I just find it odd that an entire army is 3rd level or below (and treated like first), despite the fact it's rather clear they aren't.
- Foot Soldier - Warrior 1 - 1/3
- Acolyte - Cleric 1 - 1/2
- Caravan Guard - Fighter 2 - 1
- Doomsayer - Adept 3 - 1
- Guard - Warrior 3 - 1
- Guard Officer - Fighter 4 - 3
- Battle Monk - Monk 5 - 4
- Hedge Wizard - Commoner 2/Wizard 3 - 4
- Medium - Cleric 5 - 4
- Battle Mage - Evoker 6 - 5
- Cavalry - Fighter 6 - 5
- Torturer - Expert 5/Fighter 2 - 5
- Holy Warrior - Paladin 7 - 6
- Watch Captain - Fighter 7 - 6
- Knight - Aristocrat 2/Paladin 6 - 7
- Sellsword - Fighter 8 - 7
- Priest - Cleric 9 - 8
- General - Fighter 11 - 10
Plus, I don't understand how a ranger can stealth through a camp full of 10,000 people when you can't stealth while being observed. That's even under the new stealth rules, if there's more than one person that can observe you, you can't go back into stealth. As soon as someone raises the alarm, every man in camp is going to be up and looking around, yet somehow the Ranger breaks the rules and can stealth while being observed. I don't think he has Hide In Plain Sight, but even if he does, as soon as you break stealth to kill someone, 40 or 50 people attack you.
And plus, there's never any knights or battle mages, or priests in the army. No guard captains, no hedge wizards, no holy warriors, no watch captains, no mercenary sellswords. Not even a freaking general.
Just footsoldiers, acolytes, and guards. It's like someone has lobotomized every king that fields an army.
1. You cannot go into stealth while you are being observed. You can very well stealth if you have cover or concealement into an area someone is observing. Just get your own personal bush (unroot it) and hide in it while moving. You have concealment all the time so no problem.
Or you get a minor cloak of displacement. It gives you conceleament and you can sneak all day... yay2. So you lost your 10.000 man army argument and to save it you change the rules under which we play and add high level components to it.
Of course if people add a 10th level party to the army I guess a 10th level character or party won't have a easy time. Pretty self explanatory, huh?
3. You seem to argue from an Golarion perspective. And in Golarion high level people are like REALLY REALLY RARE. The greatest wizards are like 15-18th level it seems.
In Faerun I would agree with you that at least one 10th level character in the army would be reasonable. As well as several CR 6+ monsters.
But in Golarion a 10th level character is epic hero style.
Thank you Alienfreak. I think you summed up the problems with mdt's arguments pretty handily. My entire argument has been based on PC vs army of normal people, which are 1-3rd level, and typically NPC classed. I mentioned - clearly and repeatedly - that if the army is full of similarly leveled NPCs then that changes everything.
The argument was very clearly geared towards an army of normals in a fantasy setting, where the PCs have reached superhero powers, and can quite literally be Superman vs the Nazis back in the day of 10 cent comics. And to think that mdt accused me of moving goalposts.
Likewise, the NPC statistics that mdt presents are from the Gamemastery Guide, and are neither core, nor are they reasonable. I have on several occasions pointed out how stupid they are. A barmaid is more dangerous than an orc warrior born and bread to kill people. A shopkeeper is a 5th level character. Your average prostitute is a 2nd level character who also has levels in a PC class and sneak attack. Literally, if you use the sample NPCs, then the average prostitute is stronger than your party's 1st level rogue, and your PCs could easily be bullied to death by walking down the red light district and commenting that their perfume smells like "Essence de Skank".
So anything that draws on the god-awful sample NPCs, will be promptly ignored because they shatter verisimilitude like an out of control car crashing into stain glass window. I said they could take on an army of normal people using tactics appropriate for fantasy (potions, wands, undead, flying creatures carpet bombing alchemist fires, using oils of magic weapon to pierce DR and ProtFromArrows, and melting golems with acid bombs).
I think I'm done here.
EDIT: Everyone should read The Alexandrian - Calibrating your Expectations. It sums up the way the 3E system works at giving us a false reality, and it matches exactly how the designers set up the world assumptions in 3.x. The game was most definitely not built with the assumption that prostitutes are 2nd level rogues.
A very relevant portion would be this...
People love to stat up their favorite heroes from fantasy literature as 20th level juggernauts. Fafhrd? 20th level. Elric? 20th level. Conan? 20th level. Aragorn? 20th level Luke Skywalker? 20th level.
I mean, they must be 20th level, right? They’re the biggest, bestest heroes ever! They’re the greatest warriors in a generation! Some of them are reputedly the greatest swordsmen who ever lived in any universe EVAH!
But when you stop and analyze what these characters are actually described as achieving, it’s rare to find anything which actually requires a 20th level build.
Take Aragorn, for example. He’s clearly described as one of the best warriors in Middle Earth. But what do we actually see him do? Let’s take THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RINGS as an example:
He leads the hobbits through the wilderness with great skill. (The highest Survival DC in the core rules is DC 15. A 1st level character can master the skill for non-tracking purposes. Aragorn, as a master tracker, would need to be 5th level, have at least one level of ranger, and have spent one of his feats on Skill Focus (Survival) to achieve all of this.)
He drives off the ringwraiths at Weathertop. (It’s difficult to conclude anything from this because it’s one of the more problematic passages in the book when subjected to analysis. If the ringwraiths are truly impervious to harm from any mortal man, why are they scared off by a guy waving two “flaming brands of wood”? Are they vulnerable to fire in a way that they’re not vulnerable to mortal weapons? The point is, the true strength of the ringwraiths is obscure, so it’s impossible to know how tough Aragorn would need to be in order to accomplish this.)
Aragorn treats Frodo’s wound, unsuccessfully. (The highest Heal DC is 15. As with Survival, Aragorn could have mastered this skill at 1st level.
In Moria (fighting orcs): “Legolas shot two through the throat. Gimli hewed the legs from under another that had sprung up on Balin's tomb. Boromir and Aragorn slew many. When thirteen had fallen the rest fled shrieking, leaving the defenders unharmed, except for Sam who had a scratch along the scalp. A quick duck had saved him; and he had felled his orc: a sturdy thrust with his Barrow-blade. A fire was smouldering in his brown eyes that would have made Ted Sandyman step backwards, if he had seen it. (Aragorn slays no more than six or seven CR 1/2 orcs in this encounter. A trivial accomplishment for a 5th level character.)
Even if you follow Aragorn all the way through The Two Towers and The Return of the King, you’ll find that this is fairly representative of what he accomplishes. The only other notable ping on the radar is his ability to use athelas, and even if we don’t assume that’s merely an example of him knowing athelas’ properties (with a Knowledge (nature) check), it’s still just one ability.
So what can we conclude form this? Aragorn is about 5th level.
And since Aragorn is one of the most remarkable individuals in all of Middle Earth, this would imply that Middle Earth is a place largely like our own world: People who achieve 5th level are uniquely gifted and come along but once in a generation.
Does that seem like a proper description of Middle Earth? It does. Tolkien was crafting a false mythology – a forgotten epoch of our own world. Thus the people in it are much like the people we know, although they live in a world of heroes and magic.
Now I'm done. :P
Said in another topic, about the original post/topic; making the class skills lists more flexible (kinda like the Expert) might help, players may not be interested in putting their skill points (especialy if they have very few) in non-class skill.
Also, as a DM/GM, you should "talk" to them about their characters, the PCs' background, the campaign's background/backstory/etc, if you don't tell them important informations they should know, they won't be able to make PCs that fit well.
No I didn't lose the argument. There is no win or lose that argument, as anything I come up with you will come up with a counter, which I will counter, which you will counter. Basically, it's a round robin. I'll continue it if you wish... See bottom of post...
My point is, the entire premise of a 10,000 man army who's all level 1 to 3 is debunked by the rules (which is what I posted previously). As to them not being Core rules... I can only sit here in a complete shock at that statement. I've reread the books inner cover 2 or 3 times, and it sure as heck seems to be a Paizo book, in the Pathfinder RPG line. It's not put out by Purple Duck Games or anything, which says to me, it's core rules. Unless you're definition of 'core' is the original 576 page manual only. However, if this is the case, then nobody can ever say what is core or what is not, since there are no guidelines in this book.
If you look back, you will see several times I have said the concept of an army of 10,000 where the highest level guy in it is 3 is absurd on it's face. Even within those limits however, your attempt with the ranger still doesn't work.
You are correct, a displacement cloak will allow you to make a stealth check if you are able to distract everyone looking at you when you make it.
If people are observing you using any of their senses (but typically sight), you can't use Stealth. Against most creatures, finding cover or concealment allows you to use Stealth. If your observers are momentarily distracted (such as by a Bluff check), you can attempt to use Stealth. While the others turn their attention from you, you can attempt a Stealth check if you can get to an unobserved place of some kind. This check, however, is made at a –10 penalty because you have to move fast.
Notice that his magic 30 just went down to a 20. Also, you ignored my question about guard dogs, who have scent, and to whom a displacement cloak is useless, as is most of those stealth bonuses.
The issue you run into is that the ranger must break his stealth to attack (as soon as you attack you are no longer stealthed) and must restealth the next round. That means if people are around (and they will all be up and looking after he kills a few and people notice, or when the guard dogs go nuts and bark, which is there job). This means he has to bluff them all and then go back into stealth. Next round. That means they all get to attack him for a round if they're in range, until he can restealth. Even if he has adamantine armor, do the replay of the fighter, flasks, slings, arrows, pike men, swords men, etc. Not only that, but if they can get enough people to charge on him and get next to him, he can't stealth at all, because he's surrounded. He can't move out of the ring of fighters. Since the enemy can (and will) ready actions to charge at him when he attacks someone, then they can charge him before he even get's his 'coup de grace' attempt, as soon as he breaks stealth to attack, the readied actions kick in, which preempt his attack.
Strike that last one, can't ready an action to charge. But you can ready an action to sling a stone or fire an arrow (standard actions).
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Non-Player Characters Can't do anything. They can't even operate in the world they live in. Why would anyone choose to be a commoner? And why do they insist on putting all their stats into stupid things that won't help them survive an Orc raid?
I mean really do they never go out of their houses? What are they going to do? Profession(farmer) the monsters away? What's worse they don't even think to own enough stuff. I mean my PCs hit level 5 and if allowed will be at least double if not triple what their WBL should be. While the stupid NPCs run around with barely a fraction of what each PC owns. What are they doing trading away all their +1 swords and armor for boozes? Don't they know crafting magical weapons and armor is so much better than skill focus(craft(pillows))?
Personally I blame the PCs. If they didn't constantly save the stupid people of the world we would be much better off. As it is they continuously raise unrealistic expectation of what a hero should be and that if you sit tight and bemoan your fate often enough or offer enough coin then someone else will fix your problems for you.
/tongue in cheek.
Readied attacks don't stop a coup de grace last I checked. Not even AoOs do. You have to disarm the attacker to stop his coup de grace.
The sad fact is, damage doesn't disrupt actions outside of spellcasting.
Readying an Action: You can ready a standard action, a move action, a swift action, or a free action. To do so, specify the action you will take and the conditions under which you will take it. Then, anytime before your next action, you may take the readied action in response to that condition. The action occurs just before the action that triggers it. If the triggered action is part of another character's activities, you interrupt the other character. Assuming he is still capable of doing so, he continues his actions once you complete your readied action.
Coup de Grace: As a full-round action, you can use a melee weapon to deliver a coup de grace (pronounced “coo day grahs”) to a helpless opponent. You can also use a bow or crossbow, provided you are adjacent to the target.You automatically hit and score a critical hit. If the defender survives the damage, he must make a Fortitude save (DC 10 + damage dealt) or die. A rogue also gets her extra sneak attack damage against a helpless opponent when delivering a coup de grace.
Delivering a coup de grace provokes attacks of opportunity from threatening opponents.
Nothing in Coup says it disables normal rules. On top of that, the guy can't restealth until the next round, since it takes his full round to do so. If he coup's anyone while they are within 5 feet of someone else, he provokes AoO from everyone who threatens him when he does it.
He still makes the attempt. Nothing about that attack or the AoOs denies the CdG.
Ah, sorry, I was more referring to the effect that say, 300 guys firing sling stones at him would have on his ability to do it, and another couple of hundred firing arrows. That clause about him being capable of attacking after the readied actions are done.
The ranger, unlike the earlier fighter, is not going to be having a 25 AC, not with all the WBL spent on giving him all those stealth bonuses. Which means our 1st to 3rd level mooks are likely going to be hitting him on a 17+. And given the number of soldiers was 10,000, I think saying 200 guys are within 250 feet of him is reasonable. And that 300 (out of 3000) archers are within 500 feet of him is also reasonable.
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When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.
And when example NPCs are handwaved away because someone doesn't like them, again the argument has been lost. These NPCs were created by the very people who wrote the Pathfinder rules (3.5 no longer applies because the base assumptions are different).
The simple fact is that an army of 10k in a fantasy setting will have more than simple folk in the battles. What if the army isn't human? What about an army of mixed races like goblins, orcs, ogres, and hobgoblins? What if they also had other assests like beasts of burden appropriate to them? What about an army of medusa? What about an army that uses flying mounts?
This is a fantasy world. Sticking to our historical model of an army is not appropriate.
When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.
Don't tell him that.
1 out of 5 hits miss. How much blur does that take?
Apparently enough for him to be able to go by the superhero name of 'Smudge Man'.
:)
Have you actually considered how much blurring it would take to create a 20% miss chance? We're talking a vague smudge of color that will be essentially invisible except in clean artificial environments if even basic effort has been made towards camouflage, like wearing brown.When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.
And when example NPCs are handwaved away because someone doesn't like them, again the argument has been lost. These NPCs were created by the very people who wrote the Pathfinder rules (3.5 no longer applies because the base assumptions are different).
The simple fact is that an army of 10k in a fantasy setting will have more than simple folk in the battles. What if the army isn't human? What about an army of mixed races like goblins, orcs, ogres, and hobgoblins? What if they also had other assests like beasts of burden appropriate to them? What about an army of medusa? What about an army that uses flying mounts?
This is a fantasy world. Sticking to our historical model of an army is not appropriate.
I have considered that a miss chance doesn't mean that you are automatically able to hide.
I wear glasses. If I take them off, there are a lot of things that are blurry. I can still see though. A blurry person is still visible. I had to actually fire my M16 with my glasses off and a protective mask on at target up to 300 meters away. I also had to do this with smoke grenades going off. Blurry does not mean you can simply fade from sight. The smoke allowed for it, not my lack of glasses.
And honestly, uprooting a bush to hide behind while you run through an army to slit their throats is a stupid example of how one can stealth while being observed. If you have a moving bush, you have a target for a torch.
When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.Don't tell him that.
He ain't exactly trying to sneak in to slit the throats of 10,000 soldiers either. He'll probably take a few choice shots at important officers before moving his sniping location.
He ain't exactly trying to sneak in to slit the throats of 10,000 soldiers either. He'll probably take a few choice shots at important officers before moving his sniping location.When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.Don't tell him that.
It really doesn't matter if it's 1 or 10k. An uprooted bush or a cloak if displacement isn't going to allow you to stealth while being observed.
To be fair, he could probably sneak in without resorting to silliness. I'm only arguing against the means that he tries to stealth.
if so nobody will win anyway, we all have different point of views about the rules and how to apply them.
Why do people worship the Alexandrian like it's gospel?
Right, now if the lack of glasses didn't produce a 20% miss chance it means that the blur spell blurs the subject more than your lack of glasses does. If you can distinguish anything smaller than a barn at 300 meters your eyesight isn't as bad as the blur spell...Have you actually considered how much blurring it would take to create a 20% miss chance? We're talking a vague smudge of color that will be essentially invisible except in clean artificial environments if even basic effort has been made towards camouflage, like wearing brown.When someone argues that you can use an uprooted bush or cloak of displacement for all day stealth, they have lost the argument. This is a prime example of when "common sense" is meant to be used.
And when example NPCs are handwaved away because someone doesn't like them, again the argument has been lost. These NPCs were created by the very people who wrote the Pathfinder rules (3.5 no longer applies because the base assumptions are different).
The simple fact is that an army of 10k in a fantasy setting will have more than simple folk in the battles. What if the army isn't human? What about an army of mixed races like goblins, orcs, ogres, and hobgoblins? What if they also had other assests like beasts of burden appropriate to them? What about an army of medusa? What about an army that uses flying mounts?
This is a fantasy world. Sticking to our historical model of an army is not appropriate.
I have considered that a miss chance doesn't mean that you are automatically able to hide.
I wear glasses. If I take them off, there are a lot of things that are blurry. I can still see though. A blurry person is still visible. I had to actually fire my M16 with my glasses off and a protective mask on at target up to 300 meters away. I also had to do this with smoke grenades going off. Blurry does not mean you can simply fade from sight. The smoke allowed for it, not my lack of glasses.
I don't know how to calculate a real world miss chance. What I can tell you is that it did affect my accuracy. What it did not affect is my ability to seee that a target was present. That's what is being proposed when someone makes the argument that a cloak of displacement allows you to stealth.
Unless you're definition of 'core' is the original 576 page manual only. However, if this is the case, then nobody can ever say what is core or what is not, since there are no guidelines in this book.
My copy of the Pathfinder core rulebook says core rulebook on the cover. And on the spine, in really BIG LETTERS. Does yours not? See, my core rulebook looks like this: CORE RULEBOOK. Maybe yours and mine are different. But the SRD also has everything in this book I have listed under "CORE RULEBOOK".
So I assumed that it is probably the core Pathfinder game. I mean I could be wrong, but it seems likely.
Notice that his magic 30 just went down to a 20.
Gaining cover or concealment means that you may use Stealth. You can also use Stealth while being observed if you can reach cover or concealment, but you must create a distraction first. However, the rules pretty clearly state that having cover or concealment allows you to Stealth. Likewise, if you had paid attention, I noted that you rolled a 30ish on a 1. You can take 10 with a Stealth check, which means even with a -10, it is impossible for him to fail. Please pay attention.
Also, you ignored my question about guard dogs, who have scent, and to whom a displacement cloak is useless, as is most of those stealth bonuses.
The guard dogs just couldn't find him because of hide from animals which lasted more than an hour. He didn't leave footprints either, since he was passing without trace.
The ranger, unlike the earlier fighter, is not going to be having a 25 AC, not with all the WBL spent on giving him all those stealth bonuses. Which means our 1st to 3rd level mooks are likely going to be hitting him on a 17+. And given the number of soldiers was 10,000, I think saying 200 guys are within 250 feet of him is reasonable. And that 300 (out of 3000) archers are within 500 feet of him is also reasonable.
Again, please pay attention. I noted, clearly, that the ranger's gear is actually below wealth by level. With 62,000 gp worth of gear, I listed less than 30,000 gp worth of gear. In fact, all I listed was a single minor cloak of displacement, an elixer of hiding, and a masterwork tool. Everything else is gravy. He gets his hide from animals and pass without trace as part of his own spells.
So if you're going to make snarky comments, at least do it right, so that I can be entertained while reading them. Likewise, he can stealth as part of a move action. So he can kill someone and then stealth. Rinse, repeat. Casually strolling along through the camp without anyone able to see him, or track him, or even smell him. Butchering dude after dude. He has options as to how he does it too. He could wipe out the guards on duty before they get a chance to call for help. He could sneak into one tent after another and take out all the guys who are asleep, before moving to the next tent while ignoring any open fights.
Etc, etc, etc. It's really not hard for a ranger. He also has wind wall and spike growth sooooo...
Also, in regards to blur, I don't really give a poop. As written, concealment allows Stealth. How you achieve concealment is irrelevant. You can be standing 5ft from somebody in a dimly lit room, and Stealth, because you have concealment (20%). That's just the way it is. Blur makes you difficult to see. Displacement makes you difficult to see. Which is enough for you to make a Stealth check for people to lose track of you.
I'm not here to argue anyone's house rules.
I hadn't caught this in the ensuing wall of text that folowed. I noticed it in tracing back arguments to figure out what was going on :)
Not quite. Mindless creatures were quite clearly Neutral in 1E, 2E, and 3E. You retain less backwards compatibility with the combat maneuver system than you do fixing this alignment problem, and yet the alignment issue isn't fixed and combat maneuvers are the wave of the future. Da Heck?
Skeletons and Zombies were mindless and "neutral" correct. They still were effected by Protection from Evil and Protection from Evil 10' Radius back in the dark ages of 0E as they were "enchanted monsters". Their creators were always described as "chaotic" (read evil in 0E) or just plain evil in later descriptions. When they started tightening up definitions in 3E someone noticed that Skeletons and Zombies would be left out of these spells by definition. Hence, they became "evil" for purposes of balance and continuity. The train of thought isn't hard to follow. Their creators were "evil". The magic used to create them is now described as "evil". Negative energy is yucky :) All other (intelligent) undead linked to negative energy are "evil". They were always blindly hostile and destructive in a system of moral absolutes. Therefore they must be "evil". Skeletons and Zombies as "evil" fixes an issue with minimum fuss. And has some "logic" behind it. The Combat Maneuver system fixes another, more widely argued and noticeable, problem. My 2 cp of course.
I haven't seen Alienfreak dissing any of the developers personally; unless you mean the criticism of their choices for the game path, or the criticism of their reasons for it; which last I checked is entirely acceptable on this forum because the folks at Paizo aren't some power crazy fools out to silence and quench the voice of teh rebel scum. :PBeing able to accept criticism is part of being mature, and it reflects very well on the Paizo staff. I say nothing I would not accept myself if the roles were reversed, and I imagine Alienfreak does the same.
I guess we have different definitions of "polite". No big deal there. I would imagine by this time criticism must run off them like water off a duck...
And people, could we curb the "wall of text" effect? Not just you Ashiel :) The arguements could be a lot more succinct and it might let other people chime in without reading an interactive novel. And if you have that much time why aren't you playing the game? :D
Btw, the arguement about one 10th level character against an army of 10,000 will never end without a definition of the army that everyone agree on as well as what is available to the lone character. We could go for nuclear disarmament and world peace with about as much chance of success but it does look like you're having fun...
Also, in regards to blur, I don't really give a poop. As written, concealment allows Stealth. How you achieve concealment is irrelevant. You can be standing 5ft from somebody in a dimly lit room, and Stealth, because you have concealment (20%). That's just the way it is. Blur makes you difficult to see. Displacement makes you difficult to see. Which is enough for you to make a Stealth check for people to lose track of you.
I'm not here to argue anyone's house rules.
And you have still not responded to what happens after he attacks someone from stealth (which then ends his stealth), and all 500+ people within 500 feet of him then use their readied actions to attack him.
Let's give you the concealment from the cloak and say it allows stealth while you're moving around. You have to take the next move action to restealth after you attack. That means everyone who had declared readied actions get's to attack (actually, before you attempt your coup).
So as you said earlier, I don't care what you say about the concealment, you still lose stealth when you take a full action to attack (which is required for the coup). Until your next action, when you can then re-stealth. Which leaves you open to attack.
EDIT : Just to avoid the 'I don't have to stop stealthing to coup' argument...
Check: Your Stealth check is opposed by the Perception check of anyone who might notice you. You can move up to half your normal speed and use Stealth at no penalty. When moving at a speed greater than half but less than your normal speed, you take a –5 penalty. It's impossible to use Stealth while , running, or charging.
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Also, in regards to blur, I don't really give a poop. As written, concealment allows Stealth. How you achieve concealment is irrelevant. You can be standing 5ft from somebody in a dimly lit room, and Stealth, because you have concealment (20%). That's just the way it is. Blur makes you difficult to see. Displacement makes you difficult to see. Which is enough for you to make a Stealth check for people to lose track of you.
I'm not here to argue anyone's house rules.
Except maybe your own? Go back and reread the Take 10 and Take 20 rules. Nothing about Take 10 has to do with chance of failure. It's all about being distracted. Take 20 is about chance of failure.
You can't Take 10 with Stealth when infiltrating the encampment because you are distracted. Now, if you are a rogue with Skill Mastery, then go for it. If not, then it's not gonna happen.
Displacement also does not provide concealment. It specifically mentions that it is not like total concealment. It merely provides a miss chance. If it was concealment then sneak attack wouldn't work but it does.
Why do people worship the Alexandrian like it's gospel?
Gospel? No. But he does write some very good stuff on RPGs.
Why do people worship the Alexandrian like it's gospel?Define 'people' and show how your statement applies to them. Otherwise, you're just acting like a high schooler making sidelong comments to look cool.
I think we're missing a noun modifier in that sentence.
Why do some people...
Why do people who worship the Alexandrian do it like it's gospel?
Why do you find some people...
Why do that subset of people...
I think the first one is the most elegant modification, but any of the above work.
Ok, I've never been in the army. So I'm going to ask this question to those who have been, I know there are a lot of you out there...
If you have ever been in a camp with a lot of troops, say 10,000 (or even 1,000), has there ever been a point at any time day or night where at least 4 or 5 hundred were not up and active at any given point?
Seriously, I really am curious at this point. I've always had this image in my head of an army camp, with different people having different watches, so they're all on different schedules. So at any given time there's people walking around, people cooking, people sleeping, people eating, people working on weapons/cars/etc. People playing basketball, people playing whatever. And then, on top of that, people are always entering and leaving buildings, tents, etc pretty much at random. I always assumed it would look kind of like a sluggish ant-nest from above.
Why do people worship the Alexandrian like it's gospel?Define 'people' and show how your statement applies to them. Otherwise, you're just acting like a high schooler making sidelong comments to look cool.
Okay, no need to be the very same back to me. You're better than that.
The articles of the Alexandrian grate on me. They espouse very narrow definitions of playing the game and that's fine, if you are wanting to play a game with those definitions. However, what aggravates me is when some people try to fight against the idea of the world having higher level people in it just by linking to that post over and over. It shows up in many threads. It was waved at me like a bible, no explanation given, long before I came to these boards.
It could very well be that it's a problem with the people that do that, rather than the article itself.
However, I disagree strongly with the article as well. I don't play my games that way and I'm not likely to ever do so, because it's just not fun for me and the game is about fun.
The core rules don't support that approach either. The CRB has nothing in it about how many levels NPCs have on average in the world. So saying that the NPCs in the GMG is not valid because it's not core is a really really big fallacy argument. The CRB is silent on how high the NPCs in a world should be.
It's just as Core (if we're using the limited deffinition that core is CRB only) to say that NPCs average 10th level, and range from 1st to 20th, usually NPC classes, but with many using PC classes. So, if we're going to discuss strictly CRB, then from this point forward, my stance is that it's core for NPCs to average level 10.
If people want to expand Core to mean 'books published by Paizo for the Pathfinder RPG line' (which would be the CRB, GMG, B, B2, B3, UC, UM, APG), then we should be using the GMG guidelines, which is ironically enough, level 1 to level 19.
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Okay, no need to be the very same back to me. You're better than that.No, I'm really not. But thank you for taking the time to explain.
Really, he isn't. I've met him. His wife is better than that, but not him.
:)
Well first, dude, you have to notice that the ranger is off killing you people in their tents. Since nobody notices and nobody screams, just seems like everyone is sleeping soundly. Unless they have some sort of clairvoyance that tells them that somebody has recently been slain, but then that pretty much means even mundane assassins can't do their jobs.
You're assuming 500+ archers are all awake, have bows ready, and have LoS/Effect to him. Do you seriously think that in the camp he's going to be fighting everyone at a time? No terrain, no tents, etc? Do you think he can't leave when the archers get ready to fire, and then slink back into the camp from another direction and screw with some folks hardcore?
Again, he can also drop magic traps throughout the camp that last about 7 hours, wound anyone or anything in the area anytime they move for 1d4 * 5ft moved, which cannot even be seen by anyone mobilizing against him, and the animals can't find him. It might even take the ranger a couple of tries to wipe out everyone, but the army would be undergoing a losing battle in the extreme.
Also, while he can't take 10 in combat, that doesn't really matter to him. When he's not in combat, he can just take 10. Otherwise, he rolls and basically has virtually no chance of being spotted anyway. He can take 10 to sneak into the camp. He doesn't even need to spend a full-round action to coup folks, because he could just attack anyone inside a tent with a regular action. One attack->move->stealth. One strike, one kill. He could walk into a tent with 4 guys lying there sleeping, full attack, 5ft step->stealth, and then head out on his way, leaving just the dead behind.
EDIT: About the Alexandrian article. It's about realizing what people can do in D&D. You don't have to be a high level to be amazing. But being high level means you will be amazing. My entire argument has been, quite simply, that against an army of NORMAL PEOPLE, they have no chance vs a prepped level 10 character.
I have - repeatedly - said that if you are including even some similarly leveled characters (6th-8th level scattered throughout), or things beyond normal people using fantastic resources, then it's a different story. I'm not arguing that the ranger could beat an army with fellow superhumans, but that he can beat an army of normal people. Simple as that. That's all I've said every time. Anything else is on others.
The articles of the Alexandrian grate on me. They espouse very narrow definitions of playing the game and that's fine, if you are wanting to play a game with those definitions. However, what aggravates me is when some people try to fight against the idea of the world having higher level people in it just by linking to that post over and over. It shows up in many threads. It was waved at me like a bible, no explanation given, long before I came to these boards.It could very well be that it's a problem with the people that do that, rather than the article itself.
However, I disagree strongly with the article as well. I don't play my games that way and I'm not likely to ever do so, because it's just not fun for me and the game is about fun.
The bolded part has it right on the money. The context of the article, which people arguing that you shouldn't have high level NPCs fundamentally ignore, is that you don't need to define your best and brightest characters or exemplars as being ultra high level. The game works just fine (better, even) if the man of Westernesse who will be king is much lower in level than 15-20.
The article works very well if you're playing e6, I think. It breaks down if these very people must live in a world alongside heroes and monsters.
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It works well if CR 15 monsters/characters are not hanging around every local village. Otherwise you wonder why they haven't conquered the realms. It's strange that 1st and 2nd level characters can live out on the farm unmolested when the PCs keep running into the Jabberwocky and Treerazer out in the woods.
Ashiel, I have to give you credit. You found a way to get 10,000 people killed by one person in one night.
I just wish I could figure out how the other 9,999 people (and counting down) keep failing their rolls to notice the dead bodies piling up, the blood pooling up around the tents, and so on.
9 pints of blood in a single person, if we assume only half leaks out from a slit throat (which is actually very conservative), then that's 4.5 pints * 10,000 = 45,000 pints. That's over 5,600 gallons of blood.
Again, Ashiel, you are saying if everything works exactly the way you want. Nobody is ever allowed to make a perception roll to notice the bodies, to notice tent flaps moving on their own, to hear the guy who's throat just got slit making gurgling noises as he dies.
The dogs are not allowed to make a scent check for the smell of blood and raise the alarm. It's as if the ranger's uber stealth has some stick component to it that spreads out over the camp and hides all trace of anything he does as soon as he does it.
That's bull**** and you know it. Someone somewhere would walk into a tent and see bodies and start yelling and screaming and waking up the whole camp. But you disallow every NPC the ability to see a dead body or a pool of blood or anything. Of course you can kill 10,000 people when you have god on your side wiping out any trace of your presence as you pass and hiding all the bodies and the blood and everything else.
It works well if CR 15 monsters/characters are not hanging around every local village. Otherwise you wonder why they haven't conquered the realms. It's strange that 1st and 2nd level characters can live out on the farm unmolested when the PCs keep running into the Jabberwocky and Treerazer out in the woods.
TOZ, you're going to get flamed for introducing logic into this. :) Better go put on your asbestos undies. :)
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WANTED
The Murderous Hobos
for
Killing five guardsmen
Sinking of The Coral Star
Creating Undead
Sinking of The Maiden of Cheliax
Arson of The Nag's Head Bar
Escape from His Majesty's Prison
Slaying of six Royal Prison Guards
Murder of a Brave Citizen
Destruction of a Regiment
Destruction of Castle Superior
Arson of the Alexandrian Temple
Heresy and Apostasy
REWARD
15,000 gp from the King
100,000 from Church of the Alexandrite
And the ranger moves quick. Since there's no listed DC to hear someone die. Sure, the animals could smell the blood inside the tents...if they're really close to it. Tents block emanations and such, and prevent it from being downwind. I'm sure that they would notice people were dead, but they wouldn't know how or why. They would know they weren't alone, but no one would see you. So you slink about and make kills as is convenient to do so. If they make it less convenient, like bunching up in a big open space, toss up a wind wall, drop a spike growth, and walk away to harry them tomorrow, or later today, or something else.
How much damage do you have to do to defeat an army, I wonder. Do we need to slaughter every last guy? Given time, we'll do it. You want to talk about realism? How about the fear of sleeping? People go to sleep and then end up dying. You never know when he'll be back, and there's not much you can do to defend yourself against him with normal resources.
How far do you need to push before the army breaks? How many captains or leaders do you need to kill? How many of your horses, resources, and so forth do you have to lose before the army falls apart? How many things do you need to set fire to, or poison, before the army is dead.
Ok, I've never been in the army. So I'm going to ask this question to those who have been, I know there are a lot of you out there...
If you have ever been in a camp with a lot of troops, say 10,000 (or even 1,000), has there ever been a point at any time day or night where at least 4 or 5 hundred were not up and active at any given point?
Seriously, I really am curious at this point. I've always had this image in my head of an army camp, with different people having different watches, so they're all on different schedules. So at any given time there's people walking around, people cooking, people sleeping, people eating, people working on weapons/cars/etc. People playing basketball, people playing whatever. And then, on top of that, people are always entering and leaving buildings, tents, etc pretty much at random. I always assumed it would look kind of like a sluggish ant-nest from above.
I served in 89-93. I was infantry and my job was to train soldiers on the Soviet and Sumerian tactics. Nearly every Army soldier that served in Desert Storm came through Fort Irwin for training. This included Delta Force and Rangers. We also trained Canadians, British, and Germans for their roles. What I mention is 20 years old but I doubt there's a lot of difference.
Today's military operates very differently than what we would expect from a pseudo-medieval one. That being said, here are some things that we did.
1) In basic training we had watch every night. Generally we had 1 person per platoon up when we were in the rear and 2 in the field. If you fell asleep and the drill sergeant caught you, he "slit" your throat with a red marker so everyone knew.
2) Out of basic, we had 1 per squad in the field and 1 to 2 per company in the rear. In the field we used a variety of devices to observe at night and during the day. Of coruse, during the day there were more people awake.
3) There are a variety of code words used and changed daily for various purposes. If we had to see someone face to face, they had to know the password and you had to reply with the correct one. There was also a running password that you could shout if you were being chased and there wasn't time to go through the slower procedures.
4) We were trained to use SALUTE when making reports and observing. (S)ize, (A)ctivity, (L)ocation, (U)niform or (U)nit, (T)ime, (E)quipment. You are taught this in basic training.
The size of the units were:
1) Team: 3-5 people
2) Squad: 2-3 teams
3) Platoon: 3-4 squads
4) Company: 3-4 Platoons
5) Battalion: 3-6 companies
6) Brigade: 3-6 battalions
So a battalion would be about 500 people. Roughly 2% were up on watch. There were also people who's job was to be up the whole night observing. They generally slept during the day. I would say that we usually had about 5% up at night and 97% up during the day.
I would think that a fantasy army would have closer to 15% to 20% up at night to monitor with mundane and magical detection. Remember that most of the people on watch will be rotating so that everyone is rested in the morning. You won't have 20% up at night and 80% during the day. It would be 20% at night and 100% during the day.
That's my experience and things may have changed since I left.
And the ranger moves quick. Since there's no listed DC to hear someone die. Sure, the animals could smell the blood inside the tents...if they're really close to it. Tents block emanations and such, and prevent it from being downwind. I'm sure that they would notice people were dead, but they wouldn't know how or why. They would know they weren't alone, but no one would see you. So you slink about and make kills as is convenient to do so. If they make it less convenient, like bunching up in a big open space, toss up a wind wall, drop a spike growth, and walk away to harry them tomorrow, or later today, or something else.
How much damage do you have to do to defeat an army, I wonder. Do we need to slaughter every last guy? Given time, we'll do it. You want to talk about realism? How about the fear of sleeping? People go to sleep and then end up dying. You never know when he'll be back, and there's not much you can do to defend yourself against him with normal resources.
How far do you need to push before the army breaks? How many captains or leaders do you need to kill? How many of your horses, resources, and so forth do you have to lose before the army falls apart? How many things do you need to set fire to, or poison, before the army is dead.
Unless this army is riding the short wagons into battle, your ranger will have 1 night to attempt this. After that, he will fail. Defenses will be up and he will not have the chance to do it again the next night. Even a group of level 1 commoners will adapt to this fast as all hell. However an army does not consist of only level 1 commoners.
As a former infantry soldier, I promise you that your ranger would be unlikely to be very effective even the first night. He would most likely get in and out so quickly that he would only kill one or two. The longer he's there, the higher his chance of getting caught. He is also unlikely to get at the leadership. They will be higher level than the rest of the army but will also have better defenses.