History OneManArmy / TabletopGames

*** And then there is Grimgor Ironhide, who lives for war. In 6th edition he gave combat resolution simply for being in combat. So if you did nothing and your enemy did nothing, the side with Grimgor would win.

** Ordinary citizens use the "commoner" class which has levels just like PCs, except those levels don't ''do'' a whole lot. Still, a commoner can easily be level 5 and have around 17 HP. Unlucky (and first-level) commoners can have one or two HP, and no attack can do less than one HP... and a housecat got three attacks per round, meaning that cats can easily kill some of the commoners. Lampshaded terrifically in [[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0780.html this]] [[Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick Order of the Stick]] webcomic.

** Why has nobody mentioned Sly Marbo yet? Other Warhammer 40,000 characters may fit this trope, but Marbo explicitly has nothing else to his character BUT this trope! He even has an in-game rule which takes the name of this trope. Marbo is, of course, a thinly-veiled homage to every 80s action film hero and FPS character ever seen. He even looks suspiciously like Arnie.

* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' sourcebooks generally describe the "ordinary citizen" as being a Level 1 Commoner or Expert (depending on if they're a peasant farmer or a skilled tradesman), and even soldiers aren't supposed to be much higher than Level 3 or 4 Warriors. This means that a properly equipped Level 20 PC is generally able to wipe out entire metropolises by himself.
** Considering that an ordinary citizen has maybe one or two HP, and no attack can do less than one HP... and a housecat got three attacks per round, there was a good chance that a group of strays could take out a town. Lampshaded terrifically in [[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0780.html this]] [[Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick Order of the Stick]] webcomic.

** In ''TabletopGame/Necromunda'', troops that would be mere CannonFodder in the main game (like Imperial Guardsmen and Eldar Guardians) are able to [[CurbStompBattle cut through underhive gangers like shit through a goose]]. And don't even get us started on Astartes or Aspect Warriors.

* ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' sourcebooks generally describe the "ordinary citizen" as being a Level 1 Commoner or Expert (depending on if they're a peasant farmer or a skilled tradesman), and even soldiers aren't supposed to be much higher than Level 3 or 4 Warriors. This means that a properly equipped Level 20 PC is generally able to wipe out entire metropolises by himself.
** Considering that an ordinary citizen has maybe one or two HP, and no attack can do less than one HP... and a housecat got three attacks per round, there was a good chance that a group of strays could take out a town. Lampshaded terrifically in [[http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0780.html this]] [[Webcomic/TheOrderOfTheStick Order of the Stick]] webcomic.
*** A warforged (magic robot) crusader could literally do this all day. If the population of a planet of commoners engaged him and he took the cleave feat chain and perhaps had a good movement speed he could seriously keep fighting until they all died. With the right maneuvers and or feats it could do this without equipment.
** ''TabletopGame/{{Eberron}}'' went out of its way to emphasise this point, stating that by the time the party reaches 5th level they've already overcome more than your standard city guard will face in a lifetime.
** In First and Second Edition it may have been even worse: Non-classed humans (and halflings) were considered less than 1 Hit Die creatures. The warrior classes (Fighter, Paladin, and Ranger) had the "Sweep Attack" that could be used against up to the character's level in foes of less than 1 Hit Die ''per round''. At level 20, that basically meant that the expectation against a mob of level 0 foes would be 19 kills per round (#20 would be the automatic miss on a roll of 1).
** Once ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' introduced mass combat, entire ''armies'' can be leveled by a single high-level characters. An army's power is determined by its soldier's average Hit Dice or Challenge Rating, with a 100-man troop being the norm and a single creature taking a -8 penalty to its power. However, in addition to Hit Dice, several other abilities (such as spellcasting, possessing masterwork or magical gear, channeling energy or having a mount) can give huge boosts, to the point a level 10 PC could easily take on an army of regular soldiers with minimal risk.
* ''TabletopGame/{{Nobilis}}'' are certainly capable of embodying this trope, considering the characters are literal gods. One of the higher level miracles (but certainly not out of reach for any Noble) gives the actual example 'fight your way through an army alone, one by one'. However, Nobilis prefer to manipulate things from behind the scenes, and feel that if things give over to full-scale combat, everyone has already lost.
** [[BadassAdorable Rook]] [[CuteBruiser Catchfly]] is a case in point; at Aspect 4, she's spelled out as being strong enough to beat the crap out of the entire United States Marine Corps.
** Leaving aside game mechanics, the fluff tends to keep this more-or-less limited to high-level spellcasters, who have a tendency to be able to wipe out entire armies of mooks with a single spell.

* In ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'', while any character who's even vaguely combat-focused is likely to be this, high-Essence Solars can learn a charm called In Doubt of Legions Spirit, which lets them fight entire armies single handedly at no disadvantage whatsoever.
** Indeed, for Exalted players, the entire trope gets condensed into a single word; Dawn. Dusk would be a close runner up, if they weren't more accurately described by the term 'One Man Apocalypse'.
*** The Infernal equivalent, Slayers, are just as devastating. Admittedly, their combat technique is less "I hit lots of people with my sword" and more "[[PersonOfMassDestruction I can project this radioactive hell-field that's so nasty a combat-specced Solar's best option when caught in it is to RUN!]]"
** The Big Boss of the aforementioned Slayers, Malfeas, is an even bigger OneManArmy (emphasis on '''big'''). One of his souls, Ligier, counts as an army ''just by himself'', and Malfeas has a lot of souls. Slayers' hell-field pales compared to Ligier, for he is the green sun of Hell. Stat-wise, he can fight the [[TopGod Unconquered Sun]] by his lonesome, something he's been aching to do for millennia.
** In what we've heard of the third edition, the [[BadassNormal Legion of Silence]] are hard enough that one Legionnaire versus 100 bandits leads to a CurbStompBattle in which the Legionnaire only suffers a minor wound during the brawl.
* In ''TabletopGame/{{Scion}}'' you play as the child of a god, imbued with some of their power. If you focus on things like strength and stamina, it's very likely that you could slaughter scores of normal people single-handed. And by the time you've advanced to demi-god status you officially count as a PersonOfMassDestruction.
* In ''TabletopGame/StrikeLegion'', this is the end result of the Star Republic's Legion Process, which turns a small number of suitable candidates into nearly unstoppable {{Super Soldier}}s. Aside from grating a dramatically reduced aging process and making the Legionaire virtually immune to disease and poison, it also makes the Legionaire superhumanly fast and stronger, tougher, smarter, and able to [[RealityWarper break reality]]. ''Then'' the Republic gives the Legionaires access to hyper-advanced weapons and equipment, PoweredArmor, [[HumongousMecha battle frames]], and a [[CoolStarship Strike Cruiser]], all of which are able to lay waste to entire armies of their counterparts on the Imperial side. This is all so that the Legion can [[WeDoTheImpossible carry out impossible missions]] that the regular military can't. On the opposite side, the Imperium produces their own OneManArmy troops, some of which can match the Legion in direct combat.
* In ''Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Strategy Battle Game'', a number of heroes - most notably Aragorn and [[BigBad Sauron]] - are more than capable of cruising through a staggering number of opponents. One memorable battle report in ''Magazine/WhiteDwarf'' had the entire Good army slain or fleeing except Aragorn, leading to him strolling through the remnants of the Evil force, batting off the troops and shrugging off a direct sorcerous attack from a Ringwraith, and reaching the objective by himself, limiting the Evil side to only a minor victory.
* The "Exalted" mechanic in ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'' encourages this. Each creature with "Exalted" grants a +1/+1 bonus to an attacking creature if it attacks alone. Buffed by the prayers of others, even a lowly normal human soldier can become strong enough to slay the mightiest monsters.
* Mark Harrigan from ''TabletopGame/ArkhamHorror'' has "One Man Army" as his ability. What does it do? He can't be delayed or arrested. Ever. He also has a flamethrower in his starting equipment.
* In the ''Europa'' series of World War II board games, one piece represents Hans Rudel (see OneManArmy/RealLife) and his Stuka. The typical unit in these games is a division, with regiments and brigades of supporting units, while air units represent 50-60 planes. Rudel first appeared in ''Drang Nach Osten/Unentscheiden'' (1973), and then was relegated to an optional rule (though the piece was still included) in the revision, ''Fire in the East/Scorched Earth'' (1984, 1987). Rudel can take out a Soviet tank brigade of 60-plus tanks all by himself with a favorable die roll; other types of units, and larger tank formations, are immune. In game terms, he is immortal: he cannot be shot down, and if his airfield is captured he reappears the next turn, two weeks later.
* The recreation of Achilles in ''TabletopGame/{{Infinity}}'' could be roughly described as [[AMechByAnyOtherName a TAG's]] worth of battlefield impact squeezed down to the size of a man.
* The title characters of Sine Nomine's ''TabletopGame/{{Godbound}}'' are all terrifyingly powerful, to the point where the fray die lets them slaughter {{mooks}} without even taking their actions, but ones with the Sword and/or Bow Words are the ones who most resemble ''armies'' as opposed to elemental forces. A Bow Godbound who commits Effort to power both Rain of Sorrow and Bolt of Invincible Skill can slaughter entire mobs of enemies in a single devastating hail of arrows, and this doesn't even take their entire starting Gift allotment; a similar level of devastation can come from a Sword Godbound with Cutting the Crimson Road and Unerring Blade.
-->'''Kevin Crawford:''' [[https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?773601-Sine-Nomine-Godbound&p=20262887#post20262887 Bow Gods specialised in army-killing do it Real Fast.]]
* In ''TabletopGame/{{BattleTech}}'', Kai Allard-Liao qualifies. Piloting a 50-ton 'Mech when their are many twice his size, he destroys an entire army of Jade Falcon warriors, some of the best warriors in the galaxy, by himself. His last act in the setting, done in his 80s, was slaughtering every single Capellan Confederation unit he could find, with his 'Mech being left standing in respect for him after his death.

** Kharn the Betrayer. He once shattered two entire legions of Chaos Space Marines by himself, in one night. [[OmnicidalManiac Shame one of those legions was his own, really.]] [[MemeticMutation Heck of a guy, that Kharn]]. He even has a kill-counter in his helmet, 5,000 victims in a single battle is average for him. And the n there's the fact that Khorne can bring him back if killed...

In ''TabletopGame/{{BattleTech}}'', Kai Allard-Liao qualifies. Piloting a 50-ton 'Mech when their are many twice his size, he destroys an entire army of Jade Falcon warriors, some of the best warriors in the galaxy, by himself. His last act in the setting, done in his 80s, was slaughtering every single Capellan Confederation unit he could find, with his 'Mech being left standing in respect for him after his death.

* The title characters of Sine Nomine's ''Godbound'' are all terrifyingly powerful, to the point where the fray die lets them slaughter {{mooks}} without even taking their actions, but ones with the Sword and/or Bow Words are the ones who most resemble ''armies'' as opposed to elemental forces. A Bow Godbound who commits Effort to power both Rain of Sorrow and Bolt of Invincible Skill can slaughter entire mobs of enemies in a single devastating hail of arrows, and this doesn't even take their entire starting Gift allotment; a similar level of devastation can come from a Sword Godbound with Cutting the Crimson Road and Unerring Blade.

** The Eldar Harlequins. Using a variety of exotic and powerful wargear in conjunction with their incredible (even by Eldar standards) agility and grace, they kick just as much ass as the Grey Knights.

** Sanguinius, the ''Primarch'' of the Blood Angels, [[YouShallNotPass stood alone at the gates of the Eternal Palace]] during the Horus Heresy and held off ''the entire forces of Chaos Undivided'' single-handedly in a titanic battle that lasted for hours. To prove this isn't ConservationOfNinjutsu, when their commanding Bloodthirster Ka'Bhanda challenged him, Sanguinius literally picked him up and ''broke him in half''.

** All of the primarchs were incredibly powerful, even by the standards of 40K, but Sanguinius of the [[Literature/BloodAngels Blood Angels]] manages to stand out. Why? Because it was him alone who stood at the Eternity Gate during the Siege of Terra against Horus' entire legion of Chaos Space Marines. It is widely accepted that if Horus didn't eventually pull his legion back, he wouldn't have even had a legion left after Sanguinius was through with them.

** Marneus Calgar, chapter master of the Ultramarines, held a [[YouShallNotPass breach against Orks]] for a [[BadAss day and a night]], alone.

** The Grey Knights live, breath, and have exterminated daemons from this trope. They're the only group %100 immune to the Chaos, probably by eliminating the weak. They can devastate entire armies with just a few of them, and there's only about 1000 of them total. They're too small (by comparison) to be a BadassArmy, but they qualify for BadAss Platoon easy!