Worst REAL house rules you've used

[Anonymouswizard]

In 2E AD&D wizards did not receive bonus spells for high intelligence, did not receive more than 2 bonus hp per level for high con, and just getting their scrolls took up most of their "wbl" budget.

Fighters on the other hand got leadership skills and a free army, could move and attack with their full attack bonus (depending on which weapons and splats you were using between 3-7 attacks per round at high level), and made their saving throws on a roll of 2-5, which means with moderately high stats and / or a moderately good ring of protection they would make every save on 2+. Also ranged weapons weren't terrible.

Furthermore wizards could not move at all during a turn they intended to cast, lost their dex to AC while casting, and most high level spells were extremely slow. If a wizard was hit (not damaged but hit) by any attack they automatically lost the spell. There was no concentration mechanic, and at the DM's discretion they simply can't cast in distracting conditions like rough weather or while falling.

I am sure there were some TO tricks that wizards could pull off to break the game, but we didn't know about them because it was mostly pre-internet. But given the above, I would be amazed if a party of all casters would fare better than one who had a few meat shields to protect them while they got their spells off.

Note that priests recieve bonus spells for high Wisdom, but they tend to be low-level slots for PC-level scores, and at least means you get more than one casting of Cure Light Wounds at 1st level. But they also didn't get the highest level of magic.

In actual fact Priests were kind of the best characters. 2/3 attack bonus, so good enough to fight with weapons, good spell progression with a unique spell list, and with special powers depending on the deity.

Missed out on Thief Skills and Warrior followers though, which would be important at the levels they come into play (originally meant to be the point you transitioned into a more wargame format).

Actually, I think D&D should make the 'leading armies' bit more important, maybe even make it a key component of 6th Edition. Lots of games allow me to be a hero with a sword, but I can't think of any where having an army of followers is really central. Most games which alllow you to have followers make it more of the 'small squad of redshirts' variety, or maybe a single sidekick.

[noob]

Note that priests recieve bonus spells for high Wisdom, but they tend to be low-level slots for PC-level scores, and at least means you get more than one casting of Cure Light Wounds at 1st level. But they also didn't get the highest level of magic.

In actual fact Priests were kind of the best characters. 2/3 attack bonus, so good enough to fight with weapons, good spell progression with a unique spell list, and with special powers depending on the deity.

Missed out on Thief Skills and Warrior followers though, which would be important at the levels they come into play (originally meant to be the point you transitioned into a more wargame format).

Actually, I think D&D should make the 'leading armies' bit more important, maybe even make it a key component of 6th Edition. Lots of games allow me to be a hero with a sword, but I can't think of any where having an army of followers is really central. Most games which alllow you to have followers make it more of the 'small squad of redshirts' variety, or maybe a single sidekick.

actually in 5e you have so much money that hiring armies becomes reasonable and since you can not do much else with your money I find quite weird there is not more 5e players with armies especially since it counters most monsters through sheer dakka and that if the opponent gets and army you probably have better spells to kill their army than your opponent thus making dnd 5e lopsided in the player favor if they start using armies unless you start having stupidly big enemies armies that are so gigantic that the sum of the loot and of the crs from that army would make you get in epic levels if they were a thing or armies of powerful enemies(like 500 titans who makes their supplies appear out of thin air).

[Lalliman]

I actually first mentioned this idea for #1 here. Nobody seemed to have a problem with it. Nobody in my group had a problem with it either until one of the players realized this system couldn't give him starting stats below 8 or above 16, so he would have had the same problem with 5e point buy.

Then why did you cite it as a rule that has "been described by multiple people as absolutely horrible"?

In general, why are you now defending the rules when I was just agreeing with what you'd seemingly already admitted?

In every party I’ve been this was the rule. Not sure if I would ever join a party where a GM gives different XP for every player.

In DnD parties I play after a while the GM says at the end of session. You all lvl up.

That was a two-month old comment, son. People have already bombarded the poster with that very response.

[Talakeal]

Then why did you cite it as a rule that has "been described by multiple people as absolutely horrible"?

In general, why are you now defending the rules when I was just agreeing with what you'd seemingly already admitted?

I am mostly just making conversation to try and pull this conversation away from the martial vs. caster debate that engulfs is forum.

I am personally on the fence sbout these rules, I thiught they were good ideas when I implemented them but have seen a lot of negstive feedback since, some of which I agree with some of which I dont.

I just thought it was wierd that I didnt get a lot of negative forum feedback before I i plemented the rule but am getting a lot of t after.

I suppose I could try and remember some of my previous DMs house rules if we want something undisputsbly horrible to talk about, that guy was really really bad.

[Anonymouswizard]

actually in 5e you have so much money that hiring armies becomes reasonable and since you can not do much else with your money I find quite weird there is not more 5e players with armies especially since it counters most monsters through sheer dakka and that if the opponent gets and army you probably have better spells to kill their army than your opponent thus making dnd 5e lopsided in the player favor if they start using armies unless you start having stupidly big enemies armies that are so gigantic that the sum of the loot and of the crs from that army would make you get in epic levels if they were a thing or armies of powerful enemies(like 500 titans who makes their supplies appear out of thin air).

Yes, but it's not really central. Let me explain.

Part of the assumption before 3.5 was that characters were adventuring for wealth and power, and this was reflected in the rules. I first encountered this in my dad's old BECM boxed sets, but those are long gone, and so I shall go to my copy of the 2e PhB. The 'adventuring phase' of a characters life is assumed to be up until 8th level, but after that phase is over. You've hit the level of personal power and wealth where you can reasonably claim land and build a castle to rule from.

First off, let's start with the 'generic character', the good old Fighter. At 9th level it is assumed that the fighter has enough fame that people want to follow him, and as such when be builds a stronghold and attracts both everyday soldiers and a personal guard. In oD&D it was assumed that you'd use the Chainmail rules to simulate this army taking to the field, with party-based adventures being a rare occurance (and even then probably using some of your personal guard instead of hired swords). Interestingly it assumes those with more personal power will have less political power, both Paladins (who I think get squat here) and Rangers are worse off in the followers department than Fighters, and Priests and Wizards don't get them at all. In 5e you can hire an army, but there's nothing making it a core feature of the game besides having nothing better to do.

Now I believe these rules were mainly ignored in favour of more adventuring, because mass battle rules weren't a thing in the corebook, but there were attempts to make this kind of play more of a thing (I believe there were three different sets published during 2e's run, including the system in Birthright). One of the sad bits about 3.X and 5e is that they have quite a few of those strategic level spells but none of the armies they were supposed to support (although some of those spells are still broken). Mirage Arcana makes a lot more sense with armies in play, as do massive AoE effects like Meteor Swarm. But all the way from 0e to 2e I can see the idea that a Fighter getting an army is an important thing.

Now back to BECM. I remember there reaching 9/10th level gave your character a choice. They could remain a wanderer, in which case they got a set of benefits (I believe wandering Fighters could become Paladins, Knights, or Avengers, but landed Fighters couldn't), or they could build a stronghold and enter the politcal game (including getting followers for Fighters and I believe Thieves). It was an interesting idea.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I'll say that mass combat scenarios (or hiring a horde of mercenaries) is something I'm glad went away. It's a right royal pain to run at the table. I have yet to see any decent mass-combat rules that preserve the fiction as well as give the players agency without slowing everything down to a crawl.

[noob]

Yes, but it's not really central. Let me explain.

Part of the assumption before 3.5 was that characters were adventuring for wealth and power, and this was reflected in the rules. I first encountered this in my dad's old BECM boxed sets, but those are long gone, and so I shall go to my copy of the 2e PhB. The 'adventuring phase' of a characters life is assumed to be up until 8th level, but after that phase is over. You've hit the level of personal power and wealth where you can reasonably claim land and build a castle to rule from.

First off, let's start with the 'generic character', the good old Fighter. At 9th level it is assumed that the fighter has enough fame that people want to follow him, and as such when be builds a stronghold and attracts both everyday soldiers and a personal guard. In oD&D it was assumed that you'd use the Chainmail rules to simulate this army taking to the field, with party-based adventures being a rare occurance (and even then probably using some of your personal guard instead of hired swords). Interestingly it assumes those with more personal power will have less political power, both Paladins (who I think get squat here) and Rangers are worse off in the followers department than Fighters, and Priests and Wizards don't get them at all. In 5e you can hire an army, but there's nothing making it a core feature of the game besides having nothing better to do.

Now I believe these rules were mainly ignored in favour of more adventuring, because mass battle rules weren't a thing in the corebook, but there were attempts to make this kind of play more of a thing (I believe there were three different sets published during 2e's run, including the system in Birthright). One of the sad bits about 3.X and 5e is that they have quite a few of those strategic level spells but none of the armies they were supposed to support (although some of those spells are still broken). Mirage Arcana makes a lot more sense with armies in play, as do massive AoE effects like Meteor Swarm. But all the way from 0e to 2e I can see the idea that a Fighter getting an army is an important thing.

Now back to BECM. I remember there reaching 9/10th level gave your character a choice. They could remain a wanderer, in which case they got a set of benefits (I believe wandering Fighters could become Paladins, Knights, or Avengers, but landed Fighters couldn't), or they could build a stronghold and enter the politcal game (including getting followers for Fighters and I believe Thieves). It was an interesting idea.

Well that do not change that it is weird that there is not more 5e players who thinks "Oh I have a giant pile of loot and thousands of gold. Maybe I should start recruiting an army"
In 3.5 I do think "maybe an army will be good here" but then I ponder a bit more and think "it would shatter as glass and not even hit the opponent once so I am going to use a distraction army with tons of fake soldiers and some partially real critters among them"
In 5e an army is not a distraction but an actual danger that most of the monsters from the monster manuals are unable to counter properly.
In 5e thanks to bounded accuracy and low maximum armor armies are more powerful than they ever have been before.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Well that do not change that it is weird that there is not more 5e players who thinks "Oh I have a giant pile of loot and thousands of gold. Maybe I should start recruiting an army"
In 3.5 I do think "maybe an army will be good here" but then I ponder a bit more and think "it would shatter as glass and not even hit the opponent once so I am going to use a distraction army with tons of fake soldiers and some partially real critters among them"
In 5e an army is not a distraction but an actual danger that most of the monsters from the monster manuals are unable to counter properly.
In 5e thanks to bounded accuracy and low maximum armor armies are more powerful than they ever have been before.

But armies can't usually go most places since they depend on concentrated firepower on a single target against high-power threats. And armies and dungeons (or caves, or all the usual places adventures really happen, not white rooms of infinite expanse) don't go together well. There's this pesky thing called defeat in detail.

All of these assumptions assume the worst possible tactics and scenario for the monsters and perfect tactics and morale for the army. Neither of which have a place in the fiction.

[noob]

But armies can't usually go most places since they depend on concentrated firepower on a single target against high-power threats. And armies and dungeons (or caves, or all the usual places adventures really happen, not white rooms of infinite expanse) don't go together well. There's this pesky thing called defeat in detail.

All of these assumptions assume the worst possible tactics and scenario for the monsters and perfect tactics and morale for the army. Neither of which have a place in the fiction.

No it just assume you hire 800 soldiers with the highest ranged weapons so that any monster who gets within the range where they can use their own weapon gets in major trouble and you can acquire as well as catapults to siege the dungeons.
I mean only suicidal people enters dungeon.
If the dungeon is underground you can start blocking the entries (from a distance for example by sending carts full of heavy stuff toward the entries) with if possible as many soldiers as possible placed so that they have line of fire in the entry while having the adventurers with teleport ready to act where the biggest monster tries to get out(and everyone getting ready to shoot and manage to have clear lines of fire to the entry for most people) and once the entries are blocked you start planning some stuff for killing everything inside such as earthquake over and over for long periods of time(and you might have used earthquake at the start of blocking the entries).

And trust me soldiers have a good moral if they know they can get resurrected and that each monster they meet gets instagibbed by arrows.

[The Glyphstone]

No it just assume you hire 800 soldiers with the highest ranged weapons so that any monster who gets within the range where they can use their own weapon gets in major trouble and you can acquire as well as catapults to siege the dungeons.
I mean only suicidal people enters dungeon.
If the dungeon is underground you can start blocking the entries(from a distance for example by sending carts full of heavy stuff toward the entries) while having the adventurers with teleport ready to act where the biggest monster tries to get out(and everyone getting ready to shoot and manage to have clear lines of fire to the entry for most people) and once the entries are blocked you start planning some stuff for killing everything inside such as earthquake over and over for long periods of time(and you might have used earthquake at the start of blocking the entries).

Doesn't collapsing the dungeon make it harder to get the treasure? You're going to need to keep paying those armies, after all.

[PhoenixPhyre]

No it just assume you hire 800 soldiers with the highest ranged weapons so that any monster who gets within the range where they can use their own weapon gets in major trouble and you can acquire as well as catapults to siege the dungeons.
I mean only suicidal people enters dungeon.
If the dungeon is underground you can start blocking the entries(from a distance for example by sending carts full of heavy stuff toward the entries) while having the adventurers with teleport ready to act where the biggest monster tries to get out(and everyone getting ready to shoot and manage to have clear lines of fire to the entry for most people) and once the entries are blocked you start planning some stuff for killing everything inside such as earthquake over and over for long periods of time(and you might have used earthquake at the start of blocking the entries).

But can you move those into position yesterday because the princess is going to get eaten today? And armies are big, loud, and obvious. You're denying the monsters any agency--they just have to sit there and watch an army march up over the course of days, building siege engines, etc. A dragon can use hit-and-run tactics to wipe your army out (hint--you can't have them all ready to go all the time, humans need sleep). And you're unlikely to be able to approach a lair quite so simply (armies don't handle mountain ranges without passes very elegantly. Or volcanoes. Or glaciers. Or trackless deserts). And the list goes on. You're assuming perfect conditions for the army and absolute idiocy for the monsters.

Oh, and that the surrounding communities have 800 soldiers, trained with the best ranged weapons (and with those weapons) available for casual hire. This is rarely the case even in the FR. Most of the places the adventures happen are out of the way, forgotten areas with minimal civilized inhabitants. I can't think of a single published adventure that happens somewhere where hiring (and equipping and feeding) 800 soldiers is anywhere near feasible. Soldiers don't come from kiosks, after all.

Edit: and resurrecting 400 soldiers (estimated losses in a more real scenario) requires a crap-ton of diamonds and spell slots. You're looking at 1 rez/high-level cleric/day, and even Resurrection (7th level) doesn't replace missing limbs or vital organs which a dragon's breath would totally destroy. You need true resurrection for that.

And your army is useless against a single wraith. Or a bullette. Or anything that can do hit-and-run tactics in a forest. Or...the list goes on.

[noob]

Doesn't collapsing the dungeon make it harder to get the treasure? You're going to need to keep paying those armies, after all.

It is harder but since most of the treasures have an absurd value it is likely you can get minimum wages workers to do the job(and since you have a caster you can make sure they do not take the gold for themselves with stuff like zone of truth and the fact that people often knows casters can do stuff like that)

Basically as long as you do not meet burrowing creatures you are going to be fine and you could argue that burrowing creatures suffer particularly from earthquakes.

(hint--you can't have them all ready to go all the time, humans need sleep). And you're unlikely to be able to approach a lair quite so simply (armies don't handle mountain ranges without passes very elegantly. Or volcanoes. Or glaciers. Or trackless deserts). And the list goes on. You're assuming perfect conditions for the army and absolute idiocy for the monsters.

A bunch of commoners can already kill a dragon so of course 200 soldiers can: flying makes you a big dumb target and if the dragon is not flying then it is too slow for hit and run and the breath of a dragon is terribly short ranged: basically dragons are the creatures the best countered ever by armies.
and armies while not being elegant according to the rules if a monster peeks his head and that the soliders spots the monster the monster dies to a hail of arrows: there is no rule saying that walking slowly reduce your odds of doing critical strikes.

Oh, and that the surrounding communities have 800 soldiers, trained with the best ranged weapons (and with those weapons) available for casual hire. This is rarely the case even in the FR. Most of the places the adventures happen are out of the way, forgotten areas with minimal civilized inhabitants. I can't think of a single published adventure that happens somewhere where hiring (and equipping and feeding) 800 soldiers is anywhere near feasible. Soldiers don't come from kiosks, after all.

Which is why I spoke of recruiting armies: you walk around and gather armies and manage supply lines(try to make them hard to predict) and if someones tries to stealthily attack your supply lines you have adventurers with teleport which can bring in some soldiers too as well as divination spells and the enemies can not be in really big groups if they want to go undetected by you.

And your army is useless against a single wraith. Or a bullette. Or anything that can do hit-and-run tactics in a forest. Or...the list goes on.

Why do you not burn forests?
Gasp I understood you are playing heroes and not adventurers.
I play adventurers and with players playing adventurers.
The kind of people who thinks "why is there is even an option on firestorm to not burn vegetation. It is not like if we ever wanted to not burn a tree!"

[Anonymouswizard]

I'll say that mass combat scenarios (or hiring a horde of mercenaries) is something I'm glad went away. It's a right royal pain to run at the table. I have yet to see any decent mass-combat rules that preserve the fiction as well as give the players agency without slowing everything down to a crawl.

On the one hand, in the concept of adventuring I completely agree with you. Although I'd love to see hired swords be more of a thing again (and plan to have a few if I ever play 5e again, purely because of the lack of value in gold), in terms of going into the dungeon and bringing your 100+2d20 followers alongside you it's just not worth the trouble.

Which means we likely won't see it in 6e.

However, I maintain the idea of an RPG based around leading groups of people is a good idea. Savage Worlds is a step in the right direction, being designed to run bkirmishes including 50-odd combatants relatively smoothly, but I think we can go beyond that. I am working on the vague idea, because I've had plans for a fantasy game where the PCs are leading a mercenary company and fighting in wars, and one of the things I had to do was cut out the personal scale combat almost entirely. There's rules for dueling, and a PC's stats will affect how formations fight, but D&D-style battles aren't a thing because the focus is elsewhere. Instead there's rules for logistics, supply trains, and forraging, scouting ahead, formations, unit cohesion, unit morale, walking wounded, captives, and other things more suitable for warfare. It's more like a Wargame/RPG hybrid, but I'm trying to swing more towards the latter end of the spectrum and going a bit more narrative (one of the ideas is that units itself aren't incredibly detailed, instead of '200 conscripted archers' you might have a unit of untrained ranged skirmishers at half strength).

[awa]

also you have to pay your soldiers for the time it takes to get to any engagement and all the support staff needed to feed and maintain an army. This is a trick you could pull off maybe once and then all that gold will be spent.

I mean its certainly possible to use an army otherwise armies wouldn't exist but its incredibly trivial to design a dungeon/ adventure that renders an army useless.

Your entire army of archers might get eaten the first time their is a sudden unexpected storm making archery impossible.

[noob]

also you have to pay your soldiers for the time it takes to get to any engagement and all the support staff needed to feed and maintain an army. This is a trick you could pull off maybe once and then all that gold will be spent.

I mean its certainly possible to use an army otherwise armies wouldn't exist but its incredibly trivial to design a dungeon/ adventure that renders an army useless.

Your entire army of archers might get eaten the first time their is a sudden unexpected storm making archery impossible.

there is a spell called weather control.
Even better it is cast able by Druid, Clerics And wizards.

And since gold have absurdly high values and that adventurers gets tons of it then it is rather likely that you can keep that army especially if it increase the number of monsters since it means that the amount of treasure augments since treasure is per monster.
Also if you decide "I am going to kill all the dragons foolish enough to attack the peasants" then you are probably doing a lot more good than by saving 3 hostages.(and you get more gold from that)

[PhoenixPhyre]

A bunch of commoners can already kill a dragon so of course 200 soldiers can: flying makes you a big dumb target and if the dragon is not flying then it is too slow for hit and run and the breath of a dragon is terribly short ranged: basically dragons are the creatures the best countered ever by armies.
and armies while not being elegant according to the rules if a monster peeks his head and that the soliders spots the monster the monster dies to a hail of arrows: there is no rule saying that walking slowly reduce your odds of doing critical strikes.

Which is why I spoke of recruiting armies: you walk around and gather armies and manage supply lines(try to make them hard to predict) and if someones tries to stealthily attack your supply lines you have adventurers with teleport which can bring in some soldiers too as well as divination spells and the enemies can not be in really big groups if they want to go undetected by you.

At that point you're not playing D&D. You're playing a completely different game.

And you're resting very hard on rules that don't say what you think they do. Stock commoners cannot kill a dragon. They hit only on a 20, dealing 1d4 flat damage, only from melee (only proficient in clubs). The dragon can simply sit 10' up and toast them all at his leisure.

You're also ignoring the whole time-pressure thing. Recruiting takes time (lots of time if you have to travel to do so and wait for your (very slow) army to catch up). It takes a huge amount of resources as well. Let's do the math:

800 soldiers (your number) is bare minimum 1600 gp/day (2gp/day for a skilled hireling, and soldiers are skilled). Add in 1gp/soldier/day for rations/accommodations, plus a minimum 50 gp (heavy crossbow)/soldier flat, you're looking at the following:

Day 1: 42,400 gp just to get off the ground. More for spell-casters, drovers, oxen, etc. And if you want them to actually have armor or ammo, you're paying even more.
Day 2+: 2400 gp/day bare minimum.

Considering the best an army can do is probably 15 miles per day (not being roman legions or moving over nice terrain), a 2-day out/2-day siege/2-day back trip would cost a bare minimum of 54,400 gp. Likely costs are going to be triple or quadruple that. And if you have to hire laborers (and feed them, and transport them), you've eaten all your profits. And the princess you came to rescue was dead 3 days ago.

Edit: and more likely you're spending months burning cash while the evil rituals go unhindered and news spreads of these adventurers building an army before you even start. Giving them plenty of time to prepare/move/finish their evil plots.

[noob]

At that point you're not playing D&D. You're playing a completely different game.

And you're resting very hard on rules that don't say what you think they do. Stock commoners cannot kill a dragon. They hit only on a 20, dealing 1d4 flat damage, only from melee (only proficient in clubs). The dragon can simply sit 10' up and toast them all at his leisure.

You're also ignoring the whole time-pressure thing. Recruiting takes time (lots of time if you have to travel to do so and wait for your (very slow) army to catch up). It takes a huge amount of resources as well. Let's do the math:

800 soldiers (your number) is bare minimum 1600 gp/day (2gp/day for a skilled hireling, and soldiers are skilled). Add in 1gp/soldier/day for rations/accommodations, plus a minimum 50 gp (heavy crossbow)/soldier flat, you're looking at the following:

Day 1: 42,400 gp just to get off the ground. More for spell-casters, drovers, oxen, etc. And if you want them to actually have armor or ammo, you're paying even more.
Day 2+: 2400 gp/day bare minimum.

Considering the best an army can do is probably 15 miles per day (not being roman legions or moving over nice terrain), a 2-day out/2-day siege/2-day back trip would cost a bare minimum of 54,400 gp. Likely costs are going to be triple or quadruple that. And if you have to hire laborers (and feed them, and transport them), you've eaten all your profits. And the princess you came to rescue was dead 3 days ago.

1: Armor barely change anything against monsters so the armor part is useless.
2: By destroying all the easy to destroy dungeons I help the kingdom probably way more than by saving the princess especially since by not saving the princess the evil vizier will come into power and evil vizier always have been better at managing kingdoms than regular royalty.
3:Since there is very high amounts of armor on most high level monsters then skilled soldiers do not get significantly better than unskilled hirelings.
4: the longuest range weapon is the longbow and not the heavy crossbow(although it does not change the cost)
5: in fact that total amount of gold is in fact rather low relatively to the gold you can have at that level and if you manage chaining the dungeons fast enough you can probably get good return on your investment.

[awa]

you are making huge assumption about how easy to destroy dungeons are and how close they are to your recruitment grounds.

and yes control weather is a thing which means that the monsters can do it to.

You keep assuming the monsters are entirely static just waiting for you to kill them.

[PhoenixPhyre]

1: Armor barely change anything against monsters so the armor part is useless.
2: By destroying all the easy to destroy dungeons I help the kingdom probably way more than by saving the princess especially since by not saving the princess the evil vizier will come into power and evil vizier always have been better at managing kingdoms than regular royalty.
3:Since there is very high amounts of armor on most high level monsters then skilled soldiers do not get significantly better than unskilled hirelings.
4: the longuest range weapon is the longbow and not the heavy crossbow(although it does not change the cost)
5: in fact that total amount of gold is in fact rather low relatively to the gold you can have at that level and if you manage chaining the dungeons fast enough you can probably get good return on your investment.

1. The minimum is just the cost of the weapon.
2. No. You get outlawed for not saving the princess and the real army comes and whoops your butt.
3. You need them to be skilled just to have proficiency in the weapons. Without that, they're not much use (longbows make poor clubs).
4. Irrelevant, as you say.
5. By the time you're level 17+ (which is what you need for this), you have better things to do than hit up dungeons for petty cash. You don't have nearly this amount of cash by level 11 (unless you're running a monte haul campaign). And remember, you're hauling around hundreds of soldiers for months for even the nearest ones. The proper figure is probably orders of magnitudes higher than that. And none will be recoverable, since you can't even loot the dungeon after you earthquake it. And earthquake doesn't do what you think it does--it destroys structures and puts small cracks in the ground. It doesn't collapse deeply-buried underground caves (unless the DM is being generous).
6. You're also attracting lots of local attention--very few lords are going to look favorably on private armies in their territories. And they already have most of a monopoly on the large bodies of trained soldiers and gear. So no.
7. And you're still assuming absolutely no agency on the part of the monsters/evil beings. They just sit there and wait for you to arrive. More likely, you show up and bombard an empty dungeon, while they snuck out the back 3 weeks before you arrived with all their loot.

[awa]

It is trivial to design dungeons in a way to render an army so impractical that its more liability than benefit or just give the other guys an army big enough to make it a fair fight.

So the only way i could see this being an actual problem is with an adventure path where the dm is unwilling to deviate (that said while i haven't played many adventure paths how many of them give the players the time to find and hire 800 soldiers)

[noob]

2. No. You get outlawed for not saving the princess and the real army comes and whoops your butt.

Why would that happen?
I did not sign any contract saying I had to save the princess.

[PhoenixPhyre]

It is trivial to design dungeons in a way to render an army so impractical that its more liability than benefit or just give the other guys an army big enough to make it a fair fight.

So the only way i could see this being an actual problem is with an adventure path where the dm is unwilling to deviate (that said while i haven't played many adventure paths how many of them give the players the time to find and hire 800 soldiers)

For 5e, I can't think of one where you have the time, resources, or opportunity to find and hire any non-trivial number of soldiers. Not to mention that only the most recent adventure (Mad Mage) even goes beyond level 17 in the first place, the level at which this becomes even remotely doable. And they don't give tons of treasure either; certainly not enough to carry out a plan like this. Or have freely-available dungeons with signs that say "only morons here, come and loot us at your pleasure".

Why would that happen?
I did not sign any contract saying I had to save the princess.

Contracts? Kings don't need contracts. They have armies. Already built, trained, and equipped armies. And more importantly, armies that have competent commanders and logistic trains. Things you don't have. You don't have an army, you have a rabble. And no, those "demonstrations" have the same flaws as your argument--they rely on best-case for the wizard and worst-case for the army. And the example spells are only examples, not some fixed nature of things.

5e does not run by some almighty RAW. The rules (on the DM side) are merely suggestions. You can't weaponize them unless the DM lets you. You're also metagaming horribly (depending on knowing all the details of all the monster stat-blocks). So no.

I'll stop here, since this is far off-topic.

[awa]

you realize the dm controls the npc wizards not you right?
I would be very much surprised if their is a rule that says dm are not allowed to change wizard spells around.

edit seems the thing i was commenting on has been edited out so never mind

[Anonymouswizard]

also you have to pay your soldiers for the time it takes to get to any engagement and all the support staff needed to feed and maintain an army. This is a trick you could pull off maybe once and then all that gold will be spent.

I mean its certainly possible to use an army otherwise armies wouldn't exist but its incredibly trivial to design a dungeon/ adventure that renders an army useless.

Your entire army of archers might get eaten the first time their is a sudden unexpected storm making archery impossible.

True, but if we're going into a dungeon we're not using an army.

More reasonable for a dungeon is 2-5 mercenaries/PC, and a handful of other hirelings and/or donkeys. Working with level 5 PCs, let's assume two lvl 1-2 Mercenaries per PC (2d8HP, +2 proficiency bonus, 12 STR or DEX), equipped witb short swords, spears, and shortbows, as well as one donkey per PC and a hireling to tend to every two Donkies. Assuming 5PCs this gives us ten mercenaries, five donkeys, and three donkey-handlers. The mercenaries have the following jobs: keeping watch (possibly alongside a PC) during the night, protecting the squishies in battle, and providing supporting fire or spearing from the second line. The cost should be about 25gp a day plus supplies, if we assume it takes a week to get to the site, a week to get back, and a week to raid it that means we need to make ~600gp in loot to make a profit, which seems more than reasonable for a 5th level party.

Now if you're raising an army you normally have an objective that requires an army. If you're trying to defeat a dragon you're probably paying your army in shares of the loot, which means you just have to worry about supplies (see if you can deduct the cost of the loot before splitting it up), if you're trying to conquer a region you're betting that the long term benefits of owning it will outweigh the costs of raising an army (plus you might use the immediate proceeds of capturing a region to pay the army to keep fighting).

This is why land is so important. Land gives income that you can use to either raise armies or hire mercenaries (there's arguments in favour of either for what characters would do). This is why players running a mercenary company would be playing a very different game to dungeon raiders, looking for contracts to fight in wars and the like to get enough money to keep going.

EDIT: a note on professional armies, they aren't certain to exist in most settings. Many monarchs will be able to raise an army fairly quickly, as their nobility will raise regiments and have them join the army, but a large standing army is unlikely. However the monarch will have enough professional soldiers to beat you up if you try raising an army on their lands, and the infrastructure that if they catch wind of you trying to raise an army elsewhere they can likely raise a larger army.

Although the D&D tech level is at just the right point for standing armies to be a thing, so it'll depend on how the government is sturctured. There will likely still be a need to raise regiments to fill out numbers, but also enough professional soldiers to be ready to fight quickly, and it could certainly be centrally organised rather than a job of the aristocracy.

[noob]

For 5e, I can't think of one where you have the time, resources, or opportunity to find and hire any non-trivial number of soldiers. Not to mention that only the most recent adventure (Mad Mage) even goes beyond level 17 in the first place, the level at which this becomes even remotely doable. And they don't give tons of treasure either; certainly not enough to carry out a plan like this. Or have freely-available dungeons with signs that say "only morons here, come and loot us at your pleasure".



Contracts? Kings don't need contracts. They have armies. Already built, trained, and equipped armies.

Anyway I am glad I have an army to fight: there is a thread about how a lone player wizard can annihilate an army(the npc wizards do not picks their own spells in fact most monsters lacks the ability to change their own spells) and from the killed army I will get tons of loot and equipment for my army.
And also it does not makes sense: why would the king attack the adventurers as if he excepted the adventurers to save the princess: it can only mean that he did not rely on his own best adventurers which means that his best adventurers are less strong than you and so will not have an easy time protecting their army from you.
I was speaking of liability: I can not be responsible for not saving the princess if I never told I would do that not signed any contract promising to save the princess it is why I spoke of contract: I never signed any contract saying I would save any princess.

Since the king was outlawing me on the basis that I did not save the princess I never said I would save then I can probably also kill the king since it is probably an evil aligned king(he is trying to kill someone which never did anything against him) and then grab the throne.

anyway why would the king ever excepted me to save the princess while what I did previously was burning forests with creatures and filling the dungeons with toxic fumes from some kinds of wood which burns in an horrible way.

[Kurald Galain]

Your entire army of archers might get eaten the first time their is a sudden unexpected storm making archery impossible.

Why would it? A storm would give disadvantage, and everybody knows disad doesn't stack. So adding more bad conditions to the battle doesn't actually hamper the army.

That's the fun part of bounded acc: there are actual rules about DCs and modifiers and ad/disad that counter most of your arguments. It's fine that you choose not to play that way, but by the rules it would absolutely work.

[noob]

Why would it? A storm would give disadvantage, and everybody knows disad doesn't stack. So adding more bad conditions to the battle doesn't actually hamper the army.

That's the fun part of bounded acc: there are actual rules about DCs and modifiers and ad/disad that counter most of your arguments. It's fine that you choose not to play that way, but by the rules it would absolutely work.

I think he was referring to 3.5 rules about winds.

[awa]

Why would it? A storm would give disadvantage, and everybody knows disad doesn't stack. So adding more bad conditions to the battle doesn't actually hamper the army.

That's the fun part of bounded acc: there are actual rules about DCs and modifiers and ad/disad that counter most of your arguments. It's fine that you choose not to play that way, but by the rules it would absolutely work.

luckily 5th edition is a system designed to allow the dm to make judgment calls and they are entirely in their right to say the combination of wind and really heavy rain is so bad no archery.

The rules aren't intended to be a straight jacket these problems usually come up when you treat them like they are.

[PhoenixPhyre]

luckily 5th edition is a system designed to allow the dm to make judgment calls and they are entirely in their right to say the combination of wind and really heavy rain is so bad no archery.

The rules aren't intended to be a straight jacket these problems usually come up when you treat them like they are.

Exactly. The rules (on the DM side) are more like the pirate's code. In this case, the DM has by the books full control over whether an action succeeds or fails. 5e's basic rules go:

1) DM describes a scenario.
2) Player describes an attempted action.
2a) DM decides how to resolve the attempt using the mechanics if necessary.
2b) Resolution based on decided pattern
3) GOTO 1 with changes based on success or failure.

The mechanics are explicitly, word of god, not the final arbiter. In fact, they're there as suggestions for a default set of resolution mechanics, but if other things make more sense or would be more fun, you'd be breaking the real rules not to follow that more sensible/fun alternative.

[The Random NPC]

Exactly. The rules (on the DM side) are more like the pirate's code. In this case, the DM has by the books full control over whether an action succeeds or fails. 5e's basic rules go:

1) DM describes a scenario.
2) Player describes an attempted action.
2a) DM decides how to resolve the attempt using the mechanics if necessary.
2b) Resolution based on decided pattern
3) GOTO 1 with changes based on success or failure.

The mechanics are explicitly, word of god, not the final arbiter. In fact, they're there as suggestions for a default set of resolution mechanics, but if other things make more sense or would be more fun, you'd be breaking the real rules not to follow that more sensible/fun alternative.

No! Bad PheonixPhyre! You do not use GOTO in this manner. SHAME!