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  1. - Top - End - #1
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    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Why have armies?

    I'm looking for a little help explaining the need for standing armies in D&D. What is the draw of masses of low level troops in a world where a handful of special individuals can wipe them out while munching Doritos?

    I know this is usually just swept under the rug but I'm trying to work as much realism into my fantasy as possible.

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    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    1. Even high-level wizards can't be everywhere at once. They can be close, but they can't have anywhere near the area coverage you need to enforce laws across a kingdom.

    2. Having a high-level champion flanked and supported by mooks is better than just a high-level champion, for the same reason that 4-on-1 gangbeat boss fights are usually pretty boring.

    3. There are a lot of threats out there that can be defeated by armies just fine, and often better than by PCs.

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    Flumph

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Are wizards a noticable part of the population of a fantasy world? If they are not, then there likely will not be enough powerful wizards that can be a one man army even if they could do that.

    Also, a border is really hard to cover if you are just one person. You may be able to kill a lot of people, but even if they cannot kill you, a large army can bypass you.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Logistics. It's easier to pay an army, armies are more impressive and have greater nuance, armies are less capable of outright taking over, armies are easier to deploy under command.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Most default generic fantasy realms made with DnD rules only work if characters with PC classes are far and few in between. In a opportunity where a person in power could throw a hundred men at a problem as apposed to a plucky five man band, then he's likely to hire the option that can shoot fireballs, but in most circumstances a army is the most practical choice. A powerful group of entities with PC class levels in the double digits is likely to be handled like the bloody Avengers by any self respecting government.
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    PirateCaptain

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Presence. Sheer presence. In addition to the considerations above, standing armies can be used as a deterrent. To what? Anything, really. Deter criminals from committing crimes by stationing a garrison in a major city. This also lets you deter rebels from acting against your rule. Deter PCs from thugging a town by threatening them with an army of guards and soldiers. If they don't meta, an army is usually a good threat of force, and if they do meta then the army can delay the party until the local Epic Level Guard can rock up. Deter monsters from eating your people.

    Most importantly, an army allows you to have eyes and ears everywhere for virtually nothing, and it announces your 1)Power and Reach, 2)Concern for the locals, and 3)Wealth as you can afford all these guys. Note for that last one to work you actually need to arm them well.
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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Furthermore, what makes one think that these armies wouldn't have champions/generals worthy of combat with the mighty PC's? It only stands to reason that powerful characters lead armies, either through strength, intelligence or guile, and would therefore be forces to be reckoned with.

    Also it could be that certain well trained portions of a larger standing army, perhaps like the Myrmidons or an elite knight group or something actually stand a chance against the PCs in groups of say 6-7? Armies aren't always mindless waves of mooks (unless they happen to necromancers). Whilst it's true that ancient warfare relied upon masses of numbers, you could actually make that not the case in a fantasy world that follows its own verisimilitude. In that case, due to the presence of powerful people and magic, then warfare would be carried out in methods very similar to modern military doctrine, still with standing armies, but those standing armies would be supported by various smaller units in order for large objectives to be captured with the least casualties and resources spent. If we happen to have all this fantastic technology, why need infantry? Well, Warhammer 40K teaches us that tanks can't capture objectives, you need a troops unit.

    I hope that helps.
    Last edited by Vortalism; 2014-08-15 at 06:51 AM.
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    Ogre in the Playground
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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    There is, in fact, no point to large standing armies.

    In a DnD world, where civilization is decentralized and attempts to traverse between civilized areas is so difficult that you have random encounter tables, large standing armies would really only be necessary if a really large threat appeared, like a full-blown undead invasion or a megamonster rampage.

    Instead, everyone would carry weapons/spellbooks/whatevers and presumably try to learn a bit about fighting for the basic necessity of self-defense against wandering monsters and raiders. Like many historical medieval cities, a DnD city would probably have most of its population armed anyways and regularly practicing martial skills. At any time, they could call upon a powerful and well-equipped militia if adventuring parties aren't available to solve a local monster problem.

    Outside of the cities, it would make much more sense for a ruler to have a decentralized military system based on feudalism rather than field a national, Napoleonic-style army. When monsters and dungeons and other military threats are popping up everywhere, it's simply easier and more cost effective to have some trusted feudal vassals (or probably vassals of vassals of vassals) handle it than have every little problem go through a central beaucracy. In these situations, there would still be professional soldiers, but they are going to be organized as small warbands or fellowships (or adventuring parties) that maintain relative autonomy and agility compared to state soldiers.

    In the end, it all comes down to the fact that it's much more reliable to be able to handle a pack of kobolds yourself than have to call on high level adventurers who would likely be far away, have no use for your reward, and have a really bad, high level problem to deal with anyways.
    Last edited by Vitruviansquid; 2014-08-15 at 09:05 PM.
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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Because no matter how powerful, a handful of wizards cannot do the work of a thousand or a hundred or even a dozen men. Wizards can win battles, but they can't hold and defend territory because they can't be anywhere at once.
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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Statistically, how many wizards/sorcerers ect are there in a given territory? And of those, how many actually know how to cast offensive army slaying spells?

    One thing to consider is that not every magic user is optimized, min-maxed, munchkined, ect... or in even a basic sense, how many wizards are simple 1-2 level characters at best?

    There is likely very few magic users in general. Even fewer who have reached higher levels. and of those that have only a infinitely small fraction probably know how to cast cloud kill, fireball, supermegadeath spell #5.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Or take Dark sun, which has all powerful casters baked in. They hide in their heavily magicked and fortified palaces to avoid getting mudered by each other and rarely ho outside. When the strongest of them, Dregoth, was trying to become a new dragon-god the others used scry and die teleport tactics on him.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Quote Originally Posted by redwizard007 View Post
    I'm looking for a little help explaining the need for standing armies in D&D. What is the draw of masses of low level troops in a world where a handful of special individuals can wipe them out while munching Doritos?

    I know this is usually just swept under the rug but I'm trying to work as much realism into my fantasy as possible.
    Part devil's advocate and part serious.

    Why wouldn't they need armies? The US armed forces are the best equipped in history. They have drones capable of spying on you without your knowledge. They can shoot weapons from across the world and hit with near-perfect accuracy. They have satellites in orbit that can track your every move. Not to mention weapons of mass destruction that wipe out your entire civilization with a single bomb. They also have the largest standing army in the world (well second behind China but per capita a far higher ratio). It isn't an either or situation. It is matter of resources.

    Certainly having those crazy man-less weapons of war will have a great impact and change how wars operate but ultimately in our current day we can't cut out the human-element. I don't see why petty warlords, wizards who have to physically show up (risking themselves), and even near-perfect magics; would all somehow invalidate the need for legions of low level troops.

    Not to mention that the other side may not have (as many) wizards capable of doing what you can do, they'll be deploying legions of low level troops, and so the best response is your own legion instead on relying on one dude who can also be taken out by doritos munching specialists - and then you are screwed.

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    PaladinGuy

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Governments can buy and own an army. They can't necessarily buy and own a high-level adventuring party.
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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Quote Originally Posted by Totema View Post
    Governments can buy and own an army. They can't necessarily buy and own a high-level adventuring party.
    This, pretty much. Really, a Fighter should be considered just as remarkable to a normal guy as a Wizard is, and both should pop up in populations at roughly the same number. A man able to cleave five foot solders into pieces with as many swings is just as remarkable as a guy who can channel lightning from their palms, from the guy who's leading ten thousand men, but the guy who has ten thousand men still has ten thousand men.
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    ElfPirate

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Tax collection & keeping order are jobs best done by a lot of ordinary guys for one thing. Judge Dredd is not an effective way of solving crime or unrest.

    For another, in Eberron one reason is that a lot of high-level people died over the Last War. Another might be that not all people have the same potential to gain levels past a certain point - you can't necessarily manufacture a level 9 wizard.

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    Kobold

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Plus, an army can overpower even the most powerful characters in most cases. Have you looked at the mob rules? 60 people can make a 'mob' which does 5d6 damage a round and does distraction. Even ignoring that... Say a level 20 hero is standing before a formation of 1,000 archers.

    They'll only hit and do damage on a natural 20... but 1,000 archers means about 50 hits that do 1d8 damage a round, so... around 50d8 damage a round.

    That's 225 damage on average, with an absolute minimum of around 50 damage. At most your level 20 character (aside for a wizard with aoe spells) is normally going to manage to kill maybe 5 foes (unless they've got great cleave).

    Then they get hit by another volley of arrows... and I think you can see where this is going.

    Moreover, it's pretty normal for there to be a character of 1-2 higher levels per 10 combatants so... 1,000 1st level warriors means around 100 2-3rd level warriors as sergeants, and around 10 4-5th level warriors as lieutenants, and a 1 6-7th level warrior as captain.

    An orc army like what showed up at Helm's Deep is something that'd be a massive threat to anything... Even a near deity of 20th level or a Great Wyrm.

    9,000 1st level warriors, 900 2-3rd level sergeants, 90 4-5th level lieutenants, 9 6-7th level captains, and 1 8-9th level general.

    Around 5% of any settlement's population have levels in the warrior class. So around 5% of any settlement is probably part of the trained militia, city guard, or the settlement's reserve force. This means that a metropolis can easily field an army of 20,000 when needed.

    20,000 men at arms is enough to fend off an attack by all but the most powerful monsters, and enough forces that even the highest level of adventurers would be crushed beneath the weight of arrow fire and so forth. Plus, those armies likely include high level adventurers as employees and so forth.

    It works fine to have an army... though a 20th level wizard is going to cause massive casualties until he runs out of spells or is turned into a pincushion from arrow fire.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Quote Originally Posted by Stellar_Magic View Post
    Plus, an army can overpower even the most powerful characters in most cases. Have you looked at the mob rules? 60 people can make a 'mob' which does 5d6 damage a round and does distraction. Even ignoring that... Say a level 20 hero is standing before a formation of 1,000 archers.

    They'll only hit and do damage on a natural 20... but 1,000 archers means about 50 hits that do 1d8 damage a round, so... around 50d8 damage a round.

    That's 225 damage on average, with an absolute minimum of around 50 damage. At most your level 20 character (aside for a wizard with aoe spells) is normally going to manage to kill maybe 5 foes (unless they've got great cleave).

    Then they get hit by another volley of arrows... and I think you can see where this is going.

    Moreover, it's pretty normal for there to be a character of 1-2 higher levels per 10 combatants so... 1,000 1st level warriors means around 100 2-3rd level warriors as sergeants, and around 10 4-5th level warriors as lieutenants, and a 1 6-7th level warrior as captain.

    An orc army like what showed up at Helm's Deep is something that'd be a massive threat to anything... Even a near deity of 20th level or a Great Wyrm.

    9,000 1st level warriors, 900 2-3rd level sergeants, 90 4-5th level lieutenants, 9 6-7th level captains, and 1 8-9th level general.

    Around 5% of any settlement's population have levels in the warrior class. So around 5% of any settlement is probably part of the trained militia, city guard, or the settlement's reserve force. This means that a metropolis can easily field an army of 20,000 when needed.

    20,000 men at arms is enough to fend off an attack by all but the most powerful monsters, and enough forces that even the highest level of adventurers would be crushed beneath the weight of arrow fire and so forth. Plus, those armies likely include high level adventurers as employees and so forth.

    It works fine to have an army... though a 20th level wizard is going to cause massive casualties until he runs out of spells or is turned into a pincushion from arrow fire.
    Wind Wall is a 2nd level spell, and it stops all archery, fly is a 3rd level spell and it stops all melee. So a 20th level Wizard could probably engage an army with little to no threat to themselves.

    There are several reasons that armies still exist though:

    1.) Wizards are not as easily controlled as a bureaucratically designed fighting force. It's very difficult to get a wizard to do what you want exactly in war, they're individuals, furthermore they're powerful enough individuals to be capable of almost anything without recrimination save from other wizards. As such it's very difficult (probably impossible) to plan strategy around them, since they're likely to pretty much on their own recognizance, when the wizard decides, "It's five PM, that's quitting time", then you have essentially no defenses. Also if the Wizard decides to take it on themselves to alter the plan, you can't do anything about it, a wizard could easily have a higher threshold for collateral damage than a king is willing to endure. So dangerous and unpredictable, somewhat like nuclear weapons, also worse yet, unreliable since individuals are less reliable than trained groups.

    2.) Wizards have a lot of their own concerns, this somewhat ties in with one, but is important enough to be treated separately. While the mundane forces of the kingdom aren't really going to be a threat to Wizards, that doesn't mean that Wizards don't have enemies, enemies who might be very inclined to note their distraction, or use tactics to observe them to get a better idea of their power. Also Wizards tend to be busy, they have their own projects (ascension to godhood, lichdom, whatever) and those tend to take almost all of their own time and effort. Why would Elthareil the Powerful care about what happens in his kingdom, I mean the incursion of the barbarian orcs is unpleasant, but he's kind of busy with the demon hordes trying to break through the veil and destroy all of the plane. A 20th level wizard is going to find themselves drawn to dealing with ever-bigger problems, and a small mundane war isn't really something that they'd need to concern themselves with.

    3.) And even in the case of the most patriotically interested wizard in the world, the one who has no other larger problems. It's very likely that almost all of his time is spent trying to deal with the counterpart from the enemy side. Either they both avoid interfering because that would cause countless deaths and they're rational and sacrificing both armies is a poor way to save the nations they care about. And if they are interfering they're continually going to be spending time countering the other one, Casting Forbiddence to stop teleportation. Casting Wish to undo some minor catastrophe, trying to scry and die the other wizard. They are likely to use almost all of their resources to counter each other, which is going to leave the ground armies still fighting on the ground or occasionally devastated.

    Edit:

    And 4.) Because the Wizard isn't going to have time to sit around doing sentry duty, or the regular functions of an army, even if he is involved and there is no other wizard, he simply won't have the time to guard, to deal with prisoners of war, to occupy.

    Edit 2.

    It's important to note that these things remain true even in a non-D&D setting with powerful wizards (everything except for the specific spells, although those work well as an example).
    Last edited by AMFV; 2014-08-17 at 09:12 AM.
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    RedWizardGuy

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    I appreciate all the replies. For some reason I was having a hard time wrapping my head around this. Most of your points make perfect sense and incidentally would be nice adventure hooks for a military themed campaign. Even the things I see flaws with are thought provoking.

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    RogueGuy

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    Consider a high level warrior type with a +5 weapon.

    Now consider that same warrior with a +4 weapon, with the 18 thousand gold pieces saved spent on recruiting and outfitting 100 low level mooks. They have varied equipment, but all have crossbows and oil flasks. They are well drilled and have good tactics, using trips, grapples, and every other tool at their disposal as appropriate.

    Which would win?

    The marginal returns that high level characters get are hugely expensive. In comparison an army is cheap.

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    Default Re: Why have armies?

    As the phrase now goes, "you need boots on the ground". Fireball spells and meteor strikes can't take control of a teritory or carry away loot.

    Magic and advanceds technology can however significantly increase your defensive capabilities. Europe and North America are now pretty much impossible to invade. Their ability to destroy approaching planes and ships is just so much higher than any countermeasures any potential enemies have. And with the tech to detect enemy movements on the ground, these can be destroyed from the air or by long range artillery before they get close enough to attack. Unless perhaps someone would attack with massive amounts of troops from all directions at once and hoping at least some get close enough to actually fight.

    And having a couple of high level spellcasters in your army would likely have quite similar effects. Putting some wizards on the city walls to destroy enemy siege engines and hit and run attacks against marching troops would make things really diffcult for any invading army. So any attempted invasion would have to include plans to counter them. Which probably works best by sending out your own wizards to take them out. Once the defending wizards are taken care of, the main army can move in, using conventional warfare methods. Though they would still benefit a lot from magic support. But those supporting wizards would only assist them by punching holes into enemy defenses and taking out enemy leaders. Actually taking a town or castle and subduing the population would still fall to the soldiers. Even with a couple of protection spells, wizards wouldn't be too keen about wandering through unknown buildings where there could be pikemen and archers behind every corner. Except for high level wizards in D&D, spellcasters tend to be quite vulnerable when they get swarmed by half a dozen men with swords.
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