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Old 05-18-2022, 07:56 AM   #151
Eric Funk
 
Join Date: Oct 2005
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by Varyon View Post
Fun fact - so long as you don't get high enough for terminal velocity to come into play, the falling height (and thus velocity) necessary to cause a Major Wound, drop the target to 0 HP, drop the target to -1xHP, or drop the target to -5xHP, are each roughly the same for any target. DR throws things off a bit, although I think it's less effective in a fall (I believe at least that rigid armor is treated as though it were flexible, increasing blunt trauma, but I think it may go further than that).
Ah yes, good old algebra :) There are of course three ranges, minimum, average, max..

Re: armour, yes. 1 in 5 still gets through for worn armour (not natural) B431
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Old 05-18-2022, 08:46 AM   #152
Varyon
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Note that the damage is doubled if the object landed on is "Hard"... that effects things a good deal.
An excellent point, particularly given most surfaces count as Hard in a fall. I always forget about that...
EDIT: With that in mind, 8 yards/second (a 3 yard fall) is enough for a Major Wound, 15 yards/second (a 10 yard fall) is enough to drop to 0 HP, 30 yards/second (a 40 yard fall) is enough to drop to -1xHP, and 90 yards/second (a ~380 yard fall) is enough to drop to -5xHP.

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Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
If you are going the pit trap angle sharpened logs are pretty easy to do relative to digging the thing in the first place.
Humorously, with DR in the mix, unless the GM allows for the spikes to hit the Vitals (and possibly even then, given only a few spikes will do so and most of the damage will be elsewhere), a spiked pit trap is actually less effective than an empty one, because it results in halved damage. So, what would be a 100 cr fall becomes a 50 imp fall - against DR 20, the first results in 80 HP Injury (or 84 if you treat the DR as flexible), while the second results in only 60 HP Injury. I've long felt this was a bad rule - arguably an outright Murphy's Rule ("I'm OK - the spikes broke my fall!") - although I'm not certain if "use full collision damage, change type to imp" would be appropriate (that might go a bit too far).

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
The pit trap isn't all that practical and DR 20 would probably just blunt those sharpened logs.
Realistically, yeah, but I'm not sure there are any rules that would handle this type of situation. Maybe the bit about breakable barriers?
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Old 05-19-2022, 12:38 PM   #153
sir_pudding
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

The main problem with a pit trap here is this is a snake. Making the trap collapse when the thing's center of gravity is fully committed is not trivial, and it's also not stupid so it's not going to cross a 350' rope bridge with axe dudes hanging around the other side.

***
  1. Kill a very large ox.
  2. Hollow it out.
  3. Hide a barrel of powder inside.
  4. Hide a brave hero with a slow match inside.
  5. Clear out any food from its path as much as possible.
  6. Leave the ox in its path.
  7. Make it look like it was accidentally abandoned when it was supposed to be cleared.
  8. Hopefully hungry thing eats ox.
  9. Boom
  10. Award hero's family with a title.
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Old 05-19-2022, 05:04 PM   #154
Willy
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Has someone suggested poisons, preferable slow working ones?

Another similar trick may be "donate" the food with some dirty trick who would run havoc on the worms intestines, sharp barbed splinters, hidden in chunks of meat, or wolfsangeln, some plants in fact a lot have cells who upon digestion set free really nasty and sharp structures.
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Old 05-19-2022, 06:50 PM   #155
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

The math doesn't favor poison, you would need an absurd amount.
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Old 05-19-2022, 07:27 PM   #156
Willy
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
The math doesn't favor poison, you would need an absurd amount.
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.

A bit math by my side tells me that I would need less than 27 grams green per 1000kg. Not to mention that some tricks to refine the poison are even known at low TLs. Most of this poisons show effect after a couple of hours, so a lethal dose can be taken over the course of a few snacks.

That is an absurd amount - for a human. But even a 5000 ton leviatan, can be killed with no more than 137kg plant material. Compared to the amount it will need to eat daily, it is absolutely in the possible range. The monster will have to eat whole cattle herds ! Especially if some of that poisons stay in the body for a long time and enrich themself with every fresh meal.

Concerning the needed food for the monster to keep alive, it is just to big to feed enough to stay alive, it may be a good midterm technique to drive away anything that it can eat or burn possible food.
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Old 05-19-2022, 08:42 PM   #157
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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? .
An online "volume of a cylinder" callculator

https://www.omnicalculator.com/math/cylinder-volume

....makes this beast a little over 15000 cubic feet in volume which you multiply by 63 to get weight or 472.5 tons. It's a very thin cylinder though it would be equivalent to a snake 6 feet long and 2 inches thick scaled up by a factor of 50x.
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Old 05-20-2022, 07:16 AM   #158
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

Turin Turambar killed Glaurung by climbing a narrow ravine and stabbing it in the belly as it crossed overhead.

The traditional way to kill a worm is with spiked armour. I listed three dragon slayers in Low-Tech Companion 2 who wore spiked armour: Lord More of More Hall, Sir Peter Loschy, and Sir John Lambton.
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Old 05-20-2022, 08:34 AM   #159
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

This one seems a little big for the old spiked armor trick. It's more like, as Phil said, the Persian spiked carriage trick, but it's also not dumb
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Old 05-20-2022, 10:08 AM   #160
Willy
 
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Default Re: Military Stratedgies against a 300 Foot Snake/Worm

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
An online "volume of a cylinder" callculator

https://www.omnicalculator.com/math/cylinder-volume

....makes this beast a little over 15000 cubic feet in volume which you multiply by 63 to get weight or 472.5 tons. It's a very thin cylinder though it would be equivalent to a snake 6 feet long and 2 inches thick scaled up by a factor of 50x.
Thank you very much, I wasn´t aware of the length to diameter ratio of that beast.

OK 472,5 metric tons multiplied with 27grams per ton of poison. Makes 12,76 kg roundet up of poison.

If the beast even only feeds 1% of his mass daily, not to mention it has to drink, it needs 4,725 tons of food -daily! The poison needed to kill it is a neglible percentage of his food, in weight and volume.

Even served in one meal it wouldn´t stick out without a made perception / poison role.

May I suggest the following trap, arrange everything in a way that someone wanted to give a big feast. Several lambs, ox, and other big meat chunks, prepared for the roasting spit, gutted oiled, salted and spiced including being
spiked with bacon, greens and all that. The large camp fire and music will lure it to the scene. Than the folks start running away, leaving a lot of stuff behind have some guards defending the retreat. That should do the trick.
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