I was wondering if there was a way for a group of PC's to engage an army without calculating them as 4 very small armies.
The main problem is that let's say you have a group of lvl 9 PC's. As an army they are acr 1 (because their CR is equal to their level as they have PC level gear as opposed to level-1) armies meaning they have a dv or 11 and a om of +1, and between 3 and 6.
now let's say they are facing an army of 200 lvl 2 warriors. This makes One acr 3 army with hp equal to 15.
If you played out this fight with the regular rules it would take forever, but the PC's would win, and win easily if they had a decent blaster, or at least someone who had a few blasting spells prepared. If someone could channel negative energy for example that would be really nasty. A lvl 2 warrior with 14 con has 13 hp 5d6 does on average 17.5 damage, and warriors of that level will generally fail their save. Let's say the channeler has 14 cha, as it's a secondary stat, he can still channel 5/day. considering he can hit around say 40ish people per hit, and more if he get's surrounded he can kill the army practically single handed. He likely won't get hit very often as he will lickely have an AC of 26+ and the warriors are attacking for +5 or +6, so they would just be looking for nat 20's, not to mention that the party meat sheild would be protecting him, and the rest of the party is there.
But if we plug then into the rules they are at a stark dissadvantage. They may win, but not before a few die in the process.
So it there a way to incorporate PC stats into the mass combat rules?
Actually I am keen on exactly that. I don't want PC's slinking around behind an army, They are an army. What army of level 2 warriors wouldn't flee when faced with a bunch or lvl 9 PC's. The PC's would decimate them unless they were very poorly built, or some other strange extenuating circumstance. In reign of winter you face a new unit type called a troop, which is like a swarm of medium creatures. In that situation it feels a lot like mass combat, but there are no rules in any book that I know of on how to create your own 'troop' units. Also a single troop is only 12-20 people, so if you want to simulate thousands then you will need a little more effort.
I mean what a missed opportunity. This would have been a great opportunity to make rules for PC's facing down hundreds of lesser beings and prevailing, without a combat taking 10 hours.
What if the PC's just don't have a bloody army? What then? No you fail even though it is 200 cr 1/3 goblins and you are all level 10. Too bad.
That just doesn't track with me.
Think of it this way. 200 level 2 warriors have at least 10 (theoretical) guaranteed hits (natural 20s). Assuming they are using bows they probably are going to deal 10d8+8 (assume composite bow of 1 strength). That deals 53 damage per round. Which is probably enough to kill 1 PC per round, or if not, then significantly wound 1 each round.
Honestly, the rules just don't work well for running the PCs against such a huge number of combatants.
And for what it's worth, I think you are misguided on thinking that a group of level 9 PCs constitute an army. They are a surgical strike force.
Without judicious use of magic, even high level adventurers would eventually fall to an army of thousands. Haven't you heard of death by a thousand papercuts?
That's why you get DR. Makes you pretty much immune to low level enemy hordes.
US Navy seals are absolutely awesome. They will decimate most "regular" soldiers. They stand no chance going toe-to-toe with an army.
Pathfinder works the same way.
Indeed. The PCs are Seal Team 6. But they didn't try to take down the whole Iraqi army by themselves.
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Just because there are regular rules for combat, doesn't mean that you should use those same rules for mass combat. I have seen numerous times of paizo scenario (I am talking about PFS scenario's) writers using alternate mass combat rules instead, a set of subsystem rules designed for specific scenario.
If you really wish to face PC's with entire army, you should use similar subsystem rules by either copying them from another material or inventing your own. I personally would use some type of mob/swarm template for army of that size. You seem to be also forgetting that there are such things as AoE buffs. Army of 200 soldiers would tag along several casters most certainly.
Biggest problem with mass combat is to make it fast-paced. Who would really wish to spend an hour rolling 200d20 for each attack otherwise.
Adam
US Navy seals are absolutely awesome. They will decimate most "regular" soldiers. They stand no chance going toe-to-toe with an army.
Pathfinder works the same way.
Only up to a certain point. A level 9 cleric can go "Fickle Winds! Air Walk!" and start destroying the army of 200 level 2 warriors without them being able to do anything back.