and 20ftx20ft area. Yeah, we have awesome emplacements as well.
R4) To which we reply with hordes of undead (raising your own soldiers to fight on our side), teleportation to bring us in behind your emplacements, spells to divert/block ranged attacks, creatures to whom fire or other tyes of damage are literally useless bouncing off their skin that'd walk right through your miniguns like a light rain before eating the gunner.
P5) Now, what else do you have that can't be dealt with by a tank.
P.S: anyone who says Mages can have DR gets a clip of HP .50 to the face (3d12, read it and weep)
R5) Tarasque's, balrogs, landwyrms, insibile stalkers, doppleganers to take the place of your commanding officers, beings that get inside your head and bring out your deepest fears to make you run, ghosts that again can't be hurt by ANYTHING you have and suck the life right out of you, domination spells to make the tank crews work for us. I for instance can't be hurt by ANY non-magical weapon which means your HP.50 even if it did its full 36 damage would be meaninless while I casually ripped your soul from your body (all mortal beings in a 30' radius of me die no save, no spell resistance, nothing your just dead if I get that close which I have since you tried shooting me in the face).
Incidently its not necessary to quote an entire long post like mine if your just going to post a paragraph addressing the whole thing just enough (or some indication) so we know who your addressing.
Of course the opposites of all those can be equally true just don't assume because we have advanced technology we'll have it all our own way. If you do maybe you'll have the experience of losing 60-70% of the troops in the opening rounds because nothing but the most powerful of weapons (i.e. vehicle mounted ones) even hurt what your running into.
Imagine a creature capable of assuming human form well enough to fool anything up to and including a medical exam that is able to shrug off most small rounds fire (DR 15 holy) moves at 3-4 times faster than a human, is strong enough to pick up and throw a car at you and see's in the dark as well as you do in the day.
Lets take a look at the weapons in the book hmmmm a desert eagle or a magnum revolver might hurt it (you'd need to roll max damage though for 1 point of damage)...in long arms most of those stand a decent chance of injuring it overall with a range ignoring the ones that can't injure it from 2-16 (most assault rifle and shotguns able to do 1 point) up to 2 to 24 (sniper rifle able to do 8 points of damage per hit). Of course you've got the 2 to 12 sub-machine guns where no matter how much you shoot it you wont do anything. Heavy weapons well the rocket launchers a good bet with 10d6 damage of course that's a one shot and if it pops up within 30' it wont aim and your dead. The other heavy weapons again offer 1-8 points of damage per hit. In other words the fight really can go either way depending on how the two sides fight and what base levels you assing the invaders.
Now, if you're playing a game set after the invasion, sure you can say they came out of nowhere and destroyed everything. Maybe have the myths of how they did so obscured... I'd also make the conquering presence overconfident to allow the PCs some advantage.
As it is, though, if I told my players what happened to everything during the campaign, and how the invaders had a counter for just about everything, they'd accuse me of metagaming (Yes, a GM can metagame, like when you have the tripping wolf run passed the dwarf with stability, to the human without). I mean, if you flipped the game around and gave the Earth side a dimension-crossing artifact (or several), they could dominate in the same way given the same amount of information on their enemy.
Also, MAS is Massive Damage Threshold. In D20Modern, it's equal to your constitution score... which is really bad for D&D warriors who are used to taking a fireball in the face and feeling just dandy afterward. Snipers are like long-range mages with as many save-or-die spells as they have bullets.
I suppose I'd run my campaign differently, and give the invaders a few weaknesses (overconfidence and impatience, for instance). Heck, I already told you how my version of the battle turned out. :P Neither side won 'cause they were too busy fighting off Hell's legions.
Edit: Oh, and I'm not sure DR totally negates damage. I'm pretty sure it can only reduce it to 1 point of damage... so if it's the center of attention, those ones just might drag whatever creature you're describing down.
I think flash-bang grenades might be humanity's best friend in this war... Simply for the fact that they stun the enemy. If the war lasts long enough, they might actually have more powerful ones set to do permanent damage to humanoids and at least temporary damage to monsters.
... And now I have the image of someone tossing a flash-bang into a dragons earhole. o_O
Although considering how much of a block of text that was I don't blame you for missing it.
Now speaking hypothetically again if my campaign was set during the invasion itself as opposed to after the DnD invaders wouldn't have to deal with MAS (they come from a different universe with different rules) however on the flip side the vast majority of their troops would be skeletons/zombies/goblins/kobolds etc who can be taken down by even an ordinary shot. Its just that you'd also have more powerful monsters in a smaller number (relatively as well).
Aliens is a fairly good example the marines went in cocky and overconfident and got smashed to pieces but still managed (ableit inadvertently) to take out the hive killing them. Or in the new AvP movie the national guard went in with poor info and got wiped out but then the people who actually knew what was going on called in a firestrike to wipe out the town. That particualrl infestion was removed but there's always others e.g. the merely trapped in the antarctic ocean (I'm pretty sure it could survive that preasure even if it couldn't lay any more eggs).
As for DR in my games it blocks up to X amount and you need to do more to hurt the creature your just unlikely to run into opponents with more than 5-10 DR.
EDIT
That should've been wouldn't be metagaming not would be metagaming its 20 to 4 in the morning here.
Earth's magic does not work this way, and so the invading creatures would have to be extra careful in order to avoid casualties.
It's your game, though. I just think it'll suck for the human PCs, if they have to deal with MAS while no one else does. It's better to have both sides of the conflict follow one set of rules.
And what do you mean by "I wouldn't be metagaming"? Do you mean that you would make the invaders less perfect in their tactics and research, or do you mean you don't believe it would be metagaming for the invaders to know everything about Earth?
P1) Ah... See, I'd have invaders have to deal with Modern MAS since, even though they come from a different dimension, they have to obey the rules of the dimension they are in. In the planescape there are planes with abnormal time-flow, and whenever a creature travels to those planes, it ages (or doesn't) according to the time on that plane. I don't see how MAS is any different. My explanation is that the physics of the D&D realms, magic is (almost) everywhere and gives those who live in it incredible strength... so long as they are still within its effect.
R1) I do use a consistent set of rules which I'm probably not making very clear here because (a) I've been up all day and I'm not at my best and (b) I'm alternating talking about what I'd do and responding to other peoples comments. In a more specific sense regarding MAS I don't use that in my games (hence why I didn't recognize it) the modern people e.g. military soldier are able to take more than their con in damage without ill effect as I've never bothered with massive damage in any of its forms. I also make a difference between external and internal factors.
Things like ability to use magic, psionics, shrug off insane amounts of damage are internal and a part of the being that remains constant regardles of where they go while things like time flow, positive and negative energy effects are external and part of the universe you travel too but how they affect you depends on the internal factors. For example a being born in the negative energy plane is able to be healed by that while you or I would be injured by it. So you see the external factor (negative energy dominant) remains constant but how it affects you depends on the internal factors of your makeup.
P2) Earth's magic does not work this way, and so the invading creatures would have to be extra careful in order to avoid casualties.
R2) Earth's magic in my game world works just as well as DnD magic I've been debating points made here not my game world rules as such see below for a few more details.
P3) It's your game, though. I just think it'll suck for the human PCs, if they have to deal with MAS while no one else does. It's better to have both sides of the conflict follow one set of rules.
R3) As above I do.
P4) And what do you mean by "I wouldn't be metagaming"? Do you mean that you would make the invaders less perfect in their tactics and research, or do you mean you don't believe it would be metagaming for the invaders to know everything about Earth?
R4) The second one the invaders would know a fair amount about the obvious things (major military bases, weapons, general tactics, people in power etc) but there would be things they wouldn't expect (new weapons, hidden bases, specific tactics, exact locations of troops in the field). To try and clarify I'll just post a few things about how it'd go in my game if I was running one during the invasion.
A) The invaders would have powerful magic (up to 9th level spells and innate abilites that have been eliminated/lost in the modern world as well as a few developed specifically to take advantage of modern technology since they've been studying it since WWII).
B) They would have sent scouts through with great difficulty who'd have gathered information and sent it back as they prepared various portals to open the gates between worlds as an earlier poster said taking advantage of of the closeness of planes (our dimension is far away from anything else in planar terms). Which also means that if they're destroyed after a certain time period (in this case 4 months) it'll be impossible to reopen on that scale.
C) Again because of the difficulty in reaching our dimension the information sent back is incomplete some things they know about, some they don't and some they disbelieved. For example when first coming through they wont believe rifles have the range they do so they'll be a nasty surprise whether its a surprise for your average goblin mook or an enemy mage however is up to the defenders (As I said my games set after the invasion so I haven't really thought about this much).
D) While there will be powerful beings in the invading forces that can only be taken out with extreme difficulty the majority will be weak but plentiful creatures that can be taken donwn with normal weapons e.g. the standard military machine gun fairly easily. Problem is (a) you might run into a more powerful one or (b) their numbers can overwhealm you.
E) No one has to deal with MAS or Massive damage.
F) Magic has been largely forgotten from a combination of deliberate surpression, mages trying to protect themselves and their knowledge dying out without teaching anyone what they know and the fact in my worlds you need to be born with the abiltiy to weild magic you can't just learn it. Of course there are groups who wield magic (and psychic powers) its just their less adept and far fewer in number than the opposing mages (6th level spells and either hiding in forgotten out of the way places or working for top secret military/government/private organizations).
Now as I said getting information across the barriers is difficult and incomplete so the researched spells for modern technology would be in the hands of the spies and not originally in the main forces hands. So for example when the main force comes through those groups in the know would finally have the information on what the mysterious observers were really up to and their first order as PC's would be part of a major operation to take them out and retrieve any information they may have of value. If the PC's succeed so does the operation and Earth's mages get a massive boost in the knowledge of 7-9th level spells + possibly a few new ones they didn't have although they'll need to grow strong enough to wield them (a new 10 level class reflecting the DnD's 11-20 level mages). If the PC's fail so does the operation, earth's mages don't get the boost but the invaders now have spells that allow them to fool/take advantage of modern technology although only a few would have the proper experience to get the most out of them for awhile.
Hope that helps.
P1) Ok, that does clear things up a bit, but is still maintain that modern technology could defeat most threats thrown at them. No, i don't think they'd just go "oh no, supernatural invaders, lets mop this up before lunch" they would be caught off guard, the shadow would take a lot of strategic points before the modern world could react (I'm assuming they'd just portal into the major military bases and whatnot). After that though, we set up strategic points, which have huge emplacements and we launch air strikes. Teleport is a worry but it was left out of the game for a reason, plus if we have magic too then we'd play to our strengths. Antimagic our bases so they have to come on foot, preferably over minefields.
R1) I don't agree with the whole let's nerf magic because we don't like it approach. I'll keep teleport in my games thanks. The thing about military bases is without the assciated infrasrtructure sooner or later they'll run out of aunition, however lets assume they don't before interest wanes the bases could easily become the towns left behind after the invasion that are the centers for remaining civilization in a military society. I'm just trying to make the point that if your going to fight our side iintelligently (bases, massive emplacements, air strikes) you need to extend the same courtesy to the invaders (they will teleport forces into your strongholds, they will use invisibility, they will fight intelligently).
P2) Really, how well this works depends on how you mix the two, use one ruleset, please. If you want high level magic, then use the D&D ruleset in a modern setting, if you're after the Urban Arcana War which I assumed was what this thread would be then use d20 modern rules. Mages still kick the pants off artillery if used correctly but it might be a fair fight, it comes down to tactics really. Big monsters aren't invincible and we have all we need to turn an army of hobgoblins into blood smeared craters.
R2) I disagree mixing rule sets can be quite fun if you do it right the group in the game I'm currently running really enjoyed running into that predator training squad. You just need to think through which rules you'll use first and apply them consistently. Do you really have what you need to wipe out a hobgoblin army (which this wouldn't necessarily be) when they can be backed up by all sorts of defenses you've never encountered? To return to the AvP movie they had all they needed to wipe out the alien infestation but they lost an entire town + national guard unit in doing so.
P3) I can appreciate the Post-Apocalyptic scenario, hey, I agree that they might even win but we'd inflict damages. A lot. Both us and the invaders could be considered to be post apocalyptic cultures.
R3) My problem is you seem to be overestimating how much an advantage our technology will give us by that same reasoning if they're an interdimensional force and have got their hands on say D20 Future technology they'd wipe the floor with us but it doesn't work that way. In my opinion it'll be a lot easier to learn how to use technology than magic. Anyone can pick up a gun and fire it (admitedly not very well but still) but only those with certain training can wield a lot of magic items, you can even make them so only those with X attribute are able to use them at all.
My problem is that you don't seem to realize that an enemy capable and willing to attack entire other dimensions is likely to be more than an undisciplined horde. They will probably be organized, intelligent and dedicated. What if to take a random example would the military really be willing to obey orders to gun down a small army of dominated children who've been instructed to fight to the death? Not to mention how messed up our world is ther'ed probably be plenty of groups willing to fight on the invaders side for oen reason or another.
My problem is that you don't seem to realize that an enemy capable and willing to attack entire other dimensions is likely to be more than an undisciplined horde. They will probably be organized, intelligent and dedicated. What if to take a random example would the military really be willing to obey orders to gun down a small army of dominated children who've been instructed to fight to the death? Not to mention how messed up our world is ther'ed probably be plenty of groups willing to fight on the invaders side for oen reason or another.
Point A:
They could also be overconfident, and reaching farther than they can grasp. Conquering your own world is hard enough. Conquering someone else's? That's a whole new level of megalomania.
I could totally see a lich believing himself superior to our realm, jumping to it, and trying to start something (and in the process, ruining the surprise any calculated megalomaniac from his dimension would have taken advantage of).
Point B:
They better not raid Africa, then. Dominated children won't be shown any mercy by the warlords there*... and they're VERY territorial, so good luck negotiating with them to join the most foreign cause there is.
*I'm by no means referring to this as an admirable quality. >_>
Point C:
What's to say there wouldn't be rebels for the raider's own dimension wanting the screw them over in our realm? Perhaps the first scouts on their end were tracked by rebel scouts, who saw the advantage of trapping them here?
More thoughts, more mayhem... longer war.
As for your point about African warlords its part of the reason I liked the world war series because you had humans who fought, who surrrendered and who worked for the alien invaders for various reasons.
Invisibility: This affects all visual senses, up to and including Darkvision, as noted in the SRD. Also, keep in mind that beating the +20 to Hide on your Spot doesn't actually let you see what's there. You think something's there... but no, you don't see anything.
Domination: Remember, this doesn't allow self-destructive orders, so having the kids from five day cares charge the line is NOT going to happen. Having them play in the road where any ground assault will have to bring their tanks, however...
Scent vs. Invisibility: Yes, the guard dog would know there was someone within 30 feet. Yes, he could pinpoint them if they passed within 5 feet. This argues for speed on the part of the invisible person; he has to get through between guard dogs. (Remember, security releases the dog as soon as he triggers on a scent, so that German Shepherd with the 1d6+1 bite and the Trip at +1 (it's part of the training) is going to be coming for you at his full 50 ft./round. Watch the next-to-last episode of "Who Wants to be a Superhero" for an idea of what they can do to a full-grown police officer in the complete "bite suit". It's not every day you see a man standing up with a guard dog hanging from each arm...)
My thoughts on magic vs. tech:
On the one hand, magic is going to have an edge in blocking senses and information. Obscuring Mist is only 1st-level, but it blocks everything visual, including Darkvision, once you get beyond five feet. Charm Person is useless on the battlefield, but perfect for infiltration. Moving up to 2nd, Protection from Arrows will stop at least 40 points of damage from any ranged weapon; Resist Energy can at least slow down the impact of incendiaries; Knock is the burglar's friend; and Whispering Wind can work up to four miles at the earliest level without any chance of interception.
At 3rd level, things get nasty. Explosive Runes can turn any sign into a trap (with no saving throw); Sepia Snake Sigil is useful for secure documents; Sleet Storm blocks all vision through its area; Illusory Script is the perfect "cipher", as is Secret Page.
Bards' spells are likewise useful in their own way. With Charm Person and Disguise Self, even a 2nd-level bard can charm his way into a home or installation; this becomes more apparent once you hit Alter Self (Bard 2), Animal Trance (so much for the guard dogs), and the 3rd-level Bard spell, Glibness. (At +30, any reasonable use of Bluff is going to sail straight through. "Yes, I'm here to clean the General's office." "Right this way."
(Clerics are considerably less useful against modern devices; while undead can be handy guards, they're not bright enough for squad tactics, and any given cleric is limited to 4*level HD of undead at a time. That said, healing and resurrection magic are two things any military unit would love to have.)
Technology's main advantage is reliability; defenses which stop spells won't do a thing to bullets and grenades. Better, technology can inflict more damage, at a faster rate and greater range, than magic can.
So, the two sides are on even footing. In trench or open-field warfare, technology will win the day every time, simply because it can achieve overkill faster and further away. In guerilla warfare, magic has the advantage because it's hard to detect and can take out most sensors. (Invisibility would fool laser tripwires, for example, because it can fool Darkvision, which requires no light at all.) Also, magic allows you to assault the mind much more effectively than modern psychological warfare techniques. (Nightmare, at 5th level, not only leaves the victim fatigued, but deals real damage; using this, the opposing forces could readily whittle down any of the administration that went on television, and no technology could stop them. Magic Jar can turn any prisoner into a spy. At Level 6, Veil can disguise a squad as a bunch of lemmings, a pack of dogs, or even a stand of trees; at Level 8, Screen can hide their entire headquarters, even if you're standing right next to it.)
Oh, and don't forget: Anyone that has a ring of invisibility and Silent Spell can stand there and summon monsters all day long and never get spotted. Summoning isn't an attack (per the rules), so it doesn't break the effect. Silent Spell raises the preparation level by 1 (unless you're a sorcerer, of course), but even a celestial dog (or fiendish wolf) will wreak havoc on a bivouac. Add in Obscuring Mist, Silent Image and Ventriloquism, and that poor squad is going to be spooked in nothing flat. (Unless they have guard dogs, of course. Sometimes, not having Invisibility to Animals really bites... pun (Ouch!) intended.)
Even within the D&D system, high level magic become very difficult for non-casters to match without very carefully selected tricks, including the use/abuse of magic items. This problem would likely be compounded in a purely mundane D20 modern world.
Has anyone put any thought into how much magic to allow the invading force, assuming you wanted the mundanes to have a fair chance?
Otherwise, a couple high level casters could easily assassinate all the leaders in the world (over time), and could probably mop the floor with most of the armed forces (again, slowly) through a combination of AoE damage, battlefield control, and carefully worded Contingencies.
edit: And I think we can agree to leave out Epic level casting, or the mundanes are utterly toast.
Beyond that, you reach the Valuable Asset range of levels, at which most wizards will want to settle down and start raising apprentices. At the VA levels, no sane military is going to want their wizard serving the front lines; they'll want him behind the lines, providing magic items and spell services. It'd be like sending Albert Einstein to the Russian Front, rather than keeping him safe in a lab.
Beyond that, you reach the Valuable Asset range of levels, at which most wizards will want to settle down and start raising apprentices. At the VA levels, no sane military is going to want their wizard serving the front lines; they'll want him behind the lines, providing magic items and spell services. It'd be like sending Albert Einstein to the Russian Front, rather than keeping him safe in a lab.
Except that, instead of taking weeks or months to build one atom bomb, Einstein can throw one to five of them around every day. Sure, the range is well within sniper territory, but why take the time and lifeforce to make a one-time use magi-nuke, when you can get half a dozen of them a day?
Just throw a couple of contingent revenance, contingent revivify, and contingent heal via craft contingent spell, and have them go off in the following sequence:
1) Once dead, activate revenance 30 seconds (5 rounds) after death.
2) Once revenance has gone off, wait until dead, then activate revivify.
3) Once revivify has gone off, activate heal.
4) Once heal has gone off, goto 1.
Just have a few layers of revenance and revivify, and you've got a damn near immortal Einstein. Sure, it hurts like hell, but he's not dead anymore.
It's a nice little combo, and an excellent addition to any D&D NPC of high enough level (I'd say the 15+ range, since contingent revivify is a 10th level item, contingent revenance is even lower, and contingent heal is like a 12th or 13th).
Beyond that, you reach the Valuable Asset range of levels, at which most wizards will want to settle down and start raising apprentices. At the VA levels, no sane military is going to want their wizard serving the front lines; they'll want him behind the lines, providing magic items and spell services.
Well, then again they could hire adventurers and not risk state wizards for that.
Even if you do not deploy wizards on the lines, I think there's items that let them scrye and cast onto people through scrying. That alone would kills all sorts of higher echelons and severely cripple strategic level operations.
Except that, instead of taking weeks or months to build one atom bomb, Einstein can throw one to five of them around every day. Sure, the range is well within sniper territory, but why take the time and lifeforce to make a one-time use magi-nuke, when you can get half a dozen of them a day?
Er, what nuke? Fireball does a max of 10d6 by 3.5e rules, out to 400ft. + 40/level, with a Reflex for half. Not nearly nuke territory. Lightning Bolt does no better, with a max range of 120 ft. Earthquake is better, with Fireball's range and an insta-kill for anyone who falls into a fissure, but it's also higher level (Level 8, not available until 15th level) and with a limited spread (80 ft. around the target point). By that level, Incendiary Cloud is a better bet against an army, but it deals 4d6/round out to 100 ft. + 10 ft./level, for only 1 round/level. Disintegrate? Only one target per casting.
Sorry, no nukes is good nukes in this case.
Just throw a couple of contingent revenance, contingent revivify, and contingent heal via craft contingent spell, and have them go off in the following sequence:
1) Once dead, activate revenance 30 seconds (5 rounds) after death.
2) Once revenance has gone off, wait until dead, then activate revivify.
3) Once revivify has gone off, activate heal.
4) Once heal has gone off, goto 1.
Just have a few layers of revenance and revivify, and you've got a damn near immortal Einstein. Sure, it hurts like hell, but he's not dead anymore.
It's a nice little combo, and an excellent addition to any D&D NPC of high enough level (I'd say the 15+ range, since contingent revivify is a 10th level item, contingent revenance is even lower, and contingent heal is like a 12th or 13th).
There's a problem, though: Contingent spells are triggered by events. Therefore, if both Revenance and Revivify are death-triggered, they'll both go off at the same time. Also, because they're tied to events, you couldn't tie a contingent spell to the end of the Revivify, because that's making a spell contingent upon another spell, rather than an event.
Finally, consider the costs and time involved:
Craft Contingent Spell (Complete Arcane), like other magical craftings, is based on the base price (caster level*spell level*100). It takes 1 day/1,000 gp of the base price, and 1/25 of the base price in XP.
Revivify (Miniatures Handbook): 5th-level spell, diamonds worth 1,000 gp (per casting, please note, and making it contingent doesn't change that), takes 5.5 days and costs 220 XP.
Revenance (Spell Compendium): 4th-level spell, takes 4.4 days and 176 XP.
Heal (Player's Handbook): 6th-level spell, takes 6.6 days and 264 XP.
That's 16.5 days and 660 XP, plus 1,000 gp in diamonds, to set up this trio of spells once. Even if we round normally, that's still 16 days to create the contingent spells and bind them to the wizard, and a sacrifice of enough XP to create 16,500 gp of magic items for the army to use. That's seven +1 weapons, or two +2 weapons, or 330 potions of Cure Light Wounds, or 55 potions of Invisibility.
Sorry, it's safer and cheaper to keep Einstein out of combat.
Yours truly,
The rule-checking,
Brownwolf
Well, then again they could hire adventurers and not risk state wizards for that.
Isn't that what expendable assets are there for? ;)
Even if you do not deploy wizards on the lines, I think there's items that let them scrye and cast onto people through scrying. That alone would kills all sorts of higher echelons and severely cripple strategic level operations.
Exactly, as far as the scrying goes. Scrying and Greater Scrying, however, do not allow spellcasting of any offensives through the link. Only detection spells such as Detect Evil and translation spells like Tongues. The one exception is the Crystal Ball with Telepathy, which allows you to attempt a suggestion 1/day.
So, no killing, but plenty of spying.
the biggie has to do the air-to-air missles:
No mater the type, they all do not "hit" the target. they get real close then explode a fragmentation warhead.
Heat seakers would not track a living being (not even a dragon has that high a skin temp.)
As to air to air combat: any fantacy creature would be in deep do-do against the A-10 Warthog (AKA The Thunderbolt II). The 30mm rotary cannon would easily chew up a huge ancent dragon.
Magic uses would have a hard time with anyone with a good sniping skill.
Clamore landmines would also be a hazard to the DnD relm.
At first the DnD relm would kick ass. but after modern gets its act together, DnD is history.
D&D kicks tail and takes names in guerilla combat, though. Remember, magical disguises range from illusions like Change Self all the way up to the Polymorph spells. Bards would arguably (unless you ask them, of course) be the greatest asset for the D&D army, as they could gather information, Charm most people they met, and be well-hidden rogues the rest of the time. And, until they get wise (which, if the bards are lucky, will take some time), the Modern army won't see any real point to harassing folk singers...
Sure magic isn't the be all and all in a fight but it is something that is a lot harder to counter/duplicate than modern firearms, especially when you can dominate/raise/bribe people who already know how to use them to help you. You can work for us and your family will be protected but any betrayal no matter who slight and you'll watch as their dominated bodies tear each other to pieces before we rip the knowledge out of your mind.
Which completely ignores the fact that an invasion usually takes place at the invaders discretion and a smart opponent will scout out the land first.
Anyway I'm about to go to bed but one thing I want to add is that there's something on the wizards site about DnD creatures coming through to D20 modern and how they originally retain their own abilities. I can't get into the site at the moment
so I can't check out exactly what it said. What I remember however is that they don't aclimitize for several months if not years. In other words they don't need to worry about massive damage threshold until sometime into the invasion itself. Imagine the soldiers reaction when they blow chunks out of some weird monster rampaging in Time's Square (or other cultural landmark) only to have it charge over and suck the life out of their squadmates healing all that damage. Or worse . . . seeing someone you KNOW is human walking into your gunfire like its nothing before picking up a dropped gun and turning it on you?And of course there's the fact that huamns aren't reasonable and even with a equal-opportunity invasion force you will have some who cut deals with the invaders for protection/survival/greed/pick your incentive.
EDIT
And of course when I post I can't get in I can, anyway here's the section I was talking about sblocked for your convenience . . .
Show
If you're talking about a one-shot adventure (that is, your D&D group is transported into the modern world, has one adventure, and then goes home), you really don't need to convert them at all. Your magic-using characters will be somewhat more powerful than their modern-day equivalents, but that inequity should be balanced out by the fact that the combat-loving characters won't have the proficiency feats needed to operate powerful modern-day weapons.
The rule of thumb for long-term (or permanent) migration from D&D into d20 Modern is that you should convert any character who goes up in level while in the modern world to the d20 Modern classes. Some guidelines for managing such conversions are slated to appear in the Urban Arcana book, but generally they boil down to taking the classes, skills, feats, and so forth that most closely match your character's existing abilities.
A character who doesn't go up in level should be converted after spending a year and a day of game time in the modern world. (This rule is mostly for NPCs who might somehow be sucked into the modern world but not do a lot of adventuring once they get there.)
The rationale behind this delayed conversion concept is that, in passing through the veil of Shadow, a character slowly loses her connection to her original realm and develops a connection to the modern world instead. In theory, she will begin to forget about her old life as she fully integrates into her new reality.
The rule of thumb for long-term (or permanent) migration from D&D into d20 Modern is that you should convert any character who goes up in level while in the modern world to the d20 Modern classes. Some guidelines for managing such conversions are slated to appear in the Urban Arcana book, but generally they boil down to taking the classes, skills, feats, and so forth that most closely match your character's existing abilities.
A character who doesn't go up in level should be converted after spending a year and a day of game time in the modern world. (This rule is mostly for NPCs who might somehow be sucked into the modern world but not do a lot of adventuring once they get there.)
The rationale behind this delayed conversion concept is that, in passing through the veil of Shadow, a character slowly loses her connection to her original realm and develops a connection to the modern world instead. In theory, she will begin to forget about her old life as she fully integrates into her new reality.
I was having a heck of a time trying to find it without more text to go on. If anyone else wants the note, it's located here, in the Bullet Points archive, April 3, 2003.I have to point out, though, that the article isn't discussing magical invasions. It's all about converting your characters when they move from D&D-world to D20 Modern-world. Personally, I'd stick with MAS; I note, however, that 3.5e has massive damage rules anyway, set at 50 points of damage and up. That dragon's still got a good chance at going into shock.
50+ is very different to more than your con in damage saves as well. Of course I'm not saying they'll have it all their own way but it will be a lot easier for them to adapt to modern weapons than vice versa.
Invisibility ENDS WHEN YOU ATTACK!
forgot that?
Dragons may be epic, but they are also lazy, greedy and vain. It is very hard to get them to cooperate, especially on suicide missions.
The harpers will come, nice nuke, start the timer, shift it to the erthreal plane. The ghosts go away. If you are nice...
Think Cloverfield, send through a giant monster, soften up the resistance, then, when you know it's clear, send in your troops for cleanup, a quick and easy foothold!
Sorry, just crossed my mind, figured I might throw in my 2 cents!
Interesting thought a couple of Tarasques would definatley do a lot of damage before being taken down, especially as I think in one edition you needed a wish to ensure they stayed dead which would mean they could never be permanently killed . . . hmmmmmm godzilla was really a tarasque variant sent through to soften up the earth and that's why he never seems to die permanently:D
Tarrasque only regenerates 40 damage/round. You might be able to get a decent source of non-fire energy damage and keep it dormant until it has [arbitrarily large] amount of nonlethal damage; after which it can be jettisoned into space.
After scanning most of this thread I noteiced a few goof ups.
the biggie has to do the air-to-air missles:
No mater the type, they all do not "hit" the target. they get real close then explode a fragmentation warhead.
Heat seakers would not track a living being (not even a dragon has that high a skin temp.)
As to air to air combat: any fantacy creature would be in deep do-do against the A-10 Warthog (AKA The Thunderbolt II). The 30mm rotary cannon would easily chew up a huge ancent dragon.
Magic uses would have a hard time with anyone with a good sniping skill.
Clamore landmines would also be a hazard to the DnD relm.
At first the DnD relm would kick ass. but after modern gets its act together, DnD is history.
I love this thread its like someone read my mind
I'll tell you what happened in my campaign
the goddess spent thousands of years just waiting to invade the "jewel"
she sent spies to gather intel and when she learned of technology's threat
she created a plague that literally ate technology.
sniper rifles,nukes tech in general just disintergrating before you
destroying the work of many. Just damaged beyond repair in an instant
wasn't a good day for the modern world.
Remember, even a Barret Light 50 only does 2d12 damage.
What is often forgotten, unless I am misremembering an older edition, in modern, if the damage rolled is greater than your constitution, you are toast. If a 50BMG does 2d12, then an air to air missle would do 20d12 or some other ungodly amount. Same with flying citadels, it isn't going to be any harder to level than any other city, and in fact, if it is just a flying castle, that is pretty small, much smaller than say, Denver, or Dresden.
going to be fielding c4 suicide goblins/zombies/skeletons, machine gun wielding orcs, tank driving gnomes etc
Explosives, yes, but who is building these machineguns for the orcs, and especially who is building these tanks?
http://forgottenrealms.wikia.com/wiki/Tarrasque
Now, 50 feet tall, that is just a hair over 15 meters. Well, King Kong is right at 12.5 meters Swing over to this infinitely fun website, click on the 1x tab and go all the way to the very bottom and grab King Kong and drag him over to the Yamato http://www.merzo.net/ or slide the 747 down, it is just a bit higher on the page. Now imagine that 747 flying into the tarasque, or the yamato open up fire on him....from miles away. Heck take some of those cranes that work on skyscrapers loop some thick cable around him and hoist him in the air