Hey folks
I am planning to run a large battle betweem Orcish and Dwarven armies which the PC's take part in.
I do not intend to make this rules-heavy but to streamline it in order to give it an epic feel and to make the players feel like they are in a large, chaotic battle, so I am not bothering too much with number of units etc. I'm keeping it fairly general and would only use the combat rules for individual skirmishes the PC's are engaged in. I already know the result of the battle.
I am looking for any general advice you can give, perhaps from your own experience, on how to run such a battle in Pathfinder. For example, which warbeasts would the Orcs and Dwarves be using? Will either of the armies be mounted in any signifcant way? Is magic prevelant in such a battle or is it mostly blood and guts?
My aim is to narrate the battle, soak the players in the atmosphere, and then to just let them fight without bogging them down with too many rules that will hurt the pacing. My main inspiration for this is the large battles from the Lord of The Rings trilogy of films.
Thanks.
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At least in general terms, streamlined mass battles are more or less a string of focused individual fights with a hefty amount of set dressing to link them all and is more or less the axis upon which player buy in turns.
Sure it's easy to just go "You meet 10 orcs and a troll in the melee, go punch" but it's not as engaging as describing that same squad burst through the dwarf lines and start lumbering toward the unprotected archers and will surely massacre them without timely intervention.
Anther thing to make the scene feel larger are intermittent hazards that show up in between or during the fights. Maybe the dwarfs loose a volley of arrows at the orcs the party's fighting to assist (roll reflex on the baddies for some damage) or a stray bolder heaved by an orc giant lands in such a way it can bowl over a party member (insert check here).
Lastly, to fill in the gaps as PCs just kind of cleave through chaff, you can add in small bits of automatic damage on them to represent lucky hits by the goons.
As for the other stuff about general composition...largely depends on your choices and the overall level involved. For magic, generally speaking it's assumed a minimum there'll be low-mid level magic users heaving fireballs or cures since that doesn't affect army composition too much. Go too deep into high levels and magic just obsoletes armies as the various weather control spells or cloudkills etc just make them liabilities. If you're trying to simulate Lord of the Rings type things, keeping the focus mostly on blood n guts and not "geek the archmage or all is lost" is probably best for you.
Beasts/mounts are similarly up to you. Orcs across fiction have been mounted on anything from horses to boars to (my personal favorite) dinosaurs and often yoink things like trolls or giants to do their dirty work but there's not to say there's can't be an orcish necromancer who made a few undead abominations or they made a deal with a dragon or demon or something of that sort. Dwarfs at least to me have never been about beasts or cavalry (I'm a Warhammer Fantasy guy) but it's not beyond the realm of possibility for something like using hardy mountain goats to ride around or chariots and such. Heck, maybe there's a bunch of animated suits of armor that are controlled by honored ancestors come to aid their kin. Or golems or other constructs. Whatever you think is best.
It depends on what levels your PCs are at, but you can include
orcs
orcs with PC levels (witch, barbarian, shaman, fighter, bloodrager etc.)
worgs, worgs with orc riders/cavaliers
a siege / battle mammoth
Also, I believe there are "Mass Combat" rules you could look into as well. Picking and choosing certain mechanics from them could incorporate a different kind of uniqueness to your combat which might be fun as your players do both normal combat as well as inspire the soldiers around them.
Personally for me Worgs are mentally linked to Goblins and that's not to say don't use them but perhaps have them riding Boars instead. Tuskers on Tuskers :P Make them slightly larger and more feral in appearance but like Worgs slightly more intelligent and evil. Or even both. Maybe most of the Orcs are on one sort of beast that's the standard BUT then there's one infamous group of orcs that ride their very own special mounts (choice number two - very large boars) in pairs, one melee type and a thrown or ranged rider.
How free to do their own thing are the PCs vs at the command of someone else? Do they start off assigned by command to do one thing then the chaos of battle along with seeing some threat command didn't know about end up improvising?
Will the battle take place outside or within the dwarven halls and underground or some of both perhaps? "Orcs have found the secret postern gate and you are the only ones I can spare that can reach them in time!" Or if that's too cliche maybe the dwarves are storming the orc citadel instead.
Thanks, guys! I am taking down the ideas.
The PC's are level 9, Human Ranger, Dwarven cleric and a Barbarian Half-Orc.
Kayerloth wrote: How free to do their own thing are the PCs vs at the command of someone else? Do they start off assigned by command to do one thing then the chaos of battle along with seeing some threat command didn't know about end up improvising?
Will the battle take place outside or within the dwarven halls and underground or some of both perhaps? "Orcs have found the secret postern gate and you are the only ones I can spare that can reach them in time!" Or if that's too cliche maybe the dwarves are storming the orc citadel instead.
The PC's are in a high-ranking position in the Dwarven army, so they are mostly free to do their own thing. I plan to have the battle outdoors mostly, either in a field or as a siege. It really depends though on what the PC's decide to do. But bottom line is a battle is going to take place which involves thousands of combatatants from both sides.
I have found the Mass Combat rules and I will take a look, but again, trying to keep this relatively rules-light when it comes to the bigger picture.
Do you have ideas for some creatures that will fight alongside Orcs? Not magical or summoned, just regular run-of-the-mill monsters for diversity's sake. I've already decided to use dire boars as part of the Orcish cavalry.
Tarik Blackhands wrote: At least in general terms, streamlined mass battles are more or less a string of focused individual fights with a hefty amount of set dressing to link them all and is more or less the axis upon which player buy in turns. These are the simplest and best rules for mass combat I've seen for PF. Thanks for posting them!
Lynos wrote: Thanks, guys! I am taking down the ideas.
The PC's are level 9, Human Ranger, Dwarven cleric and a Barbarian Half-Orc.
The PC's are in a high-ranking position in the Dwarven army, so they are mostly free to do their own thing. I plan to have the battle outdoors mostly, either in a field or as a siege. It really depends though on what the PC's decide to do. But bottom line is a battle is going to take place which involves thousands of combatatants from both sides.
I have found the Mass Combat rules and I will take a look, but again, trying to keep this relatively rules-light when it comes to the bigger picture.
Do you have ideas for some creatures that will fight alongside Orcs? Not magical or summoned, just regular run-of-the-mill monsters for diversity's sake. I've already decided to use dire boars as part of the Orcish cavalry.
Ettins, Trolls, (cave) Giants, Giant frilled lizards, and perhaps a small goblin army are quite quited to fight along Orcs.
And you can have each party member command a portion of the dwarven army, like the ranger commanding the archers, the cleric commanding the infantry, and the Barbarian commanding the vanguard or Cavelry.
I know that troops have been a thing for a while now. It's basically swarm-like enemies that represent squadrons, units and such. Maybe you could pick a Troop (with the abilities you need) and change the race?
Here's a link to the Troop entry, examples and a list.
Yeah, I would like very much to create an Orc troop for CR 9 but it seems complicated. I have zero experience in creating monsters from scratch. I found Troop listings for several creatures (Goblins, for example) but not for Orcs.
It's also not a template that I can simply graft onto a creature using an NPC generator. Any idea how to appraoch this, if for example we take an Orc Barbarian as a basic unit?
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/npc-s/npcs-cr-3/orc-barbarian-4/
So far I've peopled the Orc army with Dire Boars, Goblin troops and Ettins. Maybe I'll throw in a few Orc Shamans as well. I just need the Orc troops to seal the deal...
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