I have spent a few years in my campaign building up a world war.
Some very basic context is that there are 6 nations, and each nation has chosen one of my 3 PCs whom they revere as a deity, and soon things will be coming to a climax where the nations are going to go to war based on who they believe is the "true" savior of the PCs.
I want to have a sort of war system in place where the nations will be actively attacking one another and taking territories, launching counter attacks, etc, and be in full active war. The PCs job is to (hopefully) stop the war. How would I create a system to reflect won and lost battles on the world map? The PCs wouldnt really be focusing on the individual battles, likely, as there would simply be too many conflicts at the same time for them to get to. I also want to reflect each nations individuality in their militaries, with both their strengths and weaknesses at play.
Examples: one nation has a very weak military, but is excellent at infiltration and sabotage.
Another nation has an army that has very little magic, but sheer brute strength with a massive army.
Another one has a small military, but red dragon wyrmling mounts to beef up their numbers.
Yet another one has a very powerful navy, but relatively small amounts of ground troops.
One nation has a very large and varied army with lots of magic, but has a shit economy (a civil war wrecked it).
Another nation has a modest army of paladins and clerics.
Any ideas on how to run this as a theater of world war while the PCs do their parts would be helpful. I want to give the PCs a sense of urgency by showing territories being taken and villages burned, so that they dont necessarily take their time with it, this is part of why its important.
If the PCs aren't involved in the battles, then it's probably better to just determine how the war plays out based on the story you want to tell. Not only will that work better for your campaign, but in the long run that will probably be less work for you as DM. You can have the news that the players hear reflect the particulars of each of the kingdoms. Is one of them leveling villages and torching farms? Did one of them send assassins to remove local leaders, leaving the territory in disarray so their smaller army could rush in and catch them unprepared? Are two or three of them forming an alliance (and are they trustworthy)? Your players might get a better sense of "depth" in your world, if you steer the course of the war at least a little bit.
If you're totally set on having a mechanic for this, I'd suggest assigning just a handful of point values to the kingdoms. Maybe: military might, intelligence network, material resources, and population loyalty? Each "round" of the war would involve each kingdom picking a target and making some kind of skill attempt (for strategy, or deception, or propaganda, or whatever their circumstances allow) to reduce one of those numbers. On success, they've taken some area of territory and one of the target kingdom's stats is reduced a little bit to reflect whatever that territory provided. Whoever gets to 0 points is effectively out of the war, although what form that takes would be up to you (actually defeated, capital under siege, or simply forced into a final defensive position).
One other thing come to mind: what if the PCs decide not to stop the war but they just want to pick a winning side (or alliance) instead?
A simple way to visualize the progression of the war might be simply to color-code each country and paint the world map the appropriate color as the armies invade and take over. You can add little fire and rubble images to reflect the devastation. This is a shorthand, but I don't think this alone will have the urgency factor you're hoping for.
I would highly recommend you bring NPC informants into this. Hearing frequent eyewitness accounts (like a war correspondent) about the damage on the front lines will make it more personal and the need to stop it more urgent. Play on the party's emotions. Put beloved NPCs in danger/kill them. Annihilate some iconic locales. Paint a vivid picture of beautiful things that are being threatened or ruined because of the fighting. Make them care, and make them care about more things/people/areas than they can possibly hope to protect on their own. They will be spurred to action if the only real way to help is to stop the fighting. You don't need a visual cue if you have an intrinsic motivation for your character to act quickly because something precious could be lost if they don't - and if the communication to that precious thing is fraught or stops altogether, the urgency escalates instantly.
I'm confused on the set up. I thought the PCs are deities, but they're also showing up to take part in smaller battles in a war the PCs are trying to start.
Otherwise, you're basically asking the forum to design a war-game for you. D&D doesn't really have any set rules on resolving "warfare". You might want to look at the MCDM 3rd party book Kingdoms and Warfare. Some folks really like that book, others not so much, so you'd probably want to check out some reviews or discussions to see if it's your thing. I imagine there are other companies that produce war-games, actually most folks do "battle" games.
I mean, I'd honestly keep things simple and probably clone something like Risk or even better Supremacy (with all the advanced rules), build a world representative map that the board game's mechanics can be applied to, and just sort of keep that game as a sort of framework of world events the characters have to respond to.
But give Kingdoms and Warfare a look.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
If the PCs aren't involved in the battles, then it's probably better to just determine how the war plays out based on the story you want to tell. Not only will that work better for your campaign, but in the long run that will probably be less work for you as DM. You can have the news that the players hear reflect the particulars of each of the kingdoms. Is one of them leveling villages and torching farms? Did one of them send assassins to remove local leaders, leaving the territory in disarray so their smaller army could rush in and catch them unprepared? Are two or three of them forming an alliance (and are they trustworthy)? Your players might get a better sense of "depth" in your world, if you steer the course of the war at least a little bit.
If you're totally set on having a mechanic for this, I'd suggest assigning just a handful of point values to the kingdoms. Maybe: military might, intelligence network, material resources, and population loyalty? Each "round" of the war would involve each kingdom picking a target and making some kind of skill attempt (for strategy, or deception, or propaganda, or whatever their circumstances allow) to reduce one of those numbers. On success, they've taken some area of territory and one of the target kingdom's stats is reduced a little bit to reflect whatever that territory provided. Whoever gets to 0 points is effectively out of the war, although what form that takes would be up to you (actually defeated, capital under siege, or simply forced into a final defensive position).
One other thing come to mind: what if the PCs decide not to stop the war but they just want to pick a winning side (or alliance) instead?
Its extremely unlikely the PCs would pick an alliance, as there are people in each nation who want to kill the majority of the party.
I could work with the skill points idea you mentioned I think, thats a pretty creative idea actually
A simple way to visualize the progression of the war might be simply to color-code each country and paint the world map the appropriate color as the armies invade and take over. You can add little fire and rubble images to reflect the devastation. This is a shorthand, but I don't think this alone will have the urgency factor you're hoping for.
I would highly recommend you bring NPC informants into this. Hearing frequent eyewitness accounts (like a war correspondent) about the damage on the front lines will make it more personal and the need to stop it more urgent. Play on the party's emotions. Put beloved NPCs in danger/kill them. Annihilate some iconic locales. Paint a vivid picture of beautiful things that are being threatened or ruined because of the fighting. Make them care, and make them care about more things/people/areas than they can possibly hope to protect on their own. They will be spurred to action if the only real way to help is to stop the fighting. You don't need a visual cue if you have an intrinsic motivation for your character to act quickly because something precious could be lost if they don't - and if the communication to that precious thing is fraught or stops altogether, the urgency escalates instantly.
Ill definitely be color coding the world map, for sure. I fully intend as well to kill some of the many NPC allies theyve made, and level towns if the fighting reaches towns.
I'm confused on the set up. I thought the PCs are deities, but they're also showing up to take part in smaller battles in a war the PCs are trying to start.
Otherwise, you're basically asking the forum to design a war-game for you. D&D doesn't really have any set rules on resolving "warfare". You might want to look at the MCDM 3rd party book Kingdoms and Warfare. Some folks really like that book, others not so much, so you'd probably want to check out some reviews or discussions to see if it's your thing. I imagine there are other companies that produce war-games, actually most folks do "battle" games.
I mean, I'd honestly keep things simple and probably clone something like Risk or even better Supremacy (with all the advanced rules), build a world representative map that the board game's mechanics can be applied to, and just sort of keep that game as a sort of framework of world events the characters have to respond to.
But give Kingdoms and Warfare a look.
The PCs have come to become revered as deities, but they are not. Ive worked to make them believe they are deities, but again, no. They are simple adventurers who have unintentionally started a world war with their own good deeds, and they must now stop that war.
Ill give Kingdoms of Warfare a look. I was looking at something similar to Risk, honestly, but having slight difficulty simplifying that down to DnD. I do recognize Im asking for some kind of system to be developed, and that very well may be beyond the scope of people.
Perhaps a moral system could be implemented for each of the Nations with low moral having the economy being trash and be more unsafe to travel through. While a high morale means means a more smoother economy and their armed forces receive a steady supply of soldiers.
It could be represented as a 15 point system or any number really and enough small victories will bring the morale up by one and a large victory could be it up by one or two, same goes for going down with enough small losses bringing the nation's morale down by one and a really big loss bringing it down by one or two depending on the damage.
Things will happen with or without your players. Battles will be won, battles will be lost, people will die, towns will be destroyed, etc.
What I would do is, after each session, think about what happened during that session that the players didn't see. Maybe there are multiple battles going on around the continent/world/whatever, and during a session you can decide "This faction wins this battle" or "This town starts burning" or "This army moves forward into that territory" or something like that.
The players can affect the outcome of the battles by, say, blowing up a stock of weapons, or killing an important officer, or maybe just spreading a rumor which might lead to troops being diverted somewhere they're not needed. Something like that.
Perhaps a moral system could be implemented for each of the Nations with low moral having the economy being trash and be more unsafe to travel through. While a high morale means means a more smoother economy and their armed forces receive a steady supply of soldiers.
It could be represented as a 15 point system or any number really and enough small victories will bring the morale up by one and a large victory could be it up by one or two, same goes for going down with enough small losses bringing the nation's morale down by one and a really big loss bringing it down by one or two depending on the damage.
Hope this idea fits and helps your game.
Ive actually combined this with another similar idea that someone else had on here. Each nation has a predetermined score based on events that happened in the campaign, being judged on Morale, Resources, Intelligence Network, and Military Might. Each nation also has a special ability they can use, an innate ability that triggers on certain areas or when fighting certain types of enemies, and a weakness that reduces one of those stats in certain situations, each of these to reflect each nations strengths and weaknesses as nations and as a fighting force. Morale, Resource, and Intelligence checks are done, and depending on which side wins those checks, they get a +1 to military might for each check they win. Military Might checks are D20 + modifiers. Whoever wins the Military Might check, wins the battle, and territory is taken.
For narrative reasons, losing lots of land could result in entire town populations slaughtered and people the players have helped being murdered. So this will help drive the urgency for the players to end the war as quickly as possible.
Taking your suggestion, morale modifiers are lowered when forts, towns, or significant land is taken.
Basically, a large scale battle will be determined by 4 D 20 rolls with a bunch of modifiers.
If you're totally set on having a mechanic for this, I'd suggest assigning just a handful of point values to the kingdoms. Maybe: military might, intelligence network, material resources, and population loyalty? Each "round" of the war would involve each kingdom picking a target and making some kind of skill attempt (for strategy, or deception, or propaganda, or whatever their circumstances allow) to reduce one of those numbers. On success, they've taken some area of territory and one of the target kingdom's stats is reduced a little bit to reflect whatever that territory provided.
I actually went this this idea, doing the Military Might, Resources, Population loyality (morale), and intelligence network. I gave them scores based on how that nation would preform, adjusted it to reflect what happened in the campaign, and now each nation has very clear strengths and weaknesses, so thank you for this inspiration.
I took it a step further, giving each nation a special ability to use (such as a +3 to military might, or being able to try a losing battle again with disadvantage (healers)), along with innate abilities, such as +1 to military might on shoreline engagements (to reflect a powerful navy) and each nation has weaknesses (such as a -1 when a non-magically inclined nation faces off against a heavy magic faction). The special abilities and the point system you had i feel really reflects each nations individuality.
I also took someone elses suggestion, and morale gets reduced when one nation loses a town, city, or fort. So thank you everyone, I think I found a system that works well!
Devil's advocate on morale suffering because of a loss, remember the crew of reinforcement commandos who showed up on Scariff in Rogue One? Their battle cry was "For Jedha" which just got glassed by the Empire, and they kicked asymmetric butt. Not a city, but an important installation, but there's something to be said for American military resolve globally after Pearl Harbor, a similar "gloves are off" moment frankly happened after 9-11 in the U.S. where, to borrow from a Cold War song, while most folks I knew in 2001 usually didn't think about military matters, suddenly "Everybody's Captain Kirk."
I think you're right that sustaining multiple defeats or losses will affect overall morale, but I'd also entertain a "oh no they didn't!" opportunity for a rally when a particular center is struck. Before it made its way into a political metaphor, blowback ir I remember right was concept discussed in war colleges realizing Shock and Awe moments may lead to wins but inarguably result in insurgencies or even greater resistance. Maybe Lee Greenwood is in a particular nation's Bard roster, I was around for that too and winced when it was accurately deployed in Three Kings because it was dead on about the moment.
I don't know if you're still playing around with board game precedent, but this is sounding less like Risk, more like Supremacy, but even more like Axis and Allies.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
A simple way to visualize the progression of the war might be simply to color-code each country and paint the world map the appropriate color as the armies invade and take over. You can add little fire and rubble images to reflect the devastation. This is a shorthand, but I don't think this alone will have the urgency factor you're hoping for.
I would highly recommend you bring NPC informants into this. Hearing frequent eyewitness accounts (like a war correspondent) about the damage on the front lines will make it more personal and the need to stop it more urgent. Play on the party's emotions. Put beloved NPCs in danger/kill them. Annihilate some iconic locales. Paint a vivid picture of beautiful things that are being threatened or ruined because of the fighting. Make them care, and make them care about more things/people/areas than they can possibly hope to protect on their own. They will be spurred to action if the only real way to help is to stop the fighting. You don't need a visual cue if you have an intrinsic motivation for your character to act quickly because something precious could be lost if they don't - and if the communication to that precious thing is fraught or stops altogether, the urgency escalates instantly.
This.
I think it would make most sense to do something similar to what Thoughtwire and theologyofbagels are saying. You don't need to mechanically determine a winner if the PCs aren't involved. It can make much more narrative sense and require much less work to instead run it as a narrative. This battle is won by such and such a nation, this leader is assassinated by that nation, this nation's economy is collapsing so it's army is dwindling, this nation blockaded that nation, and so on a so forth. You can write the outcomes.
If you wanted to go really deep into the rabbit hole of mechanically determining the winner however.... I have considered playing basically a modified version of Axis and Allies before the session to determine the results of the battle...
Ill give Kingdoms of Warfare a look. I was looking at something similar to Risk, honestly, but having slight difficulty simplifying that down to DnD. I do recognize Im asking for some kind of system to be developed, and that very well may be beyond the scope of people.
I'm not sure if you need mechanics, but if you do, I'd give these rules a look. They are the rules for axis and allies, which shouldn't be too hard to change into D&D. Just replace the different units with units that fit D&D, whether that be spellcasters, red dragon wyrmlings, or infantry, and adjust the stats accordingly. The game already supports different nations having different units avalible, so you could for example make spellcasters more expansive for one nation (because they have less), and only red dragon wyrmllings available to one, and so on. You would probably want to change the starting units and economy and so on, but other than that it should be pretty much good to go. I think most of the Axis and Allies rules should be able to simulate what you want to do as long as you change the units.
I thought I was going to be unique and tell you to play Axis and Allies and base a world war on that.
But I see others beat me to it.
However, you don't need to buy and master the board game. You can get Axis and Allies on Steam and learn to play it. The mechanics I think would translate to DND very well.
However, I think it would be best if you could have a dedicated place to set up your war that can stay in place for several months.
Now I am inspired to think that it would be a most excellent Add on Third party 5e component to have a massive war system based on Axis and Allies for 5e.
I think the big thing to think about is if you do want to "game" this (as noted, simply narrating the course will give you more control and less work for you and the party) you are basically creating a war-game parallel to the campaign and make sure you're party is up for that. And yeah, Axis and Allies is probably the crunchiest you can get without going into hard core war-game territory, I think that's why A&A has such a passionate following still today ... I think I first played it over 30 years ago.
And I don't know about D&D specifically, but there's actually precedent for using war-games and world building games. The best example is Game Designers Workshop who wanted to use the outcome of their WWWIII game Twilight: 2000 (made in the mid or late 80s I think) as the basis of their new science fiction game Traveller: 2300 (eventually switched to just 2300AD as it had nothing to do with the Traveller Universe they were also publishing at the time). Anyway Twilight: 2000 imagines a world where NATO and the Warsaw Pact actually went to war in the 90s and there was a limited nuclear exchange. They plotted out the future of this world from then to 2300 with The Great Game which was a sort of global power game of war and diplomacy and resource development where the players would play various powers setting up a new geopolitical order in the world and then shake out how that power dynamic spread to the stars. In Twilight: 2000 France pulled out of NATO so literally ducked much of the WWIII fighting and became an important interstellar power. I think a unified Germany (which wasn't much of a battlefield, the ground war took place mostly in what was considered Eastern Europe at the time and the Middle East over oil reserves) was a big player and maybe South Africa. Anyway, because of that story I've always wanted to do a game world where I sort "great game" the world the players exist in as opposed to the usual mini novel world building exercises, and it's cool you seem to be doing it.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
And I don't know about D&D specifically, but there's actually precedent for using war-games and world building games.
There's Conquest of Nerath (2011 boardgame set in the 4th edition setting). Getting an actual set now is probably a collectors thing, but you can download the rulebook from Wizards. I've never played it and it doesn't look particularly high detail or inspired, but it does exist.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I have spent a few years in my campaign building up a world war.
Some very basic context is that there are 6 nations, and each nation has chosen one of my 3 PCs whom they revere as a deity, and soon things will be coming to a climax where the nations are going to go to war based on who they believe is the "true" savior of the PCs.
I want to have a sort of war system in place where the nations will be actively attacking one another and taking territories, launching counter attacks, etc, and be in full active war. The PCs job is to (hopefully) stop the war. How would I create a system to reflect won and lost battles on the world map? The PCs wouldnt really be focusing on the individual battles, likely, as there would simply be too many conflicts at the same time for them to get to. I also want to reflect each nations individuality in their militaries, with both their strengths and weaknesses at play.
Examples: one nation has a very weak military, but is excellent at infiltration and sabotage.
Another nation has an army that has very little magic, but sheer brute strength with a massive army.
Another one has a small military, but red dragon wyrmling mounts to beef up their numbers.
Yet another one has a very powerful navy, but relatively small amounts of ground troops.
One nation has a very large and varied army with lots of magic, but has a shit economy (a civil war wrecked it).
Another nation has a modest army of paladins and clerics.
Any ideas on how to run this as a theater of world war while the PCs do their parts would be helpful. I want to give the PCs a sense of urgency by showing territories being taken and villages burned, so that they dont necessarily take their time with it, this is part of why its important.
If the PCs aren't involved in the battles, then it's probably better to just determine how the war plays out based on the story you want to tell. Not only will that work better for your campaign, but in the long run that will probably be less work for you as DM. You can have the news that the players hear reflect the particulars of each of the kingdoms. Is one of them leveling villages and torching farms? Did one of them send assassins to remove local leaders, leaving the territory in disarray so their smaller army could rush in and catch them unprepared? Are two or three of them forming an alliance (and are they trustworthy)? Your players might get a better sense of "depth" in your world, if you steer the course of the war at least a little bit.
If you're totally set on having a mechanic for this, I'd suggest assigning just a handful of point values to the kingdoms. Maybe: military might, intelligence network, material resources, and population loyalty? Each "round" of the war would involve each kingdom picking a target and making some kind of skill attempt (for strategy, or deception, or propaganda, or whatever their circumstances allow) to reduce one of those numbers. On success, they've taken some area of territory and one of the target kingdom's stats is reduced a little bit to reflect whatever that territory provided. Whoever gets to 0 points is effectively out of the war, although what form that takes would be up to you (actually defeated, capital under siege, or simply forced into a final defensive position).
One other thing come to mind: what if the PCs decide not to stop the war but they just want to pick a winning side (or alliance) instead?
A simple way to visualize the progression of the war might be simply to color-code each country and paint the world map the appropriate color as the armies invade and take over. You can add little fire and rubble images to reflect the devastation. This is a shorthand, but I don't think this alone will have the urgency factor you're hoping for.
I would highly recommend you bring NPC informants into this. Hearing frequent eyewitness accounts (like a war correspondent) about the damage on the front lines will make it more personal and the need to stop it more urgent. Play on the party's emotions. Put beloved NPCs in danger/kill them. Annihilate some iconic locales. Paint a vivid picture of beautiful things that are being threatened or ruined because of the fighting. Make them care, and make them care about more things/people/areas than they can possibly hope to protect on their own. They will be spurred to action if the only real way to help is to stop the fighting. You don't need a visual cue if you have an intrinsic motivation for your character to act quickly because something precious could be lost if they don't - and if the communication to that precious thing is fraught or stops altogether, the urgency escalates instantly.
I'm confused on the set up. I thought the PCs are deities, but they're also showing up to take part in smaller battles in a war the PCs are trying to start.
Otherwise, you're basically asking the forum to design a war-game for you. D&D doesn't really have any set rules on resolving "warfare". You might want to look at the MCDM 3rd party book Kingdoms and Warfare. Some folks really like that book, others not so much, so you'd probably want to check out some reviews or discussions to see if it's your thing. I imagine there are other companies that produce war-games, actually most folks do "battle" games.
I mean, I'd honestly keep things simple and probably clone something like Risk or even better Supremacy (with all the advanced rules), build a world representative map that the board game's mechanics can be applied to, and just sort of keep that game as a sort of framework of world events the characters have to respond to.
But give Kingdoms and Warfare a look.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Its extremely unlikely the PCs would pick an alliance, as there are people in each nation who want to kill the majority of the party.
I could work with the skill points idea you mentioned I think, thats a pretty creative idea actually
Ill definitely be color coding the world map, for sure. I fully intend as well to kill some of the many NPC allies theyve made, and level towns if the fighting reaches towns.
The PCs have come to become revered as deities, but they are not. Ive worked to make them believe they are deities, but again, no. They are simple adventurers who have unintentionally started a world war with their own good deeds, and they must now stop that war.
Ill give Kingdoms of Warfare a look. I was looking at something similar to Risk, honestly, but having slight difficulty simplifying that down to DnD. I do recognize Im asking for some kind of system to be developed, and that very well may be beyond the scope of people.
Perhaps a moral system could be implemented for each of the Nations with low moral having the economy being trash and be more unsafe to travel through. While a high morale means means a more smoother economy and their armed forces receive a steady supply of soldiers.
It could be represented as a 15 point system or any number really and enough small victories will bring the morale up by one and a large victory could be it up by one or two, same goes for going down with enough small losses bringing the nation's morale down by one and a really big loss bringing it down by one or two depending on the damage.
Hope this idea fits and helps your game.
Things will happen with or without your players. Battles will be won, battles will be lost, people will die, towns will be destroyed, etc.
What I would do is, after each session, think about what happened during that session that the players didn't see. Maybe there are multiple battles going on around the continent/world/whatever, and during a session you can decide "This faction wins this battle" or "This town starts burning" or "This army moves forward into that territory" or something like that.
The players can affect the outcome of the battles by, say, blowing up a stock of weapons, or killing an important officer, or maybe just spreading a rumor which might lead to troops being diverted somewhere they're not needed. Something like that.
NOCTURNE OP55N1
🛈 Meet Hanako at Embers.
Ive actually combined this with another similar idea that someone else had on here. Each nation has a predetermined score based on events that happened in the campaign, being judged on Morale, Resources, Intelligence Network, and Military Might. Each nation also has a special ability they can use, an innate ability that triggers on certain areas or when fighting certain types of enemies, and a weakness that reduces one of those stats in certain situations, each of these to reflect each nations strengths and weaknesses as nations and as a fighting force. Morale, Resource, and Intelligence checks are done, and depending on which side wins those checks, they get a +1 to military might for each check they win. Military Might checks are D20 + modifiers. Whoever wins the Military Might check, wins the battle, and territory is taken.
For narrative reasons, losing lots of land could result in entire town populations slaughtered and people the players have helped being murdered. So this will help drive the urgency for the players to end the war as quickly as possible.
Taking your suggestion, morale modifiers are lowered when forts, towns, or significant land is taken.
Basically, a large scale battle will be determined by 4 D 20 rolls with a bunch of modifiers.
I actually went this this idea, doing the Military Might, Resources, Population loyality (morale), and intelligence network. I gave them scores based on how that nation would preform, adjusted it to reflect what happened in the campaign, and now each nation has very clear strengths and weaknesses, so thank you for this inspiration.
I took it a step further, giving each nation a special ability to use (such as a +3 to military might, or being able to try a losing battle again with disadvantage (healers)), along with innate abilities, such as +1 to military might on shoreline engagements (to reflect a powerful navy) and each nation has weaknesses (such as a -1 when a non-magically inclined nation faces off against a heavy magic faction). The special abilities and the point system you had i feel really reflects each nations individuality.
I also took someone elses suggestion, and morale gets reduced when one nation loses a town, city, or fort. So thank you everyone, I think I found a system that works well!
Devil's advocate on morale suffering because of a loss, remember the crew of reinforcement commandos who showed up on Scariff in Rogue One? Their battle cry was "For Jedha" which just got glassed by the Empire, and they kicked asymmetric butt. Not a city, but an important installation, but there's something to be said for American military resolve globally after Pearl Harbor, a similar "gloves are off" moment frankly happened after 9-11 in the U.S. where, to borrow from a Cold War song, while most folks I knew in 2001 usually didn't think about military matters, suddenly "Everybody's Captain Kirk."
I think you're right that sustaining multiple defeats or losses will affect overall morale, but I'd also entertain a "oh no they didn't!" opportunity for a rally when a particular center is struck. Before it made its way into a political metaphor, blowback ir I remember right was concept discussed in war colleges realizing Shock and Awe moments may lead to wins but inarguably result in insurgencies or even greater resistance. Maybe Lee Greenwood is in a particular nation's Bard roster, I was around for that too and winced when it was accurately deployed in Three Kings because it was dead on about the moment.
I don't know if you're still playing around with board game precedent, but this is sounding less like Risk, more like Supremacy, but even more like Axis and Allies.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
This.
I think it would make most sense to do something similar to what Thoughtwire and theologyofbagels are saying. You don't need to mechanically determine a winner if the PCs aren't involved. It can make much more narrative sense and require much less work to instead run it as a narrative. This battle is won by such and such a nation, this leader is assassinated by that nation, this nation's economy is collapsing so it's army is dwindling, this nation blockaded that nation, and so on a so forth. You can write the outcomes.
If you wanted to go really deep into the rabbit hole of mechanically determining the winner however.... I have considered playing basically a modified version of Axis and Allies before the session to determine the results of the battle...
I am an average mathematics enjoyer.
>Extended Signature<
I'm not sure if you need mechanics, but if you do, I'd give these rules a look. They are the rules for axis and allies, which shouldn't be too hard to change into D&D. Just replace the different units with units that fit D&D, whether that be spellcasters, red dragon wyrmlings, or infantry, and adjust the stats accordingly. The game already supports different nations having different units avalible, so you could for example make spellcasters more expansive for one nation (because they have less), and only red dragon wyrmllings available to one, and so on. You would probably want to change the starting units and economy and so on, but other than that it should be pretty much good to go. I think most of the Axis and Allies rules should be able to simulate what you want to do as long as you change the units.
I am an average mathematics enjoyer.
>Extended Signature<
I thought I was going to be unique and tell you to play Axis and Allies and base a world war on that.
But I see others beat me to it.
However, you don't need to buy and master the board game. You can get Axis and Allies on Steam and learn to play it. The mechanics I think would translate to DND very well.
However, I think it would be best if you could have a dedicated place to set up your war that can stay in place for several months.
Now I am inspired to think that it would be a most excellent Add on Third party 5e component to have a massive war system based on Axis and Allies for 5e.
I think the big thing to think about is if you do want to "game" this (as noted, simply narrating the course will give you more control and less work for you and the party) you are basically creating a war-game parallel to the campaign and make sure you're party is up for that. And yeah, Axis and Allies is probably the crunchiest you can get without going into hard core war-game territory, I think that's why A&A has such a passionate following still today ... I think I first played it over 30 years ago.
And I don't know about D&D specifically, but there's actually precedent for using war-games and world building games. The best example is Game Designers Workshop who wanted to use the outcome of their WWWIII game Twilight: 2000 (made in the mid or late 80s I think) as the basis of their new science fiction game Traveller: 2300 (eventually switched to just 2300AD as it had nothing to do with the Traveller Universe they were also publishing at the time). Anyway Twilight: 2000 imagines a world where NATO and the Warsaw Pact actually went to war in the 90s and there was a limited nuclear exchange. They plotted out the future of this world from then to 2300 with The Great Game which was a sort of global power game of war and diplomacy and resource development where the players would play various powers setting up a new geopolitical order in the world and then shake out how that power dynamic spread to the stars. In Twilight: 2000 France pulled out of NATO so literally ducked much of the WWIII fighting and became an important interstellar power. I think a unified Germany (which wasn't much of a battlefield, the ground war took place mostly in what was considered Eastern Europe at the time and the Middle East over oil reserves) was a big player and maybe South Africa. Anyway, because of that story I've always wanted to do a game world where I sort "great game" the world the players exist in as opposed to the usual mini novel world building exercises, and it's cool you seem to be doing it.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
There's Conquest of Nerath (2011 boardgame set in the 4th edition setting). Getting an actual set now is probably a collectors thing, but you can download the rulebook from Wizards. I've never played it and it doesn't look particularly high detail or inspired, but it does exist.