How to Run Mass Combat (Episode  

"Don't worry. You're a Dungeon Master. I have faith in you."

*rolls a 2 for Daenerys' army* DM: "While Dany kind of forgot about the Iron Fleet and Euron's forces, they certainly haven't forgotten about her, and...."

This is so streamlined, so simple, elegant, and flexible that I can't even begin to process it. Damn.

Thank you professor. Now I know what I was missing in my mass combat sessions: Gonorrhea!

Read the Iliad -- by Homer -- it's never about grand tactics but the individual where they are in the mass combat.

I never really thought about the differences between table top and RPGs. This video helped clarify.

This professor DM might be your best video of all time by far. The application for this are enormous, not just warfare, but any big confrontation, just reduce the 3hs fight, into 4-5 mini fight (maybe they will still take 3hs) but with desicion/rol playing between them, as well as mini victorys and defeats. Making the overall experiencia feeling more dinamic and interesting, than just repeat the same over and over and over... LOVE IT!!

Dungeoncraft. The torch bearer down the dark corridor of rpg land. Shining the light and showing us the way. The way to better d&d. I thank you

Personally, I'd use modifiers to die rolls rather than extra dice. Easier to control the probability that way, with 5% increments. Then I'd make it clear that what the players do in game will affect the modifier that applies to the final battle. So they'd have to go on adventures to build the army, arm the army, fortify the base, whatever. Tougher adventures get bigger bonuses in the final battle. Then at the battle, the skirmishes would be a second opportunity to earn more bonuses. All of these adventures and skirmishes could have lose conditions that don't involve PC death, so if the players fail it just means lower chances of success in the final battle.

It is crunchy, but the mass combat rules in the BECMI Rules Cyclopedia are probably the best set of published rules, but I'm a fan of the simplicity shown here!

I just want to say that your general philosophy on the game and knowledge of TTRPGs is intriguing on it’s own. I remember stumbling on your videos early on and being kind of offended that you mix systems and play fairly rules light, at least compared to what I generally do. However, I’m still here, because you back up your points extremely well, and the way you illustrate running your table is natural and kind of inspiring. Never stop. I know you’ve been doing this for a long time, and you’ve heard this a million times, but you’re exactly what a Dungeon Master should be. A true master of the inter-personal, narrative, and mathematical elements of your table.

I have been simplifying mass combat like this since the old Birthright 2nd edition setting. Great video!

Thank you! I have always wanted to have a simplistic system for mass combat & I think this works nicely.

This video wasn't what I thought it would be, but I really enjoyed the content/concept you've put forth here.

Thank you for showing us your method. Once again, I am grateful for your videos. As for my technic for mass combat, I now use Risk's mechanic because I enjoy the idea of adding another layer to victory: major victory or a minor one. On a major defeat, the army will most often retreat unless they have something to defend. Or at least make up sturdier defenses for the next day. On a minor defeat, the army might just lose ground or lose an important pawn on the board. I like any technic that helps me make up things along, that drives my creativity while GMing! :D

I really like the "let the dice tell the story" mantra, but it takes a very agile and confident DM. Hard for some first timers or those with some initial stage fright. Ooh, please make a video about how to address stage fright for first timers.

This inspires me to create some mass combat tables that will include dysentery and weather. I’ll use the advantage/disadvantage idea to simulate uneven army size, the presence of special monsters or spellcasters, etc. I love tables, especially tables where the results send you to other tables. They create a story that has its own drama.

Such an awesome video! My players have recently decided they wanted to join a war, and this is going to be a super beneficial for that!!

I once translated the old mass-combat system of the early L5R RPG for 3.5 a while back. It worked pretty well.

I busted out laughing at "ogre dysentery". That boggles the mind (and probably the nose)

Thank you for covering this, I was just looking for mass combat guide! I look forward to every video, keep it up!

Phenomenal information. Gotta try this with my group. Love it. keep them coming Professor!

This is easily my favorite video of yours because I LOVE the idea of a small group of players who can wade through armies and army busting is a cooler spectacle than dragon slaying. But I never really got into warhammer (even tho it has kickass lore) ever since I started 5e like 3 years ago I was trying to have my campaigns do at least 1 or 2 player VS army encounters because In the beginning I was keeping CR Ranges low to familiarize myself. I play online so it’s really easy to put 500 miniatures on the screen by copy/pasting I used a mix of 4e minions and a “mob dice” cleaving system of my own design so that the fighter would roll like 3d10 on their turn (a d10 per attack) and could slay 20 on their turn with good rolls and keep parity against the wizard/sorc fireball spam. By the end each of them could count off slaying like 2-400 enemies after a 5 hour session and we felt pretty cathartic about the body piles... but 1500 kills as we know is a really small ass army in fantasy, luckily for me I had 5 “hack n slash” player types who LOVED that system and how They could maximize by positioning themselves amidst the mob as I would mass delete tokens off the screen as the level 12 Polearm Master sprinted in a straight line flourishing their weapons reach! More recently, I have used the Monster Manual swarm rules and just said “This Bigass Token is 500 Soldiers” and the party would battle it similarlly to a tarrasqe and it’d have like 250 hit points that they could easily spam top tier damage at and kill it in a few rounds, put like 10 of those down and they slay 5000 abstractly in about 1/3rd of the time as the mob dice system. The campaign I did that for had more Thespian and Roleplay characters so they LOVED this system But when it comes to Army VS Army, I made the mistakes of Rolling out allllllllllllll their bullshit, bullshit that no one really cares about the nitty gritty of. I’ve come to a similar system as you, except I use d100s that I roll every round or so,m and just narrate the battle that unfolds around them, similar to a monsters lair actions if one side rolls exceptionally high then reinforcements go to the players vice versa. But i certainly will take that Transition Saving throws idea! Because it’ll really help the next siege scene I have in mind. nowadays, i do not have the time to be as indepth and mathematic as i was 3 years ago, and frankly dont care to be. Man i really ranted passionately on this but thanks again for this video and thanks anyone who care to read or skim through this onslaught of text.

just in time for my arch’s big conclusion next week 🙏🏻 i was going to do something similar but you always manage to make it seem more structured than what is in my head. thanks again for your masterful advice

For the opening phase, I think it would be good to have the difficulty at 11 or whatever, then have players roll a d20 and add their AC-10. This means that players with armor and other safety measures are more likely to come out safe.

Inspired! I want to watch again when I get off this bloody train and write it all down.

I like it, Dan. It is a nice simple way to role play a large scale battle, and still be able to leave the results to fate if the DM so desires. I also like the ability of the players to still take damage while they are battling and possibly be killed during the battle.

This system is impossibly elegant. I'm very excited to use this! Thanks so much, Prof.

Good stuff once again! Sounds like the mass combat rules of Talislanta, and the prequel Talislanta the Savage land. I like it simple 😁

This honestly your greatest video. Crisp clean and everything makes sense. You've captured all the best elements of combat with your skermish but with the dice rolling with the d20 at the end is perfect because it allows the players to see that yeah you may be a badass but your still one guy there's a greater conflict at hand. Bravo 👍

This is pretty good timing for me. I really like the way you approached this. I have done the fog of war approach in the past and find that really works well. Great topic.

Ok, this was fantastic and I really want to use it for Shadowdark. Great examples, Professor. Very clearly and compellingly presented.

This is really Good. I have used the one on one combat but the survival prior is great. I'm definitely using that.

I’ve been trying to research info on this subject! Thanks so much! Very helpful.

Hugely inspiring...as always is the Professor

Thanks professor. Great stuff as always.

This is Outstanding I am definitely going to be incorporating these ideas into my own game. For the longest time I've been scratching my head about how to do mass battles in a meaningful and logical way. Prof DM has come up with a really fun, simple and logical way to determine what happens in Warfare . Thank you!

Professor, your Tweed Jacket has now levelled up. This is fantastic and I will try it out at my table for sure.

Best Mass Combat rules ever! Simple, effective, let the players influenced outcome if they survive the skirmish. 😏

I recently ran a mass combat session, before seeing this video. As mentioned in this video, the players rejected the premise because they didn't feel their characters would command a troop. They instead carried out covert objectives to tip the scales, before the war started. They also played as commander NPCs, for the actual battle... so I could play test my concept. I abstracted the concept of a troop, and applied D&D combat stats for familiarity. HP were the number of men a single unit had (I chose 10), AC was the avg AC of the unit (no bonuses), and a graph square equaled 30' with a unit being able to move 30' unless they used move action in place of attack. There were other nuances, but it was somewhat simple and received well. I like the suggestions in this video, though. I felt my solution was still a little too much, in terms of rules and manageability. I think I'll blend the two approaches more.

Wow! This is great! I really like this idea and I'm going to use it in my games!

New disease for my world "Ogre Dysentery"

I’ll be watching this shortly. Can’t wait.

I watched this the day before I ran a mass combat. Thanks! I didn't do it exactly this way, but used some ideas

I love this. It's so simple.

Let me just say, your voice was epic when you said “roll for survival”.

I'm imagining an add on that the party could risk multiple skirmishes (with obviously more danger of getting seriously hurt in combat) for higher bonuses at resolution

Thank you for your insight. I am about to plan a battle where my highlevel group takes part, and your video helped me to get an idea of how to do it. I agree that playing out the whole battle is a bad idea. On the other hand, I want to let the players decide their action during battle. My idea is to set out the battle in 20 to 50 units (200 soldiers/unit max) per army. Then the battle will develop in rounds of 10 to 60 minuts per round (with 5 rounds max) and the outcome of each combat encounter is pre-determined my the DM (i.e. me). Then, I let each player decide which unit he wants to join each round and we play it out, giving the players the opportunity to change this units fate. It will take probably 6 to 10 hours. It is a lot of time, but I want my players to be able to weigh in their entire set of abilities and get to roleplay some of it and be heros. However, I wouldn't do more than one battle this way.

Glad this one is finally out!

Another great video! I just ran a mass combat a few weeks ago.

Great! Thanks Professor!

Dude seeing the UDT for the siege was a lesson in battle map design that I needed! now time to translate it into 2 dimensions...

Now I have to add a massive battle to try this out! :)

To be fair most high lvl play in 5e uses more miniatures then most 3000 points Warhammer battles

holy crap this is genui, never had a solid way of running things like this so it really helps

This video was validating. I have been using similar rules for mass combat. If there are more NPCs than PCs in a battle, I roll for each side at the start of each round. I will have pairs of NPCs engaged with one another, and remove one from the table for each failed roll. Unpaired models will look for another enemy to base next round, and players usually fight the unengaged models first. This way, the PCs have to deal with fewer enemies if their side is winning the battle, and vice versa. Fast and dynamic, and my players don't get bored watching me do maths.

Great stuff here! Love it. I run similar guidelines. Personally, I love to see how things unfold. I don't "fudge" anything. The characters make all the difference, come what may. During mass combat, I make 3-5 objective encounters or "rooms" as it were all on a secret "timer". Three "rooms" for smaller battles, five for epic battles. I "meta-tell" the party it has an undisclosed but finite number of rounds (usually around 4-6) to figure out and complete the objective of the "room" (kill a key enemy captain, hold the gate, capture the gatehouse, ect.). I do not let them know if they completed the encounter in time but let them finish the encounter however long it takes, before moving on to the next "room". Sometimes there are skill challenges in between the "rooms" for advantages or disadvantages going into the next "room". In the end, if more "objective encounter rooms" are completed in time than not (2/3 or 3/5 completed on time), the players turned the tide to win the battle, saved the day, and will reap the rewards. If not, the players are held responsible for losing the battle and allowing evil to reign. I can be so cruel, that the party will not find out whether or not they won or lost.... until the beginning of next session. Mu, ha, ha, ha.

Really like this video thanks. One thing to increase the sense of control/impact the players feel they have might be to give them a choice of objectives with differing difficulties and bonuses to the battle roll. For example. "there is a small group of artillery on the western flank to get to it you'll have to get through 1 skermish (extra roll of the initial combat die) taking this out would give your side a minor advantage (+1 on the battle roll), alternatively you can see the enemy general at the back of his army but you think you can see a way through (optional perception or intelligence roll?) to get there you'll have to go through a lot of troops (3 skirmishes adapted by the degree of success of the perception roll) and it'll be a tough fight when you get there but if you manage to take him out it could turn the tide of the battle (+5 to +10 on the battle roll). If you want to go longer give the armies hit points and dice based on this (EG. 1d20 per thousand men/hp)

Home run as usual professor!

I think Matt Cloville is doing something along these lines for a more elegant (read complicated) system that is linked to forces the player made and likely will care about. But I agree that is is hard to a merger of RPG and Wargame. It was hard with Mechwarrior and Battletech game working together to make a story that was really good.

Soild solid stuff. Thanks PDM. Now on to gore token crafting video!

More outstanding advice!

Simple mass combat. Love it.

I've found a somewhat complex way to make players care about NPCs, use their old characters as NPCs. lol

I know this video is old but I really like this method. Might apply it with a few tweeks. We'll see if the party gets to the massive battle.

This is great. I am going to try this as the campaign i am running right now will have a big battle at some point. I have been stressing how i was going to run that.

Mass combat is always such a bear. Great suggestions and rules for dealing with it.

You mentioned the FB grp. I went to join the other day but noticed it's a public grp. For whatever reason I don't like joining public FB grps no matter the hobby. Maybe it's just me and my idiosyncrasies but I'm guessing I'm not alone. Something to ponder. (for both of us?) Good vid, as always, PDM.

This is excellent.

i just run the playes part of the battlefield, and extrapolate the rest of the battle based on numbers and quality of troops and comanders

I like the CardMaster RPG rules for simplification with a little bit of "Mega Orc" thrown in his article that's in a 3.5 archives

Gotta trust the oracular power of the dice for this to work, but I dig it lol

Well, I don't know, it feels way too simple and with no player agency wich is something I like to give to my players, So one idea would be to make the skirmishes "loosable" even if characters dont die, so for example in the "Killing the orc warchief" skirmish he might be able to flee if players don't get there on a given number of rounds or reinforcements may come to aid the warchief and make the characters retreat. Given that, give a +1 ti the characters for every skirmish they win and -1 for every skirmish they lose (or more depending on the importance of the skirmish and by how much they won/lost) to the final roll. Ideally I would also give the characters the chance to choose which skirmish to take but that's a whole lot of work for the DM depending on how you deal with encounters.

You guys need some Savage Worlds. Ive tried almost everything out there, and it’s quick Mass Battle system creates the most cinematic and rewarding RPG battles I have ever experienced.

I like having small skirmish encounters with objectives that impact on the final result. Advantage is a fast way of resolving the outcome without getting bogged down too much in the details. I might go as far as designating different coloured dice for each section of the larger force to see which one pulled their weight and which ones swung the battle. Mass combat rules in basic D&D companion rules are the best ive seen but require a little crunching of numbers prior to the battle to determine the forces battle rating and has similarities to your advantage system as bonuses can stack for a superior army or one in a fortification but your system is simpler and has more story/narrative flexibility where you just can describe what happens without referring to tables for %casualties for each side.

An elegant solution. I'm totally stealing it.

I do it like normal combat close to the players, but where they aren’t, I use the battle mechanic from *Lathan’s Gold* (a solo module for the first version of D&D). I had to write the charts by hand since I don’t have the book, and there’s a lot of looking at the charts when calculating, but it works. Only goes to 150 attackers and 150 defenders though, and I didn’t want to calculate more columns for more attackers/defenders. So when there’s, let’s say, 1200 fighters on each side, I calculate 150 of them first, then the next 150 etc. until I’ve done all of them. Edit: To make it not so repeatable, I decide AC and all that based on the army, or just roll a die if I haven’t decided. So even if one part is winning, three other parts of that army could be losing because they have an AC of 2 (I never changed their AC to 5e’s AC numbers, it’s still from 0-8 because I’m lazy)

top tier content right here

Your no non-sense approach to everything is great! The biggest take-away I have from all your videos is that COMPLEX doesn't equate to better. As someone who started gaming with the blue box basic set of Dungeons & Dragons I'm happy to see this philosophy.

This is exactly what I was looking for after scratching my head thinking about how to integrate a block wargame into my campaign, this will work better. Oh and take it from me gonorrhea is a huge disadvantage

Love it. I would play with it by giving the players more (or the enrmy less) dice for each skirmish that they complete successfully. Also, small battles can come down to one single dice roll at the end, but big epic wars at the end of campaigns could be best 2 out of 3.

Not as sexy as some would like but it works, looks easy to mod and frankly despite all the training and preparation war is a roll of the dice. Henry V made his rolls count!

Really inspired me. I think I'd like it to be a little bit less random, so may roll 1d20 per side, and an advantage such as a dragon or healthier army adds 1d4 to your base roll. That way its the same ammount of dice, but bad luck won't cancel out having a larger force as the highest and lowest threshold has changed, but the ammount of dice rolled and reasons for rolling them remain the same.

GREAT IDEAS!

This is exactly what I do but I let the PC's earn dice that can affect the main battle through their skirmish battles. With added rules based loosely off of the Trojan War RPG and Testament RPG mass combat rules from Green Ronin IF I need more rules or detailed combat. Narrate the combat- set up skirmishes that earn bonus dice- and go from there. Keep it fast and focused on the PC's. I don't let PC's get killed in the 'battles' that are narrated so I don't have them make death saves. Not the way I want my PC's to die (Unless its agreed upon beforehand for an epic story death). The PC's are rockstars- so they will either get away, captured and ransomed etc. Makes for another great 'skirmish' battle to escape! Helps grow their names and standing as well!

thanks so much !

Arthurian RPG? Did someone say "Pendragon"? I've not checked out the latest edition, but my old one had pretty simple mass combat rules baked in. Along with things like knightly tournaments.

An excellent video! I’ve been thinking about trying to integrate the TSR Dragon Dice as a war element for my game but this seems to be much much easier to handle. I can see some tweaks but honestly, it provides bedrock to move forward from.

Ogre dysentery, is happening in my next game! Totally using this system in my current campaign when the players reach the point of a mass battle which will be soon.

I like what Out of the Abyss suggests. Have one character represent a group, they start with a giant to hit bonus and hp, they lose their hit bonus the more their hp goes down.

Fantastic

Man, did you know what I was gonna ask you for?

I think there's a way to get the best of both worlds with mass combat that allows players to make tactical decisions but doesn't get bogged down in rules. Don't run the entire battle like a wargame, instead everyone sets up minis on a grid representing a limited frontage of the battle line where the PCs command their retinue (say 30x30 grid squares?). Let the players figure out where they want to place their archers and spearmen, etc. Or if there's time they can try devious tactics like digging hidden trenches or scattering caltrops. If the players defeat their foes on their front, then they've turned the tide of battle! Level up as a reward! If the players lose, then they manage to escape the field as the enemy Orcs pursue the routed soldiers. The DM could run a tense chase scenario - perhaps the breathless PCs eventually find refuge in a cave or ruined temple where their pursuers dare not follow . . . To simulate a fast & furious Conan-style meatgrinder, I'd set up some house rules. For starters, resolve combat in real time. Don't slow down the game to take turns & resolve initiative and actions and opportunity attacks, blah blah blah. Players & DM just start rolling dice as fast as they can to attack adjacent opponents or else move their minis on the grid (have simple movement rules such as rolling a die & move that # of grid squares). Would be helpful here if the DM had an assistant to help roll dice for all of his troops. Give the minions only a few hit points to expedite combat. Depending on how many minis the DM owns, he can keep feeding enemy soldiers into the battle from the rear to replace casualties, or else the DM can rule that once >50% or whatever of the bad guys on the field are dead, the rest flee & the players have won. If you really want to get realistic, you could house rule combat exhaustion, say by decreeing once you've rolled five 1's all frontline combatants suffer a to-hit penalty. Or else use a timer. Cunning players might figure out how to rotate fresh troops to the front to face the still exhausted enemy soldiers.

goddamit not gonorrhea again

Brilliant thanks

In the first fase if the enemies won put some extra enemies figures on the board for PCs fight or less if they are losing in the first fase. The outcome of the skrimish may add a extra dice in the thirdh fase

I am an ardent fan, and player, of 2e's BattleSystem game, as well as 2e's BattleSystem Skirmish rules (mini's game with a thin veneer of RPG over the top). The mass battles rules of 2e BattleSystem is a totally different game than the RPG... I enjoy both, for very different reasons. I've run a couple of RPG-based mass battles, on the tabletop, using BS rules. Great fun, but everyone who plays understands that it is a different game, even though the results are used in the RPG campaign. A fellow DM has done the same, several times, incorporating the results into the RPG campaign, after the results are known. It works for us... The RPG players are also mini's enthusiasts, so it is all good. As a DM with 39 years of experience, I've taken your tact many a time: simplify a very complex role playing situation, reducing it down to a simple, few die rolls. Had two players go off to a month-long merchants' fair, 100+ leagues away, by ship, leaving the other two players behind. Rather than role play the whole mess (one Paladin competing in jousting/fighting tournaments, and a thief plying his trade of pick-pocketing, for 30 game days...), I rolled some dice to determine their success: both were ridiculously successful. Then I said, "There is a chance of a catastrophic storm, on the voyage home, which could sink the ship, killing everyone. I'll give it an Ought-Five chance. I'll roll it in front of you..." "*Ought-Five, exactly!*" [Both players screamed:] "NOOOooo!!! Are you KIDDING me?!?!" It's been a running joke for around 15 years now, and counting, "Ought-Five chance, and, 'No', I won't roll it in front of you..." LOL! Too much fun! Cheers!

One of my favorite channels...can't disagree more though. Massive battles like you described at the beginning are among the best, if not THE best sessions we've ever had. There was one that lasted three sessions, it was between two player characters. Each gathered allies and plotted against each other for the entire arc. I used a skill challenge that granted them certain advantages for the eventual battle. The actual battle is what lasted three sessions, momentum going back and forth and ultimately ending in a fight with just a handful of characters still alive (including the other player characters). We talk about the Battle of Isseldor every time we're together. It was 10 years ago. That takes a very seasoned, patient and invested group though. For casual, newer players in a campaign that's only going to last a year or so - this simplified system is FANTASTIC.

I've done something like this, inspired by the GURPS mass combat system... which may be based on something older? Anyway, besides possible HP loss to the PCs, I also included things like expenditure of spells and consumables.

This gives me ideas but the game im running is a ruined kingdom with only a few hundred people trying to retake its lands so each death on the side of the kingdom will hurt. You might lose your tailor or weapon smith. For each lose like that it would have to be replaced. Im thinking having the minis marked for who is who. Then we roll for combat to see if anyone is hurt, then roll to see who is hurt and if its enough that person could die. So if a unit has someone go down they could keep fighting or retreat and try to save that person or they could even be overwhelmed and leave the person out to die. I will have the kingdom grow the first act is to take the lightly defended city then blow a horn to let the others know to move in and be ready to defend. But the enemy will hear it to and quickly seed a small force to try to retake it. If they lose then they will send a MUCH larger one in a few days. If they win taking the city again will be MUCH harder. This will be a D&D game that gets into empire building and most of the items are going to be made by people they know and help keep safe. But you have given me ideas on how to start the war and ill make my players feel every death on the battlefield.