D&D 5E Custom Final boss

MonsterEnvy · Jul 22, 2019

For the final boss in a campaign, I decided I wanted it to be like a big multi stage RPG boss fight with quite a few parts to it. Wanted to also get some feedback on the design and how it's presented.

The villain of the game is Holloway the lich and he has spent a good chunk of the game making the players hate him and his minions. They have defeated him once before, but it was only a temporary victory due to his phylactery. The final battle against him is of course going to be more climatic. Namely because he has gained access to to a powerful divinely created construct called the Engine of Destruction.

Holloway Phase 1: Holloway the Lich.

Holloway starts off as a pretty standard lich, his main difference is having a tiny bit more hp, and his staff of meteors which he uses to pelt the party with Minute Meteors and if he gets desperate a Meteor Swarm.

Holloway Phase 2: Holloway the Engine of Destruction

After his defeat like normal his soul goes to his phylactery, however he has planted it inside the core of the Engine of Destruction, along with the special rituals he has cast in advance his destruction allows his soul to enter the Engine and control it. The Engine being a massive golemish constructs with stupidly powerful abilities. This phase serves as the meat of the boss fight. It consists of the Main Engine and it's two arms. Needing to be defeated before it fully activates and starts destroying everything.

There are also two pillars in the Room that supply energy to the Engine, each healing it for 50 HP. So those pillars need to be destroyed.

Holloway Phase 3: Holloway Possesed Core.

The final phase is just to see if they can destroy Holloway and the core. A Clockwork Orb with a spectral Skeleton face and two spectral clawed arms sticking out of it. It's weaker then the previous forms, but the players should be running on fumes at this point.

Destroying Holloway Core destroys the Engine and Holloways's Phylactery ending his thread once and for all.

Any additional Ideas or feedback?

Blue · Jul 22, 2019

I like how there's other objectives besides just "hit it!' in the second phase due to the pillars. I'd actually make them rather resistant to just the "beat on them" and make them require cleverness to shut down, be it specific skills like disintegrate, religion / arcana checks to determine where to attack to have attacks worthwhile, or whatever. You're in a massive 3-part battle, you need to mix it up.

The second part also has some build in minions in the arms. I'd suggest for the first part some more traditional minions, because 5e doesn't do well with solos and having minions plus the legendary actions should cede the action-economy advantage to the players from the start.

While at the final part there is the (we hope) running on fumes, the players have just experienced effectively two back-to-back large combats and I think it would do well to mix it up again. Maybe they need to stop the core from escaping, or the Engine will explode (with an obvious countdown) and the Core wants revenge and is trying to prevent them. Or whatever - I'd make the win condition something besides just a beat down, though I would take advantage of the running on fumes to ensure that a beat down needs to be part of it.

dave2008 · Jul 22, 2019

In general I like the idea. The villain is defeated, then powered up, then defeated, and then weakened. I would make sure to describe those states clearly, otherwise it might seem like a drag. As describe it works as a success, then an OH sh**!, and then success!, and then - he's still kicking, let's finish him off! I think that can work well.

Question: do the arms need to be defeated? Or can they take it down by destroying the engine and then the core?

If they don't have to fight the arms I feel they will be able to focus fire on the engine and take it out pretty quick.

I don't really care for disintegration wave: no save instant death doesn't work well IMO. It shouldn't come into play, but then why have it? Personally I would give it a save and a set amount of damage.

MonsterEnvy · Jul 22, 2019

dave2008 said:
In general I like the idea. The villain is defeated, then powered up, then defeated, and then weakened. I would make sure to describe those states clearly, otherwise it might seem like a drag. As describe it works as a success, then an OH sh**!, and then success!, and then - he's still kicking, let's finish him off! I think that can work well.

Question: do the arms need to be defeated? Or can they take it down by destroying the engine and then the core?

If they don't have to fight the arms I feel they will be able to focus fire on the engine and take it out pretty quick.

I don't really care for disintegration wave: no save instant death doesn't work well IMO. It shouldn't come into play, but then why have it? Personally I would give it a save and a set amount of damage.

The Arms don't need to be defeated. But the Pillars supply healing to the Engine, meaning it's hard to take it down right away, this means that the Arms are annoying extra sources of damage.

The Wave could probably be changed yeah, thinking about it. I viewed it as a sort of a timer, where it needs to be defeated before it activates.

Thanks for the advice.

Stalker0 · Jul 22, 2019

So I don’t know your parties level but I’ll assume pretty high stats.

1) phase 1 - complete cake walk. The lich has low ac and hp for that level, and no real defensive spells. He might last a round.

2) phase 2 - now we are talking. The engine gives him much needed durability. I think the d wave is overkill, what i would do instead is an antimagic wave that dispels the party’s buff. That creates some nice tension going into the last fight. But the pillars are a nice touch.

3) phase 3 - you have a really really scary opener (the howl), but after that it’s a wet blanket. The flight may be it’s strongest feature as it attempts to get away. I would tone down the howl a bit and buff everything else. The orbs are a cool touch, I think they need a bit more damage.

Now my party are murder machines...I honestly think at 9th level they would try to take this on and would probably win..they are just nuts. So note that with my feedback. But high level, you have to get nuts to make an impact, and it’s the final fight, so don’t hold anything back!

MonsterEnvy · Jul 22, 2019

Forgot to mention the first phase does have minions. Two Wight Lords, a renamed version of this statblock.

Also I have changed up Holloway Core a bit. Namely in that Howl is now Death Throes a last effort to take his enemies with him while Death Orb is now his primary attack.

Stalker0 · Jul 23, 2019

MonsterEnvy said:
Forgot to mention the first phase does have minions. Two Wight Lords, a renamed version of this statblock.
View attachment 107666

Also I have changed up Holloway Core a bit. Namely in that Howl is now Death Throes a last effort to take his enemies with him while Death Orb is now his primary attack.

View attachment 107667

The minions help out a bit I agree. Especially that life drain, that is a scary power to start the party with, as that will effect the party for the rest of the fight (I approve!).

On the howl, the problem here is....dropping the party to 0 hp doesn't really do anything mechanics wise. The chance of this actually causing a player death is almost non-existant. What you could do is add an ongoing effect. Drop to 0 hp and take X necrotic damage every round, can make Con save X to stop. Anytime they take damage its an auto death save fail, so suddenly you have something with bite. It looks pretty scary, but on the other hand if you have any players up after the howl (which you should with high level characters), they can start stabilizing the party and such...so it creates a lot of tension but is unlikely to kill. OR...give the guy one final quick resurrection (the last gasp of his phylactery). He does the howl and comes back with 1 hp. The party doesn't know, so they are terrified...some of them are down for the count and suddenly the guy is back! But....one final attack and his down, so more of a scare than a true combatant.

For the core, I would switch up the orb as the legendary action instead of the paralyzing touch. That is the "special attack" for this fight, the party has seen the paralyzing touch before. So I would leave the touch for his special on his turn attack, and instead you get a lot of orbs flying around that can keep the party busy. That will give them a lot of incentive to finish the guy quickly, before they are overwhelmed with orbs everywhere.

One last thing you could do is lower the core's HP but give it resistance ALL (including from magic weapons). Even though the math is mostly the same...players often freak out when they are dealing half damage, it makes the monster seem so much stronger, even if on paper's its not.

Stalker0 · Jul 23, 2019

Something else to consider. You gave the lich plane shift. Do you intend to use it? You have this planned as the final fight, but if he's got plane shift, he should try to use it to escape, unless you have a good plot reason that he wouldn't do that.

MonsterEnvy · Jul 23, 2019

Stalker0 said:
On the howl, the problem here is....dropping the party to 0 hp doesn't really do anything mechanics wise. The chance of this actually causing a player death is almost non-existant. What you could do is add an ongoing effect. Drop to 0 hp and take X necrotic damage every round, can make Con save X to stop. Anytime they take damage its an auto death save fail, so suddenly you have something with bite. It looks pretty scary, but on the other hand if you have any players up after the howl (which you should with high level characters), they can start stabilizing the party and such...so it creates a lot of tension but is unlikely to kill. OR...give the guy one final quick resurrection (the last gasp of his phylactery). He does the howl and comes back with 1 hp. The party doesn't know, so they are terrified...some of them are down for the count and suddenly the guy is back! But....one final attack and his down, so more of a scare than a true combatant.

It is supposed to just be a scare.

Stalker0 said:
Something else to consider. You gave the lich plane shift. Do you intend to use it? You have this planned as the final fight, but if he's got plane shift, he should try to use it to escape, unless you have a good plot reason that he wouldn't do that.

I did not change out all of the Lich's spells, but he would not be using it on himself this fight as escape is the last thing on his mind.