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I'm wondering if anyone has ever developed a D&D game that let's you command an entire army and use them? I'm looking for alternative ways to use my 40K army.

There are quite a few modern day / sci-fi games systems out there - why do you want D+D if you are using 40K?

 Mr Morden wrote:
There are quite a few modern day / sci-fi games systems out there - why do you want D+D if you are using 40K?

Because I like the systems and flexibility better than 40k?

I've played RPG sessions that took place in the middle of a large battle.

There are probably over a dozen rulesets that would do what you want that have released since the 80s. It will take some googling and research. I know D&D had at least two mass battle supplements that let you command armies.

the birthright campaign setting for D&D 2nd edition and battlesystem rulesets (skirmish as well)

What do you think 40K, WHFB, AoS, and other wargames are? D&D evolved from wargames (D&Ds direct inspiration was a wargame called Chainmail, look it up) - basically dudes were playing historical wargames set in medieval europe and wanted to fight the fantasy battles they read about in lord of the rings and conan, etc. so they created a fantasy expansion for the game and started playing that, but then the guys wanted to focus on individual characters instead of whole armies for that fellowship of the ring type experience, and thus D&D was born.

There are certain abstractions that have to be allowed for in a wargame - the amount of detail and complexity found in D&D is not conducive to commanding an army of minis, you would spend the better part of a day just playing out a single turn of an average 40k sized game if you tried.

chaos0xomega wrote:
There are certain abstractions that have to be allowed for in a wargame - the amount of detail and complexity found in D&D is not conducive to commanding an army of minis, you would spend the better part of a day just playing out a single turn of an average 40k sized game if you tried.

You could probably simplify a lot of D&D rules to make them better suited for a wargame without too much abstraction. Most NPCs don't have special attacks so it shouldn't be too much trouble if all the models in a squad have the same stats and you're not playing with much more than 100 models.
-Mass roll all attacks of a single squad at the same time. Gonna need a lot of D20s. Different colored D20s are good for mixed squads.
-Models with multiattack roll once for all attacks, all hit or all miss.
-Reroll hits or misses when attacking with advantage or disadvantage (for speed of play, no rerolling hits with advantage to try to get crits).
-Squads have a HP pool. Remove models as HP depletes.
-Hits use the average damage listed in the unit's attack. Example: 10(2D6+2). Crits deal double damage.
-Splash attacks like Fireball hit once but deal double damage. Only if you're worried about it being too powerful.
-Simplify some abilities like the Knight's Leadership or Bless, change the +D4 bonus to +2 so you aren't rolling too much.
-Player Characters and other special models don't use the above rules if they choose not to.

Could even let your troops level up. They'd do it differently to player characters. Take the Guard and the Veteran NPCs. I can easily see the Veteran as being a high level guard since they're built so similarly. Looks like NPCs get about 1 ability score each level plus multiattack. Throw in some minor feats if you want, to make them better crossbowmen, cavalry, tougher, etc. Just make sure those feats don't complicate matters when you're rolling handfuls of D20s.

Pretty sure the D&D version was called Battle Syatems, but I think the basic D&D Masters (Black box or possibly Companions in the teal box) rule books also had abbreviated rules. It was for high level characters that owned keeps, towers, etc. and had small armies of troops.

The problem is that any RPG, or part of an RPG, that's centered around commanding armies is going to use a lot of abstraction, so it's not going to make any real use of your 40k models.

Maybe instead what you're looking for is a set of wargames rules with better customization, or campaign elements that causes your troops to vary over time?

One of the simplest means is to have one model represent 10. Or 5, or 37, whatever scale works for you.

In abstract, each attack = 10 attacks. Each damage = 10 damage.

Special leaders or upgrades can be represented as another level, or feat, ability, etc.

Add a wizard to a block of troops? Multi-class!

Points system = challenge rating.

 lolman1c wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:
There are quite a few modern day / sci-fi games systems out there - why do you want D+D if you are using 40K?

Because I like the systems and flexibility better than 40k?

It was more why a fantasy system rather than a sci-fi system - there are loads of both.

Which 40k army is it?

Frostgrave comes to mind, just adjust the starting gold for a warband to the size of battle you want to play.

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Battlesystem was the official rules for 1st ed. AD&D. It is long out of print, so good luck with that.

DriveThruRPG has a number of different rule sets ... one might suit your needs.

Pathfinder had a warfare and kingdom building system that was pretty comprehensive.

Strongholds and Followers has basic warfare rules, and the follow on Kingdoms and Warfare will go more advanced.

All of these rules sets are way more abstracted than 40K, with "units" rather than models being the smallest playable items.

 lolman1c wrote:
I'm wondering if anyone has ever developed a D&D game that let's you command an entire army and use them? I'm looking for alternative ways to use my 40K army.

There were two versions of BattleSystem: 1e AD&D rules based, mass battles game; and 2e AD&D rules based, mass battles game. In 2e, they also created BattleSystem Skirmish: RPG lite, with extremely fast combat, can be used to replace the RPG combat system, making combat fast, and deadly.

I've read Chainmail, Swords & Sorcery (0e D&D based mass battles rules), and 1e BS. I've played 2e BS since 1993, along with 2e BS Skirmimshes. There is a progression from complex, to more simplified and elegant, from Chainmail to 2e BS, with 2e BS being the best, IMO.

In 2e BS, there are rules for adapting pretty much anything to the game, creating stat's for them. This includes monsters, and battle platforms. In the 2e AD&D RPG book, Book of Artifacts, it details what was a 1e artifact that was actually a Mech, for use in 2e BS games: the Mighty Servant of Leuk-O!

In 2e BS, one figure represents 10 men/creatures, except for large creatures, such as Dragons, or Giants, which are individual creatures. It has heroes, but it is NOT Hero-Hammer. I find 2e BS to be a very versatile game system, which is open-ended. I have made up my own stats for various units, using the rules largely as presented. I've run many a game using this rules system, with great satisfaction and enjoyment. You can buy a PDF copy for $4.99, at DriveThruRPG.com. I liked the rules so much that I spent the hours, and the money, to convert the PDF into a format that Lulu.com would print in a hardcover book for me. I even created an Index for the book -- unfortunately, I forgot to add that to the PDF before I uploaded it to Lulu! The hardcover copy is only for me, but others can do the work to make their own version to print through Lulu, if they desire. Cheers!