Tell me about your bandits, Veeky Forums. What to do with them, what not to do with them. Memorable encounters, things that made them stand out, all that.
I want to make an encounter that'll challenge my players without really cranking up the health and damage on your standard brigand.
bump for interest
They're all gross weirdos who can't exist in society.
Obvious deformities, hilarious sexual depravity, vary from the gleefully deranged to the bleakly depressed; imagine if you gave a gang of iron-age frogposters from /pol/ swords and horses.
They molest livestock, steal whiskey and make general nuisances of themselves until they're killed by a roaming band of adventurers.
I consider this approach to approximate a form of warped realism.
They are mercenary companies that either are unpaid or underworked.
Alternatively they are groups of criminals that join together out of necessity
Bandit groups require two things to be more than just a group of thugs committing robberies: they need to have legitimate weapons and they need to be organized. For these reasons bandits historically came in the form of foreign raiders a la the Vikings or were organized by the local lords during times of peace.
Titles during the middle ages was passed between generations regardless of wealth, so it wasn't totally uncommon for nobles to be as poor as the peasants they were ruling over. Much of the economy for high-borns and the warrior class revolved around the plunder you'd find during war time raids, so during peace times when the nobility was not called to arms at the King's behest they would raid their own villages. This crime often went entirely unpunished - because who the fuck would defend a peasant against a lord - and gave birth to the phrase "fur collar crime" as nobles wore animal furs around their collar to distinguish their status.
Often I see DMs miss out on the opportunity to give bandits depth past their mere existence. Bandits aren't just roving wild animals that will attack the party, they're sentient people who have purpose and goals. If the party runs into a bandit ambush in the woods there should exist a reason as to why those bandits were there in the first place whether they were an early scouting party for an invasion force, hoping to find resources for their encampment, or there is a local noble or their child accompanying the bandit party hoping to find some loot for their castle.
Ours were led by a noble, the Paladin redeemed them did all the stuff and convinced them to be a force for good. After we left, I slipped a message to the DM asking if my tribe could capture them and sacrifice them to our heathen gods, we got almost all of them with a couple geting away.
Consider it a job well-done.
Yes, in many places there were more titles than land, and a lot of the titles were low/petty nobility. You could easily end up with more obligations and nuisance than you could really afford. Hence the Robber Baron shenanigans, general shit heeled raiding of neighbors you didn't like, and being some of the most consistently game nobles for royal employment and campaigns. (Richer nobles had better things to do or found it more of an option than a necessity. They didn't HAVE to seek their fortune, they already had it.)
The other major class of bandit or troublemaker in many cases was out of work soldiers drifting between terms of employment with this or that noble in "legitimate" warfare. They were essentially treated as bandits by the other side if they got caught, and they acted very similarly when they were actually working for someone as they might otherwise given the opportunity, but were considered accountable if the Boss said it wasn't ok to pillage the town.
As discussed, these guys naturally had real weapons, and experience, and in most cases, were highly organized. A lot of the mercenary companies that formed during the 14th century and onwards in the 100 years war certainly were, as were the assorted Condottieri in Italy (which included some of those companies because the work was in Italy and they found their way there.)
Otherwise your garden variety outlaw was an outcast or marginal person, or maybe just hungry and desperate even if in normal times, they were better mannered. Many are the people then and now that given the opportunity, will crack a stranger or just plain easy target over the back of the head with a stick and rifle their pockets, or shoot them in the back.
If you were going any distance, you went armed as best you could, and in numbers, to fend off people like that. Everyone was at least somewhat ready to help, even if it was just throwing rocks. Peasants are good with rocks. rocks HURT.
>iron-age frogposters from /pol/ swords and horses.
change to 1980s equipped slavaboos from /k/
Swear to god, Veeky Forums is like /k/ lite these last couple of days.
Well, I'll take that as a welcome change from shitposting/r9k/ lite it's been for the past month or so.
> live in a world where absolute power lies with a spellcasting magocracy.
> not being a bandit.
>Not being a disgraced mage
>Not being kicked out the College for improper use of Bigby's Fist
>Not head-butting the Grand-Vizer on your dismissal.
>Not wenching it up with whores, booze and cutthroats
>Fuck the College Towers
Pic related, what my next mage will be like
Everyone can use a little magi/k/ in their life.
They may not be /k/ommandos yet, but they can be made /k/onscripts!
First encounter I DM'd for one of my groups.
>players are escorting a barge going downriver with trade goods and other cargo
>going from a city to a sizeable trading town, but there's not much in between
>recent reports of bandits
>players have lowered their guard, are gambling and joking around on deck
>barge rounds a river bend
>THUNK
>grappling hook flies out of the reeds and embeds itself in the wooden deck
>THUNK
>THUNK
>THUNK
>players turn around and see the barge captain's boy servant has an arrow in his throat, blood pouring onto the deck
>o shit
>grappling hooks begin to pull the barge into the river bank and run it aground
>bandits start jumping out of the reeds onto the deck
>fairly easy mooks, players are one-two shotting them without taking much damage
>encourage them to kill the enemies in creative ways
>ranger starts grappling a guy and they fall into the river for underwater combat
>give them a steady stream of easy mooks to kill in fun ways while slowly whittling down their HP
>vivid descriptions of blood and the water mixing on deck, slippery conditions, ropes entangling players and the cargo
>one of the mooks sounds a horn before getting killed
>a few turns later, a canoe appears being rowed by some bandits, in it is an XBOXHUGE boss
>boss lands on barge and is beating the shit out of party
>party is bravely trying to survive
>party hears screams coming from the riverbank
>party is nervous
>paladin NPC hitherto unknown to the party leaps over the river on his horse and onto the barge, wades into the fray
>horse-bro is fighting bandits too
>some of the party knocked to 0 HP, just a few of them and the paladin left
>XBOXHUGE boss kills horse-bro, cleaving both his front legs off with an axe
>party is enraged at injustice towards horse-bro
>MAXIMUM OVERRAGE
>fights boss to his knees
>oh thank god it's over
>IT'S NOT OVER
>boss rises to his feet and proceeds to beat the living shit out of the party with one of horse-bro's severed legs
>TPK
Man, I love the artwork for Darkest Dungeon.
The meaning is off, "чики бpики и в дaмкe" is closer to "easy peasy, lemon squeezy"
GM approved.
Fuck yeah, call me Begie
The image is really fucking old if I recall so yeah.
Bump for the bump gods
Criminals on the run from the law, murderhobos, corrupt nobles and soldiers who are suffering from a run of bad luck. They range any where from laughably incompetent to insanely dangerous.
i would have left the moment the paladin arrived
/k/ loves Veeky Forums never forget this
CLANK
They're a pathetic lot. They're the kinda guy that was either expelled from school for being incredibly stupid or held back for years due to sheer laziness and willful ignorance. Guffawing, mumbling scumbags that refuse to change their nasty ways.
Quilted hoodies that hang to the knees are their go-to; there's a big pouch on the front with a cover flap that holds their necessities. Metal coins are sewn into the quilting for added protection but that doesn't stop the bandits from sleeping in them. Underneath the hoodie? Briefs, probably. For footwear they go with foot wrappings and clogs for bad weather/terrain.
All of them carry a knife, along with several darts. If they intend to swarm a settlement, they take up machetes and clubs. The only animals that they can get their hands on are the rare fighting dog or a stolen pig if they're lucky.
The rare leader that arises is the tallest and definitely the most focused. Too bad their life goals involve sex, drugs, and bullying everyone shorter than them.
Because /k/ is the best board