DM perspective is this fair? I've been enlightened about guards

[Zanos]

I skimmed the thread and saw a lot of "That's perfectly fair and logical." If they guards know they can't win and are only going to be able to "win" by forcing the other side to have a Pyrrhic victory, why the hell would they fight at all? Guards can't get paid if they're dead. Now if the guards don't know the PCs are powerful, all bets are off and ganging up on one target is a perfectly viable strategy, although it may aggravate your players quite a bit.

As was already mentioned by other people, guards aren't there to stop high level characters. The PCs actions should have consequences, but a regular caravan or general merchant shouldn't have high level guards. Only a very small fraction of people in the world are high leveled. If this is a very expensive shipment or a magic item merchant, all bets are off. But that sounds like the kind of thing you'd hire a group of well known adventurers to protect, not a bunch of regular people who just want to get paid and go home to their families.

High Level PC's should feel powerful. Guards aren't a threat to them unless they have a hilarious amount of numbers. Now if the PC's make a habit of pushing guards around and doing whatever they want, there will be consequences, but those consequences shouldn't be "The grain merchant can now afford 10th level guards." But they're dipping into somebodies pockets by screwing around, and when there's enough money and somebody you want dead...

[jiriku]

I finally reached a conclusion, guards aren't there to kill all foes against them, they are there to cost their foes losses.

Hiring guards for your caravan is a deterrent, like putting a lock on your front door. The lock won't stop every thief, but it will stop casual criminals who aren't skilled and motivated. The lock reduces the size of the pool of people who could potentially rob you. The guards will stop casual brigands, those who aren't seasoned combatants willing to risk death for the goods in the caravan. The guards reduce the size of the pool of people who could potentially rob you.

Let's assume foes are the players at this time. Would it be fair for the guards to gang up on one PC at a time specifically trying to kill them?

From the DM's perspective, yes it is fair. You are expected to play NPC threats according to their Intelligence, training, and background. Concentrating your forces is such a basic military principle that even poorly trained guards have probably been exposed to the idea, at least. The answer changes if your guards have never worked together, are all Chaotic in alignment, or don't like/trust one another, but in the default case they'd be expected to use team tactics.

The reasoning would be if the threat of one of the party members dying is very very real the party would not be so careless. From the guards perspective, they know they won't succeed in killing all the attackers, so why not seriously kill one.

Although I agree on the fairness, I'm not sure I follow your reasoning. Caravan guards do not have any interest in encouraging their attackers to avoid carelessness. Nor are they likely to know that they are doomed until the fight is already joined and clearly going against them. And the perspective of "no man kills me and lives!" is one that not every caravan guard will share, although some might. Most would just run once it became clear the fight was hopeless. I think it's more likely that caravan guards would gang up on someone because they think it will help them win the fight.

[Chronos]

Even most animals are smart enough to gang up on one target at a time. At least, social animals (which are the ones you're most likely to encounter in groups anyway). The only difference is that an animal isn't smart enough to do as good a threat assessment as a human is.

And remember, even if the guards are so hopelessly outclassed that they can't possibly win, they don't know that. At least, not until the combat actually starts and they have a chance to see how it's going. If the party attacks a caravan, they're probably going to assume that you're just low-level brigands, and not hesitate to fight you.

[Knaight]

I skimmed the thread and saw a lot of "That's perfectly fair and logical." If they guards know they can't win and are only going to be able to "win" by forcing the other side to have a Pyrrhic victory, why the hell would they fight at all? Guards can't get paid if they're dead. Now if the guards don't know the PCs are powerful, all bets are off and ganging up on one target is a perfectly viable strategy, although it may aggravate your players quite a bit.

I'd expect surrender would be an earlier option, but if they're getting attacked and are already stuck in the fight, trying to take someone down with them is an entirely sensible way to go about things.

[nedz]

I'd expect surrender would be an earlier option, but if they're getting attacked and are already stuck in the fight, trying to take someone down with them is an entirely sensible way to go about things.

Well morale roles are a thing — just not in 3.5

[jedipotter]

And remember, even if the guards are so hopelessly outclassed that they can't possibly win, they don't know that. At least, not until the combat actually starts and they have a chance to see how it's going. If the party attacks a caravan, they're probably going to assume that you're just low-level brigands, and not hesitate to fight you.

How don't the guards know that?

Take like Thor:The Dark world as an example. The jail guards watch Kurse blast out of the cell and start to slaughter everyone. Yet they run up and do the ''for Asgard'' and die. Yet, you'd think they would know ''well ok, we are dead'', right?

How about the thugs a bit before, the ones ''making the Nine Realms full of Chaos''. They attack Thor, as if they have a chance of even hurting him, let alone killing him. then they all give up once Thor kills that rock giant. Guess it was the first giant Thor ever killed right? The same goes for the ones that escape. They run up to Thor and attack, like they have a chance.

It's like the Ye Old Superman Tv show. The bad guys would always shoot Superman, even though everyone knew he was bullet proof. So the bullets just bounced off him. And then they would throw the gun at Superman, and he would duck.

[heavyfuel]

To answer OP's question, yes it's fair. Have you ever seen a party not focus fire? I haven't. So there's no reason guards shouldn't also do the same.

I will agree, however, with the people saying that having a small army guiding a caravan is stupid, and that guards shouldn't throw themselves at swords because that just makes them dead and unable to receive payment.

why are all your guards low level :\

their job is literally to participate in encounters all day every day, get paid for it with a monthly stipend, and that doesnt count bribes and or random stuff dropped from criminals that isnt catalogued. I dont see why a guard has to be low level when level one characters level up doing less than them.

Maybe the Dmg says otherwise, but if it does you should discount that. Theres nothing within ranges 1-8 that players will do that it isnt perfectly ordinary for people to expect guards to do as well... So, rather than murdering players with focused fire, why not make some of those guards a higher level an make it a fair fight :D

Completely agree. I usually run "high-power-E6" games (sounds contradictory, but basically every one worth a damn is lv6 with PC class levels) and guess what? ALL guards are lv 6. If they're regular guards, Lv6 Fighters, if they're elite, Lv6 Mystic Ranger with "Extra Spell: Faerie Fire" for those pesky Rogues.

This makes it incredibly difficult to anyone to do anything in the face of a guard. The way it should be! If the castle guards are lv1 Warriors, then the lv6 Rogue can sneak past them 100% of the time, making them useless 100% of the time, as all it takes is a single theft from the treasury to not only break WBL but also send the entire kingdom into disarray.

You want to go on a crime spree, do it outside the sight of the guards, be that in a slums, be that out of town. But guards are there to guard, not to be insignificant obstacles.

Then why the hell does anyone need adventurers to do anything?

While this was directed at jedipotter, the same question could be asked me. So here's my preemptive answer

Adventurers can still be strong. Even in an E6 game, the guards might be lv6, but you're also lv6 with a dozen feats to boot. That makes you inherently more powerful than them, but not enough to take down a whole army by yourself. Dungeoneering knowledge (not the skill) also helps you excel in situations where guards aren't optimal.

Outside of this, on the few regular games I ran (note that I'm a firm believer that D&D completely and absolutely breaks after lv 11) elite guards were lv7 Mystic Rangers with the eventual Mindbender Wizard with Mindsight. There's no reason a regular joe won't want to be as good at his job as possible. This translates into optimizing so they can be the best possible guards they can be. But even then, a lv 11 PC would still be stronger than these guys. So that's where adventurers come in again.

[Zanos]

Completely agree. I usually run "high-power-E6" games (sounds contradictory, but basically every one worth a damn is lv6 with PC class levels) and guess what? ALL guards are lv 6. If they're regular guards, Lv6 Fighters, if they're elite, Lv6 Mystic Ranger with "Extra Spell: Faerie Fire" for those pesky Rogues.

This makes it incredibly difficult to anyone to do anything in the face of a guard. The way it should be! If the castle guards are lv1 Warriors, then the lv6 Rogue can sneak past them 100% of the time, making them useless 100% of the time, as all it takes is a single theft from the treasury to not only break WBL but also send the entire kingdom into disarray.

You want to go on a crime spree, do it outside the sight of the guards, be that in a slums, be that out of town. But guards are there to guard, not to be insignificant obstacles.

That depends entirely on the style of game you're running. In my opinion high level characters should be rare, and being a double or high single digit leveled character is an accomplishment. You're important because you can accomplish things that other people can't.

Also, unless they just leave the vault open and conveniently have cover right in front of the door, they rogue shouldn't be able to sneak past. You need cover to hide, and he still needs to be able to pick the lock, which could also be magically sealed in addition to being of supreme craftsmanship. And I really don't see a problem with someone technically capable of taking on hell's bodyguards(Bearded Devils, CR 5) being able to sneak past castle guards.

[heavyfuel]

That depends entirely on the style of game you're running. In my opinion high level characters should be rare, and being a double or high single digit leveled character is an accomplishment. You're important because you can accomplish things that other people can't.

I've ranted about this once or twice. The problem with this is that it leads to one of two scenarios:

#1: Players take forever to level up, because leveling up should be difficult (aka, not everyone is high level). This is incredibly boring because that means they'll have to spend many real-life encounters stuck at the same level and that gets boring very fast, especially when you can only meet twice a month.

#2: Every NPC is daft. If the PCs can reach high levels rather quickly, why can't the NPCs? Are they stupid? If people can get rich and strong after just a few weeks of kicking goblin ass why isn't EVERYONE strong? Unless I'm missing something here, there's no reason why this shouldn't be the case.

Also, unless they just leave the vault open and conveniently have cover right in front of the door, they rogue shouldn't be able to sneak past. You need cover to hide, and he still needs to be able to pick the lock, which could also be magically sealed in addition to being of supreme craftsmanship. And I really don't see a problem with someone technically capable of taking on hell's bodyguards(Bearded Devils, CR 5) being able to sneak past castle guards.

Lack of cover is pretty much a moot point since every Rogue worth his salt has HiPS from one source or another. Even at E6 lvs its possible (though harder) but then its just substituted for a Use Activated item of Invisibility. An AMF could work, but at the worlds I run they're incredibly rare (minimum lv11 to cast one, lv11 chars are extremely rare).

[awa]

npcs run on different rules then pcs that why they don't level. Pcs have ecl npcs have cr they arnt the same and they don't work the same.

edit nothing says you need to allow custom magic items and hide in plain sight is hard to get at level 6. Even with hips detect magic can be used not to mention if you just stick some guards in front of the door he cant open it without alerting them to his presence and once they know hes there they have a lot of options to stop a sneaking rouge.

[Zanos]

I've ranted about this once or twice. The problem with this is that it leads to one of two scenarios:

#1: Players take forever to level up, because leveling up should be difficult (aka, not everyone is high level). This is incredibly boring because that means they'll have to spend many real-life encounters stuck at the same level and that gets boring very fast, especially when you can only meet twice a month.

#2: Every NPC is daft. If the PCs can reach high levels rather quickly, why can't the NPCs? Are they stupid? If people can get rich and strong after just a few weeks of kicking goblin ass why isn't EVERYONE strong? Unless I'm missing something here, there's no reason why this shouldn't be the case.

Leveling up is difficult because those people aren't special. They're average. They have average ability scores. Their levels are in NPC classes. They aren't exceptional. Even few exceptional people make it past early levels when they decide to go out and fight orcs, as 4-15 HP does not respond particularly well to crossbow bolts and falchions. It's lethal. People die, even adventurers. People with average ability scores and NPC classes die more. I guess your adventurer could care enough about their squishy parts to just stay home, but then they're not really interesting to play. D&D (in my view) isn't about the average people. It's about the top 5%(roughly) of gifted people.


Also, if there are only six levels, how is that less boring? I guess you get a feat, but that's not nearly as interesting as a level in many classes.

Lack of cover is pretty much a moot point since every Rogue worth his salt has HiPS from one source or another. Even at E6 lvs its possible (though harder) but then its just substituted for a Use Activated item of Invisibility. An AMF could work, but at the worlds I run they're incredibly rare (minimum lv11 to cast one, lv11 chars are extremely rare).

Do you only limit your players to six levels?
My point about fighting hell's bodyguards and not being able to get into the vault still both stand.

[heavyfuel]

Leveling up is difficult because those people aren't special. They're average. They have average ability scores. Their levels are in NPC classes. They aren't exceptional. Even few exceptional people make it past early levels when they decide to go out and fight orcs, as 4-15 HP does not respond particularly well to crossbow bolts and falchions. It's lethal. People die, even adventurers. People with average ability scores and NPC classes die more. I guess your adventurer could care enough about their squishy parts to just stay home, but then they're not really interesting to play. D&D (in my view) isn't about the average people. It's about the top 5%(roughly) of gifted people.

Also, if there are only six levels, how is that less boring? I guess you get a feat, but that's not nearly as interesting as a level in many classes.

I suppose this makes some sense, but there's still no reason a group of average lv2 guys can't go out and deal with some CR1 encounters. They'll level up slower, and be one lv behind in wealth, but overall they'll still be richer than when they started and a it stronger. It might not be as I said, but even a group composed of standard array lv2 Warrior, Expert, and Adept*2 can pretty much anything an Elite-array (the average adventurer from the PHB) adventurer party can do at lv 1.

Hmmm.. Don't think there's a boredom problem there... I don't know about you, but I love me loads of feats. It allows for SO much flexibility when you're no longer bound to a single measly feat every 3 levels. It's quite refreshing being able to build a character picking from a variety of flavorful but not so effective feats instead of always spending 4 out 7 base feats of Power Attack, Imp BR, Leap Attack and Shock Trooper (or whatever combo you pick for your particular build)

Do you only limit your players to six levels?
My point about fighting hell's bodyguards and not being able to get into the vault still both stand.

What? Of course not. When not playing E6 players usually reach lv 11+ before the adventure ends. I do think these last few levels are broken as hell though.

And they can't really defeat hell's bodyguards. If they all gang up on a single one? Sure. But when's the last time you saw a bodyguard alone? Even if the SRD says they can be found solitarily, I don't think it's a fair assessment that they'll be alone when guarding hell/lower planes.

[Synar]

Just one point: if caravan guards are mid to high level, then it would be probable that there is an esay access to at least one high level wizard, and then why not just teleport the caravan rather than pay a bunch of elite (costly) guards to protect (and risk losing) it during its (long) travel? Also why not make it a flying or underwater caravan to protect against most ennemies if such high level magic is not accessible (for exemple if mid level is common but high level is very rare)? And why not put illusions over the caravan? Also, bags of holdings for discretion (paired with invisiblity cloaks)*?

My point is that if mid-high level guards are common enough that you can afford to pay them, you should not expect your caravan to be any sort of classic caravan, or a caravan at all.



*(As one or small group of invisible flying guys without cargo is much more difficult to detect and attack than a normal caravan)

[Hazrond]

Just one point: if caravan guards are mid to high level, then it would be probable that there is an esay access to at least one high level wizard, and then why not just teleport the caravan rather than pay a bunch of elite (costly) guards to protect (and risk losing) it during its (long) travel? Also why not make it a flying or underwater caravan to protect against most ennemies if such high level magic is not accessible (for exemple if mid level is common but high level is very rare)? And why not put illusions over the caravan? Also, bags of holdings for discretion (paired with invisiblity cloaks)*?

My point is that if mid-high level guards are common enough that you can afford to pay them, you should not expect your caravan to be any sort of classic caravan, or a caravan at all.



*(As one or small group of invisible flying guys without cargo is much more difficult to detect and attack than a normal caravan)

You would only need one person, just get ALOT of bags and go inception style (the rules dont say you cant, just be careful, if this goes in a portable hole reality will break) top it all off with a Hewards Handy Haversack and it will summon items from the deepest depths of the bag chain at a whim

[ddude987]

The thing about bearded devils is cr 5 really means 1 of that monster is adequate for a standard 4 person party at level 5.

[Mystia]

I think it's also worth mentioning that, depending on how precious is the caravan's cargo, how much money can the merchants taking part on it pool, and how much they're expecting to profit... The caravan is likely to have adventurers as guards. If they happen to be transporting several magic items, a powerful one, or just something really important, chances are that they'll hire some of the best to protect them from the undefined dangers of travelling. And usually, that means an adventuring party. And that means, yes, they'll use a lot of tactics, and ganging up on one at a time is going to be the least of an attacker's problems.

That is considering that your party wants to attack an caravan because they have something valuable, required for their current quest, or something like that. Of course, mundane caravans, carrying boring items, should have guards as mundane and boring as their cargo. Like others said, just to keep away most bandits and people who would rob them should they be unguarded. I agree wholeheartedly with who said that, faced with an obviously stronger enemy, most "common" guards would flee or surrender.

In a mundane caravan, guarded by mundane guards, they're expecting bandits, a single troll, and similar, and will probably fight the threat, since their training - more often than not - is enough for that. Now, if said mundane caravan was attacked by an adult red dragon, don't you doubt that the guards would flee just as quickly as the merchants, even if they made that save versus Frightful Presence. Most people value their lives way more than money, at least if they can't afford resurrection.

This is how I, personally, see combat between high level adventurers and common caravan guards happening:

Spoiler

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First, the party probably strikes from the woods or something. Chances are they are getting that surprise round, and dropping a couple guards. In the confusion that being attacked out of the blue provoked, the guards attack the closest enemies, 1v1 or 2v1 at best, since they don't know how strong their foes are. The next round, chances are more guards die. The ones left realize that this is no common enemy, and that they'll need better tactics to win this fight. The most experienced guards left order the rest to form some sort of battle formation, be it a shield wall, a position in which they can flank the melee fighters without being flanked, or else - but yes, this is the first moment they should be able to acknowledge the enemy's strength, and may start to gang up on one target at a time. However, should their new tactic also fail and only bring more death to their side, it'll be as clear as day that it's a lost fight. Next comes fleeing or surrender.

I think the guards would act like how I described above simply because they won't understand how powerful is their enemy from the get-go, unless they can recognize it as something clearly superior to their abilities, akin to my dragon example from earlier.

[Zanos]

The thing about bearded devils is cr 5 really means 1 of that monster is adequate for a standard 4 person party at level 5.

A level 6 rogue is CR 6. They should be able to win against a single bearded devil more than half of the time. The CR system doesn't work as intended so that probably won't be true, but the intent is that one of them is roughly equivalent in strength to a level 5 PC.

[MrConsideration]

If they're attacking the caravan at a level where the resulting battle is easy, surely the wealth plundered will be substantially smaller than what the adventurers could earn in a dungeon of the right challenge level? Make your PCs plunder several tonnes of grain, ceramics or lumber, or some other heavy, low-value commodity not suited to adventuring. If the caravan is carrying gold bullion, silk or magic items, people would expend money on a mix of lower-level mooks and the occasional adventuring group to protect their investment. Throw in boring guards and then a bizarre adventuring group to back them up.

NPCs don't earn their levels. Maybe Guard Rodgar spent his entire life doing drills and sparring - it still allows him to be a reasonably competent combatant. Maybe before becoming a Guard he was a soldier and saw numerous real combats, surving by pluck, guile and skill. Sure, he's not an adventurer, but he could be more than a speed-bump with numbers on his side. As for ganging up, this isn't a dramatic combat where player-character death would have much meaning - let them win and feel powerful, and have the consequences be further complications.

A caravan robbery has loads of other complications that add to the drama even if the initial fight if trivial: if anyone escapes, your PCs are now outlaws and might have to face being hunted by a more powerful force from a nearby authority, or be denied entrance to local settlements or be sanctioned by local merchants. Maybe they capture individuals travelling with the caravans who are vulnerable and now stranded, unguarded, in the wilderness. If your players are Evil or amoral make some of the travelers plot hooks. Low-level banditry could remind a high-level character of just how powerful he is before steering the party to a more appropriate challenge.

With the RAW guards, how do these communities survive the antagonistic wildlife, monsters and vast empires specifically trying to wipe them out (Drow, Ithilid etc) who possess numerous high-level characters?

[PersonMan]

I suppose this makes some sense, but there's still no reason a group of average lv2 guys can't go out and deal with some CR1 encounters. They'll level up slower, and be one lv behind in wealth, but overall they'll still be richer than when they started and a it stronger. It might not be as I said, but even a group composed of standard array lv2 Warrior, Expert, and Adept*2 can pretty much anything an Elite-array (the average adventurer from the PHB) adventurer party can do at lv 1.

Most people, even if they could theoretically go out fighting for loot, won't. When an Adept can just offer spells to make a good living, and an Expert can just take some Profession or Craft ranks. The Warrior can offer his services as a man-at-arms or guard.

They can all have a relatively good living, except without risking their lives in numerous deadly battles.

Sure, some will have the mentality needed to go adventuring, but that will be a subset of those talented enough to. There will be a caste of people with the talent and experience to have many levels, but they won't be numerous enough to guard every caravan or fort or gate.

[bekeleven]

These guards were actually contracted through Elminster security. Sure, they're all level 2. But if one sees a threat he can't handle, he snaps his Elminster Token©, and help is guaranteed within 3 rounds or your money back!

More cost effective than hiring Elminster personally for every caravan...

[malonkey1]

Honestly i think that the guards should gang up on the fighter first, until they actually KNOW a guy is a mage then they can only see the wall of muscle thats charging their line and at that point its a more reasonable plan to actually kee fighting the fighter, remember guys there are no such things as "Tiers" in the actual game world, they wouldnt know that the fighter is so much less powerful than the wizard and would probably focus on what aears to be the biggest threat, the fighter (at least till the wizard pulls some flashy crowd control like black tentacles or something)

Well, you can often tell a wizard by their clothes (they usually wear all sorts of weird robes), and honestly, I'd go for the soft target in a group, exploiting their vulnerabilities, so even if I'm not able to tell who's a wizard, I'm going to stab the wimp before I stab the big guy, because there's a reason that a big badass guy like the fighter would let Noodles McGee follow him around, either as an escort (unlikely in a robbery), or he has some vital skill that Badass Fighter lacks (magic, lockpicking, tracking, etc.) and needs. Ergo, attack Noodles, you put Badass on the defensive.

[Stella]

So, I'm not going to say that this philosophy is out right wrong, but I see two problems you'll need to contend with.

1. Piling on rather than reacting to the closest threat goes against natural instincts. It's the kind of thing that will really need to be drilled into someone. This makes it more suitable to fanatics than work-a-day guards and raises the question of whether this training time could have been raising their character level rather than drilling tactics.

If anyone asks about the "why" and gets an honest answer; they're being told that they're expendable trash. This will probably be bad for morale.

I disagree. Fighting smart is the way to give the group the largest possibility of survival. That is the "honest answer" they should be given if they ask why they should fight smart. Yes, this may mean that any particular guard might be ordered to do something which is best for the group but which might not be so great for them at the time. Any professional should recognize that they also might be the recipient of orders which help them at the risk of their fellows, and should be willing to do the same for their comrades.

2. By trying to inflict a death rather than win they may be hurting their chance of winning and also risk provoking escalation. Going out of your way to kill one attacker increases the odds that your enemy will not accept surrender, use coup de graces, and chase you down and kill you to the last man possibly desecrate corpses.

Unless the attackers are just skirmishing in to grab what they can and then withdraw there isn't much of an escalation beyond "These attackers are trying to kill us off so they can loot the caravan we're supposed to guard." If the attackers are using deadly force (shooting arrows, casting spells, inflicting damage which isn't of the non-lethal type) then there should be no hesitation for the guards to act intelligently rather than hesitating for fear that things might "escalate."

The bottom line should be that the guards should act with the level of professionalism which is appropriate to them, their history, and the merchant(s) who hired them. Which should mean that a group of six unrelated guards who were picked up just before the caravan left town will act appropriately. Not as a team, more interested in their own hides than their fellow guards, and not terribly concerned with the merchant's goods. They are there mostly as a deterrent, because six men with loaded crossbows and some armor and weapons are typically a decent deterrent to the typical bandit gang of poorly armed and armored outlaws who might be more interested in where their next meal is coming from than in taking on an armed group and facing the attrition which will surely ensue. And these six guards are being paid appropriately, and are guarding goods of an appropriate value as well.

A more established trading house which employs permanent guards and which regularly transports valuable goods through dangerous territory should have guards with much more discipline and esprit de corps, and these guards should act for the best benefit of the group and to protect the goods of the merchants, and should be well aware that their continued employment is dependent upon demonstrating an appropriate level of loyalty to their employer.

Well morale roles are a thing — just not in 3.5

Any good DM uses common sense to rule these things. The animal who attacks should typically run before fighting to the death, unless perhaps it has young who are threatened. This is how animals act in the real world, and unless the particular animal has a reason to act differently it should act appropriately. A group of lesser goblinoids should also break and run rather than force a fight where one side or the other is wiped out, probably about the time they take ~30% losses if they haven't managed to inflict any casualties of their own. They are clearly outmatched, and while having them fight to the finish will drain the party of more resources it doesn't promote much in the way of immersion or suspension of disbelief. Not many groups, even trained soldiers, will fight to the death rather than retreating when they find that they are clearly outmatched. At this point the teachings of Sun Tsu can be called into play. If the party pursues and methodically hacks down the broken and fleeing remnants, it's absolutely fine to have them turn and fight to the death out of desperation.

When you surround an army, leave an outlet free. Do not press a desperate foe too hard.

[Stella]

A level 6 rogue is CR 6. They should be able to win against a single bearded devil more than half of the time. The CR system doesn't work as intended so that probably won't be true, but the intent is that one of them is roughly equivalent in strength to a level 5 PC.

I think you have this fairly wrong. The CR system is designed to determine which encounters a party of 4 consisting of a Fighter, a Cleric, a Rogue, and a Wizard of a certain level should be able to beat 3 of per day. Not which single party member should be able to beat which single encounter half of the time. If you reduce it to a single person vs. encounter fight you have broken the system beyond any recognition of the intent for its use. It isn't a perfect system by any means, but it works far better if used as intended than if used well outside of the scope of the intent.

[Story]

they usually wear all sorts of weird robes

Says who? There's no mechanical reason for Wizards to wear robes unless they're a magical item. Guess it's just tradition, but I'm sure some Wizards would prefer not to stand out so much.

Or alternatively, they might want to stand out in a different way (this was the inspiration for my first Wizard character).

[Douglas]

2. By trying to inflict a death rather than win

Teaming up to take down one party member at a time is their best chance of winning. The reason this does not match real world tactics well is that in the real world a single wound is very commonly lethal or at least crippling.

In the real world, if each guard has a 50% chance of inflicting a serious wound in a given time interval, 10 guards pairing off 1v1 with 10 assailants will on average take 5 of their opponents out, while all 10 teaming up on 1 guy will almost certainly take out that 1 but no more than that. Teaming up more than a little bit is usually redundant and wasteful.

In D&D past the extreme low levels, that "serious wound" is merely a fraction of the target's hit points and has no effect on his capabilities at all. 10 guards pairing off 1v1 will on average accomplish nothing meaningful, while all 10 teaming up on 1 will likely actually take that 1 out, thereby reducing the enemy's immediate combat ability. Teaming up a lot is vastly more effective.

Teaming up like this, in D&D, should be the default tactic of any group of trained combatants with significant discipline. Exceptions may exist for specific combatants who use non-damage based disabling or hindering techniques, or if necessary for specific objectives, but they are just that - exceptions.

[Fizban]

Was just gonna quote one but,

Though there is a twist, as you could make the merchant caravan an ''official encounter''. And once you do that, you can make the guards anything the DM wants.

I think it's also worth mentioning that, depending on how precious is the caravan's cargo, how much money can the merchants taking part on it pool, and how much they're expecting to profit... The caravan is likely to have adventurers as guards.
This is how I, personally, see combat between high level adventurers and common caravan guards happening:

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First, the party probably strikes from the woods or something. Chances are they are getting that surprise round, and dropping a couple guards. In the confusion that being attacked out of the blue provoked, the guards attack the closest enemies, 1v1 or 2v1 at best, since they don't know how strong their foes are. The next round, chances are more guards die. The ones left realize that this is no common enemy, and that they'll need better tactics to win this fight. The most experienced guards left order the rest to form some sort of battle formation, be it a shield wall, a position in which they can flank the melee fighters without being flanked, or else - but yes, this is the first moment they should be able to acknowledge the enemy's strength, and may start to gang up on one target at a time. However, should their new tactic also fail and only bring more death to their side, it'll be as clear as day that it's a lost fight. Next comes fleeing or surrender.

I think the guards would act like how I described above simply because they won't understand how powerful is their enemy from the get-go, unless they can recognize it as something clearly superior to their abilities, akin to my dragon example from earlier.

If they're attacking the caravan at a level where the resulting battle is easy, surely the wealth plundered will be substantially smaller than what the adventurers could earn in a dungeon of the right challenge level? Make your PCs plunder several tonnes of grain, ceramics or lumber, or some other heavy, low-value commodity not suited to adventuring. If the caravan is carrying gold bullion, silk or magic items, people would expend money on a mix of lower-level mooks and the occasional adventuring group to protect their investment. Throw in boring guards and then a bizarre adventuring group to back them up.

I also liked Mystia's sample combat, but the main thing I wanted to respond with is that Arms and Equipment Guide actually has a section on merchant caravans, and this is exactly what it says to do: the caravan guards make up an Encounter Level such that the goods are an appropriate treasure for the encounter. This doesn't quite work since it ignores the fact that humanoid NPC guards need NPC WBL just to keep their CR even remotely plausible and thus already overload the treasure, but I guess it's the thought that counts? Guard animals and mounts, especially if trained to only obey certain owners or cryptic commands, could fill out the encounter without boosting the treasure. Or you could compensate by lowering the value/weight ratio until it's not even worth filling a Bag of Holding: even a cheap cart holds more than a Bag and if the horse won't listen to you it's gonna be hard to get back to town, and then the buyer sees someone he doesn't know (and if they jump through the hoops for another encounter or so then they can get the money!). And naturally any super exotic or magical load would have hired adventurers to guard it, that's a standard filler/hook/whatever quest the PCs could be doing themselves.

Also like this line:

Low-level banditry could remind a high-level character of just how powerful he is before steering the party to a more appropriate challenge.

The rate of level-gains mentioned above is a serious problem with my own immersion. In order for professional adventurers to make any sense one has to assume that the bulk of time is either spent just hanging around waiting for the next big score, or doing the low-level trivial jobs that still pay out enough to rent the whole inn without exposing themselves to any real risk. I'm basically playing a chaotic good murder-hobo, so if she's survived aggressively hunting evil for years and is only level 9 then most of her time must be spent on level 1 thugs worth no xp. But since that happened before the game started and most published adventures I've seen don't leave any real downtime, the part where you go around Batman-ing cheap thugs is sadly undocumented. Evil chararacters knocking over the corner store (for peanuts) or good characters swatting bandits who didn't expect them should happen more often.

[rexx1888]

The vast majority of guarding is standing or walking around keeping an eye on things. It's hardly constant violence.

the hell kind of job do you lot think guarding is in dnd world :\ adventurers are supposed to be rare right, thats what makes them special. In that case, that means all the lairs, thieves, murderers etc are all doing their thing until adventurers turn up and the random folks on guard have to deal with it themselves. Its got nothing to do with encounter tables. No one in dnd world looks at a guard an goes "oh, your twelfth level, better pay you more". They go "oh, your good at your job, well give you a bonus this week". What sets adventurers apart is not what they are doing, its the fact that they are choosing to do it. What sets a guard apart from everyone else is almost the same thing, except they were looking for a day job to pay for the medicine to look after their sick grandparents instead of thinking it was a good idea to raid the nearest dragon den (An thats not even counting the fact that half the PC classes would feel perfectly at home guarding things(like say a paladin of st Cuthbert, or a bored fighter, or a bard that wanted some stories or any other number of class choices).

there is no sane reason why normal npc's cant be a little higher level. They arent going to make the PC's look bad by doing it. NPC classes are rubbish, so a few extra levels of them doesnt suddenly turn an NPC into an adventurer. Just makes it a bit more of a challenge. Then you use tactics as well. We arent talking about making every guard a level ten swordsage multiclassed into sorceror with levels in JPM. Were talking about a lvl 7 warrior with a few points in INT so he can actually be competent at his job when some random thief rocks up and decides to knock over the nearest magic item shop. Yeesh, what kind of wierdo incompetent filled campaign worlds are half of you playing in :p ... ok maybe a little too much hyperbole in that last paragraph, sorry if it offends, thats not the plan. point still stands though.... even if it does mean i agree with jedipotter for once :\

[mr_odd]

A weakened enemy is still a threat; a dead enemy isn't. (Exception: Undead).

This is now one of my new mottos.

[CombatOwl]

In the world of DnD where wizards sling fireballs (except if you're on this board) and fighters cry in the corner slay demons and dragons, your average guardsman is quite useless. I've seen many-a-thread about the point of guards, and I always thought to myself "they kinda are useless." I finally reached a conclusion, guards aren't there to kill all foes against them, they are there to cost their foes losses.

I dunno about you, but I have wrecked many a low level party with nothing but a few low-CR guards with crossbows. Guards are there to be a threat to low level parties.

[Anachronity]

In real life guards actually don't lead very active lives for the most part. You could live your whole life as a police officer and never experience a single shootout, and yet it takes (very roughly) 15 to 20 encounters to gain a level in the D&D world.

It would make sense that PCs, who go out and actively seek danger, would be higher level than guards, who stand around waiting for danger to come to them. Most of their levels will be from training rather than active experience. As a general rule of thumb (found nowhere in any book) I would say that the maximum level attainable for typical training (i.e. not monk-like dedication to living a life of martial mastery) is the square root of the mentor's level, meaning that experience is the most important factor.

That being said, caravan guards are probably more experienced than most because
1: Merchant caravans are often poorly guarded compared to the wealth they contain, making them more attractive to bandits and the like.
2: Random encounters are a thing in D&D, and a caravan is going to attract much more attention than a small group of people.

I would personally represent caravan guards as an exception to the wealth by level: Their experience puts them at a higher level than, say, temple guards who are just there to look intimidating and scare off the riff-raff. However, their lack of association with a wealthy noble would mean that they probably have less expensive equipment (unless the merchant is doing particularly well and really wants well-outfitted guards).

When dealing with frequent danger, the rational human response is to learn how to make it through those dangerous situations with minimal loss of life. The most frequent threats a caravan faces are bandits and monsters, so their tactics should be particularly effective at efficiently dealing with those threats with minimal loss of life to the caravan.

Scare tactics like "kill the scariest one as quickly as possible" would be particularly effective against monsters, but not as much against bandits or other organized bands of humanoids. For those groups the best tactic is often "throw them into disarray". That way they're more likely to retreat or easier to defeat if they don't.

However, the huge difference in D&D is the existence of wizards, sorcerers, psions, druids, and the like who can cause significant damage from a distance. Such characters would likely be viewed more as artillery pieces than soldiers, tactically speaking. When presenting organized bands of humanoids as a threat, you should ask yourself how much experience these caravan guards have with casters. A typical group of bandits might have a wizard or cleric if they're lucky, but if they do that caster could present a huge threat with mass disruption like glitterdust, web, fireball, or invisibility sphere. A well-defended caravan would need to be ready against such threats. The caravan would itself likely employ a caster or two if it could afford to do so, preferring the sorts who employ spells effective against humanoid groups (since monsters are usually more predictable).

Nothing the caravan will have encountered would be very much like a group of PCs, since bandits are generally more numerous and less individually skilled. Still, lacking a well-practiced strategy for dealing with the PCs, their most likely response would be to treat them as bandits: make the casters stop casting, try to create disarray. This means they would probably underestimate the martial party members, since most bandits lack well-trained soldiers (depending on how common things like swordsages or uberchargers are in your campaign world), and go for the casters...
For a caravan with no casters this would likely make it a short fight in the adventurers' favor: The guards would try to maneuver to the backlines and the abnormally powerful marshal characters would surprise them and rip them apart before they could reach the casters, who would then proceed to destroy everything else.
For a caravan with casters, there are a lot more disruptive options: The caravan casters try to hit as many people as possible with disables like confusion, glitterdust, web, etc. while the majority of the guards bum rush the PC casters.

Keep in mind that stopping the PC casters from casting would not necessarily require killing them: silence, counterspells, or a readied action with a ranged weapon to disrupt a spell being cast would all be good options.