Friday, January 24, 2014

FRIDAY NIGHT FIGHTS: CENTAURS VS MINOTAURS PART I

Fight #4 and its the battle of the half primate/ half ungulate!

The idyllic woodlands contain centaurs, satyrs, dryads, pixies, sprites, treants, etc. On this day a few centaurs are out being a “roving band”.




NO. APPEARING: 4-24
ARMOR CLASS: 5 (4)
MOVE: 18”
HIT DICE: 4
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2 and 1
DAMAGE/ ATTACK: 1-6/1-6 and by weapon
SAVE: Fighter 4
INTELLIGENCE: Low-average
MORALE: 65%
ALIGNMENT: Neutral to Chaotic good
SIZE: L

Ok, then. Roving bands always carry weapons. Rolling for numbers I get 14 centaurs. In such a group, half (7) will have oaken clubs equal to morning stars, 1-8 or 1-6 points of damage. What to make of that? Is it 1-8 vs S-M and 1-6 vs L? Looking at the PHB page 37, morning stars do 2-8 vs S-M and 2-7 vs L. Lets see where the centaurs were used in a module. S4 has them on page 24 and indicates they are just using morning stars, so lets go with 2-7 damage vs size L minotaurs.

The next group of 4 will be archers with composite long bows (24” range, 1-6 hit points damage/attack). OK, that fits.

The last three will be leaders with shield and lance. AC 4, 1-8 or 2-24 points of damage. Is this 1-8 vs S-M and 2-24 vs L? Is it 1-8 normal and 2-24 on a charge? No idea. S4 indicates the centaurs use light lances, however, which do only 1-6 (vs S-M) or 1-8 damage (vs L). This doesn't make a lot of sense. Heck, I'll just give them heavy lances from the PHB. Its slightly less than the MM and a lot more than the light lance from the S4 version.

So we have:
7 with club (2-7), AC 5 hp 16, 18, 27, 16, 14, 13, 16 (C1 to C7)
4 with bow (24” range, 1-6), AC 5 hp 24, 12, 20, 15 (C8 to C11)
3 leaders with lance (3-18 or 6-36 double damage on charge), AC 4 hp 14, 19, 17 (C12 to C14)

A 4 HD centaur needs a 9 to hit an AC 6 centaur.

And onto the minotaurs, those bovine terrors.


NO. APPEARING: 1-8
ARMOR CLASS: 6
MOVE: 12”
HIT DICE: 6+3
NO. OF ATTACKS: 2
DAMAGE/ ATTACK: 2-8 or 1-4/by weapon type
SPECIAL DEFENSES: Surprised only on a 1
SAVE: Fighter 7
INTELLIGENCE: Low
MORALE: 78%
ALIGNMENT: Chaotic evil
SIZE: L

Rolling for numbers, I get 7. Lets say that three have huge axes (halberds) that do 2-12 vs a size L centaur. The others have footman's flails which do 2-8 vs size L, but the MM indicates that we should add +2 to damage, probably for minotaur great strength and probably applying to both huge axes and flails. Furthermore, a minotaur can butt an opponent 6' or taller for 2-8 damage.

So we have 3 minotaurs with huge axes (4-14), hp 26, 45, 42 (M1 to M3)
and 4 minotaurs with flails (4-10), hp 30, 24, 27, 31 (M4 to M7)

A 6+3 HD minotaur needs an 8 to hit an AC 5 centaur, or a 9 to hit an AC 4 centaur leader.

OK, now that all of that is out of the way, lets start the combat. I am assuming that the two groups are meeting in the forest wilderness, since centaurs are not usually found underground and minotaurs can be found in underground labryinths or above-ground wilderness. Lets roll for surprise. The centaurs are surprised on a 1-2, but I roll a 6 and are not surprised. The minotaurs are only surprised on a 1, and I roll a 1, so they are surprised for 1 segment.

We have to figure outdoor encounter distance, which is 6” to 24” (6d4, -1 for each die because of the forest and minus another 1 because of the surprise. I get 11”.

The centaurs with bows have a range of 24” and fire them. Three out of four hit and I randomly assign targets. M1 takes 6, M2 takes 2, and M7 takes 6. The other centaurs can choose to move up to 18' in one segment and do so, advancing almost 2” towards the minotaurs.

Now that surprise is over, we can determine intentions. The minotaurs advance to combat, while the centaurs with lances charge while the club and archer centaurs merely advance. Initiatitive is not rolled on the end of charge movement, but instead the monster with longer reach gets to attack first. This means that C12 to C14 get to attack first. They roll 5, 15, 17. Two hits to M2 and M6 for double damage. I roll a 16 and 31 and M6 is killed outright. Now the minotaurs can counter-attack against AC 5 leaders (penalty for charging). M1, M2, and M3 all try to hit C12 and C12 is hit once by a halberd for 9 points. M4 strikes C14 for 8 points. M5 strikes C13 for 8 points and M7 strikes C13 for 4 points. I rule that in the charge/counter-charge only weapons are used, not natural attacks (hooves/butt).

New round and time to declare intentions. The archer centaurs and club centaurs enter melee. The archer centaurs could fire into the melee, but as the centaurs outnumber the minotaurs and they are about the same size, they would be as or more likely to hit their allies. The leader centaurs and minotaurs are already in melee and they attack a member of the opposing force.

Initiative is now rolled. Minotaurs roll a 6 and centaurs roll a 5. I am going to assume all of the combatants have entered the melee at this time, so there are even chances for attacks to fall on any opponent as the melee swirls around.

M1 aims for C1 and hits for 9 points with halberd and 6 with head butt
M2 aims for C9 and hits for 10 points with halberd and 4 with butt
M3 aims for C5 and hits for 9 points with halberd and 3 with butt
M4 aims for C1 and misses with flail and hits with butt for 5
M5 aims for C5 and misses twice
M7 aims for C1 and hits for 6 points with flail only

Poor C1 is killed.

Now the centaurs can strike back.

C2 aims for M4 and hits once with hooves for 4 points
C3 aims for M1 and hits three times for 13 points
C4 aims for M2 and hits twice for 7 points
C5 aims for M2 and hits three times for 11 points
C6 aims for M5 and hits twice for 5 points
C7 aims for M5 and hits once for 3 points

C8 aims for M5 and hits once for 2 points
C9 aims for M3 and hits twice for 11 points
C10 aims for M3 and misses both times
C11 aims for M5 and hits twice for 3 points

C12 aims for M5 and hits twice for 19 points
C13 aims for M1 and hits once for 5 points
C14 aims for M5 and hits twice for 7 points

Minotaur 5 is killed.

New round and all of the monsters keep melee-ing. Roll for initiative and the minotaurs roll a 6, while the centaurs roll a 3. The minotaurs strike first again.

M1 aims for C3 and misses twice
M2 aims for C14 and hits once for 6
M3 aims for C5 and hits twice for 15 points, killing him
M4 aims for C12 and hits twice for 9 points, killing him
M7 aims for C11 and hits twice for 11 points

The centaurs can strike back!

C2 aims for M4 and hits twice for 8 points
C3 aims for M3 and hits once for 1 point
C4 aims for M1 and hits twice for 2 points, killing him
C6 aims for M4 and hits twice for 10 points
C7 aims for M7 and hits once for 2 points

C8 aims for M7 and hits once for 3 points
C9 aims for M2 and hits once for 1 point
C10 aims for M2 and hits twice for 6 points
C11 aims for M7 and hits once for 4 points

C13 aims for M1 and misses all three times, but centaur 4 already killed M1
C14 aims for M3 and misses all three times!

OK, here are the hit point tallies

C1 is dead
C2 18 points
C3 27 points
C4 16 points
C5 is dead
C6 13 points
C7 16 points
C8 24 points
C9 2 points
C10 20 points
C11 4 points
C12 is dead
C13 7 points
C14 3 points

M1 is dead
M2 2 points
M3 30 points
M4 8 points
M5 is dead
M6 is dead
M7 16 points

It looks like the centaurs are winning. We will finish tomorrow as my 8 year old daughter asked to roll up a character.

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