I was looking at Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes and there are a lot of specialty ogre classes. I want to create an ogre army with them but an entire army of them would be to OP for my players. What should I do?
Having your players confront an "Ogre Army" also raises the problem of large scale combat - for which DnD is not really suited.
What I would do in this case, is have the party fight as part of a much larger army against the "Ogre Army".
However, I would not try and simulate the entire battle. What I would do is only do cinematic description of the large scale battle, and detailed description only of the part of the battle going on around the party.
This give you opportunities to have lots of different types of enemies stumble into the part of the battle which the players are involved - and to have them stumble back out. The same for allies.
Picture the party fighting a group of gnoll skirmishers, in the middle of the battle. Things are going to well? The gnolls fall back to a trio of Ogre "heavy troops". Is it going poorly for the characters? They can gain assistance from a squad of Cavalry which ride down the gnolls flank, and help route them!
Getting to repetitive? "Suddenly you spot a squad of human warriors who have - in a moment of battle fury - punched too far into the enemy lines. The enemy troops close in behind them, pinching them off from the main battle lines, and this squad is now encircled, back to back, they struggle to hold off the ring of goblin troops hacking at their ranks!" Now you have something different for the players to do - a mid-battle rescue maneuver.
You can have the situation change suddenly, and fluidly, because the players can't really see "the big picture" - they can't see the large scale flow of battle which thrusts a group of allies into their area here, or a group of enemy troops there ( and the dirty secret is that there is no larger structure to the battle - just the DM changing the local conditions according to what seems plausible, and dramatic :D ).
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I was looking at Mordenkainen’s Tome of Foes and there are a lot of specialty ogre classes. I want to create an ogre army with them but an entire army of them would be to OP for my players. What should I do?
Loading...
Having your players confront an "Ogre Army" also raises the problem of large scale combat - for which DnD is not really suited.
What I would do in this case, is have the party fight as part of a much larger army against the "Ogre Army".
However, I would not try and simulate the entire battle. What I would do is only do cinematic description of the large scale battle, and detailed description only of the part of the battle going on around the party.
This give you opportunities to have lots of different types of enemies stumble into the part of the battle which the players are involved - and to have them stumble back out. The same for allies.
Picture the party fighting a group of gnoll skirmishers, in the middle of the battle. Things are going to well? The gnolls fall back to a trio of Ogre "heavy troops". Is it going poorly for the characters? They can gain assistance from a squad of Cavalry which ride down the gnolls flank, and help route them!
Getting to repetitive? "Suddenly you spot a squad of human warriors who have - in a moment of battle fury - punched too far into the enemy lines. The enemy troops close in behind them, pinching them off from the main battle lines, and this squad is now encircled, back to back, they struggle to hold off the ring of goblin troops hacking at their ranks!" Now you have something different for the players to do - a mid-battle rescue maneuver.
You can have the situation change suddenly, and fluidly, because the players can't really see "the big picture" - they can't see the large scale flow of battle which thrusts a group of allies into their area here, or a group of enemy troops there ( and the dirty secret is that there is no larger structure to the battle - just the DM changing the local conditions according to what seems plausible, and dramatic :D ).
It's a lot of work - but it can be fun!
Best of Luck!
My DM Philosophy, as summed up by other people: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rN5w4-azTq3Kbn0Yvk9nfqQhwQ1R5by1/view
Disclaimer: This signature is a badge of membership in the Forum Loudmouth Club. We are all friends. We are not attacking each other. We are engaging in spirited, friendly debate with one another. We may get snarky, but these are not attacks. Thank you for not reporting us.