March 8 hours, not all day. Any longer and they have problems. And yes, by RAW there is no training required to all fire when the commander says fire. As for questioning orders, that's morale checks. Moral checks are boosted by anything that helps on saves against fear, such as Marshal auras, Bolstering Voice, and Bardic Music... which is exactly what's boosting that whole army.
Well wights march all day long. They can move triple what you move. Easy outmaneuvering right there.
Nope, cover and concealment don't apply to Volley Fire. Line of Effect is for spells. Anything less than a roof over their heads has no effect. See Complete Warrior.
Cover and concealment are for the wights to hide. Living army won't fire if they don't know there's wights there.
You were talking about a giant horde sized army. And even he doesn't have to see anything... if anyone can tell him where to fire, all he has to do is target the spot.
Just because it's horde doesn't mean they're foolishly clumped in a giant ball. And unless you're blindly firing at every terrain feature, well, you won't know when to fire untill you're being fired at.
Or, you know, I could just hold a town/city/border this way. Armies of level 1 Commoners are militia defenders, not strike forces. Not to mention the Infested With Chickens flaw is available to a Commoner 1 and can feed an army... so really it's only water and arrows/bolts that are needed.
Since when is chicken-infested official published material? It was an 1st of April joke last time I checked.
And even if it was serious, the number of implications it creates (no more starvation for anyone, ecosystem destruction from endless chickens)... Well, my side will just make that knowledge check, get a candle of invocation and go to town.
Surprise round is for skirmishes, not army battles. This is army battles we're talking about here. The guys who are there to prevent giant ambushes aren't the full army groups... it's the scouts and elite types with proper class levels and things.
Who said we're playing by your custom army rules (as there's no official army movement/start of engagement rules last time I checked)? They're all still individuals, with their own skills and checks and vulnerable to attacks. You don't have an "army organization pause screen" where you can safely let your troops rest and organize them.
And heck, by all means send your scouts alone, they'll make fine additions to the wight army.
The Crusaders were for Bolstering Voice... it's morale, so no go.
You're still relying on an army of PCs to cover up for your NPC army.
Really, I don't even need the lv 1 wizard anymore. One holy arrow and some experts with diplomacy are enough to start the chain. You just keep throwing more and more lv 1 pcs, in wich case you would be off better training spellcasters and start some serious cooperative spellcasting.
Wights start out hostile to living things they want to eat. How is a low level expert going to have enough diplomacy to do anything?
Like I already said, carry the bodies to a cell before they turn into wights. Lock cell. Talk to wight. Profit with Aid another.
Seriously? You think 6 kobolds are going to raze your kingdom, but a giant army of self replicating wights is just fine once you have a few level 1 experts chat with them for a time? Kobolds aren't exactly known for being able to summon huge hordes. Wights... well it's called the wightocolypse for a reason.
The 6 kobolds alone of course not, but once they warn their thousands of brothers, hell yes. There's a reason they're considered one of the staple horde races.
It's nothing but level 1 characters, the vast majority of which being NPCs. The total backup for these guys is 7 bards (1 with Masterwork War Drums, one with regular War Drums, and 5 Dragonfire Inspiration with Masterwork War Drums), as well as one Marshal or Crusader for every 100 or so troopers, one spotter of undetermined class (preferably decent BAB and Int, but even that isn't too critical since he's targeting an AC of 5), and whoever's actually commanding the army. You call that an army of PCs backing them up?
Yes, because you forgot to include the 1000 PCs you would need to watch over your NPC army from all sides while they rest and somehow out-scout the wights wich have plain superior stats.
And then multiple armies of those, as you need to cover your whole borders, as one single lone wight slipping trough to a village will unleash hell.
Also, read Races of the Dragon. Kobolds aren't cruel sadists who would kill and barbecue everyone. They mostly want to be left alone to mine and accumulate gold and gems. If you make a deal with them like "give us a few bards to train in our army and we'll use that army to help protect your mining claims in X region from all outsiders, plus throw some extra gems your way" they'll be quite happy. They only hate everyone who dares take their stuff.
What you just described sounds awfully like dwarfs. That fluff was clearly made by a kobold fanboy (nevermind all the crunch goodies it give them), and clearly contradicts many other sources of D&D fluff, including the core MM itself that puts them as evil and suicide-charging gnomes on sight.
Yeah, you really should read up on Kobolds in Races of the Dragon before saying stuff like this. You've got Kobolds all wrong... and wights too.
I override your random supplement fluff with the core fluff. You were the one who insisted so much in DMG seting after all, not Races of the Dragon seting.
The Wights will eat you even if you manage to roll a 20 on that low level Expert's Diplomacy check (remember, Diplomacy makes them like you at best... and it's a DC 35 check just to make a hostile predator creature treat you as anything other than a potential snack).
Aid another. That's why you're using multiple experts silly.
Because you don't know that you can build them. If you can get a bunch of them, go for it. If not... then what? I'll buy "I get a few warforged for some elite units" but not "I can always get an army's worth of them."
So you're all fine with "kobolds are actually ugly LG dwarves" fluff from a random biased supplement, but you automatically discard the multiple warforged armies that show up right on one of the most popular and detailed campaign settings of all times?
Just take a look!
[spoiler]
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Hundreds of warforged as far as the eye can see! A full legion of them holding the line! And that was just for some nameless border skirmish!
Of course, just one Commoner with Infested with Chickens at level 1 can indeed feed an army, so there's that possible solution.
Ignoring for a moment that the wight army can level-drain chickens (with the level-drain rules, not with the actual wight spawn ability that only works on humanoids) to create an unending horde of wights that will blot out the sun from their capital, or all the other better shenigans you can pull out with chicken-infested, and ignoring that the feat isn't really legal anyway... Your army still needs to drink water. And again wights can afford to poison every source.