Summoning an Army

[Armitage]

Suppose you have a magic item that allows you to summon an army of orcs.  Once per year you can activate the device.  Over the next week, 1000 orcs gather from the surrounding area (they have to inhabit the area).  They remain in your service for up to three months.  They can only be gathered for one specific purpose, and disband if you deviate from it, or if you mistreat them too badly.

 

Normally, this might be designed as a Summon, but since each Phase of combat is treated as a Task, a three month military campaign would require an exorbitant number of Extra Tasks; if they only spend 5% of their time in actual combat, that's about 97,000 Tasks.  Slavishly Loyal can't be used, since they're not.

 

Would it be unbalancing to use Followers with a Continuing Charge?

 

 

Ring of Orc Summoning:  Followers (1000 55-point Orcs) (61 Active Points); Extra Time (1 Week, Only to Activate, -2 1/4), 1 Continuing Charge lasting 1 Season which Recovers every 1 Year (-1), Only To Complete One Specific Objective (-1/2), Followers Must Inhabit Locale (-1/2), IIF (Magic Ring; -1/4).  Total cost: 11 points.

 

vs

 

Ring of Orc Summoning:  Summon 1,000 55-point Orcs, Friendly (x25,000 as many tasks; +4) (305 Active Points); Extra Time (1 Week, -4 1/2), 1 Charge which Recovers every 1 Year (-4), Summoned Being Must Inhabit Locale (-1/2), Only To Complete One Specific Objective (-1/2), IIF (Magic Ring; -1/4).  Total cost: 28 points (assumes an EGO high enough for a base 4 Tasks)

 

[Sean Waters]

Well, this sounds like something the villain has and a plot device to boot, so I would not be too worried about cost, but the point with followers is that you are already getting a cost break for the extra numbers, so I would suggest that it feels wrong.  You don;t get a double cost break if you summon a vehicle.  At least I don't think you do.

 

Couple of points:

 

1. I don't see a problem with 'slavishly devoted' - they are ONLY going to be slavishly devoted to the actual task/military campaign - they still will not do anything outside that remit.  That means you can reduce costs a bit as you need buy fewer doublings of tasks, assuming you have a high EGO summoner.  OTOH, 'slavishly loyal is +1, so you lose four doublings right there, and get back about 2 and a quarter (assuming a summoner EGO of 20: 4 tasks v 20 tasks).  Probably more useful for saving on EGO rolls than actually upping the task numbers.

 

2. 100,000 tasks (I'm rounding) is a lot, but remember you don't necessarily need to buy the lot in one go.  You can buy less, it just means you have to make more EGO rolls to control the army as time goes by, and it gets harder.  Still, EGO roll skill levels are cheap...in fact you don't even need to make EGO rolls if the orcs can be persuaded to go on campaign by other means, promises of spoils, of glory or just the opportunity to fight lots.  It might be fun to have to make an EGO roll every month, of every couple of weeks - towards the end of the campaign the army might start to fragment.

 

3. You could build it with delayed effect, and summon several companies, then have them all turn up at once.

 

4. This being a summon, one decent dispel magic will break the army up.  A high active point cost might actually be an advantage...

[IndianaJoe3]

I'd buy the orcs as followers, and Limit the Followers as appropriate.

[Sean Waters]

I misread the followers bit: thought you were summoning followers, and you are not.  That could work if the GM is willing for you to have dead orcs replaced next year without you having to pay more character points, otherwise it gets a bit expensive over time.

[Armitage]

The item I was looking at was the Ring of the Pomarj, from the 1e AD&D Greyhawk Adventures hardcover, which is actually more powerful than I described, but more directly based on the personal power of the wearer.  The number of Tasks would be less than I calculated.  I used 12th level to determine the number of orcs and length of service, but forgot to halve it for the number of weeks.

 

 

 

A wizard from the Wild Coast created this black ring.  Hating all inhabitants of the Pomarj, he used it to gather troops of goblins, ogres, or orcs.  He then led these troops into battle against the humanoids of the Pomarj.  The ring is considered a threat by many other lands as well.

The ring allows a character of evil alignment to gather a horde of goblins, ogres, or orcs (in much the same fashion as a barbarian horde is summoned).  The wearer of the ring decides which race he wishes to gather, and can gather a number of creatures determined by his experience point total:

 

Race......HordeSize

Goblin....X.P. divided by 750

Ogre......X.P. divided by 4000

Orc........X.P. divided by 1000

 

The horde can be raised only on the Wild Coast, and must be raised for a specific, short-term purpose.  For example, the horde might be gathered to attack a rival tribe, to raid the County of Ulek, or to destroy elves in Celene.  It takes the horde at least a week to assemble and, whatever its purpose, the horde will remain together for a maximum number of weeks equal to half of the ring wielder’s level.  Deviation from the stated purpose may cause the horde to disband sooner, at the DM’s option.  Disbanded humanoids will return to the Wild Coast by the quickest and safest route.  Note that the ring does not charm, beguile, or otherwise compel obedience, and that a ring wielder whose humanoids disband will not receive a warm welcome the next time he returns to them.  The ring can be used but thrice in one year.

[Sean Waters]

How about: 

 

Mind Control 1d6, Telepathic (+1/4), Area Of Effect (8m Radius; +1/2), Constant (+1/2), MegaScale (1m = 10 km; +1 1/4), Cumulative (96 points; +1 1/2) (25 Active Points); Set Effect (Gather as a horde for a specific military purpose under the ringbearer; -1/2)

 

I know it says "Note that the ring does not charm, beguile, or otherwise compel obedience" but it clearly does compel them to come together and serve in a military campaign.  It just does not make them anything other than a horde of orcs/goblins/ogres under military command.  Add a maximum number of participants and a time limit and you are good to go.

[NuSoardGraphite]

Yeah, limited Followers sounds totally okay to me.

[psyber624]

Is this a thought exercise or an actual campaign question? If its a thought exercise then either method will work with different side effects (many already mentioned). If its for an actual campain then like Sean said this is a plot device and not something that needs to be statted out.

 

If for some reason you stat it out the BIG issue is that you are opening a door for players to want limited followers as well. As you demonstrated in your example its very easy to get the RC down for a ridiculous number of followers to the point that it would break a game. While you can always say "GM's Only" IME many players get upset if you do something in the rules that you would never allow them to do (and its weird because if its just "plot device" thats fine, but if you have a statted up object then especially rules lawyer types can get offended by this.)

[Sean Waters]

....

 

While you can always say "GM's Only" IME many players get upset if you do something in the rules that you would never allow them to do (and its weird because if its just "plot device" thats fine, but if you have a statted up object then especially rules lawyer types can get offended by this.)

 

The absolute truth.  If only we made sense, eh?