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As a disclaimer, the following post is about the Mass Combat Rules as presented in the Kingmaker Adventure Path as well as the revised Mass Combat rules presented in the Pathfinder RPG compatible Book of the River Nations. As someone who has both played with the Mass Combat rules as well as is a DM in the process of running the Kingmaker AP, I have some issues with the system, many of which I'm sure you out there have had as well. I also know that there are similar posts out there, but this is my take on the system. For the purposes of my post, I have made the following assumptions:
Assumption 1: The most effective way to increase the stats of a unit for the least amount of cost/consumption is to either add more soldiers to the unit, or make the unit up out of higher level soldiers
Assumption 2: Your DM is using the size of your nation to limit the number of soldiers you can raise. Common sense would dictate that a nation of 100,000 people which can conscript its inhabitants probably has, at best, a standing military of 10,000 soldiers. For comparison, the US has about 1% of its citizens in the armed forces.
For those of you not familiar with the AP or the Mass Combat rules, here is a short list of terms that you should know. Everybody else can skip down to the meat:
CR - Challenge Rating
BP - Build Points. 1 BP is roughly equal to 2-4 thousand gp
OM - Offensive Modifier. Works very much like a character's BAB
DV - Defensive Value. Works like a character's AC
Consumption - Amount of money, in BP, that it costs to keep an army in the field. This is paid weekly when the army is active and monthly when the army is in reserve
The Meat
Okay, so, I've thinking about Mass Combat as written and I thought that the following made no sense:
100 lvl 3 fighters - CR 2 / 11 HP / OM +2 / DV 12 / Cost to Raise 1 BP / Consumption 1 BP
200 lvl 3 fighters - CR 4 / 22 HP / OM +4 / DV 14 / Cost to Raise 2 BP / Consumption 2 BP
100 lvl 3 fighters w/ magic weapons & armor - CR 2 / 11 HP / OM +4 / DV 14 / Cost to Raise 66 BP / Consumption 66 BP
200 lvl 3 fighters w/ magic weapons & armor - CR 4 / 22 HP / OM +6 / DV 16 / Cost to Raise 67 BP / Consumption 67 BP
100 lvl 3 fighters w/ heavy horse mounts - CR 3 / 16 HP / OM +5 / DV 15 / Cost to Raise 1.5 BP / Consumption 1.5 BP
200 lvl 3 fighters w/ heavy horse mounts - CR 5 / 27 HP / OM +7 / DV 17 / Cost to Raise 2.5 BP / Consumption 2.5 BP
I think I've finally figured out both a.) why this is so out of whack and b.) what you can do to fix it
a.) Why This is Out of Whack
All standard armies without resources (as well as mounted armies) derive HP, Attack, Defense, and Cost/Consumption from the CR of the unit
HP = average HP x CR
OM = CR
DV = 10 + CR
Cost/Consumption = CR/2
in this way, a +2 bonus to OM AND DV AND 7-13 HP = 1 BP to raise and maintain
Magic Weapons (and all other Resources besides mounts) have absolutely no basis for any cost increase.
Is +2 to OM and DV really worth 65 BP? By the above, you should be able to get 130 OM, DV, and 455-845 HP for 65 BP.
In a role-playing sense, does it make any sense that it costs the same to maintain a magic sword as it does to enchant a magic sword? Are they re-enchanting them every week or month?
Does it make any sense that equipping 1 soldier with a magic sword costs the same as equipping 2000 soldiers with magic swords?
b.) What You Can Do to Fix It
I think the disconnect comes in two places: same cost for different army sizes and Consumption
b-1.) Same Cost for Different Army Sizes
For this, I would recommend saying that the listed cost to give the resource to the army as well as maintain that resource is for a Medium Army (100 soldiers).
In this way, equipping 100 soldiers with magic swords would cost 50 BP, equipping 50 would cost 25 BP, equipping 1000 would cost 500 BP, etc. I would also not let this cause any resource's cost to fall below 1 BP.
b-2) Consumption
To me, it never made any sense for it to have the same cost to enchant a magic sword as it does to maintain a magic sword. How many of you have played games with characters with magic weapons? I'm guessing plenty. In how many of those games did your characters have to pay 2000gp a week to keep your +1 sword working like a +1 sword? I'm guessing nobody.
That being said, I accept the fact that equipping 100 soldiers with +1 swords and +1 armor is expensive. In gp, that's around 3k gp a soldier. If we say that a BP is worth somewhere between 2k-4k gp, then 65 BP is about the right amount to equip 100 men with magic weapons and armor.
Now, how do we balance the Consumption to satisfy the game balance of having magic equipment without breaking the suspension of disbelief? in the above model, +2 OM and DV should cost about 1 BP in upkeep. However, the only time a player is really going to use Resources that give them a direct bonus to OM or DV is when they can't just get it by adding more soldiers to a unit. With that in mind, I'm comfortable for Masterwork or Magic Weapons to cost a bit more than that, since you can use them to beef up your army past what the population limits of your nation would allow. After thinking about it, I believe that upkeep should be the bonus to your DV or OM that the resource provides divided by 2, but modified by how useful the resource is.
In the following, I've gone over every resource and given what I think the Cost/Consumption should be and why (Consumptions with an * are explained in the text):
Fortification Builders - Cost 2 BP/Consumption 0 BP - These are guys who get to the battle early and use axes and shovels to dig in and fortify a defensive position. While it does provide a +2 bonus to DV, it does so only if the unit doesn't use all of its movement (situational). Also, you're already spending about 6k on shovels, axes, and training. Situational bonus plus expensive axes equals no Consumption.
Improved Weapons - Cost 5 BP/Consumption 1 BP* - Masterwork weapons grant a +1 to OM. This is good all of the time. I would say this has an Consumption cost of 1 BP for every 200 men equipped in this way, but no less than 1 BP. Alternatively, if a unit had both Improved Weapons AND Improved Armor, the the combined Consumption cost is 1 BP per 100 soldiers.
Improved Armor - Cost 3 BP/Consumption 1 BP* - Masterwork armor grants a +1 to DV. This is also good all of the time. As above, I would say this has an Consumption cost of 1 BP for every 200 men equipped in this way, but no less than 1 BP. Alternatively, if a unit had both Improved Weapons AND Improved Armor, the the combined Consumption cost is 1 BP per 100 soldiers.
Magic Weapons - Cost 50 BP/Consumption 1 BP - Magic weapons grant a +2 bonus to OM. Again, this is always good. Since it gives +2 to OM, I'm comfortable with it costing half of that in Consumption.
Magic Armor - Cost 15 BP/Consumption 1 BP - Again, magic armor grants a constant +2 DV. +2 DV = 1 BP.
Healing Potions - Cost 10 BP/Consumption 0 or 5 or 10 BP* - In the text it states that soldiers equipped with healing potions can forego an attack turn to heal themselves, up to twice a battle. Since it's not like healing potions go bad, I would say that a unit with this ability retains it with no Consumption cost until it uses the ability in battle. Once it uses the ability in battle, the until can return to a city with the requisite buildings to restore either one (5 BP) or two (10 BP) uses of this ability, up to a maximum of two uses. This also means that, if a unit uses this ability once in a battle, it can only use it once more in subsequent battles until it replenishes its stock of potions.
Mounts - Cost CR/2 BP/Consumption CR/2 BP + 2 - Of all of the resources, I believe this to be the most vaguely written AND the text as written doesn't match the sample armies in the stat blocks. I would make it read thusly: Add the CR of the riders to the CR of the mounts to get the mounted unit's CR. All values derived from CR use this combined CR. Mounted units gain an additional +2 to OM and DV. They also cost an additional 2 Consumption. Ex. 100 Lvl 4 Fighters (CR 3) mounted on Heavy Warhorses (CR 1) would have a CR of 4 (CR 3 + CR 1), 22 HP (5.5 HP for d10s x CR 4), OM +6 (CR 4 + 2 for being mounted), DV 16 (10 + CR 4 + 2 for being mounted), and a Consumption of 4 BP (CR 4 / 2 + 2 for being mounted).
Poison - Cost 6 BP/Consumption 0 or 3 or 6 BP* - Just like healing potions, poison doesn't need to be replaced just because it's Monday. I would limit poison to 2 uses per battle and structure replacement just like healing.
Ranged Weapons - Cost 2 BP/Consumption 1 BP - While ranged weapons don't add any specific increase to OM or DV, they do allow a unit to participate in an entire round of combat that it couldn't have otherwise. That makes it worth an additional 1 Consumption in my book. Chalk it up to arrows replaced after target practice.
Shields - Cost 1 BP/Consumption 0 or 1 BP* - Shields give a +2 DV against ranged combat. While it is a +2, it's only for one round of combat. If the opposing army doesn't have range, it never even comes into effect. Because it is so limited in when it provides a bonus, if ever, I wouldn't make this resource cost any Consumption. That being said, if you REALLY want to make shields cost Consumption, I would say that the shields provide the +2 DV, but are rendered useless after providing the bonus and must be re-bought, like potions and poisons.
Ships - Cost 10 BP/Consumption 1 BP - Like ranged weapons, this resource can give access to a type of combat that would otherwise be impossible, or even be used to bypass a city's walls (since you can't build city walls on the water border of a district). The +4 DV is tempered by the fact that these are useless in hexes with no water access. I'd divide the usual DV bonus/2 in half again, getting 1 BP Consumption, considering the situational usefulness of ships.
Siege Engines - Cost 15 BP/Consumption 2 BP - Siege engines not only give a +2 OM bonus, they also destroy the fortification bonus that city walls and castles provide! I'd give it 1 Consumption for the flat +2 OM bonus and another 1 Consumption for the ability to go full defense and whittle away an entrenched army's fortification, whether you actually do damage to them or not.
I hope this was helpful to those of you who are struggling with what to do with Mass Combat in your game. There are other issues that I have with the Mass Combat system as written, but, if response to this is favorable, I will address them in a future post.
You have a lot of interesting ideas. I always assumed that Consumption referred mostly to feeding and paying your soldiers and that any soldiers you gave magic weapons to would be better compensated (to prevent them from running off and selling them.)
You sound like you have more experience than I do with the mass combat system and you have some very good ideas/additions.
I'll have to look at your results in detail, but I will add this tidbit:
In order to make the numbers make any sense for the armies in Varisia, I had to offset the troops-CR table by 2 levels. There's still a hell of a lot of work to be done on those rules, but that offset at least let me use the army info from PF#4 in some way.
It's been a while, and I don't have the notes on hand — basically, I found that using the numbers of giant "armies" from PF4 resulted in all of the armies being the same and rolling at +0 or similar. It seemed to random. The message from the KM rules appears to be "go big or go home", but that doesn't really jive with the battles that have actually unfolded in the PF stories.
Jason Nelson has also fiddled with this stuff quite a bit... hopefully he'll show up soon and give you the detail that I lack.
I agree it doesn't make any sense for it to have the same cost to enchant a magic sword as it does to maintain a magic sword.
I don't see that the Consumption BP costs are going toward magical maintaince of the magical items. In part, those Consumption costs would go toward replacing any "lost" or stolen swords, armor or healing potions and/or toward proper security of those same items when in storage.
I agree it doesn't make any sense for it to have the same cost to enchant a magic sword as it does to maintain a magic sword.
I don't see that the Consumption BP costs are going toward magical maintaince of the magical items. In part, those Consumption costs would go toward replacing any "lost" or stolen swords, armor or healing potions and/or toward proper security of those same items when in storage.
+1
Same goes for MW weapons & armour - as well as the cost to replace stuff
lost by casualties & those few soldiers/supply staff who go into the magic
weapon business & replace existing stock with replicas...
Hey, might not happen often - but even a couple going missing is
expensive.
Right, but does it make any sense for the replacement and care cost for +1 swords for 100 people to be the same as buying 100 +1 swords? I submit that it does not, which is why I changed it in my model.
It also makes no sense that masterwork chain shirts cost more than non-masterwork full plate.
What I was thinking of doing, if I ever run the campaign again, is splitting "consumption" into part that must be paid when raising the unit (pulling weapons and armor out of your armory), and part that must be paid on a regular consumption basis (replacing, maintaining, etc.) Just calculate what the average soldier has, and (roughly) figure out how many BPs you need to spend per soldier -- if your men have leather and spear, that's about 11 gp/soldier you spend 1 BP (2000 gp) per (2000/11 = ?) about 180 soldiers; if you're equipping them in masterwork full plate with masterwork lances, it costs A Lot More per soldier. Then the DV bonus of armor would be, oh, about half the total armor/shield bonus for the kit.
I've actually run into exactly this problem just this week, when we first used the Mass Combat rules. I took the base rules, the River Kingdom rules, and various posts on this forum, and combined them into my own set of rules for how Mass Combat works.
I assigned each resource both an initial BP cost and a consumption cost (Improved Weapons is 5 BP / +1 consumption, magic weapons is 50 BP / +5 consumption). I also modify all the costs by size: Dim: 0.1, Tiny: 0.25, Small: 0.5, Medium: 1, Large: 2, Huge: 5, Garg: 10, Col: 20. (We use fractional BPs for the magic item economy, so this works here too). Like you, I also made healing potions and poison take no consumption once purchased.
It's still more effective to raise the CR, though. +1 CR (though recruiting one-level higher units or rules to train your own up) is +1 to OM and DV, for a .5 increase in Consumption. +2 CR (two levels higher or one step larger) is +2 to each, for 1 consumption. Both can potentially be done without needing to increase the size of the army at all, so making +1 to one of those two stats for 1 consumption just doesn't make any sense.
The only solution I've thought of is to remove the ability to choose arbitrary NPCs to form your army from. Base it on the size of the kingdom, or what buildings you have, or something, but say "Ok, your choices are currently warrior 5, cleric 2, or wizard 3. Build another caster tower, and you can get wizard 5." Given that and population-based maximum number of armies (or maximum size, or both), you'd be forced into adding resources much earlier. Of course, as the buildings in your kingdom get better, you can make smaller and smaller armies for the same CR, which would affect costs if you scale them based on army size...
Bobson- any chance you could share your combined rules? They sound very interesting to me :)
Bobson- any chance you could share your combined rules? They sound very interesting to me :)
Once I get home tonight, I'll clean them up a bit (the version-based color-coding wouldn't help you, for instance) and post them. I'll also throw in my Kingdom rules, which are similarly an amalgam (although only in certain places)
Right, but does it make any sense for the replacement and care cost for +1 swords for 100 people to be the same as buying 100 +1 swords? I submit that it does not, which is why I changed it in my model.
Definitely agree with that too, I think your changes are quite good. I only was providing reasons for why there would be ongoing consumption cost, not disagreeing with your assessment of what seems to be "out of wack."
Personally, the only change I'd make to your rules in my campaign is I'd double the consumption costs for magic weapons that you've proposed. Simply a cost ratio between masterwork and magic items, plus magic weapons can defeat DR/Magic and overcome your population limit. As mentioned this is more of a personal customization I'd do for my campaign than a change in your rules.
Bobson- any chance you could share your combined rules? They sound very interesting to me :)
Alright, I've got them uploaded.
Here you go:
Kingdom Rules
Mass Combat Rules
Any feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.
Thank you Bobson for sharing these - very nice!
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Bobson- any chance you could share your combined rules? They sound very interesting to me :)Alright, I've got them uploaded.
Here you go:
Kingdom Rules
Mass Combat RulesAny feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.
Thanks Bob!
Any feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.Thanks, looks interesting!
Only complaint so far is that the spells are quite ridiculously powerful compared to other similar level spells. For example, Summon Army N is equivalent to around Summon Monster N+6 or so, even before taking into account the difference in duration (mass combat rounds are probably longer than 6s). Why wouldn't casters use these outside mass combat?
Those are actually condensed from the River Nations book (which I highly recommend). Im actually not entirely sure I ought to be including them...
The main reason not to use it outside of army combat is that it takes At least 50 casters working together (a small army) in order to be able to use it. But yes, my party's planning on making their first permanent army a set of spell casters able to cast a summon army 2 spell, with the plan of summoning two armies with the reckless assault tactic.
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Any feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.Thanks, looks interesting!
Only complaint so far is that the spells are quite ridiculously powerful compared to other similar level spells. For example, Summon Army N is equivalent to around Summon Monster N+6 or so, even before taking into account the difference in duration (mass combat rounds are probably longer than 6s). Why wouldn't casters use these outside mass combat?
Those are actually condensed from the River Nations book (which I highly recommend). Im actually not entirely sure I ought to be including them...
The main reason not to use it outside of army combat is that it takes At least 50 casters working together (a small army) in order to be able to use it. But yes, my party's planning on making their first permanent army a set of spell casters able to cast a summon army 2 spell, with the plan of summoning two armies with the reckless assault tactic.
Good Plan! Definitely doable.
Good Plan! Definitely doable.Any feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.Thanks, looks interesting!
Only complaint so far is that the spells are quite ridiculously powerful compared to other similar level spells. For example, Summon Army N is equivalent to around Summon Monster N+6 or so, even before taking into account the difference in duration (mass combat rounds are probably longer than 6s). Why wouldn't casters use these outside mass combat?
Those are actually condensed from the River Nations book (which I highly recommend). Im actually not entirely sure I ought to be including them...
The main reason not to use it outside of army combat is that it takes At least 50 casters working together (a small army) in order to be able to use it. But yes, my party's planning on making their first permanent army a set of spell casters able to cast a summon army 2 spell, with the plan of summoning two armies with the reckless assault tactic.
That's the problem, though. A CR3 army that can summon two CR2 armies to boost itself will wipe the floor with most other single armies in that same range (1-5). On the other hand, throwing multiple armies at it would even things out, even if they're weaker to begin with, just because each army can only attack one target at a time. I'm not sure about that balance...
I think I made spellcasters too strong. IIRC, the core book just gives a boost to OM and DV based on highest spell level, and River Nations adds actual spellcasting (including summons) without nerfing that previous bonus. I'll need to go check my source material, but I should probably come up with some way to balance it. Perhaps make it:
Where X = maximum level of spell, assign X, X-1, and X-2 to OM, DV, and one spell, and have a second spell of X-2.
Good Plan! Definitely doable.Any feedback would be great. Especially on the Mass Combat rules.Thanks, looks interesting!
Only complaint so far is that the spells are quite ridiculously powerful compared to other similar level spells. For example, Summon Army N is equivalent to around Summon Monster N+6 or so, even before taking into account the difference in duration (mass combat rounds are probably longer than 6s). Why wouldn't casters use these outside mass combat?
Those are actually condensed from the River Nations book (which I highly recommend). Im actually not entirely sure I ought to be including them...
The main reason not to use it outside of army combat is that it takes At least 50 casters working together (a small army) in order to be able to use it. But yes, my party's planning on making their first permanent army a set of spell casters able to cast a summon army 2 spell, with the plan of summoning two armies with the reckless assault tactic.
That's the problem, though. A CR3ish army that can summon two CR2 armies to boost itself will wipe the floor with most other single armies in that same range (1-5). On the other hand, throwing multiple armies at it would even things out, even if they're weaker to begin with, just because each army can only attack one target at a time. I'm not sure about that balance...
I think I made spellcasters too strong. IIRC, the core book just gives a boost to OM and DV based on highest spell level, and River Nations adds actual spellcasting (including summons) without nerfing that previous bonus. I'll need to go check my source material, but I should probably...
thank you for posting all this Bobson its helped alot but I had two questions, your PDF mentions expanding your castle and creating open space but I can't seem to find anything about what that means in them. Could you
please elaborate?
thank you for posting all this Bobson its helped alot but I had two questions, your PDF mentions expanding your castle and creating open space but I can't seem to find anything about what that means in them. Could you
please elaborate?
Expanding the castle involves building special castle buildings listed in the River Nations book. If you don't have that book, just skip that bit. Developing open space is building things like farms, roads, mines, etc. You have more options with River Nations, but the basics are in the base kingdom rules.
AD&D had some really good mass combat rules called war machine. The best part? If they were simplified down just a bit, they were beautiful. Used them for years in a massive politics game I ran. Might want to chase them down.