Okay, so I've got a new campaign world going on, with the campaign being based largely around the huge war going on here. But I, not being incredibly high in brainpower, don't really know how many people should be in each army (of which there are about twenty). One main problem is: several of the armies are primarily the undead. How do I know just how many are in their army? It would really help to know these statistics just because then my players would have a somewhat more basic measure of the power and sway of an individual army.
So here are the armies I have:
Angels-large army of celestials trapped on Prime Material Plane, trying to aid Helm's Watchers (see below)
Elves-the remaining elves, who were the first to be targetted by the Cabal (see below). Many were killed.
Dwarves
Aventi-from Stormwrack, the United Resistances underwater allies
Helms Watchers-the god Helm, trying to purge the Prime Material Plane entirely
Devils
The Cabal of Reform-the undead forces, striving to take control of the plane for the sake of......well that's a little complicated. Let's just say it's for the sake of being evil.
Metallic Dragons
Gith
Chromatic Dragons
The Fang-splinter army of the Cabal, headed by vampires
The United Resistance-the remaining mortals, fighting to recover the world from the undead
Beasts-goblinoids, savages in the wilds
Drow
Demons
Jerren-from book of vile darkness
Vashar-from book of vile darkness
The Skulls-think goblinoid pirates
Alright that's the basics of my armies. If you want more information about the setting to help you come up with some sort of numbers, feel free to ask. Any comments on these armies or any different cool armies are welcome. But mostly, I need any ideas on how big these armies should be.
nam out
P.S.: Any armies I didn't elaborate on are just what it says (i.e. Dwarves, Drow). Thanks.
Are you planning on running a battle involving these armies or are they just there as background color?
I'd say probably a couple of hundred troops per army, forming a brigade. In my D&D campaigns, armies are made up of professional fighters, not thousands of conscripted farmers (magic and monsters makes them worse than useless) and average about 1% of the population of a nation. City guards and local constables make up another 1% (they stay home and guard the homefront while the army is out fighting).
If you are planning encounters with various armies, I suggest drawing up statblocks for about 4-5 typical members of that army and then varying them slightly in between encounters (different magic, 1-2 more levels of some class, etc) to keep your players on their toes.
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A typical human feudal civilization could field 1 knight on horse for every 200-250 humans pooling resources. Interpolate from your kingdom's population. Double this; this is an emergency levy of retired veterans. Triple the original army count; that is an available peasant levy.
The orcs/ goblins/ zombies need to outnumber them between 4 and 10 to one to mount a decisive invasion.
The heavier hitters (devils, demons, dragons, angels) should only number about 1/200th or less of either army's total, or they will overwhelm the battlefield, making the human or goblin armies a moot point.
Say you have a human population of 500,000.
There's a 2,000 man standing army, 2,000 emergency militia, 6,000 available peasant levy.
Needs 40,000 orcs and goblins to attack. Or 20,000 zombies; they're twice as tough.
Angels/ vs. demons/dragons, say 50 of each on each side, any more than that and they would easily wipe out the opposing army common levies.
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Also here's something I've noticed about battles: all things being equal, victory usually is a direct result of 1 of 2 things:
1)distinct scientific advantage--longbows vs. platemail.
2)massive strategic mistake--Custer left his gatling guns back at camp when he went to the Little Big Horn because "he didn't think he'd need them."
Sometimes it all comes down to brilliant leadership, but Alexander the Greats, Rommels, and Napoleons are truly few and far between.
And always remember, at certain key moments in certain battles, the actions of one man for better or for worse have changed the entire direction of world history. This goes for the lowliest of privates, as for the most infamous of generals.
Don't forget terrain and line of supply. Those factors have caused more battles to sway the other way than I can count.
Armies are expensive to maintain, both it terms of equipment and food. Undead armies don't have to deal with this as much since they don't have to feed most of their troops and a lot of undead have natural weapons. Also, I have to imagine that most undead summoning spells cost less money than it takes to train a standard trooper. This should allow the undead to field and maintain larger armies. However, as a dissadvantage, you had better keep whoever is controlling the undead very safe or else you have a large uncontrolled mob on your hands.
I heartily second what Lillith said. I would suggest and stress that you doublecheck two particular historical texts before running a seriously major military campaign. Sun Tzu's "the Art of War" (James Clavell's translation if you can find it is one of the more readable..i've collected almost every english translation of this book), and Miyamoto Musashi's "the Book of Five Rings" (not as readily translatable to gaming combat terms). The text of these books read almost as truisms, but they help you remember and focus on a lot of elements that are easy to forget...and help you use them (Sun Tzu is particularly good for this as he actually quotes some ratios in parts of his text), and in most translations of the Art of War, historical examples, notably from Chinese military history, are given and they can be a wonderful inspiration for setting up battle scenes.
I also suggest the D and D suppliment Heroes of Battle. It has a wonderful structure for laying out battle flow, and how to integrate PC party actions as part of a battle without having the PCs just running one side of a miniatures battle (like the Miniature's handbook, good as it is for what it is, tends to be).
However, as a dissadvantage, you had better keep whoever is controlling the undead very safe or else you have a large uncontrolled mob on your hands.
Better be paying said necromancer well and keeping necromancer happy. It would really really suck to be the guy that didn't and have said armies of undead turn on you in your own encampment.
When people talk about ancient war, they always think England and France and forget about the Greek and Roman armies. WHen Alexander the Great fought the final battle with King Darius of Persia there were over a a hundred thousand soldiers on the battlefield (40,000 Greek, and 60,000 persian). It really depends on social structure, as to how many soldiers a society can produce. In england soldiers were conscriped. In Rome, all men did a tour in the army. It gave them a huge pool of warriors that allowed them to take over most of the known world of their time.
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When people talk about ancient war, they always think England and France and forget about the Greek and Roman armies. WHen Alexander the Great fought the final battle with King Darius of Persia there were over a a hundred thousand soldiers on the battlefield (40,000 Greek, and 60,000 persian). It really depends on social structure, as to how many soldiers a society can produce. In england soldiers were conscriped. In Rome, all men did a tour in the army. It gave them a huge pool of warriors that allowed them to take over most of the known world of their time.
The Persian armies were the result of a huge empire, not necessarily because they could generate more warriors per head. Alexander's army was also an imperial Greek army, plus lots of mecenaries. So their size was probably more of a factor of the population pool size they were drawn from. Also, the army sizes reported are probably a bit over-reported in the sources for dramatic effect.
British soldiers were more volunteers than conscripted - a large portion of the population practiced with the longbow, for example, which gave us an edge in archery. The knights were, of course, the landed aristocracy obligated to their lords under the feudal system. The foot soldiers were not "professionals" as, at that time, no one maintained a standing professional army of any size. But I'm pretty sure they didn't drag anyone there kicking and screaming during the medieval wars. Most of them took place overseas (mostly in France) and the fellas who showed up for that wanted to be there for the loot.
I'm also pretty sure that in the Roman army was professional. People didn't "do a stint" but actually signed up for a tour of 25 years, getting a pension and land at the end of it. It was a bit different for the officer class, as they were aristos generally doing it as part of their process for political advancement. It may have changed in the later Roman Empire, but certainly in the classic period we tend to think about (1st Century AD or so) it wasn't the case that the male population did National Service.
Also here's something I've noticed about battles: all things being equal, victory usually is a direct result of 1 of 2 things:
1)distinct scientific advantage--longbows vs. platemail.
2)massive strategic mistake--Custer left his gatling guns back at camp when he went to the Little Big Horn because "he didn't think he'd need them."
Sometimes it all comes down to brilliant leadership, but Alexander the Greats, Rommels, and Napoleons are truly few and far between.
And always remember, at certain key moments in certain battles, the actions of one man for better or for worse have changed the entire direction of world history. This goes for the lowliest of privates, as for the most infamous of generals.
I'd be careful with this generalization. We read about battles that changed the world not ones that changed little.
Probably most battles where basically stalemates. Even in a conflict like World War Two most combat was not descive its just that when one is dealing with Total War even a bloody stalemate is, ultimatly, more advantagous to one side then the other.
I'm also pretty sure that in the Roman army was professional. People didn't "do a stint" but actually signed up for a tour of 25 years, getting a pension and land at the end of it. It was a bit different for the officer class, as they were aristos generally doing it as part of their process for political advancement. It may have changed in the later Roman Empire, but certainly in the classic period we tend to think...
Roman armies changed over the course of the Empire from a levy of all male citizens to a professional force to a mainly mercenary force.
in any given war, most of the battles are not so much non-events or stalemates, but developments in the ongoing back and forth ebb of the war itself as one side gains ground/resouces/effectiveness and the other side loses. Certain battles in any war are pivotal, and the question on the impact of the war itself are only to be determined by the flow of events following. The American Civil War generally is one that many can only name between two and six battles. How many battles can be cited from the Korean War, the Vietnam Conflict? World War I, or World War II. The Hundred Years War, one hundred and sixteen years of conflict, few can name more from it other than the Battle of Agincourt.
The actions of an individual can influence a battle. A battle can influence a war. And a war can influence history. But none of it can be predicted or controlled in advance. Or even predicted completely at the time, completely. I do think that the system of integrating role playing scenarios into batttles outlined in the Heroes of Battle suppliment is one of the best to try to address this idea that i've seen in a role playing game situation.
just my opinion
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I do think that the system of integrating role playing scenarios into batttles outlined in the Heroes of Battle suppliment is one of the best to try to address this idea that i've seen in a role playing game situation.
I definately second that. Not only does it make a war manageable to carry out in the context of a D&D game, but it also provides excellent advise on how the characters can influence the outcome of a particular battle. Heroes of Battle is one of the best supplements to come out in ages.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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There was a great book I read in college (for a class called "War, Weapons, and Arms Control") titled How to Make War. It is focused on modern warfare, but if I recall, there is a lot of detail of what pre-modern warfare was like. It had useful statistics like the number of casualties per dead in a battle (I believe it's twice as many casualties as dead) and a large hunk of information about supply lines and their importance.
As has been mentioned, supply lines are a frequently overlooked element of warfare. A major reason both Napoleon and Hitler failed to conqure Ruissa was because they lost control of their supply lines and could not feed or arm their troops.
Some real general stuff - wildly rounded off and based on experiences more than a decade a ago but that I still use in spinning up worlds:
Typical Infantry Line Units:
Fire Team Consists of 5 men, 4 basic soldiers + 1 team leader
A squad consists of 2 Fire Teams + 1 squad leader + 1 medic (if you're lucky)
A platoon consists of 4 squads + 1 platoon leader (lowest officer) + 1 platoon sergeant (experienced NCO) (one of the squads might have some heavier weapons)
A company consists of 4 platoons + 1 company commander (Captain) + 1 executive officer (senior lieutenant) + 1 platoon sergeant
A battalion consists of 4 line companies + 1 head quarters company + 1 battalion commander +1 executive officer + 1 communications officer, +1 logistics officer, +1 intelligence officer, +1 strategy officer, +1 NBC officer (nuclear, biological, chemical), +1 admin officer, +1 battalion sergeant major.
Units larger than battalion were typically pieced together from those building blocks depending on the mission.
Of course there are endless varieties of specialist units, snipers, special forces, cavalry scout (my old job - though I was in a tank rather than on a horse), artillery, air defense, etc.
In general though every thing scales - 4 of something have one leader.
The other thing I remember is that for every man in the field there are 7-10 people in support. Delivering food bullets, running medical facilities, training, admin, intelligence, motorpool, armory, etc., etc.
A similar split works for me in my game worlds and keeps the actual warriors "elite" and elite units highly prestigious, creating the rationale for orders and PrCs.