Black Flag Tales of the Valiant Monster Vault Marilith Preview

[Reynard]

Not a fan of the Demonic Resilience trait. It’s easier for the GM if you can quickly check all relevant resistances and immunities at a glance. With Demonic Resilience your eyes first go to the trait, then down to the trait description. Also, it’s a very defensive creature and honestly comes across more like a devil than a demonic spirit of killing incarnate.

I’d love to see the marilith’s damage profile shifted to an offensive parry or counter attack. A reaction to being hit or missed by a melee attack that deals damage to the attacker. High level 5e is so hp bloated that a mostly defensive marilith only exacerbates the issue.

I have been thinking about this and in the end I think it makes sense with them making the marilith a commander/boss instead of an elite trooper. You want your boss to last long enough to buff the vrocks or whatever she's sending against the PCs.

 

[Shardstone]

I'll agree to disagree with you on the first part.

But I am curious about your last sentence. Would you like to elaborate?

In combat sports, and in actual combat tactics, an intelligent offence includes using parries and counters in order to ensure you don't take too much damage; this is because taking damage actually lowers your damage output. While D&D doesn't mechanically represent this, in an effort to tie fiction to mechanics, any hyper-competent warrior needs to be able to parry or decrease incoming damage. Failure to do so without the ability to reduce damage ala a Berserker's rage is basically fighting as unintelligent as possible. Any demon that's a warlord, like the Marilith in this example is, should be able to defend itself in order to keep up delivering damage. Otherwise, it is no different then a frothing demon with little in the way of wits.

 

[I'm A Banana]

One of the benefits of the 5E version is that it makes seven attacks: six with its longswords and one with its tail. So as the DM, I can quickly see, 'okay, +9 to hit, 13 damage'. I just repeat that six times. Boring, but easy to remember.

With the ToV version, it has two dagger attacks (9 piercing 7 fire), two mace attacks (11 bludgeoning 7 fire), and two longsword attacks (13 slashing 7 fire). So as a DM, I have three different sets of damage numbers that don't differ all that much. Why? I don't feel like the juice is worth the squeeze. It feels like an unnecessary complication of the statblock. It's also still boring, just now it's harder to remember.

The Bonus Actions are cool, and the extra reactions are nice (assuming you remember that this specific creature has five extra reactions to use, which maybe I'm dumb but I will almost assuredly forget).

The different weapons struck me as clunky, too. I'm already rolling 5-6 attacks, don't give me four different calcs!

I like the addition of a command action, but I'd like it even better if it was more demonic. Demons don't follow orders. They don't do tactics like mortals do. The marilith should be pushing them to destroy, to damage, to sacrifice themselves in a ball of fury. Like, what if the movement had to be toward an enemy, and instead of advantage on an attack, she granted them extra damage, or the ability to hurl creatures they damaged, or just an aura of fire (that could also damage the fiend she granted it to, why not?), or some sort of barbarian rage effect? It's currently just sort of a generic commander ability, but we could probably make it evoke the vibe of a bloody DEMON GENERAL, yeah? You could play with the idea that the marilith is a pretty savvy operator by doing things like granting invisibility or flight or some temp hp or something that the front line brutes wouldn't think of, but which she knows will be more devastating.

The teleport change is pretty good. Gives it something to do with a bonus action and keeps that D&D demon vibe.

The fire damage seems...fine? Like, not exciting, but sure.

Not a fan of looking in two different places for immunities and resistances.

Reactive strikes me as actively worse than the 5e version, which lets the marilith do OA's as well as parries.

Y'know, mixed bag. I'm on board with them playing up the distinguishing characteristics of the monsters, but also, don't give me a generic commander ability, give me something that only the commander of a hoard of entropy-reveling forces of destruction and carnage would do!

 

[Shardstone]

The different weapons struck me as clunky, too. I'm already rolling 5-6 attacks, don't give me four different calcs!

I like the addition of a command action, but I'd like it even better if it was more demonic. Demons don't follow orders. They don't do tactics like mortals do. The marilith should be pushing them to destroy, to damage, to sacrifice themselves in a ball of fury. Like, what if the movement had to be toward an enemy, and instead of advantage on an attack, she granted them extra damage, or the ability to hurl creatures they damaged, or just an aura of fire (that could also damage the fiend she granted it to, why not?), or some sort of barbarian rage effect? It's currently just sort of a generic commander ability, but we could probably make it evoke the vibe of a bloody DEMON GENERAL, yeah? You could play with the idea that the marilith is a pretty savvy operator by doing things like granting invisibility or flight or some temp hp or something that the front line brutes wouldn't think of, but which she knows will be more devastating.

The teleport change is pretty good. Gives it something to do with a bonus action and keeps that D&D demon vibe.

The fire damage seems...fine? Like, not exciting, but sure.

Not a fan of looking in two different places for immunities and resistances.

Reactive strikes me as actively worse than the 5e version, which lets the marilith do OA's as well as parries.

Y'know, mixed bag. I'm on board with them playing up the distinguishing characteristics of the monsters, but also, don't give me a generic commander ability, give me something that only the commander of a hoard of entropy-reveling forces of destruction and carnage would do!

I'm just saying, if the Marilith just pushed people to kill themselves in a balls of fury, they wouldn't be famed warlords etc or hired by kings for advice. They would instead just be really boring stock demons, since every other demon is the same way. I like the idea of a more demonic command though, but I think making the explicitly called-out warlord demon into a chaotic stupid berserker is the opposite of what should happen here.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I'm just saying, if the Marilith just pushed people to kill themselves in a balls of fury, they wouldn't be famed warlords etc or hired by kings for advice. They would instead just be really boring stock demons, since every other demon is the same way. I like the idea of a more demonic command though, but I think making the explicitly called-out warlord demon into a chaotic stupid berserker is the opposite of what should happen here.

Yeah, I don't think she should make herself a chaotic stupid berserker.

I think she should make the chaotic stupid berserkers in her employ more "effective." And I imagine effective, to a demon, is destructive. Even to their allies. A demon general doesn't want to minimize casualties to accomplish their goal - their goal is usually just to maximize casualties as an end in and of itself. She's happiest when no one but her is left standing. Whatever kills more people, or torments more souls, or causes more property damage. Mariliths are smart enough to deploy their big brutes in such a way that the death toll falls mostly on the hospitals and orphanages and the civilians.

So, I do like the idea of things that make her brutes more mobile, more able to get behind the front lines to whatever these fools thought they were defending. In addition to things like a corrosive acid that adds damage and also damages her allies because the suffering of her horde is one of her most effective resources. It should suck to be in a marilith's horde, though it should suck in such a way that you at least get to revel in the moaning of your enemies before the Abyss calls you back.

 

[Shardstone]

Yeah, I don't think she should make herself a chaotic stupid berserker.

I think she should make the chaotic stupid berserkers in her employ more "effective." And I imagine effective, to a demon, is destructive. Even to their allies. A demon general doesn't want to minimize casualties to accomplish their goal - their goal is usually just to maximize casualties as an end in and of itself. She's happiest when no one but her is left standing. Whatever kills more people, or torments more souls, or causes more property damage. Mariliths are smart enough to deploy their big brutes in such a way that the death toll falls mostly on the hospitals and orphanages and the civilians.

So, I do like the idea of things that make her brutes more mobile, more able to get behind the front lines to whatever these fools thought they were defending. In addition to things like a corrosive acid that adds damage and also damages her allies because the suffering of her horde is one of her most effective resources. It should suck to be in a marilith's horde, though it should suck in such a way that you at least get to revel in the moaning of your enemies before the Abyss calls you back.

I like it! I also like the idea of the Marilith maybe "downloading" visceral knowledge into those she commands. Maybe the people she commands know exactly where to hit the target to leave a gnarly wound, or exactly what to destroy to shatter the enemy's morale. You could also play off the "demon madness" ideas from the Abyss and have the Marilith's commands turn the army into more demonic, more psychopathic killing machines that eventually turn on the king, etc.

 

[Zaukrie]

Yeah, I don't think she should make herself a chaotic stupid berserker.

I think she should make the chaotic stupid berserkers in her employ more "effective." And I imagine effective, to a demon, is destructive. Even to their allies. A demon general doesn't want to minimize casualties to accomplish their goal - their goal is usually just to maximize casualties as an end in and of itself. She's happiest when no one but her is left standing. Whatever kills more people, or torments more souls, or causes more property damage. Mariliths are smart enough to deploy their big brutes in such a way that the death toll falls mostly on the hospitals and orphanages and the civilians.

So, I do like the idea of things that make her brutes more mobile, more able to get behind the front lines to whatever these fools thought they were defending. In addition to things like a corrosive acid that adds damage and also damages her allies because the suffering of her horde is one of her most effective resources. It should suck to be in a marilith's horde, though it should suck in such a way that you at least get to revel in the moaning of your enemies before the Abyss calls you back.

I guess the idea that every demon fits your fiction is the issue here......it's clear this one has a different fiction/role.

 

[Reynard]

I guess the idea that every demon fits your fiction is the issue here......it's clear this one has a different fiction/role.

If all demons (or whatever) act the same, it is very difficult to produce interesting adventures with them as regular antagonists without things getting stale.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I like it! I also like the idea of the Marilith maybe "downloading" visceral knowledge into those she commands. Maybe the people she commands know exactly where to hit the target to leave a gnarly wound, or exactly what to destroy to shatter the enemy's morale. You could also play off the "demon madness" ideas from the Abyss and have the Marilith's commands turn the army into more demonic, more psychopathic killing machines that eventually turn on the king, etc.

I love the idea of working psychic damage or fear or some betrayal-charm effects. Turning the well-ordered army into a screaming mess of terrified backstabbers is exactly the kind of thing that would make a marilith smug.

This also lets you differentiate her (and demons in general) from the diabolic generals out there, who probably want to march in formation and guard their troops and worry about "training." When you summon a marilith to advise you on your army, you gotta know you're dealing with someone for whom the idea of an "army" is just inherently hilarious. You call in this demon when you want a terror campaign, when you have a horde of berserkers or crazed cultists that you need someone intelligent to manipulate in a way that is cruel and calculated and you don't really care what happens to your troops as much. Get a pit fiend if you want training and discipline. Get a marilith if you want to maximize the pointless horror.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I guess the idea that every demon fits your fiction is the issue here......it's clear this one has a different fiction/role.

I mean, it's just "typical D&D demon vibes."

The tactics action as written is a good idea, but pretty generic - any warlord-esque character could have abilities like that. If they want to lean into the monster's unique place in the game, lean away from generic. Give me demon general. Give me something no other monster or NPC can do.

Not every demon acts the same. Mariliths, for instance, are clever generals. Graz'zt is famously a manipulator and a corruptor. Demogorgon is insane and fishy. But, demons overall are creatures of chaos and evil, of entropy and hopelessness and destruction. "Remember your training" and "protect yourself" and "march" aren't hitting that vibe, really. These are not things I would imagine a demon general saying.