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Old 05-20-2022, 10:28 AM   #161
Eric Funk
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
But it's rather common for "Medieval Fantasy" settings to either outright lack black powder, or have it only available as an exotic thing, so it's entirely possible the people fighting these giant snakes wouldn't have any access to it.
If this "worm" is a "arch villain turned to 'dragon' " scenario then perhaps some basic fire spells could be available... a Magery 3 wizard can manage a 9d explosive fireball, which inside is a 3x vitals hit (p.B415) bypassing DR, for up to 162 damage... (and vitals causes more KO).



I was going to note that a similar situation recently occurred in my GURPS campaign -- a large flytrap clomped onto the party's wizard's arm and started "Worrying" (Autodamage so can't use blocking defense spells). Doing the math the wizard's reaction was to immediately cast an Exposive Fireball with the hand inside the plant, and ended up doing less damage to self than the plant would have had it been able to keep munching... (and crushing vs the plant's cutting could have easily severed the arm with a moderate roll...)
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Old 05-20-2022, 11:10 AM   #162
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by Willy View Post
Depends! Has someone calculated the weight of that monster? There are some plants who kill a healthy grown up human with less than 2 grams of fresh green, not the refined poison itself.
I previously determined you'd need around 300 kg of death's cap mushrooms - the deadliest mushroom in the world - to have a ~50% chance of killing it (based on its LD50). Death's cap are said to reliably kill a human with 30 grams, so if your plant kills with 2 grams (1/15th as much), that means you'd need 20 kg of the stuff. That's just using the poison in its natural state, of course - you can markedly reduce the weight if you can concentrate the poison reliably.

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Originally Posted by Eric Funk View Post
If this "worm" is a "arch villain turned to 'dragon' " scenario then perhaps some basic fire spells could be available... a Magery 3 wizard can manage a 9d explosive fireball, which inside is a 3x vitals hit (p.B415) bypassing DR, for up to 162 damage... (and vitals causes more KO).
162 Injury occurs once out of 46,656 instances, so can be ignored (note that's the same probability, with a 3d attack, of rolling a 3 to hit, a 3 on the critical hit table for x3 damage, and maximum damage on the attack roll). Better to bet on the average, which is 94.5 - respectable wounding, but not even a Major Wound. Of course, OP already indicated he doesn't want to know what sort of magic could be used, but rather what mundane tactics might work.
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Old 05-20-2022, 11:53 AM   #163
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Apparently there's no good numbers for castor bean/ricin toxicity. A dose between 1/2:and 30 beans probably will kill you, with two beans being likely threshold for a lethal dose in healthy adults.

And that's as poisonous (to humans) as plants get.

Obviously there may be poisons this is more susceptibility to.
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Old 05-20-2022, 12:14 PM   #164
Eric Funk
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Another option might be to lure it to a low area and then choke it with gas or possibly water if it cannot swim. With HT10 it has 10FP , supriused it can only hold its breath in combat for 5sec before it starts suffocating (B351)... at 0 FP it will likely fall unconscious (B437). at -FP it also loses 1HP per second (B426).

To quantify the "Harrying" idea where poeple ride up on horseback, throw spears or whatever a few times an hour to keep the worm active, B427 says the the FP lost due to lack of sleep can only be recovered by sleeping... so the first day of harrying costs 1FP for missing sleep, then 1FP per quarter day. After a day it will be at half FP so will need to make Will rolls every 2 hours or fall asleep (during which the Army could set up siege weapons...)
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Old 05-20-2022, 12:16 PM   #165
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Diseases scale better than poisons, a dose sufficient to give the creature an equivalent to cholera might be pretty small, but you'd first have to figure out what diseases even work on the snakes.
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Old 05-20-2022, 12:56 PM   #166
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Another option might be to lure it to a low area and then choke it with gas or possibly water if it cannot swim.)
There's no reason it shouldn't float. My weight estimate assumed the same density as a human being.

Then there's that "climb walls 20 ft high" ability. It should be able to elevate its' head that high and a little more. You'll need a deep area of gas.
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Old 05-20-2022, 02:18 PM   #167
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

New thought...

It might be ticklish!
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Old 05-20-2022, 04:22 PM   #168
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Snakes are carnivores so any poisonous vegetation fed to them will simply be regurgitated. It won't be digested so the toxin would have a limited opportunity to affect it. The snake's slow metabolism would further reduce its efficacy.
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Old 05-20-2022, 08:51 PM   #169
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Ropes are probably still your best bet. You get enough ropes, and enough people, and you can make this critter helpless.
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Old 05-20-2022, 09:02 PM   #170
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Ropes are probably still your best bet. You get enough ropes, and enough people, and you can make this critter helpless.
You'd need 400 people just to roll evenly agaisnt the thing's ST. That's 100 ropes per side with two people per rope.

You also need to get all those ropes in place simultaneously so that it never gets to put even a fraction of its' full ST against an inadequate number of ropes.

The only vaguely workable idea I've seen is the very high fortified wall with massed Scorpions on top. You write off any territory beyond those walls that the Megasnake wants.
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