___________________________________ (Unrelated Background) I'm running a modified version of HotDQ, where my party has started off in Greenest at Level 6 rather than Level 1 (we played through LMoP with these same adventureers). As such, I've been beefing up the power of the attacking Cult mostly by using larger numbers of low-CR attackers, to bring some truth to the idea that the Cult has amassed an army, but one of relatively straightforward, mundane power (rather than all the other types of units and abilities the Cult with acquire as the party encounters more mages, Dragonwings, Paladins of Tiamat, etc).
The players have only just entered the Keep after the initial assault. They are attempting to decide what to do next. They know that they could sneak out of the Keep to perform 'commando style' raids on the Mill, Sanctuary, etc in order to weaken the assault, but they also know that they have little hope of simply fighting the whole army head-on, even at Level 6.
One of my players is a manipulative Warlock, with high Cha. He asked if there are many civilians trapped in the keep, specifically young teens/boys. I replied yes. He asked if he could 'rally' these young people to come with the group on one of their missions. I called for a Persuasion or Performance check (his choice) and he rolled high. Not really certain how to proceed, I made a quick call that 4d6 (rolled 15) young men pledged to fight with them on their next mission, who went to the Keep armory to gather whatever weapons they could.
Out of character, the warlock stated that these boys mean nothing to him except extra HP between the party and their enemies.
When it comes to untrained fighters, we pretty much just have the Commoner stat bloc. That x15 is a little much, so I've grouped them into 3 'pack's of militia, each representing the combat ability of 5 commoners armed with whatever basic equipment they could find (hide armor and spears, mostly).
Being untrained and inexperienced, I feel that there should be a significant chance that the morale of the 'pack' will break and that the unit will flee. However, I personally feel that the 'morale check' in the DMG is too arbitrary. When the DM 'feels like' making a check, morale could collapse.
I think that morale should be something that the players can affect. Something that increases and decreases moment-to-moment through the ebb and flow of battle. I've put together a one-page draft of morale rules that I'm thinking about implementing. I've created these goals specifically to use when there are "goons" and "Leaders" -- Players and dangerous bad guys don't have morale, but either might be leading forces which do. My goals for these rules are:
Easy to use without disrupting the flow of battle.
Have a simple number which lets leaders know how close a unit is to 'breaking'
Provide incentive for leaders to place their followers carefully so they support one another, and a reward to maintaining high morale ("Inspired" state)
Set a clear point where morale "breaks" and a unit flees
Given the fast-changing nature that I want to have for morale, I created a 'tracker' sheet with a scale from 0-15. The 'leader,' player or DM, puts a d6 on the bar, then slides it left/right as appropriate for quick reference.
I'm looking for feedback, opinions, and suggestions. Things always get ugly on the internet, so I'm prepared for "This is s&$t" comments, but if you feel that way, please explain WHY it is s&$t.
Is it too complicated? Too simple? Should the scale be 0-100? Should there be more incentive? Should morale break faster? Slower?
it's simple to understand, morale increases and decreases at an equal rate, the rally action seems unbalanced at first glance but after seeing the once per combat part, is perfect. the only things i would suggest is they make a DC10 save at 3(or somewhere around there) morale, and a DC15 at zero also maybe make it a morale of 12 to get the d4 boost. but honestly nice work, might steal this
NNCHRIS: SOUL THIEF, MASTER OF THE ARCANE, AND KING OF NEW YORKNN Gdl Creator of Ilheia and her Knights of the Fallen Stars ldG Lesser Student of Technomancy [undergrad student in computer science] Supporter of the 2014 rules, and a MASSIVE Homebrewer. Come to me all ye who seek salvation in wording thy brews! Open to homebrew trades at any time!! Or feel free to request HB, and Ill see if I can get it done for ya! Characters (Outdated)
The rules look interesting but they seem to me to be a bit much to try to track in the midst of combat. Each unit, tracking hits, misses, damage and modifying the unit morale after each.
Each of your units has five commoners - each executing an attack. If they each hit then their morale could go up by 5. If someone hits them then they might go down by 1. The morale system seems to say that the group will have a better morale against one difficult opponent rather than a mass of weak opponents simply because the difficult opponent has fewer chances to decrease morale.
I don't think the "Inspired" ability makes any sense. Adding a d4 to hit, AC and saves is better than having a bless spell cast on them. Based on these rules the party of PCs itself, which would usually have a decent morale should have a permanent super bless. I would remove the Inspired part entirely. At the most, when morale is high, they should have a reduced chance of breaking and running.
There are two aspects that I think you leave out. Green untrained troops should have a much higher chance of running away or becoming unable to fight than experienced veteran troops. In your example, a bunch of teenagers grabbing weapons they don't know how to use are likely to bolt and run away as soon as they see the one next to them get sliced open with a sword or take an arrow to the head. Wounds are shocking, losing your best friend because you are running around a field with a weapon you don't know how to use can't give you the knowledge or training on how to use that weapon well. It is most likely going to convince you that you do not belong there and leave immediately. This is especially true if the folks who are encouraging you to fight are only interested in your use as meat shields and targets to prevent them taking damage.
I can't find a statistic for the typical losses required before an army would break and of course historically there is a huge range and stories of armies standing their ground against overwhelming odds. One less reliable source suggested 30% - lower for inexperienced troops and higher for veterans. Factors like fighting on home ground, defending their homes/families and similar effects also play a role.
The rules look interesting but they seem to me to be a bit much to try to track in the midst of combat. Each unit, tracking hits, misses, damage and modifying the unit morale after each.
Each of your units has five commoners - each executing an attack. If they each hit then their morale could go up by 5. If someone hits them then they might go down by 1. The morale system seems to say that the group will have a better morale against one difficult opponent rather than a mass of weak opponents simply because the difficult opponent has fewer chances to decrease morale.
I don't think the "Inspired" ability makes any sense. Adding a d4 to hit, AC and saves is better than having a bless spell cast on them. Based on these rules the party of PCs itself, which would usually have a decent morale should have a permanent super bless. I would remove the Inspired part entirely. At the most, when morale is high, they should have a reduced chance of breaking and running.
There are two aspects that I think you leave out. Green untrained troops should have a much higher chance of running away or becoming unable to fight than experienced veteran troops. In your example, a bunch of teenagers grabbing weapons they don't know how to use are likely to bolt and run away as soon as they see the one next to them get sliced open with a sword or take an arrow to the head. Wounds are shocking, losing your best friend because you are running around a field with a weapon you don't know how to use can't give you the knowledge or training on how to use that weapon well. It is most likely going to convince you that you do not belong there and leave immediately. This is especially true if the folks who are encouraging you to fight are only interested in your use as meat shields and targets to prevent them taking damage.
I can't find a statistic for the typical losses required before an army would break and of course historically there is a huge range and stories of armies standing their ground against overwhelming odds. One less reliable source suggested 30% - lower for inexperienced troops and higher for veterans. Factors like fighting on home ground, defending their homes/families and similar effects also play a role.
This is the sort of feedback I wanted to hear.
The 'inspired' part is powerful, true, but I wanted to provide an incentive that was worth the trouble of tactical placement and keeping track of the morale at all. Removing the only incentive would, in my opinion, make the system punitive rather than engaging ("you have to keep morale up or get punished with the unit breaking, and there's no reward for doing really well"). Perhaps a smaller bonus would work, or removing the bonus to everything except attack rolls: they fight harder, but are not harder to kill. I will certainly keep what you have said in mind, and I hope that I am responding to your statements with appropriate respect.
I completely agree that an untrained unit of teenagers grabbing weapons should receive some kind of penalty, and break more easily. They were the starting point of creating these rules, but I am trying to create a system that can be generalized to other units as well. Such as groups of 'guards', 'veterans' etc.-- Perhaps the militia would be capped at a lower number or they would break at 5 rather than zero. I put in a rule that morale drops to 0 automatically at 50% HP, but then we get into discussions of what that HP actually represents - would a group at 50% mean that half are dead? Creatures in 5e fight at 100% power all the way until they hit 1HP...
One other thing to mention is that purpose of the miltia 'grouping' involves reducing the number of dice rolled. My idea was 2 attacks rather than five, with a flat 7 damage per hit (avg of 2d6 for spears and 10 Str). Tracking the 5 separately would mean that they dealt more damage (5d6 vs 4d6), but treating them as a group means that they have 5x HP, so I felt it appropriate to lower their damage output as I raised their survivability.
Forgive my inexperience, I've only been a dm for about a year, now - I've had tremendous trouble dealing with large amounts of turns in combat, so I'm trying other things out to compensate.
Too much to track. Drop the active changes. Change Passive chart to just morale chart.
Within 5 feet of ally +1 only once
Taken causality -1 per
Within 5 feet of enemy -1 only once.
Large plus enemy doing damage to our side -2 (Only once. )
Bloodied, unit has lost 50% hp. -5 Replaces Taken causality .
Green units -2, Rookie -1, Trained 0. Battled +1 Vet +2
Inspired drop or change to Morale is 15 + acts like is under a bless spell.
Rally Any commander or PC can take an action (or insert some pc abilities) to rally a unit which can hear the PC. The DC is the current morale score of unit +5. This is a cha or (insert certain pc abilites) check.
I think it would be impractical to actually use. It's going to be a lot of you rolling to see if they hit, then you making a note on your tracking sheet, compare it to the morale chart, then you rolling to see if someone hits them, then you making a note on your tracking sheet, then compare it to the morale chart. All the while, your players are sitting there twiddling their thumbs. I also would be surprised if a player used their action to boost the morale of the cannon fodder. Most people think healing a PC who's still standing it a waste of an action; trying to stop some kids from running away would be even below that on the priority list, I'd imagine.
I see the value of doing this to try and make it fair and less up to your whim. But honestly, I'd go with that whim, instead. Just feel it out, if things are going well, they stick around, if they're going poorly, they cut and run. If one kids rolls a crit, maybe he turns into a minor hero for the town.
I think everyone is agreeing that my first draft has too much to track on a per unit basis. Upon retrospect, I agree. Other suggestions point out that the system is too generous. I can get behind that, too.
One thing I haven’t mentioned is that the intent is for The PCs to be the ones implementing these rules for any NPC allies they have. The DM would use them should he judge that some of his weaker units would fall under them, but my plan is to create a system for player use. Is there a risk that the players might cheat? Always, but I want to start somewhere.
I’ve created a streamlined V2 based on the feedback I’ve seen here:
I think everyone is agreeing that my first draft has too much to track on a per unit basis. Upon retrospect, I agree. Other suggestions point out that the system is too generous. I can get behind that, too.
One thing I haven’t mentioned is that the intent is for The PCs to be the ones implementing these rules for any NPC allies they have. The DM would use them should he judge that some of his weaker units would fall under them, but my plan is to create a system for player use. Is there a risk that the players might cheat? Always, but I want to start somewhere.
I’ve created a streamlined V2 based on the feedback I’ve seen here:
I have no problems with this. It is simpler than the 1E rules I remember. Now you just have to decide how many critters are in a unit? Does the unit use mob/swarm rules? And I can't think of anything else.
Is there a risk the players could cheat? Always. That said, if I thought the people I was playing with were cheating, I'd quickly find a different group.
This is certainly more streamlined. I would be shocked if someone would ever use the rally action. The situation becomes, I (the player) can use my action to potentially give this kid with a pitchfork a chance to stand there for another couple rounds, or I can fireball a pack of enemies, then the choice is clear. If you actually want players to use it, I'd say make it a bonus action, and give it some range. Still, its going to depend on the build, for example, a fighter who made CHA a dump stat (so will have a less than 50% chance of success) and has PAM is certainly going to attack for their action, and would rather use their bonus action to try and hit the guy in front of him instead of making sure the kid next to him doesn't run. Realistically, its going to be bard, sorc and warlocks who might have the cha to use it, but they won't be up in melee next to the ally, hence the need for some range. Maybe a paladin could actually use it as written, they do have a lot of bonus action spells, but they don't use them often, so they might want to rally someone with a bonus action. They still wouldn't use their action do it it when they could be smiting someone for tons of damage. Maybe someone uses it one time, just to try it out, and then everyone realizes that it was a waste of a round and no one else would do it.
Still, I question the need for the whole thing. If you are the DM, you are the one who knows the personalities of these NPC and knows if one is uncommonly brave or cowardly or just normal. I wouldn't cede that decision to the dice. It's much more interesting, and opens up more options for you both in terms of combat and narrative if you decide when the person flees. You can use it to amp up the drama of a fight if and when it's needed, instead of the dice doing it for you. You can decide that this one is not running, no matter what, and he's up in the mix and now the PC's can't use their AoE spells without hitting him. This other one is going to cut and run at the first battle cry and now the area the PCs wanted him to hold is empty, and they need to change their strategy. This also makes NPCs more memorable characters, instead of a bunch of values on a sheet of paper. Then when the fight ends, the players have to decide what to do about these NPCs, they know who they can depend on and who they can't, so they can make more interesting choices themselves.
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*TL/DR Below*
Asking for guidance and feedback, fellow DMs!
___________________________________
(Unrelated Background) I'm running a modified version of HotDQ, where my party has started off in Greenest at Level 6 rather than Level 1 (we played through LMoP with these same adventureers). As such, I've been beefing up the power of the attacking Cult mostly by using larger numbers of low-CR attackers, to bring some truth to the idea that the Cult has amassed an army, but one of relatively straightforward, mundane power (rather than all the other types of units and abilities the Cult with acquire as the party encounters more mages, Dragonwings, Paladins of Tiamat, etc).
The players have only just entered the Keep after the initial assault. They are attempting to decide what to do next. They know that they could sneak out of the Keep to perform 'commando style' raids on the Mill, Sanctuary, etc in order to weaken the assault, but they also know that they have little hope of simply fighting the whole army head-on, even at Level 6.
__________________________________________________
One of my players is a manipulative Warlock, with high Cha. He asked if there are many civilians trapped in the keep, specifically young teens/boys. I replied yes. He asked if he could 'rally' these young people to come with the group on one of their missions. I called for a Persuasion or Performance check (his choice) and he rolled high. Not really certain how to proceed, I made a quick call that 4d6 (rolled 15) young men pledged to fight with them on their next mission, who went to the Keep armory to gather whatever weapons they could.
Out of character, the warlock stated that these boys mean nothing to him except extra HP between the party and their enemies.
When it comes to untrained fighters, we pretty much just have the Commoner stat bloc. That x15 is a little much, so I've grouped them into 3 'pack's of militia, each representing the combat ability of 5 commoners armed with whatever basic equipment they could find (hide armor and spears, mostly).
Being untrained and inexperienced, I feel that there should be a significant chance that the morale of the 'pack' will break and that the unit will flee. However, I personally feel that the 'morale check' in the DMG is too arbitrary. When the DM 'feels like' making a check, morale could collapse.
I think that morale should be something that the players can affect. Something that increases and decreases moment-to-moment through the ebb and flow of battle. I've put together a one-page draft of morale rules that I'm thinking about implementing. I've created these goals specifically to use when there are "goons" and "Leaders" -- Players and dangerous bad guys don't have morale, but either might be leading forces which do. My goals for these rules are:
Given the fast-changing nature that I want to have for morale, I created a 'tracker' sheet with a scale from 0-15. The 'leader,' player or DM, puts a d6 on the bar, then slides it left/right as appropriate for quick reference.
__________________________________________
*TL/DR*
This is my draft:
Morale Rules (first draft)
This is the Tracker:
Tracker
I'm looking for feedback, opinions, and suggestions. Things always get ugly on the internet, so I'm prepared for "This is s&$t" comments, but if you feel that way, please explain WHY it is s&$t.
Is it too complicated? Too simple? Should the scale be 0-100? Should there be more incentive? Should morale break faster? Slower?
——————————————
Second Draft based on early feedback:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/18N85uPiIQQmj8Yzc6n8iZBjN_w_e0Vqu4NTZGMspSmQ/edit
it's simple to understand, morale increases and decreases at an equal rate, the rally action seems unbalanced at first glance but after seeing the once per combat part, is perfect. the only things i would suggest is they make a DC10 save at 3(or somewhere around there) morale, and a DC15 at zero also maybe make it a morale of 12 to get the d4 boost. but honestly nice work, might steal this
NNCHRIS: SOUL THIEF, MASTER OF THE ARCANE, AND KING OF NEW YORKNN
Gdl Creator of Ilheia and her Knights of the Fallen Stars ldG
Lesser Student of Technomancy [undergrad student in computer science]
Supporter of the 2014 rules, and a MASSIVE Homebrewer. Come to me all ye who seek salvation in wording thy brews!
Open to homebrew trades at any time!! Or feel free to request HB, and Ill see if I can get it done for ya!
Characters (Outdated)
The rules look interesting but they seem to me to be a bit much to try to track in the midst of combat. Each unit, tracking hits, misses, damage and modifying the unit morale after each.
Each of your units has five commoners - each executing an attack. If they each hit then their morale could go up by 5. If someone hits them then they might go down by 1. The morale system seems to say that the group will have a better morale against one difficult opponent rather than a mass of weak opponents simply because the difficult opponent has fewer chances to decrease morale.
I don't think the "Inspired" ability makes any sense. Adding a d4 to hit, AC and saves is better than having a bless spell cast on them. Based on these rules the party of PCs itself, which would usually have a decent morale should have a permanent super bless. I would remove the Inspired part entirely. At the most, when morale is high, they should have a reduced chance of breaking and running.
There are two aspects that I think you leave out. Green untrained troops should have a much higher chance of running away or becoming unable to fight than experienced veteran troops. In your example, a bunch of teenagers grabbing weapons they don't know how to use are likely to bolt and run away as soon as they see the one next to them get sliced open with a sword or take an arrow to the head. Wounds are shocking, losing your best friend because you are running around a field with a weapon you don't know how to use can't give you the knowledge or training on how to use that weapon well. It is most likely going to convince you that you do not belong there and leave immediately. This is especially true if the folks who are encouraging you to fight are only interested in your use as meat shields and targets to prevent them taking damage.
I can't find a statistic for the typical losses required before an army would break and of course historically there is a huge range and stories of armies standing their ground against overwhelming odds. One less reliable source suggested 30% - lower for inexperienced troops and higher for veterans. Factors like fighting on home ground, defending their homes/families and similar effects also play a role.
This is the sort of feedback I wanted to hear.
The 'inspired' part is powerful, true, but I wanted to provide an incentive that was worth the trouble of tactical placement and keeping track of the morale at all. Removing the only incentive would, in my opinion, make the system punitive rather than engaging ("you have to keep morale up or get punished with the unit breaking, and there's no reward for doing really well"). Perhaps a smaller bonus would work, or removing the bonus to everything except attack rolls: they fight harder, but are not harder to kill. I will certainly keep what you have said in mind, and I hope that I am responding to your statements with appropriate respect.
I completely agree that an untrained unit of teenagers grabbing weapons should receive some kind of penalty, and break more easily. They were the starting point of creating these rules, but I am trying to create a system that can be generalized to other units as well. Such as groups of 'guards', 'veterans' etc.-- Perhaps the militia would be capped at a lower number or they would break at 5 rather than zero. I put in a rule that morale drops to 0 automatically at 50% HP, but then we get into discussions of what that HP actually represents - would a group at 50% mean that half are dead? Creatures in 5e fight at 100% power all the way until they hit 1HP...
One other thing to mention is that purpose of the miltia 'grouping' involves reducing the number of dice rolled. My idea was 2 attacks rather than five, with a flat 7 damage per hit (avg of 2d6 for spears and 10 Str). Tracking the 5 separately would mean that they dealt more damage (5d6 vs 4d6), but treating them as a group means that they have 5x HP, so I felt it appropriate to lower their damage output as I raised their survivability.
Forgive my inexperience, I've only been a dm for about a year, now - I've had tremendous trouble dealing with large amounts of turns in combat, so I'm trying other things out to compensate.
Too much to track. Drop the active changes. Change Passive chart to just morale chart.
Within 5 feet of ally +1 only once
Taken causality -1 per
Within 5 feet of enemy -1 only once.
Large plus enemy doing damage to our side -2 (Only once. )
Bloodied, unit has lost 50% hp. -5 Replaces Taken causality .
Green units -2, Rookie -1, Trained 0. Battled +1 Vet +2
Inspired drop or change to Morale is 15 + acts like is under a bless spell.
Rally Any commander or PC can take an action (or insert some pc abilities) to rally a unit which can hear the PC. The DC is the current morale score of unit +5. This is a cha or (insert certain pc abilites) check.
Bloodied move to the chart.
Broken. No changes at this time.
No Gaming is Better than Bad Gaming.
Oh. Treat the unit as a mob of 5. AC 10 HP 20 Speed 30 To Hit +2 Damage 8 4 if at half hitpts.
No Gaming is Better than Bad Gaming.
I think it would be impractical to actually use. It's going to be a lot of you rolling to see if they hit, then you making a note on your tracking sheet, compare it to the morale chart, then you rolling to see if someone hits them, then you making a note on your tracking sheet, then compare it to the morale chart. All the while, your players are sitting there twiddling their thumbs. I also would be surprised if a player used their action to boost the morale of the cannon fodder. Most people think healing a PC who's still standing it a waste of an action; trying to stop some kids from running away would be even below that on the priority list, I'd imagine.
I see the value of doing this to try and make it fair and less up to your whim. But honestly, I'd go with that whim, instead. Just feel it out, if things are going well, they stick around, if they're going poorly, they cut and run. If one kids rolls a crit, maybe he turns into a minor hero for the town.
I think everyone is agreeing that my first draft has too much to track on a per unit basis. Upon retrospect, I agree. Other suggestions point out that the system is too generous. I can get behind that, too.
One thing I haven’t mentioned is that the intent is for The PCs to be the ones implementing these rules for any NPC allies they have. The DM would use them should he judge that some of his weaker units would fall under them, but my plan is to create a system for player use. Is there a risk that the players might cheat? Always, but I want to start somewhere.
I’ve created a streamlined V2 based on the feedback I’ve seen here:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/18N85uPiIQQmj8Yzc6n8iZBjN_w_e0Vqu4NTZGMspSmQ/edit
(Removed double post)
I have no problems with this. It is simpler than the 1E rules I remember. Now you just have to decide how many critters are in a unit? Does the unit use mob/swarm rules? And I can't think of anything else.
No Gaming is Better than Bad Gaming.
Is there a risk the players could cheat? Always. That said, if I thought the people I was playing with were cheating, I'd quickly find a different group.
This is certainly more streamlined. I would be shocked if someone would ever use the rally action. The situation becomes, I (the player) can use my action to potentially give this kid with a pitchfork a chance to stand there for another couple rounds, or I can fireball a pack of enemies, then the choice is clear. If you actually want players to use it, I'd say make it a bonus action, and give it some range. Still, its going to depend on the build, for example, a fighter who made CHA a dump stat (so will have a less than 50% chance of success) and has PAM is certainly going to attack for their action, and would rather use their bonus action to try and hit the guy in front of him instead of making sure the kid next to him doesn't run. Realistically, its going to be bard, sorc and warlocks who might have the cha to use it, but they won't be up in melee next to the ally, hence the need for some range. Maybe a paladin could actually use it as written, they do have a lot of bonus action spells, but they don't use them often, so they might want to rally someone with a bonus action. They still wouldn't use their action do it it when they could be smiting someone for tons of damage. Maybe someone uses it one time, just to try it out, and then everyone realizes that it was a waste of a round and no one else would do it.
Still, I question the need for the whole thing. If you are the DM, you are the one who knows the personalities of these NPC and knows if one is uncommonly brave or cowardly or just normal. I wouldn't cede that decision to the dice. It's much more interesting, and opens up more options for you both in terms of combat and narrative if you decide when the person flees. You can use it to amp up the drama of a fight if and when it's needed, instead of the dice doing it for you. You can decide that this one is not running, no matter what, and he's up in the mix and now the PC's can't use their AoE spells without hitting him. This other one is going to cut and run at the first battle cry and now the area the PCs wanted him to hold is empty, and they need to change their strategy. This also makes NPCs more memorable characters, instead of a bunch of values on a sheet of paper. Then when the fight ends, the players have to decide what to do about these NPCs, they know who they can depend on and who they can't, so they can make more interesting choices themselves.