5E: Fifth Edition Monsters Inspired by Third Edition Sources

[Casimir Liber]

Ok -I'll make it High Thrall of Pazuzu. Yes was just thinking of more powerful warlock-type and at this point no immediate plans for different classes (hadn't thought of this but will muse on it) - happy yo aim for CR 14 Anzu.

 

[Cleon]

Ok -I'll make it High Thrall of Pazuzu. Yes was just thinking of more powerful warlock-type and at this point no immediate plans for different classes (hadn't thought of this but will muse on it)

Eh? The one we just finished was more a sorcerer-type spellcaster. It doesn't have any invocations like eldritch blast.

If we did go for an eldritch-blasting approach we could call it a Thrall of Pazuzu Warlock.

happy yo aim for CR 14 Anzu.

Works for me, but that can wait until we've finished the Powerful Pal of Pazuzu.*

* That was not a serious suggestion for the name.

 

[Casimir Liber]

Blargh - ignore my misuse of spellcaster appellations!

Ok so did also think of "Thrall-exalted" as a name (exalted meaning high)...or just high thrall

(the wings are supposed to be improved but "improved wings" sounds lame..."mighty/great/demoniac/unholy..?"

xxx Wings of Pazuzu. The high thrall has grown a pair of great black raven wings; this gift from Pazuzu grants it the power of improved flight; a flying speed of 50 ft. (60 ft.?) and ....? flyby (move out of melee range without invoking an opportunity attack?

 

[Cleon]

Blargh - ignore my misuse of spellcaster appellations!

Ok so did also think of "Thrall-exalted" as a name (exalted meaning high)...or just high thrall

Exalted is good. Shall we use that?

(the wings are supposed to be improved but "improved wings" sounds lame..."mighty/great/demoniac/unholy..?"

xxx Wings of Pazuzu. The high thrall has grown a pair of great black raven wings; this gift from Pazuzu grants it the power of improved flight; a flying speed of 50 ft. (60 ft.?) and ....? flyby (move out of melee range without invoking an opportunity attack?

We don't really need to specify the fly speed in the trait, since the standard thrall's Wings of Pazuzu doesn't include that detail. It's simpler just listing its fly speed in its Speed line.

I would give it a flight speed of 60 ft. (hover) though, since the original's improved flight included perfect aerial maneuverability.

If you want it to fly out of melee without provoking opportunity hits I'd just give it standard Flyby like a Pteranodon has. If it's buried in the middle of a flying movement trait it'd be easy to forget it in the heat of an Encounter. It's a lot clearer keeping action-related special traits like that separate, i.e.:

Flyby. The exalted thrall of pazuzu doesn't provoke an opportunity attack when it flies out of an enemy's reach.​

Personally I wouldn't bother. The 3E prestige class didn't get Flyby Attack as a bonus feat.

 

[Casimir Liber]

all sounds good and incorporated

 

[Cleon]

all sounds good and incorporated

Okay, I'll update the "Voice of Pazuzu" to get this Exalted Thrall of Pazuzu train off the road…

Here's some initial brainstorming that came up with while I was updating the above.

The exalted thrall is a proficient spellcaster, so instead of the Fiendish Blessing you proposed in the Anointed Rough Draft I'd simply add mage armor to her spells and include that in her Armor Class, i.e.:

Armor Class 12, 15 with mage armor
​

If you like the AC 16 of the rough draft, I'd bump the DEX up to 16 or 17, which'll also increase the rapier and dagger attacks' effectiveness, e.g.:

Armor Class 13, 16 with mage armor
DEX 16 (+3)
​

Indeed, I'd like the DEX and CHA to have the same ability modifier, because that means her magical attacks and her weapon attacks will have the same numbers which makes the Challenge Rating calculations a bit sounder.

Also, if her spells are Charisma-based, shouldn't the Spellcasting say "sorcerer spells" instead of "wizard spells prepared"?

What did the regular Thrall use again…

Spellcasting. The thrall is a 4th-level spellcaster. Its spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 12, +4 to hit with spell attacks). It has the following spells prepared.
​

…Oh, I dodged the issue by not mentioning a class.

Clever of me, or just lazy? No one gets to decide!

Indeed, we'd have to do something like that because the base thrall has a jumble of spells from different classes pick-and-mixed as we like. For example, shield of faith is a spell on the cleric and paladin lists, it's not a wizard or sorcerer spell.

 

[Cleon]

Okay, Abilities.

The regular Thrall has two odd and four even (Str 11, Dex 14, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 13, Cha 14), so I'm tempted to invert that for the Exalted Thrall and give it four odd and two even.

Maybe Str 11, Dex 16, Con 15, Int 13, Wis 15, Cha 16?

For Saving Throws, I'm dithering between the CON, CHA proficiency of a Sorcerer and the WIS, CHA of a Warlock.

Maybe combine the two into CON, WIS, CHA?

However, if it ends up with Flyby that implies aerial agility, so maybe DEX, WIS, CHA instead?

 

[Casimir Liber]

going with DEX, WIS, CHA as it makes more sense thematically. Ditched class adjective for spells as suggested. Have gone with ability scores as suggested. I can't italicise "mage armor" if I write ", 16 with mage armor" in appending text to AC annoyingly

 

[Cleon]

going with DEX, WIS, CHA as it makes more sense thematically. Ditched class adjective for spells as suggested. Have gone with ability scores as suggested. I can't italicise "mage armor" if I write ", 16 with mage armor" in appending text to AC annoyingly

We'll just have to make do with it unitalicized.

Checking the SRD, it used parentheses for the armour-boosting spell of the NPC Druid so I'll changed the Enworld working draft to "Armor Class 13 (16 with mage armor)" accordingly.

 

[Cleon]

Next up is Hit Points.

Your rough draft is a 10 Hit Dice creature, but that's fewer HD than the original monster would have.

A creature must be 6th level or higher to meet the Thrall of Pazuzu Requirements. To qualify requires 9 ranks in Bluff and Diplomacy, and the max ranks a 3E creature can put in a skill is HD+3.

That means a 10th-level thrall of pazuzu must have at least 16 HD in 3E; ten from the thrall prestige class plus six or more from whatever class levels it had beforehand.

So how many Hit Dice do you fancy for the Exalted Thrall?

The Anointed rough draft's maths is also wrong. It has "Hit Points 96 (10d8 + 16)" but (a) (10d8 + 16) is 61 hit points not 96, and (b) it has CON 15 (+2) so the bonus HP should be twice as many as its HD, suggesting (10d8 + 20) for 65 hit points or possibly (8d8 + 16) for 52 hp.

If it's supposed to have 96 hp, the best fit to the target is (15d8 + 30), which comes to 97 hit points.

Perhaps make it a nice even sixteen HD, for Hit Points 104 (16d8 + 32)?