Horse sized duck should be a lot stronger than that. Should be equivalent to a griffin. Maybe stronger because horses are a lot bigger than lions. I imagine it being a hp sponge.
I would actually imagine a horse sized duck to not be that strong in terms of HP. Sure if you draw what we know from already large birds there is information to gain, but evolution doesn't work in a way that you can copy from one tree and paste into another. The brittle hallow bones of a duck would likely pose itself much more of an issue than the duck's sheer size and strength. That and we aren't taking into account the strength of humans, that we are endurance hunters, so while the question is often thought in a cage match style fight, it would much more likely be in a scenario where given the opportunity the human could always catch up with faster prey. So all you would need to do is to break the wings of the duck (with any form of blunt force, it should be easy due to the weak bones) in a scenario where you get a weapon you can easily take a warhammer and one shot to a wing and once shot to the sternum. The ribs would collapse like a termite infested mine and the duck will almost certainly die.
@@theblankfacegamer333 hollow bones being incredibly brittle is a myth last I heard. The duck would however probably not be able to walk due to the square cube law though
@@theblankfacegamer333 Why break its wings and exhaust it when you can grab its neck and break it? And that is not only its weak point but also its deadliest weapon (although not only one, many wild ducks have short spurs).
Variant human/custom lineage with heavy armor master makes it so that the duck sized horses cannot do any damage, the rest of the build is irrelevant as long as your character starts with heavy armor.
@@AuStistic_Lemurr they can hit but they will not do any damage. A crit will also not even double the damage because no dice were rolled, but even if they did heacy armor master reduces damage by 3 so they would still do no damage.
@@1V0ah You won't be able to rage long enough at level 1 to kill the 100 horses before they kill you. Half orc won't work as their relentless endurance trait only works once per a long rest.
They seriously under estimate the horse sized duck in this video. They made duck sized horses broken by giving them all individual turns instead of treating a literal pack of horses as a pack. Nah shove a duck sized enemy into a 5×5 square so your tiny horses can... block players in and swarm them... when literal tiny horses could be stepped on and killed by a humanoid player. Ya know... like a real duck? They didn't even present a situation to attempt to start trampling the horses? Falling down would be bad for the player. But a successful roll? How many horses can an orc barbarian crush in a sprint? If my DM ran this scenario with their interpretations from this video I would be seriously disappointed. Super sad they were so lazy on considering more ways this could be ran aside from their owm lazy mechanics.
@@nickybeingnicky lol it's not lazy, it's following RAW. How many horses can an orc barbarian crush in a sprint? Just one without house rules. The point of the video was to understand how action economy works in the game, not create real-world strategies for killing ducks.
@@bryan__m I'm not going to watch the video again to tell you you're wrong. But there are rules for trampling over small enemies, there are rules for stampede scenarios too. If the orc barbarian, two size classes over the horses, cannot use it's movement speed over them like they are rough terrain, then the DM isn't using RAW. They are house ruling out real tactics.
@@nickybeingnicky yes, there's a rule that you can move through space of creatures 2 categories smaller than you, though that might not work in this case since you also can't end your movement in a hostile creature's space, and depending on how they are oriented, 15ft-30ft of movement might not be enough to get to a free square. Plus you provoke AoOs through your movement, so that tips action economy pretty strongly against you. However, my objection wasn't to the movement, it was to the "trampling" attack that would allow you to kill every creature whose space you enter. I don't know of a rule that lets you do that -- is it from a non-core rulebook?
Given that tiny creatures don’t occupy the space they’re in, find a boulder that the duck sized horses cannot climb. Or better yet, cast the mold earth cantrip to raise the 5ft cube of earth beneath your feet up so that you are out of reach of the beasts attacks. Positioning on the battlefield vs the duck sized horses leads to victory in any situation. Especially if you are a caster with the acid splash cantrip, as you can not only attack from range, but you can also strike multiple of the very likely grouped up horses.
Was gonna say the same thing. Ducks are no joke. Although they're weaker than geese which in turn are weaker than swans. Those majestic death machines terrify me.
@@lydiamourningstar2028 ooh, now I want to create an evil queen with a pair of swans flanking her throne. Nasty enough at regular size to keep the peasants in line, but enlarged to horse-size to take on the adventurers
Before I watch I'm going to take a guess. 100 hits doing one point each would be devastating, but not many horse-sized monsters deal 100 points of damage on one hit. So I'll take the horse sized duck any day
Although I think 5e's action economy is terrible the bigger issue here is that there is no way to stat the little horses as doing less than 1hp of damage. A creature either does a full hp or can't do damage at all. The game (quite reasonably) just doesn't scale down that low.
How fast can the duck-sized horses move? If it's less than the character, and the character is a caster, they should be able to outlast the horses with ranged cantrips. Pack Thunderclap or Sword Burst in cast you get surrounded, and Acid Splash so you can potentially kill two horses from afar. Also bring an AoE such as Thunderwave or Burning Hands (preferably the former, since the 15ft cube effect is slightly larger than the 15ft cone) to mass-slaughter a larger amount if they get too close. Feel free to also bring Sleep, since the horses are only gonna have 1hp, so you can shutdown a large amount of them with just one of your ever so precious first level slots. If the horses are faster than you, there are first level spells that increase your speed. Expeditious Retreat is first level, for example. Use that, and get 100 rounds of superior speed. Acid Splash (or alternatively, something with a better chance of actually hitting them since Acid Splash is a DEX save). If you can't beat them fast enough, cast Expeditious Retreat again for another 60 rounds of survival.
@@annasolovyeva1013 That's where the cantrips come in! If you use the Fire Bolt cantrip, you can not only hit them from 120 feet away, but you can also catch something on fire, and if enough of the horses are in said fire, they will take at least 1 damage. Another one you could use for more likely hits is Mind Sliver, as it's an INT roll, which should be in your favor, as the horses have a -4 on intelligence rolls. Both of these are definitely viable if you use Expeditious Retreat to keep your speed up for dashing away.
@@annasolovyeva1013 If you use no other first level spells, you can have 200 rounds of combat with Expeditious Retreat up. If the tiny horses (which shouldn't be nearly as fast as regular horses!) have a move speed slower than yours, you can put space between you and them by dashing even if they dash every round, otherwise use Expeditious Retreat so you can Dash twice each turn (Expeditious Retreat lets you Dash as a Bonus Action, so you can do that and then Dash again as your Action, like normal, for a total of three times your regular walking speed). Acid Splash is not entirely ideal, since it only has a 60ft range, but the horses have 2 INT and should not be able to understand that they need space between them to avoid having two of them targeted at once. Even with their DEX modifier,you are likely to hit at least one per shot. If the horses get to a range of 60ft on their turn, you can Acid Splash and still get out to a range of 90ft, assuming no Expeditious Retreat and a walking speed of 30ft. So they'd need at least 45ft of walking speed to catch up with you on their next turn, which is ridiculously high for a tiny little duck-horse. Additionally, I'm sure you can get at least 35ft of walking speed by choosing a non-human race, probably more, which further increases the maximum speed for the horses that you can still deal with. And lastly, if the DM makes stamina a consideration, gently remind them that stamina is humanity's evolutionary niche, and that your wizard should be able to outlast the little tiny horses (even if you choose a different race, they all have enough similarity to humans to make this plausible).
@@PikaLuigi Mind Sliver is a great option for a near-guaranteed hit if the DM is metagaming to make the horses realize they should stay apart. Acid Splash can hit two horses at once (and statistically, you should be able to hit slightly more than one per shot, unless they're proficient with DEX saves, in which case I'd have to calculate the exact odds, but it'd be looking pretty good for Mind Sliver). I was generally assuming that you'd be faster than the horses, because they're so tiny. I mean seriously, imagine a duck-sized little horse trying to run at you on its teeny-tiny legs. Expeditious Retreat can keep them off your case if they're slightly faster, though.
@@theuncalledfor On the sense of their running speed, a duck sized horse is equal to a small dog. And those can still move fast. Remember, they also have less mass to carry, so if their physique is relative they might actually be QUITE fast. Depending on your DM, of course.
Well, as always, depends on the party build. In the campaign I'm running (almost every player, me included, being noobs) I use a legion of draconics as the main antagonists, and for the first quests, that meant kobold. The thing is, from the original 3 players, 2 are spellcasters, with a solid AoE build, so throwing a crap lot of kobolds usually end up in 1 or 2 massive murders at the start of the battle, and the rest just fighting the few left. I think I understand balance better now, but those first quest were way too easy in terms of encounters. Playing the number games doesn't really help my poor gang of fanatic supremacists.
The duck should have both had a higher AC, since feathers can be pretty good at defence, and had more attacks (like a wing attack), as well as maybe higher strength and flight.
Yeah, there are many ways to subtly tweak the scenario that can significantly alter the balance. Even a silly, apparently simple premise had a lot of potential implementations in the game!
Go warlock with armor of agythis and blade ward. Blade ward will reduce damage from the horses to zero (0.5 rounded down is zero), and armor of agythis will kill every horse that attacks you. Assuming that you can keep armor of agythis up for one round before you can cast blade ward, and the horses keep attacking you each turn, you will eventually win.
@@swest6982 Phb p.7 "There’s one more general rule you need to know at the outset. Whenever you divide a number in the game, round down if you end up with a fraction, even if the fraction is one-half or greater." SRD p.96 "With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, but never negative damage."
Play an Aarakocra, Fairy, or any race with a fly speed wizard, sorcerer, etc... and use the disengage action to fly above the horses on your first turn about 30ft high. After the other 100 turns go by start casting damage dealing cantrips while you flutter in the sky. No armor or feats required.
To beat 100 duck sized horses I would roll a lvl1 fighter variant Human with chain mail and take Heavy Armor master feat. " While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3." You have all the time in the world as their attacks would do you no damage
@@Lavenish You cannot reduce damage below 0. From the PHB p.196 "Damage Rolls Each weapon, spell, and harmful monster ability specifies the damage it deals. You roll the damage die or dice, add any modifiers, and apply the damage to your target. Magic weapons, special abilities, and other factors can grant a bonus to damage. With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, *but never negative damage* "
I would use a Wizard. Depending on how fast they're supposed to be, either bring some AoE spells, or Expeditious retreat. Cantrips never run out of ammo, unlike a bow, so my Wizard can stay ahead of the swarm and continuously cast Acid Splash to potentially kill up to two horses each round while never being in range to be hit back. If they're faster than you, cast Expeditious Retreat so you'll be faster than them for 100 rounds. You have two first level slots, so you can get 200 rounds of being faster than them. If they figure out that they can avoid the double-kills by staying apart, switch your attack cantrip to Mind Sliver, which is an INT save and very hard for the horses to pass. 200 rounds should be enough to wipe them out, or at least thin the herd enough that you can wipe out the rest with Sword Burst or Thunderclap. Their CON is weak, so Thunderclap is preferable. You'll also want Mage Armor, in case they manage to get close. So as to not waste a slot on that, cast it just before the end of your long rest, so you'll have Mage Armor AND two first level slots. (Rest casting is actually legal in both RAW and RAI. Read the rules to check the RAW, and RAI has been confirmed in... I think a tweet or something.)
@@theuncalledfor Expedious retreat won't actually work since they can use an action to dash to keep up with you and get an opportunity attack every time you try and move away. This is of course assuming they have a slower movement speed than a regular sized riding horse since they would keep up to you without the dash action otherwise. If they had a movement speed below 25ft (I'm going to assume they don't, otherwise this encounter is trivial for most characters) this would work. As far as rest casting, this may or may not be a factor depending on what time of day the encounter happened. Either way it's unlikely your wizard at level one would survive for long.
@@stickjohnny Expeditious Retreat _will_ work because you can still Dash with your Action, though that reduces the amount of turns you have to actually attack them. And it would be absurd to make tiny horses as fast as a full-sized horse, since they have such an immensely shorter step length.
Acid splash is likely the most resource efficient way for a caster to deal with the horses. Burning hands twice with your level 1 spell slot, then try not to get cornered and pick them off in pairs.
Huh, that's a thought one. I guess static damage effects would be the way to go, something like create bonfire. But it'd be a toss-up whether a caster would survive long enough to surround themselves with them.
Unfortunately, Create Bonfire is a Concentration spell. As you cast it a second time, the first is instantly extinguished. But the logic stands, so if you could set up an equivalent of a Spikes trap (a passive effect that reliably deals a minimum of 1 damage) this becomes similar to the Pokemon training battle (in Pokemon Gale of Darkness) against an army of Shedinja (you have to beat all six of them in a single turn).
Your assessment is perfectly correct for D&D 5e, but things would be much different irl. See, horses rely on their size to be dangerous to humans (I have been assaulted by a dog sized horse). While a tiny horse can cause pain and minor injury, causing catastrophic injury or death is going to be difficult, if not impossible. You might get a broken toenail or a bruise where it bit you. Now, to a giant duck... you're just a snack. I'm not sure if a horse sized duck can swallow a human whole, but I feel like they absolutely could rip a human carcass into bite sized pieces
Exactly! Even the fiercest horses have to be trained often violently to be aware that they're big, and therefore dangerous to the little two leg creatures making loud noises at them. It's a good chance you rock up on a duck sized duck, and get yourself run at. A horse sized duck, would beat you with those wings and knock you flat. Their beaks are also not soft and cute, they're edged on the inside, so when they shake their head, fish clamped in their beak get shredded...
I just can’t help myself here is another one, once my brain starts on a puzzle/puzzle it just won’t let go. This’ll work with any class even D6 hit die classes you just have to make sure your minimum life total is more then 9 hp. It is doable with stat array. You just need to have at least a +3 in constitution. So that’s a starting hp of 9. Pick the old Air Genasi from Elemental Evil Player’s Companion. First turn levitate 10 or more feet above the horsesducks . You now have ten minutes to kill everything. Spam cantrips. Use a weapon with reach and poke the one below you. Or have a sling and 10 bags of sling bullets (that’d be 200 shot).
Ooh, now that's a good one! People keep forgetting the Genasi, but they are so cool! (I have come to hate almost any character that is a human because they are just a custom race but better than pretty much any other. Dull. I haven't flat-out banned them in my games... but I encourage my players to build interesting characters and so far it's been a blast.)
Level 1? I have a few builds that will work. Bladeward reduces 1 damage to 0.5 damage which is rounded down to 0. So now you just need to figure out a way to hurt them. Fog cloud is pretty good at ensuring the horses will never critically hit you and last for an hour. Next we need to deal damage… Word of radiance or thunder clap are good AoE options for targeting -1 con mod miniature horses. Of course if we could door way dodge, alchemist fire is pretty good item to have for a mark of warding forge domain cleric in ring mail with a shield who just happen to marry someone within 30 feet of them yesterday. (19 AC, this consumes the average amount of starting gold of 125 that the cleric would normally have) I believe disadvantaged gives a -3.5% chance to get the roll needed to hit. Good berry also gives us 10 hp per spell slot, and there are races that can cast it for free once per day. Such as the mark of healing halfling. Which gives 30 total extra HP if you want to go this route. And with a life domain cleric, this is 90 extra hp. To do this, I would be a witherbloom student to have the Druid spell added to my spell list. A torch and either grease or oil come to mind. If I’m allowed to prepare. I can drench the whole place in oil and light on fire on a monks starting gold (which is less than taking the starting equipment and selling it!!) Of course I can’t forget about flying races… horses don’t have a ranged attack! Heavy armor master reduces damage from the physical kinds by 3 which means even a crit does 0 damage. Most importantly, speak with animals to offer them sugar cubes if they leave you alone. I think I’ll be okay against the 100 horses.
A horse-sized duck would have much greater damage output. A normal sized Swan has wings strong enough to break a man's arm. Also, when threatened by a land-based threat a duck will fly at their enemy and thrash with wings while pecking. Given the size and weight of this monstrous duck, I would also give it a charge/pounce attack that could possibly knock a medium sized creature prone.
Heh, this reminds me of the first campaign I ever DM'ed. It was first designed to be one shot, but developed into a full blown campaign when the first quest was over. The first quest being, essentially: "There's a group of cities situated around a lake, which depend on import of food. The entrance of the lake has been blocked by a 5m duck, no ships dare approach it. What do you do?"
We've actually been facing this in a friend's campaign. We get a lot of downs as PC because we are levels 1-3 (leveled to 3 last night), and some of the enemies have had things like multiattack, while also outnumbering us at least 1.5 to 1. So it's been difficult. I always think smaller amount and stronger size is better. 3 monsters with +5 to hit and 1d10+3 for damage is better then 8 monsters with +4 to hit and 1d6+2 for damage. Multiattack in any scenario makes an encounter deadly below levels 4
there is the hoarde fighting rules in the DMG. I can't remember it perfectallly or be bothered to look it up but its along the lines of if you 1 shot an enemy you can (I can't remember if you need to roll to hit again or not) carry over the damage to the next enemy in reasonable reach. you could kill several ducks a swing.
Best bet would prob be a wizard or something with an aoe spell for the duck sized horses. Sleep may be effective since the tiny horses aren't smart enough to wake up their allies, and instead try to reach an unreachable target. Aoe cantrips like thunder or word of radiance could also work. By money would go on a level 1 twilight domain cleric for the 18 ac, sleep, and Word of radiance
Assuming the fight starts with the fighter being surrounded by the tiny horses as you suggest, the fighter's best move would be to dash outside of the cloud of tiny horses and look for some terrain bottleneck that would limit their ability to approach. From an advantageous position, or using their backup ranged weapon (which all adventurers should have), the fighter could take out the horses with little personal risk, though their best play would probably be to just flee the scene.
First on reupload! This reminds me, I gave my players the option of taking on horse sized geese in steel cage matches. Was a good session 1 at the Gooseberry Festival :)
Dmg has a variant rule for cleaving where you can continue your attack through and deal excess damage to any number of monsters as ling as they're in range and you bring them from max HP to 0 HP, so on average the fighter is going to kill like 6 duck sized horses per round. That means that the fighter kills all the ducks in about 18-20 turns, which still results in the ducks winning, but still, it's not as grim as your calculations (If you're using this variant rule)
Or are variant human and take heavy Armor master "While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3" so the horses cannot hurt them.
Well, if the fighter is using the optional “cleave through creatures” rule from the DMG, they might stand slightly more of a chance. I know it’s a big IF, since not many even know of the rule.
Or are variant human and take heavy Armor master "While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3" so the horses cannot hurt them
Also are you allowing the cleave through variant rule? If the damage would kill a creature than any damage gets applied to the next creature until no more damage is left. I’m not good at math but what about a bugbear Fighter with heavy armor and has a glaive. That way the fighter can possibly reach 48 ducks.
The problem with that is while you can reach 48 of them, you'll never be able to damage more than 12 in a round (36 on a crit). Taking that into account, you'll take down an average of 4.8 horseducks per round, and have to last ~21 rounds while taking ~2.4 damage per round. You could use a lance (and if you always attack a horseduck out of range first then cleave into the closest ones you won't have to worry about the disadvantage), then that ups to 5.4 horses per round, and you'd have to last 18 rounds. That all being said, this is probably the most viable melee method I've seen here.
I'd really love to see you guys do a more concise take on world building using a d&d spin on the "what do they eat" question from the video "TUN: The Shandification of Fallout" the video is pretty old, and has been re-uploaded a dozen times because the original was taken down thanks to a little bit of NBA footage or something, but I think the core messages there are really valuable to the d&d crowd.
In Swords and Wizardry, a Fighter who downs an opponent can attack again. So the 1st level fighter *could* kill as many duck sized horses as he could reach each round. Assuming the mass of duck sized horses has significant morale, it would take 6+ rounds of killing several duck sized horses before they checked morale at 50% strength, but your morale system might check at 2/3 strength or 75% strength. The fighter has maybe a 50/50 chance to hit the ducks, and the ducks have maybe a 1:4 chance to hit the fighter, assuming he has heavy armor (AC 16). The high numbers of the duck sized horses will eventually kill him. Using two weapons for +1 to hit would be very helpful, raising his chances to 55/45 or 60/40. A smart thing to do would be to create a pool of oil in a horse shoe shape behind him that would limit the number of duck sized horses that could attack him at once, assuming he has enough oil flasks to keep it going for several rounds and has no doorways or other chokepoints to take advantage of, this would help him a lot. This would extend his lifespan considerably, assuming the duck sized horses are afraid of fire and can only attack six at a time from his front. They would deal perhaps 1 damage a round, but he would kill 1-2 a round. He could also use their bodies to feed his fire.
it also depends on how they are played. if played as a pure slugfest then obviously take on the duck. But if it is more in line with the original animals' personality, then the hardest part of the horse fight would be chasing down the horses(these animals get freaked out by their own shadow, so a towering goliath[metaphor not inherently race] actively trying to kill them? you might kill a few by fear induced heart attacks alone)
worth noting that ducks have small rows of serrated teeth on their beaks and tongue, so the bite attack might be slashing damage. Also, birds bite hard. I’ve never personally been bitten by a duck, but i’ve been bitten by parrots and they can exert a lot of force
I love this video because I have a group of lv1's right now. I just so happen to have a ceramic duck which I use as a dragon mini in other games because it takes up the perfect area on a battle map.
Whenever it comes to enemy swarms, Area of Effect it always important. There are a fair few low level spells, even cantrips which let you hit multiple targets at once.
This is true, but how many AoE attacks are there at level 1 that could hit 100 squares? Burning hands hits 7. Even in 6 rounds, you won't even kill half the horses.
@@andrewb378 I think Thunderwave hits everyone around you, so that could go as far as 8? 9? Gonna check the book real quick... Its a little unclear if a cube can center on you, but projecting from you works best in anycase. Sleep is actually a pretty useful spell in this case, as it can put 5d8 HP worth of creatures to sleep and effectively remove them from combat (yeah, the horses could hit each other to wake them up, but with only 1 HP each, they would take each other out of combat doing so). Though even in that case its unlikely to be able to finish them all off with only 2 casts of Sleep available at first level. Heroisim was another interesting option I saw, since it gives the target essentially regenerating temporary HP for a minute that could actually absorb most if not all the damage per turn. But the limit of one minute manys its not likely to last a full combat against those numbers. Armor of Agathys is also noteworthy since it also gives temporary HP, but also damages the enemy when they deplete any of that temp HP. Though its only a set 5 temp HP so it does not last nearly as long as a Heroism would (presuming someone else casts Heroism, since it is concentration). Chances are there just isnt a good way to defeat 100 duckhorses with a level 1 character, but it is fun to analyze possible tactics to get as far as one can.
Using the mob attack options from the dmg, the horses would smash a party that didnt have area damage to reduce the minihorses quickly Is also the why on zombie campaings i always use common zombies at first until the group feels confident enough to fight hordes of zombies, is then when i release the real nightmare... 100 zombie chihuahuas... roll initative
well because of the square cube law where the mass of a object increase with the power of 3 but the mussel strength only increases linearly witch causes the duck to not be able to stand up so I would fight that in real life too
Alt just give the fighter a pair of shortswords or even daggers to double their attacks, also the use of items like flammable oil could prevent them from being swarmed. Ducks are probably tiny, rather than small/medium tho, so a player could be surrounded and attacked by 12 at a time. If the character has access to a Cantrip (spellcaster class or magic initiate for variant human), Blade Ward (assuming the rounding down rule) would make them immune to all damage at the cost of an action. Since it takes an action, you wouldn’t be able to deal any damage, but the horses still wouldn’t be able to deal any damage, even with opportunity attacks, allowing you to freely move and perhaps escape or reposition and make use of environmental hazards. For other Cantrips, Sword Burst could kill all 12 surrounding you, assuming they all fail the saving throw. Create Bonfire can block off whole 5ft cubes, unless the horses are unrealistically willing to run through flames AND pass the saving throws, so surviving 8 turns, becoming exposed to fewer attacks after each one, the caster can fully protect themselves before attacking outwards from range. Mould Earth can be used to create a 5ft elevated platform, which a tiny creature probably wouldn’t be able to climb, but a medium PC definitely would with just 10ft of movement. The 1st level spell burning hands would also be good at taking out a bunch of horses in one go. Just thought of the best combo! Blade Ward and Armour of Agathys. You take no damage when you are hit (aside from perhaps the first turn), but every time a horse hits you it takes 5 damage and is killed outright. It depends on the PCs ability to cast AoA in one round and then BW in the next without being hit 5 times in between. This would depend on the horse’s starting formation (if they immediately surround the PC or have a straight line) their movement speed (riding horse is large with 60ft movement, so a tiny creature 20-40ft) and their starting position (in melee or a short distance away). If the horses have less than 35ft movement, an elven warlock/warlock initiate, if they are faster then probably a goblin, allowing for a dash as a bonus action. With this the user should be able to outrun them with an action to spare each turn.
There is one mistake in the video, the range of the Thunder Wave is a 15ft cube coming from the caster, yes, but that means the 15ft cube connected to the caster on one of its sides or corners, like here x = spell c = caster xxx xxx xxx xxx cxxx xxx xxx xxx cxxx c But in the video cube is 35 feet, centered on the caster. It's actually a common spell mistake I've made myself in the past. What would be a much more effective strategy in my opinion? To use the much more niche spell ma boy Sleep™, which can put up to 5d8 worth of hp of a duck sized horses to sleep. That's 22 little horses on average, and then just try to kill as many as you can with some splash damage cantrips. But overall, very nice and funny video. And they corrected a video by removing a caster part. well shucks.
The caster could choose to position the cube such that they are in the center of a cube face, to throw force out in all directions. There's nothing in the wording of the spell that prohibits this. Every table is different though, and a DM is free to to limit the casting to edges and vertices if they wish.
@@Oxaphosphetane You're right about the position, yes, caster can cast it on self, but I noticed in my comment that the cube doesn't become a sphere with a radius by doing that. the cube's size is determined by its edge, so it 15ft cube centered on the caster will look like this xxx xcx xxx Check PHB p. 201 "Spellcasting" to see more details.
Not much uncertainty in real life: duck-sized horses: get really frightened of "angry enormous giant" and run away. horse-sized duck: immediately collapses and soon dies of cardiac arrest. (bird biology cannot support such sizes, emus and ostriches are highly specialized exceptions, and even their body mass is a fraction of horse's)
Horse size duck should get a special wing buffet attack to stun. For small size creatures, I usually give my players one creature hit for each combat bonus so +4 = 4 horses hit per round. And the horses should get a special stampede attack with trample damage. And just to kick it old school, after several rounds of losses, the horse would break morale and run off rather than fight to the death. But fun thought experiment.
All I need is a 1st level wizard and the high ground, like a tree or something. Bring on the 100 duck-sized horses, or watch me get destroyed by one horse-sized duck when it starts flying at me. :3
A Horse Sized Duck. Getting ready to play Curse of the Ganshoggr. Plenty of big ducks/geese in that one. They always say getting nibbled to death by ducks is tedious. I'd give the Giant Duck maybe an AC 8 The Duck can buffet you with the wings d 2-8 . save versus constitution or stunned for the next round. 100 duck sized horses you sweep with burning hands potentially. Cast and perhaps 10-20 of the little buggers the first round and likely panic a proportion of the rest. Second round maybe another ten as the bravest left try to swarm you. More flee. The third round some of the horses get close to you. Maybe your battle mage gets another spell off or a stomp and hack with a dagger as you leap , retreat out of range. The mop up will take a while but the little buggers are going to have a hard time hitting you and will get less and less interested in the pursuit to do their 1 or two points of hoof damage? Bite damage? A fighter I would definitely let cut through the horse ducks with their sword. So if they roll up 10 damage I keep cutting horse ducks until they run out of hit points, Maybe 2 1/2 horse ducks per successful swing? The Fighter loses their sword maybe there is a problem, But a swarm of these little fellows may get 6 attacks? 8 attacks? and what can the little hoofs really do. These are going to be quarter hit dice creatures. Probably a reach to hit say an AC 4(16) fighter. They will need a 20. I sense a Lilliputian stomping of the horse ducks.
I would have assumed the 100 duck sized horses would act like a swarm with just with bigger individuals. So would have just choose a random swarm monster like rot grubs and make the swarm a size bigger to adjust for the bigger individuals. so Large rot grub swarm, retextured to look like horses.
Fiend Warlock with Thunderclap and Armor of Agathys, 15 Cha 14 Con 13 Dex 12 Wis 10 Int 8 Str. +1 to Cha and +2 to Con. Be a Tortle from Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse. That's an AC of 17, HP of 11, and DC of 13. All 8 horses have a -1 Con save assuming no Proficiency, so a 65% fail rate vs Thunderclap. To hit an AC 17, they have a 40% chance with their +4. On average, 3.2 will hit the Tortle every round, and the Tortle will hit 5.2. As a Fiend Warlock, every time the Tortle drop a hostile creature to 0 HP, they gain 4 Temp HP (+3 Cha +Lv1 Warlock). Assuming they go before the horses, they're likely to drop at least one horse to 0, adding the THP, which the horses will be unlikely to get rid of before the Warlock's next turn, starting the cycle again. And as a backup, they can cast Armor of Agathys to guarantee the next 5 horses to land a hit instantly drop to 0. Granted, if the initiative is such that the successive waves of horses can approach and attack after the closest horses drop in the same round, it might not work out. But this is the best I could come up with for a Lv1 character facing a gauntlet of 100 small horses.
I would really want to fight those suckers as a wizard or sorcerer with high enough level to use an aoe spell like fireball or chain lightning. If had to try to fight that many at level 1 I would want to be a rouge using hit and run tactics or a ranger sniping from a structure the tiny horses can not retch.
If you build the "100 duck sized horses" as a few swarms - like you are supposed to do - it becomes a much more sensible calculation. The part where you even thought about running ~100 tiny horses as anything _other_ then a "Swarm of Tiny Horses" or 4, is where you messed up. There are quite a few example swarms that turn "CR 0 (10 XP)" and "CR 0 (0 XP)" - some of which deal 0 damage - into something worth running by making them a "Swarm of [Creature Type]", without breaking the action economy. Granted with that many tiny beasts, we are still talking about at least 3 Swarms (at 32 tiny horses per swarm) - so the number are still stacked against the single PC. But it is not quite as insane anymore.
Just how small do you think a duck is? They are either a Small creature (average duck) or Tiny (smallest ducks). They can group into a space if Tiny (allowing 32 attacks against their target), but they aren't a swarm (which implies they move and attack as a single unit, which doesn't make sense here).
Hm. Seems my memory is a bit off about duck size. They are on the bottom end of Small or the highest end of Tiny. Either way, they would not be a swarm, though they might be able to share a space, allowing for 32 attacks in a round.
I see Heavy Armor Master has already been figured out for killing the 100 duck sized horses, so I'll suggest a build for a kill speed run. I think you want to go variant human with magic initiate, choosing the spell Armor of Agathys and the cantrips thunderclap and create bonfire. You are a Draconic bloodline Sorcerer with 8 str, 16 dex, 14 con, 8 int, 10 wisdom, and 16 charisma. This gives you an AC of 16. The real question is how long do you have to prepare for combat at this point. If there is a prep round you cast Armor or Agathys on yourself, that is instantly killing 5 horses and protecting you from the first 5 attacks. You cast Create bonfire to protect one side of yourself and can eliminate up to 5-6 horses a turn in that bonfire if enemies continuously fail dex saves. But on average should kill about 3 a turn. Every turn after you are either refreshing Armor of Agathys which you can cast 3 times, or casting Thunderclap which should kill up to 6ish average horses in one turn. With this in mind you should be killing about 8-12 horses a turn, with an additional 5 a turn dying to your armor. I'm gonna roll this out and see how I do. ___ I died, killed 55 of them though. I lost concentration on Create Bonfire after 2 rounds so that is what really cost me. If I could figure out a way to get heavy armor master and armor of agathys at level 1 I think that would do this the fastest, because you would only have to cast the spell once, bur it does not appear to be possible to get both at that level.
Since it's folly to run a combat in 5e with more than a dozen monsters, I'd make the tiny horses a handful of swarms (herds?) out of necessity. At that point the action economy wouldn't overly favor the horses, but the swarms would be pretty tough against a low level party. For the horse-sized duck, I'd reskin something nasty and add flight... a smallish allosaur mightn't be TOO far out of line and would be lots of fun!
How would you justify them being a swarm? They are still the size of a small dog, and you would (hopefully) not use swarm mechanics with creatures of that size. They might share a space if you go for the smallest size of duck, making them Tiny, and thus having 32 creatures surrounding the PC, but then the next turn that is 32 attacks coming their way. The point is to make a character clear the challenge as-is, not figuring out how to nerf the challenge.
Or if you're a fun dm to run minion encounters you can let the player destroy multiple ducksized horses with one attack. (Ye also not try anything like this till there a slightly higher level as first level is to deadly already)
Variant human with heavy armour master -3 damage to all none bludgeoning piercing and slashing damage from non magical sources the horses cannot harm the fighter
Most of the comments I'm seeing are saying the same thing and that's basically "tell me you've never had to fight a duck sized duck, without telling me you've never fought a duck sized duck." You left out the ducks viscous wing beat attack, which gets a bonus strike, and has a +4 to hit and can leave players stunned on a successful hit 50% of the time. Duck sized horses can be defeated by standing in front of them and clapping real loud, and then throwing out your hands. Used to keep horses, and them suckers jump at their own farts! Try scaring a duck and that mother fucker has a 60% chance to get real tired of your shit, real fast, and put an end to you.
1 horse sized duck is easy: just hit it. One shot if I, palladin, smite. 100 duck-size horses are tough, you need an AOE attack or crowd control you don't have at low levels. There's only one thing that my character, half-orc palladin, could successfully have done to the horses. Scaring them brutally and making noise.
Swans/Geese have the ability to hurt people by whacking them with their wings. So the horse sized duck should have a slam attack on top of the bite attack.
If you have AOE spells on your side a swarm of small enemies can be dealt with much quicker then a single big enemy, so this reasoning does not always apply. For example, a 5th level wizard surrounded by 100 duck-sized horses could cast fireball into the hoard and kill up to 40 in a single turn.
That's why the question is specifically asking about 1st level characters. 5th level anything could come up with various ways to deal with either situation.
hmmm what about a 1st level caster? aoe attacks might help, though the horses still might win with few casualties anyway. green flame blade would be a great fighter assist spell, though again they'll still die.
A known inherent problem with D&D is the abuse of tiny CR creatures with minimum damage 1 to kill anything. See 3rd edition cats being wizard death in the surprise round at level 1. That's why when small things come in large numbers you abstract it out to a swarm. Think of rolling for individual bees and the time consuming headache that would be! I have several issues with your stats as presented. 1) Your tiny horses don't have a +4 to hit. Yes you gave them Feat: Use Dex to Hit, but they don't have that feat when they're horse sized so they don't get it now. Their proper to hit is -3. This makes it a 20 to hit. I would still say that the 100 individual horses will win because of the previously known tiny CR abuse. 2) I was going to say that the duck looked weak for a large sized creature, but it looks like you just gave it Riding Horse stats. So I acknowledge your choice. Well done. I will say that I think the inherent power of being Large means the rule book made horses too weak, but they probably did it so that you can't just use a horse to win all your fights at low level.
Yeah, as DM for my group, I take the nature of animals into account. A level 1 adventurer is incredibly unlikely to have a war trained horse, and most horses will bolt, rather than fight. My adventurers don't try using things like horses to fight for them. A hundred duck sized horses, are a hundred skittish creatures, that will have to roll for a chance to be scared because the thing they're attacking makes a loud noise at them lol.
Ducks would typically be Small creatures, not a swarm. Swarms are meant to be a cluster of Tiny (or smaller) creatures that move and attack as a single unit. Ducks and horses would not typically be swarms, that's just nerfing the encounter for the sake of it. The point is the challenge as stated, 1 vs 1 or 1 vs 100.
I think this is more than anything illustrative of the problem that DND's HP system can't properly account for very minor injuries. 10 bites, kicks, whatever, from a duck-sized horse is probably not going to kill an adult person, certainly not one wearing 18 AC worth of armor. 1 HP of damage from any one of these attacks *grossly* over-estimates the extent of the injury sustained. I realize this is just how the rules are written, but you'd need to use some sort of fractional HP system (or just multiply all the HP values by a large amount like a Final Fantasy game) to have this situation make practical sense.
@@stickjohnny Just curious, what is the path to obtain an average of 55? Modifying the scenario from the vid, I'll assume 1st lvl caster, so that's 5d8 affected HP, average of 22.5, two casts for 44-45 affected horsies.
The challenge is to do it at lv. 1. Have fun with your (checks list) whopping two lv. 1 spell slots. Even if you do the highest aoe and don't miss anything, they still get to munch your corpse in no time.
I'm pretty sure in real life the huge duck would be absolutely vicious but in dnd the horses would win by action economy.
😂😂 right!
Horse sized duck should be a lot stronger than that. Should be equivalent to a griffin. Maybe stronger because horses are a lot bigger than lions. I imagine it being a hp sponge.
I would actually imagine a horse sized duck to not be that strong in terms of HP. Sure if you draw what we know from already large birds there is information to gain, but evolution doesn't work in a way that you can copy from one tree and paste into another. The brittle hallow bones of a duck would likely pose itself much more of an issue than the duck's sheer size and strength. That and we aren't taking into account the strength of humans, that we are endurance hunters, so while the question is often thought in a cage match style fight, it would much more likely be in a scenario where given the opportunity the human could always catch up with faster prey. So all you would need to do is to break the wings of the duck (with any form of blunt force, it should be easy due to the weak bones) in a scenario where you get a weapon you can easily take a warhammer and one shot to a wing and once shot to the sternum. The ribs would collapse like a termite infested mine and the duck will almost certainly die.
@@theblankfacegamer333 hollow bones being incredibly brittle is a myth last I heard. The duck would however probably not be able to walk due to the square cube law though
@@theblankfacegamer333 Why break its wings and exhaust it when you can grab its neck and break it? And that is not only its weak point but also its deadliest weapon (although not only one, many wild ducks have short spurs).
Variant human/custom lineage with heavy armor master makes it so that the duck sized horses cannot do any damage, the rest of the build is irrelevant as long as your character starts with heavy armor.
You could also hide in a sturdy barrel and they'd never get in
big boots
@@AuStistic_Lemurr they can hit but they will not do any damage. A crit will also not even double the damage because no dice were rolled, but even if they did heacy armor master reduces damage by 3 so they would still do no damage.
Or you could be a barbarian, or a half-orc too
@@1V0ah You won't be able to rage long enough at level 1 to kill the 100 horses before they kill you.
Half orc won't work as their relentless endurance trait only works once per a long rest.
Anyone who says they'd rather fight a horse sized duck has clearly never fought a duck sized duck. Them bastards are vicious.
If you win, then you fight the boss: the goose
They seriously under estimate the horse sized duck in this video. They made duck sized horses broken by giving them all individual turns instead of treating a literal pack of horses as a pack. Nah shove a duck sized enemy into a 5×5 square so your tiny horses can... block players in and swarm them... when literal tiny horses could be stepped on and killed by a humanoid player. Ya know... like a real duck?
They didn't even present a situation to attempt to start trampling the horses? Falling down would be bad for the player. But a successful roll? How many horses can an orc barbarian crush in a sprint?
If my DM ran this scenario with their interpretations from this video I would be seriously disappointed. Super sad they were so lazy on considering more ways this could be ran aside from their owm lazy mechanics.
@@nickybeingnicky lol it's not lazy, it's following RAW. How many horses can an orc barbarian crush in a sprint? Just one without house rules. The point of the video was to understand how action economy works in the game, not create real-world strategies for killing ducks.
@@bryan__m I'm not going to watch the video again to tell you you're wrong. But there are rules for trampling over small enemies, there are rules for stampede scenarios too.
If the orc barbarian, two size classes over the horses, cannot use it's movement speed over them like they are rough terrain, then the DM isn't using RAW. They are house ruling out real tactics.
@@nickybeingnicky yes, there's a rule that you can move through space of creatures 2 categories smaller than you, though that might not work in this case since you also can't end your movement in a hostile creature's space, and depending on how they are oriented, 15ft-30ft of movement might not be enough to get to a free square. Plus you provoke AoOs through your movement, so that tips action economy pretty strongly against you.
However, my objection wasn't to the movement, it was to the "trampling" attack that would allow you to kill every creature whose space you enter. I don't know of a rule that lets you do that -- is it from a non-core rulebook?
Given that tiny creatures don’t occupy the space they’re in, find a boulder that the duck sized horses cannot climb. Or better yet, cast the mold earth cantrip to raise the 5ft cube of earth beneath your feet up so that you are out of reach of the beasts attacks. Positioning on the battlefield vs the duck sized horses leads to victory in any situation. Especially if you are a caster with the acid splash cantrip, as you can not only attack from range, but you can also strike multiple of the very likely grouped up horses.
I love that each horse has 1HP
One horse power
IMO the horse sized duck is quite nerfed. you never fought a duck IRL and it shows
If they fought a duck IRL I'm not sure they'd be here to tell the tale...
Was gonna say the same thing. Ducks are no joke. Although they're weaker than geese which in turn are weaker than swans. Those majestic death machines terrify me.
@@lydiamourningstar2028 ooh, now I want to create an evil queen with a pair of swans flanking her throne. Nasty enough at regular size to keep the peasants in line, but enlarged to horse-size to take on the adventurers
Before I watch I'm going to take a guess.
100 hits doing one point each would be devastating, but not many horse-sized monsters deal 100 points of damage on one hit. So I'll take the horse sized duck any day
Although I think 5e's action economy is terrible the bigger issue here is that there is no way to stat the little horses as doing less than 1hp of damage. A creature either does a full hp or can't do damage at all. The game (quite reasonably) just doesn't scale down that low.
How fast can the duck-sized horses move? If it's less than the character, and the character is a caster, they should be able to outlast the horses with ranged cantrips. Pack Thunderclap or Sword Burst in cast you get surrounded, and Acid Splash so you can potentially kill two horses from afar. Also bring an AoE such as Thunderwave or Burning Hands (preferably the former, since the 15ft cube effect is slightly larger than the 15ft cone) to mass-slaughter a larger amount if they get too close. Feel free to also bring Sleep, since the horses are only gonna have 1hp, so you can shutdown a large amount of them with just one of your ever so precious first level slots.
If the horses are faster than you, there are first level spells that increase your speed. Expeditious Retreat is first level, for example. Use that, and get 100 rounds of superior speed. Acid Splash (or alternatively, something with a better chance of actually hitting them since Acid Splash is a DEX save). If you can't beat them fast enough, cast Expeditious Retreat again for another 60 rounds of survival.
Spell slot economy, dude.
@@annasolovyeva1013 That's where the cantrips come in! If you use the Fire Bolt cantrip, you can not only hit them from 120 feet away, but you can also catch something on fire, and if enough of the horses are in said fire, they will take at least 1 damage. Another one you could use for more likely hits is Mind Sliver, as it's an INT roll, which should be in your favor, as the horses have a -4 on intelligence rolls. Both of these are definitely viable if you use Expeditious Retreat to keep your speed up for dashing away.
@@annasolovyeva1013
If you use no other first level spells, you can have 200 rounds of combat with Expeditious Retreat up.
If the tiny horses (which shouldn't be nearly as fast as regular horses!) have a move speed slower than yours, you can put space between you and them by dashing even if they dash every round, otherwise use Expeditious Retreat so you can Dash twice each turn (Expeditious Retreat lets you Dash as a Bonus Action, so you can do that and then Dash again as your Action, like normal, for a total of three times your regular walking speed).
Acid Splash is not entirely ideal, since it only has a 60ft range, but the horses have 2 INT and should not be able to understand that they need space between them to avoid having two of them targeted at once. Even with their DEX modifier,you are likely to hit at least one per shot.
If the horses get to a range of 60ft on their turn, you can Acid Splash and still get out to a range of 90ft, assuming no Expeditious Retreat and a walking speed of 30ft. So they'd need at least 45ft of walking speed to catch up with you on their next turn, which is ridiculously high for a tiny little duck-horse. Additionally, I'm sure you can get at least 35ft of walking speed by choosing a non-human race, probably more, which further increases the maximum speed for the horses that you can still deal with.
And lastly, if the DM makes stamina a consideration, gently remind them that stamina is humanity's evolutionary niche, and that your wizard should be able to outlast the little tiny horses (even if you choose a different race, they all have enough similarity to humans to make this plausible).
@@PikaLuigi
Mind Sliver is a great option for a near-guaranteed hit if the DM is metagaming to make the horses realize they should stay apart. Acid Splash can hit two horses at once (and statistically, you should be able to hit slightly more than one per shot, unless they're proficient with DEX saves, in which case I'd have to calculate the exact odds, but it'd be looking pretty good for Mind Sliver).
I was generally assuming that you'd be faster than the horses, because they're so tiny. I mean seriously, imagine a duck-sized little horse trying to run at you on its teeny-tiny legs. Expeditious Retreat can keep them off your case if they're slightly faster, though.
@@theuncalledfor On the sense of their running speed, a duck sized horse is equal to a small dog. And those can still move fast. Remember, they also have less mass to carry, so if their physique is relative they might actually be QUITE fast. Depending on your DM, of course.
Small correction, the duck should have a +5 to hit not a +2 to hit. (2 proficiency + 3 strength).
Needs a 13 on the dice to hit.
Well, as always, depends on the party build. In the campaign I'm running (almost every player, me included, being noobs) I use a legion of draconics as the main antagonists, and for the first quests, that meant kobold. The thing is, from the original 3 players, 2 are spellcasters, with a solid AoE build, so throwing a crap lot of kobolds usually end up in 1 or 2 massive murders at the start of the battle, and the rest just fighting the few left. I think I understand balance better now, but those first quest were way too easy in terms of encounters. Playing the number games doesn't really help my poor gang of fanatic supremacists.
The duck should have both had a higher AC, since feathers can be pretty good at defence, and had more attacks (like a wing attack), as well as maybe higher strength and flight.
You could also make the 100 horses a swarm, which would greatly benefit the player
Yeah, there are many ways to subtly tweak the scenario that can significantly alter the balance. Even a silly, apparently simple premise had a lot of potential implementations in the game!
Go warlock with armor of agythis and blade ward. Blade ward will reduce damage from the horses to zero (0.5 rounded down is zero), and armor of agythis will kill every horse that attacks you. Assuming that you can keep armor of agythis up for one round before you can cast blade ward, and the horses keep attacking you each turn, you will eventually win.
Unfortunately damage rounds up not down and minimum damage is never less than 1.
@@swest6982
Phb p.7
"There’s one more general rule you need to know at the outset. Whenever you divide a number in the game, round down if you end up with a fraction, even if the fraction is one-half or greater."
SRD p.96
"With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, but never negative damage."
Play an Aarakocra, Fairy, or any race with a fly speed wizard, sorcerer, etc... and use the disengage action to fly above the horses on your first turn about 30ft high. After the other 100 turns go by start casting damage dealing cantrips while you flutter in the sky. No armor or feats required.
I think the large duck's bite should be a grapple, too, potentially swallowing a small-sized hero
To beat 100 duck sized horses I would roll a lvl1 fighter variant Human with chain mail and take Heavy Armor master feat. " While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3." You have all the time in the world as their attacks would do you no damage
1 damage minus 3 due to heavy armor master -2 damage dealt meaning heals you 2 hit points every attack
@@Lavenish You cannot reduce damage below 0.
From the PHB p.196
"Damage Rolls
Each weapon, spell, and harmful monster ability specifies the damage it deals. You roll the damage die or dice, add any modifiers, and apply the damage to your target. Magic weapons, special abilities, and other factors can grant a bonus to damage. With a penalty, it is possible to deal 0 damage, *but never negative damage* "
I would use a Wizard. Depending on how fast they're supposed to be, either bring some AoE spells, or Expeditious retreat. Cantrips never run out of ammo, unlike a bow, so my Wizard can stay ahead of the swarm and continuously cast Acid Splash to potentially kill up to two horses each round while never being in range to be hit back. If they're faster than you, cast Expeditious Retreat so you'll be faster than them for 100 rounds. You have two first level slots, so you can get 200 rounds of being faster than them. If they figure out that they can avoid the double-kills by staying apart, switch your attack cantrip to Mind Sliver, which is an INT save and very hard for the horses to pass. 200 rounds should be enough to wipe them out, or at least thin the herd enough that you can wipe out the rest with Sword Burst or Thunderclap. Their CON is weak, so Thunderclap is preferable.
You'll also want Mage Armor, in case they manage to get close. So as to not waste a slot on that, cast it just before the end of your long rest, so you'll have Mage Armor AND two first level slots. (Rest casting is actually legal in both RAW and RAI. Read the rules to check the RAW, and RAI has been confirmed in... I think a tweet or something.)
@@theuncalledfor Expedious retreat won't actually work since they can use an action to dash to keep up with you and get an opportunity attack every time you try and move away. This is of course assuming they have a slower movement speed than a regular sized riding horse since they would keep up to you without the dash action otherwise. If they had a movement speed below 25ft (I'm going to assume they don't, otherwise this encounter is trivial for most characters) this would work.
As far as rest casting, this may or may not be a factor depending on what time of day the encounter happened. Either way it's unlikely your wizard at level one would survive for long.
@@stickjohnny
Expeditious Retreat _will_ work because you can still Dash with your Action, though that reduces the amount of turns you have to actually attack them.
And it would be absurd to make tiny horses as fast as a full-sized horse, since they have such an immensely shorter step length.
Acid splash is likely the most resource efficient way for a caster to deal with the horses. Burning hands twice with your level 1 spell slot, then try not to get cornered and pick them off in pairs.
Huh, that's a thought one. I guess static damage effects would be the way to go, something like create bonfire. But it'd be a toss-up whether a caster would survive long enough to surround themselves with them.
Unfortunately, Create Bonfire is a Concentration spell. As you cast it a second time, the first is instantly extinguished.
But the logic stands, so if you could set up an equivalent of a Spikes trap (a passive effect that reliably deals a minimum of 1 damage) this becomes similar to the Pokemon training battle (in Pokemon Gale of Darkness) against an army of Shedinja (you have to beat all six of them in a single turn).
Spirit Guardians.
Your assessment is perfectly correct for D&D 5e, but things would be much different irl. See, horses rely on their size to be dangerous to humans (I have been assaulted by a dog sized horse). While a tiny horse can cause pain and minor injury, causing catastrophic injury or death is going to be difficult, if not impossible. You might get a broken toenail or a bruise where it bit you. Now, to a giant duck... you're just a snack. I'm not sure if a horse sized duck can swallow a human whole, but I feel like they absolutely could rip a human carcass into bite sized pieces
Exactly! Even the fiercest horses have to be trained often violently to be aware that they're big, and therefore dangerous to the little two leg creatures making loud noises at them.
It's a good chance you rock up on a duck sized duck, and get yourself run at. A horse sized duck, would beat you with those wings and knock you flat. Their beaks are also not soft and cute, they're edged on the inside, so when they shake their head, fish clamped in their beak get shredded...
I just can’t help myself here is another one, once my brain starts on a puzzle/puzzle it just won’t let go.
This’ll work with any class even D6 hit die classes you just have to make sure your minimum life total is more then 9 hp. It is doable with stat array. You just need to have at least a +3 in constitution. So that’s a starting hp of 9. Pick the old Air Genasi from Elemental Evil Player’s Companion.
First turn levitate 10 or more feet above the horsesducks . You now have ten minutes to kill everything.
Spam cantrips.
Use a weapon with reach and poke the one below you.
Or have a sling and 10 bags of sling bullets (that’d be 200 shot).
Ooh, now that's a good one! People keep forgetting the Genasi, but they are so cool! (I have come to hate almost any character that is a human because they are just a custom race but better than pretty much any other. Dull. I haven't flat-out banned them in my games... but I encourage my players to build interesting characters and so far it's been a blast.)
Level 1?
I have a few builds that will work.
Bladeward reduces 1 damage to 0.5 damage which is rounded down to 0. So now you just need to figure out a way to hurt them.
Fog cloud is pretty good at ensuring the horses will never critically hit you and last for an hour.
Next we need to deal damage…
Word of radiance or thunder clap are good AoE options for targeting -1 con mod miniature horses.
Of course if we could door way dodge, alchemist fire is pretty good item to have for a mark of warding forge domain cleric in ring mail with a shield who just happen to marry someone within 30 feet of them yesterday. (19 AC, this consumes the average amount of starting gold of 125 that the cleric would normally have)
I believe disadvantaged gives a -3.5% chance to get the roll needed to hit.
Good berry also gives us 10 hp per spell slot, and there are races that can cast it for free once per day. Such as the mark of healing halfling. Which gives 30 total extra HP if you want to go this route. And with a life domain cleric, this is 90 extra hp. To do this, I would be a witherbloom student to have the Druid spell added to my spell list.
A torch and either grease or oil come to mind. If I’m allowed to prepare. I can drench the whole place in oil and light on fire on a monks starting gold (which is less than taking the starting equipment and selling it!!)
Of course I can’t forget about flying races… horses don’t have a ranged attack!
Heavy armor master reduces damage from the physical kinds by 3 which means even a crit does 0 damage.
Most importantly, speak with animals to offer them sugar cubes if they leave you alone.
I think I’ll be okay against the 100 horses.
A horse-sized duck would have much greater damage output. A normal sized Swan has wings strong enough to break a man's arm. Also, when threatened by a land-based threat a duck will fly at their enemy and thrash with wings while pecking. Given the size and weight of this monstrous duck, I would also give it a charge/pounce attack that could possibly knock a medium sized creature prone.
Heh, this reminds me of the first campaign I ever DM'ed. It was first designed to be one shot, but developed into a full blown campaign when the first quest was over. The first quest being, essentially: "There's a group of cities situated around a lake, which depend on import of food. The entrance of the lake has been blocked by a 5m duck, no ships dare approach it. What do you do?"
Cant I just cast Speak with Animal and haggle with Goodberry?
We've actually been facing this in a friend's campaign. We get a lot of downs as PC because we are levels 1-3 (leveled to 3 last night), and some of the enemies have had things like multiattack, while also outnumbering us at least 1.5 to 1. So it's been difficult. I always think smaller amount and stronger size is better. 3 monsters with +5 to hit and 1d10+3 for damage is better then 8 monsters with +4 to hit and 1d6+2 for damage. Multiattack in any scenario makes an encounter deadly below levels 4
there is the hoarde fighting rules in the DMG. I can't remember it perfectallly or be bothered to look it up but its along the lines of if you 1 shot an enemy you can (I can't remember if you need to roll to hit again or not) carry over the damage to the next enemy in reasonable reach. you could kill several ducks a swing.
Best bet would prob be a wizard or something with an aoe spell for the duck sized horses. Sleep may be effective since the tiny horses aren't smart enough to wake up their allies, and instead try to reach an unreachable target. Aoe cantrips like thunder or word of radiance could also work. By money would go on a level 1 twilight domain cleric for the 18 ac, sleep, and Word of radiance
It begs the question then... which would you rether DM the encounter for?
Assuming the fight starts with the fighter being surrounded by the tiny horses as you suggest, the fighter's best move would be to dash outside of the cloud of tiny horses and look for some terrain bottleneck that would limit their ability to approach. From an advantageous position, or using their backup ranged weapon (which all adventurers should have), the fighter could take out the horses with little personal risk, though their best play would probably be to just flee the scene.
First on reupload! This reminds me, I gave my players the option of taking on horse sized geese in steel cage matches. Was a good session 1 at the Gooseberry Festival :)
Dmg has a variant rule for cleaving where you can continue your attack through and deal excess damage to any number of monsters as ling as they're in range and you bring them from max HP to 0 HP, so on average the fighter is going to kill like 6 duck sized horses per round.
That means that the fighter kills all the ducks in about 18-20 turns, which still results in the ducks winning, but still, it's not as grim as your calculations
(If you're using this variant rule)
That really helps off set the problem I mentioned on huge numbers of weak creatures. Nicely done!
Or are variant human and take heavy Armor master "While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3" so the horses cannot hurt them.
Well, if the fighter is using the optional “cleave through creatures” rule from the DMG, they might stand slightly more of a chance.
I know it’s a big IF, since not many even know of the rule.
Or are variant human and take heavy Armor master "While you are wearing heavy armor, bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing damage that you take from nonmagical attacks is reduced by 3" so the horses cannot hurt them
And this is why there's a "cleaving through creatures" optional rule.
Also are you allowing the cleave through variant rule? If the damage would kill a creature than any damage gets applied to the next creature until no more damage is left. I’m not good at math but what about a bugbear Fighter with heavy armor and has a glaive.
That way the fighter can possibly reach 48 ducks.
The problem with that is while you can reach 48 of them, you'll never be able to damage more than 12 in a round (36 on a crit). Taking that into account, you'll take down an average of 4.8 horseducks per round, and have to last ~21 rounds while taking ~2.4 damage per round. You could use a lance (and if you always attack a horseduck out of range first then cleave into the closest ones you won't have to worry about the disadvantage), then that ups to 5.4 horses per round, and you'd have to last 18 rounds.
That all being said, this is probably the most viable melee method I've seen here.
I'd really love to see you guys do a more concise take on world building using a d&d spin on the "what do they eat" question from the video "TUN: The Shandification of Fallout" the video is pretty old, and has been re-uploaded a dozen times because the original was taken down thanks to a little bit of NBA footage or something, but I think the core messages there are really valuable to the d&d crowd.
In Swords and Wizardry, a Fighter who downs an opponent can attack again. So the 1st level fighter *could* kill as many duck sized horses as he could reach each round. Assuming the mass of duck sized horses has significant morale, it would take 6+ rounds of killing several duck sized horses before they checked morale at 50% strength, but your morale system might check at 2/3 strength or 75% strength. The fighter has maybe a 50/50 chance to hit the ducks, and the ducks have maybe a 1:4 chance to hit the fighter, assuming he has heavy armor (AC 16). The high numbers of the duck sized horses will eventually kill him. Using two weapons for +1 to hit would be very helpful, raising his chances to 55/45 or 60/40.
A smart thing to do would be to create a pool of oil in a horse shoe shape behind him that would limit the number of duck sized horses that could attack him at once, assuming he has enough oil flasks to keep it going for several rounds and has no doorways or other chokepoints to take advantage of, this would help him a lot. This would extend his lifespan considerably, assuming the duck sized horses are afraid of fire and can only attack six at a time from his front. They would deal perhaps 1 damage a round, but he would kill 1-2 a round. He could also use their bodies to feed his fire.
100 duck sized horses...... the way horses work you would only have to kick the shit out of the lead horse and the rest you could get to fall in line.
fight the horses! a duck as large as a horse is, Literally, a Dinosaur!!
You are not counting flying tho or smashing, actions that a horse-size duck can do
it also depends on how they are played. if played as a pure slugfest then obviously take on the duck. But if it is more in line with the original animals' personality, then the hardest part of the horse fight would be chasing down the horses(these animals get freaked out by their own shadow, so a towering goliath[metaphor not inherently race] actively trying to kill them? you might kill a few by fear induced heart attacks alone)
worth noting that ducks have small rows of serrated teeth on their beaks and tongue, so the bite attack might be slashing damage. Also, birds bite hard. I’ve never personally been bitten by a duck, but i’ve been bitten by parrots and they can exert a lot of force
I actually had the chance to reference this video on my radio show this morning!
I love this video because I have a group of lv1's right now. I just so happen to have a ceramic duck which I use as a dragon mini in other games because it takes up the perfect area on a battle map.
Whenever it comes to enemy swarms, Area of Effect it always important. There are a fair few low level spells, even cantrips which let you hit multiple targets at once.
This is true, but how many AoE attacks are there at level 1 that could hit 100 squares? Burning hands hits 7. Even in 6 rounds, you won't even kill half the horses.
@@andrewb378 I think Thunderwave hits everyone around you, so that could go as far as 8? 9? Gonna check the book real quick...
Its a little unclear if a cube can center on you, but projecting from you works best in anycase.
Sleep is actually a pretty useful spell in this case, as it can put 5d8 HP worth of creatures to sleep and effectively remove them from combat (yeah, the horses could hit each other to wake them up, but with only 1 HP each, they would take each other out of combat doing so). Though even in that case its unlikely to be able to finish them all off with only 2 casts of Sleep available at first level.
Heroisim was another interesting option I saw, since it gives the target essentially regenerating temporary HP for a minute that could actually absorb most if not all the damage per turn. But the limit of one minute manys its not likely to last a full combat against those numbers.
Armor of Agathys is also noteworthy since it also gives temporary HP, but also damages the enemy when they deplete any of that temp HP. Though its only a set 5 temp HP so it does not last nearly as long as a Heroism would (presuming someone else casts Heroism, since it is concentration).
Chances are there just isnt a good way to defeat 100 duckhorses with a level 1 character, but it is fun to analyze possible tactics to get as far as one can.
Polearm master with tunnel fighter fighting style can probably whittle down the enemy somewhat.
Using the mob attack options from the dmg, the horses would smash a party that didnt have area damage to reduce the minihorses quickly
Is also the why on zombie campaings i always use common zombies at first until the group feels confident enough to fight hordes of zombies, is then when i release the real nightmare... 100 zombie chihuahuas... roll initative
You could use an Ace beak for the giant duck stats since its pretty similar
well because of the square cube law where the mass of a object increase with the power of 3 but the mussel strength only increases linearly witch causes the duck to not be able to stand up so I would fight that in real life too
Just found your channel. It's so good!!! I have no idea how I hadn't seen it until now....y'all do great work. Keep it up!
Alt just give the fighter a pair of shortswords or even daggers to double their attacks, also the use of items like flammable oil could prevent them from being swarmed.
Ducks are probably tiny, rather than small/medium tho, so a player could be surrounded and attacked by 12 at a time.
If the character has access to a Cantrip (spellcaster class or magic initiate for variant human), Blade Ward (assuming the rounding down rule) would make them immune to all damage at the cost of an action. Since it takes an action, you wouldn’t be able to deal any damage, but the horses still wouldn’t be able to deal any damage, even with opportunity attacks, allowing you to freely move and perhaps escape or reposition and make use of environmental hazards. For other Cantrips, Sword Burst could kill all 12 surrounding you, assuming they all fail the saving throw. Create Bonfire can block off whole 5ft cubes, unless the horses are unrealistically willing to run through flames AND pass the saving throws, so surviving 8 turns, becoming exposed to fewer attacks after each one, the caster can fully protect themselves before attacking outwards from range. Mould Earth can be used to create a 5ft elevated platform, which a tiny creature probably wouldn’t be able to climb, but a medium PC definitely would with just 10ft of movement. The 1st level spell burning hands would also be good at taking out a bunch of horses in one go.
Just thought of the best combo! Blade Ward and Armour of Agathys. You take no damage when you are hit (aside from perhaps the first turn), but every time a horse hits you it takes 5 damage and is killed outright. It depends on the PCs ability to cast AoA in one round and then BW in the next without being hit 5 times in between. This would depend on the horse’s starting formation (if they immediately surround the PC or have a straight line) their movement speed (riding horse is large with 60ft movement, so a tiny creature 20-40ft) and their starting position (in melee or a short distance away). If the horses have less than 35ft movement, an elven warlock/warlock initiate, if they are faster then probably a goblin, allowing for a dash as a bonus action. With this the user should be able to outrun them with an action to spare each turn.
There is no winning, a hundred duck sized horses gang up and kick you until your bones are powder, and a horse sized duck is a dinosaur
There is one mistake in the video, the range of the Thunder Wave is a 15ft cube coming from the caster, yes, but that means the 15ft cube connected to the caster on one of its sides or corners, like here x = spell c = caster
xxx xxx xxx
xxx cxxx xxx
xxx xxx cxxx
c
But in the video cube is 35 feet, centered on the caster.
It's actually a common spell mistake I've made myself in the past.
What would be a much more effective strategy in my opinion? To use the much more niche spell ma boy Sleep™, which can put up to 5d8 worth of hp of a duck sized horses to sleep. That's 22 little horses on average, and then just try to kill as many as you can with some splash damage cantrips.
But overall, very nice and funny video.
And they corrected a video by removing a caster part. well shucks.
Just wanted to comment to let you know you were right ;) (edge, not radius)
The caster could choose to position the cube such that they are in the center of a cube face, to throw force out in all directions. There's nothing in the wording of the spell that prohibits this. Every table is different though, and a DM is free to to limit the casting to edges and vertices if they wish.
@@Oxaphosphetane You're right about the position, yes, caster can cast it on self, but I noticed in my comment that the cube doesn't become a sphere with a radius by doing that. the cube's size is determined by its edge, so it 15ft cube centered on the caster will look like this
xxx
xcx
xxx
Check PHB p. 201 "Spellcasting" to see more details.
@@jesternvs8102 Seems like I misread your diagram, and thought you were saying the caster could only be on the edge or corner of the cube.
Not much uncertainty in real life:
duck-sized horses: get really frightened of "angry enormous giant" and run away.
horse-sized duck: immediately collapses and soon dies of cardiac arrest. (bird biology cannot support such sizes, emus and ostriches are highly specialized exceptions, and even their body mass is a fraction of horse's)
It’s a hypothetical horse sized duck assuming that the biomechanical issues do not exist/have been resolved somehow
Horse size duck should get a special wing buffet attack to stun. For small size creatures, I usually give my players one creature hit for each combat bonus so +4 = 4 horses hit per round. And the horses should get a special stampede attack with trample damage. And just to kick it old school, after several rounds of losses, the horse would break morale and run off rather than fight to the death. But fun thought experiment.
All I need is a 1st level wizard and the high ground, like a tree or something.
Bring on the 100 duck-sized horses, or watch me get destroyed by one horse-sized duck when it starts flying at me. :3
A Horse Sized Duck. Getting ready to play Curse of the Ganshoggr. Plenty of big ducks/geese in that one.
They always say getting nibbled to death by ducks is tedious.
I'd give the Giant Duck maybe an AC 8
The Duck can buffet you with the wings d 2-8 . save versus constitution or stunned for the next round.
100 duck sized horses you sweep with burning hands potentially. Cast and perhaps 10-20 of the little buggers the first round and likely panic a proportion of the rest. Second round maybe another ten as the bravest left try to swarm you. More flee. The third round some of the horses get close to you. Maybe your battle mage gets another spell off or a stomp and hack with a dagger as you leap , retreat out of range.
The mop up will take a while but the little buggers are going to have a hard time hitting you and will get less and less interested in the pursuit to do their 1 or two points of hoof damage? Bite damage?
A fighter I would definitely let cut through the horse ducks with their sword. So if they roll up 10 damage I keep cutting horse ducks until they run out of hit points, Maybe 2 1/2 horse ducks per successful swing?
The Fighter loses their sword maybe there is a problem, But a swarm of these little fellows may get 6 attacks? 8 attacks? and what can the little hoofs really do. These are going to be quarter hit dice creatures. Probably a reach to hit say an AC 4(16) fighter. They will need a 20.
I sense a Lilliputian stomping of the horse ducks.
I would have assumed the 100 duck sized horses would act like a swarm with just with bigger individuals. So would have just choose a random swarm monster like rot grubs and make the swarm a size bigger to adjust for the bigger individuals. so Large rot grub swarm, retextured to look like horses.
Irl a horse sized duck would be terrifying, but 100 ducksized horses? Give me a good hammer and an hours time.
Of course, the real question is do I have the perfect mini to represent the duck? Yes. Yes, I do.
Fiend Warlock with Thunderclap and Armor of Agathys, 15 Cha 14 Con 13 Dex 12 Wis 10 Int 8 Str. +1 to Cha and +2 to Con. Be a Tortle from Mordenkainen Presents Monsters of the Multiverse. That's an AC of 17, HP of 11, and DC of 13. All 8 horses have a -1 Con save assuming no Proficiency, so a 65% fail rate vs Thunderclap. To hit an AC 17, they have a 40% chance with their +4. On average, 3.2 will hit the Tortle every round, and the Tortle will hit 5.2. As a Fiend Warlock, every time the Tortle drop a hostile creature to 0 HP, they gain 4 Temp HP (+3 Cha +Lv1 Warlock). Assuming they go before the horses, they're likely to drop at least one horse to 0, adding the THP, which the horses will be unlikely to get rid of before the Warlock's next turn, starting the cycle again. And as a backup, they can cast Armor of Agathys to guarantee the next 5 horses to land a hit instantly drop to 0. Granted, if the initiative is such that the successive waves of horses can approach and attack after the closest horses drop in the same round, it might not work out. But this is the best I could come up with for a Lv1 character facing a gauntlet of 100 small horses.
If you climb 10ft long vertical platform or some thing you can beat 100 little horse with reach weapon or cantrip
In my last DnD session our Dm threw at us huge goose. As soon as we cut its head off it turned out to be goose-hydra. What a glorious fight!
Oh, i make a hydra-sized goose on my campaing... and it has multiple heads too... it was the goosedra
The CLEAVING rules in the DMG should cut through those numbers a bit. Though it'll still take a while.
You’d be a quack to fight the duck, nay, fight the horses instead!
dwarf wizard with thunderclap and thunderwave start with medium armor and make sure to have at least 14 dex
Variant human with polearm master. Would be funny but i think the fighter would still lose. But the mental image is funny.
I'd go with a Flying Race + Ranged Damage Cantrip
I would really want to fight those suckers as a wizard or sorcerer with high enough level to use an aoe spell like fireball or chain lightning. If had to try to fight that many at level 1 I would want to be a rouge using hit and run tactics or a ranger sniping from a structure the tiny horses can not retch.
If you build the "100 duck sized horses" as a few swarms - like you are supposed to do - it becomes a much more sensible calculation. The part where you even thought about running ~100 tiny horses as anything _other_ then a "Swarm of Tiny Horses" or 4, is where you messed up.
There are quite a few example swarms that turn "CR 0 (10 XP)" and "CR 0 (0 XP)" - some of which deal 0 damage - into something worth running by making them a "Swarm of [Creature Type]", without breaking the action economy.
Granted with that many tiny beasts, we are still talking about at least 3 Swarms (at 32 tiny horses per swarm) - so the number are still stacked against the single PC. But it is not quite as insane anymore.
Just how small do you think a duck is? They are either a Small creature (average duck) or Tiny (smallest ducks). They can group into a space if Tiny (allowing 32 attacks against their target), but they aren't a swarm (which implies they move and attack as a single unit, which doesn't make sense here).
the 100 duck sized horses would be easier if you used the cleaving optional rule then you could kill 8 per turn
That's not an optional rule that's something you have to get?
Horse-sized duck (large beast)
100 duck-sized horses (swarm of tiny beasts)
Hm. Seems my memory is a bit off about duck size. They are on the bottom end of Small or the highest end of Tiny. Either way, they would not be a swarm, though they might be able to share a space, allowing for 32 attacks in a round.
I don't care if it's a horse-sized duck, a duck-sized horse, or a house-sized mouse, they all look the same to a flask of oil and some matches.
I see Heavy Armor Master has already been figured out for killing the 100 duck sized horses, so I'll suggest a build for a kill speed run.
I think you want to go variant human with magic initiate, choosing the spell Armor of Agathys and the cantrips thunderclap and create bonfire. You are a Draconic bloodline Sorcerer with 8 str, 16 dex, 14 con, 8 int, 10 wisdom, and 16 charisma.
This gives you an AC of 16. The real question is how long do you have to prepare for combat at this point. If there is a prep round you cast Armor or Agathys on yourself, that is instantly killing 5 horses and protecting you from the first 5 attacks.
You cast Create bonfire to protect one side of yourself and can eliminate up to 5-6 horses a turn in that bonfire if enemies continuously fail dex saves. But on average should kill about 3 a turn.
Every turn after you are either refreshing Armor of Agathys which you can cast 3 times, or casting Thunderclap which should kill up to 6ish average horses in one turn.
With this in mind you should be killing about 8-12 horses a turn, with an additional 5 a turn dying to your armor.
I'm gonna roll this out and see how I do.
___
I died, killed 55 of them though. I lost concentration on Create Bonfire after 2 rounds so that is what really cost me.
If I could figure out a way to get heavy armor master and armor of agathys at level 1 I think that would do this the fastest, because you would only have to cast the spell once, bur it does not appear to be possible to get both at that level.
Since it's folly to run a combat in 5e with more than a dozen monsters, I'd make the tiny horses a handful of swarms (herds?) out of necessity. At that point the action economy wouldn't overly favor the horses, but the swarms would be pretty tough against a low level party. For the horse-sized duck, I'd reskin something nasty and add flight... a smallish allosaur mightn't be TOO far out of line and would be lots of fun!
How would you justify them being a swarm? They are still the size of a small dog, and you would (hopefully) not use swarm mechanics with creatures of that size. They might share a space if you go for the smallest size of duck, making them Tiny, and thus having 32 creatures surrounding the PC, but then the next turn that is 32 attacks coming their way.
The point is to make a character clear the challenge as-is, not figuring out how to nerf the challenge.
Or if you're a fun dm to run minion encounters you can let the player destroy multiple ducksized horses with one attack. (Ye also not try anything like this till there a slightly higher level as first level is to deadly already)
dont forget that ducks have teeth. sharp ones too.
Love OG final fantasy cameo
Variant human with heavy armour master -3 damage to all none bludgeoning piercing and slashing damage from non magical sources the horses cannot harm the fighter
Most of the comments I'm seeing are saying the same thing and that's basically "tell me you've never had to fight a duck sized duck, without telling me you've never fought a duck sized duck."
You left out the ducks viscous wing beat attack, which gets a bonus strike, and has a +4 to hit and can leave players stunned on a successful hit 50% of the time.
Duck sized horses can be defeated by standing in front of them and clapping real loud, and then throwing out your hands. Used to keep horses, and them suckers jump at their own farts! Try scaring a duck and that mother fucker has a 60% chance to get real tired of your shit, real fast, and put an end to you.
A charisma of only 6 ? For a live version of Princess Sparkle the toy horse ?
Well fuck-a-duck. Ain't that something! 🙂
1 horse sized duck is easy: just hit it. One shot if I, palladin, smite.
100 duck-size horses are tough, you need an AOE attack or crowd control you don't have at low levels. There's only one thing that my character, half-orc palladin, could successfully have done to the horses. Scaring them brutally and making noise.
Swans/Geese have the ability to hurt people by whacking them with their wings. So the horse sized duck should have a slam attack on top of the bite attack.
Any race with flight and a reach weapon beats the 100 duck-sized horses
Yeah, aracocra ranger.
Fireball for the 100 duck sized horses.
If you have AOE spells on your side a swarm of small enemies can be dealt with much quicker then a single big enemy, so this reasoning does not always apply.
For example, a 5th level wizard surrounded by 100 duck-sized horses could cast fireball into the hoard and kill up to 40 in a single turn.
That's why the question is specifically asking about 1st level characters. 5th level anything could come up with various ways to deal with either situation.
My immediate question is: do I have fireball? Followed by: are they grouped up?
No, you are lv. 1. And only 1 small creature fits in a space. They are on the bottom end of Small, but likely shouldn't be Tiny.
A bard/wizard would be best at level 1 against the horses, just use the sleep spell.
In terms of a decent leveled wizard, they could just use an aoe on the horses or something
With Enlarge/reduce you only get +d4 or -d4 in damage. The stats will not change.
Good thing this isn't a case of Enlarge/Reduce then. They are custom creatures, as they should be.
hmmm what about a 1st level caster? aoe attacks might help, though the horses still might win with few casualties anyway. green flame blade would be a great fighter assist spell, though again they'll still die.
To defeat 100 duck-sized horses jump on top of a table.
A known inherent problem with D&D is the abuse of tiny CR creatures with minimum damage 1 to kill anything. See 3rd edition cats being wizard death in the surprise round at level 1.
That's why when small things come in large numbers you abstract it out to a swarm. Think of rolling for individual bees and the time consuming headache that would be!
I have several issues with your stats as presented.
1) Your tiny horses don't have a +4 to hit. Yes you gave them Feat: Use Dex to Hit, but they don't have that feat when they're horse sized so they don't get it now. Their proper to hit is -3. This makes it a 20 to hit. I would still say that the 100 individual horses will win because of the previously known tiny CR abuse.
2) I was going to say that the duck looked weak for a large sized creature, but it looks like you just gave it Riding Horse stats. So I acknowledge your choice. Well done.
I will say that I think the inherent power of being Large means the rule book made horses too weak, but they probably did it so that you can't just use a horse to win all your fights at low level.
Yeah, as DM for my group, I take the nature of animals into account. A level 1 adventurer is incredibly unlikely to have a war trained horse, and most horses will bolt, rather than fight. My adventurers don't try using things like horses to fight for them.
A hundred duck sized horses, are a hundred skittish creatures, that will have to roll for a chance to be scared because the thing they're attacking makes a loud noise at them lol.
Ducks would typically be Small creatures, not a swarm. Swarms are meant to be a cluster of Tiny (or smaller) creatures that move and attack as a single unit. Ducks and horses would not typically be swarms, that's just nerfing the encounter for the sake of it. The point is the challenge as stated, 1 vs 1 or 1 vs 100.
The main reason why this is such a problem is because there's a minimum of one damage. Maybe try flipping a coin 0 to 1.
I think this is more than anything illustrative of the problem that DND's HP system can't properly account for very minor injuries. 10 bites, kicks, whatever, from a duck-sized horse is probably not going to kill an adult person, certainly not one wearing 18 AC worth of armor. 1 HP of damage from any one of these attacks *grossly* over-estimates the extent of the injury sustained. I realize this is just how the rules are written, but you'd need to use some sort of fractional HP system (or just multiply all the HP values by a large amount like a Final Fantasy game) to have this situation make practical sense.
Solution: Cast Sleep
On average this would defeat 55 horses but the other 45 would likely defeat you afterwards.
@@stickjohnny Just curious, what is the path to obtain an average of 55? Modifying the scenario from the vid, I'll assume 1st lvl caster, so that's 5d8 affected HP, average of 22.5, two casts for 44-45 affected horsies.
@@andruloni You're correct. I thought sleep was d10s not d8s.
Be a wizard. Let the horses swarm and cast burning hands and shield
The challenge is to do it at lv. 1. Have fun with your (checks list) whopping two lv. 1 spell slots. Even if you do the highest aoe and don't miss anything, they still get to munch your corpse in no time.
Action economy almost always means more actions wins in 5e